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Bridge collapse is wild card in House race
In today's special election to fill Rep. Steve Sviggum's seat, the candidates' transportation funding goals could make the difference.
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One of the first tests of the political impact from the Interstate 35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis last week will come today in the towns of Zumbro Falls and Pine Island and the surrounding townships of southeastern Minnesota.
Voters there will go to the polls in a special election to replace 15-term Republican stalwart Steve Sviggum, a former House speaker who is becoming the state commissioner of labor and industry.
Even before last week, the House race between DFLer Linda Pfeilsticker, a 35-year-old high school teacher running for office for the first time, and Republican Steve Drazkowski, a 42-year-old cable contractor and former University of Minnesota extension agent, had been regarded as too close to call.
But the bridge collapse in Minneapolis makes the outcome even more uncertain by raising new concerns about how the state's transportation infrastructure is funded.
The collapse has renewed calls for a gas-tax increase, which even Gov. Tim Pawlenty now seems ready to support, after twice vetoing such measures.
During the legislative campaign, Drazkowski had remained adamantly opposed to increasing the gas tax, saying it would cripple the economy of the district.
But on Monday, the last full day of the campaign, Drazkowski said he would leave open the idea of supporting a gas-tax increase.
Just hours before the bridge collapse last week, the Minnesota Republican Party put out a news release warning that DFLer Pfeilsticker's "repeated refusal to rule out a gas tax increase means the residents of House District 28B had better hold onto their wallets."In terms of whether I'll support a gas tax or other funding mechanism, generally speaking I'm willing to see what type of lead the governor takes," Drazkowski said, adding that he would prefer other funding approaches, such as bonding and using a budget surplus.
Pfeilsticker (pronounced file-sticker) has said she would not rule out a gas-tax hike as part of several funding mechanisms. "There isn't one source that is going to be long term or stable enough to fund transportation," she said Monday.
A district up for grabs
Both Drazkowski and Pfeilsticker said the bridge collapse has magnified what citizens in the rural district have been saying about the quality of their own roads.
"They knew the roads were in terrible condition," Pfeilsticker said. "They point out, 'Here's this road, there have been five fatalities on this road.' Granted, those don't make the headlines across the state but that is something they were experiencing. Now we see it in a much larger incident."
Added Drazkowski: "I think we need to have a discussion about funding independent of an incident like this."
The closeness of the race appears unusual in a district that historically had been regarded as solidly Republican. Sviggum had won with no less than 60 percent of the vote in his past seven elections.
Yet in the 2006 election, the district, which includes half of both Goodhue and Wabasha counties, gave majorities to DFLers Amy Klobuchar for U.S. Senate, Tim Walz for the U.S. House, Steve Murphy for the Minnesota Senate (defeating Drazkowski), Rebecca Otto for auditor and Lori Swanson for attorney general while supporting Republicans Pawlenty for governor, Sviggum for the Minnesota House and Mary Kiffmeyer for secretary of state.
"It's really one of those districts that seem up for grabs," said Sen. Dick Day, R-Owatonna, a former Senate minority leader.
Veto math a factor
Turnout of each candidate's base is expected to be critical because special elections, particularly those called in the middle of summer, historically have a difficult time generating interest.
Sviggum's departure, long talked about after Republicans lost the House majority, was believed to be delayed over concerns about securing another Republican in his district. DFLers maintain an 85-49 majority in the House, five short of the number needed to override any gubernatorial veto.
"We need to maintain the ability of the House Republicans to prevent an overzealous, almost ideological, House majority from increasing taxes by another $5.5 billion like they did the last session," Drazkowski said.
Pfeilsticker said the people she has talked to are less concerned about the math of veto overrides than the issues that affect them personally: health care, economic development and roads.
"I don't think that on a personal level that's one of their great issues. The politics of it really haven't entered into play here," she said.
Mark Brunswick • 651-222-1636 • mbrunswick@startribune.com
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