A Cook resident walks through flood waters on River Street on Friday, June 21, 2024. Photo by Jerry Burnes/Iron Range Today.
Minnesota lawmakers, who adjourned last month, have begun calling for a special legislative session to confront the destruction of rising floodwaters, as residents, businesses and managers of key infrastructure — especially water systems — begin cleaning up while bracing for more.
State Sen. Grant Hauschild, a Democrat who represents a northeast swing district that’s been deluged in recent weeks, said on X Monday that a special session limited to disaster recovery and an infrastructure bill “just makes sense.”
Hours earlier, Gov. Tim Walz said he was open to a special legislative session.
Even as legislators began mulling a return to St. Paul, Minnesotans watched spectacular images of the partial failure of the the Rapidan Dam near Mankato.
Rapidan Dam this morning. pic.twitter.com/u1iJJOftr0
— Jason Leary (@jasonlcvcmn) June 24, 2024
The Star Tribune reported that “the west bank of the century-old dam had already washed out, along with several nearby buildings, sending construction material and trees downstream, as the Blue Earth River continued to rise after heavy rains fell on the region over the last several days.”
Local officials worried the dam could fail but now think it will survive.
“We believe it’s intact and it will hold,” Eric Weller, emergency management director for Blue Earth County, told the Star Tribune.
Walz and U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar are scheduled to provide an update Tuesday afternoon on conditions in southern Minnesota following an aerial survey, Walz’s office said in a release.
Late last week, Walz toured communities in northeast Minnesota that are also getting hammered with rain and flooding, as Jerry Burnes of Iron Range Today reported.
Theresa Drift, a local homeless advocate, told Jerry Burnes of Iron Range Today that she thought her home was safe when only minor rainwater seeped into the basement — until it wasn’t anymore — and three or four feet of sewage poured in from her toilets and sinks. Drift and her family were temporarily staying with a friend.
“I work with homeless people and now I’m homeless,” Drift told Walz, fighting back tears, as state officials toured one of the hardest hit areas on the Iron Range after several inches of rain flooded the area earlier in the week.
Former state Sen. Tom Bakk, who represented Cook for decades, said he hadn’t seen water like this since the flood of 1970.
Walz said that the damage across the state could rival the 1997 Red River flooding that devastated many cities along the Minnesota-North Dakota border.
House Speaker Melissa Hortman, DFL-Brooklyn Park, and Senate Majority Leader Erin Murphy, DFL-St. Paul, did not respond late Monday to text messages about a special session.
Special sessions can be politically tricky: Only Walz can call a special session, but once lawmakers return to St. Paul, they decide on their own adjournment, which means it can turn into a free-for-fall of political grandstanding and gamesmanship.
Lakeville Republican state Sen. Zach Duckworth hinted as much Monday, calling for a special session on X that would roll back Democratic spending priorities and use the money on disaster assistance.
“Minnesotans would be well served by a special session to reconsider how much of the $19.5 Billion surplus commitments can be deferred or diverted to emergency disaster relief and critical infrastructure. We should invest in rebuilding our communities and keeping our people safe.”
Often governors and legislative leaders work out an agreement ahead of time to keep a special session’s legislation and timeline tightly constrained.
The flooding comes after recent years of drought. The drought of 2021 was one of the most severe in 40 years, the Department of Natural Resources reported.
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