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Michigan taxpayers deserve to know how their money is being spent, especially when that money is doled out to private companies. But some state entities, including the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, still resist providing public records to taxpayers.
In a recent lawsuit, the Mackinac Center and our client, Michigan Rising Action, successfully fought attempts by the MEDC to delay releasing records about its dealings with a Michigan subsidiary of a Chinese company.
Michigan Rising was investigating American Lidar Inc., a corporation whose parent company, the Hesai Group, had been declared a threat to national security by the U.S. government. Michigan Rising wanted to understand any connection between American Lidar and the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, so it requested e-mails, correspondence, and other records from the MEDC. This routine Freedom of Information Act request should have been met with prompt compliance. Unfortunately, it took a lawsuit to force the agency to produce records that belong to the public.
Michigan Rising sent an initial request to the MEDC on May 29, 2024. The agency acknowledged the request, estimating it would take 16 hours and $593.48 to fulfill. Michigan Rising mailed a check. As the weeks passed, Michigan Rising repeatedly attempted to contact the MEDC for an update. Over six weeks later, the MEDC finally responded. Its response was lackluster. The agency simply said that it was working on the request and couldn’t say when it would be finished. Frustrated with the unreasonable delay, Michigan Rising came to the Mackinac Center for help.
These delays were no surprise. The Michigan Economic Development Corporation has long resisted attempts to shine a light on its incentive programs.
Michigan’s Freedom of Information Act does not require government bodies to produce records on a fixed timeline. Instead, they may issue nonbinding, good-faith estimates of the time it will take to complete a request. But that discretion is not unlimited. A public body’s estimated time frame must be met by diligent work to fulfill the request. The Mackinac Center’s lawsuit argued that the MEDC’s estimate and slow response violated this basic standard.
The lawsuit was quickly dismissed after the MEDC produced hundreds of pages of unredacted records in a little over a week. We are pleased with the result, but it should not take a lawsuit to obtain public records. We hope that this lawsuit will encourage public bodies such as the MEDC to take their responsibilities to be transparent more seriously and to produce records in a reasonable time frame.
