Senate Conference Committee Member Distribution

In Minnesota, when similar bills pass both bodies of the legislature in different forms, a conference committee is called. Members from each body are appointed to serve on this committee, where the two sides try to compromise. It is interesting at the legislature to see everyone in a mad rush to finish the session on time, while at the same time accomplishing everything that everyone came to do. Conference committees are one of the most important parts of this closing time at the Capitol. There are some members who are on multiple conference committees, and this can make things difficult to schedule at the end of session.

I broke the numbers down for the senate, and here are the number of conference committees that each of the following senators sit on:

--Betzold: 5
--Skoglund and Neuville: 4
--Higgins, Hottinger, Berglin, and Jungbauer: 3
--Pogemiller, Skoe, Murphy, Moua, Limmer, Scheid, Rosen, Sparks, Pappas, Metzen, Saxhaug, Bakk, Cohen, and Frederickson: 2
--Vickerman, Belanger, Rest, Marty, Kelley, Solon, Bonoff, Marko, Senjem, Langseth, Koering, Kubly, Stumpf, Robling, Tomassoni, Michel, Larson, Sams, Dibble, Ortman: 1

You can imagine the problems that the government may run into when they're trying to hold meetings to get these things done, especially when certain members (Betzold, Skoglund, Neuville) are on so many committees.

Once again, a LIST of the conference committees this session.

Nothing groundbreaking, just interesting.