Steve Sviggum

Steven A. "Steve" Sviggum is a Minnesota politician, a member of the University of Minnesota Board of Regents, and an executive assistant to and communications director for the Republican caucus in the Minnesota Senate.[1] A former Speaker and member of the Minnesota House of Representatives, Sviggum represented District 28B in the southeastern part of the state. The area was known as District 25A until the 1982 legislative redistricting, and then as District 26A until the 1992 redistricting, and has included all or portions of Dakota, Dodge, Goodhue, Olmsted, Steele, Wabasha, Waseca and Winona counties.[2]

Steve Sviggum
56th Speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives
In office
January 5, 1999 – January 2, 2007
Preceded byPhil Carruthers
Succeeded byMargaret Anderson Kelliher
Minnesota House Minority Leader
In office
April 17, 1992 – January 4, 1999
Preceded byTerry Dempsey
Succeeded byTom Pugh
Member of the Minnesota House of Representatives
from the 28B, 26A, 25A district
In office
January 3, 1979 – July 17, 2007
Preceded byJames F. White
Succeeded bySteve Drazkowski
Personal details
Born (1951-09-15) September 15, 1951
Minnesota
Political partyIndependent-Republican
Republican
Spouse(s)Debra
Children3
ResidenceKenyon, Minnesota
Alma materSt. Olaf College
Professioneducator, farmer, regent, legislator

Background

Of Norwegian-American ancestry, Sviggum was born in September 1951. He received a B.A. in mathematics from St. Olaf College in Northfield, and later worked as both a teacher and a farmer.[3]

Service and leadership in the Minnesota House

Sviggum was first elected to the House in 1978. He served as minority leader from April 17, 1992 to 1999,[4] and became Speaker after the 1998 elections, when the Republicans took control of the House. He began his speakership under unusual circumstances, as 1998 also saw the election of Reform Party candidate Jesse Ventura as governor while the Democrats retained control of the Minnesota Senate. Sviggum was the leader of the Republicans in a government divided among three political parties.[5][6]

In 2003 Sviggum alleged that then-State Representative Rebecca Otto had knowingly distributed false campaign materials. Otto was indicted, but the presiding judge dismissed the charges.[7]

In the 2006 election, the Democrats regained control of the House, ending Sviggum's tenure as Speaker. Though he won reelection to his House seat, he chose not seek a leadership position in the next session. Democrat Margaret Anderson Kelliher succeeded him as Speaker.[8]

State commissioner

On June 26, 2007, Governor Tim Pawlenty announced that Sviggum would succeed Scott Brenner as Minnesota Commissioner of Labor and Industry. He resigned from his House seat and took over the position on July 17, 2007, serving until December 2010. A special election held on August 7, 2007, to determine Sviggum's successor was won by Republican Steve Drazkowski of Wabasha.[9][10]

On December 2, 2010, in the waning days of the Pawlenty administration, Sviggum was appointed Commissioner of the Minnesota Management and Budget Office, the department responsible for preparing budget proposals for the governor.[11] He served just over a month, leaving office with Pawlenty on January 3, 2011.[12]

University of Minnesota regent

Sviggum and former Representative Laura Brod were elected to the University of Minnesota's Board of Regents on February 21, 2011, by a joint meeting of the Minnesota House and Senate. He is serving a six-year term on the 12-member body, which is charged with overseeing the University of Minnesota system.[13][14]

Work with Minnesota senate

On January 16, 2012, Sviggum was named communications director and executive assistant for the Republican caucus in the Minnesota Senate. Sviggum replaced Michael Brodkorb, who had resigned in the wake of a scandal involving former Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch. Sviggum was criticized for his intention to remain a regent during his tenure with the Senate. Senate Minority Leader Tom Bakk said he believed holding both positions was a conflict of interest.[15]

Sviggum admitted that taxpayers should not have paid for pamphlets created by the Minnesota Senate Republican communications department and used by 15 Republican Senators for Republican attendees of precinct caucuses. He publicly apologized for using taxpayer's resources to produce campaign materials.[16]

On June 11, 2012, the Minnesota Office of Administrative Hearings ruled that sufficient evidence existed for a complaint the Minnesota DFL Party filed against Sviggum and 14 Republican Senators regarding the pamphlets to continue. The complaint against Senator Doug Magnus was dismissed.[17]

gollark: Yes.
gollark: ```sqlnonlocality=# EXPLAIN ANALYZE SELECT url, ts_rank(fts, query) AS rank, ts_headline(fts::text, query, 'MaxWords=60') FROM pages, websearch_to_tsquery('bee') query WHERE fts @@ query ORDER BY rank LIMIT 1; QUERY PLAN -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Limit (cost=860.79..861.06 rows=1 width=96) (actual time=35935.590..35935.594 rows=1 loops=1) -> Result (cost=860.79..874.83 rows=52 width=96) (actual time=35935.587..35935.589 rows=1 loops=1) -> Sort (cost=860.79..860.92 rows=52 width=178) (actual time=35934.109..35934.111 rows=1 loops=1) Sort Key: (ts_rank(pages.fts, query.query)) Sort Method: top-N heapsort Memory: 25kB -> Nested Loop (cost=0.25..860.53 rows=52 width=178) (actual time=444.148..35932.932 rows=349 loops=1) Join Filter: (pages.fts @@ query.query) Rows Removed by Join Filter: 10272 -> Function Scan on websearch_to_tsquery query (cost=0.25..0.26 rows=1 width=32) (actual time=0.038..0.041 rows=1 loops=1) -> Seq Scan on pages (cost=0.00..728.95 rows=10495 width=142) (actual time=10.189..289.581 rows=10621 loops=1) Planning Time: 0.184 ms Execution Time: 35935.637 ms(12 rows)```
gollark: What? Why does it say it's doing a sequential scan now? Æ all is bee.
gollark: Slower, even.
gollark: Oops, it turns out I'm accidentally sorting by it instead of the rank, but it's equally slow after fixing that.

References
  1. Senate GOP taps Sviggum as communications chief
  2. http://www.leg.state.mn.us/legdb/fulldetail.asp?ID=10643
  3. http://www.leg.state.mn.us/legdb/fulldetail.asp?ID=10643
  4. Smith, Dane (April 18, 1992). "Sviggum chosen IR's leader in the House". Star Tribune.
  5. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on July 20, 2011. Retrieved March 4, 2011.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  6. http://www.leg.state.mn.us/legdb/fulldetail.asp?ID=10643
  7. http://www.presspubs.com/news/article_7e032ec6-ed4b-5d28-8503-cb5331e56b62.html
  8. http://www.leg.state.mn.us/legdb/fulldetail.asp?ID=10643
  9. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on July 20, 2011. Retrieved March 4, 2011.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  10. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on March 28, 2012. Retrieved March 4, 2011.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  11. Former House leader Sviggum named to budget post
  12. http://www.leg.state.mn.us/legdb/fulldetail.asp?ID=10643
  13. http://politicsinminnesota.com/blog/2011/02/former-legislators-brod-sviggum-among-four-regents-approved/
  14. http://thekenyonleader.com/news.php?viewStory=3943
  15. Senate GOP taps Sviggum as communications chief
  16. Scheck, Thomas (February 14, 2012). "Sviggum apologizes for pamphlet mistake". Minnesota Public Radio. Retrieved July 1, 2012.
  17. Scheck, Thomas (June 11, 2012). "DFLers cry foul over GOP fliers printed with public money". Minnesota Public Radio. Retrieved July 1, 2012.
Preceded by
Phil Carruthers		 Speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives
1999–2007		 Succeeded by
Margaret Anderson Kelliher
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