This story was originally published by Bridge Michigan, a nonprofit and nonpartisan news organization. To get regular coverage from Bridge Michigan, sign up for a free Bridge Michigan newsletter here.
LANSING — With another legislative year nearing an end, Michigan is poised to remain one of just two states that fully exempts its Legislature and governor's office from public records requests under the Freedom of Information Act.
House Speaker Matt Hall has made clear that his chamber will not take up Senate-approved transparency legislation to expand FOIA even though he personally supported similar bills as recently as last year.
"We’re just not going to," the Richland Township Republican told reporters last week.
Hall's opposition is the latest roadblock in a long-running effort to expand FOIA, which applies to most other government officials in Michigan — just not state lawmakers and the governor.
Now, transparency advocates are questioning whether a petition drive for a potential ballot proposal may be their only shot at changing the law.
But that effort could cost anywhere from $7 to $8 million, according to officials with the Michigan Press Association. Much of that money would go toward paying circulators and advertising for the initiative.
Even if advocates could raise the funds, past attempts show there’s no guarantee they could collect enough signatures to make the ballot.
That means the Legislature remains the fastest and most cost effective way to usher in true transparency reforms, said Lisa McGraw, public affairs manager for the Michigan Press Association.
“I feel like it’s become a political football,” McGraw told Bridge Michigan. “I’m starting to feel like I’m Charlie Brown and the Legislature is Lucy.”
For the last decade, McGraw has worked with lawmakers as the House and Senate took turns in debuting and refining public records transparency legislation. Each time, bills would get through one chamber, only to be stopped by the other.
The most recent push died last fall during a chaotic lame-duck session in the final days of a Democratic trifecta.
Michigan stands out
FOIA laws at the federal and state level are considered vital tools to prevent corruption by allowing the public to see internal government documents and communications, including how lobbyists are interacting with state policy makers and how tax dollars are spent.
But Michigan and Massachusetts are the only states that do not currently subject their governor or lawmakers to FOIA requests.
That distinction has contributed to failing grades on national transparency assessments, including a 2015 report card by the Center for Public Integrity, which ranked Michigan dead last for systems to prevent corruption.
A recent statewide survey shows that Michigan voters widely support expanding the FOIA law, said McGraw, with the Michigan Press Association.
State Sen. Jeremy Moss, D-Bloomfield Township, and Sen. Ed McBroom, R-Waucedah Township, have spent years working on bipartisan legislation to expand the Michigan Freedom of Information Act. (Jordyn Hermani/Bridge Michigan) “In my mind, it’s kind of like the fire department,” McGraw said of FOIA access to government records. “You hope you never need them, but when you do, you want them to be there and you pay taxes to have them there.”
In January, the Michigan Senate introduced and quickly passed a two-bill package that would open the state House, Senate and governor’s office to FOIA requests — though not until 2027, when many current officials will already be out of office.
Hall bucked the effort immediately, telling reporters at the top of the year that “fast action” on FOIA was not a top priority of his despite voting for the bills in sessions past.
Instead, Hall said he’s focused on other transparency reforms: An ongoing push to require lawmakers to disclose pet project funding requests ahead of state budget votes, and a proposal to institute a two-year ban on lawmakers becoming lobbyists immediately after leaving office, among other things.
It’s a policy push Hall’s taken to calling HEAT, or the “Hall Ethics, Accountability and Transparency” plan.
Position shifts
Hall has publicly advocated for FOIA expansion in the past, including last year in a letter to then-House Speaker Joe Tate, D-Detroit.
"The Freedom of Information Act is supposed to ensure public access to government records, and it's worrisome that there are gaps in how information is shared and communicated with the public," Hall wrote at the time.
"We need measures to ensure that tour leaders are held accountable and that everyone has access to information necessary for informed decision-making."
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, has also said she supports expanding public records laws, but she has not honored her 2018 pledge to open her own office up to public record requests even if the Legislature did not require it.
But with the legislation now sitting in the House, it appears the transparency push is again dead through at least next year’s elections.
“We’re not doing FOIA,” Hall told reporters last week, reiterating his belief that “HEAT will have much better benefit than FOIA” in terms of government transparency for state residents.
State Sen. Jeremy Moss, a Bloomfield Township Democrat who has tried for years to pass FOIA reform in both legislative chambers, is skeptical of that claim.
Moss told Bridge Michigan on Monday that he’d even be open to a potential trade — the Democratic-led Senate voting on Hall’s HEAT package in exchange for the Republican-led House voting on FOIA reform, joking: “Don’t threaten me with a good time.”
“If the result is that he passes FOIA (reform), and it has to be tied to more transparency bills? That’s literally everything I’ve been asking for,” Moss said.
He questioned why Hall would block FOIA bills a year after urging FOIA reform last year when Republicans were the minority party in the House.
“There is absolutely no good reason that Michiganders should be among a vast minority of residents that don’t get to see what their state government does,” Moss said, calling Hall’s position “painfully illogical.”
McGraw, with the Michigan Press Association, said that while she could see the merits in the alternative transparency reforms Hall is pushing, any serious government accountability package should include FOIA reform.
“It all ties together,” she said.
This article first appeared on Bridge Michigan and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
