Feb. 13: AG Dana Nessel may review Michigan minimum wage, sick leave law

Dec. 14: Snyder signs bills that weaken Michigan minimum wage, sick leave law

Michigan state senators on Wednesday dramatically scaled back two citizen-backed laws to raise the minimum wage and require paid sick leave.

Lawmakers exempted small businesses — those with fewer than 50 workers — from requiring paid sick leave, while slowing the increase of the state minimum wage to $12 by eight years, to 2030.

The changes are big revisions to initiatives that legislators adopted in September after proponents gathered hundreds of thousands of signatures from Michigan voters. And they were hurried through in hours after the revisions were first publicly released Wednesday morning in a committee meeting, even though lawmakers have several weeks to adopt legislation before it dies at the end of the two-year term.

Update: Group behind Michigan paid sick leave vows 2020 ballot drive if law gutted

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Critics blasted Wednesday’s votes as Republicans working in secret to gut laws they don’t like before their legislative majorities shrink in January and a new Democratic administration takes over.

Senate Minority Leader Jim Ananich, D-Flint, who voted against the measures, said he saw them for the first time Wednesday morning.

He said he told incoming Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey, R-Clarklake and the sponsor of the sick leave changes, that he’d be willing to negotiate revisions in the new legislative term that starts in January.

“We may not have agreement exactly, but I’d be willing to compromise. They chose to go this route,” Ananich said. “They want to ram things through in the dark of night, 11th hour, right before session ends. I think that’s the wrong approach.”

Outgoing Senate Majority Leader Arlan Meekhof, R-West Olive, said the GOP is “absolutely not” being secretive.

The Legislature followed the law about posting committee hearings, he said, and heard testimony on the amended bills in public before the full Senate voted.

Meekhof said Senate Republicans heard from business owners in their districts that addressing both proposals “is one of the first things we should do.”

But the action in lame-duck session potentially has ramifications that will extend beyond December, when the two-year legislative term ends.

Supporters of the original laws have vowed to sue. They say the decision to rush legislation prevents citizens from reading, understanding and commenting about what would be changed before lawmakers voted.

“Most of the (senators) that are hearing these (bills) have been voted out or are term-limited,” said Danielle Atkinson, one of the organizers of the MI Time to Care ballot committee that backed the sick leave initiative. “They’re not going to have to live with the consequences of their constituents telling them that this is bad.

“It’s a broken system,” she added, “and we really need to have a process that lets people put their input in. And we also need representatives and senators that respect the ballot initiative process enough not to gut a bill that they passed a few months ago.”

Dec. 21: That's a wrap! What bills passed, died in Michigan lame duck for the ages

Related: See what Michigan lame-duck bills we're tracking