Departments

Canada / Michigan

Maximizing Region’s
Global Trade and Jobs

by Rick Haglund
February 21, 2012

As mayor of Lansing in the late 1990s, David Hollister led the state’s capital city to an improbable and stunning economic victory.

Faced with the prospect of General Motors Co. closing its operations there, Hollister pulled together a blue ribbon committee of local business, education and community leaders that not only convinced GM to stay, but also to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in two new assembly plants.

Now, as the vice president of strategic initiatives of the Prima Civitas Foundation in Lansing, Hollister is championing an even more ambitious effort to revitalize the state’s economy by integrating its air, rail, water and highway systems with Canada’s transportation infrastructure to maximize global trade.

Various groups have predicted that tens of thousands of new jobs could be created by convincing shippers to transport goods from Europe and Asia through deep-water ports in Halifax and Montreal.

From there, cargo would arrive by rail in Michigan. The state would serve as a logistics hub to distribute finished goods throughout the Midwest. Parts that arrive here would be manufactured into automotive and other products.

“The larger issue is how do we stop the freight arriving here and add value to it?” said Doug Smith, senior vice president of strategic partnerships at the Michigan Economic Development Corp.

The MEDC recently named Peter Anastor, director of policy, program management and governmental affairs at the agency, to coordinate various transportation and logistics projects proposed in the state.

Among them are a rail tunnel under the Detroit River linking Windsor with Detroit, and several plans to connect Michigan to ports in Halifax and Montreal through rail connections.

Positioning Michigan as a transportation hub also would allow the state to boost exports of agricultural products and durable goods throughout the world.

“We’re trying to figure out how we can leverage these assets,” Hollister said. “With companies insourcing jobs and pulling their supply chains back into the United States, we can put Michigan on the map as a major transportation and logistics center.”

Formed by Michigan State University in 2006, Prima Civitas initially concentrated on economic and talent development in mid-Michigan. It expanded its focus statewide last year.

Hollister, who was the first chief executive officer of Prima Civitas, stepped down last year to focus on major new initiatives.

Among the biggest he’s helped put together is the I-69 International Trade Corridor, which would move goods through a transportation system using the Blue Water Bridge between Port Huron and Ontario, rail lines, the I-69 freeway and Bishop Airport in Flint.

Five counties and 34 local communities in the corridor recently applied for a Next Michigan Development Act designation that would allow the corridor to offer a variety of tax incentives to companies locating there.

Gov. Rick Snyder recently approved an interlocal agreement between the state and counties needed to move the project along. The trade corridor proposal is awaiting final approval from the Michigan Strategic Fund.

Bishop Airport would serve as the corridor’s “aerotropolis,” which places an airport at the center of an urban development. A similar project has been approved under the Next Michigan act to develop an aerotropolis surrounding Detroit Metro and Willow Run airports.

“This could be more significant over time than what we did in getting General Motors to invest in the Lansing area,” Hollister said. “This is the most sophisticated deal I’ve been involved with in my 40 years of public service.”

Prima Civitas also worked with Business Leaders for Michigan in developing a “Gateway to the Midwest” transportation and logistics element in BLM’s update Michigan Turnaround Plan, announced on January 24.

Hollister said Michigan’s near economic collapse during the past decade has prompted government and business groups to collaborate like never before.

“Regional collaboration efforts in the past were all about turf, turf, turf,” he said. “But communities have been so shaken by the recession that they really see cooperating on increasing trade as a hopeful opportunity to create jobs.”

Last October, more than 130 leaders from the public and private sectors in Michigan and Canada came together in a “Great Lakes International Trade and Transport Hub” summit at Michigan State University to discuss how the state and Canada could boost trade.

Hollister chairs the hub’s steering committee, which is focusing on the following areas: promoting greater collaboration among businesses and industry, integrating the state transportation and logistics assets, educating citizens for careers in global trade, marketing Michigan as a transportation hub and helping companies develop supply chains so they can boost exporting.

Even though Michigan and Canada are neighbors and do more than $60 billion a year in two-way trade, Hollister said Michiganders aren’t nearly as informed about Canada as they should be.

The hub report recommends greater education about Canada in the K-12 system and making students more aware of job opportunities related to trade between Michigan and Canada.

“Canada does a much better job than we do in terms of covering the United States in their school curriculum,” the report said. “International relations study is important to our students’ futures.”

Michigan has a rare opportunity to provide a secondary shipping and logistics alternative to Chicago, but must act quickly, experts say.

“Everybody knows there are delays in Chicago,” Hollister said. “Those delays are money. We need to offer a value proposition for companies to come here. That’s what we’re working on.”

But other Midwest metropolitan areas, including Columbus, Indianapolis and Louisville, also are working to develop logistics hubs that would serve as alternatives to shipping through Chicago.

Some say a major threat to Michigan is a $175 million CSX Transportation intermodal train terminal built last year in North Baltimore, Ohio, south of Bowling Green.

Ohio Lt. Gov. Mary Taylor told the Toledo Blade in June that the project has the potential to create about 2,000 spin-off jobs in logistics and warehousing. She said the terminal “symbolizes to the rest of the world that Ohio is open for business.”

Hollister and others say Michigan’s advantage is its manufacturing base that allows components shipped to the United States to be built into finished products.

The state’s manufacturing and agricultural assets could be combined to make Michigan a major player in the “green economy,” he said.

Seats, steering wheels and other automotive components can be manufactured from soybeans and other agriculture products. An improved transportation system here would allow those products to be shipped around the world.

“We haven’t taken advantage of our strategic assets,” Hollister said. “We need more out-of-the-box thinking.”

Rick Haglund is a freelance writer and former business reporter and columnist for Booth Newspapers.

Columns


John Lindstrom
Gongwer News Service

Bridging Political Waters

June 17, 2011

If there is one thing, one thing only, supporters of a new bridge between Detroit and Windsor, and opponents of a new bridge between Detroit and Windsor, agree on, it is this: there needs to be a new bridge between Detroit and Windsor.

Yes, yes and yes again. Supporters and opponents of a new bridge both agree a new bridge should be built. The controversy comes down to who builds a new bridge, who pays for it and where it is located.

That alone makes this issue one of the oddest the state has dealt with in years. It has taken on greater emphasis since Governor Rick Snyder has pulled out all the stops to win legislative passage of authority for the bridge. But it has been a cantankerous conundrum of conflict for years.

Will it take years yet to resolve? Well…

To keep all matters straight, since we are talking about two potential bridges, let us recall that Mr. Snyder now calls what once was the Detroit River International Crossing the New International Trade Crossing, so for purposes of this column we will use NITC. In terms of a proposed new Ambassador Bridge, let us refer to a New Ambassador.

The basic elements of the issue by now are burned into every Lansingite’s consciousness. The Detroit and Canadian business communities, and governments, want a new crossing over the Detroit River.

The owners of the Ambassador Bridge, the Moroun family through their Centra Corporation and a variety of subsidiaries, want to build a second span next to the current bridge, meaning the New Ambassador would land south of Windsor’s downtown near the University of Windsor. The Ambassador Bridge owners are willing to pay for the bulk of construction of the New Ambassador and its attendant infrastructure.

The vast majority of businesses, and governments, on both sides of the river, want a new bridge built two miles south of the Ambassador/New Ambassador site. A new structure there will be able to connect directly with two freeways (which the current Ambassador Bridge does not on the Windsor side).

Plus, bowing to fears of terrorism since the September 11, 2001, attacks, a major project of this sort has to be built to provide some level of secure redundancy. In other words, two bridges next to one another, the Ambassador/New Ambassador proposal, would be more likely to be devastated and disabled in a disastrous attack than two bridges some distance apart.

That’s as clean as the issue gets, kids. Woven in its cabling are questions of actual need for a new bridge, and whether public funds should be used when a potential private source is available. Woven within that weave are ongoing disputes about construction at the current Ambassador Bridge, the potential for job development with a new bridge, the clear though officially unstated determination of Canadian officials not to land a new bridge in or near downtown Windsor, and the argument that Matty Moroun should not be trusted because he owns dozens of properties in Detroit, many of which — most, say his opponents — are in, shall we say, a state of disrepair.

Add to this is the extraordinary offer by Canada to fund Michigan’s share of building roads and access ramps. Supporters have said this frees Michigan from having to pay anything for the NITC. Opponents say the offer is a sucker bet designed to lure Michigan into a proposal that will eventually stick it with the bill.

Mr. Snyder took a pass on the issue during the campaign. He came out strongly in support of the NITC during his State of the State address. As he did, there was a sense among supporters that finally would the issue be resolved in the NITC’s favor.

But the Morouns, who have led the opposition to the NITC, are not giving in. They have stepped up their efforts, which include an expensive set of television ads that simply argue there is no reason for a new bridge because traffic has gone down.

And that is true, traffic is down, primarily because of the state’s economic decline, but other economic and international factors contribute to that as well. While it is hard at this moment to quantify the actual impact these ads are having, there is a sense that they are having some effect.

Clearly, listening to the legislature, lawmakers are nervous about an NITC. Part of this is because of a genuine opposition to spending money, or the chance of spending money, when there is private money available.

Much of it is because lawmakers are scared. The 2012 elections promise mayhem to those who support government spending or even the hint of spending. If the TV ads are not yet having a big effect on the public, they are with lawmakers.

So far, resistance is making the bridge issue Mr. Snyder’s biggest legislative defeat-in-making to date. Mr. Snyder in his trademark sunniness assures reporters, politicians and the public as well that the issue is going through its paces and is in no danger. Watching Lt. Gov. Brian Calley and NITC supporters, though, it is clear they are perplexed and worried.

Yet, no one really considers the issue a defeat, yet.

Mr. Snyder had called on the legislature to act by July 1 on his proposed bill authorizing an authority that could then authorize construction of a bridge. That won’t happen. Sure, sure, call for completion of a $40 billion-pus budget by May 31, that the legislature can do. But, hey, this bridge thing is tough and it’s scary, too, kinda, so July 1 is awful quick to make up a decision on this.

One lawmaker actually said Mr. Snyder was trying to move the issue too fast.

Yet a mewling infant born the day of the first serious talk about building another crossing over the Detroit River is eligible to join AARP today. Besides the Ambassador Bridge there is the traffic tunnel and a couple rail tunnels linking Detroit and Windsor. For decades government officials and business executives have talked about adding a new crossing over the river to both provide needed redundancy and to help expand business.

Because that is one of the curious factors in this debate that has not been exploited: the potential for the Detroit area, and by extension the entire state, to become a major international trade hub.

Detroit is already one of the busiest trade crossings on the planet, by virtue of the auto industry and its location next to Canada. With the aerotropolis legislation now in place to expand trade efforts at the Detroit airports, possible improvements to the city’s port and a new bridge, one could argue the region would be poised for explosive growth in terms of international trade logistics. Yet that argument has only been touched on in the fight, lost in the details of whether or nor the state will pay for any portion of a bridge.

And one irony in the fight is that opponents to the NITC hurt their own argument for a bridge of their own. Remember both sides want a new bridge. Arguing a new bridge, at least the NITC, is not needed, because of declining traffic volumes and the like, makes it harder to logically argue the New Ambassador should be built as well.

Complicated as the issue is, the seeds of how it may be resolved are already germinating in the bill before lawmakers.

Recall that the bill itself doesn’t really call for legislative approval of a new bridge, but for approval of an authority to approve a new bridge.

To win on this, Mr. Snyder will likely have to find an even more refined way of giving lawmakers cover to say they did not approve a new bridge, but approved a series of steps that if followed could allow for an agency to review the recommendations of an authority to call for construction of a new bridge if a company with experience managing and maintaining an international crossing meets certain criteria to oversee construction and financing of a bridge that does not call for any initial investments by the state, and so on and etc. and dosey-doh and yaha.

In other words, do without doing so that everyone is happy and can say literally and honestly they did not do what they did. Hey, it’s a grand old political maneuvering of bridging the different sides.

And in so doing, then all get what they all really want, which is a new bridge between Detroit and Windsor.

John Lindstrom is publisher of Gongwer News Service. For nearly 50 years in Michigan, Gongwer News Service has provided independent, comprehensive, accurate and timely coverage of issues in and around Michigan’s government and political systems. For subscription information, including a free trial, visit Gongwer online.

Columns

Jack Lessenberry

Bridge Criticism
Doesn’t Hold Water

May 27, 2011

DETROIT — So what are the real risks to Michigan if the legislature does go ahead and approve a second bridge over the Detroit River, now called the New International River Crossing?

None whatsoever, according to Roy Norton, Canada’s top diplomat — consul general — in Detroit. “The people of Michigan are in danger of getting stuck with absolutely nothing. Not a penny.”

“This bridge is a gift to them,” he said. “All the liability is being assumed by the governments of Canada, the United States, and the private contractor they will select to build the bridge.”

During a wide-ranging interview, Canada’s top diplomat in the region indicated strongly — though in diplomatic language — that the arguments against the bridge are essentially all, well, lies.

Most of the anti-bridge campaign is, of course, being orchestrated by the family that owns the aging Ambassador Bridge, which is wearing out, has no backup, and carries more freight — $170 billion a year — than any other international crossing in the nation.

There is, however, a very real economic danger to the entire region, the consul general warned, if the bridge doesn’t get built.

“The Ambassador Bridge was built to last a hundred years, and was not built for today’s heavy trucks. Modern business needs assurance that they are going to have a safe and reliable 21st century infrastructure. If not, they may eventually leave.”

Canada clearly wants the new bridge — wants it so much that it has offered to front any costs the State of Michigan might incur, up to $550 million. (The state would later pay this back painlessly, after the bridge is finished, out of Michigan’s share of toll crossing revenue.)

Canada’s top diplomat acknowledges that his country’s interests are at stake — but quickly adds that the private business interests, mostly in the United States, want and need it as well.

Ford Motor Company wants the bridge. So do General Motors, Chrysler, Toyota and Honda. Last year, Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm endorsed it. This year, GOP Gov. Rick Snyder’s behind it.

L. Brooks Patterson wants the bridge. Mayor Dave Bing wants the bridge. Everyone with any economic stake in the region wants and needs the new river crossing, except one man:

Matty Moroun, who turns 84 next month, and who is the sole owner of the Ambassador Bridge, which is just two years younger than he is. To be fair, his wife and son are against the new bridge, too.

And they have managed to hold up any new crossing for years — in large part because they spend vast sums of money donating to state legislative campaigns and causes, some of which is hard to trace. The Morouns are now also spending vast sums more on a noisy statewide disinformation campaign.

Consul General Norton is a fairly high-ranking diplomat, for all intents and purposes sort of a “mini-ambassador” to the region that includes Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky — an area which has, coincidentally, as many people as the entire nation of Canada.

His main job here is facilitating and encouraging trade and commerce, and though Norton has been stationed in Detroit only nine months, he knows his stuff. Since earning a doctorate in international relations from Johns Hopkins, he has been in and out of government and the private sector for more than two decades.

He can tell you without notes that trade between Canada and Michigan was up 43 percent last year (to $62 billion) and that 237,000 Michigan jobs depend on trade between the two nations.

And he can also demonstrate to you that virtually all the claims made by the owners of the Ambassador Bridge, are, well, false.

For example, the Moroun family has claimed that they would be happy to “twin” their bridge, but says Canada won’t give them the additional span.

“Well, we haven’t said no. The fact is, they have never even submitted the necessary paperwork for an environmental impact statement, even though we’ve repeatedly invited them to do so since 2007.” True, he hinted that such an approval might not happen.

Windsor, he acknowledges, is dead against a second span of the Ambassador, in part because the last thing the nearby residential neighborhoods need is more congestion and exhaust fumes.

Nor can the toll plaza accommodate any more volume. Mr. Norton suggests that the owners of the Ambassador worry too much. “The Ambassador Bridge is still going to be there. It is still going to be profitable, if perhaps not quite as profitable.”

The new bridge project is not, Norton emphasized, “socialism” or a government boondoggle. Canada and the United States will jointly select a private contractor to build it, and private investment will be welcome. Meanwhile, construction will mean “10,000 direct jobs in Southeast Michigan and 25,000 indirect jobs.”

Nor will this happen overnight; even if the Michigan Legislature were to give the green light to the new crossing this summer, the earliest the new bridge could be open to traffic would be 2016.

If the owner of the Ambassador Bridge is still living, Manuel J. Moroun will then be 89. Consul General Norton did not speculate as to why a man who is worth $1.8 billion would worry about the threat of lower profits as he prepared to enter his 10th decade.

Perhaps wisely, I didn’t ask.

Veteran journalist and national Emmy Award winner Jack Lessenberry teaches at Wayne State University, serves as Michigan Radio’s senior political analyst and writes regularly for several publications. He also serves as The Toledo Blade’s writing coach and ombudsman and is host of the weekly television show Deadline Now on WGTE-TV in Toledo.

Departments

Canada / Michigan

Canada’s Mercifully Short Election Campaign

by Rick Haglund
April 15, 2011

Congressional Republicans and Tea Party types who’d like to oust President Barack Obama might be wishing the United States had Canada’s form of government.

While we elect a president every four years, Canada’s leader — the prime minister — is subject to an election at almost any time unless his party can retain or capture a majority of seats in Parliament.

That’s the fate facing Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, the Conservative Party head who is campaigning for re-election for the second time in just three years.

Canada’s minority government was toppled March 25 when the opposition parties passed a no-confidence vote against Harper for failing to disclose financial details about his anti-crime legislation, corporate tax cuts and plans to buy 65 American-made stealth fighter jets.

This will be the fourth federal election in Canada in seven years, a result of the powers opposition parties hold in that country’s political system. The election will be held May 2.

“It’s a totally different system than the one we have,” said former Michigan Gov. James Blanchard, who served as U.S. ambassador to Canada from 1993 to 1996.

Voters in Canada don’t directly elect the prime minister. They vote for local members of the House of Commons. The party winning the most seats forms the government and the party leader, also a member of a member of the House, becomes prime minister.

If the ruling party in Canada has a minority government, meaning that it does not hold the majority of seats in the House, opposition parties can force an election through a successful “no confidence” vote against the prime minister.

It’s the second time since 2008 that the Liberal, New Democratic and Bloc Quebecois parties have forced Harper and the Conservatives to submit to an election. Together, those parties hold the majority of seats in Canada’s House of Commons.

“If you think you can win it, you call it,” Jim McNiven, a visiting Canadian Fulbright Scholar at Michigan State University, said about Canada’s election process.

But McNiven and others expect the election likely will keep Harper and his Conservative Party in power, although polls have shown that the party will likely fall just short of winning a majority of seats in Parliament.

“Many people believe the Conservatives are happy to have an election,” Blanchard said. “The Conservatives don’t mind the opportunity to try to win a majority.”

Blanchard described the Conservative Party as similar to moderate Republicans in the United States.

In Canada’s system, the party with the most votes controls Parliament and the cabinet. Members of the Canadian Senate are appointed.

“It’s a fusion-of-power system where both the legislative and executive branches are run by the same bunch,” McNiven said.

Blanchard and others say the election, whatever its outcome, likely will have little effect on Canada’s relations with Michigan and the rest of the United States.

“The relationship Canada has with the United States is the most important relationship in the world historically and it will continue to be after the election,” said Roy Norton, Canada’s consul general in Detroit.

Political pundits describe Harper as a bland leader who nevertheless has survived because Canada came through the recent global recession relatively unscathed.

And what is happening in Canada bears no resemblance to the political upheaval in Egypt, Libya, Yemen and other Middle East countries where citizens are rebelling against repressive regimes.

Richard Adams, a political columnist in Britain’s Guardian newspaper, described the call for another election in Canada as simply “all part of the convoluted nature of Canadian politics and its electoral structure.”

Harper and the Conservatives were elected as a minority government in 2006 and have since failed to win a majority. That has left them vulnerable to calls for election any time opposition parties wanted one.

Canada has no set dates for regular federal elections, but they take place at least every five years when a majority government is in power. That’s because the government’s appropriations power ends after four years and the money runs out in the fifth year. (Wouldn’t advocates for smaller government in the United States love that?)

Minority governments last, on average, two and a half years, said McNiven, who has worked for several governmental agencies in Canada.

Some think there is much to admire in Canada’s mercifully short election campaigns, compared to the campaign marathons that characterize U.S. elections.

The current one in Canada will last just 38 days. In the United States, the race for the presidency effectively starts the day after the election. Obama formally declared his run for re-election on April 4, 19 months ahead of the November 2012 election.

But Canada’s recent history of minority governments means that members of Parliament essentially never stop campaigning to hang on to their seats.

“Canadians are always campaigning in a minority government because you never know when it’s going to fall apart,” McNiven said.

Laid-back Canadians regard these frequent elections as “a bit of a nuisance,” he said, but generally accept them as part of the country’s system of government.

While observers don’t expect much impact on border issues in the upcoming Canadian election, Blanchard said Canadian party squabbles over such issues as energy policy and a troop withdrawal date from Afghanistan could cause minor disputes with the United States.

But the election should have no effect on Canada’s strong political and financial support for a new bridge connecting Detroit and Windsor, Blanchard said.

Formerly called the Detroit River International Crossing, the proposed span is now known as the New International Trade Crossing. Gov. Rick Snyder also has thrown his support behind the bridge.

“The big issue is getting the new bridge,” Blanchard said. “All the parties have supported The New International Trade Crossing. It started under the Liberal Party.”

Rick Haglund is a freelance writer and former business reporter and columnist for Booth Newspapers.

Departments

Canada / Michigan

Building a Stronger
Michigan-Canada Region

by Rick Haglund
February 20, 2010

Imagine a Great Lakes region revitalized by the states and Ontario cooperating to boost the economy, rather than competing by using costly tax incentives of questionable effectiveness.

Manufacturing would thrive and new knowledge jobs would be created as major corporations strengthen relationships with their smaller vendors, known as the supply chain.

A seamless transportation system would bring back thousands of jobs lost to China as businesses discover that lower logistics costs here outweigh savings from cheaper labor costs in Asia.

Sure, it sounds like a fantasy. But some government officials, academic experts and business leaders say greater economic growth in the region depends on just those kinds of cooperative ventures.

“Regional economies are becoming more and more important,” said Steven Melnyk, a business professor and supply chain management expert at Michigan State University. “We have an infrastructure here that is potentially able to make us very powerful.”

Already, more than 700,000 jobs in Michigan, Indiana, Kentucky and Ohio depend on two-way trade with Canada, according to the Canadian Consulate General’s office in Detroit. A quarter of the $550 billion in annual trade between Canada and the United States passes through border crossings between Michigan and Ontario.

Promoting the region as a transportation, distribution and logistics cluster could bring 70,000 new jobs to Southeast Michigan, according to a recent MSU study.

“The bottom line is we live in a global economy,” said Daniel Lynch, director of the Centre for International Trade & Transportation at Delhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. “We have to work together.”

But too often we don’t, Melnyk said.

“Instead of seeing the Great Lakes area work together, you see a lot of competition between the states,” he said. “Nobody is coordinating anything. Everybody is doing their own thing.”

Michigan governors going back to at least James Blanchard have tried to convince their fellow Great Lakes governors to work more closely as a region in economic development. But, if anything, the states are competing with each other more vigorously than ever to attract business investments using increasingly lucrative financial incentives.

That competition could soon ease, though, as severe budget problems are forcing the states to consider pulling back on costly tax breaks and other financial incentives.

Gov. Rick Snyder’s proposed 2012 budget, for instance, eliminates most tax incentives for businesses and replaces the complex Michigan Business Tax with a simplified 6 percent corporate income tax he says will bring more jobs to Michigan.

Mike Finney, the recently installed president of the Michigan Economic Development Corp., said he wants to take a more regional approach to economic development.

“The world is our competition,” he said. “For us to fight over limited resources in the Midwest doesn’t make a lot of sense to me philosophically. It really doesn’t contribute to the economic vitality of the Midwest.”

Melnyk said states could start the process of regional cooperation by jointly developing an in-depth database of suppliers and their capabilities.

“We need a capabilities index for the Great Lakes region,” he said.

And states can improve education to better prepare workers for the reality of a global economy that depends heavily on companies linked in complex supply chains.

“We live in a world of assemblers,” Lynch said. “Subassemblies come from all over the world. People want to buy American, but that doesn’t work anymore.”

Suppliers have become critically important because automakers and others have outsourced so much of the product development and innovation to them. The speed, efficiency and security of their supply chains often determine how successful manufacturers are in global competition, Melnyk said.

“A supply chain is like a fast racing car,” he said. “If it’s used properly, you can win the race. If it’s used poorly, it can get you killed.”

In a world where supply chains are increasingly important, the Great Lakes region is poised to capitalize on the greater economic growth they could produce.

The auto industry, for example, is made up of hundreds of companies that do business with each other across several Midwest states and Ontario. Although Michigan is the intellectual capital of the industry, it ranks second to Ontario in the production of cars and trucks. Yet suppliers and manufacturers in the two countries are tightly linked.

Melnyk said the region might be able to win back lost manufacturing-related jobs from China through the strength of its supply chains if it improves its transportation infrastructure.

Supply chain-based manufacturing relies on security, innovation and speed, all of which are lacking in China and other low-cost countries, according to Melnyk.

General Electric, Caterpillar and AT&T are among companies that have announced they’re bringing back jobs, or at least considering doing so, from China to the United States. They’re “onshoring” or “reshoring” jobs for a variety of reasons, including high shipping costs, complex logistics and quality concerns.

But Melnyk and others said the Great Lakes region needs to improve its transportation systems to attract more jobs. Roads and bridges in the region are generally in poor shape, especially in Michigan. And bottlenecks at the borders connecting Michigan to Canada are hurting trade, some say.

Experts say there is a delicate balance between a secure border and one in which trade flows freely. Border security has become a huge issue since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But there are ways to ensure both, some say.

Lynch said the Halifax airport has instituted a pre-clearance system in which Canadians traveling to the United States can clear U.S. customs there, saving time when they arrive at, say, Detroit Metro airport.

“If I’m a consultant or a support person, it makes it much easier for me to travel,” he said.

And Canada is aggressively promoting construction of the proposed Detroit River International Crossing bridge that would link Windsor and Detroit, the busiest U.S.-Canada crossing.

Canada has offered to pay Michigan’s $550 million bridge-related costs, an offer that Gov. Rick Snyder wants to accept. He also announced in his State of the State Address last month that federal officials have agreed to allow Michigan to use that $550 million as a match to leverage $2 billion in federal highway funds. The project could help greatly improve the Great Lakes region’s economic competitiveness, supporters say.

“No one state or province has all the assets necessary to meet companies’ needs,” Melnyk said. “The reality is we need a strong, competitive region.”

Rick Haglund is a freelance writer and former business reporter and columnist for Booth Newspapers.

Columns

Tim Skubick

Bridge Deal Poses
First Big Test

January 21, 2011

Gov. Rick Snyder did something the other night that he rarely did as a candidate. He took a stance on a controversial issue and ended up actually making news.

Glory be.

Making headlines was never in his campaign playbook, because when you embrace something that not everybody likes, it can cost you votes. Since he no longer has to worry about that, the non-career politician made a bold move and endorsed a second Detroit to Windsor bridge.

How he arrived at that was vintage Snyder. He was methodical, refused to rush to judgment, weighed all the data and finally made what he thought was the right call.

“We must plan now for a new bridge connecting Detroit to Windsor, Ontario,” he told members of the Michigan House and Senate during his first State of the State Address.

The House Democrats were the first to leap to their feet, because the GOP governor had just endorsed one of their top legislative priorities.

In marked contrast, the Republicans were late coming to the standing ovation because they got no such endorsement from their governor on their agenda items of welfare reform and Right to Work.

You gotta wonder if any of the Rs thought, “Is that our governor up there or theirs?”

The decision was controversial because many Republicans believe government should keep its big nose out of this and let the private sector/free market do the bridge building.

It was also a gutsy move because businessman Snyder was tossing down the gauntlet to a fellow business guy who owns the Ambassador Bridge, and that owner is loathe to have competition from the public sector, namely the Michigan and Canadian governments.

The governor, of course, made no mention of those factors in his speech. Instead, he proceeded to construct an air-tight case for everyone to get on board.

“This is not just a Detroit issue,” he began his business-like analysis of why this was good for the entire state. It was an important point to underscore, because outstate Republicans are not eager to help Motown.

The governor knows that and offered this, “Every farmer and manufacturer can tell you why it’s important to have world trade,” which he believes will be fostered by the second bridge.

The reason the Democrats wanted the thing was there are 20,000 construction jobs ready to go, and Mr. Snyder is all about creating jobs.

But if there were still doubters in the legislative ranks, he gave them yet another reason to join the bridge brigade.

Unbeknownst to anyone, the governor and his transportation director sneaked off to Washington the other day and got some aid from the Obama administration. Oh boy, ultra right-wingers may not love that, but pothole-weary motorists will.

The crafty governor “secured a unique agreement” to use Canadian money for the bridge as the matching moola the state does not have to secure more federal road repair funds.

So Canadians will help repair Michigan roads. Hey, this guy is one sharp business cookie.

And to lower the fears to zero he added, “Michigan will not take on any debt related to this project.”

Game, set, match. It was a brilliant deal and an offer very few can refuse.

Thus, this becomes his first real test to see if he can deliver votes on one of his top priorities.

If he can’t get members of his own party to back this, they will be handing him his first major legislative loss — and this new governor does not like to lose.

Tim Skubick is Michigan’s Senior Capitol correspondent and has anchored the weekly public TV series Off the Record since 1972. He also covers the Capitol and politics for WLNS-TV6 in Lansing.

Tim Skubick Extra Extra…
(A weekly bonus only for Dome readers)

Gov Faces Lose-Lose
If will soon be put-up or shut-up time for the new governor, who will eventually have to weigh in on the water battle brewing between the suburbs and the City of Detroit.

And two Detroit city council members have just made the Day of Reckoning a little more foreboding by trying to paint the governor into a box. Governors don’t like that.

But there was council President Pro-tem Garry Brown predicting that the governor would veto any legislation that gave the suburbs control of the Detroit Water Board. Council President Charles Pugh did not go quite that far but came close enough: “We have full faith in Gov. Snyder that he believes in Detroit and that he is going to support us on this issue.”

It was noted that the governor has not said that, but Pugh adds, “This is a big test” on whether he backs the city or not, “but we think he’s going to pass.”

Oh my. That will play well with those suburban legislators who feel aggrieved by the Detroit Water Board. Now they will go to the governor and ask him to pick sides: are you with us or against us?

It’s a simple question, but one filled with all sorts of political landmines for the governor, who is not used to those kinds of no-win choices.

So here is a governor who is all about working together in a positive way but faces a tough choice that will certainly result in less cooperation from one side or the other. Going with Detroit makes him a “traitor” to some Republicans. But siding with the suburbs makes him a “hypocrite” with some Detroit officials.

Can you say lose-lose?

So Much for Loyalty
If governors had their way, they would mandate that members of their own party do everything the governors want them to do.

Not around here.

Loyalty to your governor is one thing. Pushing your own agenda to appeal to the voters back home is quite another, and in this case, House Republicans are wandering far from where Gov. Rick Snyder wants them to go.

During the campaign, candidate Snyder was asked about flipping Michigan into a Right to Work state, which organized labor despises.

Die-hard Republicans figure if you can dilute the influence of the labor bosses, then more jobs will be created. Mr. Snyder, however, refuses to sign up, observing that a battle over RTW would divide the state just when he is feverishly working to bring everyone together.

So what did House Republicans do on their first day in office?

You guessed it. They stiffed the governor, introduced a modified form of Right to Work, referred it to a favorable committee and, dollars to donuts, unless the new governor leans on them, it will find its way to the floor for a vote and contentious debate will follow.

As if that slap in the face was not bad enough, the very same House Rs want to open another can of worms that will send Democrats into an attack mode. They want some “welfare reform,” which the Ds argue will hurt families that are already hurting.

Again, candidate Snyder did not run on any social wedge issues such as abortion, gay rights, or welfare. He’d rather watch a Jennifer Granholm State of the State than push those to the top of his agenda.

There again, House Republicans began the new year with a plan to end welfare benefits after four years, with no exceptions. Period.

They could have waited for the middle of the year to suggest this to preserve what’s left of any bipartisan cooperation, but, no, they decided to lead with it and, predictably, the Democrats are on the defensive.

And finally, the last thing the new governor wants is a war between the suburban lawmakers and Detroit legislators. But Rep. Kurt Heise (R-Plymouth) apparently could care less. He’s got a bill to give the suburbs control of the Detroit Water Board, and this could get very ugly.

So much for loyalty.

Departments

Canada / Michigan

‘Canadian Sensibilities
are Michigan Sensibilities’

by Rick Haglund
December 16, 2010

Roy Norton, well versed in Canadian and U.S. politics, diplomacy and public policy, was named counsel general of Canada in Detroit in August.

He had most recently served in the Canadian Embassy in Washington, D.C. as minister in charge of relations with Congress, as well as media and public relations and cultural and academic affairs. An Ottawa native, he holds masters degrees from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies, as well as a doctorate from Johns Hopkins in International Relations.

Mr. Norton spoke with Rick Haglund about his duties in Detroit and key issues in the vital relationship between Canada and Michigan. Following is an edited version of that conversation.

For starters, what does a counsel general do?

Canada has 13 counsel generals in the United States. In Detroit we oversee relations with four states [Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky] that have a total population of 32 million people, almost exactly the population of Canada.

The United States and Canada have the largest two-way trade relationship in the world, some $550 billion U.S. a year. That one-quarter of that trade would cross one of the bridges joining Canada and Michigan is somewhat of a phenomenon.

We advance Canadian interests here. We try to get folks in the four states to recognize that the interests of Canada and the region are integrated. The more likely the states are aware of the linkages, the less likely they are to advocate policies that hurt us.

We also have a substantial visa operation. U.S. citizens don’t need visas to travel in Canada, but we process visa applications for third-country nationals. We issue in excess of 20,000 visas a year.

We look after Canadians in need. People get into car accidents and they get into trouble.

What are your impressions so far of Michigan?

I started my assignment here on 13 September. I come from Ontario. I was born in Ottawa and lived a good chunk of my life in Toronto.

There’s nothing foreign to me here. I feel very welcome. Washington lacks, should we say, Midwestern sincerity. It’s a delight to be in the company of like-minded people who pretty much realize how interdependent Michigan and Ontario are.

Anything you’ve seen since September that surprises you?

I’ve been asked that question before and, sadly, I’ll confess not. Michigan’s economy seems to be improving. I detect considerable hopefulness now. It’s a good thing to come into a setting where you sense things are on an uptick.

How would you characterize the overall relationship between Canada and Michigan these days?

I think it’s superior on almost every level, save maybe one [the Detroit Regional International Crossing, or DRIC]. It’s the one that happens to be Canada’s number one national infrastructure priority. That’s a source of some considerable frustration for Canadian officials, Canadian business people and average travelers.

(Editor’s note: Canada has proposed paying up to $550 million of Michigan’s costs for a second bridge over the Detroit River, the DRIC. The project is opposed by Ambassador Bridge owner Manual “Matty” Maroun, who has been heavily lobbying the Michigan Legislature to scuttle the plan and has so far succeeded in preventing bridge approval.)

We can’t fathom how the legislature would fail to grasp the benefits of 10,000 short-term jobs and, long-term, the certainty and confidence of investors and businesses on both sides of the border.

There’s a tendency to look at this as a Detroit issue. We point out that Canada-Michigan trade was about $45 billion last year, slightly less than a tenth of U.S.-Canada trade of $550 billion. It’s really about the Canada-U.S. trade relationship and putting in infrastructure that works reliably on an ongoing basis.

The Michigan Senate refused to vote on the bridge project before ending business for the year. What are its prospects for next year?

I hope it turns out with the new governor and the new legislature recognizing that it’s time to get on with it. Governments change in Canada, too. Right now the $550 million to Michigan is just an offer. We hope prudent legislators and administrators in Michigan will recognize it’s time to accept this opportunity. Because we’re hopeful people, that also is our expectation.

Concerning environmental protection of the Great Lakes, what are the areas of agreement and conflict between Michigan and Canada?

There are issues of ballast water regulations [on ocean-going ships coming into the Great Lakes]. We don’t have an issue with Michigan. Canada and New York have an issue. New York has drafted regulations that are unimplementable. We have an issue with them.

There was a conflict between Ontario and Michigan on the export of garbage to Michigan. An agreement was worked out in 2006. All municipal waste importation will be eliminated by 2010. That will happen. That’s a good news story of jurisdictions coming together to reach an agreement.

Canada and the United States have been involved in a decades-long trade dispute over the importation of Canadian lumber into the United States. What’s the status of that dispute?

Canada and the United States in 2006 signed an agreement on softwood lumber. Since then we have taken each other to international tribunals because of disputes. Canada almost always wins.

The 2006 agreement called for Canada to place an export duty on softwood lumber. The objective to significantly drive down the consumption of softwood lumber in the United States has been met. We tax the exports, meaning the Canadian government keeps the revenue when exports go above a certain amount.

Everybody in the industry is hurting because of the housing slump. We think there should be free trade. But the United States does not want free trade in lumber, it seems. The managed trade agreement in 2006 has worked out pretty well.

How would you assess the border security issues, specifically involving linkages between Canada and Michigan?

It’s definitely more restrictive than it was before 9/11. That’s for entirely understandable reasons. It’s one of the reasons, frankly, for adding new infrastructure here. The level of security can’t be reached with current infrastructure.

If there are 8,000 trucks a day crossing the border between Detroit and Windsor and you add 30 seconds per truck because of increased security measures, it adds up. You end up with a considerable backlog.

But I think at the operational level, people are working extremely well together.

What are your ideas for expanding trade or for other areas of cooperation?

We try to do it every day, at the micro level — company by company — and also at the policy level. One of the ways to grow trade is not put barriers in its way. When that happens, companies and governments perceive the need to retaliate.

We aren’t China or India. We are Canada, your free-trade partner with comparable rules and laws. We pay comparable wages. No one could take the rational position that we are undercutting you. Canadian sensibilities are Michigan sensibilities. We try to make the point that we are like you.

What personal details about yourself can you share with us?

I’m one of those pathetic people who works all the time. I enjoy my work. It’s how I am fulfilled. I work 75 to 80 hours a week. I like sports. In my three months, I’ve been to one Tiger game. It was the second-to-last game of the season and they won. It was a spectacular evening.

My late grandmother was a fanatical Gordie Howe fan, but I haven’t been to a Red Wings game yet.

Your favorite hockey team?

I cheered for the Boston Bruins for a long time, but later I became an Ottawa Senators fan, and I remain a Senators fan. I will go to Red Wings games and cheer enthusiastically for the Red Wings unless they are playing the Senators.

Rick Haglund is a freelance writer and former business reporter and columnist for Booth Newspapers.

Departments

Canada / Michigan

Looking Out for the Great Lakes

by Rick Haglund
October 16, 2010

Lana Pollack doesn’t lack for controversial Great Lakes water issues to grapple with in her new job as U.S. Section Chair of the International Joint Commission.

Asian carp with voracious appetites are swimming closer to Lake Michigan through the Mississippi River system, threatening to wipe out native species.

In July, an oil pipeline break spilled nearly a million gallons of crude oil into a creek that feeds the Kalamazoo River, raising larger concerns about the safety of hundreds of underground pipelines in the state.

And a variety of pollutants resulting from farming, manufacturing and human waste continue to foul the lakes despite years of effort to clean them up.

“The lakes are not healthy,” said Pollack, a former state lawmaker and past president of the Michigan Environmental Council “There is plenty of pollution entering the lakes, some of it in an increasing amount.”

Pollack, appointed by President Barack Obama, took over as the top U.S official at the IJC in June. The commission works to prevent and resolve water disputes between the United States and Canada under the Boundary Waters Treaty of 1909.

Its jurisdiction covers the 5,000-mile U.S.-Canada border and 300 shared bodies of water. The organization also serves as an advisor to the U.S. and Canadian governments on pollution and water quality issues.

Water quality is a major issue in the special economic and social relationship between the United States and Canada, and the health of the Great Lakes is of critical concern to Michigan and Ontario. Problems on one side of the border affect both nations and their political subdivisions; pollution and invasive species don’t respect map boundaries.

That’s the chief reason a number of formal mechanisms exist to foster cooperation on these tough water issues.

The IJC was involved in the drafting of the 1972 Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement in which the two countries agreed to control pollution and clean up waste from industry and communities.

“It’s still seen as one of best water compacts in the world when looking at water quality,” said Joan Rose, co-director of the Center for Water Sciences at Michigan State University.

Renewed attention
The Great Lakes, which contain nearly 20 percent of the world’s surface fresh water, are getting renewed attention from a number of groups and officials, not the least of which is the Obama administration on this side of the border.

Earlier this year, the administration announced the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, a $475 million effort to clean up the lakes and deal with invasive species. It’s the largest federal spending project on the lakes in two decades.

Michigan so far has been awarded more than $2 million from the initiative, administered by the Environmental Protection Agency. Among the grant winners were researchers at Michigan State University and Wayne State University; the state Department of Natural Resources and Environment; and the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments.

“If the Great Lakes are to continue to take care of us, we need to continue to invest in them,” said Cameron Davis, known unofficially as Obama’s Great Lakes czar and officially as special advisor to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson.

Thirty million Americans get their drinking water from the Great Lakes. The lakes also support multibillion-dollar commercial fishing, shipping and recreation industries on both sides of the liquid border.

The United States isn’t the only one undertaking cleanup actions. Earlier this year, Canada and the province of Ontario extended a 2007 Great Lakes protection funding agreement, set to expire this year, until March 31, 2011.

The two governments will spend $16 million through next year in projects to keep invasive species from entering Lake Superior and deal with algae blooms that foul Lake Huron beaches. The money also will be spent on keeping polluting nutrients out of Lake Erie and protecting biodiversity along Lake Ontario shorelines and watersheds.

World interest
The importance of protection and wise use of the Great Lakes was among topics discussed at the World Water Congress held in September in Montreal.

Nearly 5,000 water experts, including Rose and several IJC commissioners, attended the conference, sponsored by the International Water Association, a group of private and public water system professionals.

Rose said one of the issues discussed there was aging infrastructures in the states and provinces of the Great Lakes region. In host city Montreal, for example, millions of gallons of drinking water from the St. Lawrence River are “lost” because of old, leaky pipes.

The $475 million allocated by the Obama administration to restore the Great Lakes is the equivalent of a few drops of rainwater in Lake Superior in addressing the need, some say.

Estimates run as high as $20 billion to replace leaking water and sewer pipes, and to halt pollutants such as mercury and phosphates from entering the lakes.

“We’re using technologies from the 1970s. It hasn’t advanced much,” Rose said. “It’s going to cost us a lot in our communities to keep moving forward and not move backwards.”

But in addition to increased spending, Davis said numerous groups need to work closely in improving the Great Lakes environment. A major part of his job is coordinating the work of 16 different federal agencies charged with regulating the lakes.

Eight states, two provinces and two federal governments have jurisdiction over the Great Lakes.

In addition to those, there are multiple Canadian government agencies and a variety of other groups, such as the Great Lakes Commission and National Wildlife Foundation, that work to improve the lakes.

But Pollack said the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement and the healthy relationship between the U.S. and Canada are strengths in protecting the lakes.

“We really do have an amazing relationship with Canada,” she said. “We share a 5,000-mile boundary, 40 percent of which is water. We get along remarkably well.”

Occasional tensions
But there are occasional tensions between the two countries, as well as differences in regulations.

Michigan and the United States, for example, ban oil and gas drilling in the Great Lakes. Canada allows it.

And the pipeline that spilled oil into the Kalamazoo River last summer is owned by Canada-based Enbridge Inc. (Former Michigan governor and U.S. ambassador to Canada James Blanchard sits on Enbridge’s board of directors.)

“These pipelines have been out of sight and out of mind,” said Andy Buchsbaum, regional executive director of the National Wildlife Federation’s Ann Arbor office. “They’re not going to be out of mind very much longer, though, because of their potential to do enormous damage.”

Pollack said most of the conflicts involve the various users of the lakes, not political jurisdictions.

Homeowners living on Great Lakes shorelines want their beaches protected. Shipping companies want deeper navigational water for their freighters. Environmentalists want stiffer regulations protecting wetlands and habitat.

Greater cooperation among those groups will be needed to improve the quality of the lakes, Davis said.

“The only way we’re going to save the Great Lakes is if we’re all moving in the same direction,” he said.

Great Lakes restoration efforts will be further complicated by climate change, experts say.

Warmer air temperatures are creating faster-developing, more intense storms that overwhelm storm sewer systems and dump pollutants into the lakes, Pollack said.

And the resulting warmer water temperatures from climate change are likely contributing to oxygen-depleted dead zones in Lake Erie, Saginaw Bay and Green Bay, Buchsbaum said.

These are [areas] of the Great Lakes that are sick and unable to heal themselves,” he said. “The sense of urgency is higher than at any time I’ve been working on these issues over the past 20 years.”

Pollack said citizens cannot take the future of the lakes for granted.

“We live in a terrific place. We have fewer water problems than most places on earth,” she said. “But the lakes should not be considered a free, endless resource.”

Rick Haglund is a freelance writer and former business reporter and columnist for Booth Newspapers.

Stitching and Weaving Politics and Policy

by John Lindstrom
Gongwer News Service
April 30, 2010

May beckons, and with it a growing sense of urgency seems to build in state government. Deadlines, hard deadlines in some cases, loom, so the weavers that stitch together policies and politics together have stepped up at least their public efforts to resolve the pending items.

During all of this, though, an interesting question of history was raised at one point. It was a question that goes in part to the heart of the overall purpose of governing, and it was a question that raises a troubling contemplative point.

So, in unraveling the first line in the warp and weft of the week is the question of whether Geoffrey Fieger will put his Lexus in the garage as he tours the state in a U.S. luxury car seeking the Democratic nomination for governor. He has hinted, again, that he might run, despite enduring a devastating defeat to then Governor John Engler in 1998.

And a recent poll of likely Democratic voters showed the only name that attracted more support than Mr. Fieger was “undecided.” In an initial indication, Mr. Fieger outpolled House Speaker Andy Dillon, Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero and Rep. Alma Wheeler Smith.

The silent scream you didn’t hear was from top Democratic officials rending their garments at the prospect. Everyone in the party knows Mr. Fieger is a generous financial backer and probably as rock-ribbed a Democrat as one could get. No one disputes he could prove very formidable in a primary.

But politically Mr. Fieger is not very politic, which is both his draw and downfall. Can one honestly think that his comments on Jesus Christ that dogged him all through the 1998 campaign will not be, ahem, resurrected? Or that Republicans won’t make huge hay out of his ongoing fights with the Supreme Court and federal courts? Mr. Fieger on the ballot will help generate Republican turnout, because even moderate Republicans (of which there are still a fair number in Michigan) will show up to vote against him. The initial betting has to be that he would draw better than the 38 percent he got in 1998, but not enough to win.

The hard deadline he faces is May 11, by which he would have to produce 15,000 petition signatures to run for governor. The longer he delays in saying he is out there running, the harder that task becomes, so one could reasonably expect Mr. Fieger to make something that appears like an actual decision soon. Then again, known for going with his gut, reason may have little to do with Mr. Fieger’s decision.

The second thread to tug at are the efforts to resolve the state employee and teacher retirement issue. Having already missed the April 1 deadline, legislators kept Thursday’s session open long as they tried to reach an agreement before May 1.

Governor Jennifer Granholm had called for lawmakers to reach a hard decision by a hard deadline so school districts, especially, could try to convince older teachers to step aside to allow younger teachers in.

Typically, in the past, whenever early retirement programs have been discussed, state workers and teachers are giddy at the prospect. Not so much this time. With the economy still extremely weak, and with the setup of any of the retirement proposals meaning people in their early and mid-50s (when they may still have kids in college or facing the prospect of helping their own parents) would face taking either retirement or paying more for their benefits, the proposals rankle many.

The action also comes as the Michigan Education Association has undertaken an aggressive ad campaign saying teachers will no longer be the punching bag for policymakers.

The anguish public workers have voiced seems to have had some effect, at least according to opinion polls showing the public is less supportive of the retirement proposals than before. At the same time, the public might well wonder about teachers or public workers being actual punching bags in state policy. Clearly, Republicans have long targeted the MEA and the Michigan Federation of Teachers as roadblocks to cutting overall spending. The simple facts are, however, they have hardly blown those impediments away (or to continue with the sewing analogies, ripped the seams out). Compared to what state workers have had to endure in the last decade, teachers haven’t faced some of the budgetary constraints.

No, teachers have not been immune from pain, especially as districts have been forced to make layoff decisions. But the point is, lawmakers have tried to protect education funding before anything else, so on the relative scale of public employee suffering, teachers have done better.

And while the public may sympathize with the worries of teachers and public workers about having to pick up more of their insurance and retirement costs, it would be well for public workers to remember that private sector workers have shouldered those burdens for quite some time. Appeal to the public’s sympathy if you will, ah, but don’t somehow imply you got it worse than they have had.

The next thread hanging is the intensifying fight over the Detroit River International Crossing. The owners of the Ambassador Bridge are pulling out all the stops to convince lawmakers not to approve plans that give the state okay for the new bridge. The top executives, even the hitherto somewhat elusive Matty Moroun, have come out fighting hard. So far they have been able to hold the Senate Republicans, and picked up a fair amount of support from House Republicans as well, in their corner.

But with the news that Canada would pay the state’s portion of the DRIC project (to be repaid later) coming from a literally breathless Ms. Granholm before the House Transportation Committee, the Ambassador’s executives may have to quickly find a new argument that can win, or find a way to become part of the DRIC deal.

Unquestionably, a new bridge will affect the Ambassador’s business, especially in the short term as industrial traffic will want to shift to the new bridge that ties with Canada’s 401 highway.

The two arguments used against the DRIC are traffic and Canada. Traffic is down substantially in the last several years, the argument goes, and a new bridge will dilute that flow even more. True, but DRIC supporters argue back that traffic has improved some and should grow substantially when the economy improves. There is also the unspoken thought that the DRIC could help drive (or let us say stitch together) an economic boost in the area that will attract more traffic overall.

The argument that Canada alone is forcing the DRIC seems curious. Senate Majority Floor Leader Alan Cropsey (R-DeWitt) has even in the past said Michigan was being bullied by Canada. Given the history of U.S./Canadian relations, that surely must be a surprise to Canadians who have been annoyed that Americans tend to ignore them except during the Stanley Cup playoffs and worried that at some point the U.S. would just take them over.

Even then, there is a kernel, well, thread, of some truth. No, Stephen Harper (he’s the prime minister, in case you ignored Canada so much you missed that) isn’t sitting in Ottawa sticking pins in a Michigan voodoo doll. But Canada is far more economically dependent on manufacturing, especially automotive manufacturing, than the U.S., so moving goods and parts as rapidly as possible through the Detroit crossing has always been critical to our NATO ally. Therefore, getting the DRIC approved and underway has more resonance to Canadians than initially to the U.S.

The issue overall has a feeling that the ever-stronger winds will at some point shred the sails and overwhelm the opposition. As tough a fight as the Ambassador Bridge execs and allies are putting up, it is hard to see how the DRIC proposal is blocked indefinitely. Ultimately, the answer may be to wrap each other in the coverlet of cooperation and mutual benefit, however such a garment is made.

But during all the knitting and stitching and weaving of the immediate, day-to-day issues, Bill Rustem of Public Sector Consultants posed a question that prompts long-term thinking: What are the legacy issues of this legislature, the issues that will affect and improve the lives of our children and generations beyond?

It is a hard, and in some respects unfair, point to put to the 95th legislature. Lawmakers and Ms. Granholm these past two years have had to fight against an economic collapse not seen in two generations. Worrying about a legacy seems irrelevant when one is trying to hold onto something that could be used to build a legacy on.

In one way at least, conservatives can actually claim some success in building a legacy, because the state has had to pare back, cut spending and the size of government. And they have been successful in blocking tax increases, at least so far. So if one came to government seeking to cut its size and cost, then in that, at least, one has been successful in building a legacy.

But budget and fiscal issues cannot be all that government is about, Mr. Rustem said. His comments echoed a complaint made earlier in the year from Secretary of State Terri Land that the legislature seemed incapable of doing anything other than budget issues.

Budgets will always be a matter of struggle and controversy in governing. It simply goes with the territory. What else can this body point to as that which will actually make a difference for the state in 20 years or longer? What triumphs will the 95th legislature pass onto history?

Unraveling that question may yet leave just scraps and rags to somehow piece back together.

John Lindstrom is publisher of Gongwer News Service. For nearly 50 years in Michigan, Gongwer News Service has provided independent, comprehensive, accurate and timely coverage of issues in and around Michigan’s government and political systems. For subscription information, including a free trial, visit Gongwer online.

Border Security Trumps Local Economic Opportunity

Is Michigan doing enough to make sure Port Huron and other border communities connect with their Canadian neighbor?

by John Foren
April 16, 2010

PORT HURON — It is early afternoon on a beautiful Friday, the last vestiges of ice floes are streaming down the St. Clair River and if Port Huron wanted to pose for a postcard, today would be the day. Downtown — just a couple blocks off the water — looks abandoned, however. There are only a few scattered walkers and a man on a street corner with a sandwich-board sign hawking a going-out-business sale.

Kathleen Smith is admiring the water outside the Great Lakes Maritime Center off of downtown and talking about the days when Port Huron was bustling and heading over the border to Canada didn’t arouse international suspicion.

Smith, a 66-year-old poet, is speaking of the ties between the two countries, citing her poem “Under the Blue Water Bridge.” Its verse includes the lines, “There is a magical, captivating beauty. The United States and Canada connect here, sharing river and the great lakes it reaches. It is an area enjoyed and loved.”

The question is, is Michigan doing enough to make sure Port Huron and other border communities connect with their Canadian neighbor?

Those who have studied Michigan’s border communities say Port Huron, in particular, has huge assets as an international hub that few, if any, communities in the nation can claim. That includes the twin spans of the Blue Water Bridge and the Canadian National Railway’s rail tunnel under the St. Clair River, an entry point for international goods.

But in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks, the border has tightened and security, not economics, rules the day.

The same kind of gridlock that cripples the lines at the bridge seems to have commandeered any efforts to play on the border’s assets, some say.

“You can’t be talking about any other city in Michigan in terms of the infrastructure already in place — double-decker bridges, underwater railroad tunnel. How long would it take to put that stuff in place today?” said Lawrence Molnar, who heads the Michigan Business Incubation Association.

“Port Huron has a competitive advantage over any other communities that are located on the Canadian border, both in Michigan and probably across the entire border between Canada and the United States. It’s really a global crossing point for commerce, trade, intermodal and just about anything else you can think of.”

Molnar, also of the University of Michigan’s Institute for Research on Labor, Employment and the Economy, has been working with St. Clair Community College on the possibility of starting an incubator tied to transportation, distribution and warehousing firms. That’s directly tied to Port Huron’s border crossing status.

U.S. Rep. Candace Miller (R-Harrison Township) is a member of the House Homeland Security Committee and stresses that border safety trumps everything. “Let me be pretty frank: my job is to protect America,” she says.

Still, as the Port Huron area’s congressional representative she bridles at what she sees as missed opportunities to use the economic advantages of the crossing. While state officials engage in an almost-daily debate on a second international bridge in Detroit, they are ignoring the potential a few miles up the road, she says.

“It’s unbelievable the potential that is there,” says Miller, who sits on the U.S.-Canada Interparliamentary Exchange Group, which promotes interaction between lawmakers on both sides. “You have to play to your strength.”

Port Huron, she says, has “tremendous assets. You can’t just drive anywhere and find those assets.”

Port Huron is one of the top trade crossings in the country and is the busiest international rail entry point in the U.S. Nearly 22 million tons of goods was expected to cross the bridge last year.

Some 8 percent of St. Clair County’s total payroll comes from workers in businesses dependent on the border, according to a December study financed by state and local economic development officials. The study identified 62 firms in the county as relying on border business, such as freight.

About 700,000 visitors from Canada were expected to visit the county in 2009, spending an estimated $57 million.

The study, by Chmura Economics & Analytics of Richmond, Va., said the border gave the area several clear economic advantages, namely access to a larger labor pool, and would help the region replace manufacturing jobs with trade-related work.

The study largely buttressed local officials’ arguments in favor of the massive Blue Water Bridge Plaza Project, a $600-million plan to expand the plaza on the American side of the bridge and improve 2.5 miles of the I-94/I-69 corridor west of the site.

The federally approved project, scheduled for completion in 2017, involves replacing and widening the bridge to nine lanes to separate local and international traffic. It will accommodate what could be a doubling in truck traffic across the bridge and provide an intermodal facility that will make it easier to shift goods by rail to truck or other means.

Proponents say there also will be hundreds of construction jobs and, once the project is finished, dozens of new businesses that benefit from the increased traffic.

Most important, perhaps, the expanded bridge is projected to decrease the average delay in crossing from 28 minutes to 3 minutes in the year 2030.

The project comes in the wake of increasing grumbling about security tie-ups at the bridge in the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks. On a recent day, traffic volume on the bridge seemed relatively light but still the trucks lined up and caused a quarter-mile backup.

It’s the chief reason cited by residents and businesses for why they don’t partake more often in their international neighbor.

The last time Dale Myers, of nearby Peck, was across the bridge in in Sarnia, Ontario, was just after 9/11. Myers, 68 and retired from the Navy, says he’d cross the border more often “if they didn’t make it so difficult.”

“We’re neighbors, we’re not enemies,” he says.

Another longtime area resident, Paula Rosenthal, 61, says she understands the concerns after 9/11, “but we need to do something to allow for easier access to the public.”

Rosenthal also says the American and Canadian sides should market themselves better to capitalize on the jewel they have.

Canadians make up about 10 percent of the business at the Office Lounge, which is just off the exit at Water Street near the bridge. That’s dropped in the last year after passport laws tightened, said Norm Krol, who owns the place.

Krol also is not looking forward to the May 1 enactment of Michigan’s smoke ban in bars and restaurants. He said being able to puff is another attraction to Canadians, who face public bans in their own country.

The Canadian influence on local business shouldn’t be underestimated, says Krol.

“It’s pretty strong,” he says. “You get a lot of people who come over shopping, they get things they can’t normally get in Canada…The regulars we get are here to get fuel, stop by and get some steaks at Sam’s Club, come here for a beer, have a couple smokes.”

Check the parking lot of the Birchwood Mall, in Fort Gratiot, a northern Port Huron suburb, and you’ll get an instant reminder of how much the area relies on Canadian consumers.

Ontario license plates are omnipresent — not the majority of shoppers by any means but plentiful enough to make a difference.

Toby and Sally Zimmerman of London, Ontario, had a choice on a recent open afternoon: drive a couple hours to Toronto for some shopping or head almost directly west more than an hour to Port Huron. The Michigan city won, and so did their pocketbook.

The Zimmermans, both in their 30s and with a young son, said they paid $20 less to fill their gas tank than they would have in their country.

“I think generally almost everything is less,” Toby Zimmerman said.

They are the kind of people Port Huron’s economy relies on (Canadians spend an average of $77 per day when they visit St. Clair County, according to the Chmura study). And that’s who Vickie Ledsworth, president of the Blue Water Area Chamber of Commerce, is working to keep.

Ledsworth has been meeting with Sarnia chamber leaders on developing stronger commercial ties between the two border communities. One priority is allaying Americans’ fears about border hang-ups and exchange rates so they frequent Canadian businesses, including Sarnia’s Hiawatha horse track.

“We’ve always had a very strong relationship with Canada, it’s just become more complicated,” Ledsworth says.

How complicated?

In the old days, Dan Lockwood would swim a half-mile across the St. Clair River into Canada. The last time he tried it, about three years ago, he was told firmly by a border patrol agent not to do it again.

In another sign of the times, a Homeland Security camera is being installed in his neighborhood to keep an eye on the waterfront and border. The images will be sent to Selfridge Air National Guard Base in Harrison Township.

Lockwood, president of the Downtown Development Authority in the city of St. Clair, south of Port Huron, says business between the two sides isn’t what it used to be.

“Canadians think twice about crossing the border because of the difficulty of coming across,” he says. “We used to think absolutely nothing of going to Sarnia for dinner. You have to think about those things now.”

John Foren is the former editor of The Flint Journal and spent years as a reporter for Booth Newspapers in Washington D.C., Lansing and Flint. He is an instructor at the Michigan State University School of Journalism.