With about a month to go in the campaign season, the It’s Just Politics crew zoomed in on one of the three proposals on the ballot: Proposal 1 on legislature term limits and financial disclosures.
With this ballot, the future of term limits is in the hands of Michigan voters. Right now, members of the Michigan legislature can serve three terms of two years in the House of Representatives, along with two terms of four years in the state Senate, bringing the total served to 14 years. Proposal 1 would reduce the number of years to 12 , but allow legislators to serve all of those years in a single chamber.
This doubles the time that someone could spend in the state House of Representatives, since someone could serve six two-year terms in the single chamber. It would also bring the total number of terms servable in the state Senate to three four-year terms.
Also dealt with in the proposal would be financial disclosure rules. While the members of the Michigan Congressional delegation are required to disclose assets, sources of income and other agreements about employment, gifts and travel, currently, state-level officials are not. Should it pass, Proposal 1 would require the governor, attorney general, secretary of state and members of the state legislature to submit annual reports about financial activity.
But do Michigan voters actually want this? Would this be beneficial or detrimental to the legislature? Zoe Clark is here to figure all of this out, plus more.
GUESTS ON TODAY’S SHOW:
- Jason Roe, senior advisor for Voters for Transparency and Term Limits
- Patrick Anderson, CEO of Anderson Economic Group and an author of the 1992 term limits amendment
- Dave Boucher, state government and politics reporter, Detroit Free Press
- Stephen Henderson, host of Detroit Today, WDET
- Nolan Finley, editorial page editor of The Detroit News
