The Minnesota Legislature hit a key deadline last week. Committees in the state House and Senate had until 5 p.m. on March 22 to act on proposed policy bills, said Sen. Gary Dahms.

“Now, we’ll start deliberating bills on the floor a lot more,” said Dahms, R-Redwood Falls.

This week, Dahms and Rep. Chris Swedzinski, R-Ghent, gave an update on the current legislative session and talked about issues of concern.

“There are a lot of things still sitting out there,” Dahms said.

“The governor makes it sound like there’s not a lot going on,” Swedzinski said of this year’s session. However, he said there was “a lot of, quite frankly, radical stuff” being proposed in the legislature.

One issue that both Swedzinski and Dahms touched on was the Republican effort to restore a religious exemption in the Minnesota Human Rights Act, which would protect religious organizations and schools against claims of gender identity discrimination.

Without a religious exemption, the inclusion of gender identity in the Minnesota Human Rights Act would open Christian, Muslim and Jewish organizations and schools up to the possibility of lawsuits, Swedzinski said. “It’s very concerning,” he said.

“It’s a more serious issue than a lot of people think it is,” Dahms said.

Swedzinski said a House proposal for a religious exemption was tabled by majority Democrats. “I’m not sure where it’s going to wind up,” he said.

Dahms said a similar amendment to the Minnesota HRA was proposed by Senate Republicans. “So far, the DFL has not taken any of our amendments,” he said.

Swedzinski said he was also concerned about a bill that could allow the state legislature to meet year-round. The proposal would change provisions in the state constitution that set a mandatory adjournment date in May, and limit the number of days the legislature can be in session each biennium.

Having a “full-time legislature” would make running for office infeasible for many Minnesotans, Swedzinski said.

“That really changes the game,” he said. Meeting year-round was “just not an option” for small business owners or people who are raising families, he said.

Earlier this month, Dahms said it was positive that a couple of controversial proposals, including a bill supporting assisted suicide and a bill to make Minnesota a “sanctuary state” for undocumented immigrants, did not have the votes to move forward in the legislature.

Swedzinski said this week it wasn’t certain that sanctuary state and assisted suicide proposals were gone for good. However, Dahms said the proposals had met resistance from legislators on both sides of the aisle.

“We heard a lot on those two bills,” he said.

In addition to policy issues, Dahms said there were some things coming up this session he wanted to focus on. One was to address bills passed last year that still needed work or corrections.

“We’ve also got a bonding bill coming up, and that’s certainly something we’re going to be focusing on,” Dahms said. This year there were a lot of bonding requests from cities and organizations in southwest Minnesota, and Dahms said he wanted to help “shepherd them through” the bonding bill process.