A modest school pension reform proposed by Gov. Jennifer Granholm earlier this year was mostly gutted by the Republican Senate, and subjected to more savagery in the Democratic House, but it nevertheless crawled out with a provision requiring employees to contribute an additional 3 percent to the cost of their retirement benefits. The amended statute contains no language requiring that money be used to ease the budget challenges facing school districts, however.
From MichiganVotes.org:
2010 House Bill 6274 and 6275 (Allow Detroit pension funds to loan to city)
Introduced by Rep. Bettie Scott (D) on June 22, 2010, to allow the Detroit police, fire and other employee pension funds to lend up to 20 percent of their assets to the city at a discounted interest rate.
About 3,500 people attended the Michigan Education Association's rally in Lansing yesterday. This amounts to about one-third of what the MEA projected for an event it had been planning and promoting for months.
In one sense the lack of attendance could be viewed as an organizational and communications failure on the part of the MEA. Yesterday's attendees represented less than 1 percent of the total number of public school employees in the state and just 2 percent of MEA's total membership.
Or perhaps it was just a waste of time and money (taxpayer's money, to be exact). The MEA has been saying for at least the last three years that school employees are getting beat up by politicians even though they've supposedly agreed to $1 billion worth of contractual concessions. But the reality is that school employees (and especially teachers) have weathered Michigan's decade-long economic storm quite well when compared to the rest of the state. Perhaps school employees stayed home yesterday because they're not as interested in griping about their pay and benefits as their union leaders think they should be.
The Michigan Education Association protested in Lansing yesterday to demand more taxpayer money for the public school system and to protest recent public school pension reforms. But the pension reforms will allow districts to have more resources to devote to improving education.
Michigan Film Office Director Janet Lockwood said she has received a subpoena as part of the Michigan Attorney General's investigation of movie studio Hangar42, according to WWMT-TV3 in Grand Rapids.
Communications Specialist Kathy Hoekstra told WWMT "We're thrilled to see people starting to pay close attention to the administration of these types of tax subsidies."
The Michigan Education Association, which represents a majority of the teachers in the state (who happen to be the highest paid in the nation when compared to relative state wealth), is holding a demonstration at the state Capitol today to lobby for more money.
From MichiganVotes.org:
2010 House Bill 6234, Clarify scope of deer feeding ban:
Introduced by Rep. Mark Meadows (D) on June 1, 2010, to clarify that the law restricting or banning wild deer or elk feeding does not ban the "incidental" feeding of these animals when feeding wild birds or other wildlife. Reportedly the bill was introduced after a Northern Michigan man who broadcasts the action at his bird feeder on his website was served with an arrest warrant by the Department of Natural Resources because deer sometimes are seen eating the fallen seeds.
Grand Valley State University wants to expand its downtown campus and is turning to eminent domain as a tool to accomplish its plans according to a report in The Grand Rapids Press. The university has been negotiating with DeVries Properties to purchase a former A&P warehouse site adjacent to its downtown campus to expand its Seidman College of Business. The court can decide if GVSU's claim of using eminent domain to achieve a public purpose is valid and if so the court has the authority to negotiate a price.
Two bills are working their way through the House of Representatives in Lansing that would change the process of binding arbitration, which is used to resolve contract disputes between local governments and their employees. One of these bills is, at best, a complete waste of time. The other is just a lousy idea.
Today marks the fifth anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's attack on private property rights in the Kelo vs. New London decision.
Susette Kelo, the homeowner involved in the case, was a guest of the Mackinac Center at an Issues & Ideas forum on the topic in 2009.
The lawsuit filed by the Detroit Public Schools Board of Education against Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb is "unprecedented," according to Education Policy Director Michael Van Beek. The board is suing Bobb in a disagreement over whether he or they control the district's academic requirements.
Lansing political newsletter MIRS News (subscription required) reports that some legislators are steamed about a decision by state Lottery Commissioner Scott Bowen to burn $40,000 in lottery proceeds that otherwise would be available to fund public schools by giving it to the city of Grand Rapids for a fireworks display.
Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox's office has heeded a call from Mackinac Center Legal Foundation Director Patrick J. Wright to investigate the Hangar42 movie studio subsidy deal, according to The Grand Rapids Press.
Michigan Capitol Confidential has more information here.
Lansing political newsletters Gongwer and MIRS (subscriptions required) today both cite this Mackinac Center news release that calls for an official investigation of the Hangar42 movie studio deal.
The Grand Rapids Press also includes a mention of the news release in a story about the resignation of the chief of staff to Rep. Robert Dean, D-Grand Rapids.
Every week, MichiganVotes.org sends a report to newspapers and TV stations showing how just the state legislators in each publication's service area voted on the most important and interesting bills and amendments of the past seven days. The version shown here instead contains a link to the complete roll call tally in either the House or Senate. To find out who your state senator is and how to contact him or her go here; for state representatives go here.
By Jack McHugh
Questions surrounding the "Hangar 42" movie studio subsidy-seekers are so troubling that the Mackinac Center has called for an investigation by the Michigan Legislature, Michigan Attorney General or the U.S. Attorney's office. The involvement of a state legislator on behalf of the subsidy seekers adds another layer of questions.
The U.S. EPA has classified milk as an oil that is subject to federal regulation, which requires that it be regulated under the Clean Water Act. The EPA ruling mandates that dairy farmers, already struggling to stay in business due to depressed milk prices, prepare and implement oil spill prevention plans for milk storage tanks. In response to EPA's regulatory overreach the Michigan Senate passed Senate Resolution 158, which states: "The EPA has created an onerous solution searching for a problem; ..... we urge the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to rescind rules that would require dairy farms to have oil spill prevention plans for milk storage tanks......"
In 2009, the vast majority of teachers in the Traverse City Area Public Schools received a base salary between $45,355 and $67,973, with an average of $56,742. The district also pays $14,631 annually for employee health insurance plans, toward which teachers contribute $87.50 per month, or 7 percent. This contrasts with the statewide average cost in the private sector for an employer-provided family plan of $11,300, with employees picking up 22 percent of that amount.
Incoming UAW President Bob King got his term as leader of the autoworkers off to a less than encouraging start, offering a lazy analysis of the UAW’s woes and a strategy that amounts to little more than wishful thinking. King understandably seeks to restore the UAW’s past position as representative for the entire American auto industry, but his first target, Toyota’s NUMMI facility in Fremont, Calif., makes little sense.
In a June 5 Wall Street Journal column called "Slouching toward Athens," American Enterprise Institute President Arthur Brooks described how in Greece, "labor unions and state functionaries demand that others pay for the early retirements," while in America, "the tea partiers demonstrate not to get more from others, but rather against government growth."
The Kalamazoo Gazette's Julie Mack recently praised the privately funded "Kalamazoo Promise" college scholarship program and questioned the priorities of Grand Rapids-based philanthropists who support charter schools and vouchers. She claimed that while parental choice programs serve less than 5 percent of students, "The Promise taps into the power of public schools."
Mackinac Center President Joseph G. Lehman appeared on "The Glenn Beck Show" on Fox News Channel Wednesday evening to discuss the Overton Window of Political Possibility, a theory created in the mid-1990s by Joseph P. Overton, the Center's late senior vice president.
New data was released yesterday from Michigan's Office of Labor Market Information that indicates Michigan's economy may be recovering. The state unemployment rate dropped from 14 percent to 13.6 percent, marking the fifth straight month of decreasing unemployment rates. National figures will be released Friday.
Many thanks to The Allegheny Institute of Public Policy, which recently reported on the financial woes of the Rivers Casino in Pittsburgh, PA. This casino has suffered financial setbacks since it’s inception in 2008, and has seen its credit rating drop to “selective default,” which is the lowest it can receive from Standard & Poor’s. It received this recent rating reduction after both the General Retirement System and the Police & Fire Retirement System of the city of Detroit invested a significant amount of funding to help the casino arise from debt.
Mackinac Center President Joseph G. Lehman is scheduled to appear on "The Glenn Beck Show" on Fox News Channel at around 5:20 p.m. EDT today to discuss the Overton Window of Political Possibility, a theory created in the mid-1990s by Joseph P. Overton, the Center's late senior vice president.
