JR Afternoon with Chris Renwick
GOP’s Bold Roadmap to Repair and Reprioritize
So Republicans in this election here in the state of Michigan also flipped the House of Representatives. So there will be a split Lansing as Republicans will enjoy the majority in the House and incoming House Speaker, Speaker-elect Matt Hall, has unveiled a plan which he says will actually fix Michigan's roads. An area where Republicans say is is a black mark on Governor Gretchen Whitmer's agenda that that she actually hasn't done enough to fix the roads and as a result Matt Hall says he's got the plan to actually fix them and Matt Hall joins me here this afternoon. Mr. Speaker-elect it's good to have you. Thanks for having me. Great to be here. Alright so what's the plan? How do we fix these things? Well for the last few years what Governor Whitmer proposed we remember she came into office running to fix the roads and then the first thing she did is proposed a 45 cent a gallon gas tax increase and no Democrat had the courage to introduce that bill in the legislature at the time so that died so then she decided to borrow billions of dollars to fix state roads and what happened is that borrowing is ending and so at the end of next year there'll be a huge reduction in funding for roads. The second thing that happened was during the during the COVID-19 pandemic there was a huge influx of federal spending on roads that is also drying up toward the end of next year so we're facing a cliff here in Michigan where our road funding is significantly going to decline so my proposal is that we prioritize our road funding first under Whitmer our general fund is increased 40 percent and so a lot of that money has been spent on splash pads and boxing rings and shady nonprofits that weren't even in existence at the time they got money. We see proposals to to send hundreds of millions of dollars to GM to tear down the Renaissance Center. We see proposals to give money to corporations. I don't know how many people campaigned on that. I can't think of one but I do know we all campaigned on fixing the roads. So our plan is let's let's number one your mark 1.2 billion dollars out of the corporate income tax to roads so it comes off the top instead of going in the general fund because when it goes in the general fund they spend it on stupid things. Number two let's let's dedicate all of the money at the pump that we collect to roads. That'll get us about 900 million that puts us over 2 billion then when Whitmer's corporate welfare slash fund runs out next year let's dedicate that to roads to that'll get us 2.7 billion dollars which is more than enough to fix all of our local and city roads. And would that be running that would be a year over a year would be spending nearly 3 billion dollars on road on road repairs. Correct yeah we should do that every year we should dedicate it because when we get into times where we have to use discretion I don't think we should be using that discretion to cut road funding we should we should cut the other things that are a lot less popular but roads public safety education you know we should fund those things and then when we run on hard times and we have to make discretionary decisions then let's cut the boxing rings and splash pads and hip-hop academies and things like that. So one of the things that you mentioned after she was elected in 2018 and really it was not long before the pandemic started that she bonded it out and to the tune of like three and a half billion I believe it was to help fix roadways. I mean those those bills are going to come do as well what do you what's the the future and the and the repayment of those bonds as we're trying to continue to fund our roadways at what you're saying 2.7 billion so how do you how do we pay those bonds back while continuing to fund our roads. So you're right you know the the life of those bonds is longer than the life of those roads in some cases you think about it we had a nine billion dollar surplus into last year and the democrats spent all of it and we didn't get much movement on our local roads and bridges we could have been paying off that debt but you think they're borrowing that three point five billion dollars when they have a nine billion dollar surplus so you're right we'll be paying that back for years but we also need to fund new road projects which is why I'm proposing this 2.7 billion dollars a year and we weighed it toward our city and county roads because all the state roads are where Whitmer her borrowing went to so we we still have a lot of local and county roads that we have to repair and that's where we're going to dedicate the lion's share of this new funding. Is there I mean even if you go back to 2017 2015 something like that and I'm not sure if you have the number with you but but how does that how did how did what we spent the decade to go on roads per year stack up to the 2.7 billion because I don't think we were spending that much back then. Well that's right so when the what happened was Whitmer boosted the amount of money going to roads and she did it by borrowing money and then the rest of it came through federal money and so you know you build up a workforce you build up you know and you know industrial base and then when that money runs out you're going to see significant drops back to what you described 10 years ago and so what we're saying is let's let's not do that let's let's find a way to permanently fund at the level we were at and a little higher but let's dedicate it to local roads and county roads and that's what we're proposing. We think that's where our money should go instead of um to big corporations into splash pad. Is there uh have you talked to your counterparts on the opposite side of the aisle is there an appetite for this is this something that that you that they might signal that they're going to support? Yeah I've been talking to them about this for weeks and I've been asking them to tell me what their ideas are and and Whitmer for years has not been giving us a plan so what I realized was uh the people in the media were equating my actual plan to them just saying we want to work on it so I said well I'm just going to put out all the details of my plan publicly and challenge the democrats to come up with a plan too um and and they don't have a plan so at least I have a plan and I hope in December we can move my plan and if they have ideas well we want to hear them but for since the 45 cent gas tax increase they have no plan and I think they should put it on the table and then we'll say do you want to use existing revenue or do you want to raise taxes because everything we're spending money on is so great that we need to raise taxes. I think people are going to agree with a 40 percent increase in the general fund we can get it out of our general fund which is what I propose. Yeah uh michigan house speaker elect matt hall uh always appreciate our conversations you're welcome anytime I'd love to have you back on because I've got questions on on how you intend to run the house of representative as well when republicans take over so let's uh we'll we'll we'll shelve that for now we'll talk again here uh soon down the road in back thank you yep you got it that is matt hall the republican speaker elect here in the state of michigan all right we'll take a break uh i've got some folks on the line if you want to weigh in on this plan to fund our road repairs 800 8590957 more next.
November 22, 2024 ~ In Michigan, Chris Renwick reports that Republican Matt Hall, incoming House Speaker, criticizes Governor Whitmer’s road funding. Hall prioritizes reallocating $2.7 billion for local road repairs over corporate projects.