(Source: MIRS.news, Published 01/13/2025) (DETROIT) – Gov. Gretchen Whitmer didn't rule out Monday signing legislation that would amend the tipped wage and earned sick leave, saying only in response to reporters' question, "I'll continue to watch and see what they come up with."

The Governor spoke with the media for about three minutes, following a bill-signing event on last year's legislation to create a $60 million “Michigan Innovation Fund.”

Her Detroit press conference took place on the eve of the Republican-controlled House's first legislative hearing on the issue. The “Protecting Michigan Employees and Small Business Committee” is scheduled to discuss HB 4001 and HB 4002, which preserves Michigan's tipped credit system, gradually raises the state's hourly minimum wage to $15 in 2029 and offering more employer flexibility over paid sick time standards.

Senate Democrats have put forward their own proposals on the wage and tipped credit issue, which are scheduled to change Feb. 21 under a summer Michigan Supreme Court ruling.

However, Whitmer's remarks this afternoon indicated she is right now refraining from putting her own proposal in the mix.

"I understand that there is a desire on one side of the aisle to have that conversation. I'll continue to watch and see what they come up with," Whitmer said.

Meanwhile, the managing director of Progress Michigan, Denzel McCampbell, is describing HB 4001 and HB 4002 as a gutting of the laws ignited by the court's ruling, linked to 2018 ballot initiatives.

In 2018, legislators adopted ballot initiatives to gradually eliminate Michigan's tipped wage system, boost the minimum wage and to create new earned sick time standards. The action kept the citizen-led proposals off the statewide ballot that fall. The Michigan Supreme Court ruled that lawmakers were unconstitutional in how they both adopted the proposals and then significantly amended them within the same term.

"We cannot allow corporate lobbyists to pressure our legislators and steal well-deserved wages and benefits to workers across the state," McCampbell wrote in an email to followers. "State legislators need to know that Michiganders across the state are in support of ALL workers getting a raise and paid sick leave. We need to give folks the ability to take care of themselves and their loved ones."

Additionally, Whitmer was asked about the future of road funding by the Michigan Public Radio Network.

"One of the things that you'll hear me talk about on Wednesday in the 'Road Ahead Address' (will be about) long-term need for road funding, but also the global pressures on this industry that's the backbone of Michigan's economy," Whitmer said, referencing the remarks she'll be giving on Wednesday at the Detroit Auto Show.

According to Whitmer, the "Road Ahead Address" will feature her economic vision for 2025.

MIRS asked Senate Majority Leader Winnie Brinks (D-Grand Rapids) about the future of road funding in a New Year's interview. In early December, Whitmer and now-House Speaker Matt HALL (R-Richland Township) had their first one-on-one meeting to discuss a long-term road funding plan, after Hall proposed a $2.7 billion shift in tax revenue spending, with $1.2 billion from the corporate income tax being moved from economic development to road infrastructure.

"I think I'm glad there's a willingness to talk about it. I think that's what we learned from the very end of last year," Brinks said. "I don't have a really strong commitment to a very specific set of ideas in order to get it done."

She said she just knows it needs to be fair to people, adequate to address the problem and "if at all possible," set up as a long-term solution so "we don't find ourselves in this position again as a state another two or three terms from now, and have again a protracted argument about what is the most responsible way to fund roads in the state of Michigan."