By JACK LESSENBERRY
Columnist
June 27, 2009 09:05 pm If Michigan is going to be economically competitive in the future, it has to have a better-educated work force. That's one of the few things that virtually every expert agrees on. Everyone, that is, except for the state Senate, which just voted to totally eliminate the best-known scholarship program, and make major cuts in other forms of needs-based financial aid. "This makes no sense. It's so basic to your state's future," said Lt. Gov. John Cherry, who unsuccessfully pleaded with GOP lawmakers to reconsider before the vote Tuesday. "It's like eating your seed corn," Cherry added. Citing a lack of money, the Republican-controlled Senate voted 19-17 to eliminate all funding for the Michigan Promise Grant, which has provided up to $4,000 in college tuition money for students who have graduated from Michigan high schools. State officials estimate that 96,000 students are counting on Promise Grant checks this fall. State Sen. Liz Brater, D-Ann Arbor, said cutting out funds for the program breaks a promise both to the students and to Michigan's economic future. But State Sen. Tony Stamas, R-Midland, chair of the Senate Higher Education Appropriations Subcommittee, isn't buying it. When his colleague Nancy Cassis, a Novi Republican, introduced a compromise amendment, to partially fund the Promise Grant, again, the answer was "no." "We don't have the dollars," he said. The Senate then also voted to dramatically cut other forms of aid. It cut money for nursing programs, even though the state's shortage is such that nurses are being hired from Ontario. Total amount of financial aid the upper house has proposed to eliminate: $143 million. The Senate action is not final. Democrats control the House and the governor's office, and some of the financial aid money may be restored. But probably not all of it. In one sense, of course, the Republicans do have a point -- there is, indeed, not enough money. Michigan is facing a budget deficit for fiscal 2010 of at least $1.7 billion. Some of this will be plugged with federal stimulus dollars. Still, deep budget cuts have to be made on top of that. Republicans want to cut the budget by about $1.2 billion. Democrats, by a little less than half that much. But sabotaging the ability of Michigan's young people to get a college education might be the ultimate example of an extremely short-sighted policy. Five years ago, a high-powered commission led by Cherry concluded that if Michigan were to be competitive in the future, it would need to double the number of bachelor's degrees being awarded in the state within a decade. Halfway along, the state is way behind that pace. Michigan has a smaller percentage of young adults with college degrees than the national average, or its surrounding states. "For years, this was a brawn-based economy," said Phil Power, chairman of the non-profit Center for Michigan. "Now those days are over forever, and some people still haven't gotten the message." The state's students may not be the only losers. Cherry is virtually certain to be the Democratic nominee for governor next year, and is thought to be facing an uphill battle against whomever the Republicans nominate, given the poor economy and the perception that Gov. Jennifer Granholm is a failed leader. But there is likely to be great outrage among many parents for the elimination of the Promise Grant, and other scholarship programs. If this becomes an issue, Republicans could be badly hurt. n Ranking the governors: The national political Web site fivethirtyeight.com has a new rating system for the nation's governors -- and Michigan's Granholm doesn't come out very well. The site, whose analyst Nate Silver was among the first to predict that Barack Obama would win both the nomination and election, established comparable "power rankings" for the fifty chief executives, adjusted for each state's size. The verdict? As reported in the current issue of Bill Ballenger's Inside Michigan Politics, Granholm ranks 47th. She was less popular and effective than the governors of every state except Nevada, Massachusetts and New York. However, Ohio's Ted Strickland did much better, finishing ninth. The study was completed, however, before the bizarre Argentine adventures of South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, who had been 27th, so presumably Granholm may move up a notch. Some other governors of note, with their rankings: Alaska's Sarah Palin, 36th; and California's Arnold Schwarzenegger, 33rd. Closer to home, Indiana's Mitch Daniels was an impressive 6th. Wyoming's Dave Freudenthal was seen as the best-situated governor in the nation. Weakest was David Paterson, the unelected and misstep-plagued New York governor who succeeded Eliot Spitzer. As Linda Ellerbee might have said, so it goes.
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Jack Lessenberry