Many communities across our state, especially in my district, face incredible logistics challenges when it comes to getting to the store, to the doctor, or to the pharmacy among other things. The same goes for getting students to school. Parents in rural communities often don’t have the same options available as parents in more populated areas, and in turn schools face huge transportation costs when it comes to getting kids to school. My amendment would provide access to more funding for Michigan’s isolated and rural school districts to help mitigate these high transportation costs and ensure that we get students to school on time and ready to learn. I encourage a “yes” vote on this amendment.
Senator Huizenga’s statement is as follows:
I rise today to join my voice with those who support and advocate for Michigan’s at-risk students. This amendment provides much-needed financial support to Michigan students who need the most help in order to succeed and thrive within our educational institutions. I am certain that all members serving in this chamber can agree that every child should be given the best opportunity possible to be a successful student. As a state, we must be committed to supporting the at-risk students and walk with them, side by side, to address the challenges they face. Colleagues, I urge us to unite behind supporting these students by voting “yes” on this amendment which will allocate an additional $100 million to support a brighter future for the 715,000 students in our schools who are considered at risk.
Senator Camilleri’s statement is as follows:
Today I am excited for an historic school budget that we are going to pass out of this chamber today. We set out to create a budget with students and teachers at the forefront and I am proud to say that we delivered on that promise. Among other things, our recommendation includes an historic 6 percent increase in the per-pupil funding, getting us to $9,700 per pupil. A higher weighted funding formula for at-risk students, English language learners, and students with special needs—we are doubling the English language line, and fully funding our special needs student population. In addition, it includes a change in the at-risk funding that we’ve never seen before in Michigan that we’re calling the opportunity index, which will improve equity and flexibility for our students.
Our budget also includes funding for universal school meals. I will say as a note on that topic, I don’t know of many billionaires who send their kids to public school so I don’t think we need to worry too much about funding school lunch for all of our kids; they will be fine no matter what. We also have significant investments in teacher recruitment and retention, creating a student loan program for our educators to keep them in the classroom, and also creating an incentive to boost teacher pay as we are figuring out the teacher shortage across Michigan.
I want to thank everyone in this chamber for participating in this budget—and yes, I do mean everyone. We included Republican ideas in this budget already. We had interesting dialogue, I think some of the ideas you presented were not something I could get totally on board with just yet, but we did include some others I thought were good policy along the way. That’s how the budget should work and our kids should not be held to a partisan standard when it comes to funding their school districts. I’m excited to continue this conversation. I do urge you to support our kids and support this budget. Voting “no” is voting against all the things I just laid out today, and I’m hopeful that we’ll get to an end product that earns everyone’s support. I urge a “yes” vote.
The following bill was read a third time:
Senate Bill No. 219, entitled
A bill to amend 1978 PA 368, entitled “Public health code,” by amending sections 9204, 9206, 17703, 17707, 17708, 17713, 17751, and 17757 (MCL 333.9204, 333.9206, 333.17703, 333.17707, 333.17708, 333.17713, 333.17751, and 333.17757), section 9204 as amended by 2006 PA 91, section 9206 as amended by 1996 PA 540, section 17703 as amended by 2021 PA 36, section 17707 as amended by 2020 PA 142, sections 17708 and 17751 as amended by 2022 PA 80, section 17713 as added by 2020 PA 324, and section 17757 as amended by 2022 PA 13, and by adding sections 17724 and 17724a.
The question being on the passage of the bill,
The bill was passed, a majority of the members serving voting therefor, as follows: