State Reps. Oakes, Brown, Brunner Unveil Middle-Class Plan

Lawmakers release response from Listening Tour

SAGINAW — State Representatives Stacy Erwin Oakes (D-Saginaw), Terry Brown (D-Pigeon) and Charles Brunner (D-Bay City) held a press conference at the Andersen Enrichment Center in Saginaw to announce Michigan’s Middle-Class Plan, the House Democrats’ plan for helping families, seniors and kids. The plan is based on the response Democrats received during their recent statewide, Real State of Our State Listening Tour. Reps. Oakes, Brown and Brunner attended a Listening Tour stop in Flint on March 11.

“The Listening Tour confirmed what has been echoed across the state — Michigan’s middle-class families are hurting,” said Oakes. “We want to make sure the decisions we’re making in Lansing are informed by the people of our local communities. This legislation reflects their thoughts and solutions for our state’s future.”

The House Democrats’ Middle-Class Plan includes real solutions to problems facing Michigan’s families, seniors, kids and women. The plan calls for middle-class tax relief, restoring and protecting funds to public education, eliminating barriers to health care for women, and provides solutions for fixing our roads and bridges. Michigan’s Middle-Class Plan, will:

• Repeal the tax on seniors’ retirement income, restore the per-child tax deductions, restore the Earned Income Tax Credit to 11 percent, restore the Homestead Property Tax Credit;

• Level the playing field for overweight and out-of-state trucks, ensure existing transportation funds are used for road construction and refinance existing infrastructure bonds;

• Make the School Aid Fund only available for use in funding K-12 education and increase per-pupil funding by $320;

• Improve access to health care for women by removing barriers to clinics and increasing access to family planning services.

“The concerns we heard in Flint echoed those we have been hearing across the state. Mothers, teachers, laborers and seniors are all being negatively affected by recent policies passed in Lansing,” said Brown. “They told us that Republican-passed legislation is increasing the holes in their pocket books and hurting their children’s education.”

Brunner said, “We can’t wait any longer to fix these issues. The House Democratic Caucus is fully aware of the problems Michiganders are facing, and we designed this plan with those problems in mind. We want to take what we heard on the Listening Tour and start helping people now.”

For more details, or to view the plan in its entirety, visit www.RealStateofOurState.com