Background from the first article in this series:

Thousands of people throughout Michigan have been forced into a union because they receive assistance from the state while they take care of loved ones who are disabled. The Service Employees International Union receives close to $6 million annually in forced dues from this abusive arrangement. 

House Bill 4003 would end this injustice by clarifying that Michiganders who care for relatives in their own homes are not government employees, and hence are not appropriate targets for government unions. That bill has passed the House but is stuck in the Senate. While we wait for the Senate to act, the SEIU continues to siphon money that was meant to help families.

Here's one example of where that money might be going, drawn from the SEIU's 2010 LM-2 report.

The Ballot Initiative Strategy Center claims to be "the progressive community’s only research and capacity-building organization focused solely on the ballot measure process." It received three payments from the Service Employees International Union totaling $185,000 in 2010.

According to BISC, its key issues are:

• Working Families ("Disguising cuts to funding for education, health care, and other key public services as ‘good economics’ is an old trick used by the right wing to push ideological ballot measures into law.");
• Clean Energy and Environmental Protection;
• Equal Opportunity;
• Immigration;
• LGBT Equality;
• Reproductive Justice.

BISC is one of many organizations that Michigan taxpayers are indirectly supporting with money that is supposed to be used to help families care for disabled people.

Tuesday: America Votes.

Previously:

Clean Economy Development Center

Change That Works

Applied Research Center

Brave New Foundation

The Atlas Project

Change.org

SEIU Healthcare Michigan

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