Courtesy of MIRS News Service
Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan and House Speaker Tom Leonard (R-DeWitt), after the defeat of their no fault package last week, indicated that they will wait for another chance, perhaps next year. However, there are other options out there including movement on a bi-partisan plan pending in the House Insurance Committee.
Or action by the Senate GOP leader Arlan Meekhof (R-West Olive).
“I’m hopeful we can move on that. I’m willing to talk,” said Rep. Sherry Gay-Dagnogo (D-Detroit) who was a no vote on the Duggan-Leonard plan but was one of 15 house members embracing their Plan B.
Six Democrats joined with nine Republicans on the package that, according to Rep. Tim Greimel (D-Auburn Hills), cuts rates without cutting benefits.
But the insurance lobby, through Pete Kuhnmuench’s office, says the plan “doesn’t take the cost out of the system but shifts the costs around.”
Gay-Dagnogo may be willing to talk but she is not pleased that Duggan “threatened” those Detroit lawmakers who voted no on the plan at a church meeting on Sunday night. It failed with 45 yes votes, including four from Detroit Democrats. “It may have been an emotional response,” she told MIRS, but threats make it tougher to talk.
So far nobody has talked about a discharge effort, but it will likely be discussed at a dinner meeting tonight involving Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson, who opposed the Mayor’s proposal.
Leonard has said he’s ready to move on to other issues and a person familiar with the Mayor’s thinking reported the Mayor has an election to deal with and is undecided about his next step on no-fault, although he did say it would be next year.