By: Jacob Wheeler, Staff Reporter

Governor-elect Mark Dayton today offered the following comments on the United States Census Bureau’s announcement that Minnesota would retain eight seats in Congress as part of its reapportionment process:

“Thank you to the Minnesotans who responded to the 2010 Census and helped us achieve the second highest response rate in the nation. I am very pleased that Minnesota will continue to have eight Representatives in the United States Congress. As our state faces dire budget circumstances and Minnesota families continue to struggle in a tough economy, we simply could not afford to lose an important voice in our national policy discussion, nor the billions of federal dollars that are allocated to our state based on population. While we will maintain eight congressional seats in Washington, we will still face a redistricting process that will change the geographical boundaries for Minnesota’s representation in Washington and in our state’s Capitol. We must adopt a process that encourages transparency, fairness, and absolute integrity. In the end, we must arrive at districts that best serve, not one political party or the other, but Minnesotans as a whole.”