Capitol Review: Divorce Education, Tattoo Regulation and Commissions for Real Estate Agents

Editor's note: Capitol Review is a weekly look at what your state legislators are doing at the Minnesota Capitol—how they're voting, the bills they're writing and the issues they're getting behind. Come back to Burnsville Patch every week for a new Capitol Review.

Have a look at what Burnsville legislators have been doing recently:

Senator Dan D. Hall (R-District 40) of Burnsville
Email: sen.dan.hall@senate.mn
Phone: 651-296-5975

Senator Hall was elected in 2010 and is serving his first term in office. He is the vice chair of the Environment and Natural Resources Committee. He also serves on the committees for Health and Human Service and Judiciary Public Safety.

Authored a bill on a mandatory dissolution of marriage education program (SF1161 / HF1135)

The bill requires divorcing couples to participate in a four-hour marriage dissolution education program in cases involving minor children. The program can be completed online or in person and is aimed at reducing parental conflict and improving the children’s adjustment in dissolution of marriage situations. 

An application for dissolution of marriage will not be considered complete unless accompanied by a certificate stating the party has completed said program. A judge or referee presiding over a dissolution of marriage can order parents to attend additional educational programs if he/she deems it necessary for the safety of the children.

The bill was introduced and referred to the Judiciary and Public Safety Committee on April 11.

Authored a bill regulating body art technicians (SF1134)

The bill requires body art technicians to apply for a license for each skill they practice. The applicant must have completed at least 200 hours of supervised training AND coursework approved by the commissioner on bloodborne pathogens, the prevention of disease transmission, infection control and aseptic techniques.

The bill also states that infectious waste and sharps must be managed and disposed of by an approved infectious waste hauler at a site permitted to accept the waste. It requires sharps ready for disposal to be disposed of in an approved sharps container.

The bill was introduced and referred to the Health and Human Services Committee on April 11.  

Co-authored a bill on dues check-off (SF1146)

The bill requires all public employees to provide a written request for dues check-off for contributions to foundations, political action committees, or publications.

Dues check-off is the automatic deduction of union dues from employees’ paychecks. The bill was introduced and referred to the State Government Innovation and Veterans Committee on April 11.   

State Rep. Pam Myhra (R-District 40A) of Burnsville
Email: rep.pam.myhra@house.mn
Phone: 651-296-9895

Representative Myhra is a retired CPA and teacher. She serves on the committees for Capital Investment, Education Finance, Education Reform and Taxes.

Representative Myhra neither authored nor co-authored any bills between April 5 and April 11.

Elsewhere in the legislature:

According to the Minnesota House of Representatives’ bipartisan Public Information Services, Rep. Joe Hoppe (R-Chaska) and Sen. Chris Gerlach (R-Apple Valley) have sponsored a bill that will allow real estate agents to charge an additional fee for giving their “broker price opinion.”

A broker price opinion is not the same as an official appraisal, it is a market-value analysis of a property’s likely selling price. It is usually considered part of the package of services included in the real estate agent’s commission.

The bill (HF323 / SF167) was approved 131-0 by the House on April 4. The fee charged does not apply to a typical home seller or buyer, but to third parties interested in obtaining price opinions, such as banks handling foreclosed properties.  

In other news, the House Veterans Services Division approved a bill (HF1327) on April 4 that requires the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) to give qualifying small-business owners who are veterans contracts for state-funded construction projects.

The bill is sponsored by Rep. Bruce Anderson (R-Buffalo Township) and would allow local governments to implement a similar bid preference program for veteran-owned small businesses.

In both state and local government projects, up to 6 percent of the bid amount could be subtracted from the veteran-owned bid for purposes of determining which company is the low bidder.

If the veteran-owned contractor became the low bidder under this formula, the contractor would still receive the full bid amount, including the percentage that had been deducted for determining the low bidder.