Inside 208

The Michigan Municipal League needs your help to oppose new legislation that is expected to move quickly in this Lame Duck legislative period in Lansing. The Lame Duck period for the Legislature is now underway and the League needs your support in opposing Senate Bill 1188. This bill would enact the “Vegetation...

On October 20th, the Local Community Stabilization Authority began distributing approximately $200 million to local units of government as reimbursement for their annual losses related to the new Personal Property Tax system.  The October payments represent the third year of reimbursements under the new system as eligible manufacturing personal property...

Earlier this month the Legislature wrapped up its pre-election session schedule, meeting for nine days between Labor Day and the first week of October.  Both chambers recessed on October 4th until their scheduled return on November 7th, following the General Election.  While the Lame Duck session period technically begins on...

As communities prepare for the next round of personal property tax reimbursements later this month, the Legislature is continuing the discussion over how any dollars remaining after all losses are reimbursed at 100% are to be distributed to local governments.  House Bill 6348 was reported by the House Appropriations committee...

Late this afternoon, State Treasurer Nick Khouri released the following information on uniform assumptions for communities that have defined benefit pension or OPEB (retiree health care) liabilities to comply with the reporting requirements of PA 202 of 2017.   These finalized uniform assumptions have been modified following feedback from the Municipal...

Treasury’s Community Engagement & Finance Division published the following announcement earlier today for their upcoming Local Government Summit on October 10th at Livonia’s Laurel Manor conference facility.  League staff will be participating on the Legislative Panel scheduled that afternoon. The Michigan Department of Treasury’s Community Engagement and Finance Division would...

Following the July 18, 2018 Municipal Stability Board meeting, the Michigan Department of Treasury published an initial guidance document for communities that find themselves in “underfunded” status for retirement pension system and/or OPEB offerings. Under PA 202 of 2017, all local governments with defined benefit pension or retirement health insurance...

The OPEB-pension “underfunded status” list is final and out and about. The large number of communities on the list representing all corners of the state, further demonstrates how Michigan’s system for funding municipalities is broken and needs fixing. Without meaningful municipal financial reform more and more Michigan communities will continue...

Late last week, the State Treasurer met with Michigan Municipal League, other local government organizations, and local tax officials to discuss a proposed reform initiative centered around the property tax assessing process. Following years of tax law changes, the creation of new exemptions, and state court and tax tribunal decisions,...

WATCH the hearing live here TODAY (March 13, 2018) at 2:30 p.m.: https://www.commerce.senate.gov/public/ Michigan Municipal League CEO and Executive Director Dan Gilmartin will speak before Congress in Washington D.C. this week about infrastructure needs. We all know how ferociously bad Michigan’s roads are. Now Washington, D.C. is going to learn. Gilmartin has...