February 2025
There seems to be general agreement, among those who follow the machinations of state lawmakers in Lansing, that the most recently completed sessions stand as open acknowledgment that something is sorely amiss in the legislative segment of state government.
Just picture this. Republican House members decided in mid December to boycott any further session of that chamber where Democrats held a 56-54 slim majority, and a 56 member quorum must be present to hold a session. Then consider that Karen Whitsett, a Democrat Representative from Detroit, decided she would no longer show unless House majority leaders agreed to take up what she described as “Black issues” – which included wiping out debt (hundreds of millions) of city schools, a water affordability bill and other legislation.
After several days of this stalemate, House Speaker Joe Tate (D-Detroit) issued a short-lived and unsuccessful call of the House order to round up missing members and then on Thursday, December 19, called an adjournment of the House until the end of December.
Left unaddressed were dozens of bills that had passed the Senate but still needed a vote of the House. Also neglected in the cluster were nine bills that had passed both chambers and needed to be presented to the governor for either a signature or a veto.
Lost in the mess created by House Republicans and Whitsett was the expansion of the Freedom of Information Act to include the legislature, lieutenant governor and governor. The original FOIA adopted by the state in 1976 specifically exempts the offices and employees of the governor and lieutenant governor, and an opinion by past Michigan Attorney General Frank Kelly exempted the legislature.
Only one other state provides a blanket exemption for the governor/lieutenant governor and most legislatures have at least some limited coverage by their state’s FOIA, even though the specific requirements may vary on such details as required response times and fees that can be charged.
As many have repeatedly noted, Michigan is rated by outside interest groups as dead last in terms of transparency of the state government. Yes, a financial disclosure requirement in the Michigan Constitution was adopted by voters in 2022 (Proposal I) but enabling legislation from lawmakers was at best a water-downed version of what was originally requested by an outside bi-partisan group. The bills expanding what branches of government would be subject to the FOIA would have gone a long way in cleaning up part of the problem in Michigan.
If memory serves me correctly, one of the first attempts at expanding FOIA coverage was a House bill in 2014, so this issue has been allowed to linger with no resolution for the past decade. The House has passed something similar more than once but it was often sent off to a committee to die in the Senate.
Democrat Jeremy Moss of Southfield has been on the ground floor of this attempt when he served in the House from 2014-2018 and he is still at the forefront of this effort since moving to the Senate representing a district that includes Bloomfield Township and Bloomfield Hills.
I spoke to Moss in recent weeks as the first bill introduced in the new session of the Senate was proposed FOIA legislation that for the most part mirrors what was left to die in the House last year with no floor vote in the lame duck session, even though a committee had approved sending the bill to House membership after the senate, in June of last year, had passed the bills.
Moss said an expanded FOIA will likely be a top priority but I reminded him that Republican Matt Hall (R-Richland), the new House Speaker, has said the issue was not tops on his agenda in the new session, even though in the past he has voted for such legislation. Moss said he remained hopeful after having a private discussion with Hall in recent weeks.
There has been some off-the-cuff talk by some public interest groups to possibly go to the ballot to move this issue for the 2026 election. After all, citizens here were granted the right in the 1963 Michigan Constitution to use the ballot for referendum efforts on law, amendments to the constitution and passage of new laws. The right of citizens initiative was first granted in 1908 but the restrictive nature of requirements prevented much from happening. Changes made in 1963 really opened the flood gates.
Since 1963, through initiative petition there have been 35 proposed amendments to the Michigan Constitution; about 15-16 citizen initiative law attempts, and 14 referendum attempts on the ballot to challenge laws.
Not all of those have passed but we are fortunate enough to have this right as one of the 26 states that allow for initiative petitions or referendum efforts, or both. Michigan voters have determined the fate of ballot issues on tax limitations; the bottle bill; private school vouchers; voting rights; non-partisan elections of judges; minimum wages; cannabis use; and physician-assisted suicide, just to name a handfull.
To put a proposed new law on the ballot for voter determination, signatures on petitions must equal at least eight percent of the votes cast in the last gubernatorial election. A citizen initiative to amend the constitution requires signatures equaling 10 percent of all those who voted for governor in the last election, while a referendum drive only requires signatures equaling five percent of the total votes last cast for the office of governor.
No easy task, to be sure. It requires a strong organizational effort on the part of the citizens, and a boatload of money for both the petition drive and promotion of the issue once on the ballot.
But we were granted this right and it may take such an effort to get FOIA expansion enacted after a failure by lawmakers to deal with this issue. We have waited 10 years – enough is enough.
David Hohendorf
Publisher
