(bright music) - [Tim] Thanks for tuning in this holiday weekend.

Lance Binoniemi is a lobbyist for the road builders and wants to build more gravel pits in the state.

Our lead story, letting prison inmates out early, stirs up a controversy.

On the OTR panel, Jonathan Oosting, Zoe Clark and Zachary Gorchow sit in with us as we get the inside out, "Off the Record".

(bright music) - [Karel] Production of "Off the Record" is made possible in part by Martin Waymire, a full service strategic communications agency, partnering with clients through public relations, digital marketing, and public policy engagement.

Learn more at martinwaymire.com.

And now this edition of "Off the Record" with Tim Skubick.

- Thank you very much.

Welcome to "Off the Record".

We are taping on Thursday morning so everybody can get out of town tomorrow.

- Is that what's happening?

- Yeah, I think so.

It's on the calendar.

So Ms. Clark, let's start out with what's called the productivity credits.

Stirring up the town quite a bit.

- Yeah, I mean, this week that's definitely what's happened.

This would be the idea that folks who have been in prison could work or could learn some kind of skill, take some education classes, and that would go against the amount of time that they would be in prison for.

- Do we not have a law that says you must serve your minimum sentence until you get to get out early?

- And that was one of the conversations this week.

This idea of the minimum time versus what folks are pushing is.

Look, you can spend time in prison and not do anything and you're not gonna come out necessarily any better.

And recidivism rates here in Michigan at about 25%.

And so, the push is folks who can again, learn some kind of job skill education will come out and it will be better for society.

- Jonathan, to say the least, the law enforcement community was not enthused.

- Yeah, I mean, it seems there's a wide variety of opinions on this issue.

I mean, it's interesting that even there's one Republican who's part of the group sponsoring it, but other Republicans are holding press conferences to bash it.

There are some victims who are supportive of it, victim community and some who are very opposed.

So there's not a lot of clear lines on this.

It's a really interesting issue.

But to Zoe's point, I mean this goes back to the whole, it's sort of a new spin on the good time credits that Michigan voters chose to get rid of.

And there's some question whether the legislature would need a super-majority even to do this, whether it does impact a ballot proposal that was passed by voters.

One of the fiscal agencies said one of the bills does do that.

Lawmakers don't think so.

So sponsors, anyway, so.

- I love this when I have two Zs on the program.

Z, the male Z jump in.

- Well, this is kind of this long running conversation about criminal justice reform.

And the question is, at what point is it too much for the legislature and the state government to keep going with?

But this is, as Jonathan said, this has been kicked around in different forms for a while, good time has never gotten any traction in the legislature.

There have been a couple of very weak ballot efforts that never got off the ground.

So this is a new crack at it, and it really is kind of dividing up things on a partisan basis.

You've got a Democratic prosecutor that was part of this press conference that was critical of the legislation.

And this three quarters majority that the Constitution requires to amend a vote, a law passed by voters is probably insurmountable if that is what is needed to make this happen.

- Although yes, some disagree that that is what's needed.

- That would likely be fought out in court most likely.

It sounds like the sponsors are prepared to try to pass it with a simple majority, because this will be difficult.

And what's interesting is even though there is bipartisan support and bipartisan opposition, you have to think the Democratic majority will look at this with something of a political eye, because they know there are certain members, they cannot ask to vote yes on this.

- This is toxic back home if you're in a swing district.

But let's look at what's driving this debate.

There are the Koch brothers, if all people are behind this ever, because look at if we get people who are rehabilitated into the workforce, we need bodies, okay?

And the other side is saying, yeah, you need bodies, but we don't want dead bodies as a result of this effort.

Is that a fair analysis?

- That is an extreme analysis, but I think no, I mean, this is what we're... And it feels like the past couple weeks too, we've had such large conversations right now, and we'll talk a little bit about the Consensus Revenue Estimating Conference last week, but conversations about Michigan's workforce, population declined.

- The age.

- The age.

- We are all too old.

- Some of us.

(panel laughs) So I think part of this broader conversation of the future of Michigan, the future of work and our economy and where these jobs are gonna be coming from, remember Rick Snyder, right?

We're gonna be under the most pro-immigration governor, Republican or Democrat in order to bring jobs to the state.

So when you look at it through that lens, it's a really fascinating conversation about where Michigan's workforce and training is going to come from or go in the future.

- Yeah, one of the skills programs that folks could go through, prisoners could go through is the vocational village.

Right now, the state has, I think just two of them.

It was an effort started under Snyder to have on-the-job training basically in prison, whether it's bricklaying- - And it's working.

- Yeah, folks right now, I mean, there's such demand for jobs.

Folks right now are getting job offers, multiple job offers while they are still in prison.

There's a pipeline right now of prison to jobs, which is a good thing.

But these programs are not huge and not widespread either.

So you could also of course, get a GED or something like that and qualify.

- Let's talk about the budget situation.

After we put the show in the can last week, we found out that the estate, well, we knew it was a $3 billion shortfall, but we knew that this was going to be here.

So the economic impact according to the administration, is not to worry.

- Well, it's less of a crazy historic surplus than they thought.

It's not like the state has gone into the red and cuts are coming, but it is certainly quite a bit less than what Governor Whitmer based her budget on.

However, the House and Senate, as they have passed their original budget bills in the last month or so, we're accounting for the expectation that there was going to be less revenue than expected in January.

The main reason being there have been a slew of tax cuts that the legislature has passed and the governor has signed into law.

Sometimes revenues drop, because the economy has gone in the tank.

That's not the case here.

It's simply less revenue's gonna be coming in, because taxes have been decreased.

So it's sort of one of these like, "Wow, that's a huge number multi-billion dollars less."

In the past it would've been panic at the Capitol, but when in the context of what was a $9 billion surplus, it used to be a billion there, a billion there.

And that's real money.

I don't know, maybe it's 10 billion now is real money, but it looks like they'll be able to accommodate this without too much strain.

- Your take.

- Oh, everything that Zach said, I mean, and to that point, it's just sort of fascinating.

I think especially when Jonathan and I first sort of started in the Lansing it was like the $2 billion budget deficit out of an $8 billion general fund, under a grand and I was like, "How are they gonna work this?"

And now it just x it's a billion here, a billion there.

One of the things that also came out from the conference though, is that it looks like Michigan's economy though is going to stay strong.

And this was this sort of conversation that's like, again, as we talk about what is the future of Michigan going to look like that the headwinds seem okay, but let's also put into context that we're talking while there's this huge debt ceiling fight going on in Washington DC and one of the things that Republicans are talking about is clawing back money that has been unspent from COVID dollars of which Michigan has like a $1 billion of unspent money too.

- They better spend it quick.

- Well, I mean, it's just something to add into this conversation as this mix, as the House budget and the Senate budgets start having, conference committees and conversations about.

- But yet the Republicans after the Revenue Estimating Conferences say, "You know what?

This is a potential danger signal."

- Yeah, I mean, well part of the reason is, so the governor's budget, or sorry, the legislature's budget did account for this earned income tax credit expansion and the repeal of the pension tax.

But the unexpected wrinkle is that the income tax will roll back, the rate will roll back for one year, because of a trigger law from 2015.

It's complicated.

- Watch "On the Record" from months ago.

- It's complicated, but the bottom line is the income tax will be rolled back for one year.

Although there's an open debate, Republicans are pretty openly talking about the likelihood that they or somebody is gonna sue- - Absolutely.

- To try and make that income tax rate cut permanent.

And if that happens, then you've got a cascade revenue effect.

- It's $600 million.

It's $600 million which is some loose change which can impact the budget.

- It would be more than that if it was a full fiscal year too.

I mean, we're talking the impact over part of a fiscal year, because the tax year is a different calendar.

So if that income tax is made permanent, then you've got a longer term budget issue to deal with.

Making up $600 million in one year isn't gonna be impossible given this surplus that they had.

- All right, so we had the speaker of the House had a news conference this week where he announced they wanna take $100 million Zoe out of the state sales tax and the general fund to fight crime.

- Yeah, so this would be a proportion of the percentage of the sales tax that doesn't go to the school aid fund.

It would be a proportion of that proportion and it would be $100 million a year to go towards sort of, I don't wanna necessarily say new initiatives, but sort of, I don't even wanna say out of the box, but this idea of mental health services.

So it's not just more cops on the streets.

I mean, that could be one thing.

- Community policing is a big piece of this.

- Exactly, and again, conversations surrounding mental health and what needs to be done.

So when you call 911, it's not always, just this inflamed situation.

And so, the money, I keep saying proportionally, but then a proportion of that money would be representative to cities that have the highest proportion of crime.

So the money would be broken down to the communities, the cities that have the highest crime rates.

- And outstate Michigan residents are gonna say, "Why are we giving more money to those cities?"

- Yeah, I've been thinking a lot about that issue.

And it feels to me like when you're talking about polling, if you're watching some cable news, the fact is violent crime is up, it just is since COVID, there's a lot of reasons for that.

Could be probably a whole nother conversation and a whole nother show about why that is.

- I'm gonna get to that in a second go ahead.

- But I do think whether because of that, because of maybe some hyperbolic conversations about that, there is a sense among voters about safety.

And so yes, I mean, when you talk about more money than into cities, but I mean, you hear, again, I keep going I guess maybe commercial right-wing television, but it's the violent crime rate in Chicago, they don't know what they're doing.

And I don't know, I think there's something like, okay, well, then put your money where your mouth is.

You wanna do something about it, here's some dollars to try something to do it.

I'm not necessarily advocating that it's going to work, but it's a sort of like, can you do one?

Here's an actual plan to try it if this is such a big issue for voters across the state.

- I thought one of the takeaways from the news conference is that the mayor of Detroit, who was no slouch when it comes to playing politics, found a reason to explain his crime problem in Detroit.

Okay, shootings in Greektown, okay?

He said it was nasty COVID and the courts were closed for two years and all those crooks never got their due justice.

And then people went out and bought a lot of guns.

Did you hear that?

And when you heard it, what did you think?

- Well, I mean, look, Mike Duggan has a lot of ambitions still.

Does he wanna be governor at some point?

That's obviously being kicked around.

And Detroit hasn't exactly had it great from a financial standpoint, from the state, probably since the eighties.

So this is a chance now with this new Democratic majority to work with his good ally speaker Joe Tate, and put together something that is, let's face it, is largely gonna benefit Detroit.

They've got the most people violent crime rate there, is a real thing.

There will be other cities that would benefit, but Detroit being the biggest city is gonna probably get the biggest slice of this.

And it's something the mayor can say as he's heading into another reelection campaign, "Look what I did with my allies in the legislature to improve safety in the city."

So I wouldn't be surprised if we see a few more of these kinds of things where the mayor works with the legislature to bring some funding into the city that looks good on TV too.

- Yeah, Tim, to your earlier question about what folks out-of-state are gonna say?

What are out of state lawmakers gonna say on this?

I mean, logically it makes sense.

You've got high crime areas- - You're not gonna impose logic on the legislator's process.

- Focus on those areas.

- It's like the road funding debate that we've had for years, PA51.

Folks in the rural districts get an outsized share, because they have a lot of lane miles, but it's not necessarily where the money is needed.

But are you gonna get folks to vote to send money out of their districts and into somebody else's?

- Well, that's the question.

- So it's a political football.

- All right, let's call in our guest and talk about building more gravel pits, oh, what a segue, aye?

(bright music) All right, that's a game of musical chairs, y'all comfy over there?

- I'm good, thank you.

- All right, let's start out with, just look it, the environmentalists are going nuts.

They say these gravel pits are noisy, trucks driving all sorts of hours of the night and it's an environmental polluting everything.

How do you respond to those greens?

- Well, I would like them to go actually visit a pit and see exactly what they're talking about.

- Well, they say they don't have to, the local officials have told them this.

- They're absolutely wrong.

There are provisions that require noise.

There's provisions where require time when the trucks can and cannot go.

There are air pollution provisions, there's water quality provisions.

That's one of the big misunderstandings about this issue is when we extract sand and gravel, we are not polluting the environment.

It is simply taking the dirt from the ground.

- So are these folks lying?

- Well, I think there's a lot of misinformation out there.

- So Lance, just to set the state here.

The big debate in Lansing right now is who should be able to decide whether pits can go into an area?

Is it a local community or is it the state regulators?

Right now, local communities can decide.

Why should local communities lose the authority to make these decisions for themselves?

- Well, they have been fed a lot of misinformation and local units of government are having a hard time, getting in front of their citizens, getting in front of their friends and neighbors who are screaming at them, who have had coaching from advocates around the world talking about how bad this can be.

Again, more misinformation and they believe it and they start screaming at their local officials and their local officials, I feel sorry for 'em and they aren't able to pass these.

And so, we've got dozens of different pits in the state that are either delayed or in court proceedings right now that aren't getting, or have been denied that aren't getting opened up.

- [Jonathan] So is your position that big government knows best?

- Well, I'll tell you, this has been a hard struggle for the industry, because we have heartburn as well going to a state department to do this.

But we feel like it's our only option at this point.

None of these pits are gonna get opened if we don't do something.

- Who are the folks right now that you have as supporters?

We were talking earlier about the productivity credits and sort of the interesting bedfellows that has come with that.

I mean, it's the same with some of the folks who are supporting you.

Why do you think there is this interesting dynamic right now?

- Well, I think it is a broad coalition and thanks for bringing that up.

We have labor onboard.

We have some of the biggest labor organizations onboard with the laborers, the operating engineers and the carpenters, teamsters, I should say, sorry.

And they are in bed with the Chamber of Commerce as well in the road industry.

And so, I think we're all together, because we wanna fix the roads and this is a good way to reform the system and do more roads than we can now.

- And yet, you have environmentalists and locals on the other side.

- But what really would this mean for roads?

How is being able to mine more aggregate out of Michigan going to mean fixing more roads or fixing it more cheaply than what's happening now?

- Sure, and for us, that's our simple reason why we're here, is because we do believe it'll drive down the cost of a construction and it'll allow us to stretch our dollars even further by lowering those truck hauling routes.

We are driving aggregate to construction sites over 60 miles at times.

Now that's extremely expensive.

We've got a construction site going on in Oakland County that we're taking pit grand and savel all the way from St. John.

So let's just call that 90 miles.

We could have a pit 10 miles within that construction site.

Instead, we have to go 90 miles to get the sand and gravel for it, which right now trucking costs are one of the biggest increases in the inflation.

As we can imagine fuel costs are high, there's a trucker's shortage.

And so again, we believe this will significantly lower costs.

- This is the classic, not in my backyard issue, but what if someone, family member of yours, good friend, lived essentially next to one of these and it was gonna be dealing with the traffic, the noise, whatever other effects.

How do you say to them, "Hey, sorry, getting this out for roads is more important than your quality of life,"?

- Again, there are a lot of parameters out there that mandate certain noise requirements, certain beautification around the pit, so you can barely see it, different trucking, hauling routes.

And so, I think those are minimized with this legislation and I think they even go beyond what some of the local restrictions have been for different pits.

But I also think this is helping out the public.

We are fixing our roads.

This governor has run twice on fix the roads and it's been reelected on that.

The citizens have pulled this way above as the number 1 issue that they're concerned about, about fixing our roads.

So I think, individuals are getting the benefit from this.

- Let's explore what you said earlier.

You said there was a global misinformation campaign.

Who's the boogeyman here?

And why are they doing it?

- Again, I think, well, they're doing it, 'cause they have the wrong road plan.

They don't have- - No, what is the motivation for stopping this if they're wrong?

What are they trying to accomplish?

- I think there's a lot of fear-mongering going on.

I think that, again, I'll repeat that we're not- - So for the sake of fear-mongering and to stir up the troops, they're doing the campaign?

- Absolutely.

I think to stop these mines and to stop these mines from happening that, absolutely.

- But how do they benefit from doing that?

Why would they wanna do it?

- Well, they're under the assumption that they're helping the people and the citizens.

- Not true.

- I don't believe So.

- Lance, you said aggregate is shipped sometimes 90 miles, could be closer.

I mean, I drive 90 miles every couple weeks up north or whatever.

Doesn't seem like that big of a distance to me.

How much money is that really adding to things?

And in a big road construction job, how many trucks of aggregates are you hauling to a job site?

- Sure and it depends on the job and it depends on how long the route is and how many trucks you're using.

And I don't have all those figures, but we will be saving hundreds of millions of dollars on a $6 billion road plan.

- Let's quickly turn to the EV.

Are we gonna have an electric vehicle tax in Michigan in a pilot program?

- We have an electric vehicle tax right now.

Our registration fees are higher on electric vehicles than they are.

- But you want more money.

- So what we wanna do is we wanna re-look at how we tax all of our vehicles fairly.

Right now as normal gas combustion engines are more fuel efficient, we're losing tax dollars for our roads and bridges.

As we become more electrified, we lose even further, 'cause while they are paying a surcharge, it does not equate to what they would pay in the gas tax.

- [Tim] So how do you wanna charge it?

- So we wanna look at different ways of doing it.

In 20 other states, they have a vehicle miles traveled pilot program within them.

There are three regions that are also doing this.

We think that we should at least study a vehicle miles traveled pilot program.

In Michigan, get the citizens aware of what it is, how it would work, and we want it to be fair and equitable.

We want, doesn't matter what kind of fuel or battery is charging your car and running it, we wanna make sure you are paying your fair share for what you're putting on the road.

In addition, electric vehicles are often heavier than what the internal combustion engine vehicles are.

So theoretically they're putting more damage on the road without paying their fair share.

- How far behind the ball is Michigan in this?

I mean, you mentioned 20 other states are doing this.

Oregon has had a program like this for over a decade.

Michigan, I remember in 2015 when Governor Snyder was pushing a road funding deal.

A couple people mentioned this in passing, but there was really no interest in this.

Thinking about the actual future, how far behind are we on this issue?

- We're fairly behind and when I first started at MITA, which was 12 years ago, I thought this was gonna be the next best thing and we were gonna do this right away.

I always thought that the federal government would come in and mandate how it would look, how you capture the mileage.

And they've been kind of slow on their feet as well.

They've just started a pilot program for themselves.

But yeah, we are behind the ball.

- Does it feel to you like the governor has maybe not given up, but moved on from the idea of raising substantial ongoing new revenue for roads.

It just has not been a subject she has really talked about this year at all?

- Yeah, we have wished that there'd been more conversation not just from the governor but by the legislature as well, on additional road money.

But I think this governor has done just about everything she can in her own power.

She needs support from the legislature to actually move forward on a longterm solution.

- [Tim] Do you have a sponsor to move this legislation?

- I do not.

- Do you see any legislature actually doing anything to raise any kind of substantial funding for roads?

- Well, we have an opportunity to educate lawmakers that the law- - Oh, we had that opportunity for, I love the word opportunity, for decades and decades.

I mean, is there any actual way that lawmakers will vote to have taxpayers or drivers have to increase the amount they pay?

- Yeah, I think, first step is that we've gotta get out and educate more.

We've got a ton of new lawmakers who haven't seen this issue.

And so, our education process will go through that and we've gotta get the ball moving before we can even start talking about solutions.

- How come you don't have a sponsor?

- Well, there's not a solution out there yet, Tim.

- Well, you've just said vehicle miles.

Okay, introduce a bill, put a number on it and then get 'em to debate it.

- Well, again, I believe personally that Michiganders will require some sort of easing-in process as a pilot program.

And the pilot program is in the House budget.

- Does this lengthening in term limits a bit, help or hinder you trying to get lawmakers and the legislature to better understand this issue?

- I think it helps me significantly.

You've had shares of the transportation committees that are here for six years.

Last one was here for four years.

By the fourth year they finally get it.

And these are big issues that have to be tackled at over a long period of time.

The aggregate issue is the same thing, over a long period of time.

And so, when you have a chair that's there for four years and then out, you're basically starting over.

And so, I think having the ability to be chair for 10 or 12 years, we can get something done in that period.

- A few years ago, the governor used the State Transportation Commission to sell bonds to input the proceeds of more than 3 billion towards state-owned roads, big interstates and freeways.

But pretty soon those funds are gonna start to be exhausted as another year or two.

And then how worried are you that there's this big cliff coming and construction is gonna fall off the table?

- Yeah, we are extremely worried.

And that's because our members were asked to ramp up their facilities to make sure that we could cover the 2015 increase, the bonding program.

I get the question all the time, "Well, are you guys gonna be able to do this?

Do you have enough workforce?

Do you have enough equipment?"

The answer's always yes.

And the industry has always proven that they can.

But when you have inserts of additional funding, such as we had with the bonding program, the Infrastructure and Investment in Jobs Acts of the federal government, those all run out about 2027 and you have a huge dip in revenues.

Well, my members have purchased all those vehicles, have put a lot of money in training their employees that are 20, 30-year investments.

- So let's cut to the chase.

Is there gonna be a pilot program on this thing before the end of the year?

- They might have an established set it up, but MDOT's gotta set it up, gotta figure out exactly what the parameters are, decide, there's one statement that has-.

- So you have a shot at it.

- I hope, setting it up, yes.

- All right, thank you sir.

It's good to see you.

I know you've had some health issues.

I'm glad you're sitting in that chair.

- Thank you.

- Also, our thanks to our panel members.

More "Off the Record" next week, right here, see you then.

- I avoided that.

- [Karel] Production of "Off the Record" is made possible in part by Martin Waymire, a full service strategic communications agency, partnering with clients through public relations, digital marketing, and public policy engagement.

Learn more at martinwaymire.com.

For more "Off the Record" visit wkar.org.

Michigan public television stations have contributed to the production costs of "Off the Record".

(bright music) (logo chimes) (logo chimes)