House Bill 5963, sponsored by Rep. Tim Melton (D-Pontiac) would force schools to spend down their general fund balances to 15 percent of their current operating expenditures. This attempt to micromanage their budgets isn't likely to help schools become more fiscally stable or deal with dwindling enrollment and the resulting declines in revenue.
The Detroit Free Press reported today that the White House announced yesterday that it will buy the first 100 plug-in electric vehicles to roll off American assembly lines before the end of the year. Surprise: The only car to meet that qualification is the Chevy Volt, which coincidentally started production at the Detroit-Hamtramck plant on the same day of the White House announcement. Apparently, federal purchasing requirements have been creatively constructed to allow the U.S. government to purchase the vehicles from General Motors, of which the federal government has a 61 percent ownership.
The Lansing State Journal published an editorial blasting the state of Michigan for forcing independent day care owners into a union — the subject of the Mackinac Center Legal Foundation's lawsuit, Loar v. DHS. The piece begins:
If you received an unemployment check, do you think that qualifies you as a member of some kind of “unemployed union”? Would you expect the state, on your behalf, to deduct money from your payment to unionize you against some obscure agency that the state itself created?
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a press release on March 29, indicating that "no stationary sources will be required to get Clean Air Act permits that cover greenhouse gases (GHGs) before January 2011." Regulating greenhouse gases is a top priority for the Obama administration. Cap-and-trade legislation stalled in the U.S. Senate primarily due to concerns that limiting energy production through controls on carbon dioxide emissions would lead to higher energy costs for households and businesses, further dragging down an already weak economy.
$6,876,303.90
$22.45
$0.00
The first figure is how much I was billed for the Michigan State Police to fulfill a Freedom of Information Act request concerning the department's handling of the federal Homeland Security Grant program from its inception through September 2009:
Nearly every aspect of a teacher’s job falls under the rules of a union contract. The following is a synopsis of just one of those agreements in Michigan. It comes from Fruitport Community Schools near Muskegon, which employs 224 teachers and enrolls 3,200 students. Of its $32 million operating budget (excluding capital expenditures and debt services), 83 percent goes to pay employee compensation.
Over the weekend, the Obama administration announced 15 recess appointments, among them that of Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board, the five-member body that interprets and enforces federal labor law.
Becker’s appointment is problematic because his views are well outside of the mainstream of labor law. In a wide-ranging University of Minnesota Law Review article published in February 1993, Craig Becker distorted the notion of “industrial democracy” to an extent seldom seen even in academia.
(Editor's note: This article contains a correction to the version originally published. The decline in private-sector employees' compensation is now correctly stated as 5.1 percent.)
Spokespersons for Michigan government employee unions contend that they have given up hundreds of millions of dollars in wages and benefit concessions over the past few years. The claims are in dispute, and data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis offers some support for those challenging them. It shows that since 2000, government employee compensation in Michigan has increased 11.4 percent, while private sector employees are getting 5.1 percent less.
To make the state eligible for $400 million in federal "Race to the Top" grants, last December the Michigan Legislature passed a package of school reforms, one of which creates a state "school reform/redesign officer" and office in the Department of Education, with the authority to take over the management of 5 percent of the lowest achieving public schools statewide. The office would then implement one of four strategies specified in the RTTT guidelines: a "turnaround" model, a "restart" model, a "transformation" model or a "school closure" model.
You’re a rich girl and you’ve gone too far,
‘Cause you know it don’t matter anyway
You can rely on the old man’s money,
You can rely on the old man’s money …
Reading Iris Salters’ latest article in the Detroit News, one has to understand the position the Michigan Education Association president is in. That position can be summed up in one word: secure.
When I was a pitcher in Little League, my coach often said, "Focus on what you can control." I couldn't control errors by the shortstop or adverse calls by the umpires, but I could control the pitches I threw.
Reading about Adrian Public Schools' budget deficit for 2011 made me think that it and hundreds of other school districts experiencing similar budget-balancing challenges could benefit from my coach's sage advice.
The recent news that the state's Michigan Economic Growth Authority offered a convicted embezzler's company a $9.1 million tax credit has caused quite a stir in Lansing. Last week, legislators held hearings on how the Michigan Economic Development Corp., MEGA's parent agency, could have let someone with the embezzler's background be part of a multi-million-dollar selective tax break deal.
The University of Michigan's student newspaper, the Michigan Review, wrote an extensive piece on the Mackinac Center Legal Foundation's case on behalf of home-based day care providers who have been shanghaied into a union. The article culminates in a discussion of the implications for families:
The Detroit News cited the Mackinac Center in an editorial opposing a $25 billion broadband internet plan put forth by the Federal Communication Commission.
Arguing that "Americans can't afford it and don't need it," the piece draws upon the Mackinac Center's report on Michigan's own failed experiment with governmental broadband efforts:
The last thing Michigan lawmakers should do is encourage local government to take on more debt. However, that is precisely what HB 5663, the "local green energy bond act," does. The local green energy bond act would encourage local units of government to create and operate programs that promote green energy use by local homeowners and businesses — funding the new government programs with green bonds. The local government loans could be used for energy-efficiency purposes, including biomass stoves, insulation, solar water heaters and small wind energy systems. Almost all of the energy-efficiency applications have long paybacks, often stretching over a period of years or decades.
Two releases from government statistical agencies this week show that the state's economy is still pretty bad, but that its long fall may have finally bottomed out. The state unemployment rate is 14.1 percent, down from its peak. Michigan's per capita personal income was down again, but Michigan was not the worst state in the country.
This week, both the Michigan House and Senate are holding hearings on how the state's economic development apparatus managed to offer a $9.1 million tax credit to a convicted embezzler. Sen. Jason Allen, R-Traverse City, is presiding over the Senate event. ("Legislature's Most Persistent Targeted-Incentives Booster to Run Hearings on Embezzler's Tax-Break Deal.")
The trampling of states' rights by the federal government seems to know no bounds. Fueled by the TEA Party movement, which recognizes the importance of the principles of constitutional government and federalism, states are pushing back. One of the latest examples is an effort coming from the Arizona Senate called the "Freedom to Breath Act." The proposed law states that, "Arizona, through its Legislature, has the exclusive authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions produced by humans and other greenhouse gases and substances produced by mechanical or chemical processes, including agricultural operations and waste operations."
The Mackinac Center Legal Foundation has appealed to the Michigan Supreme Court its lawsuit defending the rights of small-business owners who were shanghaied into a union, according to WEYI-TV 25 in Saginaw.
The plaintiffs in the case, three home-based day care owners, are independent contractors who receive subsidy checks from the state of Michigan on behalf of low-income parents who need child care while they are working or enrolled in school. A shell corporation created by the Michigan Department of Human Services and Mott Community College led to the forced unionization of some 40,000 day care operators, with some $3.7 million in "union dues" being taken from their state payments.
In her first public statements since it was revealed that the Michigan Economic Growth Authority approved a $9.1 million tax credit deal for a convicted embezzler, Gov. Jennifer Granholm was quoted by the Gongwer Michigan Report as saying, "And obviously, a mistake was made, and it cannot happen again."
If Michigan wants to recover from its economic doldrums, it would help if local governments could get their finances back in balance. And if local governments are going to balance their books, it would help if they could get some relief from labor laws that empower unions at the expense of taxpayers.
This week, the Michigan House and Senate are both holding hearings on the Michigan Economic Development Corp. after a convicted embezzler on parole duped the Michigan Economic Growth Authority into offering his company a $9.1 million tax credit. The real issue they should examine is not whether the occasional criminal wins an "incentive" deal, but the lack of transparency that characterizes this entire operation.
The parole violation arrest last week of convicted embezzler and Michigan Economic Growth Authority tax credit winner Richard A. Short has caused deep embarrassment for state officials. Faces are even redder given that Short shared the dais with Gov. Jennifer Granholm at a press event announcing his and other MEGA awards; at her invitation he even took the microphone for several minutes to relate all the wonderful things his apparent shell-company was planning to do.
The Michigan House and Senate plan to hold hearings this week on how a convicted embezzler on parole duped the Michigan Economic Development Corp. and Michigan Economic Growth Authority into offering his company — which was being run out of a Flint mobile home park — a $9.1 million tax credit. (This could have become a "refundable" credit, meaning the state would likely be writing checks to the embezzler.)
In the wake of the state granting a targeted tax credit to a convicted embezzler's company, much sound and fury has come from the Michigan Legislature and executive agencies. Unless decision-makers recognize the root problem, however, it will all signify nothing.
