You may have read this last week that the Mason County Board of Commissioners made a resolution of their intent to establish a Promise Zone for the high school graduates of the county. The 9 AM meeting on Tuesday, January 9th was attended by a classroomful of local school principals, administrators, and teachers playing hooky in order to present a consolidated front of Promise Zone support to the county board.

The local discussion began in earnest back in November, when the Mason County Press alerted the public to a meeting at the Ludington Area Center of the Arts later that month to discuss the concept.  It was noted by Promise organizer Annette Quillan that they had no funds at that point.  This meeting attracted a lot of educators and some of the public to listen to a pro-Promise message from Quillan and new LASD Superintendent Jason Kennedy.  

At the December 12th County Board meeting, the commissioners resolved to send a letter of intent to the state treasurer to establish a Promise Zone for the county, there was no public notice of this action other than at the very bottom of that meeting's agenda

On December 19, the local newspaper reported that MCC School Superintendent Mount was excited about the prospect and how great it would be for the county without ever mentioning an upcoming public hearing and vote by the County Commission.  School administrators love the potential promise of increased enrollments and money they expect will come with it.  Also hiding in the lower corner of page 6 of that issue and the same place the previous day, was the required notice the County Board needed for a public hearing that would take place at the aforementioned early hours of January 9th.

Like the November meeting, this was an informational meeting that reportedly featured the finest features of Promise Zones attended by very strong proponents of the local school systems who would likely see some benefits from the designation.  The rest of the public unable to attend the meeting never saw the commissioners vote unanimously for the resolution which made them the last of the 15 Promise Zones.  With the possibility of Grand Rapids falling ahead of them, depending on what the state determines about their public notice failing at an earlier hearing, as noted at Mlive on 12-22-17.

But you may not know exactly what a Promise Zone is or how they originated in our state. It started back in 2005, when anonymous donors made it possible to provide all graduates of the Kalamazoo Public Schools full tuition scholarships to any state university or community college in Michigan.

Then-Governor Jennifer Granholm called for the establishment of “Promise Zones” in Michigan’s economically distressed cities one year later. Each zone would be a public-private partnership committed to ensuring that every child in a community had a tuition-free path to at least an associate's degree. Lawmakers of both parties collaborated to develop Promise Zones legislation in 2007 and by January 2009, Granholm signed Act 549 of 2008 into law.

The transition from voluntary private donors to less-than-voluntary public-private funding was potentially a dicy step, the public money would have to come from somewhere, and those places would be limited due to the need of voter approval to raise tax rates in Michigan due to the Headlee Act. While it seems like a worthy concept, voters might be hesitant to create a new, potentially large, tax on themselves for what was effectively a guaranteed college education.

The law instead created a familiar public funding mechanism that allows up to ten (now fifteen) cities, counties, or school districts to “capture” half of the growth in a state-levied property tax, to support the provision of college scholarships. This "tax increment financing" (TIF) is familiar to Ludington Torch readers as a scheme for created public or public/private entities to effectively tax the taxing authorities of an area with the belief that the new entity and their actions is contributing significantly to the growth of the affected area.

But the money taken from those taxing authorities (whether they be from the treasury of a county, city, library, pension board, mass transit authority, soldier relief fund, etc.) by the TIF create shortfalls in their budgets which may leave them ill-equipped to handle their own responsibilities, much like the large portion of money taken out of your paycheck affects your abilities to pay for the necessities and desires of your life.

To be sure, the first two years of a Promise Zone's existence of operations must be funded from non-public sources, that's why Quillan's admission of an empty coffer may signify that the actual Promise Zone may take some time.  Working in the Promise Zone's favor, however, is that the Mason County Foundation, a local charitable organization that often supports such high-profile programs financially, is being led by previous LASD Superintendent Andrea Large, who attended the Promise meetings and will likely supply a healthy amount of funds for those first two years. 

If the money doesn't come in, our promise zone may end up like the one started in Jackson, where they needed $2 million to get the ball rolling and wound up nearly $2 million short with $63,000.  There just isn't a lot of incentive for individuals of the area to invest in the project other than the promise of higher taxes in the near future to compensate for the TIF district forming.  

After that, our graduating seniors will start 'capturing' taxes through their Mason County Promise Zone Authority to help pay their college tuitions depending on what the MCPZA draws up.  Expect West Shore Community College to inflate their tuition more than modestly in response and a very modest increase, if any, of enrollments and graduation rates among our kids once it starts taking effect.  

Which is fine, however, the additional TIF scheme to fund it after the first two years of operation and the additional TIFs sought by other developments like the so-called 'bowling alley block' will add up and continue to drain Mason County and State taxes with the 'promise' of growth and development.  A promise is made to some of our society, and others are forced to back that promise under threat of losing their homes if they don't.  This wasn't Kalamazoo's original promise.

Perhaps Michigan should look closely at what happened with California and their experiments with TIF.   They abandoned this "Ponzi scheme" much like Promise Zone promoter Governor Jenny Granholm abandoned Michigan for California for good within a month of being replaced.  

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Don't know where to start.  Thanks X, this is what I thought when it first was announced.  

...Nothing is "free".

Unless you're the crazy curator of the website, membership and sharing knowledge on The Ludington Torch is and always has been free.  Also, if you happen to be a Christian, your salvation is supposed to be free.  No coupons needed, you just need a personal revelation to approach the light in either case.

Why subsidize the higher education of students who will have no incentive to remain in this high tax/poor return area after they receive their education?

If it is such a good idea why don't local educators fund this with their pensions? 

It is scary when you consider how often increases taxes are approved in this county. 

The Government can not tax and spend its way to prosperity.

As usual, you ask the right questions shinblind, and observe the oft-indirect taxes and fees that our local and state governments exact on us for the privilege of them doing things inefficiently, secretly, and/or corruptly.

In this 2015 article, written when President Obama was wanting to make community colleges free for all, it has a few good supplementary points.  Obama's plan was to finance up to 75% of the costs for those who had a 'C' average or better in high school.  It addresses the inflation that would definitely happen at communisty colleges, and the rather poor outcomes of your typical college-goer already, surely to decrease once they have zero skin in the game.  " Free community college would put even less pressure on high schools to produce graduates who are prepared for college-level work, as they could expect the new free community colleges to fill in what the high schools are failing to do. The proposal is more likely to produce a six-year high school system than a two-year gratis workforce preparation experience."

I hang around a lot of people without a lot of money, and I can't recall anybody worrying too much about being unable to afford tuition at our local WSCC.  Those who may fret always seem to have options involving going into debt in order to improve their lot.  Likely, WSCC will become a lot less affordable to those unable to get their tuition paid via the promise zone, which may work against it in attracting out-of-county students, a significant portion of WSCC students.

Good points torchers. This is just another liberal feel good, stick it to taxpayers program. If any type of promotion should be put forth it should not be for degrees in liberal arts but in the skill trades. We are facing an acute shortage in skilled blue collar jobs. from electricians to appliance repair.

To answer your last question, the promise zone, even after two years running, is not supported by a tax, so it doesn't force a vote by the people.  It's TIF, which can be voted on by public bodies after holding public hearings on the matter.  They don't have to heed the public, of course, so they talk up the 'free tuition', 'private donors', and 'no new taxes' at their informational meetings, and have education leaders run with those points while neglecting the bad things. 

According to LASD Superintendent Jason Kennedy, this TIF is currently expected to capture over $500,000 the first year it takes effect, then nearly 2/3 of a million the second year.  The interesting aspect of that is that the state property taxes that are siphoned off are being redirected from the schools to the colleges, so one would think it would ultimately be bad for K-12 learning.

Yup, and it will happen again on Monday, when a new First Ward councilor is installed by the city council of Ludington, with four installments already on the council.  The city council could rectify that issue with calling a special election as our charter advises, but for some reason they aren't.

A very high percentage of teenagers that move on with higher education in college usually move away from Mason county.  Lack of jobs here and better pay elsewhere.  Knowing that I do not see how this can be beneficial to Mason county.  No return on investment.

The City of Ludington continues to create debt each day. Even on their days off, paid for by the People they represent.

Yet, the People they Represent have "No Say" in these Pipe dreams... Or, even the ones covered in LEAD, mind you. The kids in Ludington have only a few choices. They can "leave town" to survive their life the day they graduate high school. Or, they can spend four years at Westshore College working a dead end job to graduate college with a nothing degree and a low-paying job while repaying college debt or, join the Service. There is nothing in this town to create such a tax base for these dreams. The City has built a wall of debt that the People have to dig under just to escape. We have unchosen councilors only representing themselves in attendance for their personal benefit, entertaining "Conflicts of Interest" in secret business dealings and, reinventing "something they saw in another State", for their Legacy. When they get close to broke it will only take a good lawsuit to wipe Ludington off the map. The City's politics is the City's disease.

Nice bit of prose-poetry, John; it can quickly make one sick going to these what-are-supposed-to-be public meetings and public hearings and not actually getting met or heard because the decisions have already been made for you by appointed, imported fools, regardless of whether 90% of the public would disagree with the decision if presented with all of the facts.  

Thankfully, we have the City of Ludington Daily News to protect us from the tyranny..., of concerned citizens that actually show up, voice their concerns over incompetent, illegal, and/or unethical public officials, acts and policy and are bully-shamed by city officials at the end of the meeting when their official rules protect them from simple refutation-- not that it would matter to the COLDNews anyways as they would just let the City fools write their recap. 

Our City is so blessed with amazing resources and caring people, but we and our natural wonders are being undermined at every point by those who would remake Ludington to look like the s-holes they moved away from.

Sadly, as in many communities, the voters choose to remain ignorant, apathetic and uninformed on the issues and politicians who control their basic services. I mentioned before X that you should wear a shirt with this web site printed on the back so that when you stand up at the podium the people who may want to educate themselves can be presented with the opportunity to at least have access to the truth. 

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