Do Prop 4 Supporters Know What It's About?

The executive director of a group pushing Proposal 4, the forced unionization of home-based caregivers, appears to be unsure of exactly what he supports.

In the Detroit Free Press, Norm Delisle of the Michigan Disability Rights Coalition said the public supports changing the constitution for "measures such as training and background checks for home health care workers."

Without the measure, Delisle said, it will "become increasingly difficult to find qualified home health care providers."

Delisle and his group, which is backed by the Service Employees International Union, have an interest in focusing on the innocuous-sounding part of this initiative. They hope that people will read "training" and "background checks" and "home care workers" and "safety" in the petition and vote for it, thinking the issue is solely about a simple home care group.

But this is false.

Every single thing Delisle claims Prop 4 will do is already happening: An entity devoted to home care already exists. There is already training for workers. A registry can be found online right now. Patients already receive financial help to hire caregivers. Absolutely nothing Delisle mentioned is new.

So if all this is already happening, what exactly would this ballot proposal change? Enshrining in the constitution the forced unionization of these caregivers.

A government employee union is trying to force into the Michigan Constitution a proposal that allows them to continue skimming millions of dollars per year, mostly from families taking care of their disabled loved ones. That is what Proposal 4 is all about.

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