WKBT La Crosse, WI-NewsChannel 8-Minnesota Looks Forward with State Budget

Minnesota Looks Forward with State Budget

Individual states are expected to get billions of dollars in federal aid from the stimulus package.

Tuesday, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlently paid a visit to Winona today to speak about the state budget with community leaders.

In addition, U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar met with healthcare leaders in the southeast portion of the state to take a proactive approach to a healthcare reform.

Both Minnesota politicians want to relay the message that governments, both at the state and local levels will need to tighten their belts while still funding key priorities.

Despite the near $5 billion budget deficit Minnesota faces, Gov. Tim Pawlenty explained it's important to plan for the future.

He did so by breaking apart his priority-based budget for the state.

"Some things are getting an increase, like K-12 schools and maintaining our commitments to veterans and National Guard and also state public safety programs while other things are getting held flat or reduced. But, it's important to set priorities and my budget reflects that," said Pawlenty.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar's visit to the region addressed how Minnesota and Wisconsin serve as a teacher in quality, affordable healthcare for the rest of the county.

"If some of the other parts of the county used the protocol that the Mayo Clinic does in the last four years of a patient's life, we could save 50 billion dollars every four years in medicare spending in this country," said Klobuchar.

The new Gundersen Lutheran clinic in La Crescent is a good example of why clinics are important in smaller communities.

"As our elderly become dependent on healthcare it's nice to have that as a resource right in the community. A number of people come in here on a daily basis for their blood checks and everything without having to go somewhere else, and that's a very positive thing," said Mike Poellinger, La Crescent Mayor.

However, in continuing to serve as an example, one challenge facing La Crescent is the short pay in money occurring at the state level.

"Our budgets are already set and the state relies on us to stick within those budgets, but then when they pay us short we don't have the mechanisms to make that up so then it affects services that we can provide," said Poellinger.