Kathleen Gray

Detroit Free Press

LANSING - Gov. Rick Snyder signed a bill Wednesday afternoon that has local officials worried that they won’t be able to inform the public about upcoming ballot issues.

Snyder said in a signing letter that he interprets the bill’s language differently than local officials, but also asked the Legislature to enact a new bill that will address those concerns.

“And clarify that the new language does not impact the expression of personal views by a public official, the use of resources or facilities in the ordinary course of business and that it is intended only to prohibit the use of targeted, advertisement style mass communications that are reasonably interpreted as an attempt to influence the electorate using tax dollars,” he wrote in a letter explaining why he signed the controversial bill.

The legislation was the last to pass the Legislature in December and grew from a non-controversial bill that had passed the Senate unanimously at 13 pages, to a totally revamped bill that grew at the last minute to 53 pages and was passed with only Republican votes.

The bill prohibits local officials to publicly discuss ballot proposals or millage issues in the 60 days leading up to an election. It has been blasted by municipal and school district officials as an official state “gag order” and a violation of free speech.

But Snyder disagreed.

The “new prohibitions were not made applicable to any of the other existing exceptions in current law, in particular, those that are not grounded in First Amendment political speech protections,” he wrote in his signing letter.

He also said he didn’t think it applied to policymakers expressing their own views or using a public facility to host debates or town halls on ballot questions.

“These are important exceptions to retain to protect free political speech and also ensure that the electorate has the opportunity to be adequately informed about upcoming ballot proposals,” he wrote.

Local officials, however, held a press conference Tuesday, saying the bill’s language was so vague that they would be at risk of fines of up to $20,000 for publicly discussing ballot proposals.