Gov. Tim Walz and legislative leaders reached a deal for a special session of the Minnesota Legislature to convene Monday morning at 10 a.m. and finish no later than 7 a.m. on Tuesday.

Lawmakers say there’s no chance they won’t finish by the deadline.

“In politics as in life, you’re only as good as your word,” said DFL House Speaker Emerita Melissa Hortman at a news conference on Friday. “We have signed our names to a document. All the people who signed that document intend to live up to their word.” When asked what would happen if they don’t finish by 7 a.m. Tuesday, Republican House Speaker Lisa Demuth simply said, “We’ll get the work done.”

That confidence might have been diminished if they’d watched a contentious three-hour hearing of the Transportation Working Group, where metro county commissioners lined up to criticize a surprise provision in the transportation bill that shifts $93 million from counties to the Met Council.

“We sincerely ask you to remove the proposal that threatens county projects and reduces our ability to deliver on the promise of fundamental change in our transportation system,” said Dakota County Commissioner Laurie Halverson, a former state lawmaker.

Another former lawmaker and now Washington County Commissioner, Karla Bigham, says she was appalled by the process to make this change in the transportation bill. “The transportation working group’s decision to slash county funding in half without a bill, without a public hearing, lack of transparency and without the voices of counties is simply unacceptable,” she testified.

The county commissioners had support from Republican lawmakers who oppose the provision. “This came from left field,” said Sen. John Jasinski, R-Faribault. “It was not talked about. There was no committee. No bill. There was nothing. So I was really shocked when I heard about it.”

Rep. Jon Koznick, R-Lakeville, urged anyone watching or listening to Friday’s hearing to call their lawmakers. “In total, $93 million is being stolen from those counties, and the investments are not necessarily going to be made in those counties,” he said of the shift from counties to the Met Council for bus rapid transit projects likely to happen in just a few counties.

“I hope you’ll call your legislators and say, ‘Please get this removed from the transportation bill.’”

He says the transportation bill will be jeopardized unless the provision is removed. “I’m not sure it’s going to pass with this provision in it, but taking this out will probably ensure that it does pass,” he said.

The prospects for doing that seem dim after Hortman said she expects few changes to any of the bills.

When asked if there’s something wrong with adding a major new provision to a bill with no hearings or public testimony, she said, “They’re having a hearing right now and as Leader Demuth said if there’s any changes they’re going to have to be agreed to by four leaders and the governor. I don’t anticipate any changes to these bills except for a few pieces we know are parked on the side of the road.”

When asked if it’s fair to have a hearing after a decision is already made, she simply said that’s common at the Capitol.

“That is often how things unfold in the Legislature, where there’s a lot of different alternatives to how you can accomplish something, and when people finally agree on what it is that’s when you have a public conversation. What the House and Senate did in 2023, and the governor signed into law, was a metro area sales tax that provided new revenue for transportation, and the deal in 2023 was that the counties would get 17% of it. The new deal is that counties are going to get 8.5% of it. They’re still getting new revenue from the metro area sales tax, but because we have an anticipated shortfall in the general fund, they’re not getting as much new money as they were going to get. It’s still more than they were getting before.”

Opponents say they will continue trying to remove the provision in the special session on Monday. There are other potential obstacles, ranging from health insurance for undocumented immigrants to the tax bill that still needs to be resolved.