LANSING —Gov. Gretchen Whitmer delivered her seventh State of the State address Wednesday night, laying out her legislative wishlist for the year.
Whitmer kicked off her speech with three priorities that she says lawmakers from both parties can get behind.
“One — costs. Let’s make life more affordable for Michiganders,” she said. “Two — jobs. Let’s create more opportunities to help people in our state earn more money. Three — results. Let’s make government work better for the people we all serve.”
Whitmer hit on housing access, saying the state is still 140,000 units short of its needed capacity.
“Let’s invest $2 billion to build, buy, or fix nearly 11,000 homes,” she said. “This year, let’s make the largest housing investment in Michigan history.”
One of Whitmer’s top priorities is striking a deal for road funding. Whitmer and House Republicans have each put forward competing proposals that would allot about $3 billion for infrastructure projects and repairs.
“Michiganders won’t accept inaction,” she said. “To get it right, we’ll all have to recognize some hard truths. To my friends in the GOP. A long-term fix means new, fair sources of revenue. We can’t cut our way to better roads by slashing public safety, health, or schools.”
Whitmer says that she hopes to find common ground with President Trump and state House Republicans, who said they appreciated the tone of collaboration.
“I think there’s no doubt we’re going to do more bipartisan compromise bills that are going to get done,” said Rep. John Roth, (R) 104th District. “I think the governor is sincere about that.”
With a Republican-controlled House, any legislation put forward will need to garner bipartisan support.
“We’ve got split government now which we have to understand, and i think that’s a good thing you saw it with the earned sick time and the tip credit issue last week,” said Rep. Parker Fairbairn, (R) 107th District. “We got a bipartisan deal done on that and I think that’s the kind of work we need going forward in this legislative session.”
Still, they say they’d like to see Whitmer come their way when it comes to government spending and road funding.
“I’m glad she’s interested in working on that,” Roth said. “Creating a lot more new revenue to do that is a non-starter. I think we’ve got to look at internal ways of raising the money right now.”
Other policies discussed include restricting smartphones in classrooms statewide, establishing consumer protections for medical debt and continuing to provide universal school breakfast and lunch for all Michigan students.