Whitmer emphasizes safety, jobs in signing $83 billion budget | News, Sports, Jobs

MICHIGAN GOVERNOR GRETCHEN Whitmer discusses highlights of the state’s fiscal year 2025 budget before signing it into law Wednesday at Detroit Fire Station 52. (Kyle Davidson/Michigan Advance)

After a thundering introduction from Detroit Fire Chief James Harris, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed the state’s $82.5 billion budget for fiscal year 2025 on Wednesday, after touting money for public safety, economic security and infrastructure.

Whitmer met with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, Michigan House Speaker Joe Tate (D-Detroit), Senate Majority Leader Winnie Brinks (D-Grand Rapids), House Budget Committee Chair Angela Witwer (D-Delta Township), Senate Budget Committee Chair Sarah Anthony (D-Lansing) and several other state and city officials to discuss the budget’s potential impact on the upcoming fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1.

“What we’ve done here is create another balanced, fiscally responsible budget that doesn’t raise taxes one cent, but still puts a new deposit into our emergency fund that’s set to a new record of $2.2 billion,” said Whitmer. “So we are responsible, but we have been investing for a long time in things that matter and make people’s lives better.”

On Tuesday in Flint, Whitmer signed the $23.4 billion education budget for fiscal year 2025.

Before Whitmer’s speech, Duggan touted a number of state investments, including a $100 million investment in building additional affordable housing. He noted that the state has traditionally relied more on the federal government for affordable housing than on state funding.

Duggan also welcomed the more than $500 million included in the FY 2025 budget to replace lead water pipes.

“In the past, Lansing would wait until there was a crisis with lead pipes to take action. But now we are replacing 200 homes a week with new pipes,” said Duggan.

“We are not going to wait until these pipes finally start to deteriorate because of the support from the State of Michigan,” said Duggan.

He also pointed to the recently created Public Safety Trust Fund, which has received $75 million from the budget to support law enforcement and community violence responses in Michigan’s cities, towns and villages.

“In the city of Detroit, we put a third of our share into our community violence initiative from the beginning. The people who live in the neighborhoods that prevent the shots in the first place, they got money from the federal government that was going to expire in July,” said Duggan.

“If you go to the Warrendale neighborhood in the last year, shootings are down 70 percent. It’s absolutely a function of the community violence teams in those neighborhoods,” said Duggan.

Duggan said the city could also hire an additional 100 police officers, noting that mayors of many other Michigan cities have already agreed to hire additional officers.

While the budget builds on the elimination of the state pension tax and the expansion of the earned income tax deduction, the emphasis in this year’s budget is on safety, Whitmer said, citing legislative efforts to reduce gun violence and strengthen the state’s criminal justice system for domestic violence offenders, in addition to the impacts Duggan cited.

“We want to make sure that every Michigander, no matter where you live, is safe when you go to work, when you take your kids to school, when you go grocery shopping. This budget does that,” said Whitmer.

Whitmer also highlighted funding in the budget to increase the economic security of Michigan families by building factories, creating jobs and bringing supply chains home.

The budget includes $45.5 million for Talent and Growth to support the state’s current and future workforce needs, grow Michigan’s population and help businesses looking to locate or expand in the state. It also puts $500 million into the Strategic Outreach Attraction Reserve fund, which is used to attract manufacturers and industries to the state.

It also provides $2.5 million for the recently created Economic and Worker Transition Office, along with another $8.6 million for a pilot fund to help Michigan residents transition to electric vehicles and clean energy, and prepare for advanced energy and mobility jobs.

The budget includes $60 million to establish an Innovation Fund that will invest in scalable startups and help entrepreneurs launch new businesses in the state.

Whitmer also pointed to $3 million in funding to establish a farm-to-family program,“to bring the harvest of Michigan to the tables of Michigan.”

As construction continues into the summer, Whitmer said the coming budget year will see the announcement of the final $700 million bond in her Rebuilding Michigan Plan, which focuses on rebuilding major highways and bridges in the state.

The state budget also invests $4.2 million in road and bridge construction projects, including $1.7 billion from the federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.

Whitmer touted $150 million to support the reopening of the Palisades Nuclear Facility. While Whitmer said the nation’s first such effort would protect 600 jobs and provide energy to hundreds of thousands of homes, multiple environmental groups called on the governor to invest the funds in environmental priorities such as drinking water and wastewater issues, public transportation, environmental cleanups and energy efficiency upgrades for homes.

The budget also includes funding for a number of health initiatives, including $161.5 million to establish new behavioral health clinics across the state and $18.1 million to continue the Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies program, which aims to reduce racial disparities in infant and maternal mortality.

Members of the Michigan Legislative Black Caucus highlighted funding for a number of efforts to support maternal and infant health, including $3.9 million gross and $1.1 million from the general fund to support doula care and $3.3 million gross and $918,700 from the general fund to support the Maternal Infant Health Program.

The group also praised several other budget items, including $10 million for grants for minority-owned businesses, $3 million for the Michigan Independent Retailers Association to help wholesale and retail grocery retailers combat food deserts, and $250,000 to fund a study of the impact of Michigan’s health care professional training requirements on access to and delivery of health care services.

“We have translated one-time investments into our ongoing commitment to shared priorities, creating a moral document and values ​​statement that provides much-needed, ongoing support to the people of Michigan,” Anthony said in a statement. “While Michigan residents of color have been ignored in the state budget process for decades, as the first Black female Senate Budget Chair, I have ensured that we finally have a voice in the process.”

However, not all members of the legislature were pleased with the budget. Some Republicans accused the majority Democrats of prioritizing “wasteful hobby projects for politically advantaged communities.”

Both fiscal year 2025 budget bills passed along party lines, with Republicans in both chambers voting against the two bills.

“The state budget must responsibly address the needs of the entire state of Michigan, like fixing broken roads and keeping our neighborhoods and schools safe. The Democrats’ priorities lie elsewhere,” Rep. Andrew Beeler, R-Port Huron, said in a statement.

State Rep. John Roth, Republican from Interlochen, argued that the budget did not include enough money for infrastructure projects in northern Michigan.

“The lack of key funding for infrastructure projects was evident throughout Northern Michigan,” Roth said in a statement. “But that’s the way the governor works. It doesn’t matter how planned or how important the funding is for a project. It doesn’t matter if a sewer system fails or a library roof collapses. The only time the governor cares about people north of Grand Rapids is when she needs a new vote.”

Beeler also argued that the budget did not include accountability measures for local projects. He said the legislation did not include proposals from House Republicans for accountability measures, such as requiring recipients to submit a spending plan before receiving funds, conducting an annual audit of grant spending, and pausing and investigating projects that misuse funds.

While funds for many local projects requested by lawmakers were approved, not all escaped the governor’s pen, with Whitmer vetoing five requests totaling nearly $9.2 million. This includes $2.5 million for a grant program for religious organizations that provide affordable housing, $425,000 to build an indoor shooting range and $3 million in gas station rebates to boost ethanol sales.

When asked about her decision to block funding for the shooting range and a $250,000 grant to a nonprofit investment firm for the renovation of historic buildings in Detroit, Whitmer said: “If we don’t negotiate, I don’t think anyone should be surprised that they’re going to be taken out of the budget. So I’m fine with that.”

“If the colleagues who posted those items want to have a conversation, I’m open to that, but that was the reasoning,” said Whitmer.

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