...NEW YORK (S&P Global Ratings) Nov. 14, 2017--The Minnesota Senate announced on Nov. 10, 2017 that it intends to lay off all 205 of its legislative staff members and possibly shut down on Jan. 12, 2018, if there is no solution to the standoff between the legislature and administration. Despite this, S&P Global Ratings believes this dispute has not negatively affected the state's credit quality (general obligation debt rating: ##+/Stable), although it is monitoring the situation. The legislature and administration have been at odds since May 30, 2017, when the governor line-item vetoed the legislative appropriations to the House and Senate for fiscal years 2018 and 2019, primarily due to disagreements over the long-term implications of the tax reductions on state revenues. The legislature's budget is still just a small portion, about $129 million, of the state's approximate $45.56 billion biennium budget, and has been defunded for political, not financial reasons. According to the Senate,...
