A Minnesota House Committee hearing on the topic of creating an Office of Inspector General bill to fight fraud came to an abrupt end Thursday when the two co-chairs disagreed over an amendment.
Republican Jim Nash of Waconia said he wanted to ask questions about the amendment but that was rejected by the Democratic Chair Ginny Klevorn of Plymouth…
“(Nash) Madame Chair, it is customary (Klevorn excuse me) to allow an amendment to receive questions. I had questions. I alerted you to the fact that I had questions and I had comments. (Klevorn) No I’m sorry you did not. (Nash) Well, I most certainly did.”
The amendment was blocked along party lines.
You may recall the full Senate passed the OIG bill last session, but it stalled in the House during budget negotiations. GOP State Senator Michael Holmstrom of Buffalo described the proposed Office of Inspector General position on a recent edition of “Spotlight” on KRWC…
“So that position would be emboldened to investigate any part of the state agencies. It would probably focus on DHS because that’s where most of the fraud is at. And then it would have the ability to subpoena and bring charges. Currently the only auditor who can do these types of investigations is the Legislative Auditor. But the Legislative Auditor doesn’t have the ability to pull those subpoenas and make those arrests. Some agencies have their own auditors, but again…fox watching the henhouse situation, at least from out perspective that’s what it looks like. That did pass through the Senate, so the House can either take it up or they can leave it on the table. They could change it and then kick it back to the Senate and we could work with it, but that currently is passed through the Senate.”
There is no word when the bill will come up for further discussion in the House.
