MLA Advocacy News

MI Vote Counts

MI Vote Counts is a weekly non-partisan virtual series hosted by the Michigan Department of State and Michigan Bureau of Elections. Join the series to help equip Michigan voters with fact-based election information and tips on how every voter can become an active bystander in support of Michigan’s democracy and elections.

$500,000 Added to FY23 State Aid to Libraries

July 1, 2022

MLA Members and Friends,

Your work to advocate for increased investment in libraries has again been rewarded. 

For the third straight year, MLA is proud to announce an additional $500,000 has been included in the State of Michigan budget for State Aid to Libraries. In addition, $800,000 was allocated for the library pilot program that addresses a partnership between public and school libraries. Resources were also included for the Poet Laureate ($100,000), and $1.2 million was awarded through an enhancement grant to the Inkster Library. (One hundred unique projects were identified to receive $205 million in the newly released budget.)

HB 5097 Moves Forward to Ban Race and Gender Stereotyping in the Classroom – Challenging Intellectual Freedom

In early June, the Senate Education and Career Readiness Committee took up House Bill 5097, which was first introduced by Rep. Andrew Beeler (R-Fort Gratiot), and referred it to the committee of the whole. The legislation would ban “race and gender stereotyping” from the classroom. Two Democratic members of the committee walked out of the committee meeting in protest. 

State of Michigan Budget Updates

There is still a lot of uncertainty on how the State of Michigan budget will play out overall, but there is definitely a lot of conversation about how to spend the additional dollars that are coming into play. Last week, the Consensus Revenue Estimating Conference revised revenues for the current and upcoming fiscal years upward by $5 billion. For the current fiscal year, revenues were increased by $1.7 billion General Fund and $1.3 billion School Aid Fund. For the upcoming fiscal year, revenues were increased by $1.1 billion for the General Fund and $948.7 million for the School Aid Fund. It should be noted that there is still some reluctance to spend these dollars freely and add more programs or increase the budgets of departments not knowing what the future holds.