We have a govenor's thread, why not one on the proposals. Anyone have some good non-biased info on these? Since we don't get debates on them, it's hard to sift through the one sided commercials on these...


PROPOSAL 06-1
A PROPOSED CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT TO REQUIRE THAT MONEY HELD IN CONSERVATION AND RECREATION FUNDS CAN ONLY BE USED FOR THEIR INTENDED PURPOSES
The proposed constitutional amendment would:
• Create a Conservation and Recreation Legacy Fund within the Constitution and establish existing conservation and recreation accounts as components of the fund.
• Use current funding sources such as state park entrance and camping fees; snowmobile, ORV and boating registration fees; hunting and fishing license fees; taxes and other revenues to fund accounts.
• Establish the current Game and Fish Protection Fund and the Nongame Fish and Wildlife Fund within the Constitution.
• Provide that money held in Funds can only be used for specific purposes related to conservation and recreation and cannot be used for any purpose other than those intended.
Should this proposal be adopted?

PROPOSAL 06-2
A PROPOSAL TO AMEND THE STATE CONSTITUTION TO BAN AFFIRMATIVE ACTION PROGRAMS THAT GIVE PREFERENTIAL TREATMENT TO GROUPS OR INDIVIDUALS BASED ON THEIR RACE, GENDER, COLOR, ETHNICITY OR NATIONAL ORIGIN FOR PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT, EDUCATION OR CONTRACTING PURPOSES
The proposed constitutional amendment would:
• Ban public institutions from using affirmative action programs that give preferential treatment to groups or individuals based on their race, gender, color, ethnicity or national origin for public employment, education or contracting purposes. Public institutions affected by the proposal include state government, local governments, public colleges and universities, community colleges and school districts.
• Prohibit public institutions from discriminating against groups or individuals due to their gender, ethnicity, race, color or national origin. (A separate provision of the state constitution already prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color or national origin.)
Should this proposal be adopted?

PROPOSAL 06-3
A REFERENDUM ON PUBLIC ACT 160 OF 2004 – AN ACT TO ALLOW THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A HUNTING SEASON FOR MOURNING DOVES
Public Act 160 of 2004 would:
• Authorize the Natural Resources Commission to establish a hunting season for mourning doves.
• Require a mourning dove hunter to have a small game license and a $2.00 mourning dove stamp.
• Stipulate that revenue from the stamp must be split evenly between the Game and Fish Protection Fund and the Fish and Wildlife Trust Fund.
• Require the Department of Natural Resources to address responsible mourning dove hunting; management practices for the propagation of mourning doves; and participation in mourning dove hunting by youth, the elderly and the disabled in the Department’s annual hunting guide.
Should this law be approved?

PROPOSAL 06-4
A PROPOSED CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT TO PROHIBIT GOVERNMENT FROM TAKING PRIVATE PROPERTY BY EMINENT DOMAIN FOR CERTAIN PRIVATE PURPOSES
The proposed constitutional amendment would:
• Prohibit government from taking private property for transfer to another private individual or business for purposes of economic development or increasing tax revenue.
• Provide that if an individual’s principal residence is taken by government for public use, the individual must be paid at least 125% of property’s fair market value.
• Require government that takes a private property to demonstrate that the taking is for a public use; if taken to eliminate blight, require a higher standard of proof to demonstrate that the taking of that property is for a public use.
• Preserve existing rights of property owners.
Should this proposal be adopted?

Just my takes, not a voters guide. Please correct inaccuracies.

1- Not that big a deal. If you spend $20 on a duck stamp, and that money is being set aside for habitat, should that money have to go to habitat. Usually does, but Engler jacked some cash once. Vote yes.

2-Yucky. This one is unclear to most folks, and while I support it at the core (it will actually help spread money to those most needy/deserving), the way they got it on the ballot and have run the campaign bothers me. I plan to vote yes, with some hesitation. Someone convince me not to.

3-Clear as day. We can kill animals, is it OK to kill pretty/cute ones. I have hunted doves when I was young, and they are mighty tasty. I'm voting yes.

4- This issue creates problems either way, I don't like the idea of gov. taking peoples homes, but I also don't want ma and pa kettle who've lived in the same house for 40 years stopping a huge development that would provide hundreds of jobs. Leaning yes again.

5. Teacher stuff, my wife works in schools, I vote yes.

I must have missed copying 5.

On 5 I will vote no because we don't have the money to increase that budget. We already have one of THE HIGHEST fundings for public education in the country. The problem isn't money, it's the administration of the money. If you vote to increase the funding (i think it was $595 million), how are we going to afford that? Especially since they repealed the SBT and its 1.5 billion that it created. All #5 will do is put us farther in debt IMO. And I have two very good friends that are teachers too. I just know there is no way we can afford that without gutting everything else.

My thoughts, FWIW:

1) Yes. I tend to be "no" on issues like 1 and 5, as they limit the state's flexibility to do stuff that makes financial sense. As it is today, most of the state's budget is tied down with fixed costs. An executive has to go through hoops to jigger with flexible costs, with associated consequences, even just a little bit. But, the DNR is different. >95% of its $3.3 billion comes from specific fees and taxes directly tied to the environmental resource usage. You pay your hunting license, it goes to hunting. A polluter pays a fine, it goes to cleanup work. If a funding imbalance exists, they have a better regulatory structure to raise rates or otherwise adjust. I don't care for such specific language in amendments, but the intent is sound enough. Our state legislature passed it unanimously. I'll live with it.

2) Fuck if I know. Do I believe that there's past bias that affirmative action can address? Yes. But I don't want that to be the case in perpetuity. I wish this would have a timeline that isn't "right now". If someone tacked on an "effective date" of 2015 or 2020, part of me would really dig it. Make it something that -will- go into law eventually, setting enough of a precedent for action. But, there's unavoidable acts of race and gender based issues. Women get pregnant. Blacks are far more likely to have sickle cell anemia than whites. Are we blind when color and gender make inherent difference? And why limit to just those two? No one seems to get hung up about the biases in favor of tall people, even though height is as uncontrollable and inherited as race or gender and leads to just as much of a bias. I'm torn.

3) Yes. I just wish we'd get rid of the mourning dove as our "state bird of peace". It's nonsensical to have a "bird of peace" that you go out and hunt. Doves have all sorts of symbology that leads people down a lovefest that has more to do with Noah and ancient Middle East stories than with the reality. Doves are pigeons. Call it a mourning pigeon and no one raises an eyebrow.

4) No. The Michigan Supreme Court gives us most of the protections we need, and it doesn't seem like this does anything more for us other than pay lawyers to argue about blight standards and 125% of fair market value. If someone were to just codify what we have as current Michigan Supreme Court law into the state Constitution, I'd be happy. I'm not losing too much sleep if it passes, but it seems wrong.

5) No. That's too big a piggy bank mixed in with too many other monies to try and lock down within the state Constitution. It'd just tie a governor's hands, and lead to more "me too" kind of amendments covering everything that a state would fund. It's helpful to read the specific language of what actually would get amended:

http://www.mackinac.org/article.aspx?ID=7954 (yeah, these guys are a DeVos-funded conservative think tank, but they're who showed up first in Google with the text in HTML instead of a PDF :) )

I want good things for teachers. I want good things for revenue sharing. I want good things for police. Sometimes, some of those things are going to have to take it in the ass if the money isn't coming in. Whoever would dare cut such things frivolously will have a sub-50% approval rating and be in danger of not being re-elected. Suppose such a law had been enacted in 2002. What would Granholm have cut more of instead?

Something to note overall -- with the notable exception of #2, the specifics of what would be amended to the state Constitution (which are surprisingly hard to dig up) are really lousy. If I were to vote on constitutional language alone, only #2 would get my vote. My "yes" votes above factor in a lack of desire to see how sausage is made.

When you think constitutional rights, do you think:

"I have the constitutional right to have hunting fees for mourning doves be $2.00"

-or-

"I have the constitutional right for my state's school funding to be at year 2005 levels, adjusted for inflation."

Or do you think of something that's a little more general sounding?

Here's something to show to anyone who you want to vote against Prop 2:

kAfYu_htDpU

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/sos/ED-138_State_Prop_11-06_174276_7.pdf

is the complete text of what would be put in the constitution for each amendment.

1- Yes. I like rules that make them have to actually ask for money and use it for its stated purprose. It's all too often that they jack up fees in one area and it just goes right into the slush fund.

2- No. The most ironically named proposal ever. It's just bad.

3- Yes. I think hunting is dumb but I don't care or mind at all if other people do it. Also, every time I see that lame dove-hugging commercial I want to shoot one myself. In a barrel.

4- I don't know. Better standards are needed for eminent domain but I can't say if this proposal puts the line where it should be.

1- Yes. I like rules that make them have to actually ask for money and use it for its stated purprose. It's all too often that they jack up fees in one area and it just goes right into the slush fund.
Most sources of money for most things are inextricably tied into the general slush funds. If roughly half the money for something comes from a slush fund and the other half comes from usage fees, how do you draw the line? The DNR in Michigan pretty unusual in how it's operated, largely because of how Milliken tried to balance sanity with commercial use of the environment.

Again, the biggest problem I have is that, while it's good as a law, it's lousy as constitutional law. Putting too many specific dollar values and fractions and operational details into the constitution is lousy. If you look at what went right with the U.S. Constitution, the biggest successes were the plainly worded laws. The biggest failure involved slaves being 3/5ths of a person. Fractions just don't tend to survive the test of time, and dollar values almost assuredly do not. It's expensive to change this shit if it needs changing.

I changed my "yes" to a "no".

Again, the biggest problem I have is that, while it's good as a law, it's lousy as constitutional law. Putting too many specific dollar values and fractions and operational details into the constitution is lousy.

Very good point. Good enough to switch me over to a no on that question.


Oh and while I'm here, I just saw that anti dove hunting commercial again... I'm going to buy a gun.

I knew this Mxy guy was a plant all along.

A plant... pray tell, for whom?

I have a "black thumb" relationship with plants, AFAICT.