October 22, 1999

Legislative & Political Week in Review

• Sen. Schuette (R-Midland) hopes that by 2002 the legislature will be able to do something it hasn’t done since 1925—complete the reapportionment process without having the results thrown out in court. Following the 2000 census, the legislature must redraw district boundaries in time for the 2002 election. This process is extremely difficult because legislators must satisfy competing and often contradictory goals, e.g. equal population to the maximum extent possible, proportional representation by race, and minimal crossing of jurisdictional boundaries. Senator Schuette’s approach is to put into statute the standards that the state supreme court used to redraw districts in 1982; the vehicle is a package of bills (SB 810–15) that was approved by the Senate Reapportionment Committee this week.
• Of course, the legislative redistricting process is inherently partisan, and Senator Schuette’s legislation contains an important provision favorable to his party, the GOP. Namely, it prohibits basing redistricting on the results of statistical sampling techniques. Proponents of statistical sampling (Democrats) contend that a "hard" population count misses poorer people in urban areas (who generally vote Democratic), while opponents (Republicans) insist that using statistical sampling instead won’t cure the undercount. Without judging the merits of these arguments, it is curious that politicians never speak well of the system detrimental to their own party’s chances. Needless to say, yesterday’s committee vote was strictly party line.
• Governor Engler sent a shock wave through the education community this week by cutting the Department of Education. He moved the Michigan Education Assessment Program (MEAP) to the Department of Treasury, stating that he wishes to allow better coordination between those who develop and score the MEAP test and those who administer the new Michigan Merit Award program, the $2,500 scholarship program funded by Michigan’s tobacco settlement. State Board of Education Vice President Kathleen Strauss, however, suggests that it is "ridiculous" to separate the MEAP from the setting of education standards. The governor also transferred adult and technical education programs to the Department of Career Development.
• Michigan will move toward a centralized collection and distribution system for child support payments under legislation (House Bills 4816–27) passed by the Senate and now awaiting the governor’s signature. Some Democrats criticized the governor for entering into an agreement with Lockheed-Martin to develop the system before he had authorization from the legislature, while some Republicans criticized the federal government for mandating how the states should handle child support.
• Senate Bill 663, which prohibits public school principals from unionizing, took another step forward this week, passing the House Employment Relations Committee on a party-line vote. Although opponents of the bill have mounted an advertising campaign against it, the bill likely will become law due to support from David Adamany, the superintendent of Detroit schools, and Republican leaders.
• If the Republican leadership gets its way, Michigan will avoid the acrimonious debate over liability for health maintenance organizations that is occurring in Washington. Although Rep. Laura Baird (D-Okemos) has sponsored legislation (HB 4127) to allow citizens to sue their HMO for damages arising from the denial of treatment, the bill is bottled up in the House Health Policy Committee; Republicans oppose the bill, saying it would result in higher health care premiums. Baird’s attempt at a discharge motion this week failed on a strictly party-line vote.