Michigan Votes Forum

Introduced in the Senate on March 2, 2005, the Senate version of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2005-2006 state police budget. This appropriates $543.5 million in unadjusted gross spending (funded from all sources, including special state restricted fund and federal pass-through dollars), compared to $443.0 million, which was the FY 2004-2005 amount enrolled in 2004. Of this, $234.0 million will come from the general fund (funded by actual state tax revenues), compared to the FY 2004-2005 amount of $244.3 million, and $107.9 million will come from state restricted funds. The budget concurs with Gov. Jennifer Granholm’s to close posts in Grand Haven, Groveland Township in Oakland County, and Iron River

The vote was 34 in favor, 4 opposed and 0 not voting

(Senate Roll Call 243 at Senate Journal 57)

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Senator Cassis, under her constitutional right of protest (Art. 4, Sec. 18), protested against the passage of Senate Bill No.280 and moved that the statements she made during the discussion of the amendments be printed as her reasons for voting "no." The motion prevailed. Senator Cassis' first statement is as follows: One of the priorities our citizens recognize as very significant is safety in our neighborhoods, communities, and states. For Governor Granholm to arbitrarily propose closing three State Police posts and shift the positions elsewhere is patently unfair. If the Governor were serious about budget savings, she could have used and even hand an equitably close all State Police posts with responsibility for covering townships. But this is not the case. Her proposal is flawed, specifically with regard to the Groveland Post because the State Police will still have responsibility to patrol, and they will have to come all the way from Oak Park. Much of this area is state land, and therefore, must have State Police patrol. I am going to read to you something very briefly that the Michigan State Police director stated publicly, Mr.Sturdivant. He stated, "Full patrol services will continue to be provided by troopers from neighboring posts. The MSP remains committed to providing essential police patrol services to all areas of the state not covered by a dedicated police department." Well, if they have to come all the way from Oak Park, that's a two-hour drive. That is going to increase costs, so actually in summary, these proposals may end up costing the state money. So I urge a "yes" vote on the Prusi amendment. Senator Cassis' second statement is as follows: Groveland and Rose Townships have been responsible. In fact, they have saved the state dollars, as has been mentioned, by providing the building and the maintenance for this post. With our calculations, we come with a dollar figure of $50,000 administratively for one secretary and a telephone. Importantly, the good Senator from Waterford has identified where dollars can come from within the budget responsibility and accountably. That's what the Price of Government is all about. This area's rural citizens can ill-afford a tax increase. In addition, most of the land, as I mentioned, is state-owned. So development won't be occurring in the state-owned land, and therefore, will not contribute to any tax revenue that could go to pay for police services. The current Governor has proposed this closing. If I were Governor, I would not do so.

Rep. Lemmons, Jr., having reserved the right to explain his nay vote, made the following statement: "Mr. Speaker and members of the House: I voted against the adoption of the second conference report of Senate Bill 280 (FY 2005-6 State Police Budget) for the following reasons: MCOLES This budget contains major reduction in GF/GP funding for Michigan Commission On Law Enforcement Standards (MCOLES). This cut would hamper efforts to keep our law enforcement officers abreast of the latest crime fighting techniques and methods. In the post 9-11 world it imperative that police officers receives the latest training. Every law enforcement organization in the state opposed this shift. Fire Investigation Arson is one of our most destructive crimes. It drives up insurance rates, spreads fires to nearby properties and conceals murders. Few local departments have personnel with the expertise and training to conduct fire investigations. Fire and arson specialists throughout the state testified against the transfer the responsibility Fire Investigation Unit to the Criminal Investigation Unit. State Police Posts I oppose the State Police Post closings in Groveland Township, Iron River, and Grand Haven. It is important that these communities have timely response in the event of an emergency. The Michigan State Police Command Officers Association and the Michigan State Troopers Association oppose this budget. This budget impairs the ability of law and fire enforcement officials to protect our citizens."

Senator Cherry’s statement is as follows: Madam President, I’m going to be voting “no” on the conference report—adoption of the conference report. I’m doing so, as has been said earlier, because of the State Police post closings that are in this budget. As the previous speaker said, we’ve come up with a number of options in terms of trying to find dollars to save those police posts and even at a time when those police posts don’t even cost the amount of dollars that has been stated that they cost. For example, the one in Groveland Township has no building costs, no maintenance costs, does not cost the 300 and some thousand dollars that it’s projected to be—that the State Police has said they cost. There is no cost savings in terms of staff. It is very simply not going to cost what has been projected, and we’ve also tried to find dollars even if we assume those costs are correct. It’s hard to understand why we would cut State Police coverage at a time when homeland security is such a problem. I also think it’s important in terms of the I-75 corridor. As I’ve said before in this body, that post is the only post along I-75—in a very dangerous area of I-75—to have any coverage, and we will be leaving that out without this post being open. I hope as we go forward that we do try to find a solution to this, but at this time with those posts not in the budget, I’m going to be voting “no.”

Senator Prusi's statement is as follows: An earlier speaker made reference to the executive budget recommendation that did include the aforementioned cuts, but I think all of us are aware that in the last several weeks, as we've gone around and around on this budget, that there's been a reversal of that position and a willingness on the administration's part to work within the budget target number to find adequate funding to maintain the State Police posts and to maintain the General Fund support for the MCOLES training line. I believe during the conference committee deliberations there were several viable options put forward to find the funding within the targeted amount of money and unfortunately, even reasonable people have the ability to disagree but I believe those options were not seriously considered and were rejected out of hand. I would encourage members--I would implore members--to reject this conference committee report and allow the conferees to go back and continue to consider what I would believe to be several viable options to resolve these issues within the target agreement.

Senator Cassis' statement is as follows: I, too, rise in opposition to the closing of the Groveland post because, in all seriousness, if real significant savings were the intent here, we would be looking at a fair approach of closing State Police posts across the board and finding other ways for them to provide their own police services, perhaps with sheriff departments or consolidating with other townships or villages on police services. But we're not doing that. We're targeting three posts. My concern is that this may also actually, unwittingly perhaps, result in increased costs because those officers who now will have to come to service these areas will come from farther distances, and there is an increased cost with that occurrence. Furthermore, in Groveland and Rose Townships--fairly rural areas--there is a huge store of state lands that do not provide any tax base. In my opinion, this is one of the more irresponsible applications of the so-called Price of Government because it reduces the health, safety, and welfare of citizens and may very well result in higher taxes for them. In addition, the removal of fire investigation opportunities is also a serious threat to our well-being. There really is, at this point in time, no other way for me to represent my district than to vote "no," despite--and I want to underscore this--many efforts that I and others have made to encourage a compromise.

Senator Schauer's statement is as follows: I, for one, am not going to buy into the rhetoric from the Majority Leader on this crisis and this brinkmanship that is before us. I want to remind us of some history. While it is September 28, this majority party decided to enter into a new budgeting process--the Price of Government that was funded by the Michigan Chamber of Commerce and the Michigan Association of Realtors--to create this new budget process. That led to a near meltdown in the budget process, a summer that was squandered, and I heard one comment in the conference committee that it's sad that it's so late. Well, this bill could have been fixed at any point this summer, and it's not too late now to fix this bill. I think the statement made by the Appropriations Committee chair about re-election certainly reveals what this is largely about. This is about politics. There have been references made about the Governor's executive budget recommendation. While that is true, the Governor has been clear that it is her priority to keep these posts open. It wasn't in the Governor's recommendation to include boilerplate language that remains in this budget that after this 60-day window, no state general funds can be used to maintain and operate those three facilities. That boilerplate language came from a conference report that was proposed by the majority party. This is a bad bill. There are a number of reasons why. This is a bad bill before us that we should reject. I do not agree with the Majority Leader that this is it. It wasn't long ago that we, as a chamber, amended the joint rules because of this Price of Government budgeting process in this omnibus bill on the House side to allow House members to chair conference committees of bills not originating from that chamber. We could amend those same joint rules to allow this conference committee to go back and fix this bill. There are several issues that remain. The MCOLES line item that affects our communities. I have heard from a lot of my police chiefs and local elected officials that are very concerned about resources to train local police officers and police agencies. We have three State Polices posts that would close now on November 30, rather than September 30. So we should reject this conference report, and we should stay here until it's fixed.

Senator Switalski's statement is as follows: I want to speak to another aspect of this budget. I argued about this in front of the Appropriations Committee at the time we did the budget, and I will argue it again because I think it's an oversight. We don't have enough money. We have to make some very tough choices. We heard that over and over in these budgets. We have to set priorities. I just want to outline two priorities where I think we are making a wrong choice. There is about $1.3 million in this budget for school bus inspections. Now, someone please explain to me why is it the job of the state of Michigan and the State Police to inspect local school buses? These are local school buses owned and operated by local school districts. They have bus depots. They have mechanics. They operate a bus system for their students. Why is it our job, as the state, to inspect their buses? Why can't they inspect their own buses? If you look at industry, we have changed in the last 20 years the way we do inspections. People who make a part in a plant inspect their own part. They have to make their own part right. That was a revolution that made our industry much more competitive. Why would we not do the same thing with school bus inspection. The locals own and operate them, and they should be responsible for making sure they meet safety standards. If they don't, they would be subject to lawsuits from their constituents who ride those buses. So we are spending money on something that really isn't our job. In the meantime, we are cutting money for the state arson investigations. Arson investigation is a very specialized area. You have to be a trained expert on this to be able to determine if arson has been committed and successfully prosecute that. We are cutting that, which is really a great function that the State Police can provide to all the locals who don't have the expertise or the ability to duplicate what the State Police do. We are cutting that. We are cutting these posts. Things that we need we are not paying for; something that isn't really our job, we are paying for.

Senator Emerson's statement is as follows: I came to the mic mainly to respond to some of the dire predictions of the constitutional realities of the five-day rule and what occurs if this conference report gets rejected. I think maybe we forget that there are about six other conference committees on budgets that are available for us to deal with if the body chooses not to accept this conference committee report. Yes, we can't do another conference committee on this particular bill, but there are about six other bills that are available to us in conference committee that can be used for this. I don't mean to say this to give people an easy excuse to vote "no." I think it is a serious issue. There is no question, as the chair of the Appropriations Committee has pointed out, that the Governor recommended closure of these three posts that we are talking about. But she also presented us with a budget that was silent on this, and we are the ones who chose to put language in there that says in 60 days, we, the Senate of the state of Michigan, want those posts to close. And I'm not sure if I want to buy into that language that this conference committee put before us. We could have handled this issue in any number of ways. The Governor, I believe, would have stood by her position and closed the posts if the language was silent. I suggested that to the leadership of the Senate. We chose to create this manufactured crisis, so-called constitutional crisis. We do have the ability to deal with this in a number of other ways if this conference report is rejected. I reject that we are going to put ourselves in grave danger of being attacked by Osama bin Laden or any other craziness that has been suggested here. It is nothing more than that. We are all concerned about the safety of people in the state of Michigan. We also all have a constituency that we represent, and it is our job to try and make sure we put together a budget that best reflects the needs of our constituents. If we choose because of some of the things the conference committee has put in here and chosen to wait until the 27th or 28th of September to issue a conference report, that's our fault. I blame all of us in leadership for waiting until the 28th to take this up. There were target agreements nearly three weeks ago, and why we are dealing with this budget on the 28th is our fault and nobody else's. We can blame it on no one else. So I don't believe we are in the constitutional crisis that has been outlined by some of the previous speakers, and I'm strongly considering a "no" vote on this conference report.

Senator Sikkema's statement is as follows: This issue facing the Senate today is a very simple one and it's very clear and that is whether beginning midnight on Friday, the Department of State Police will be funded or not. There is no more opportunity to have a third conference report. Senate rules, House rules, and joint rules are very clear. A second conference report, which this is because the first on was rejected earlier today, is the last conference report that can be adopted. If the Senate chooses to reject this report, you have to start over. That means the constitutional five-day rule has to prevail in both Houses, and the consequence is in an age where we have concern over terrorism, homeland security, and natural disasters. The law enforcement agency for the state of Michigan will go unfunded as of midnight Friday night. People who choose to reject this conference report have to think about that. I'm going to vote "yes." I don't think it is right to hold the entire Department of State Police hostage over a couple of items that some members wanted in this budget. Every single budget has had to be cut--every single budget. We've been working since spring with the House and the Governor to come to an agreement. This one ought to be relatively easy because it's the Governor's recommendation. I, as a leader, went to the subcommittee chair and members of the subcommittee and said, "You might not like this, but it is the Governor's recommendation. Look at other priorities in the budget and tell me what you think." I think the basic decision came down that we want to preserve trooper strength versus facilities. That's the right decision. I heard an earlier speaker say, "Let's just reject this conference report and we can go back to work." No, we can't. This is it. I urge in the strongest possible terms, for those who care about protection of Michigan citizens, for those who want to fund homeland security, that you vote "yes" on this conference report, and I urge my colleagues in the House, both Democrats and Republicans, to do the same thing.

Senator Johnson's first statement is as follows: Through you to the members on the other side of the aisle, I ask you a simple question: Does this administration, that by the way recommended the closure of these three posts as opposed to eliminating state troopers, want you to vote "no" on this budget? Does the Governor of this state want to run for re-election after having shut down the entire State Police at midnight on September 30th? Do you honestly and pettily want to do that for three buildings? We're talking about three buildings, and we're talking about protecting the first line of our defense should anything tragic happen in this state. We have 90 of our state troopers down in Louisiana right now. How foolish can you be for three buildings? That's like pork--pork, pork, pork--and I bet you the Governor would urge you real quick to vote "yes."

Senator Cropsey's statement is as follows: First of all, I think it's unseemly to make partisan attacks in this body when we almost have this budget wrapped up. I'm not even going to go there. But I think it's important to remember that now all of a sudden when we start talking about the closing of these three State Police posts, the Governor went through the Price of Government process also with her staff, and their recommendation was closing down these three posts. This is not a partisan issue; this was the Governor's proposal. Are there public safety concerns? You better believe there are public safety concerns. When I did the Corrections budget, we had major public safety concerns about closing down prisons. We found money to keep the punk prison up in Baldwin open, if the Governor chooses to keep that punk prison open, so that we have enough beds. I mean even with that prison open, we're still going to be short maybe a thousand beds next year according the Department of Corrections. It's going to be interesting to see what the Governor does with that and see how much she really does care about public safety. If we reject the report, Saturday the State Police are not funded. Now I don't want to go into a situation where this coming Saturday that I have voted to not fund the State Police. The first line of defense, that's where the funding comes through for the war on terror for homeland security, and I don't want to leave this state naked because of three State Police posts out of 60; but three of them that the Governor has recommended be closed. Do we need the police? I think we need the police. Why do I think we need the police? Why do we need the personnel? Because we know we have 45,000 fugitive felons out there. We have 275,000 misdemeanant felons out there. In other words, we have almost one-third of a million people out there who are criminals on the run. We need to make sure that we keep the men in blue and the women in blue going. And if we have to close down a building or two or three in order to keep the personnel there, we need to keep the personnel. I would just like to commend the subcommittee chairman from the 16th District for the terrific who are work that he did on this issue to try and save as many personnel as we can to keep them out going after the bad people. And that's really what we're talking about. Is it going to be bricks and mortar, or is it going to be people who are out apprehending the criminal element in society? I hope that this body will say we will keep the police going. I would hate to see this body turn it down because you know what, we can't suspend the Constitution. The five-day rule is in the Constitution, and we can't suspend it. If you vote against this, you're making a conscious decision to de-fund the State Police as of Saturday morning.

Senator Johnson's second statement is as follows: First and foremost, it was the Governor of this state who met with her administration and the heads of her departments on a retreat to become acquainted with the Price of Government. And, indeed, she embraced it. Remember? Secondly, with regard to a time frame, we have been working on this budget since it was first introduced. Subcommittees have been meeting, haggling things out. We got down to conference committee and suddenly there is an interest in re-establishing the three buildings. They're buildings-- they are not state troopers. I would like you to ask the state troopers union whether they prefer the buildings or the employees? I'd also like to recommend to those of you who are running for re-election: I hope you are listening Senator and Lieutenant Governor, go ahead and vote "no". Shut down the State Police statewide and you'll live to regret it.