March 30, 1995

Legislative Week in Review

• Condition critical: The Michigan Underground Storage Tank Financial Assurance (MUSTFA) fund created in 1988 to help clean up petroleum leaks is flirting with insolvency. The Senate Natural Resources Committee received a report from Public Sector Consultants this week concluding that MUSTFA has been underfunded since its inception and presently has only $165 million with which to address $401 million in outstanding claims. Recommended remedies range from an end to state sponsorship of the program to a 1.3-cent-per-gallon gas tax increase to bolster the flagging fund.
• Legislation revising unemployment insurance requirements (SB 322) was passed by the House and sent to the governor amid revelations that language reflecting key amendments made to it was not contained in the final bill. Inadvertently excluded was a measure that would have exempted construction workers from being classified as seasonal employees, permitting them to collect unemployment benefits during periods of construction inactivity. Lawmakers promise to correct the oversight in an additional bill.
• The Senate begins its spring recess this week, returning to session on April 18. The House follows suit with a break from April 7 to 25. Roundup will not be published on April 13, when both chambers are recessed.

Political News

• Odds are that the gubernatorial gaming panel report due next month will recommend approval of off-reservation Indian gaming in Detroit and private casinos in up to five other cities, according to the Detroit Free Press. Race tracks will likely get a split decision: yes to increased simulcasting for wagering on off-site races; no to gambling machines at the tracks. The 13-person panel will meet at least once more to review these and other tentative recommendations before forwarding findings to Gov. John Engler by an April 11 deadline. Strongly held views on all sides of the issues underscore apparent consensus that the state’s gaming practices are too important to be left to chance.
• Meanwhile, casino gambling’s poor cousin, political bingo, won a few weeks’ reprieve in Lansing this week. The State Court of Appeals set an expedited schedule to hear two lawsuits affecting a statute that would ban the use of bingo for political fund-raising, effective April 1. The suits deal with the validity of petitions gathered to force a voter referendum on the new law in the next statewide elections. Briefs are due by May 3, with oral arguments likely in early June. In the interim, the grass-roots staple of Democratic money-making can continue pending judicial branch disposition of the matter.
• Allegations that women inmates in Michigan prisons routinely face sexual abuse, medical neglect, and squalor were levelled in a stinging letter from U.S. Assistant Attorney General Deval Patrick to Governor Engler, giving the state 49 days to correct conditions and respond. In an equally heated rejoinder, Corrections Director Kenneth McGinnis accused the Justice Department of a "witch hunt designed to circumvent state sovereignty." This latest chapter in a standoff between the Engler administration and the U.S. attorney general’s office follows a federal judge’s ruling last year that upheld the state’s right to refuse access to federal investigators who declined to specify the allegations under examination. Patrick’s letter accuses guards at prisons in Plymouth and Coldwater of raping, fondling, and peeping at inmates forced to endure deficient sanitation, inadequate medical care, and crowding.
• Observing what it calls a new order in the court, the Detroit News cites American Bar Association statistics showing Detroit boasts twice as many African-American female judges as any other city in the country. An organized and active female electorate and a gubernatorial tradition of aggressive affirmative action in judicial appointments are credited as factors in Michigan’s total of 115 African-American judges, the second highest in the nation behind California’s 155. Michigan’s total includes 57 women, 45 of whom preside in and around Detroit.