MinnPost: Months after Annunciation shooting, Minnesota lawmakers are not close on school safety legislation

We already knew the Legislature would not pass significant gun control legislation following the Annunciation school shooting. Less clear is if Republicans and DFLers might hammer out a school safety package sans gun restrictions to show Annunciation parents, ‘Hey, at least we did something.’

On Tuesday, lawmakers in the split House gave their answer for now: No, there will not be a bipartisan school safety bill. 

Rep. Bryan Lawrence, R-Princeton, introduced a bill to the House Education Finance Committee that would put $102 million toward school safety proposals and was dead before the committee even met. 

“This proposal by my Republican colleagues isn’t serious,” the committee’s DFL co-chair Cheryl Youakim of Hopkins declared in a press release an hour before the panel met. “It does absolutely nothing about guns in our schools or communities.”

In the most predictable vote in the history of votes, the committee reached a 12-12 deadlock on advancing Lawrence’s measure with every Republican saying ‘aye’ and each Democrat uttering ‘nay.’

Youakim said that she would bring forth a DFL school safety proposal before the committee Thursday. 

Guess how committee members will vote on that. 

Lawrence’s measure included money for not just school districts but charters, tribal compact and private schools currently cut off from some aid programs, a key issue for Republicans. 

“This works to create a safe, educational learning environment for all students,” Lawrence said at a news conference prior to the committee. “And I’m going to repeat that part of it, all students in the state of Minnesota.”

(The Catholic Conference, which Annunciation is part of, supports such a measure. The lobbying group has also advocated for an assault weapons ban.) 

Its spending items include $50 million for one-time school facility grants. 

Read the full story at MinnPost.