Outdoors/arts tax: Millions up for grabs

Confusion, competition and a shrinking pool of cash are confronting the so-called Legacy Amendment, four months after Minnesotans decisively voted to increase their taxes to better fund the outdoors, the arts, clean water, and parks and trails.

Only in programs for the outdoors has there been real progress toward deciding where to spend the money from a statewide sales tax increase that takes effect in July. Even there, occasional in-fighting has flared as the jockeying for money begins. One member of a panel working to allocate outdoor funding publicly accused another -- a state legislator -- of acting in a way that "blows [our purpose] to smithereens."

Still less defined is how the money will be spent from the three other revenue streams -- for the arts, parks and trails and clean water programs. Some organizations seeking money have tried to tap one source after another, only to be told they are in the wrong place. Others have vowed that, whatever the process, they will lobby for funding on their own if they do not formally get recommended for funding. Many of the groups have talked publicly of working together; privately, they predict the competition will be fierce.

In the end, the DFL-led Legislature and GOP Gov. Tim Pawlenty will decide how the money is used. In a glimpse at what may be a looming political battle, House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher and Senate Majority Leader Larry Pogemiller, both Minneapolis DFLers, have said the Legacy money should not be used to plug holes created by budget cuts.

"I don't necessarily think that there is confusion. But there is some anxiety," said Sen. Patricia Torres Ray, DFL-Minneapolis, whose Senate committee took its first steps toward recommending who gets parks and trails money.

However it's distributed, there will probably be less money than originally thought. When proponents urged Minnesotans last fall to vote for the amendment, which received 56 percent of the vote, it was estimated the three-eighths of 1 percent sales tax increase would produce $300 million a year. Because of the bad economy, state officials have since lowered the estimate to $238 million in the first year. The figure is expected to dip even lower when a new state revenue forecast is released today.

Still, with Minnesota facing a nearly $5 billion state budget deficit, the 25-year sales tax increase represents the only significant new state money many programs will see anytime soon.

Friction, uncertainty

No category of programs will get more money than the outdoor heritage fund, which will receive 33 percent of the amendment's total, or $78.5 million in the first year. For more than a month, often in front of packed meeting rooms, scores of organizations have brought proposals before the 12-member Lessard Outdoor Heritage Council, which was created by the Legislature to sift through the requests but at times has been bogged down by internal squabbling.

So far, the Lessard council has heard a bit of everything: One group wanted $2.2 million to plant 10,000 trees along Rochester's streets and boulevards, saying buildings in cities with "high levels of greenery" had 56 percent fewer violent crimes. John Elholm, Washington County's parks director, told the panel $300,000 would remove buckthorn and other unwanted vegetation from 217 acres of native forest land in the county.

As the council moves toward presenting its recommendations by April 1, a framework for how the money might be spent is taking shape.

But it's unclear how much weight the Lessard council's suggestions will carry. Already, some organizations have said they may lobby the Legislature directly if their programs are not recommended.

"I believe in my projects. I believe they fit the criteria ... so I will fight for them," said Deborah Karasov, executive director of Great River Greening, a St. Paul nonprofit pushing several projects, including wanting $312,000 to restore 400 acres of forest land along the St. Croix River.

Rep. Rick Hansen, DFL-South St. Paul, and a Lessard council member, created a small firestorm when he introduced legislation to use money from the amendment to help fund the Minnesota Conservation Corps -- a move that Michael Kilgore, the Lessard council's chair, said was done without his knowledge. "There was disappointment among council members," said Hansen. "I think we've moved on."

'Who are the water people?'

But if there is friction on the Lessard council, uncertainty reigns over where to go, and who to see, regarding money for the arts, water resources, and parks and trails.

When the amendment passed, the Legislature created the Lessard council to oversee the outdoors money, but left vague how the other areas would be handled. Only now is the void being filled by a handful of existing legislative committees, which have begun hearings on how to proceed.

Darby Nelson, a member of the Lessard council, said some groups -- with no obvious claim to outdoors money -- are nonetheless coming to the council because they don't know where else to go. One group from Rochester pushing a groundwater project, he said, was "trying to maneuver it" into the outdoors fund. "[We said], 'Go to the water people,' said Nelson, "and they just sort of threw up their hands and said, 'We'd love to go to the water people, but who are the water people?'"

The process is equally unfocused for the arts and cultural money. Pawlenty has recommended eliminating state funding for the Minnesota Arts Board, an often mentioned candidate to oversee any amendment money. Ben Vander Kooi, a former head of the arts board, said he is confident the arts community will figure things out.

But if they don't, he said, "there'll be regional competition, there'll be interest group competition and it's not going to be pretty."

At a recent hearing, Peggy Adelmann, the Minnesota Zoo's chief financial officer, said she was still trying to find out where to make a plea for money -- and hoping to dispel any ideas the zoo is not eligible. "We're not mentioned" in the amendment's language, she acknowledged.

So are there some who believe the zoo should not get some of the money? she was asked. "Most of the people in this room, I would think," she said, laughing, but then added, "Everyone in this room is competing with everyone else."

Mike Kaszuba • 612-673-4388 Jake Grovum is a University of Minnesota student reporter on assignment for the Star Tribune