Gov. Rick Snyder
Metro Times columnist Jack Lessenberry writes that Gov. Rick Snyder "sold us all out" by signing the state legislature's bill to fix our crumbling roads:
Late last summer, one more attempt to get a deal to fix the roads fell apart when Gov. Rick Snyder did the right thing. He stood up for sanity, and refused to go along with an insane and irresponsible demand by the Republicans who control the state House of Representatives.
They were demanding that any deal to raise the $1.2 billion a year needed to fix the roads included cutting the state's already cash-poor general fund by $600 million a year. That, anyone who examined the budget knew, would mean cuts to higher education, Medicaid benefits, probably other human services like foster care.
The governor knew that would be terribly irresponsible. Then, this month, he sold us all out. He agreed to go along with a ridiculously stupid roads plan that is actually worse in some ways than the ones he rejected before. This deal will indeed raise taxes, jacking up your annual vehicle registration fees by about 20 percent.
He also caved in to the worst right-wing yahoos in his party and agreed to cut the general fund by the $600 million they wanted, without saying where those cuts will come from.
