Inside 208

The Michigan Municipal League has major concerns with HB 5304, a bill to require local road agencies that receive less than $50,000 in 2012 would have their funds shifted to their respective counties starting in 2015. The legislation would affect 128 agencies. The League has already met with some legislators...

The Federal Emergency and Management Association (FEMA), is accepting grant applications for the Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response Program (SAFER). The SAFER program provides funding to assist communities in hiring new firefighters, retaining existing ones, or rehiring those that have been recently released. The program guidance and application...

A Federal Appeals Court has upheld a 2009 FCC ruling that limits the time state and local governments have to consider cell tower siting applications. Ruling on a challenge brought by Arlington and San Antonio, Texas, in which the National League of Cities intervened, the U.S. Court of Appeals for...

As noted in previous posts, early 2012 is to be the time when the U.S. House and Senate move forward on authorization legislation for a new transportation funding bill.  That time has arrived, although given the sharp contrasts in the proposals, there are still plenty of skeptics out there as to whether...

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has made public all grant allocations to cities and states for FY 2012 for the CDBG, HOME and grants under Community Planning and Development. Recall that Congress cut overall CDBG funding by nearly 12 percent and given the lack of agreement on how...

The latest results from local officials polled as part of the Michigan Public Policy Survey show a great deal of concern with the requirements surrounding the new Economic Vitality Incentive Program (EVIP).  Recall that the EVIP replaced the former statutory revenue sharing program. This poll and other work by the...

The Senate Regulatory Reform committee passed HB 5011, which amends the State Construction Code Act to allow a governmental subdivision to contract with a private organization to operate its building department. Currently, some communities use outside companies to operate building departments, but this practice has been called into question. There...

Governor Snyder’s Special Message on Infrastructure has resulted in 19 bills. The 19 bill package was introduced and has both Republican and Democrat sponsors. Below is a brief summary on some of the bills that are in the package. A bill to convert the fuel taxes to a wholesale tax by...

In December the Michigan Governor Rick Snyder signed into law changes to the Urban Cooperation Act and related statutes. These laws, Public Acts 261, 262 and 263 of 2011, are designed to remove barriers to municipal service sharing and cooperation. The Michigan Municipal League has put together a one-pager with...

Three new communities recently engaged the Michigan Municipal League for executive searches for city/village managers. These are the Village of Spring Lake (2,514) on the southwestern side of the Lower Peninsula; Essexville (3,766) in the “thumb” area and Iron River (pop. 3,386) in the Upper Peninsula. The Michigan Municipal League...