This year is the first year in a long time that Minnesota has had a Budget deficit, and it's a whopper- Almost 5 Billion dollars. :O The last 5 or so years, we'd been having budget surpluses, of a billion dollars or more, and the legislature has been giving a lot of it back, and then they went and started cutting taxes, and now they cut themselves off at the knees. Personally, I'd have rather seen the state keep the surplus for a rainy day like this, as I knew I wasn't getting any money back anyway, so I didn't really care one way or the other.
Now projects like the Northstar corridor (MN's first ligt rail), and may other projects that need to be funded are on the verge of getting cut, and the schools are going to get a big hit again too, I think. Jesse Ventura fought and fought to hang on to that money, he really did, and there was just an overwhelming majority to give it back... He really wasn't a bad governor, just a little more eccentric than most people thought a state governor should be.
I kind of wish that Arne Carlson had run for governor this year, to retake the spot he lost from Jesse, but he didn't... He was governor for 12 years, or 16, I think, before Jesse, and he had his **** together, and he did a lot of great things for MN. Oh well... Maybe, if I continue living in MN, I'LL run for governor, and be as crazy as 'ol Jesse.
