March 24, 2026 · Labor · 7,819 words · 11 speakers · 152 segments
The Senate Labor Committee will come to order. Senator McEwen is online today, so I am filling in as chair. We have two bills on the agenda. We're going to start with Senator Johnson Stewart, Senate File 1714. Welcome to the committee, Senator Johnson Stewart.
Well, thank you, Mr. Chair and Committee members. Good to see everybody. Let me know. Is it okay?
Just go ahead.
All right.
Senate File 1714 relates to public contracts payment transparency requirements. So thank you for hearing this bill. It's an important bill for Minnesota and for the construction industry for two reasons. First, it increases payment transparency on public construction projects. And secondly, when subcontractors are not being paid, Senate file 1714 will give them the information they need to enforce the prompt, the Prompt Payment Act. As a reminder, some of you knew me back the first time I served. I used to own a construction or a consulting company that mostly did subcontracting work. And so the provisions of this bill are very important for me as a former business owner, I want to briefly highlight all the work that's gone into this. First off, I have three Republican authors, and Senator McEwen is my Democratic co author. So we have bipartisan support not only in this body, but in the House as well. I also, frankly, want to thank Senator Rarick, one of my co authors here, as well as Senator McEwen. Sixteen trade associations support the bill, and that list is included in your packet. Over the last year, both private industry and public owners have come together to bring more payment transparency to public construction projects. We've held three large stakeholder meetings with 20 to 30 participating, representing public owners, contractors and industry groups, and there has been significant work outside those meetings as well. I do have the A7amendment, which I would offer.
Senator Pappas moves the A7amendment, and this is not technically an author's amendment because it's been through other committees already.
Correct.
So you want to speak to the amendment?
Yes. It reflects several rounds of significant changes and compromise. Again, with the amendment, the bill has changed substantially since introduction, and the subcontracting community has repeatedly made meaningful concessions to make compliance workable for public contractors and owners. With the A7, we are deleting two meaningful provisions that would have prevented protected a subcontractor's right to submit timely invoices. And while it's not being addressed today, many stakeholders have committed to working over the interim, and we look forward to resolving that next session. So, Senator Marty, do you want me to keep going or do you want
to move that Senator Rarek wants to speak to the amendment?
Certainly.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I'm just wondering, we can understand which specific groups were asking for this change. I guess adopting this amendment makes it really hard for me to even want to accept this bill. And I would strongly consider taking my name off the bill if this amendment goes on. Because too many times we make concessions to people trying to say we're going to try to make everything, everybody happy. But at times we need to be able to look people in the eye and say, what you're asking for is too much and it's time to say, no, what we're asking for is common sense and is the right thing. And I don't. Maybe this is an author's amendment, but, Mr. Chair, I just think this amendment is the wrong thing. I think the bill in its original form is what we should be going after.
This. That's Senator Rehric. It's not an author's amendment. It's an amendment the author was asking us to put on it. But we are discussing it and so on. Senator Johnson Stewart on that.
Yeah. Thank you, Mr.
Chair.
And Senator Rarick, you and I come from a similar experience of serving as a subcon. Oops, sorry. That's my alarm to get here. We come from a similar experience. I did attend the stakeholder meetings. And one of the stakeholder meetings specifically resulted in several conversations I had with DNR and some of the other state agencies who explained to me that some of the original provisions of the bill were extremely cost prohibitive for them to get done quickly. Now, I hear you, and I mean, I realize we all are. Not all of us, but many of us are running for reelection. And I hope to be back here in the fall where I have pledged my commitment to the subcontractor group that we will continue to work on. This saw from that stakeholder meeting was an opportunity. So, members, for those of you not familiar with this issue, one of the challenges many subcontractors have, including myself, so I'm just going to speak for myself right now, is getting paid from those general contractors who have the contract with a public agency. So, for example, if I were to work on a MnDOT project, my contract would not be with MnDOT, it would be with the general or a different consultant that actually did have the contract. And what I found and what other subs have found is that if payment was at all delayed and we wanted to, there are provisions that require subs to get paid within a certain amount of time. And that number is escaping me. But there is a provision that on public contracts, when a General is paid. The sub must be paid within X number of days. We as a. I'm saying we as my company. Again, I'm not speaking for everyone, but Senator Rarick, you may have had a similar situation. We would have times where we wouldn't get paid for months, sometimes hundreds of days. And our only line of communication was to the General. And certainly most of the generals that we worked for are excellent business people and would pay us as soon as they were paid. But if we didn't have the information that we were wanting, the current law does not allow us to call the holder of the contract, so MnDOT, for example, because they can't give us that information because we're not on the contract. So this is a first step. And Senator Rarick, I hear you. I understand. And there is more work to be done. What I told the subs is we are going to get this done now, which opens them up to at least the communication and finding out if a contractor has been paid. And then I promise we're going to work on this more and we're going to address some of the issues around invoicing, invoicing, software invoicing processes. But in the interest of the deadline coming up, we are just frankly compromising. But I also think this is an important compromise. If I still own my business, if this goes through and this bill gets passed, I would be able to call MnDOT or DNR or Department of Administration and ask directly. Actually, our provision requires written notice, but I would be able to write them and ask specifically, has company X been paid? If they've been paid, then legally they're required to pay me, whereas before they, frankly, even if there was just one, there were generals who are holding the money and not paying. So it's. I hear you, I understand. And I actually hope that you and I can work on it next session if we both get reelected. Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I appreciate that response. Again, especially, I mean, if this had been an author's amendment, our custom is to pass it. I would have. Being it is not, I'm going to be opposed to this amendment. We've worked on this a number of years. Back when I was in the other body is when we capped retainage at 5% because many contractors and groups were trying to push that to 10%. You know, we heard the stories from so many contractors, especially our early inns, how you're having 10% of your contract held up for months and months, if not years. A great example was Fradalone, who did the demolition at the old Metrodome and they had 10% of their contract withheld until U.S. bank Stadium opened up. That was two and a half years later. It was clear they were done the moment they started the new construction. So capping that at 5% and then a couple years later we got a trigger date put in place. But like I said, what we're getting at here too is there's a pay when paid clause that says within 10 days a subcontractor must be paid if the contractor above them has been paid. But how do you know that unless you can get information from their contract who they're contracted under if that payment has been made or not? But what we're also seeing in this part that's being taken out in section two and section three is you may get that notification, but it's becoming more and more difficult for getting your invoices submitted. I have a company that even though state statute says, you know this, 10 days pay when paid, they were demanding that I make an agreement that I'd go to 120 day terms, which I that was before I came here. I was unwilling to work for that company anymore. Now I would believe that is actually unlawful in the state of Minnesota to even ask someone to do that. But what we're taking out here is this idea that they will be able to, okay, I'm going to get that information. But if my invoice doesn't get turned in now, it's going to be delayed potentially another 30 days because of how they operate their system. And so I'm still delayed out further than I really should be because they will not accept my invoice. That's what I believe we're taking out with this amendment. And I think that is wrong. It is not a concession that we should be making. And I'll be voting no on this amendment.
Other comments on the amendment I'm kind of watching this from knowing the disputes between contractors, subcontractors and everybody and was thrilled everybody was on board with everything. And now I see it may not be. Is there any other comments on the amendment? Senator Johnson?
Stewart thank you Mr. Chair and Senator Rarick, again, there is much work to be done in this, in this issue. I think the originating problem that we're trying to address is the fact that subcontractors are often subject to unfair practices. And frankly, the role of the subcontractor is to serve the contractor. You know, many of us have businesses or I had a business where our role is as a subcontractor. The Metrodome for example, or, I'm sorry, Viking Stadium would not contract to an electrical contractor to do the work. That's just not how business works. They would have a general contract. In the case of the Metrodome, it would cover hundreds of subcontractors. I'm sorry, the Viking Stadium, we worked on that project, too. And so subs play a really important part in the construction industry, but they often, often are subject to requirements placed on them by contractors. Another issue that we're going to address in the fall, Senator Rarick and others, is the whole procurement process, the whole issue of change orders and delays, which are also out of the hands of contractors, and something that we certainly have to fix. The issue of cash flow, I would say, for my business, for the 25 years I owned it, cash flow was the biggest challenge I had. And now, you know, we are seeing some changes in contract law coming where, you know, a 30 day delay can result in significant loss in business opportunity. And so we need advocates for the sub. So, Senator Rarick, I respect your decision and Senator Marty, I would still encourage others to vote for this amendment and have trust in the fact that we're going to continue to advocate for subcontractors and, and continue the work that needs to be done after the deadline and after this session is over. So I ask for a yes on the amendment.
Senator McEwen, you have your camera on. Did you want to speak to this?
Thank you, Mr.
Chair.
No, I don't have any comment. I was just turning my camera on, so I'm fully participating. Okay, thank you.
Thank you.
Further discussion, if not all those in favor of the A7Amendment center, it looks like.
Mr. Could I have a roll call, please?
Sure.
Okay.
Roll call has been requested. Staff will any further discussion.
This is on the amendment. Mr.
Chair.
This is on the amendment. The First Amendment.
Yes, the A7amendment. The staff will take the roll.
Thank you, Chair. Chair Marty.
Vote Aye.
Senator McEwen.
Aye.
Senator hochschild? Ranking member dornick.
No.
Senator kupek. Senator liske. Senator umu verbatin.
Yes.
Senator pappas.
Yes.
Senator rarick, senator wiesenberg, Vice Chair Hochschild and Senator Wiesenberg are absent. There being.
There being five ayes and three nays, the motion does prevail on the bill. Are there other amendments? Right now we should take the testimony. I believe you have some testifiers. I have Heather Hoffman listed in Blake Nelson, if they want to come up.
Thank you, Mr.
Chair.
Please go ahead and identify yourselves and then you may speak to the bill.
Chair and committee Members My name is Heather Hoffman and I represent Commercial Drywall, a Minnesota commercial subcontractor. Commercial Drywall was founded in 1993 by my father whom I worked alongside for most of my career until he passed away in 2020. I am now a second generation owner leading CDI as a certified woman owned small business. We have served Minnesota for over 33 years in our busy seasons. Each year we typically employ between 65 and 85 Minnesota construction professionals. We take great pride in the work we do on public construction projects in Minnesota and we value the companies that work alongside us and the public owners we work for. To work on a public job requires significant administrative responsibilities and long payment terms. We secure insurance and bonds and pay prevailing wage or higher. As an example, we may provide employee background checks, detailed wage reports, workforce utilization reports, lien waivers, bond claim waivers, and other other required documents each month to the public owner. In addition to these obligations, we often wait many months or years to be paid in full for our work. Senate File 1714 proposes a straightforward solution, greater transparency about payments made on public construction projects. This improved transparency will allow us to plan our cash flow and know when we should be getting paid. To provide an example, today on a large Minnesota school project not to be named, contract terms indicated that based on the prescribed process, our company should be able to count on payment within 60 days of the invoice more than once. At around 70 days, the general contractor indicated that no payment had been received from the public owner and accordingly they would not pay us at 90 days. Still no information about the payment. The GC would not provide additional information, simply no payment available from the owner. After much frustration and more than one irregularity, we decided to request payment information from the school district. Come to find out our company had been paid between 11 and 20 days late three different times over the course of 10 months. Unfortunately, we received this information far too late to do anything about it. The payment information request from the public owner took approximately 45 days from the date we made it to receiving the information. If we had the payment information in a timely manner, it would have given us the freedom to call out the due date, call out the general contractor and be paid much faster. Truthfully, I am not sharing this to put anyone on the spot. I'm sharing this example because slow payment like this is commonplace in the industry and something has to give for small business and subcontractors to succeed. The cost of capital is real. It often erodes funds available for overhead and profit which are often capped on public projects at 10% with today's interest rates for lines of credit at 6% and higher, it does not take long to erode our profits. When we wait months or years for payment, this capital costs real money. The bill does not guarantee we get paid, but it will provide us with timely payment information and greater transparency on public work. Thank you very much, Senator, for carrying this bill, and thank you to the committee for your consideration. We respectfully ask for your support today.
Thank you. Ms. Hoffman, questions from the committee. Thank you very much, Mr. Nelson.
Thank you. Chair and committee members. My name is Blake Nelson. I'm an attorney with Hellmuth Johnson in Minnesota. I'm the chair of our law firm's construction law group, and I have practiced construction law for over 30 years. I'm also currently the president of the Minnesota Subcontractors association. And I want to thank you for hearing this important bill and for considering its passage. One of the most common issues that my clients face as subcontractors are not knowing when they should be paid under the current law. A subcontractor, I think, has been noted, is to be paid within 10 days after the public agency pays the general contractor if a subcontractor is not paid on time. Current law provides remedies like attorney's fees or interest that can be recovered by a subcontractor if they're not timely paid. But unfortunately, the payment process on public work is opaque. Subcontractors are often left in the dark about when payments are made and when they are received. And when a subcontractor asks a general contractor, they're often provided with a generic response stating that they've not been paid or they just might not get any answer or an answer in a timely fashion. A lot of my clients who are subcontractors are small businesses, and payment times can make or break these businesses. The intent of amended Senate File 1714 is to ensure subcontractors can know when the general contractor is paid so they can enforce their rights to seek timely payment. The bill before you does that and has been significantly revised to accommodate the public owners and the general contractors. Over the last year, we have participated in multiple stakeholder meetings and made significant concessions. Originally, this bill required the public agencies to be proactively transparent and to notify subcontractors when every payment was made. They literally would have had to have notified every sub of every payment. And we had a lot of pushback there because of the time that that would require. However, after working through the concerns raised by the public owners, we adopted an alternate approach that they proposed and that they believe is workable under the amendment before you today. A subcontractor must request the payment information and the public agencies must provide it within seven days. In the end, we believe that this ask and answer approach, based off of the public owner's language, will work for all parties and will lead to more transparency, better working relationships, and prompter payment to small businesses. Senate File 174, as you've heard, has bipartisan support in both bodies, and it was developed collaboratively with public and private bodies. It brings more transparency to public payment processes in Minnesota, and as has been said, it has the support of 16 trade associations and we hope that you will pass it today. Thank you for your time and consideration, and I'm happy to stay for questions.
Thank you. Are there questions from the committee for either of the witnesses? If not, thank you both.
Senator Johnson Stewart thank you, Mr.
Chair.
There is work to be done on here specifically around the issue of invoicing. We had it in the bill and a few weeks ago frankly hit a significant opposition to that part. We weren't able to come up with language that was acceptable to both the contractors and the public agency groups. Frankly, I'm kind of I'm really excited to think about an opportunity where Senator Rarick, Senator Lang, Senator Matthews, Senator McEwen and I might be able to offer up a very strong advocacy group for the subcontractors and work on this next year, provided we're all back in the Senate. I think it's a really important thing, and frankly, we ran out of time. I worked with Mr. Nelson and I worked with others to try to come up with something that we could propose during this hearing, and we just, frankly, ran out of time. So as I counseled the subcontractors that I was working with, I said, let's get this done. And then you have my pledge that we're going to continue to work on it over the summer. But I do think this is an important step in allowing subcontractors to find out even the simplest information. We worked with the public agencies to make sure that it wasn't cost prohibitive for them to meet those requests. And so I think this is a common sense bill that will help subcontractors, and I'm proud to support it. I ask for your approval.
Senator Omover bayton Thank you, Mr.
Chair.
I just had a few questions for Senator Johnson Stewart.
Certainly.
Thank you for bringing forward the bill. And I am just wondering, I know that the language says a subcontractor of any tier then we added some language in the amendment around if they could provide documentation of participating in the public improvement project. But can you just clarify the intention is that whether it's a, like a subcontractor who's right underneath the general or like further subcontracted at a lower tier, they would still be able to request that information from the agency.
Mr. Chair, Senator Werver Bayton yes. So this is in response to public agencies saying, well, we think it's inappropriate for us to just answer any question that has to do with privacy concerns about if a contractor has been paid. And so we set the bar very low that any subcontractor, you know, on a huge contract, a huge construction process project that could be even the person who delivers the, you know, personal protective equipment or the bath, the satellites or anything to a project. We just want to hear what the departments are saying. And if there's just any proof that there's a contract, an agreement, then that opens up the departments, the public agencies to give that information out. So we tried to set the bar very low for them. It doesn't have to be a formal contract. It could just be a rental agreement or anything like that. Mr. Chair,
further discussion on the bill.
Senator Mover BRITTON thank you, Mr.
Chair.
Thanks for answering the question. I know that Ms. Hoffman talked about it taking like 40 days, I think,
to get that information.
I might be mis remembering them.
No, that's accurate. Okay, 40 days.
Yeah.
And now the bill says that the agency would need to provide that information within seven or calendar days of the receipt, which is great. In your experience, when you had to, when you made that request, was it easy to come up with the sort of documentation that the agency would have been requesting, showing that you were a part of the project? You just mentioned some of what those examples would be, Senator Johnson Stewart But I just wanted to hear from a contractor as well.
Yeah.
Mr.
Chair.
Mr. Chair, there's many of the school districts have an online portal where you can enter your information and then you wait. So you enter an online portal and you receive an email stating that they've received your information and that they'll reply. In some cases, and I don't know all the details of the laws, but in some cases they do have the right to charge, depending on what you're asking for. So they may come forward with an invoice proposal, then you have to agree to it. Then when you agree to pay the invoice, you pay it, and then they put it in a queue for someone to pull the information and Then eventually when they pull it, then they send it securely and then you get to open it. So that was the process. So we expect that this new process would be simpler.
Anything else? Any other questions or discussion from members of the committee? If not Senator Pappas, move Senate File 1714, as amended, be recommended to pass.
So moved.
Is there further discussion? If not, all those in favor say aye.
Aye.
Opposed? Motion prevails.
Mr. Chairman, I assume it's going to the floor.
Yes, it's headed to the floor.
Thank you, committee members. I think this is an important step and we'll continue to work on the problem.
Thank you.
Thank you. And thanks for the witness. Senator McEwen, you are next up with Senate File 4212.
Thank you very much. Mr. Chair, can you hear me okay?
Yes,
Mr. Chair. Colleagues, it's my pleasure today to present to you Senate file 4212. This bill is about energy code support,
grants,
services to help me meet the building energy code. We all use and need energy in our everyday lives, especially in Minnesota, to heat, cool and power our buildings. Being energy efficient with our energy helps us to save money and avoid pollution. It's a win win across the board. Of course, it's cheapest to put in insulation, add air sealing and install triple pane windows when a building is under construction. Retrofits are a lot more cumbersome. They disturb people's lives and businesses and take time. So we'd rather not do that. We'd rather do this when a building is under construction. Minnesota has been a leader on energy code work since the 1980s. Our energy code continues to evolve thanks to the legislature and the work done in the past few years. Alongside the traditional prescriptive or checklist pathway for meeting code requirements, development teams now have what are called performance based options. So for these performance based projects, energy modeling is required and requires that performance based project requires a more intensive understanding of building science and a specific set of skills to review. The benefit of using that option, however, is that performance based pathways can result in construction methods that are more cost effective and result in more energy efficient buildings. But because this is a newer way to approach this, code officials just have less familiarity with it. And those code officials are also tasked with not only ensuring the compliance of the energy code, but also many other building codes, electrical code, mechanical plumbing, etc. So it is difficult, if not impossible, to be an expert on everything and
they can use some help with that.
So our solution is, with this bill, is to take technical is to make technical assistance more Readily available. Even though we have a statewide building code in Minnesota, the code is mostly implemented by cities. What this bill does is create a grant program for cities to tap into and select technical experts for support, education, training and tools to help them with compliance and implementation. Essentially, it ensures that the people who are enforcing the code have the resources that they need. The program as set out in the bill would be overseen by the Department of Labor and industry. Also of note, conversations with a number of cities show that there is support for these grants and members. You'll note letters of support from a number of cities. In conclusion, our building stand for decades, if not centuries. Constructing them to use energy efficiently from the start, from the beginning, reduces utility costs from day one. And giving cities access to the technical tools they need for improved energy code implementation ensures owners and tenants alike can reap the benefits of energy efficiency. So we view this as a win win. And respectfully, I ask for your support for Senate file 4212.
Thank you. Are there questions from members of the committee? If not, we have two witnesses here. Oh, okay, two witnesses first, then. Megan Hoy and Will Nissen. Welcome to the committee. Go ahead, whichever one of you wants to go first.
Thank you very much. Mr. Chair, my name is Megan Hoy. I'm the director of climate Equity action for the city of Minneapolis and for context, because of the discussion today, while I oversee the climate sustainability team and our climate equity plan within the city of Minneapolis, I also have a background in sustainability, clean energy, and originally a background in architecture and have been working in these combined fields for the last 20 years. I'm here today in support of this bill. As was stated before in the legislature in 2023, you all took action to ensure that Minnesota would be adopting energy code at the rate at which national code is written. So it's the speed at which we will be adopting at a faster rate than we have in the past. And with that comes adaptation and new technology that will help with compliance to this code. This was a huge step forward to make buildings more efficient and cost effective and low carbon, but successful implementation of the code, and in particular the energy code for commercial buildings, which is really what we're here talking about today, is not just about the standards themselves. We currently do not have all of the code enforcement, support and technology, education and navigation capacity that we need. This bill and the proposed grants will help to close these gaps. So first code official support services. We have seen support services like this in the past for cities where they're, you know, they're really experts in reviewing plans and inspecting buildings on the ground, but they are not experts at energy models. They're not experts at really complex projects that are following the performance based pathway that Senator McEwen was speaking of before. And that's an increasingly important pathway as we have more stringent codes. So these plan review services have been offered in the past and they've been quite helpful to cities. They're no longer available today because of funding that has been lost from formerly federal funds that were available to provide these services. It's also again, the need of the code officials is spread thin across multiple codes. And this is a very nuanced bit of information to be reviewing in these buildings. And you know, these types of projects typically happen in our largest cities in the state, but not just. But these performance based projects typically happen in our largest cities. So there's that need from the code official side. Additionally, architects, developers, building operators and code officials as well have need to be more exposed to and have further guidance on new technologies which will help make this make building compliance easier. So newer technology examples include ultra efficient heat pumps, building specific geothermal wells, other types of battery storage. I could name a few others. But there will be more and we need more to keep being compliant with the code as it continues to change. I hear from architects and developers about code challenges and their need to know more about technologies and how to utilize those in buildings that they're working on. And I see building operators looking to learn about new technologies that they could implement in an upcoming project so they can be compliant and bring down energy costs. And so the need for this education and navigation of new technology is out there. We have letters of support from the city of St. Louis park, the city of Bloomington, the city of Edina, as well as the city of St. Paul and of course Minneapolis here today. So the resources from these from this
bill
will be essential to build the energy efficient and compliant buildings that we're looking for that will serve our businesses with lower energy operating costs and best serve the residents and businesses in our state. So I thank you for your time and I ask you to support the Senate file 4212.
Thank you. Good afternoon Chair Marty, members of the committee, my name is Will Nissen. I'm Director of Policy at the center for Energy and Environment. I want to thank Senator McEwen for carrying Senate File 4212 and for that great introduction of the bill. I'm here to offer our support. CEE is a non profit organization whose core mission is to discover and deploy the most effective energy solutions that strengthen the economy and improve the environment. And for decades, we've built on that through program development and implementation, collaboration with communities, research efforts, lending tools and policy advocacy. And so in our experience, commercial building energy codes are a foundational part of ensuring Minnesota businesses are comfortable and affordable to operate through the life of the building. And as energy codes have advanced alongside building technologies and more complex building systems, so have methods for determining compliance with the energy code. And this includes performance based standards like you've heard today, that are intended to provide flexibility for builders to meet commercial code requirements in different ways, but also are more complex to assess and require additional knowledge and expertise and tools on the part of code officials as they're determining compliance with projects. So Senate File 4212 would provide that support to municipalities and local code enforcement officials to determine compliance with commercial building energy code for new construction and major renovation projects, and with that particular emphasis on the performance based standards. So thanks for your time. We support the bill and happy to answer any questions.
Thank you very much. Are there questions for either of the witnesses? Sarah McEwen, I don't have a question,
but I do have an amendment.
Do you want me to fire that up right now or go ahead? Right now I have the A1amendment which should be in your packets. Senator kupek offers the A1amendment which is in our packets, and that would change it. Okay. So it's not just the cities over 50,000, but those that would be under it as long as they've adopted the state building code.
That's right.
So, yeah, my, I'm not sure 50,000 was just kind of an arbitrary number.
And I know my city of Moorhead is 45,000 and I think we follow the state building code.
So I just feel like if there
are any other cities that are below
that 50,000 mark that follow the state
building code, they should probably have access
to these grants as well.
So that's the reason for the change.
That seems to be a more efficient way of doing it than simply capping it at a certain number, even if some of them have adopted it. Senator McEwen, on the amendment, thank you very much, Mr.
Chair. And thank you, Senator Kubec, for this amendment. We've had some discussion about this via email today, and I am happy to accept this as a friendly amendment. We may have some more discussion about some of the details as we the bill is laid over, but for now I'm, I'm happy to accept it.
Any further discussion on the Kupek amendment If not, all those in favor say aye. Opposed? Motion prevails. Further discussion on the bill. Senator dornick thank you, Mr.
Chair. I guess I want to just get a little more clarity on first. Senator McEwen, thank you for the, for the bill. So with the cities and now with the adopting of those that adopt the state code, do we know how many cities or how many that we're dealing with now? What number?
Ms.
Hood yeah. Mr. Chair, thank you for the question. The the state code is actually adopted at the state level in our in Minnesota and so all municipalities are required to follow that. So it's actually some states do adopt at a local level, but that's not in Minnesota how it's done. So all of them.
Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Senator Doornick, follow up.
I guess I'm not sure if this is a question for maybe Representative from Dolley or if you can answer it. I guess how are we going to the funding is only a million dollars one time money just to be competitive. I get that. But do you have a amount that you're thinking for each city or each entity that's asking?
Ms. Hoy or Mr.
Chair, I can speak to that. And Senator McEwen, whatever makes sense to add on. So I think that there's an opportunity for these grants to be provided out to third party expert groups that can provide these types of services broadly and that they're not necessarily given out directly to the cities themselves, but where there can be shared resources across multiple cities or regions of the state and that they can be called upon as cities need them.
Thank you, Mr.
Chair.
So this question might be for Senator McEwen. Have you talked to Dolly because they're going to be implementing this and just wondered how that conversation went with them.
Senator McEwen, thank you very much for that question. You know, I have to look back on my notes to see if I have spoken with Dolly about this. If there is someone here from Dolly or dli, I'd welcome their input. But I'm of course, as we move forward, we'll be talking to them about many things and happy to talk to them about this as well and happy to loop you in on those discussions, Senator.
Okay.
Welcome to the committee. Please go ahead and respond to the question.
Thank you, Chair Marty thank you, Senator Dornick, for the question. Just to clarify was the question about DLI's Grant administration under this bill?
Senator Dorant thank you, Mr. Chair. Just basically was just the conversation that Senator McEwen and if she had one with you guys and since you're here, maybe just how maybe you think you're going to implement because you're going to be administrating it, correct?
Mr. Moore, please identify yourself as well and go ahead.
Thank you. Chair Josiah Moore, Legislative Director at Department of labor and Industry. So, under this bill, we would be receiving the funds and operating a grant program competitively and taking, taking those applications. We, we do several grants already, and so we don't, we don't see this as being outside of the norm of the sort of thing we would, we would handle as far as coordination with Senator McEwen. We have spoken briefly about it, but haven't had that much to discuss as it's a simple bill.
Thank you, Mr. Moore. That's good for me.
And Mr. Moore, with this. I mean, just to understand that the intent or. Senator McEwen, perhaps you're the one to ask. The intent is for the grants not to be going.
First.
Read this. Competitive grants to provide code enforcement officials with support, education, training. In other words, it's not to the municipalities for the, for the grants, for the training. The code enforcement would be third party entities that would be providing the training that Dolly would contract with. Senator McEwen, do you want to respond or. Mr. Moore,
Thank you for that question, Mr. Chair. That is my understanding, but if other people have a different one, I think it would be good for clarity if there is a different understanding. Thank you.
Mr. Moore, any of the witnesses, because. Go ahead.
Yeah, I can speak to that. Mr. Chair, thanks for the question. I think the flexibility and the funding is helpful, but I do think that third parties would have a strong role and an important role in being able to provide these services in a way, again, that, like, spreads. Spreads the benefit to multiple jurisdictions and cities across the state.
And Mr. Moore, anything to add?
Thank you, Chair. I would just add that that's a good question. The language in the bill perhaps could be a bit more clear about who the applicants for these funds could be. So that's something that we could possibly provide technical assistance and work with counsel on.
Well, Senator McEwen has indicated that she wants to have the bill laid over for further discussion, so I'm sure that will be one of the matters discussed. Is there any, Senator rarick?
Thank you, Mr.
Chair.
And just one quick comment that wasn't going to the answer to Senator Dornick's first question. I think the amendment we adopted basically has zero impact with the answer that it's a statewide adopted code, not city by city, so that A1amendment is not going to open it up to anybody else other than cities over 50,000. So I hope, senator Kupek, you work on whatever changes need to be made to accommodate that. But what I was going to talk about is I just, you know, I struggle a little bit with this just from the standpoint of, you know, in the electrical industry, you know, we have a code book that we follow and it tends to follow behind a little bit new technologies as we learn more and then adopt them into the code. And it just seems to me that some of these green building codes that we talk about are getting out in front of technologies. And thus that's why we're here asking for more training for people. Because these technologies are out in front of the knowledge that people have. And part of our electrical licenses and part of inspectors licenses is continuing education that they would be getting that would talk about these emerging technologies that we should be getting before they become the codes that have to be put into our building. So I think when we adopted that statewide code, I think we were out in front of ourselves, which is why we then end up here saying, oh my gosh, now we need to train people because they don't know how to deal with all of these new codes that we put in place. So I think that's one of my struggles that we. I believe we acted way too quickly adopting that energy code and now we're trying to catch up. Seems to be a theme we've been hearing over and over. So I hope we think about that in many things before we just jump in and adopt, making sure that the technology and the folks who make these codes are actually involved in the process and we know what we're getting into before at the legislature, we jump in and adopt, making sure folks who enforce it have the knowledge to do that before we tell them, no, you gotta go out and do it and oh, by the way, figure out how to get the training so you know what you're doing.
Thank you, Mr. Moore. I had one. Maybe not for him, but whoever the author or Mr. Moore, whoever. I wanted to a question about the state because the building code is statewide. If a city adopts it, that means they're enforcing it, but it applies everywhere in those. Is that accurate? In other words, if Moorhead has adopted the building code, that means they're planning to enforce it. If Wilmer does not adopt it, then it still applies in Wilmer, but nobody's enforcing. Or does Dowley have people in that or who does the building code enforcement in those cases?
Thank you, chair, for the question yes. So to clarify, we do set a statewide code, and we adopt that at DLI via the Construction Codes Advisory Council.
However,
municipalities adopt the code by ordinance, and so you're correct that it may be unenforced in municipalities that have not adopted the code via ordinance.
Okay, thank you, Senator Rarick. You're gonna clarify my misunderstanding?
No, thank you. And I just wanna get clarification. My understanding would be. Would be that the cities wouldn't adopt the codes themselves. They're choosing to do enforcement themselves. So, like, the city of Minneapolis could decide, and for a while, they provided electrical inspections. They didn't adopt a code themselves, but they decided to enforce the code that had been adopted by the state. They then decided not to do that, and it was turned back over to the Department of Labor to have state inspectors do it. And I believe it would be the same thing with energy codes. A municipality would make the decision that, are we going to locally enforce the state code or are we going to have the state do it? So they're not adopting the actual code. The state has done that. They're just choosing whether they're going to enforce it or not.
So to. So I'm clear, in other words, we should. Instead of cities that adopt it, there are cities that adopt enforcement of it. Okay, that's helpful clarification. Thank you. Is there any further discussion on this bill? If not, Senator McEwen, any final words before we lay it over for further consideration?
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. No, just want to make sure that as we implement new code, that I guess I take a little bit of a more optimistic view, although the opinions shared by Senator Rarick are noted, and I can understand where he's coming from, but I do think it's a very positive thing to be moving forward with our codes. And then as. As they're adopted and implemented, we are going to identify places where extra supports are needed. And that seems absolutely within the realm of expectation to meet. And so, as such, I ask for your support.
I think it's a good thing.
Thank you. And with that, at Sarah McEwen's request, this bill will be laid over for further discussion. And. And with that, is there any further business for the committee? If not, this committee is adjourned. Thank you.