A “favor” the Michigan Department of Corrections gave Jackson County has cost taxpayers millions of dollars, Fiscal Policy Director Michael LaFaive told The Jackson Citizen Patriot.
The MDOC has continued a contract with Jackson County, buying steam from the county’s incinerator to use at state prisons in Jackson, even though a 20-year contract between the two parties expired in 2007. The state kept the contract in place until this year, when bonds used to originally build the incinerator will be paid off. It would have been “unfair to leave the county with debt when they were trying to assist us,” a DOC spokesman told The Citizen Patriot as to why the state kept paying.
By Jack McHugh
If the Republican-controlled Michigan Legislature votes to accept the Obamacare Medicaid expansion, it will prop-up an unpopular and vulnerable law that practically all members of the majority caucus have said should be repealed. How could this be? Wes Nakagiri, a savvy Tea Party leader from Livingston County, has explained one very possible scenario for his members:
By Jack McHugh
This week Michigan Capitol Confidential reported a committee vote to adopt a substitute version of House Bill 4714, the Obamacare Medicaid expansion. The next day some of the Republicans named in that report voted against advancing this bill to the full House. These expansion opponents were Reps. Kevin Cotter, Ken Goike, Ray Franz, Tom Leonard and Dan Lauwers. While these legislators missed the chance to place a "speed bump" in front of Obamacare capitulation, on the more important committee action they voted against accepting the Medicaid expansion.
In so many ways, Michigan’s got it good compared to Nebraska. We boast Michigan State University for one and the birthplace of punk, Motown and heavy metal for another. Hemingway hunted and fished here as a boy; it’s the birthplace of both George C. Scott and Dick York; and the Upper Peninsula inspired the poetry and fiction of Janet Lewis.
Monday the Foundation for Excellence in Education sent out an email under the masthead “Common Core State Standards” that proclaimed the Mackinac Center “has endorsed higher standards for Wolverine State students.” Although the email never stated that the Mackinac Center actually favored the Common Core, many could have easily been led to believe just that. The email was based on a Gongwer summary (subscription required) of an article I wrote, but unfortunately fails to capture my opinion on Common Core.
Senior Legislative Analyst Jack McHugh testified before the Michigan House’s Competitiveness Committee Tuesday about why the state should not expand Medicaid under Obamacare, according to The Detroit News.
“Why in the world would you want to be remembered as the politicians who helped prop up this law at the very moment when it was becoming highly vulnerable to a serious course correction?” McHugh asked the legislators.
The Daily Caller and Reason today highlight a recent Michigan Capitol Confidential story about the 2013-2014 Michigan teacher of the year who, thanks to his district’s single salary schedule, makes about $21,000 a year less than the average teacher in that district.
Those of us who have championed capitalism and free markets have had a tough go of it in an era of financial meltdowns, Occupy Wall Street and the snarky fella at the end of the bar who persistently bloviates that the rich keep getting richer while the poor keep getting poorer, free trade is a bust and soon we’ll resort to eating our young and elderly.
MichiganVotes.org has the details on a resolution to support "International Talk Like A Pirate Day" introduced last week by state Sen. Roger Kahn, R-Saginaw.
Sen. Kahn playfully sported an eye patch while his proposal was discussed, but the moment of frivolity is bound to remind observers of how members of a full-time Legislature can be full-time mischief makers, whether they intend to or not.
If Michigan Republicans capitulate to special interests and accept the Obamacare Medicaid expansion, they’re likely to make a big deal about a supposed “opt-out” clause in the instrument of surrender, declaring the state can bail at some future time if certain promises and expectations don’t come true.
(Editor’s note: The following is a sneak peek at the summer issue of IMPACT, the Center’s bimonthly magazine.)
The Mackinac Center for Public Policy’s job is to be prescient and offer policy solutions that may not seem palatable at the time they are introduced.
By Jack McHugh
Senate Bill 173, Ban local mandates that private employers must grant employee leave: Passed 25 to 13 in the Senate
To preempt local governments from adopting ordinances or policies that require private sector employers to provide paid or unpaid employee leave that is not required under state or federal law. This is related to a nationwide campaign promoted by left-of-center groups and unions to lobby for such local mandates.
The Republican-controlled Michigan Legislature has passed a budget allocating $50 million for the state's film subsidy program.
Previously, the budget from House Republicans proposed eliminating the program, while Gov. Rick Snyder, who has said he is philosophically opposed to the program, asked for $25 million. But the GOP and Democratic leadership in the Michigan Senate wanted a minimum of $50 million annually.
Executive Vice President Michael J. Reitz is cited in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal on the possibility that Republicans in the Michigan Legislature could be close to caving in on support for Medicaid expansion under Obamacare.
Here is a compilation of analyses and commentary on why that should not happen.
The Mackinac Center will be among dozens of local and national organizations in 30 states promoting National Employee Freedom Week June 23-29.
NEFW “is a national effort to inform union employees of the freedom they have regarding opting out of union membership and making the decision about union membership that’s best for them.”
In an attempt to thread the needle between Left and Right on Medicaid expansion, Michigan House Republicans recently unveiled House Bill 4714, which expands Medicaid to everyone earning less than 138 percent of the federal poverty level, but only if certain reforms are approved by the federal government.
By Jack McHugh
Does Michigan have enough schemes for local governments to tax-and-spend without full democratic accountability, or could it use more?
Does it benefit the people of this state to expand the ability of local governments to borrow-and-spend on “business improvement” projects designed to benefit certain property owners more than the community as a whole?
A recent Huffington Post article calls Michigan’s public charter school sector “questionable” and spins the results of the most comprehensive study of these schools into something negative. Authors Joy Resmovits and Ashley Woods take issue with the references former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush made to a 2013 Stanford University report, claiming “the study of Michigan’s [charter] schools…is less definitive than [Gov. Bush] made it sound.”
Oliver Porter, a nationally recognized expert on public-private partnerships, writes in today’s Detroit News how privatization can help Detroit and other financially distressed cities in Michigan, particularly with long-term debit associated with legacy costs.
By Jack McHugh
House Bill 4228, Final 2013-14 state education budget: Passed 25 to 12 in the Senate
The final House-Senate compromise version of the K-12 school aid, community college and university budgets for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1, 2013. This authorizes $13.361 billion for K-12 public schools (a record high in nominal terms), compared to $12.944 billion the previous year; $1.430 billion will go to state universities, compared to $1.399 billion the previous year; and $335 million to community colleges, up from $294 million. Of these amounts, $1.861 billion is federal money.
Some highlights include: A $30 per pupil "foundation allowance" increase for school districts, and $60 for ones whose spending is at the lower end. Spending on preschool programs will increase by $65.0 million to $174.6 million. Students in grades 5 to 12 will be allowed to take up to two online courses per term. Universities would get less money if they raise tuition more than 3.75 percent.
Senior Investigative Analyst Anne Schieber was a guest on “The Tony Conley Show” on WILS AM-1320 in Lansing this morning, discussing her story and video about cities adopting “cost recovery” ordinances in an effort to squeeze extra money out of law breakers by charged extra fees, particularly on cases involving drunk driving.
Labor Policy Director F. Vincent Vernuccio writes in today’s Washington Times that unions should sacrifice some of their massive wealth to help shore up underfunded pension funds instead of seeking to reduce retiree benefits.
New data released by the Michigan Department of Education shows that the average public school teacher salary in Michigan increased slightly for the 2011-2012 school year to $62,631.
This was up 1.7 percent from 2010-2011 year, but 0.6 percent less than the all-time high of $63,024 reported by the MDE for 2009-2010.
“A popular Government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.” ~James Madison
Seems you don't want to be the guy who tells the Detroit Institute of Arts that its treasures are in jeopardy if the city winds up in bankruptcy.
In typical shoot-the-messenger style, the DIA is spinning a story that Detroit Emergency Financial Manager Kevyn Orr actually wants to sell the city-owned artwork to settle a portion of the Motor City's $15 billion debt.
