Last week, Dayton Administration officials announced a shutdown website sponsored by the Minnesota Department of Management and Budget. The website is intended to be able to answer frequently asked questions. For example:

Question – If a budget agreement isn’t reached, do agencies have the authority to continue spending after July 1st?

Answer – No. The Constitution requires appropriations before spending occurs. Without an enacted budget, the Courts will have to determine what limited activities might have to continue.

Priority One and Two Critical Services concerning life, health, safety and personal custodial activities will likely continue to operate based on direction from earlier court orders. Support services that are both directly related to priority critical services and that are absolutely necessary for the continuation of these priority critical services could also continue to operate.

As a reminder, since the 2011 legislative session ended without a balanced budget, state government is set to shut down on July 1, 2011 unless a budget is agreed upon prior to July 1.

Minnesota has experienced one government shutdown in our state’s history, and it was only a partial shutdown. In 2005, lawmakers had failed to approve appropriations bills for three budget areas: K-12 education, health and human services, and transportation. As a result, starting on July 1, only critical life, health, safety and personal custodial functions in these three budget areas could be continued (as well as any related functions that were absolutely necessary to carry out those core operations). Ultimately, the partial shutdown lasted eight days.

In 2005, defining what counted as critical was a decision left to the courts. A special master was appointed to hear petitions and determine which state functions could continue until the necessary appropriations bills were passed. It is not certain that this process will be repeated if a stalemate leads to a government shutdown in 2011, but it’s likely that some process will determine what services are essential, and the one established in 2005 could provide a foundation for this process.

A few activities are automatically exempted from a shutdown. If an activity is funded from a source other than the state’s general fund (such as federal funding or fees), those activities are not affected by the state government shutdown. Most of the activities in the state’s K-12 education budget are funded by an open appropriation, so they were not impacted by the 2005 shutdown, even though no K-12 budget was in place.

Care Providers of Minnesota is actively talking to lawmakers to ensure that our priorities are maintained in the final budget deal. We are also exploring legal strategies in the event that there is not a budget deal by July 1.

If you have questions, please contact Toby Pearson at tpearson@careproviders.org, or Heidi Holste at hholste@careproviders.org.

Heidi Holste
952.851.2482
hholste@careproviders.org