May 7, 1999

Legislative & Political Week in Review

• Lawmakers bent to their tasks this week, generating legislation ranging from the topical to the arcane. In the former category was a bill to ban riotous collegians from state university campuses. SB 525, unanimously reported out of the House Judiciary Committee, would bar persons convicted of a felony stemming from an unlawful assembly from the grounds of any in-state public campus for two years. Misdemeanor convictions for riot-related acts would carry a one-year banishment. The House committee action came as district court arraignments for charges in connection with March riots at Michigan State University reached a total of 83.
• Other legislative action reflecting current headlines included formation of a Safe School Task Force, announced by Senate Majority Leader Dan DeGrow (R-Port Huron). Chaired by Sen. Joanne Emmons (R-Big Rapids), the new panel will hold hearings this month and report back to the legislature by July 31. In related actions, Senate committees reported out measures to ban Internet use in planning or executing a bombing and to encourage schools to require students to wear uniforms. Accused participants in the recent bombing/shootings in a Colorado school allegedly obtained bomb-building advice from the Internet, and wore distinctive clothing.
• Former FBI agent and current state senator Mike Rogers (R-Howell) spoke for the majority in the upper chamber this week when he said that it is wrong for municipal governments to "capture and incarcerate" the families of policemen and firefighters through residency requirements. SB 198, passed 23–14, bans public employers from requiring workers to live in any specified area or within designated travel time to any location. The bill’s language includes employers in state, city and township government and covers collective bargaining agreements as well as local ordinances or statutes. The bill is opposed by the Michigan Association of Police Chiefs, among other groups, which cites concerns that public safety workers will not arrive to disasters in time if their commutes are overlong. Supporters counter that cash incentives to live within city limits are fairer than requiring residency as a job condition. Similar legislation is under consideration in the House.
• A three-bill package circumscribing procedures for human organ removal unanimously passed the House this week. Generally held to be a legislative rebuke of currently imprisoned assisted suicide advocate and practitioner Jack Kevorkian, the bills stipulate that only licensed physicians may remove human organs for transplant, and they may only do so in state-approved facilities.
• With passage of a nine-bill health care reform package, House Republicans were crowing that they had largely delivered on the agenda promised to voters in the last election cycle. Key among the provisions of HBs 4479–87 are those which promise continued care to patients who change health plans during the course of an active treatment plan. Such persons would be permitted to complete the treatment plan even if the provider were not a participant in their new health plan. Also, a wider variety of prescriptions will be covered under state health plans, and parents will be able to consult pediatricians without a referral from a primary physician.
• With visions of a sizeable state surplus dancing in their heads, House Democrats took to the chamber floor this week with lapel pins exhorting, "Give it Back!," urging a $40 rebate for every state taxpayer. The refund is the Dems proposed disposition of an anticipated budget surplus that may exceed $350 million. Final revenue estimates and budget targets are due to be set by legislative leadership and executive branch money managers later this month. House Republicans have previously suggested a variety of tax cuts and credits as a means of sharing the surplus; Speaker Chuck Perricone (R-Kalamazoo Township) quickly seized the political high ground with praise for the Democrats’ tax-cutting talk. Perricone did stop conspicuously short of specifically endorsing the Democratic proposal.