Michigan lawmakers add $411M in pet projects to state budget

• New Michigan budget includes $336 million in “enhancement grants” and $74.5 million in infrastructure-related earmarks
• The earmark process, used by leadership to secure votes for the budget, have drawn criticism for lack of public review or competitive bidding
• Michigan lawmakers won’t have to say which grants they sponsored until December

LANSING — The state budget approved early Thursday by Michigan’s Democratic-led Legislature includes more than $400 million in earmarks for individual projects in legislator districts, according to state fiscal agencies.

The spending plan, negotiated with Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and now headed to her desk for signature, includes $336 million in “enhancement grants,” along with another nearly $75 million set aside for “critical infrastructure projects.” 

According to a House Fiscal Agency analysis, there are 229 appropriations between the two categories. The money is a small part of the state’s $82.5 billion budget for the 2024-2025 fiscal year.

The grants include $10 million for a youth sports complex in Frankenmuth, $10 million for Lansing’s Potter Park Zoo, $2.5 million for an indoor sports facility in Shelby Township and $2 million for Detroit’s Downtown Boxing Gym.

Infrastructure projects include $7 million for the Detroit Zoo, $2 million for a tunnel under M-20 in Oceana County’s Shelby Township, $4 million for road repairs in Southfield, $2.5 million for sidewalk improvements in Garden City and $3 million for a noise study along the M-14 corridor in Ann Arbor.

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Lawmakers have traditionally defended the grants as important investments for their local communities. But the process – used by both Democratic and Republican legislative leaders to secure votes for state budgets —has drawn criticism due to the lack of public review and open bidding process. 

The grants included in the new budget were first made public around 12:30 a.m. Thursday. Majority Democrats later approved the plan, with mostly party-line votes on the general government bill coming after 4 a.m.

It's not immediately clear which lawmakers sponsored which grants - and that information likely won't be known for months. 

Under language Democrats first added to the annual budget last year, legislators must tell the state budget office which grants they sponsored by December. The state must then publish that information online by March 15 of next year. 

Here are all the readily identifiable earmarks in the FY 24-25 Michigan state budget, per the nonpartisan House Fiscal Agency. pic.twitter.com/XzIp1Pqg9v

— Simon D. Schuster (@Simon_Schuster) June 27, 2024

The amount set aside for earmarks was considerably lower than the more than  $1 billion in earmarks doled out during the previous fiscal year, when Michigan enjoyed a record surplus from a glut of leftover pandemic-era federal funding.

Bridge has detailed how earmarks allotted in past years have revealed potential conflicts of interest for projects that often receive only cursory review.

Two years ago, Bridge first reported how then-House Speaker Jason Wentworth, R-Farwell, pushed for a $25 million Clare health park grant later awarded to a nonprofit his former aide set up during the budget process. 

The project was never realized and is currently being investigated by Attorney General Dana Nessel’s office. The remaining unspent $15 million has been frozen amid the inquiry. 

More recently, state Rep. Will Snyder, D-Muskegon, received $15,000 in campaign contributions from a developer awarded an $18 million earmark in last year’s budget to redevelop a long-vacant Muskegon building.

Macomb County Developer Jim George, secured a $5 million earmark in last year’s budget to fund redevelopment of a dilapidated motel in Mount Clemens, quickly became one of the largest political donors to the state Legislature, albeit indirectly through a separate political action committee. 

Mount Clemens Mayor Laura Kropp previously told Bridge that George was seeking other earmarks for additional developments in the city. “There's some other appropriations from what we're being told that are going to come in the future to help with that gap,” she said in May. 

Mount Clemens received three earmarks in the new budget: $5 million “to support downtown redevelopment,” $2 million for a “riverfront revitalization project” and $1.5 million for updates to the city’s aging sewage treatment infrastructure.