Dr. A. J. Eckstein of New Ulm, representative of District 28-B, will return to the legislative trenches in St. Paul Jan. 27 prepared for an important session.

“There’ll be more coming up than I thought a few weeks ago,” he said.” I felt for a while we’d have a short session lasting February and March, but now I’m not so sure.”

Three items he listed as top priority:

1) A Department of Transportation bill designed to group all transportation, including highways, aviation, rails and riverboats, under one chief.

2) Changing the 18-year-old drinking law.

3) Legislation to help sons of farmers who want to take over the home place.

DR. ECKSTEIN said he didn’t know how far the transportation change would go. Currently, the aeronautics and highway departments are separate.

“Another issue in transportation may be a bonding bill for bridges,”he said. “When it comes to getting an appropriation for another bridge or a by-pass, we need resolutions and selling by the city councils and county commissioners.”

There are projects in need in his district, consisting of most of Brown County, part of Nicollet and a skinny strip of Cottonwood.

Dr. Eckstein said it was a mistake to lower the drinking age to 18 in the first place.

“There’s plenty of criticism now, especially from high schools,” he said, “and I look for action going up to 19.”

Dr. Eckstein, who grew up on a farm, sees a need for some change in inheritance tax laws to help the boy stay on the farm. Inflationary jumps in the price of farmland make it difficult to keep the farm in the family because of inheritance taxes.

“We are thinking about something to help preserve the family farm, such as a guaranteed loan or some sort of tax break,” he said.

THE UNSETTLED drainage issue, a big controversy in the 1975 session, still poses many problems, said Dr. Eckstein.

“I’ve been trying to get a hearing in this area, but Chairman Willard Munger hasn’t gotten around to it,” he said. “He may feel he has enough votes to pass the bill which got through the House and into conference committee. If it passes, there’ll be some unhappy property owners.”

Drainage legislation attempts to define public waters and require permits for farmers to drain sloughs.

SOUTHWEST STATE University at Marshall may come up because of its student decline, he said. On this, Dr. Eckstein has ready opinions:

“I think we should quit talking about Marshall and let it work out its problems. It cost the state in the neighborhood of $80 million, and there’s no good alternative use for the plant. If the University were to be discontinued, it would hurt the entire state. All this talk of closing just hurts the school more.”

Dr. Eckstein forecasts that weather modification may get more support than it did in 1975.

“I think it has merit,” he said.”Both South Dakota and North Dakota have experts in charge of their modification projects.

“Hearings have been held the past few months on weather, and there still is skepticism. Some want to be shown that there will be controls on rainmaking.”

FOR THE 202 lawmakers in the House and Senate, more pay is an issue, too. Salaries were raised to $8,400 annually in 1972. In addition, legislators get a per diem living fee when in session or working during the interim.

“My opinion,” said Dr. Eckstein,”is that we should continue per diem living allowance, and leave the salary base at present, but vote a cost-of-living raise for the years since the present scale started.”

Some proposals are to jump salaries to $20,000; others to raise it to $15,000 and drop the expense account.

Personally, Dr. Eckstein has his office in order to attend the session. A veterinarian, he has a woman vet to handle calls when he is away. She has been on his staff since the last session.

New Ulm Daily Journal

Jan 5, 1976