2009 EDITION

STATE GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN LOOMING SEPT. 30!

MICHIGAN LEGISLATURE:
Pass the Budget, No More Cuts to Essential Services

State government leaders are at it again, playing a reckless game with your interests.

Local governments have adopted their 2009-10 budgets. Schools and universities have adopted their budgets.

But once again, just like in 2007, Gov. Jennifer Granholm and legislative leaders have proven incapable of reaching agreement in a timely fashion.

The clock is ticking. Unless the Legislature passes a balanced budget by September 30, state government again faces shutdown and chaos.

The Legislature must pass a balanced budget for 2009-10  that makes no more cuts to public safety, health services for children and low income persons, higher education, and other essential public services. (Click here to tell your lawmakers to pass a balanced budget before Oct. 1 that invests in Michigan and makes no more cuts to critical services!)

Then lawmakers must get to work on a long-term budget solution that protects the essential services that make Michigan strong, safe and healthy and ends the state’s structural budget deficit.

Michigan Has Already Cut its General Fund Budget by 40 Percent!

Michigan’s general fund budget — the only piece that the Governor and Legislature have any real control over— today is 42.5  percent smaller, adjusted for inflation, than it was in 2000, when John Engler was Governor. This despite the fact that population and personal income in Michigan has actually increased this decade.

No More Cuts to Education!
A college education is the path to prosperity. States with the highest percentage of their population with college degrees are the states with the highest per capita income. That includes Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey and Maryland. States with the lowest percentage of their population with degrees have the lowest income. Those include West Virginia, Arkansas, Mississippi, Kentucky, Alabama and Louisiana. Michigan is 34th in the percentage of its population with a degree; it’s 33rd in per capita income. The only path to prosperity is increasing the number of college educated people in our state.

No More Cuts to Police and Fire Protection!
Cutting state revenue sharing means cutting local government services such as police and fire protection. Michigan has set up a system of revenue sharing intended to return state tax dollars to local governments to assist with the provision of essential services. In return, cities have given up the ability to raise taxes locally. In recent years, state government has cut payments to local governments by more than $2 billion — forcing the layoff of more than 1,800 police officers and 2,400 firefighters across Michigan.

No More Cuts to Social Services!
Local nonprofit associations around the state, from food banks and Meals on Wheels programs to religious providers of homeless shelters and soup lines, have saved taxpayers millions of dollars by leveraging their volunteer services with tax dollars. Cuts to nonprofit agencies and other providers of social services diminish Michigan’s quality of life.

Cuts proposed by the Michigan Senate will mean an end to Meals on Wheels for thousands of seniors, major reductions in services to our honored veterans, closure of libraries, reductions in school bus inspections and many more services vital to the state’s most vulnerable, its seniors and children.