Tuesday, May 8, 2007

PIONEER PRESS: Pawlenty vetoes 2 major bills



BY BILL SALISBURY

Gov. Tim Pawlenty's red veto stamp got a workout Monday as he rejected budget bills to fund state agency operations and jobs programs.

Pawlenty signed a $2 billion anti-crime package and said he would be signing an $865 million appropriation for environmental and energy programs.

That means he will have signed three and vetoed three of the 11 tax and spending bills that will define the state's two-year budget. He's vetoing objectionable bills quickly, he said, to give the Legislature time to fix and send them back to him before the May 21 constitutional deadline for adjourning.

The Republican governor accused leaders of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor legislative majorities of adopting a new "ping-pong approach" to budget-making. Instead of negotiating spending targets with him, as previous legislatures and governors have done, he said, this year DFL lawmakers are sending him the budget bills they like, and he sends back the ones he dislikes.

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