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Dear Friends and Neighbors,

Over the past 9 sessions, I have been focused on addressing the priorities for constituents in Bloomington and Richfield. We have made progress in many areas, but there is more work to be done and that is why I am running for re-election to represent our new district 51 in the Minnesota Senate. I would be honored to represent the communities of Richfield, Bloomington, and Minneapolis at the State Capitol.

As the 2022 campaign season gets underway, I hope to introduce myself and talk with you about the issues you care about. Given all the challenges we are facing right now, I will be working with my colleagues to find the best solutions that set us on a path to a fair and just recovery from the pandemic. Education, health care, children's issues, and improving access to mental health care have been priorities for me.

I will continue to work hard to represent residents in a way that addresses our communities’ needs for strong schools, affordable health care and prescription drugs, investment in infrastructure, and preserving our environment. If you would like to receive email updates from our campaign you can add your name and email address below. Thank you for visiting my website, and let's stay in touch. I value your input and look forward to hearing from you in the weeks ahead.

2022 Legislative Session Priorities:

Rebuilding an economy that empowers those most affected by COVID
- Pass the Frontline Worker Bonus bill in order to provide some relief for those who worked to take care of us all through the pandemic.
- Use the surplus to raise the wages for those working in caring professions such as Direct Service Professionals, nursing home workers, and child care workers.

Prioritizing investments in all of Minnesota’s children, families, and communities
- Pass funding bills to fully fund Minnesota's special education and English Language Learner programs.
- Invest in affordable housing and address racial equity gaps with a state rent assistance program.

Working to ensure all Minnesotans have access to health care and prescription drugs at prices they can afford.
- Ensure women have access to reproductive health and abortion care with no barriers.
- Build towards a system where everyone has affordable access to the health care they need. Melissa is Senate author of the MinnesotaCare buy-in plan bill and the Minnesota Health Plan bill.

Other key issues:

Building an early childhood care and education system that allows families to find affordable and accessible high-quality child care anywhere in Minnesota and ensure that providers are paid what they deserve for the important work they do. This means restructuring our current model where providers are often unable to live on the wages they make.
Legalizing and regulating adult-use cannabis. To do this effectively, we must allocate resources to support substance abuse prevention, substance abuse treatment, and youth education activities.
Reducing gun violence in our communities by passing evidence-based, common sense reforms.

ABOUT

Deep roots in our communities

Melissa’s roots are deep in our communities with her parents and extended family living close by in Bloomington and Richfield. Melissa grew up in Bloomington and attended Bloomington public schools including graduating from Kennedy High School. Melissa’s parents were both public employees and both devoted their careers to public service: her mother as an educator in Bloomington and her father as a state employee. Melissa and her husband, Craig, have lived for 36 years at the same address in Bloomington and have two children.

Melissa has a Bachelors Degree from the University of Minnesota in Electrical Engineering and worked for a telecommunications and Internet services company as an engineer, manager and director. Her roles included providing field support of telecommunications equipment, testing and developing new data services and managing teams of network engineers, systems architects and software developers.

Melissa has also been active in her community, working on many committees and boards relating to school, church and sports as her children were growing up. In 2009, she was elected to the Bloomington School Board and served her last year as Chair. As a Board member, she was an active member of District committees and chaired the Legislative Committee. Melissa brought her leadership skills as well as her background in data analysis to the position in order to help the School Board effectively perform its governance and policy-making roles.