Monroe Town Hall - Education, jobs and more

I told you about the legislative process which is important to Michigan for a number of other reasons and one is the example that I gave about the (Jacos) process for building facilities like this that are all about the future. Somebody was saying the other day, well, what do you want to build that building for? I said well it's aboutÖhe said I'll never use it I said, well I guess itís not about us, it's about the future and we're grateful for it. And that person I'd like to salute for his help in all of this, State Representative Rick Olsen. And while Rick is making his way up here, it could not have been done without Senator Richardville, the senate majority leader who lead the Jacos process for us 0:00:57.900,0:00:59.190 and... there were others too and Dale Zorn, of course, who you're going to hear from a little bit later todayÖRick Olson. Thank you, good morning and a good morning it is you know I was just tempted to breakout in song from Oklahoma the musical, Oh What a Beautiful Morning, but I don't think I could compete with the previous singer, so Iíll dispense with that. SoÖweíre really lucky today to have the opportunity to have Governor Snyder with us today I've had the opportunity to work with him and his staff on a couple of different workgroups and have really appreciated his data driven analytical objective approach to issues I'd like to talk to you a little bit about a couple of the issues that Iíve had a chance to work on and what the status of them is because both of them are very very important to Monroe County. The first one really stemmed from the campaign a couple years ago when I became aware that the roads here in Monroe County were not the best so I asked to get on the transportation committee and ultimately served on the workgroup for transportation funding. So I want review a little bit of the findings that we not only that our workgroup came up with but a number of other studies recently in the last year and a half. Our study initially said that we needed 1.4 billion dollars 0:02:21.430,0:02:23.519 more to adequately fund our roads and bridges just to maintain the pavements and that number was picked up by Governor Snyder in his October Special Message on Infrastructure. Ultimately in January then a series of seventeen bills were introduced in the House of Representatives and companion bills, thirteen of them, in the Senate and we've done some work on them but they haven't progressed as quickly as we would like. But when we didn't get the job done last year I thought we had better run that model again that we used to figure out how much money we needed and because of the year delay that number went up from 1.4 billion to over 1.5 billion more per year. And the year delay cost you as taxpayers 1.8 billion dollars more or the next twelve years. So we got a problem. There are other studies that have we've done, one of them... one of the legislators said we should really do thisÖ maybe two million more, then four hundred million more, then six hundred million more. So we ran the model again and what that showed was if we did it step by step by step we're not going to get where we want to go - we are not going to have our roads and bridges at the state that we need them. So incrementalism doesn't work. The Michigan Chamber Foundation and the Anderson Economic Group just last week also released a study indicating that if we invest the amount of money that we're talking about that we would increase jobs in the state - about eleven thousand jobs. So bottom line weíve got a lot of work to do and we're hoping that we can make progress when we get back in lame duck. We had hoped to get things done earlier but that'sÖ we've got one session day in July one session day in August two-and-a-half weeks in September and then the lame duck - so lame duck is the opportunity to do that. But I'm absolutely convinced that it's just like changing your oil in your car. Itís either pay me now or pay me later and that's because we've really got to do that preventive maintenance otherwise it will cost us a lot more. So stay tuned on that issue... the governor may say something about transportation funding and heíll probably say something about a bridge. But there's also other infrastructure investments that we really need to be looking at to take advantage of the geographical location we have. We are really on the trade route from Halifax, Nova Scotia all the way through Mexico. We'll be talking not only about the bridge but you'll hear in the future much discussion about a new train tunnel from Windsor to Detroit. You'll hear about a freight hub in Detroit. These are all very very important initiatives that will be very very important for job creation in Michigan. So stay tuned on all that whole infrastructure message. The other big topic that we've been working on is the problem we've got with the Michigan Public School Employee Retirement System. The last comprehensive annual financial report that we have seen on that showed that we've got an unfunded liability there of 45 billion dollars. And we've been told that the new CAFR that's going to come out very shortly will show that that has risen to over 50 billion dollars. So the retirement and the health care benefits for retired school employees is in danger unless we do something. So we worked for months on that and weíve come out with a proposalÖ the senate passed a version, the house has passed a version. When we got out of session two weeks ago we were not able to reach agreement. Weíre working behind the scenes between now and July 18th and hopefully we will have something done on that. But itís really imperative that we do something on that to make sure that those benefits that weíve promised our school employees will be able to be paid. So those are the two things that Iíve had had a chance to work closely with the governorÖfeel free to ask him questions on many many things. But like I said it's really been a pleasure to work for someone who really comes at things objectively and doesn't look at things based on politics. Itís been one of the disappointments that I've had in Lansing is that too many things are looked at in a political way and I've been told there's an election this year so Iím sure by the time October comes around you'll all be very, very tired of hearing about politics. With that, Iím not sure who I need to hand it back toÖ Oh, Dr. Nixon, thank you very much. Thanks State Representative Rick Olson. Rickís predecessor, of course, Kathy Angerer had a lot to do with the legislative process. We talked about too and we want to sincerely thank her for that. She was one of those in the original meetings when the faculty was designing the curriculum for that new career tech center,-the other one was Senator Richardville-couldn't be with us today because he's flown out to California, however, we have someone to introduce that is representing him as a member of his staff and when I was talking about our faculty and students a little bit earlier, heís also one of our graduates, Jake Mclaughlin, representing Senator Richardville. Iíll just take up a few seconds of your time. Iím Jacob on behalf of Senator Richardville He couldnít be here today heís out visiting his daughter in California and grandson. We'd like to welcome you to the Meyer Theater and we'd like to welcome Governor Rick Snyder to Monroe. we hope you enjoy this informative town hall meeting and that's all I have. Thank you. Thank you very much, Jake. Now ,if you would please stand, remove your hats we would like to reintroduce Molly for the Star Spangled Banner. Oh say can you see By the dawnís early light What so proudly we hail'd 0:08:47.510,0:08:50.010 at the twilight's last gleaming? Whose broad stripes and bright stars, thru the perilous fight, O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming? And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there. Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave? Please remain standing Rory Welling is going to lead us and In the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance To the flag Of the United States of America And to the republic For which it stands, one nation, Under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice, of allÖ Wow... Senator Richardville told me never to follow kids or cute puppies. Well folks thank you so much for coming out. My name is John Manor. Iím the legislative policy director for Representative Dale Zorn and I'm also lifelong resident of Monroe county and a former student here at Monroe County Community College. I wanted to let you folks know that we are going to be making a very valiant effort to ask the governor all the questions that you guys have on your list. We have lots of duplicates but I want to assure you that we will be getting to tryÖ weíll actually be trying to get to each one of the individual issues. Also the governor's office wanted me to make you aware that on Friday the 29th that the governor's mobile constituent service office will be at Agua Dulce Coffee and Tea at 1519 North Telegraph. It's in the Big Lots plaza behind McDonald's there on Telegraph Road. They will be there from four thirty to six thirty and representatives from the governor's office will be there to answer any questions that you guys may have. As you can see this is just a small stack of questions that we have and I believe Dr. Nixon has a similar stack. What I'm going to ask is that if you have questions to raise your card up and I will come and pick those up and when the Governorís Q and A session starts weíll be getting to those so thank you so much for your patience. Also I wanted to let you know - any questions that we don't get to we will be responding to either via email or a letter so I want you to be assured that your questions will get answered. Thank you so much for coming out And I believe Dr. Nixon is up. Thank you, good morning. Iím Dale Zorn, State Representative of the 56th district here in Monroe County. A year and a half ago, after a decade of economic crisis, after a loss of one million jobs, state lawmakers set out to rewrite the business model that not only would attract business to Michigan but retain those that are currently here. Last year we made hard choices to eliminate wasteful spending making government more efficient and accountable. Since then, Michigan has become known as the comeback state where unemployment is at a four-year low because new businesses are starting and existing businesses are confident to remain in Michigan. The steady decline of our population has ceased our children that have left the state are returning where dreams once again can be found, here at home in Michigan. It is a pleasure to have Governor Rick Snyder with us today in our home of Monroe County - especially here at one of our county gems, the Monroe County Community College - where they too are experiencing growth in building a new career technology center. I wish to thank the college and Dr. Nixon For their kindness in hosting this town hall meeting. Governor Snyder has 0:14:17.270,0:14:19.620 been a relentless positive leader of our state and he has brought a vision of reform unlike others. Positive reform, that has begun the reinvention of Michigan. During his inauguration, he said we can only achieve extraordinary things if we aspire beyond traditional thinking. It is my pleasure to introduce to you the governor of this great state of Michigan, Governor Rick Snyder. Well thank you for that wonderful welcome. And I want to compliment you - you have good taste - you've picked an excellent state Representative. Letís give a round of applause for Dale. I also want to recognize he has another colleague from legislature here who has done a great job and that's Representative Rick Olson. I'm excited to be here at the community college and I want to thank Dr. Nixon for hosting us today. I'm a huge fan of community colleges. I actually began my college career at Kellogg Community College back when I was a junior high school. And it made a difference in my life, so I have a real appreciation for the role that community colleges can play. You've got a great one here doing some wonderful things. The career technology center in particular is really exciting to me. I don't know if you've heard me speak but quite often when I was even campaigning and I would go across the state talking about the need for more skilled trades people in our state and the illustration of a position that I talked about all across Michigan every corner Michigan was the need for more weldersÖ that we had enough demand that if you are welder in this state you could get a job in about twenty minutes in any corner and I challenge people in the U.P. on this and in Detroit on this and in St. joseph on this and you've got one of the best welding programs among many other things at the Career Technology Center. So you should be proud of that. Now the real question is how do we market it better, how do we get more people involved and grow programs like that to create jobs? But I'm here today to do a town hall for a couple reasons I like to do events like this because it does a couple things. One, it gives me a chance to communicate with you about what's been going on in Lansing and kind of the vision and focus, some accomplishments we've had happen, some of the challenges and the next things weíre up to do. But it also gives me a chance to hear your questions, which is really important because that gets to one of the first things I want to mention to you: what's the role of government? Dale was talking about the challenges we had a couple years ago, and it was true mission was broken, and our government was broken in the state in my view. And we've made a lot of progress over the last couple years but we shouldnít be satisfied with where weíre at; weíre only beginning. But part of the reinvention of Michigan, because again, fixing mission is not good Enough, but the reinvention of Michigan came back to a question of really defining who we are and why we're here and what we're trying to do. And one of those things is, what is the role of government? Because I believe that that's gotten lost somewhere. Not just in Michigan, but across our country too often. If you think about it, whatís government supposed to do? Because when I became governor, after I got sworn in, it really got highlighted to me. Iíd walk in a meeting and people are usually pretty nice to the governor when you walk in a meeting, they say ìhiî pretty friendly. At least they did until January and February of last year when I came out with the budget and stuff and tax reform. They were friendly, but the first words out of their mouth would be we need money or we want money. And the role of government isn't to be an ATM machine and just give out money. The role of government is to serve you. And that's something Iíve tried to bring to the table and really create a culture to say the role of government is weíre a customer service business. And our customers are the citizens of our state and the organizations in our state. Our goal is to give you great customer service to show that you're getting a real return for what you invest. When we ask for those hardworking tax dollars, we need to show you measurable, transparent, tangible returns for those dollars. In the biggest picture, and I know you don't feel this way quite often when you get that tax billÖ in the big picture though, in many respects, we're just another shopping choice for youÖ that you need decide how much government you want to buy. And that we deliver critical things that other people don't sell: public safety education are great illustrations. But when you buy those things, I want it so you feel like you've made a smart purchase, and that was a worthwhile purchase. Isn't that the way we should operate? Now the other part that goes with that is job creation because the reinvention of Michigan is about more and better jobs and a future for our kids. Now on the job creation front, the role of government isn't to create jobs. I mean, think about that. Would you want all 10 million of us working for the state of Michigan? That would be a really scary thing. Our role is to enable job creation to happen, to create the best environment for economic freedom. For people to build businesses, entrepreneurs to come along, small businesses, medium size businesses, large businesses, to flourish and to create jobs. And so that's what weíve worked ***, is making the best environment possible for job creation. And we've made a lot of progress. We had the worst unemployment rate in the nation. In August of 2009 we were at 14.2 percent. We are at 8 1/2 percent today. The national average is 8.3 percent. But I can tell you 8 1/2 is still too high. Weíre the comeback state but weíve got a lot more work to do so I donít want you to be satisfied. I donít want you to be content. Let's just keep going. We are on that right path, itís exciting. And as part of thatÖ Iím going to pick one special item that I think is really cool that's a great opportunity for us that deals with jobs and kids. Itís one thing I announced just a week ago or so was about building a new bridge. The new International Trade Crossing. Well thank you, I appreciate that, because one of the challenges we've had is this is a situation where there's a party out there with the Ambassador Bridge that spent millions of dollars on misleading ads. So there's a lot of bad information out there. Because people wonder: why are we doing this bridge? And I wanted to clarify a couple things. Because this bridge is a great opportunity; it's about job creation. It's about long-term jobs most importantly, international trade. If you draw a circle from Montreal to Chicago, it's a third of the North American economy. Weíre in the middle of that. To make more trade happen with our Biggest, best trading partner, Canada, we need another crossing. And then short term jobs, it'll generate about ten thousand jobs on the Michigan side, while it's being built. And the best part of all, it's not going to take a dollar of taxpayer money from Michigan taxpayers because we have a great partner in Canada thatís advancing the funds to pay for the Michigan part of the project. Those dollars will be repaid from tolls, no obligation to Michigan. Itís absolutely clear. So what a great opportunity. And then we went to the federal Government, the U.S. Government and said can we use those dollars for federal road matching projects - that Canadian investment in Michigan? They said yes. So we can use those dollars to do road projects in every corner of Michigan, including Monroe County. That's a really good deal. But I actually have a special guest here I want to welcome up on stage because in many cases you wonderÖ youíre always hearing it from the Michigan side. I am proud to say we've got an awesome partner in Canada, they've been wonderful. We have the Consul General from Detroit with us today, Roy Norton. I thought it would be great to have Roy come up and just share for a couple minutes the Canadian perspective, on why this crossing is so important and why they're so committed to be a great partner with Michigan. So let's welcome, Roy Norton. Thank you Governor Snyder and Representative Olson and Representative Zorn. This is my second visit to Pure Monroe as I understand this community is called. Itís my third visit to Monroe, I spoke in this hall about a year ago and met with President Nixon then. At that time, the Michigan-Canada trade relationship was about 63 billion dollars and it's now grown to 70 billion dollars. it's the most important trade relationship that Canada has and it's the most important relationship That Michigan has, and so when you speak of partnership I think the numbers substantiate the importance of the partnership I saw sign outside that said ìforget the bridge we want health care.î Canada's not proposing to pay for your health care but Canada is proposing to pay for our bridge. And Prime Minister Harper when he was here and met with the governor in Windsor and in Detroit on Friday a week ago, signed an agreement that our prime minister called, ìthe most important infrastructure project in North America.î He said itís an investment that Canada is prepared to make in the manufacturing future of this region. He said it was the most important project that will be completed while heís prime minister, and he leads a conservative majority government, and he's not going anywhere Soon. So he's clearly anticipating that this will be the signature infrastructure achievement of his prime minister ship. I sat across from this gentleman through several negotiations toward that agreement. And I can tell you that in addition to being a courageous leader and a visionary leader and clearly an incorruptible leader, he's also a formidable negotiator. This is an agreement that most people I think would be happy to score for their state. Itís not something that we do often, but we regard this as a win-win opportunity. The governor has talked about some of the particulars... let me just emphasize or underscore for you 0:25:57.650,0:25:59.230 that this is something that comes with no liability to the state of Michigan. This fellow, this formidable negotiator, has secured an arrangement whereby Canada will front the cost of the bridge, bear all liability. If it costs more than expected it's on Canadian taxpayersí shoulders. If revenues from the bridge from tolls are less than expected, it's on Canadian taxpayersí shouldersÖwe think this is a good deal, by the way. And the governor has secured for Michigan equal control, equal ownership equal control of the construction and of the operations of the bridge and an equal share in the revenues, the long-term revenues from the bridge. And let me tell you, that on a bridge built to last 125 years, as this one will be, as compared to bridges built in the 1920s that were supposed to last 50 years the revenues, after the builder is paid and after Canada is paid for its 550 million dollars for the interchange, should total between 3 and 4 billion dollars between year 45 or 50 and year 125. That's Michiganís share, Canada will also receive between 3 and 4 billion dollars. Thatís free money, in a sense, that you assume no liability, you put nothing down, and yet starting 50 years from now through year 125, I tell you, you want to have this fellow negotiating on your behalf. This is something that has regional importance. I doubt that anybody in Michigan is likely to be told by folks in Ohio or Indiana how they should put priority on things, maybe particularly not people in ohio, but the Ohio State Senate, the Ohio State House, the Indiana State House the Indiana State Senate, have all in the last seven months, unanimously, passed resolutions calling on Michigan to proceed with this project. Funny what can happen when there are no television commercials that are run in in the state. It's also the case, indeed it also underscores that they have a stake, indeed there a lot of states that have a stake in the importance of this. I read this morning, Governor, in a publication in Washington, an academic originally from Michigan, Chris Sands, heís of the Hudson Institute - he said that if Al Qaeda 0:28:41.320,0:28:44.350 had really wanted to cripple the U.S. economy, instead of bringing down the World Trade Center, they would've figured out a way to bring down the Ambassador Bridge. That's how important this is to our two economies. Just one other thought: The Detroit Free Press, on the 17th of June, two days after the agreement, ran an editorial Saying, ìCanada believes in Michigan.î and indeed, they got it right, we do, because if we didnít, we wouldnít have taken this risk. The second paragraph of that Editorial, Iíll paraphrase, was it would seem that Canadians believe more in Michigan than most Michiganders do, which that could be true, but if it is, it's kind of ridiculous. You have every reason to believe in yourselves. Youíre soon going to have some some world-class new infrastructure,but you have world-class companies, you own the geography that allows you to be the hub for transportation and logistics for goods from Michigan to the world. Youíve got all of the trained labor force that you could possibly want and more coming out of great institutions all of the time. So we think that you should join us in believing as much in yourselves as what we clearly believe in you. And one way to signal that might be this November, there will be, it would seem, a constitutional amendment proposal that's on the ballot. Legally, that likely has no significance. We believe, Canada believes, that we've entered into a jurisdiction that has the legal ability to implement the agreement just as you believe we have the legal ability. But wouldnít it be great if Michiganders stood up and said enough of the stunts - let's move on, let's look forward let's tell the world, tell Canada and maybe even tell yourselves that you have a very strong and impressive future under visionary leadership and you should be proud of that future and seize the opportunity that the bridge offers. Governor, thank you for this Opportunity. I really want thank you, the Consul General, for being here and I appreciate you having the opportunity to hear him and get some feedback on that and just to put in perspective for you, one last point on our relationship with Canada. Roy mentioned how we've gone from 63 to 70 billion dollars of trade and very short time. If you look at our trade with Canada, it's more than the next twenty-five countries combined. They are our partner and they're a wonderful partner. Thanks again, I really appreciate you being here. With that though, let me stop talking, and see if weíve got some questions and such that we can hear from you in terms of different things and I think we have it set up so Dale and Dr. Nixon have some questions that have come from the audience and I always like this, I never get to see them so it's always an interesting surprise for me just as much for you to hear what's on your mind. Are you kicking it off Dale? This one comes fromÖ Iím going to try and get this rightÖ What is the rantionale behind the cut in the 0:32:17.059,0:32:20.539 income tax? (again) What is the rationale in the cut of the income tax? Sure, there is a proposal to cut the Michigan income tax in terms of moving up the timing of when the tax rate drops by several months plus increasing the personal exemption. The reason for that is because those are taxpayer dollars that we were accomplishing what we said we wanted to accomplish with the budget and we had resources left so shouldnít we give that back to the people that gave it to us? And to put that perspective isÖwhen I say we accomplished our goals; we have an awesome budget in Michigan We were a mess. If you think about it, we had shutdowns of government in two of the last three or four years before I took office. The last two years, because of a partnership with the legislature, we've gotten the budget done the fastest in the last thirty years, but more important than speed is quality. The budgets you saw last year, which was tough, because we had to deal with a billion-and-a-half dollar deficit so I know we had to ask for sacrifices from people. But this year, we actually had a surplus. And weíre doing these budgets without accounting gimmicks, no games, being much more open and transparent. I'm an old CPA, Iím the only CPA governor in the country - I think we could use more CPA governors around the country. We did a balanced budget that's a solid budget we started paying down liabilities that hadnít been paid down in the fashion they should have been in prior years for a long time. We have continued to put money in the rainy day fund and we still need to grow the rainy day fund but with this budget weíre bringing it back up to about half a billion dollars. To give you a perspective, when I took office, the rainy day fund had 2 million dollars in it. So there's more to do, but we thought we were being prudent by putting it on a regular periodic basis to add some more this year, hopefully weíll add some more next year. We had remaining dollars because of the improvement in the economy. Give it back to the hard working people Of the state Michigan is the right answer. Governor, this question is from Kirsten Doyle who asks: as a small business owner, I'm wondering what kind of programs or incentives have been planned to help small business owners and to encourage others to come to Michigan to do business. Thatís a great topic because if you look at job creation it really starts with people that are in Michigan. There are couple of aspects to that question that Iíd highlight. One is a question from a small business person which is great, the second one, though, the last part was, ìwhat are you doing to bring business to Michigan?î Well, we fundamentally changed how we do economic development. Iím a private sector person, I came from the business world. So I think it was a new appreciation of a different way of doing things because think about this: the old ways of doing things, which is still true most the country, when you're having a tough time isÖ they go out andÖ we were buying companies to come into Michigan with huge incentive packages. We'd offer these big incentive packages that amount to currently we're having to pay about a half a billion dollars a year in tax credits out. How many people knew that we were putting out about a half billion dollars a year in tax creditsÖ in terms of paying for deals that were done in earlier years? That's a lot of money folks. So my view isÖ think about this if you are a business person, or even at home if you have a challenged business environment, and your customers are having difficulty, do you work on making sure your current customers are the happiest best customers or do you go after new customers? Business 101 is you always take care Of your current customers first. My methodology wasÖlet's stop going after these big companies with huge incentive packages, let's say how can we help Michiganders be successful right here by creating the best playing field for businesses whether youíre a small business or a large business. Isn't that the way it should work? Create the best competitive Playing field so we can compete against anyone. And so we're focused on what's called economic gardening, which our first priority is to help people right here in Michigan. And then we ask the question as we come back in MichiganÖ weíll start doing more, weíre doing a little bit now , but do more to bring companies to Michigan but what's the best way to get somebody to come do business with you, to acquire a customer? It's not The ad you run, and we have great ads, and it's not anything I say, it's a happy customer. Itís word of mouth from a happy customer; itís the best way to get another customer. So it's really having Michigan companies speak up about why they love Michigan so much is the best way to get other people to come here. And then for small business, we did wipe out most of the incentives but actually if you're not incorporated, if you're not a regular corporation, and youíre a small businesses thatís unincorporated, a partnership or something, we did one of best things. We wiped out the Michigan business tax, which was the dumbest tax in the United States. One of my favorite lines is when I was Campaigning I ran against a bunch of people that were fixing Michigan so they'd say, well cut the surcharge or cut it in half. My answer is if you got something that dumb, dumb divided by two is still dumb. Get 0:37:39.910,0:37:42.449 rid of the whole thing. So we got rid of the whole thing but also what I would say for small business people we do have a lot of great programs that the Michigan Economic Development Corporation can happen, youíve got good economic development people here in the Monroe area, but those are programs about not giveaways but there's good loan programs and good business advice programs and so I encourage you; they should contact these local groups or the state level because that we've got some great programs again not about spending money but about helping make connections and build relations for success. Governor, you talk about the unfunded pension, why is unfunded, where did the money go? A couple pieces. One, we haven't been fully funding our pension obligations for a long time, and the other part is there are some changes in the stock market that affected many of us personally. So, weíre underfunded in the pension plan but even more than the pension plan and is for post retiree medical. to the degree weíre giving retirees medical coverage, we weren't setting aside any real money to pay for that. We were just doing pay as you go. That's not a smart answer. So we've build-up huge liabilities both at the state-level for state employees, which are better managed now, but then we have the Michigan public employees pension system. T Michigan public employee pension system has about 45 billion dollars in obligations outstanding. Think about that. Think about the mortgage you have on your home. Our mortgage is that 45 billion plus some other billion from the state plan plus debt We owe. I can tell you weíre finally being responsible about saying, shouldnít we be making payments on these plans? Shouldnít we be doing reforms? Again, respecting that people are counting on this, too. And we want good retirement plans for people. But we need to be more thoughtful and we need to look at how the private sector is operating, how we can find these things to be financially responsible for the long term. Because that's one thing again, that too much of government; all they did was look at was cash in and cash-out in a one year time frame. No one was looking at the debt. Again, as an accountant, I came in to say: we're looking at the debt. I can tell you weíre actually working hard. Iím working with our budget director, weíre doing analyses now on 2030, 2040 and 2050. Because we're coming up with reforms to Say, in that timeframe how do we pay off the debt? Because one of the things you elected me on was more and better jobs but the second one was a future for our kids. Now, on our watch from the last twenty or thirty years, we haven't been responsible like we should. Is the right answer you just sort of let that keep going or do you take responsibility? Regardless of how it Happened, blame no one, but let's solve that problem. Use relentless positive action and letís solve It. One thing I'm really proud of - we are the poster child for what Washington DC needs to do. We know how to balance a budget, we're paying our long-term liabilities, we need Washington to do the same thing. Governor, Judy Greene writes: Is there a plan about returning the 470 dollar per-pupil funding that was taken from the students, now that the school aid funding is in the black? Yeah, actually And, you can go back, the 470, there's a lot of dispute about what the number is, but we did have to make some cuts last year. I believe it is much less than that but as a practical Matter, itís about 100 (dollars) but if you look at it and you go through the analysis, issue was we had a billion-and-a-half dollar deficit. And we did have to ask for sacrifice, thereís no doubt about it. Was this easy? No. and a perfect world would you like to do that in the wrong but we had a close a billion-and-a-half dollar deficit so we asked for a much smaller reduction in education than we did not almost any other area. And we came up with ideas on how school districts could help save those dollars, and I recognize that was still tough. So this year we are increasing education funding at a reasonably good margin in terms of other priorities. Again, we're putting more money in education than many other things that we could be investing in because our kids are critically important. The other challenging point is we need to work harder to get teachers to have faith in us because a lot of times teachers are feeling but upon. We've asked for a lot of stuff and a lot of challenges. Teachers really do matter. Our educational system, though, needs to be reformed. Our educational system is not working right today and teachers aren't the issue,it's the system overall. So that's where we need to work *** coming up with better answers. So that's where we're going to continue to put dollars in education but not spending money just simply spending money. We need to see that there's a return on That. That's why we need to have metrics and measures to make sure weíre getting 0:42:55.819,0:42:57.589 student growth. Why do I say that? If you look at the Numbers, only 17 percent of our kids are college ready. Seventeen percent. That's not right. When people say, well I don't know if I buy that number. If you talk to the community colleges, the percentage of kids having to take remedial classes coming out of high school is running about sixty-plus percent. These are kids that got a high school Diploma, they should not need a remedial class to take the college level class. So we have a real problem and the focus is on reform to solve the problem and teachers should be part of that and I want to see teachers feel more empowered. So we've talked about things about creating a master teacher category to allow teachers to be mentors for other teachersÖ there's a lot of cool things that we can do by partnering together in understanding these are tough issues but letís solve tough issues together. So I'm excited about the future and I Appreciate it - we've asked for sacrifices out of people over the last year. Hopefully, weíre on that positive path now though. This one comes from Doug Darling. Many of the ballot proposals look to be costly to the state of Michigan. Are there any of the proposals that have any benefit or value to our state? I haven't formally come out on all of them, but most of them don't have a whole lot of value. Basically all they're doing is messing with the Michiga Constitution, trying to go backward, taking us back, or making things more complicated or more expensive. One of the things we need to do, and this is a very personal thing, and I'll ask this for those of you who are about my age profile. I got out of school in 1982. The closest time to the last few years was about 1982. We actually get had higher unemployment back then, it got to about 15 percent or so. The Houston Post was being driven up to Detroit to be sold...the Sunday paper was being driven up by semi loads because people were looking at the want ads in the Houston Post to take jobs in Texas. And what happened was, two or three years passed and we got through that. 1985 came, 1986Ö things picked up in Michigan pretty nicely. They improved a lot. You know what happened? We have amnesia about the bad times. We got complacent. We got content. To say, oh the bad times are over, we don't really need to change anything, we don't need to reinvent ourselves let's just keep the old thing going. I can pick two or three other times that many of you here would have lived through too. Where we went through these cycles that things were bad but when they came back they said oh theyíre back again, we don't need to think about that. That was really dumb. And it finally came home this time. Because if you look at the trend line, the trend line kept on going down even though we have these ups and downs. And that was my commitment to you, that's what I spoke about earlier. My commitment to you is not to be satisfied, not to be content. We should not let this happen to us again. We need to reinvent ourselves. This is still a crisis. When youíve got 8 1/2 percent Unemployment, itís still a crisis. Let's keep that fire and passion. Use relentless positive action. No blame, no credit, just solving problems, solve the next problem, solve the problem after that, 0:46:26.799,0:46:28.339 and go! And then we're going to be that great state again. We just have to have that conviction and not get lulled into a sense of Oh, we go back the same old ways. That doesn't work. I hope those of you in my age profile can really cheer the fact that we got our act together this time. Governor, Karen Chenivar writes: I retired in two 2011 after thirty five years, I need work but she writes, there is a law that prevents her from subbing. Will this be corrected? She has much to offer, and she says, I'm very a very viable employee for schools, so we're assuming that she's a teacher. I'm not sure of all the specifics of that issue, but Iíd be happy to take that question back and we can try to follow up with her. Because again we want to create an environmentÖ there are some restrictions, again, some legislation that was passed before I came to office about people going back into their same system, it's called double dippingÖ to sort of manage that issue. Some of that went too far. So weíre trying t be thoughtful about the right Balance, so I'd have to learn more about that particular case, but I'm happy a have us follow up on that. Martina Hillman. As a retired special education teacher, I planned a my retirement based on the promised financial numbers. Now my pension has been taxed, my copay for my health insurance will be compromised The police and fire and judges are under the same retirement Policy. Why are the teachers and school personel being targeted? No, this is the good part about getting questions like this so we can we can talk about it. Because the way I view it is: we didn't change people's pension at all. Again, that's protected the Michigan constitution and should be. You earned your pension. So you're keeping your pension. Now when you start talking about other benefits we built a dumb system in Michigan, again. That goes back to being unsustainableÖ and that dealt with how we would tax pensions. Iíll give you a quick history on this. This goes back to the 1960s. When they did the personal income tax System, they excluded public pensions from the system, from the income tax. Not constitutionally-protected, that was just the way the law was written. Now think about it. Is it fair that the public pension people don't pay anything, where if you had a private pension you paid, or if you didn't happen to have a pension and you made income you had to pay. That's not fair. So the solution a few years later, because they recognized they've messed up, instead of solving that problem the right way, they started excluding a bunch of private pension stuff. So now, depending on what kind of private pension, you still had to pay, and if you're the poor person that didn't happen to have the right job so you got a pension, You were having to pay. That's not particularly fair. So then you step back and say well shouldnít we have a fair system, regardless of the source of income. And then you say, one of the reasons that I think I got elected was keeping our kids in Michigan. So what happens if you create a retirement system, and then you have a lot more people becoming seniors. So in the next 20 to 30 years, we're going have a lot more seniors that wouldnít be paying anything under the system. Youíve still got to pay for stuff, right? so what would happen then is youíre shifting your tax burden to say let's tax are young people more to pay for us. Now is that a good message to send to young people? To say we want you to stay in Michigan but we want you to pay more than weíre paying. Thatís not fair. That's a way to drive them out of state. So we had a messed up system that went back fifty years. What we did though, because again, you need to be sensitive to these things, thereís no perfect answer. So what we did was, we grandfathered people in that were already seniors. If theyíre sixty-seven or older, the law doesn't change for you. You still get all those benefits. if you're between sixty seven and sixty there's a transition where you get most of that And I'll remind you - your social security isnít going to be taxed period. So we're not taxing social security at all. And we created an exclusion that can either be part of that or an alternative to say if you have any kind of income, you can exclusion up to twenty thousand for a single, forty thousand for a couple. And it doesn't matter whether you had to work at the local retail store, Mcdonald's, you had a public pension or a private pension. That's a lot fairer. And then for people that are younger coming up your pension isn't being touched at all, again thatís protected. But to say, shouldnít you contribute something towards taxes because you're getting services plus you get, again, social security or this other exclusion. That's much better than any other age group of our citizens gets. So again, this was one of those tough things to say, we were building a house of cards, just like we did on that debt side, to say we were building a house of cards that was unsustainable, we couldn't pay for it, it, was going to help drive young people out of our state. We might have been able to say we can wait another five or ten years to do This, but that's not why I believe you hired me to take this job. You hired me to reinvent Michigan and take on some really ugly issues. The easeier answer would have just been to ignore it. But I don't feel I would have been doing the job you asked me to do if I wasn't honest and put that issue on the table. And again, ask for some sacrifice, but let's put something in place. Now our kids can be excited about Michigan. And the people that are already seniors doing it ñ wereíre not impacting them. We can make the system work. I appreciate that, I like questions like that because it's a chance to clear the air. It wasn't done just to cause somebody some trouble. It was to get us to get the facts out to Say, we had done some really dumb things . Let's be honest about it and solve them. Relentless positive action. Governor, this question was written by Rose Marie Braun, who writes, with rising costs of health care, why do elected officials still receive free health care? Well, when you say elected officials the Governorís not on that program, I can tell you, because we shouldnít. So I think the legislature has made a number of changes so that's been phased out. So that is being corrected in terms of health care because that plan was way too generous. That wasnít right, nor fair. So the legislature has addressed it for them in a go forward fashion. The governorÖ that had already been resolved for my office some time ago. The good part is we are solving that. But we do, again, we need to be always sensitive to that because, again, if weíre representing you, we need to be in the same spot everybody else is, not have a better deal. Next question: One more question. Oh, that was last one? OK, well let me turn this mic over. I really appreciate the chance to be with you but we have another special item here that I thought worth giving up the floor for because this is cool stuff. I really want to thank you for the opportunity to be here. Itís been very worthwhile. I'm going to turn it over Representative Zorn because he has another special guest to come up that I'm excited about. I'll give it over to Dale. Thank you so Much. Thank you Governor Snyder for being here with us today. This town hall is very beneficial to all of us in Monroe County as well as Michigan to hear the issues that we have. At this time I would like to invite Dr. Nixon to join us on stage, as well as a friend of ours, a friend of Monroe County, A friend of Michigan, Kurt Darrow, CEO of Monroe Countyís own La-Z-Boy Chair Company. 0:55:04.729,0:55:11.729 We have a very special announcement. Thank you, Dale. and... Thank you Governor Snyder and Representative Zorn for hosting this event in Monroe. Governor, youíre talk was right on target. We did hire you to tackle the tough issues, you're doing a marvelous job. And, I need to take speaking lessons from the guy from Canada. He's pretty sharp. But I don't want to negotiate with you. Today there was much discussion about private and public partnership and cooperation to build a solid future in Michigan. This year La-Z-Boy is celebrating its 85th anniversary and we are proud to have spent all eighty-five years here in this great state and the Monroe community. We are also proud of our continuing efforts in our community at large and longstanding relationship our company has had with the Monroe County Community College. In 2004 the La-Z-Boy Foundation committed 2 million dollars to help build this beautiful La-Z-Boy center on campus and has been a wonderful addition to our community. And in keeping with the commitment to the community and the Monroe Community College, we are pleased to announce another significant contribution from the La-Z-Boy Foundation. La-Z-Boy will donate half a million dollars to help fund the Career Technology Center to assist the college in fulfilling its mission to educate our citizens and provide them with the skills necessary to compete in a global market place. Thank you very much. We... we sincerely appreciate the opportunity to make this announcement at today's forum and we would hope that this is the first of many contributions from other organizations in the community to help fund this very, very worthy project. Thanks for your time today. Thank you, Kurt, and thanks to the foundation. Is June Ellen here or Don Bloom, or Marve? The foundation members of La-Z-Boy. And we can still say La-Z-Boy rocks Monroe County. We are truly grateful. This has been a private public partnership with Monroe County Community College and its community and this is a way you're helping us serve the community. And I might mention, Kurt, for our folks as they leave the facility today they'll see a little plaque out there that's a tribute to the founders of La-Z-Boy and it is truly in keeping with their direction for La-Z-Boy - you've done a great job. Governor, thanks for being here today, this is a pleasure for us to also host this event at Monroe County Community College and Representative Zorn and of course Representative Olson. But it is truly reinventing Michigan that our college is interested in and we are inspired by your comments and the comments of your counterpart from Canada for giving us new Inspiration. Thanks to all of you for coming out today We sincerely appreciate this opportunity, by the way, the questions, everyone has their email addresses on there, so the governor's staff, if they were asked, will have an opportunity to respond to those. Thank you very much. Thanks for coming out.