I’ll be honest up front: I don’t know the first thing about government or politics or any of that bureaucratic stuff. I can tell you what “checks and balances” are, and maybe spout off a couple of things from 9th grade history class, but that’s about it.
However. I am smart enough to know that the legislators who determine Michigan’s state budget for the fiscal year need to get to work and finish the damn budget before the entire state government closes down!
The fiscal year begins October 1st. The budget has not been decided yet. They have four more days to figure it out. In four days, if it hasn’t been determined, all government agencies will cease operation, all government workers forced to take unpaid days off, until it has been confirmed.
This includes the agencies that provide for those on welfare. It includes hundreds of thousands of office workers (including my mom, to insert some personal bias here) who will be temporarily out of a job. This includes the state police, you assholes!
I’ve already received a mass email from the president of my college, trying to calm the panic from the potential “government closure” (to use his nonthreatening term). He tells us that this is still only a possibility, and there are still four days left… But wait! Four days is NOT a lot of time, is it? No, Michigan legislators, it’s not.
while it does indeed include office workers and so on, my understanding is that it will not include ‘essential services’ which would include prison workers and the state police.
but, yea, they need to bite the bullet that everyone else has. It’s not nice to play ‘chicken’ with people’s lives (not just the state workers, but all of the other folks whose lives and livlihoods depend on them).
Do you know of any website or source I can check that confirms essential services staff staying on or not? Unfortunately all I have to go on is just word of mouth; I was told the state police would shut down as well.
And on the same topic, I’d like to add that already, by cutting it this close to the deadline, they’ve caused concern among the many thousands of people who are aware of the situation, and panic among the people who depend on them for income, food and whatever else the state provides them.
looked around, but no. However, w/in my work structure, the state workers I work w/that perform employment services are aware they’d be off work, the prison guards, parole agents etc, not so much.
so state cops are specifically mentioned, I believe that services such as prison guards would also come into play , but you’re right in that it will probably affect things like DHS workers (who process food stamps) unemployment workers (who process claims), perhaps even treasury workers (processing checks).
A friend and I were talking about this two days ago, I have to say I didn’t really even believe her a whole lot,(She’s kinda out there when it comes to the government) but thats some sad stuff right there.
It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out, though I’m guessing that they will pull it out of their ass tomorrow.
If they don’t, well… shit! I’d better go to the post office early, or something. Sorry, I’m oddly unaffected by this. I think it’s a government sized prank.
:smack:
I knew that. I was lost in momentary confusion, making out my list of things to do tomorrow, post office was one of them, and the light went half on, and I thought government! Yes, bigger branch.
Okay then, now that my wits are mostly with me, I’m glad that I don’t have to renew my plates until January. They’re sure to have this worked out by then! If not, we’ll have a new state slogan for sure!
That wouldn’t be a bad thing. Bastards took away the gray and black plate years ago, and I loved the simple blue and white it was up until this year. Now they’ve done away with that plate and replaced it with this and while the new plate is blue and white, the uniform blue before was nice. It’s harder now to play the guess the state from the plate game on the road.
I bought the Michigan Wolverine’s plate this year, so I’ll just need a new sticker. I don’t know how far in advance they print those though…
I like Granholm, but she has not been an effective leader. I don’t fault her for it, the Republican Party has been obsessed with trying to make her look bad since she was sworn in. Her predecessor, John Engler, (picture a fatter Boss Hogg) raped, pillaged, and plundered the state treasury. He cut taxes irresponsibly and paid for it all by squandering the billion dollar rainy day fund. When he left office, the Pubs put up a stiff (Dick Posthumus) in the hopes that Granholm would raise taxes and clean up their fiscal mess, then they would run a True Believer against her in 2006. But she didn’t raise taxes, she trimmed sails and cut fat. Personality-challenged Dick DeVos ran a poor race against her in 2006 and got his clock cleaned. Now the Pubs HAVE to work with her, but they’re still trying their best to be ornery. Senate Majority Leader Bishop TOOK THE ENTIRE DAY to name three members to a joint committee to hammer out a resolution to Engler’s mess.
Part of the blame I give to term limits. In the old days, a congressman like say Jacobetti could make a tough vote and know that his constituents still knew him well and liked him. Now with two terms and gone, nobody can look past the next election. What a mess left by these rogue elephants.
Yeah boy. Can’t quite imagine how they do it even with the gov and both houses being held by the same party!
Heck, welcome to the federal gov’t every September. “Do we have a budget yet? Has a continuing referendum been passed?”
One time a decade or more ago we were all sent home on October 1st and instructed not to do any work or take any work home with us (like THAT was gonna happen) because a budget hadn’t been passed.
Meanwhile, this month as in all past years new purchases keep appearing in the halls and folks keep disappearing on unnecessary travel as we valiantly try to spedn every penny of last year’s budget. Then with the strikeing of midnight on October 1, things will clamp down again and paper clips will be rationed…
in press releases, the governor is outlining some of the services that would stop immediately - one of them is delivery of liquor (it’s state controlled). I look forward to the legislators to quickly restore this vital public service.
The state of Wisconsin’s budget was due July 1 and we still don’t have anything from the legislature. There was a blurb on the radio this morning quoting one a-hole who said that “past Christmas” is a possibility.
I don’t know of any direct effects of this at this point, other than state employees have not gotten yearly COLA raises. This article from the AMA says that Medicaid funding may soon be affected.
I would suggest a bill stating that if the budget is not passed by the due date, legislators do not receive pay, per diems, or expense reimbursement. This would never happen again if the worthless douchebags responsible for it actually had some stake in it.
I’d say a lot of the problem stems from this. In the House, you spend your first two years figuring out how it works, the second term, you can be somewhat effective, and then the third shift is all about getting into the Senate. Besides, a third of the House are rookies. Similar things in the Senate. You wind up with more extreme viewpoints. There should be some rethinking about term limits.
