News

With only a handful of days left in this session, the Michigan Legislature is taking up bills that will directly impact our business climate. We need you and your colleagues to contact your state legislators and share how these issues affect Michigan businesses.

Please see the (non-exhaustive) recap of this week’s lame duck legislative session and the top items our team is working on. We’ll be playing Dan Campbell’s post-game speech on each drive to Lansing this week as we work to support the West Michigan business community.

TOP PRIORITY: Earned Sick Time & Tipped Wages:

• The Chamber and our coalition allies are continuing conversations around the bills and additional language that would make the upcoming changes more workable for small businesses and their employees.
• The House will be the first to take up the issue and will need to pass it to the Senate by the 12^th to give us a reasonable shot at getting this done.
• Reach out to your legislators and share your perspective. Legislators rely on direct feedback from you to understand the critical importance of these issues. Find talking points here.

• • Find Your State Rep
  • Find Your State Senator
  • Speaker Joe Tate (Speaker of the House) @ JoeTate@house.mi.gov
  • Senator Winnie Brinks (Senate Majority Leader) @ SenWBrinks@senate.michigan.gov
  • Governor’s Office | Phone: 517-335-7858

Top Line Items:

• The Michigan Senate passed a significant increase in unemployment benefits on a near party-line vote. Benefits would be extended to 26 weeks and increased to $614/week from the current $362. (Senate Bill 40)
  • Unemployment is 100% employer funded, and this creates a significant tax increase for businesses as the trust fund is spent down.
  • This will very likely be sent to the Governor, but the House may not go along with this exact increase, and we are speaking with leadership and house members on specifics.
•  The Michigan Senate Labor Committee had a hearing on major changes to workers’ compensation including increasing the maximum weekly rate from $1134 to $1259/week, allows health/dental insurance to be calculated into wage loss, and more. The bills did not receive a vote, and we are continuing our advocacy against them.

What Moved This Week: 

• Legislation that could increase the cost of health care by expanding the circumstances, increasing limits on damages for noneconomic loss from medical malpractice passed House Judiciary Committee. (House Bills 6085-6086)
• Bills that would limit the use of non-compete agreements (House Bill 4399) and require employers to provide employees with wage information of other similar employees at their request passed House Labor Committee
• “Price Gouging” bills were voted out from the Senate Finance, Insurance, and Consumer Protection Committee. The House Economic Development and Small Business Committee had a hearing on mirrored legislation.
  • The price gouging legislation is extremely broad and would limit price increases to during a state of emergency for building materials, food, goods and more (defined as unjustified disparity in price or >10% increase).
• House Economic Development and Small Business advanced amendments to zoning items including setting a max cap on mandated parking spaces per unit. These caps can be used to make residential development financially unfeasible, and we support allowing the market to respond more to housing demand.
• We also supported making eligible prisoners candidates for productivity credits. This legislation helps individuals gain valuable skills and provides opportunities for life outside of prison, which reduces recidivism rates and keeps our communities safer. The bills passed out of Senate Civil Rights, Judiciary, and Public Safety Committee. (SB 861-864)
• A bill that requires public employers to pay at least 80% of an employee’s healthcarebenefits passed House Labor Committee. The current maximum of 80% would now be the floor and local governments, schools and more will see their costs increase in the near future.
• A bill giving EGLE the ability to create new water regulations without the Legislaturepassed the House Natural Resources, Environment, Tourism and Outdoor Recreation.  (House Bill 5205) This could create new regulatory challenges with reduced oversight, and the bills were opposed by local government and business associations.

What’s on Deck for Next Week:

• We oppose the repeal of “Dark stores” legislation that could significantly increase property taxes on retailers. House Bill 5865-5868 would prohibit tax assessors from using vacant stores with deed restrictions as comparable real estate for open and operating stores. These bills will hurt retailers and other businesses across the region as they try to balance tight margins, rising prices, decreasing consumer spending, and ever-increasing property tax evaluations.
• A lame duck road funding fix might not be as far fetched as originally thought. Incoming Speaker Matt Hall has been discussing with the Governor and it might be possible this item gets connected to the Governor’s Economic Development priorities and earned sick time.

Other Items:

• The House Labor Committee posted to have a hearing on legislation that would virtually eliminate independent contracting in Michigan, but it was removed from the agenda. This bill has been ‘dead’ several times and is currently on life support.
• The Senate Finance, Insurance, and Consumer Protection Committee heard a bill that would require collectors and processors of personal data to obtain consent from a consumer before processing the consumer’s personal data and provide a privacy notice concerning the purpose of that data processing. (SB 659). The committee adjourned without voting.
• A bill that gives local units of government the authority to mandate contractor and subcontractor wages (and other employment requirements) for any private or public project that receives an incentive (including bond financing) or has a contract with a local government was introduced into the Senate. (Senate Bill 1173).
  • The same legislation was introduced into the House (House Bill 6218) – meaning this could move quickly.
• Bottle Deposit Expansion (SB 1112-1113) If passed by the legislature and approved by voters it would expand the 10-cent deposit to all beverages excluding milk or fruit and vegetable juices greater than a half-gallon or freezable containers. It would also require universal redemption – requiring dealers to accept and grant the full refund value for an empty bottle of any kind, size, and brand sold in the State, regardless of whether the container was sold by that dealer. This is a big burden on retailers and the current bottle law has not proven to have the desired outcomes on recycling rates.
• Although the House sent new ratios for journeymen to apprentice plumbers on a job site to the Governor, similar legislation for electricians is sitting on the House floor with a lack of support currently. This legislation would arbitrarily worsen the talent shortage.

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Chamber Membership Benefit: Direct Help with Legislator Connections

As always, please contact our team with your questions and concerns. We are happy to connect you with your legislator or to further expand on any legislative topic.