Dear Friends:

Thank you for the opportunity to serve you and provide updates about what is going on at Michigan’s Capitol.

I am the state senator for the 18th District – covering all of Barry County and parts of Allegan, Calhoun, Kalamazoo, Kent and Ionia counties. Please feel free to contact me with any issues related to state government at SenTAlbert@senate.michigan.gov, or by calling 517-373-1734 (toll-free at 855-347-8018).

Sincerely,

Thomas Albert
State Senator

The Michigan Legislature has concluded its voting session days for 2025. The first day of formal session for 2026 is scheduled for Jan. 14.

I would like to wish you a happy holiday season, a Merry Christmas, and a blessed new year. Thank you for the honor of representing you and the 18th District in the Michigan Senate.

I recently introduced a resolution in the Michigan Senate urging our state to take advantage of a new K-12 scholarship opportunity offered through a new federal law.

The Federal Tax Credit Scholarship Program begins in 2027. It would allow privately funded scholarships to help K-12 students in public, private and homeschool settings. Scholarships could help pay for tuition, tutoring, books, supplies and more without requiring more tax dollars.

Scholarships would be privately funded with money raised through scholarship granting organizations. Individual donors could claim a federal tax credit of up to $1,700.

This is a great opportunity to help improve educational outcomes in Michigan, which often fall short when compared to other states. It would help students who want to remain in their local public schools, as well as those who want to explore new opportunities.

To participate, states must opt in to the program through their governors or other entities that would first have to be designated in state law. Read more about my thoughts on this program here.

The Michigan Senate recently passed legislation to protect residents from being forced to repay unemployment benefits issued during the COVID-19 pandemic due to a mistake by the government.

Senate Bill 700 would prohibit the Unemployment Insurance Agency from attempting to collect most improperly paid benefits three or more years after the payment date. Exceptions would be made for cases of fraud.

I sponsored an amendment designed to protect businesses by prohibiting the state from recouping costs from the Unemployment Insurance Agency Trust Fund, which is fully funded by employers, to pay for the state’s mistake.

The bill was passed by the Senate with bipartisan support and will now move to the House for consideration. It is possible some changes will be needed to the legislation to better achieve its goals, but I am hopeful the issue will be resolved early in the new year.

The Legislature overwhelmingly approved bills designed to help members of the Michigan National Guard with child care and health care costs. I was pleased to support the package that included Senate Bills 370 and 540.

The first bill will help reimburse premiums associated with a health care plan, while the second will help National Guard members pay for child care during weekend drills or annual training.

National Guard members make selfless sacrifices to help keep us all safe. This legislation is one way for our state to help them, while assisting with recruitment and retention efforts.

A bipartisan package to clarify Michigan’s farmland preservation program was overwhelmingly approved by the Michigan Legislature.

The legislation seeks to eliminate confusion in the program that provides an income tax credit related to eligible agricultural land. The changes were driven by farm families who ran into interpretation issues with what is often referred to as the P.A. 116 program.

I was able to successfully add an amendment to Senate Bill 690 related to past filing dates and credit eligibility. Overall, the legislation will provide more consistency and certainty for families with land enrolled in the program now and in the future.

I expect the negotiations over so-called “work project” funding in the state budget to continue early next year. This issue bubbled to the surface when the Michigan House Appropriations Committee disapproved funding for some of these projects earlier this month.

This decision was made without involvement from the Michigan Senate. In response, the Senate last week voted in favor of House Bill 4576, which appears aimed at restoring funding for virtually all of the work projects in question.

If given an opportunity to address these work projects individually, I would support restoring funding for some of them — including but not limited to a program providing wigs for kids with hair loss from cancer, support for kids related to the Flint water crisis, and public safety funding, just to name a few. For some other projects, at a minimum, I would need more information before reaching a final decision. Some of the work projects that were disapproved tied to the previous fiscal year have new funding approved for the fiscal year that began on Oct. 1, and that also should be a consideration.

Unfortunately, House Bill 4576 lumped all projects together in a single vote with insufficient detail and no advance notice. Some details about the work project cuts are still unclear. The funding bill approved by the Senate is equally unclear, and I could not support it in the form presented to senators.

Work projects involve a budgetary mechanism that allows funding to be carried over from one fiscal year to the next, potentially for up to four years. Funds can be designated either at the time of budget bill passage or through a State Budget Office request at the end of a fiscal year. The funding in question currently was connected to the 2024-25 fiscal year budget that ended on Sept. 30, 2025.

As required by state law, the State Budget Office notified both the House and Senate appropriations committees detailing fiscal year 2025 work project accounts in mid-November. Either the House or the Senate Appropriations Committee then had 30 days to disapprove newly requested work project accounts, which is what the House did. This process is outlined in state law.