Inside 208

UPDATE: This bill is on the House agenda today (Dec., 20, 2018) as a potential addition so it is very important that you contact your state Representative today and tell them to vote against this legislation. The Michigan Municipal League needs your urgent help TODAY to oppose a bill that [...]

Legislation that would institute the Governor’s proposed water fee has passed the House by a vote of 60-49. A substitute to HB 5898 was adopted in committee and stripped the bill of the proposed fee increase. The bill now creates a Rebuild Michigan Fund, directs the Department of Treasury to [...]

Our third Monday Morning Live is in the can, as they say! Watch it here now. We heard your comments about the sound quality and we listened. For this episode, we have much better sound than we have had for our last two shows. So, we hope this episode is [...]

Legislation that would institute the Governor’s proposed water fee was a last minute addition the to the House Appropriation Committee agenda this afternoon. A substitute to HB 5898 was adopted but the committee stripped the bill of the proposed fee increase. The bill now creates a Rebuild Michigan Fund, directs [...]

Yesterday in the House local government committee SB 1188, the “Vegetation Removal Preemption Act” aka the tree bill, was on the agenda. The committee hearing ended without a vote being taken because the legislation lacked support from committee members to move it. This was a small victory, but the push to oppose [...]

Following months of advocacy and committee discussion, the House Tax Policy committee reported two bills this morning that would shift the cost burden for the disabled veteran property tax exemption from local governments to the state. During this morning’s hearing, two new versions of House Bills 4985 and 4986 were [...]

A recent court decision has disrupted how many communities have been operating under PA 152 of 2011, the state’s hard cap/80-20 law.  Both the House and Senate are considering bills that would address two key components of the recent Command Officers Association v Shelby Township case that the Michigan Supreme [...]

Last week legislation enacting the “Vegetation Removal Preemption Act”  (see previous blog HERE) saw swift action in the Senate. Senate Bills 1188-1194 were voted out of the Natural Resources committee on Wednesday afternoon and immediately taken up the next morning and passed by the full Senate 23-15. A substitute bill [...]

Legislation that moved out of the House Regulatory Reform Committee last week would reduce the number of days and the time people are allowed to shoot off fireworks. Under current law there are approximately 30 days per year that allow fireworks to be shot off until 1 a.m. House Bill 5939 would [...]

The Senate Michigan Competitiveness Committee reported Senate Bill 1129 last week with the support of the Michigan Municipal League. This bill would extend the 12/31/2018 sunset date of the current law by five years and expand access to this bonding tool to single-A rated communities. The League has long argued [...]