A 10-Year Assessment of Equitable Geographic Inclusion in Minnesota's Legacy Amendment

Abstract

As a dynamic model for public funding to the arts - and the single largest state-based conservation finance measure to pass in the nation's history - Minnesota's Clean Water, Land and Legacy Amendment dictates annual government spending to environmental, artistic, and cultural causes in an unprecedented method. The Legacy Amendment boasts the largest voter turnout for an issue referendum in Minnesota's history and represents a nationally distinct policy model responsible for more than $3 billion in total dollars designated for the aforementioned purposes from 2009 to 2021. This project interrogates only one of several measurable areas of the policy model, specifically examining the geographic spread of funds over the amendment's first 10 years and using an equity lens to explore the relationship between government spending and the measure of "fairness" as a key criterion for success. Previous research exploring socially equitable public administration has challenged such ambiguous benchmarks for policy goals, instead encouraging more empirical, contextual definitions of how success might be determined. With these critiques in mind, this study lays the groundwork for understanding the Legacy Amendment as a multi-pronged instrument of economic subjectivity by navigating how the relationship between legislative priorities and spending decisions manifested during the first decade of the policy. Initial findings indicate approximately two-thirds of all Legacy funds affected statewide or multi-county causes, demonstrating a broad alignment with policy goals. Despite significant variances in total dollars spent, higher density urban areas and economic development regions demonstrated relatively parallel ratios in their share of Legacy spending per capita. The baseline data collected through this project lends itself to future examination of the Legacy Amendment's other self-described and perceivably benevolent goals.