Last week the House Local Government Committee heard testimony on House Bill 4939, a bill that would allow a department head to serve as a city manager.

The legislation was prompted by a community in Rep. Knezek’s district where the police chief if serving as interim city manager. Under the current statute this is permissible in communities with less than 25,000 population. This legislation would expand it to larger communities.

The committee did not vote on the legislation, and we expect a second hearing this week.

Samantha Harkins is the Director of State Affairs for the Michigan Municipal League.  She can be reached at 517-908-0306 or email at sharkins@mml.org

Lats week the House Local Government Committee passed House Bill 4624, a bill that would make a full-time firefighter’s ability to work as a firefighter in another community a prohibited subject of bargaining.The legislation is supported by the fire chiefs and the Michigan Townships Association.

The League is opposed to this legislation as it violates local control in the bargaining process. The legislation is now awaiting action on the House floor.

Samantha Harkins is the Director of State Affairs for the Michigan Municipal League.  She can be reached at 517-908-0306 or email at sharkins@mml.org

The Michigan Municipal League has been saying for quite some time now that the state’s system for funding municipalities is a broken system.

Lawmakers and others have asked for our proposed solutions and we’ve recently answered those requests with the release of our Partnership for Place Agenda. This policy agenda proposes a commitment of action in partnership between the State and its municipalities that will facilitate Michigan’s economic growth and allow for the development of places to provide key services and amenities that contribute to a high quality of life.

It focuses on a more regional approach to service delivery, which would change the way services are provided, how resources are dedicated, and how systems are supported.

Approved by the Michigan Municipal League Board of Trustees in June of 2013, this policy agenda proposes actions that will re-establish a partnership for prosperity in four key areas: Funding the future; Michigan in Motion; Place for Talent; and Strength in Structure.

Read more about the agenda here and here.

This Partnership for Place plan is so important that we dedicated the League’s October Prosperity Agenda Radio show to this topic. The radio show airs monthly on News/Talk 760 WJR. League CEO Dan Gilmartin hosts the show, which is co-sponsored by the League and the Michigan State Housing Development Authority. Dan’s media co-host for this month’s show is Detroit News reporter Chad Livengood. Show guests are the League’s Samantha Harkins, Paw Paw Village Manager Larry Nielsen and Berkley Councilmember and League Board Member Steve Baker.

While the radio show is set to air 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2013, you can listen to it now at the League’s website here or by subscribing to the FREE iTunes podcast. View additional photos from the show taping here in this set on the League’s flickr page.

Matt Bach is director of media relations for the Michigan Municipal League. He can be reached at mbach@mml.org and (734) 669-6317.

The House and Senate passed, by wide margins, HR 2775 which funds the federal government through Wednesday, January 15, 2014 as part of a continuing resolution from the current FY 2013 levels. In addition, it also extends the debt-limit through February 7, 2014. The Appropriations Act is retroactive to October 1st, the day the shutdown began. Now that Congress has provided a few month reprieve until budget debates heat back up, the focus will resume again to other priorities including federal tax reform – which we’ve been engaged with in order to preserve federal tax exemptions on municipal bonds.

Summer Minnick is the Director of Policy Initiatives and Federal Affairs. She can be reached at 517-908-0301 or smininck@mml.org.

This morning the House Financial Liabilities Reform Committee heard testimony on a package of bills, Senate Bills 541-545, that make positive clarifying changes to PA 152 of 2011, the Publicly Funded Health Insurance Contribution Act.

Senate Bill 541 would amend the definition of “medical benefit plan”, which currently excludes benefits provided to individuals retired from a public employer. The bill also would exclude a public employer’s contributions to a fund used for the sole purpose of funding health care benefits available to public employees or elected public officials only upon retirement or separation from service.

Senate Bill 542 would amend the requirements regarding the cap on the dollar limit that a public employer may pay toward health care costs. The bill would also increase the multiplier used to calculate the cap on the total dollar amount that a public employer may pay toward health care costs for individual and spouse coverage;include individual plus one nonspouse dependent coverage within family coverage for cap calculation purposes; include elected officials in calculation of the cap; and exclude from calculation of the cap employees or elected officials who declined coverage.

Senate Bill 543 would amend provisions that allow a public employer to opt for a percentage limit on its medical plan contributions, instead of complying with the dollar amount limits, for a medical benefit plan coverage year. Under this option, a public employer may not pay more than 80% of the total annual costs of all of the medical benefit plans it offers or contributes to for its employees and elected public officials.

Senate Bill 544 would require any contracts or other agreements in effect on September 27, 2011, to conform to contribution limits under the Publicly Funded Health Insurance Contribution Act. Currently, this applies to agreements in effect on September 15, 2011.

Senate Bill 545 would modify a provision that allows a local unit of government to exempt itself from the Act’s requirements by a two-thirds vote of its governing body each year, and requires a two-thirds vote to extend an exemption to a new year. The bill would require an exemption or extension vote to take place before the beginning of the medical benefit plan coverage year.

The League is supportive of these changes as they are important clarifications that will help with PA 152 compliance and interpretation from the Department of Treasury. We are anticipating a vote on this legislation next week.

Samantha Harkins is the Director of State Affairs for the Michigan Municipal League.  She can be reached at 517-908-0306 or email at sharkins@mml.org

Yesterday the House passed House Bill 4121, a bill that as passed would allow local units of government to exempt property purchased from a school district from real property taxes for five years.

The legislation would automatically exempt these properties unless the local unit of government passes a resolution to place them back on the tax rolls.

The bill now goes to the Senate for consideration.

Samantha Harkins is the Director of State Affairs for the Michigan Municipal League.  She can be reached at 517-908-0306 or email at sharkins@mml.org

Yesterday the Senate unanimously reported Senate Bill 387, legislation that would amend the Worker’s Disability Compensation Act to include a reserve or auxiliary police officer as an employee of the State for purposes of the Act when he or she was performing duties in that capacity.

In general we find this legislation to be positive. While it does expand worker’s compensation it makes these officers employees of the state thus putting the responsibility on the state to pay for any claims.

The legislation now heads to the House for its consideration.

Samantha Harkins is the Director of State Affairs for the Michigan Municipal League.  She can be reached at 517-908-0306 or email at sharkins@mml.org

Yesterday the Senate unanimously passed Senate Bill 307, a bill introduced Senator Steve Bieda (D-Warren) that removes population thresholds for communities who want to use a police and fire special assessment as a revenue option.

Under the law currently a city with a population of under 15,000 may levy a police and fire special assessment. A city with a population of more than 15,000 and less than 70,000 in a county with a population between 230,000 and 235,000 may levy an assessment with a vote of the people. The only city that meets this very narrow criteria is the City of Saginaw.

Senator Bieda’s bill would eliminate the population threshold so that any city above 15,000 could levy a special assessment for police and fire under the Act with a vote of its electorate.  We are grateful to Sen. Bieda for introducing this important local option.

It now heads to the House for consideration.

Samantha Harkins is the Director of State Affairs for the Michigan Municipal League.  She can be reached at 517-908-0306 or email at sharkins@mml.org

Today the House Commerce committee took up HB 4996, legislation to enable crowdfunding, the idea of funding projects or startups by obtaining small sums of money from many individuals.  HB 4996 will allow the sales of securities to an unlimited number of non-accredited investors, provided the issuer registers with the State of Michigan.  Any Michiganders who do not fit the federal definition of an accredited investor are given the opportunity to support their local entrepreneurs, existing small businesses, and real estate investments.

There were some concerns from some of the representatives on the committee not about the idea and intent of the legislation but regarding the level of safety built in for those investing so there may be a new draft with amendments coming forth.

We see this as a creative approach to economic development in the state of Michigan.  It is no secret that entrepreneurs are one of the keys to economic success.  Entrepreneurship is among the League’s 8 key assets to creating vibrant, successful, 21^st century communities.  Studies have shown the communities with the largest growth rate are those in which entrepreneurs are flocking to.  These very entrepreneurs are finding it difficult to pull together the necessary investments to start their businesses.  The investment strategy allowed for under this legislation will help to close the gap and make the entrepreneurs dream of starting a business and having a presence in the community very real.  Entrepreneurs help to make our local municipalities flourish and helping these businesses succeed makes for strong local and regional economies. Local communities are doing their part in identifying the aspects of a community that entrepreneurs seek out in places where they want to set up shop but that doesn’t matter if there isn’t a means for them to get off the ground and running or to grow their business. This legislation will provide another avenue for other local individuals to invest in their community in a new way by supporting the businesses they know best.  Healthy local economies and healthy communities go hand in hand.

It is exciting and refreshing to be able to be supportive of such a creative and positive economic development effort at the state level.  We want to thank Rep. Jenkins for all of her work on this and for championing this issue.  Also a huge thank you to Chris Miller, city of Adrian, and his team for all of their work on this too.

Nikki Brown is a legislative associate for the League handling economic development and land use issues.  She can be reached at nbrown@mml.org or 517-908-0305.

CALL MISS-DIG. Under the legislation considered today by the House Energy & Technology Committee a local unit of government faces penalties if they do not call the MISS-DIG system when beginning a project that involves digging. If a local unit does call MISS-DIG there is no liability.

This afternoon the House Energy and Technology Committee heard testimony on Senate Bills 539 and 540.  Originally the legislation last session would have entirely exempted any action under the MISS-DIG Act from government immunity. That was problematic for us, so the fee structure arose as a result of many discussions with the Senate and the Governor’s office, as well as utility stakeholders. The League always has concerns with expanding government immunity.  Given, however, the inclination of the legislation to create an exception to governmental immunity, this is an extremely narrow exception.

The legislation has wide support from many of the stakeholders in the process, and we will continue to work on this legislation.

Samantha Harkins is the Director of State Affairs for the Michigan Municipal League.  She can be reached at 517-908-0306 or email at sharkins@mml.org