Four of five county road millage questions gained approval from the voters Tuesday night. Eaton County’s millage proposal to levy 1.5 mills for local roads appears to have passed, the Lansing State Journal reports. Meanwhile, voters in Midland, Otsego and Ottawa counties easily approved plans to raise millions for local roads. However, Lapeer County voters rejected a roads millage. MAC congratulates these counties on their road efforts, while still noting that a permanent solution to Michigan’s transportation crisis must come from the State Capitol. Speaking after his re-election victory, Gov. Rick Snyder told the media that a transportation funding measure would be a top priority for him in the post-election legislative session. MAC supports a 1 percent sales tax increase dedicated to roads as the best method to raise the funds needed to handle the crisis.

Six counties — Eaton, Mecosta, Oakland, Oceana, Ottawa and St. Clair — are among local governments landing funds via the “Competitive Grant Assistance Program” for work they are doing on “mergers, consolidations, interlocal agreements and cooperative efforts,” the Treasury Department announced Tuesday.

All together, the six counties will receive about $4.5 million.

Oakland will receive the lion’s share of that sum, $3.8 million for “collaboration by three counties to form the Great Lakes Water Authority” to fix and upgrade the Detroit water system.

The amounts and purposes for the other awards are:

• Eaton, $10,0001, for collaboration by area communities to determine the feasibility of shared recycling services.
• Mecosta, $601,641, for consolidation of morgue services with Newaygo County.
• Oceana, $13,750, for collaboration by area communities to determine the feasibility of shared fire services.
• Ottawa, $31,588, for consolidation of the Ottawa County Sheriff’s Office with the Village of Spring Lake/City of Ferrysburg Police Department.
• St. Clair, $10,500, for collaboration with Sanilac County to determine the feasibility of shared public health services.

For more information on the program, visit its official Web page.

 

The conventional wisdom in political circles is that a significant increase in transportation funding will be a heavy lift in the upcoming “lame duck” session of the Legislature after the November elections. That CW might explain why, in the words of this slide in August from the House Fiscal Agency, transportation funding has been “relatively flat” since the late 1990s. Meanwhile … “The average Michigander pays $357 annually in unnecessary repairs to their vehicles due to poor roads.” MAC’s position: An additional penny on the state sales tax, dedicated to transportation, is the best way to improve roads.

PILT (payments in lieu of taxes) is a perpetual issue for Michigan’s northern counties, where ownership of land by the state and federal governments is common. The National Association of Counties has created an interactive feature that allows you to see exactly what the federal PILT program can do to a county’s primary source of revenue.

As seen in the example below, the federal government paid Crawford County less than $2 per acre — far, far below the “market” tax result. For 2014, Michigan counties received about $4.6 million for approximately 2.2 million acres.(For a table showing all of the FY14 federal PILT to Michigan counties, click here.)

And in the “going from bad to worse” category, the future of PILT in the 2015 federal budget remains in doubt. The authorization for PILT actually expired on Sept. 30 with the end of the 2014 fiscal year. PILT was not included in the continuing resolution that is keeping the federal government going in lieu of an enacted budget. That resolution expires at the end of December and NACo is planning a big push in November and December to get PILT back into the federal spending plan.

Stay connected to MAC’s communications channels for updates on this topic.