(dramatic music) - This is "North Dakota Legislative Review."

I'm Dave Thompson.

Thanks for joining us.

Our guest today is Senator Jerry Klein.

He's from Fessenden, North Dakota.

And you are the assistant majority leader in the Senate, correct?

- Yes.

Well, thanks for having me, Dave.

And yes, I am the assistant majority leader.

And yes, I am from Fessenden, which is District 14, which is seven counties in Central North Dakota.

- Absolutely, you've got one of the larger districts.

- I think we have overtaken the old District 39 that used to spread from Bowman to Watford City, used to be the largest, but of course, with redistricting and the growth in Western North Dakota and population wise, it did pose a bit of a problem for Central North Dakota, and as we were all scraping for 17,000 residents versus the old 14,500, we wound up adding a county and a half, so to speak.

So, you know, we do represent Pierce, Benson, Eddy, Wells, Sheridan, Kidder, and 27 townships in Burleigh, so you can't hardly cross North Dakota without going through District 14 somewhere.

- So that makes it kind of interesting when you have to campaign for the office.

- I often say there, I'm quoting someone from one of the redistricting meetings who said, "The city guys can do it on a couple of pairs of Nikes.

"Us rural guys need a couple of sets of Michelins."

So there's a lot of traveling just to get to the first door and start knocking and then attempting to attend those events in those particular communities.

So if you go from Fessenden to Rugby to McClusky to Steele to Rockford to Harvey, it does pose...

I did burn up tons of gallons of gas in my last election.

- [Dave] A lot of windshield time, for sure.

- Yes.

- So, if you could, just talk about your role as the assistant leader.

- Well, Dave, primarily I review the calendar, the calendar, which is the order of business that we do during a particular session.

I work with the front desk to try to keep things moving.

We look at bills and where they should be placed in the calendar.

We have the sixth order, which is amendments, 11th or 14th, which is a full bill, and then now we're getting into that conference committee time of the year, which is the 12th order.

So oftentimes, people are wondering what orders I'm hollering or suggesting to the president, but I work with the president, who happens to be our lieutenant governor, or if she's not there, in our case, it's Senator Bekkedahl, and as of this afternoon, it'll be Senator Davidson.

So I work with them in the front desk to work through our agenda, so that we rehearse a little to make things seem... Well, I think generally speaking, things go very smoothly other than if we have a technology glitch, but that's one of my roles as assistant leader.

And I think the other thing is I'm there to listen to, we have any number of new members.

They're wondering about the process and why you do this.

And we have a rule book, which is very descriptive as to how we move, what days we go from sixth order automatically to 11th or 14th.

And they ask questions, and I'm there to try to help them along, trying to understand the process and why we do the things we do.

So, I'm there to help the majority leader, but in many respects, it's to keep the action on the floor going and help with the new members so they understand the process better.

- Absolutely, that's why you need somebody like you in that kind of role to keep the train rolling.

- Well, Dave, you've been around a little longer than I have, but this is my 15th session.

Who would ever thought that the citizen would continue to elect me, but I have gone through eight elections, and in that entire time, we've seen a lot of changes.

We were there back in the days when it was all a paper project.

I mean, our bill books were literally this big with all kinds of staff running around, putting little amendments in.

So we have matured and just trying to get everyone to understand where you can call up something, how you can click up a bill and some of those issues now that become electronic.

And of course, these younger people that are coming now are certainly much more techy than I will ever be.

And so, they pick up at it pretty quickly and understand the process and what they can find and how much information is actually readily available right there in your laptop.

- And then you've got cameras in the chambers and in the hearing rooms, and people can tune in if they want.

- Well, the chamber was recorded back for many years, but there was a lot of anxiety about providing cameras in the committee rooms.

Well, COVID bounced that up, and so after COVID, we said, "Hey, you know what, "we're gonna have to stay six feet apart, "but we still want input from the citizens."

And our tech folks did just a remarkable job getting us set for the 21 session, and so we were able to separate ourselves.

But then every one of our committee rooms was wired, so citizens could watch, and they could tune in.

They could ask to be on the agenda, and then we started taking testimony remotely.

So if you have an expert from Washington DC who wants to speak on a particular issue that's really important, they can get their time in front of that committee, but every citizen then can also tune in and watch whatever committees and whatever action they want.

And then right after lunch, certainly tune in to either the House or the Senate to enjoy whatever might be more entertaining than the other chambers.

So, this technology has really come a long way.

I used to say my mom and dad really saw a lot of changes from being born in 1920 and then going through the horses and the cars, and finally, a TV and milking machines and electricity.

And I used to think, wow, they saw a lot.

Just think of what you and I have experienced and the technology changes and a computer now in our pocket as we go by our daily lives and the fact that we're connected.

And if we need information, we've got it there at the touch of a button, which back in the day, we still have a couple of sets of encyclopedias if you're interested in any of those, Dave, and also, the children's section of those books, which nobody looks at anymore because they could just Google it.

But yes, we've seen a tremendous amount of change in the legislature and how we do things, and we've been able to reduce staff.

And if you notice this year, there's not even any hard line phones at the desks.

Those were removed.

It was a cost savings.

Plus, nobody was using them anymore.

Everybody's pretty much on their cell phones.

If they're communicating with a constituent, they just use their cell phone.

And so we were saving, I dunno know, $10 a desk a month for four months, and so there was some cost savings to that, and it was an annoyance how many people kicked that phone off the side of their, under their desk.

But once again, and our desks is our office, so we don't have a whole lot of flexibility, and my door is always open if you wanna come stop by.

- Absolutely.

(Jerry laughs) Well, I wanted to get to some of the issues that as we're getting into the conference committee, the third period of the hockey game, so to speak.

Name your three most contentious or most interesting issues that you're watching.

- Well, I think everybody is kind of really interested in how our property tax issue's gonna land.

The House sent a bill over, we did some amending to it, so that it'll continue to be discussion.

So I think that will be the highlight of, and near the end, will be the point of discussion or conflict.

And then the other thing is we're looking to how much additional revenue we might have.

We didn't get a real rosy picture in this last budget report, revenue forecast with the stripper well issue happening and the revenue from oil not quite being to where we expected.

And of course, right now at the federal level and at the stock market, we're all wondering how bad or maybe we're just ticking.

It has not affected us at this point yet, so the other revenue sources that may be added to increase one of the property tax issues.

I think it's a point of contention when we talk about yearly sessions.

For me, I think I've been accustomed to working those 80 days or almost 80 days and worked hard.

We are very proud of the fact that we hear... Every bill gets a hearing, and every bill gets a floor vote.

I would sense that that will have to change into the future, because if we're going to limit ourselves to half of that per session, will the leader get too much power, and that could be another contentious issue.

I think just the whole budgeting process now is getting to where, you know, what's really a need and what's a want?

And, but nobody knows which one they are unless it's their ox that's getting gored, so to speak.

'Cause we're really trying to hone in on maintaining that revenue, knowing what the revenue is, knowing where we're... You know, as of Wednesday we were what, $172 million still upside down on the general fund.

So you take that $172 and expect the $75 million ending fund balance, that gets us up to $250 pretty quickly, and so there's some shaving that's gonna need to be done.

And those are always difficult times now when we become arguing with the, well I'm not saying arguing, creating compromise with our House colleagues.

- Well, they can get contentious at times depending on who's got a favorite thing in the debate.

- You know, you're absolutely correct.

I mean, we all have a favorite thing or something that we certainly think it's totally necessary where in 46 other senators' eyes, it's not, but that's what we... We come there to represent our district and then the state, and so sometimes our hearts are with our district until the very end, and then we have to realize that what's best for the state, and is this really something that's ultimately really important that we get passed, and that we can hang our hat and say, "Hey, I got this."

But so yes, you're absolutely right, we've got some work to be done on those conference committees, especially as it relates to the budgeting process and the tax issue.

- Well, the one budgeting process I did wanna bring up is I've been hearing a lot of back-channel talk about the new state hospital and that the Senate and the House are approaching it a little differently.

- That has been discussed any number of different ways.

As you may recall, we're looking at anywhere from $285 million to $330 million, depending on who you ask.

I believe that was in the human services budget, and I think it's been now moved to the OMB budget just to clear the human services budget and then have our folks directing the traffic as to how that money should be done.

Should that be built in Jamestown?

Do we need to have eight regional centers?

The constitution says the state hospital shall be in Jamestown.

We have to work around those parameters.

Do we bond for that?

Bonding is kind of...

The Senate is not really excited about bonding any issues.

We're more, if we can do this, we're gonna do it with SIIF funding, State Infrastructure and Improvement Fund, or maybe we don't need it at this point.

When do we need the money?

Are we shovel ready?

A lot of those things are being discussed on that state hospital issue, and I don't know where it's gonna...

There's certainly a lot of influences, and there's a lot of, that will be...

I'm glad you brought that up, because I think that'll be one of the last other things that's gonna be talked about and tried to get compromise to the very end.

- And you brought up bonding, 'cause I think that's an interesting discussion, because when you started the session, bonding looked like a possible option, but given some of the economics right now, maybe not so much.

At least that's what I'm hearing.

- Dave, I think you're right on.

Bonding was discussed early on.

The former governor had some discussion about using bonding as an ability to, I think not only help the state hospital situation, the military museum, Highway 85, there are some big-ticket items out there that we're looking at the bonding.

But keep in mind, we also are already spending about $100 million in maintaining our bond payments that we have already put out there for like the (indistinct) diversion that we decided we're gonna give you that money, now get it done and don't come back and bother us anymore.

But you know, I think that may be money well spent when we did that any number years ago.

And when you've got a project that's up and running, I mean, it's not only the shovels are are shoveling, and so I think it's a way to, in this case, get our money's worth, because we did it at a particular time when costs were tremendously, are a lot lower than they currently are.

And we talked, you mentioned the museum, or I mentioned the museum, the military museum.

I'm told that the bids on the military museum, which is not gonna be nearly as large as the Heritage Center, are more than what we spent to build the entire Heritage Center.

So, if you think about where the cost of doing business is going, it's grown substantially over the last few years.

- It's funny you should bring that up, because I was thinking about the Heritage Center the other day, and I remember the discussions and the pros and cons when that was being discussed.

- Well, yes, there were pros, there were cons.

And I think what we found was as we worked through, especially on the water projects, we wanted to just take that off, because it was impeding our ability to expand water projects, important water projects throughout the state.

And so we kind of tried to move that off the table, so we can move forward with some of our rural water projects.

I think we're still trying to finish up the Minot flood control project.

And so that was one of the thoughts, that we've got that hanging there, hanging over our heads, and so we're trying to be careful that we are funding projects that can get done in the next two years.

I mean, North Dakota only has so many contractors.

We can only get so much project... Our construction window is relatively small, so I think we have to be careful in providing dollars for projects that aren't gonna be ready until two, four, six years from now.

- Okay, there is a project that you talked about water projects.

There's one project that may take a while, and that's the Red River Valley Water Supply Project.

- (sighs) Well Dave, that project goes right through a big chunk of my district, and I had a lot of individuals who are not supportive of digging the six-foot pipe in the ground across their property and going from over by McClusky all the way to north of (indistinct), dumping it in and getting underneath the water to Fargo eventually.

So, that project, it's a big project, and it's a state project, so we have a little more flexibility as to where it goes and how we're doing it.

But it will tie up a lot of resources as far as water projects that could be done in different areas of the state.

But they're whittling away at it, whether we do nine miles, 10 miles, whatever, it's a huge pipe, it's one pipe per truck.

It's gonna impact a lot of roads.

So, I'm a skeptic on that project, and yeah, and the other thing is we have the diversion ditch north of Fessenden, which was just being talked about back when we moved there in '78.

And there was a lot of controversy, and we watched this canal cut through our county, create a lot of disruption to rural traffic, rural roads, added a lot of new rural bridges that now are becoming issues, and it absolutely serves no function, and that's been a difficult thing for the Wells County folks or even folks who may have experienced it from Sheridan County all the way through Eddy County to see something, you know, the canal to nowhere, and the resources that were spent, the dollars tied up in that thing.

And so there there's some skepticism about will this pipe be the true answer.

And so, I think that one is still out for debate - Yet I know that some of the supporters of the project say that it might benefit counties, might benefit Fessenden perhaps if you can get some water from it.

But that's a another difficult discussion, I'm sure.

- And I'm not sure.

I haven't followed the session as much as I did last session when we tried to help my producers in Southern Wells County with some conflict that they may someday have with the Red River Water Supply.

But cities are signing up and trying to be in line, similar to a major gas project.

But when this project gets done, hey, we're gonna buy some water from you, and a couple of questions there.

I don't think we know yet what the water's gonna cost, but communities along the way, and certainly, this is a project that we're certainly hoping to help the valley.

The Red River Valley is, you've seen the old pictures of the thirties when there wasn't hardly but a trickle going down the Red River.

Do we have some concerns about that?

Maybe.

And whether or not we get there, you know, this is a big project, and it's expensive.

- Well, it just can't be done in one session.

Well, it can't be done in two years.

- I would suggest it's gonna be a while before we get this thing completely done.

- You know, there are other water projects.

Of course, you've got the Southwest, which is just kind of an upgrade of what they've got going there.

You've got the NAWS Project in the Minot area, the Northwest Area Water Supply Project.

You had mentioned the Red River, the flood, which is happening in the Red River Valley diversion.

And then in Minot, you've got the Minot Flood Control Project too.

- We have a lot of water projects and fortunately for us, I think the state is benefiting, certainly the goose that's laying those eggs out west, and the money we're taking off of the oil revenue to put in that resource trust fund, which is money, the resource trust fund and money used for water projects.

And that's a dedicated source, which we didn't have up until we developed that formula, so that the water would flow, general fund, SIIP fund, Resource Trust Fund, and everybody got a share, and hopefully at the end, the prairie dog, would benefit our community, our towns, cities, and townships, actually.

So, I think with the oil revenue and hopefully, we can maintain that.

That has provided us with an opportunity to do a lot of water projects that were stalled back in the early 2000s when I was here.

When we started, we were struggling with, well we're trying to keep our young people here into the state.

We're all struggling with projects, 'cause we didn't have any sort of revenue that was, you know, we'd gone through the boons and busts of oil.

So, and now we are trying to catch up, and there's lots of projects, and hopefully, we can get caught up before there should be a downturn in the oil revenue, 'cause that would be critical with well over 50% of our budget comes in some form from oil.

- Well, since you mentioned that the old adage is, "Oil and water don't mix," and we've proven that wrong in North Dakota.

- Well, yes and no.

- In a way, in a way.

- But yes, or the old adage that, "Whiskey's for drinking "and water's for fighting over," because every time we, you know...

There's always conflicting in many respects, although the folks out west, we have tried to help them.

We've done a lot for Western North Dakota to help with their infrastructure, because they were really impacted during the boom, you know, the early 2010 to 13, and the workers coming and going and living in cars, and well, along with that comes more crime and more people and more housing issues.

And I think we're at a point now where things are really working out, I think, for the citizens and Western North Dakota, and we've got people living there and sending their children to schools and participating in the community.

So, I think we've leveled that off, so I think in a lot of respects, I thank our Western North Dakota folks.

And at one point, it seemed like they were in with their hand out constantly, and I understood.

When you traveled out there, you knew why.

But I think we've reached a point now where they continue to help us out, and now, they're contributing to the entire state.

And that was the whole idea when we developed the formulas, and of course, Senator Wardner and the Prairie Dog Dollars that he worked through in that formula.

- We've got about a minute left, so I just have a couple real quick questions for you.

(indistinct), when?

- Well, our goal is April 30th, which would provide us with an additional seven days of an opportunity to call us back.

We won't be past the 80 days.

Concern there being we don't know what's happening at the federal level.

We don't know what's happening in the oil world.

We want to have that opportunity to call us back.

So, we are on this April 30th, so if you're taking any bets with your friends, bet on April 30th, 'cause you heard it from me.

- I've already lost my bets on that, so but okay.

Very briefly, speed limits, yes or no, going to 80 miles per hour?

- The bill is gonna be heard by early next week.

80 passed the committee.

I'm not an 80 supporter, but Senator Rommel has done a tremendous amount of work to, okay, if we're gonna go 80, let's also provide some additional penalties.

Our whole fine system is all goofed up.

Our point system's all goofed up, so he's got a lot of work.

It's gonna be on the floor.

We'll see where that... We'll see if we can move that down the road.

- Well, thank you for being here.

- Oh, Dave, thank you.

It's always been a pleasure.

- My guest today, Senator Jerry Klein of Fessenden, the assistant leader in the North Dakota Senate.

For "Prairie Public," I'm Dave Thompson.

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