How Stabilizing Is the Community Stabilization Plan?

At the end of the November 23rd Ludington City Council meeting, Mayor Steve Miller introduced a proposed letter (see p. 183) courtesy of the Michigan Municipal League (MML) to send to the governor and state congressional leaders regarding the adoption of the elements of a Community Stabilization Plan (CSP).  The city council had no objections and gave unanimous consent.  

What is this plan?  A press release by the MML distributed one week after the council's consent seems to be the formal introduction to the public of the CSP.  On November 30th, Grand Rapids Mayor Rosalynn Bliss, Port Huron Mayor Pauline Repp, along with Westland Mayor/MML President William Wild explained why the plan was needed to save Michigan communities.  

Mayor Wild would say:  “Local governments are on the front lines of this crisis.  The Community Stabilization Plan we are presenting to lawmakers will ensure that local governments can continue providing the vital services our residents and businesses need and expect and keep us functioning efficiently as we work to defeat the pandemic.”

Mayor Repp would add:  "[Tax] Deferral is not an option at this point, since the need to mitigate future financial shortfalls is immediate.  Life for the past nine months has been completely upended because of this virus, and if the Legislature does not work together to pass the Community Stabilization Plan, then the financial impact to cities across the state will be felt long after it’s gone.  Without legislative action, the impact to parks, public safety, and local roads will be yet another tragedy felt by the virus.”  

Mayor Bliss would be quoted as saying:  “The Community Stabilization Plan will ensure our communities can quickly recover from the pandemic and have the resources we need to provide police, fire, road maintenance and other vital services that impact the quality of life our residents and businesses expect and deserve. It’s critical that the legislature takes up this issue before the end of this year

When a bunch of mayors and the MML support legislation to be passed in the lame duck period that will ensure vital services and mitigate future financial shortfalls, the critical reader realizes where the money will come from to support their solvency.  When looking at the three pillars of the plan (seen here in detail), one can see why the CSP is geared to protecting cities rather than the citizens.  The MML describes those pillars thusly, followed by LT criticism of them (in parentheses):

1)  Extend changes to the Open Meetings Act (OMA) that allow public bodies to conduct virtual meetings. The Legislature approved in October a change to the OMA that allows public bodies to meet virtually through Dec. 31, 2020. It is clear that the virus will continue to be a public health crisis throughout Michigan well past this deadline.

Constitutional attorney Katherine Henry of Belding has comprehensively outlined why virtual government meetings are either unconstitutional or in violation of the OMA.  If we can convene trials, hold sporting events, and shop with hundreds of others at Walmart during a pandemic, what's preventing a truly open meeting?  These virtual meetings foster non-transparency and unaccountability.

2)  Prevent local income tax losses that will devastate revenues in Michigan’s 24 income tax cities. A significant number of employees have spent the past nine months working from home. Current state law does not allow municipalities to collect local income taxes from these workers on days they are not working in their employer’s physical location. Combined with losses in tax collection from unemployment income for local governments—a restriction federal and state governments do not suffer—the Treasury Department estimates Michigan’s 24 local income tax communities will lose up to $250 million in revenue this year alone. This represents up to 30 percent of income tax revenues among these 24 cities.

Among the 24 Michigan cities that impose a local income tax, we find that two of those cities are Port Huron and Grand Rapids, supplying up to 25% of the city's income.  PH Mayor Repp and GR Mayor Bliss have good reason to support the plan, their city's budget will increase substantially from being able to impose these taxes on all those workers staying home in the nearby suburbs, even though they are not using any of the services or infrastructure of the city.  An at-home worker living in Walker and working for a GR firm could pay two sets of local income taxes.   

Is overtaxing the workers forced to stay at home due to unreasonable government edicts a pathway to sustainable stabilization or economic growth, for that matter?

3)  Address property tax losses caused by the interaction of Proposal A and the Headlee Amendment. COVID-19 is causing the permanent closure of businesses and reducing occupancy for retail and commercial office space across Michigan, which could lead to reduced property values—and therefore cuts to property tax revenue—in every single community. As we learned from the Great Recession, the fiscal impact to local governments that result from declines in property values caused by the pandemic will become permanent due to the unintended interactions between Proposal A and Headlee.

Draconian State policy introduced by Governor Whitmer and continued unabated by the DH&HS Director Gordon, has led to these business failures leading to people losing their livelihoods.  Are we to value our level of public services further on their backs and the rest of the community?  Tampering with these citizen-passed reforms to keep government budget growth in check only burdens the public more, especially the targeted businesses that had to close.  When people are hurting financially, taxing them more than they would without this change is immoral.  

As you can see, the Community Stabilization Plan is nothing of the sort-- it's more of a City Hall Stabilization Plan.  The rest of the community itself gets fuc destabilized.

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I absolutely agree with your assessment X. It is still a wonder that supposedly intelligent people like Mayor Repp continue to blame covid for the mess we find ourselves in but refuse to lay the blame where it truly belongs. And that is with the devious and disastrous decisions made by Michigan's own top Marxist, Herr Whitmer. I might add she is closely followed in her dereliction of duty by the Legislature who gave a mighty growl but has still failed to curb the Governors craving for power and control.

X,  you have accurately described and revealed what this community stabilization is really all about and that is about  bailing out the over spending communities that think that there is a never ending supply of tax dollars. Ludington is a prime example. Just add up all the fluff, such as Legacy Park, that is costing taxpayers millions and driving up the debt.

All of this is over a virus that is not as potent as the flu. According to  the charts, Mason County has had 6 deaths from Covid and that is questionable the way they tabulate what a person has died from / with. 6 people out of almost 30,000 people. That is .0002 of the population. The local fruit farmer has a better chance of bleeding to death after getting circumcised by a mechanical apple harvester.

As a society we have collectively allowed ourselves to be shot in the foot.

Good analogies, Willy! Laughing about the farmer! What a vision that is!
Talk about hindering the public's involvement in government, exactly X, this idea that we can't have open meetings, when we can shop with hundreds at Meijer or Walmart, is getting carried away, and easy to be a scapegoat for doing public service. With the technology of the computer you would think we could at least have better communication from city hall during the shutdown. What do we get?

Talk of the Town Thursday is getting more boring, sad-faced and gloomy, if you can make it past the first few minutes of one explaining her hard life and why she is late and harried, the other making popcorn-eating sucking sounds and picking leftover kernels out of her teeth with her fingers. Caught off guard? I guess that lesson was how to get an oral cleaning without sanitary tools. Cackling at themselves, so totally self-absorbed in how old they might look under what light, they either can't finish a sentence or mumble so you can't hear the inside joke. I couldn't watch any further. Is this really the best communication the city can offer? Thanks for some real news, X. This Community Stabilization looks like a fancyword to stop the bleeding, but we should have put the brakes on spending in many decisions through the years. If you don't prepare for the tough times, the tough times will prepare for you--same for a city that has been blowing money like a drunken sailor on the shores of Pere Marquette Lake. More tough times will come, and will we be any better prepared? I fear not, with the airhead plans we seem to have going on.

The underlying lesson to learn from this is that the MML has little regard for opening and limiting local government, they are a 'progressive' organization that wants citizens to pay more taxes to a less transparent and responsive local government.  This is why progressive mayors like Bliss, Repp, and Miller are at the forefront in promoting these ideas-- they show no concern as to how it affects the taxpayers, just the bottom line of a City that may lose revenue due to the state's edicts on shutting down small community businesses.

Talk of the Town has been running during the shutdown and recent slowdown and all that time in between, and I can empathize that it must be difficult with 90% of the downtown small businesses not being able to be open w/o incurring the wrath of the State.  Busts my heart walking downtown last night and seeing three cars total parked on James Street and Ludington Avenue at a time when the parking would normally be full and the open businesses bustling with activity.  

I would have some instant respect for either Jen or Heather if they advocated for businesses opening up, responsibly, and criticized the state policy which makes TOTT show how irrelevant they actually are.  They will never do that because the State holds too much sway over their other pursuits.

The loss of Christmas shopping may be the end of many downtown businesses but not Meijer or Walmart. They are as crowded as ever. Doesn't  make make much sense.

I am visiting family this weekend in Lansing and drove by Spartan Stadium on the MSU campus. What a sad sight that was. The only noise from the stadium was the loud speaker and crickets. Never seen or heard anything like it. And not a creature or student was stirring on campus. I expected to see tumble weed blowing thru the campus on gusts of wind.

Your right! If the DDA was worth anything they would be lobbying for stores and restaurants to be allowed to open up. Instead, like all  leftist's, Heather and the gang are satisfied just to get their paycheck, pretend they have performed their duties, have their pictures taken, propose more tax gouging spending on  wasteful projects then go home after shopping at Walmart and eat store bought Christmas cookies while patting themselves on the back. Just like good lefties.

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