Senators McMorrow, Bayer, Irwin, Geiss, Alexander, Wojno and Santana, under their constitutional right of protest (Art. 4, Sec. 18), protested against the passage of Senate Bill Nos. 1149, 1150, and 1153.
Senator McMorrow moved that the statement she made during the discussion of Senate Bill No. 1153 be printed as her reasons for voting “no.”
The motion prevailed.
Senator McMorrow’s statement, in which Senators Bayer, Irwin, Geiss, Alexander, Wojno and Santana concurred, is as follows:
I rise to give my “no” vote explanation on Senate Bill Nos. 1149, 1150, and 1153.
These bills have been brought before us for the idea that as a company transitions to a fully automated warehouse, that we would grant them additional property, sales, and use tax exemptions—that they want the same qualifications as a manufacturer. And as we think about this, I think that it presents a unique challenge. A company came before our committee and said—this is a company that’s been a phenomenal corporate partner in Michigan; who’s been here their entire career; who’s created careers and countless jobs throughout our state, which is fantastic, and brought up the challenge of as we look to companies like Amazon, Foxconn was brought up in our committee—that the state tends to bend over backwards to get new companies into the state by offering tax incentives and lucrative packages to lure these companies here and that it’s not a level playing field. And with that I fundamentally agree. However, I don’t believe that we should be incentivizing automation of jobs—the elimination of jobs. And for our locals, it’s death by a thousand cuts. These are cuts to our local communities, cuts to our local schools, to our services, and we’ve seen over the past decade or so the tax burden shift radically from companies onto the backs of taxpayers so that people who live in our communities every day feel like they’re paying much more and getting much less. So I agree with the bill sponsor and those who are supportive of this package that we do need to level the playing field. But I would like to see the Amazons of the world step up and be able to pay their same fair share as many of our companies here do.
And just to put that into perspective, over the course of this pandemic—from March to now—Jeff Bezos’ personal net worth has increased by more than $60 billion—more than the entire budget of the state of Michigan for 10 million residents for an entire year. So I don’t think that it’s too much to ask that we take a really, really close look at how we are taxing companies who do business here, what we are incentivizing, and how we bring companies in here to grow here, to make sure we’re providing jobs here, but also that we are not cutting funding to our schools, to our people, to our public services, to our police, and the things that are really going to be, what I think is going to attract and retain companies here which is our people and making sure that they want to move to Michigan, stay in Michigan, and raise their families in Michigan.
The following bill was read a third time:
Senate Bill No. 1109, entitled
A bill to amend 2016 PA 560, entitled “Michigan veterans’ facility authority act,” (MCL 36.101 to 36.112) by adding section 6b.
The question being on the passage of the bill,
The bill was passed, a majority of the members serving voting therefor, as follows: