Tagged: brian calley

It will soon be illegal in Michigan to discover a dead body and not report it.

It’s one of more than 50 bills signed this week by Lieutenant Governor Brian Calley.

Failing to report a corpse will be a misdemeanor, which can come with up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine. It will be a felony to fail to report the body if the intention is to hide the death or its cause.

Republican state Senator Tonya Schuitmaker sponsored the bill.

Governor Rick Snyder and Lieutenant Governor Brian Calley want the Legislature to enact a major tax overhaul before its current session ends in two or three weeks.

It would phase out Michigan’s tax on business and industrial equipment.   

It is widely agreed the tax discourages investment and is a particularly large burden on manufacturers.

The phase-out would take 10 years, with smaller businesses benefiting first.

Lieutenant Governor Calley said Michigan’s economy is still rooted in manufacturing.

“Eliminating this disincentive to invest will help improve our climate for job growth. Our whole state will benefit,” said Calley.

The holdup has come from local governments and school districts, which rely on that revenue.

David Lossing is the mayor of the city of Linden, near Flint, and president of the Michigan Municipal League. Lossing said there are still too many questions about this plan, and it could force many communities to cut services.

“We want to make 21st Century communities. We want to make these places where people want to live, want to shop, want to open a business, and so forth. If you throw us over the cliff, we’re not going to attract the businesses that we think we need to have to make us prosperous," said Lossing.

The plan would guarantee money for police, fire and other emergency services, but only if voters approve the plan in a statewide election. Other services could face cuts.

The state House Tax Policy Committee will hold a hearing on the proposal Wenesday.

Lt. Gov. Brian Calley says a ballot proposal to require the public to vote on a new international bridge in Detroit won’t stop the project. But he says it could put a halt to future infrastructure projects, including a badly needed upgrade to a rail tunnel in Detroit.

Calley says Governor Rick Snyder’s deal with the Canadian government to build a new international bridge in Detroit pre-dates the ballot question. But he says there are other international crossings in Michigan.

“As we look at Sault Sainte Marie, we look at Port Huron, and we look at the rail tunnel where cargo goes back and forth between our nations, there will likely be a need for expanded transportation options all along our border, and all this does is limit that," he said.

The amendment would require a statewide vote to use public resources on an international bridge or tunnel.

The ballot campaign is financed largely by the Ambassador Bridge company, which is trying to stop a competing span. A spokesman says it would not affect the privately owned Detroit rail tunnel, unless tax dollars were used for the upgrade.

Lieutenant Governor Brian Calley has called a special election to fill the vacancy created by the sudden resignation last week of U.S. Rep.Thaddeus McCotter (R-Livonia). It is the latest twist in a bizarre series of events that began when McCotter failed to make the ballot because of faked petition signatures.
       

The special election will be held on the same date as the Nov. 8 general election. The lieutenant governor says McCotter resigned too late to avoid calling the special primary a month after the regular primary, which will cost taxpayers $650,000.

Lieutenant Governor Brian Calley is continuing to push for the need to secure an additional international border crossing between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario. The new bridge would directly connect Michigan’s freeway system with that of its most important trading partner, Canada.

Calley says the Snyder administration will continue to plow ahead with “the end-to-end border solution that Michigan manufacturing needs,” despite some anticipated pushback.

“We don’t have a final determination of the plan as of yet, although we’re zeroing in. I do expect that the owners of the Ambassador Bridge will continue the campaign of deceit and the campaign of lies on what the proposal actually is," Calley says.

An election year tax cut could be in the offing for individual filers in Michigan.

State House Republican leaders want to bring that into the discussions on phasing out a tax on industrial equipment.

Democrats in Lansing have hammered Republicans with the complaint that tax reforms enacted over the past year and a half have all been directed at helping businesses, while many of the exemptions and deductions enjoyed by individual filers have been scrapped.

Lieutenant Governor Brian Calley says a tax rollback for individuals and families has not yet been put on the table, but he and Governor Rick Snyder are open to the idea if that’s what the Legislature’s GOP leadership wants.

Calley says he hopes a debate over reducing the income tax or some other tax cut for individuals does not slow down a tax rollback that would encourage more investment in manufacturing in Michigan.

State officials, teachers, school administrators and researchers will mingle today at a day-long education conference in East Lansing. This will be the 17th annual Governor’s Education Summit.

Last year, Governor Rick Snyder called for an overhaul of education and how teachers do their jobs.

A lot of the sessions will focus on flexibility in classrooms and helping teachers and students meet new performance expectations. Also, strategies to create an education system that starts with pre-school and continues through college or job training.

Democrat John Austin is the president of the Michigan State Board of Education. He says Michigan needs to do a better job of making education past high school accessible and worthwhile.

“We said everybody needs a post-secondary degree, not a high school degree, and we’ve been dis-investing in our community colleges and our universities in this state for a dozen years," Austin says.

Republican Lt. Gov. Brian Calley will also address the conference on different strategies for improving Michigan schools.