Minnesota Legislature's health and human services bill aims to boost families

Many Minnesota families — including new mothers, parents struggling with child care costs and those on the state's family welfare program — will get a financial boost under a health and human services budget deal state leaders called historic.

"I do not think we'll see in another generation a bill that is as good as this one," said House Health Committee Chairwoman Rep. Tina Liebling, DFL-Rochester. "There is a lot in this bill that helps moms and babies and families."

The wide-ranging budget bill accounts for about a third of the state's general fund spending and includes changes to programs for families, older adults, people with disabilities and those without homes. Legislators are expected to vote on the measure this weekend and send it to Gov. Tim Walz, which would prevent a shutdown of the state agencies providing services to Minnesotans who were hard-hit by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Lawmakers have been churning through votes on different areas of the next two-year state budget, and must wrap up work before Thursday to avoid a shutdown. The compromise they struck on health and human services was heralded by state agency leaders as a significant increase.

"This is the biggest HHS budget in Minnesota history and has something in it for Minnesotans of all walks of life," Department of Human Services Commissioner Jodi Harpstead said in a video responding to the bill. "We are proud to have centered children in our budget work this year." But House Republicans oppose the scale of new spending in the plan, and disagreed with additional dollars for the Minnesota Family Investment Program (MFIP) that provides cash and food assistance to families with children. It requires parents to work at least part time.

"We're giving bonuses to welfare recipients who didn't lose their jobs over the past year, but aren't renewing a program that held down health care costs for more than 150,000 Minnesotans," said House Deputy Minority Leader Anne Neu Brindley, R-North Branch, referring to the state's reinsurance program which was extended for one additional year. "Democrats are also abusing the legislative process to cut off our ability to debate and offer amendments on the HHS bill itself."

Families in the MFIP program would start seeing cost-of-living increases — something advocates have long fought for — as well as getting a one-time $435 payment. The welfare program saw its first increase in three decades in the last budget two years ago, when families started getting an additional $100 per month. The cost-of-living adjustment would increase the average MFIP grant by $13 a month starting in October, and in 2024 the average MFIP recipient would get $65 more a month, according to the Department of Human Services. Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan highlighted the increase to MFIP, a program her family depended on when she was a child.

"We think that this makes a difference," she noted. "Many of the MFIP families in our state have been front-line workers who experienced the brunt of this pandemic and work in industries that have been hardest hit."

Those changes, in tandem with another agreement to increase Child Care Assistance Program provider reimbursement rates, will have a big impact on helping families move out of poverty, Harpstead said. The child care program helps low-income families cover day-care costs as they work, search for a job or go to school. State leaders said boosting the rates, which are far below the national average, will expand the aid to more families.

The bill would also allow new mothers to be eligible for medical assistance for up to a year after giving birth, a significant extension from the current coverage of just 60 days postpartum. And the new "Dignity in Pregnancy and Childbirth Act" requires hospitals with obstetric care and birth centers to offer anti-racism and implicit bias training to staff who care for pregnant and postpartum patients.

"From a public health perspective, there's not much you can do that is more upstream and more full of impact for lifelong health than to improve the health of mothers and infants," said Department of Health Commissioner Jan Malcolm.

Flanagan said some key DFL priorities were left out of the deal. She plans to continue to push for earned sick and safe time and paid family and medical leave in the future.

Jessie Van Berkel • 651-925-5044

Ryan Faircloth • 612-673-4234