Lawmakers still can’t agree on DWI reforms and voting rights for felons.

A response to David Strom's commentary on Minnesota's gas tax.

Neither liberals nor conservatives think it is a good idea to doom a government agency to failure before dime one is spent,yet that is exactly what the wholesale tax on gasoline is likely to do.

observers Expect mid-May to be a flurry of for marathon floor sessions and vital late-night meetings to reach agreement.

House Speaker Kurt Daudt and other Republican transportation leaders announced their plan to repair and replace 15,500 miles of roads and 330 bridges statewide by “re-aligning” existing tax revenue toward transportation, bonding and general fund money.

The governor and Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk are united in calling for new revenue dedicated to transportation and pressing House Republicans to share a “real” plan of their own.

Gov. Mark Dayton released a list of unscheduled road and bridge projects that he said would happen if the proposal survives the uphill battle it faces in the Legislature.

The governor’s plan is similar to one supported by a coalition of transportation and transit advocates and to the plan Senate Democrats put forward, but is light years away from House Republicans’ plan.

Advocates of increased funding for roads, bridges and transit projects across Minnesota hope to recreate a formula that worked once before. In the wake of the 2007 I-35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis, a broad coalition of groups, which included the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce as well as labor unions, joined hands to push for a 5.5 cent gas tax increase in the 2008 session.

A week after the Senate Transportation Committee tabled its budget bill due to lack of support, the committee on Wednesday evening passed a bill that increases funding for highways and transit. The bill reduces the gas tax by 6 cents per gallon and increases the sales tax on gas at the wholesale level by 5.5 percent.