2024 Legislative Session: Omnibus Bills Compared
As we enter the second half of the legislative session, the scope of education policy priorities for the Governor and DFL leaders is becoming clearer. MREA has developed a spreadsheet that shows a side-by-side comparison of what the House and Senate Omnibus Education Policy bills have in them. When looking at the spreadsheet the items in red are the same or similar in both the House and the Senate. The items on the bottom that are in black have significant differences.
View the comparison spreadsheet.
Typically, when bills are the same or similar in both the house and the senate, they have a greater chance of getting included in the final conference committee report that is sent back for final passage in the House and Senate. Provisions that are brought by one body only are either negotiated, traded for other provisions between the various players or they simply fall onto the cutting room floor and are left behind. A conference committee between the House and Senate will come together to sort out the details. The Governor and his agency commissioners play a significant role in this process as the Governor ultimately signs or vetoes the bills put on his desk by the legislature.
The scope of Education Policy could evolve somewhat when the House debates their bill on the floor, but the MREA comparison spreadsheet is a good snapshot at this time of where the legislature is putting their policy priorities for this session. The supplemental budget target for education this year is $43M for this biennium and $18M in the tails. This is a very low target, and we should expect that most of this money will go to one-time funding needs. The supplemental budget bill will likely be unveiled the week of April 15, and the fiscal deadline where bills that have revenue consequences need to be out of committees is April 19.
