After a nearly 20-hour voting day State Rep. Mike Hoadley early this morning voted against advancing a budget plan that prioritizes pet project spending over priorities for northern Michigan.

“This budget plan doesn’t take into account issues that people across northern Michigan are facing,” said Hoadley, of Au Gres. “It doesn’t provide additional dedicated funding to fix local roads people depend on from driveway to highway. It makes critical cuts to school safety and takes away key transparency measures as people continue to call for a government that is more accountable to them. For how much money this budget spends, it completely misses the mark for our region and doesn’t give people sufficient return on their investment.”

Hoadley took issue with a number of areas of the budget, including:

• Cuts to school aid and raiding teacher retirement benefit funding to pay for a bloated budget: There is no foundation allowance increase in the budget plan. Last year’s budget included $328 million for school safety and mental health grants. The plan for the upcoming fiscal year cuts that down to $26.5 million – a reduction of over 90 percent. The budget also makes it more difficult for schools to put school resource officers in hallways. Hoadley said dedicated funding that let schools hire officers was critical for rural areas, as many districts who wanted to help keep students and staff safe had no means to obtain them. The plan comes on top of a proposal which raids more than $600 million from Michigan’s public school teachers’ retirement fund, commonly known as MPSERS, to help pay for other projects.

• Plight of Four Lakes area ignored yet again: The budget plan includes no dedicated appropriation for the Four Lakes Task Force for dam restoration. Hoadley has pushed for this needed funding for Gladwin and Midland counties as the area continues its rebuild following the devastating 2020 flood that impacted numerous families and business owners. With a current price tag of over $400 million for reconstruction, some property owners are being hit with special assessments to pay for something they weren’t at fault for. Hoadley said the exclusion of funding is unfair given that the total cost of the budget plan is being supported by taxpayers from Gladwin and Midland counties.

• Less transparency in government: Reports emerged earlier this year that a Detroit businesswoman who was awarded a $20 million grant in last year’s state budget spent $4,500 in taxpayer funds on a coffeemaker and thousands more on first class flight tickets. Despite this embarrassing revelation, key accountability provisions for grant reviews were not included in the budget plan. The plan also increases contingency spending limits – this gives unelected bureaucrats free rein to spend money without input from legislators or the people they represent.

• Wasteful spending: The budget plan includes tens of millions of tax dollars for a COVID racial disparity task force, e-bike purchase incentives, and zoos, boxing gyms and theaters in Detroit. The proposal also sets aside $25 million for electric vehicle charging stations – gambling on the inconsistent demand for EVs and picking winners and losers based on what kind of cars people drive.

• No dedicated funding for local roads: Despite a budget plan that totals nearly $80 billion, there is no extra funding specifically set aside for local road agencies to repair crumbling roads. Hoadley has consistently fought for ways to get money into the budget plan for local roads, including supporting an amendment when a budget plan passed the House last month that would have shifted millions of dollars away from an electric vehicle pilot program to local road funding for cities, villages and counties. The amendment was not incorporated into Democrat plans.

The fiscal year budget plan now moves to the Governor for review.