Democrat McCollum emphasizes schools, health care and opposition to war in Iraq

10/21/2006

BY TAD VEZNER
Pioneer Press

“People don’t move here for the weather,” U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum tells a group of labor leaders over morning bagels and coffee at the St. Paul Area Trades and Labor Assembly. She’s talking about what attracts businesses, and their employees, to Minnesota.

What does it, then?

“Schools” are the first of several things she ticks off, followed by “amenities.”

A six-year incumbent of Minnesota’s 4th Congressional District, education has become McCollum’s focus and spur: She points out that she was the only Democrat on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce to vote in committee against the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001 (one Republican joined her in voting “no").

“I’m gonna be a teacher for a minute,” she tells a group of parents and educators in Roseville, trying to explain, during the height of election season, the esoteric federal funding ills facing the K-12 public school system. “Our kids are seeing the lowest investment in them in decades.”

McCollum, 52, rails against “unfunded and under-funded federal mandates,” from No Child Left Behind to the Head Start program to funding for students with disabilities. Next year’s No Child programs in Minnesota were shorted $152 million during the appropriation process. Nationwide, the programs’ funding levels sit at 58.4 percent.

“They’ve continued to be cut, cut, cut, cut, cut!”

McCollum has authored a bill (now languishing in a congressional subcommittee) that would allow states to skirt the mandates of No Child Left Behind unless the program is fully funded by the federal government.

For a time, in the late 1980s, she was in the classroom. She was a substitute social studies teacher while working as an appliance and carpet sales manager at Sears — and also as a city council member.

Her official induction into politics came in 1986 during her second run for North St. Paul City Council. Her first run, two years before, was prompted after her 2-year-old daughter fell off a slide and cracked her skull. She approached council members and grew angry at a perceived lack of response.

That year, she came in “dead-dog last” out of five candidates vying for two seats. But she befriended Mayor William Sandberg, who put her in a decent position for her second run — and also put her on the city’s parks and recreation board, where she ensured there was enough sand around the local slides to prevent serious injuries.

In her first run for the Minnesota House of Representatives in 1992, she ran against a 12-year incumbent and won. She was elected to the U.S. House in 2000 — taking the seat after the death of U.S. Rep. Bruce Vento, who held it for 24 years.

Beyond education, health care is a core concern for McCollum: She touts co-founding (with the help of two Republicans) a congressional caucus to address global health issues, with an immediate focus on a bird flu pandemic. As for the war in Iraq: “The people in my district didn’t think we should go. And I agreed with them.” She voted against the war’s authorization in 2002.

A resident of St. Paul, McCollum grew up in South St. Paul with a father who was a Democrat and a mother who was Republican. “I didn’t know which party I would join in the beginning,” she said. She joined the Democratic Party because she saw it as allowing a greater variety and flexibility of views “coming together for the common good.”

According to Project Vote Smart, McCollum received these scores from special interest groups in 2005: NARAL Pro-Choice America (100 percent), National Association of Wheat Growers (40 percent), National Taxpayers Union (17 percent), U.S. Chamber of Commerce (33 percent), NAACP (100 percent), National Education Association (100 percent), Family Research Council (0 percent), NOW (100 percent), Gun Owners of America (25 percent), American Public Health Association (100 percent). The ratings reflect, among other factors, how often the politician voted in support of the group’s preferred position. According to the National Journal, McCollum voted more liberal on economic, defense and foreign policy issues than 94 percent of the representatives.

Tad Vezner can be reached at or 651-228-5461.

Betty McCollum

Political party: Democratic

Age: 52

Hometown: St. Paul

Family: One son, one daughter

Professional: Former North St. Paul City Council member (three terms); Minnesota House member (four terms); U.S. House member(three terms). Prior to that, a substitute teacher and sales manager at Sears.

Information: http://www.mccollum.house.gov; 651-224-9191