We are One Detroit and we are on Mackinac Island for the Detroit Regional Chambers 2025 Mackinac Policy Conference.

This year's focus is on Michigan's equation for impact.

Just ahead, we're going to bring you some of the conversations on the island about the vision and tools needed to move the state forward.

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When you take good people out of a bad system, turnarounds happen a lot faster than you expect.

I think the momentum and sort of the movement that's happening overall in women's sports.

That the time is now.

I'm convinced we have two capable leaders who are focused on generating the strongest economies that America and Canada have ever experienced.

We can do hard things to succeed.

You've got to be willing to work with people you disagree with about most things to find what you can do together.

It's the harder path to take in the moment, but it's always the right one.

Business, education and community leaders, along with government officials, have come together once again for the Detroit Regional Chambers Mackinac Policy Conference.

Welcome to this special edition of One Detroit.

I'm Stephen Henderson, a One Detroit contributor and the host of American Black Journal.

We are coming to you from the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island.

This is our 15th year bringing you coverage from this event, from the conference sessions to the conversations that took place here at the Detroit PBS desk.

Over the next hour, We're going to share some of the highlights.

We're going to hear from Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan as he prepares to leave office at the end of the year.

Plus, Governor Gretchen Whitmer is going to talk about Michigan's future.

Also ahead, a conversation with the U.S.

Ambassador to Canada, Pete Hoekstra.

Plus, we'll examine the connection between school, truancy and mental health.

And we'll hear from the group that is hoping to bring the WNBA back to Detroit.

That's all coming up.

But first, I'm joined by One Detroit contributors, Nolan Finley, the editorial page editor at the Detroit News, and Zoe Clark.

She is the political director for Michigan Public.

Guys, 15 years we've been doing this.

That's a long time.

And don't look a day over, right?

That's right.

All right.

So let's start with what we feel is kind of happening at the conference.

It's the vision for the theme here.

This year was a little less specific than it has been in recent years.

So what does it mean and what are we actually getting?

I don't know what what is an equation.

For equation for impact?

Yeah, I don't know what it means, but I do know there's a lot of politicking going on.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So I would election.

Year in Detroit.

And an one next next year.

So that's the perpetual campaign.

Yeah, but I think that's the predominant theme here.

That's what people are talking about.

You know, hearing people talking about, well, gosh, how do we fix these schools?

What are we going to do about infrastructure or tariffs?

The conversation in the small groups all over the porch and in the parlor is about who do you like for governor?

Yeah, you know, you think this guy or that that one they got a chance in the election.

So I mean, I can't imagine what next year is going to be like.

But that disconnection of policy from politics is different here.

But it's not necessarily different in our politics, I guess.

No, I mean, like, let's be honest, you can't take the politics out of Mackinac Island, whether it is an odd year or an even.

Yeah.

You know, election year.

So, I mean, the yes and no.

And I absolutely think because when you have a group of elected officials, you are going to talk about, you know, who is up, who is down.

We have new polling from the chamber that came out this week as well.

But what I'm really noticing in my conversations this week is just this level of uncertainty and unpredictability about the economy, whether we're talking about the national economy or more specifically, the Michigan economy.

And I think why that's coming up is because we're surrounded by a lot of business leaders and business leaders like predictability.

Somebody I was talking to was saying about going to Washington to lobby one of our elected officials in one of the office buildings and that the line outside was like 50 people.

Now, that is not something you actually see in in Washington very frequently.

But this person was saying, look, we feel like we're a little on our own.

We need help.

Yeah.

And we don't know that we're getting it in in D.C.. And it's hard to believe those representatives can't respond to that.

I think they're going to have to act sooner or later in their own interests and figure out what it is their constituents really want and what are the best practices for the people of their districts.

And, you know, I think they've decided some of the things that are going on help their districts.

Other things are hurting.

And I think over the next couple of months, maybe longer, you're going to see a real shake out in those policies.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There's not a lot of hard power that happens here at Mackinac but there is soft power and there are moments where you are going to see folks pull someone aside, a federal official or something like that.

Right.

The member of the congressional delegation and folks I think are more and more saying like, this is not going to work for us.

What the opposite solution looks like?

I don't know that they have the answer, but I think what, again, they're seeing is like this instability is not working right now and people aren't enjoying it.

Right.

Right, right.

Get back to politics really quickly.

We do have this big year next year statewide.

Yeah.

I wonder what you're hearing about the field that's shaping up for governor and Senate.

All of those folks are here.

Yeah.

And they really are politicking like the election is in ‘25, not 26.

And they sort of were last year.

Yeah, right.

Some of these gubernatorial candidates.

Right.

Look, this is in many respects, Mike Duggan's conference.

Yeah, right.

Not only is he, of course, the outgoing mayor of the city of Detroit, you know, ten year history.

And he's always sort of, you know, had these speeches here on Mackinac that are just fascinating and use this platform.

And so I just think right now it's eyes on Duggan polling also came out this week that actually shows him pulling the same number from both Republicans and Democrats, which I think was surprising to many.

And doing extraordinarily well in metro Detroit.

Yes, just.

Blowing away the field in metro Detroit, outstate, not so much.

I mean, it's hard to believe.

Well they don't really know him Well.

Yeah, it's hard for us to believe.

But up here, a lot of people have never heard of him.

Right.

Right.

How could that be?

But, you know, one of the things I noticed about the field, whether it's Republicans, Democrat, not many fresh faces.

No.

These are a lot of retreads, reruns.

And I think, you know, fresh blood in our political system wouldn't be a bad thing.

And we have heard from voters now time and time again saying that is what they want.

And I want to know, you know, these Duggan numbers don't suddenly meet.

It's an easy path, right?

We haven't elected an independent governor.

Right.

It is a hard path.

But I think it was surprising to see the numbers and some of his favorability is in southeast Michigan.

Favorability is close to Gretchen Whitmer's.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And again, though, he's going to have to raise some money and and that's an integral piece of this conference meeting with the people who can fund your campaign because the other candidates, Democrat or Republican, they're going to get tons of money from the Republican.

National help too.

Yeah.

Yeah, tons of money from the Democratic Governors Association.

Lots of money is going to come in.

And can Duggan match that with just a metro Detroit base supporters?

And I think you're going to see him as of January 1, spend almost all his time outstate.

Yeah, Yeah.

I think so.

You know, I think one of the things he hopes to make this about is Mike Duggan versus the Democratic or Republican candidate versus an independent.

Right.

I mean, there's much being made of him being an independent.

But what he's going to do is say, I'm Mike Duggan and his billboard on the way up.

One of them talked about Michigan could use a really great mayor.

Right.

That's a perfect line for him.

Yeah.

That gets to why he thinks he should be.

Yeah, he should be governor.

All right, guys, we're going to come to you for more before the end of the show.

Thank you.

So were going to start with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan.

This was his last appearance at the conference as the city's mayor.

Of course, he is hoping to return in the future as governor of Michigan now that he has launched his campaign for the state's top job.

The mayor delivered a keynote address about Detroit's progress.

We exited bankruptcy less than a year after my election.

Well, that was good that we got rid of the back debt.

But we still have the city with the highest homicide rate, the highest poverty rate in 47,000 abandoned houses.

Bankruptcy wasn't going to solve our problems.

We had to have an entirely different political system.

And so I'm looking at the fact that we have 20% unemployment rate and I have a lot of people with high school degrees who want to go to work.

And there's only one answer for that.

I had to bring manufacturing back to Detroit.

There was no other way that we could deal with that.

People don't have a job, nothing else gets solved.

And so when I talked about this, the experts said, never happen.

You're never going to get large manufacturing plants in Detroit.

But I looked at that and said.

Why not?

We got vacant land.

We got lots of people ready to work.

We got the workforce.

And I know how to do a lean process to give them the fastest damn permitting system anywhere in America.

Why shouldn't we win?

But of course, what were the businesses afraid of?

The crazy political system.

And here's the difference.

I sit down with city council and I said, Here's our problem.

If we don't change the system so that people feel confident investing, you and me together, Detroit has no future.

Let's talk about what you need.

And the council people said, okay, we understand that.

We know we're going to take grief if we vote for these projects, but we don't want to give cash up front to businesses.

I mean, we're just coming out of bankruptcy.

We can't be giving away cash.

But if somebody is going to build out a vacant land, we're getting no taxes for and hire thousands of people.

We'll give them a discount on the new taxes.

We could all agree on that.

And one thing, though, they've got to give preference to hiring Detroiters.

We're not going to build all this and have people come in from out of town.

And I said to the council people, each one nine at a time, okay, I'm going to start landing these deals.

You should scrutinize it and make sure they make these provisions.

But if they do this, are you prepared to take the grief and vote for them?

And I will to my last day give city council credit because they're the ones in those meetings who are taking the grief.

But here's what we did.

We said, everybody here will make our land available.

We won't give you the cash up front.

We will give you the discounts.

You are going to have the easiest permitting process anywhere in America, and we will send you a workforce.

And you got to interview our folks first.

If you do that, come here.

If you don't, don't.

Very simple.

Don't waste your time.

And so took the land, marketed it and sure enough Flex-N-Gate comes in and built the first new auto plant in 20 years.

All right.

And as soon as he did it, the national media dismissed it as rare.

Nobody thought another one was really coming.

But an interesting thing happened when he opened.

It went to hire 500 people.

16,000 applicants showed up and every manufacturing company in the Midwest said, whoa, we're having trouble filling positions where we are.

We have an opportunity here.

And we went one after another.

Lear demolished the 40 year old abandoned Hudson plant.

This is what we've been looking at for 40 years and built a new Lear plant, hired 700 people, and the Kettering High School site became a 600 employee dashboard plant.

And when Jeep went to site a 5000 employee plant, we competed against all the states in the South.

South Carolina and Georgia, all these ones have been winning them.

We won it.

We beat them out and they hired 4000 Detroiters, moved 4000 families to the middle class in one shot.

And we kept going.

The state fair had been closed since 2011.

We built out a whole park, including Amazon, employing 2400 people.

The new Huntington Bank headquarters came downtown.

Ford did the unthinkable and saved the train station, just moved in a thousand workers.

The Henry Ford is building $2 billion in construction today.

Dan Gilbert is opening this building and GM is moving this fall into the new headquarters.

And he's very soon going to open the second tallest building in the state of Michigan.

All right.

When you take good people out of a bad system, turnarounds happen a lot faster than you expect.

One of the top priorities for the state is attracting and retaining talent.

We've been talking about it for decades.

In fact, Michigan's first ever chief growth officer, Hilary Doe, has been focused on this goal ever since she was appointed by Governor Gretchen Whitmer in 2023.

It's also a challenge that cities like Grand Rapids are hoping to solve.

Frankly, a lot of good news to announce in the last couple of years.

It's been really exciting to see.

Last year, we saw 65%+ of Michigan counties grow, which is wonderful to see.

And I think more importantly, our young adult population also is growing, which is really exciting to see or more importantly, accelerating faster than 45 other states.

So that's wonderful news in part because of regions like Grand Rapids, but also our northern communities.

Traverse City, Detroit.

It's just been been great to see and to help ensure that we can continue that growth we created Make My Home, which is a first of its kind first in the nation program that allows our local communities to apply and create really tailored talent attraction and retention programs.

They can apply and say that they'd like to provide down payment or student loan forgiveness or welcome programs to ensure that local talent can stay in their communities, or that they can invite folks from across the country to come and join them.

And we've really seen overwhelming interest from folks across the state, and it's exciting.

Examples of what you ideas that you heard and that have been announced.

Well, just today we actually got the chance to announce the City of Detroit Interest.

They're actually doubling down on wanting to retain entrepreneurs here in the city and are supporting with some housing stipends.

For example, we also saw specific targeted West Michigan ask for help with teacher attraction, which is really exciting to see.

So it's really varied and very regionally specific.

And, you know, we looked at retention programs across the country to really analyze what will work.

And the truth is what works for Marquette and Traverse City will be different than Grand Rapids and Detroit.

So this is intended to be locally driven.

And I think that's what will make it successful here in Michigan.

Well, let's turn to the west side of the state and what is working for Grand Rapids, because many folks would say that the Grand Rapids region and the growth is a success story in the state.

Of Michigan.

Rick, what are the tools that are in your toolbox right now that you are seeing that is helping the region grow?

Well, this has been a decades long journey for Grand Rapids to really reinventing itself.

And I think what's potentially unique in our region is we have a very vested business community that has strong partnerships with our public sector.

So we want to create a community that's vibrant, it's attractive.

We all want to live in a place that's attractive and vibrant and energetic and other things to do.

And so, you know, really setting our eye on the prize and everybody aligning and being focused on like these are the things that we want to do over the next few years, few decades to make sure that we continue to grow as a community.

Each year, Governor Whitmer updates conference attendees on the state's progress and her vision for the future.

She also uses this platform to announce new initiatives to grow Michigan's economy and position the state for success.

I have 19 months left in this office.

I'm not counting down.

It really is the best job in the world.

I go to work every day to make the place that I love most in the world a little bit better.

And as I think about how best to use the time that I have left, I want to lay out a few more hard things we got to do together.

So let's start with our children.

I believe that every child deserves access to high quality public education from pre-K through post-secondary.

When I took office, we've been under investing in education for decades, and we had wide funding gaps between public schools as high as $400 per student.

For years we had been trying to fix it, and in 2021 we finally closed the funding gap in our public schools.

Since then, we have raised teacher pay, cut retiree taxes.

We expanded on campus, mental health resources, started feeding all 1.4 million Michigan public school students free breakfast and lunch, our graduation rate, our A.P.

class numbers and career and tech education completion rates are at all time highs.

We can do these hard things, but let's be frank, we face a literacy crisis, not just here in Michigan, but across the country.

Just a quarter of our fourth graders can read proficiently.

That's not acceptable.

We all need to work together to tackle the literacy crisis.

The next hard thing we must do is make sure that every kid in Michigan can read.

We must focus every education policy to meet this high level goal until we hit it.

Next.

Let's talk about my favorite subject, the roads.

We need to deliver a sustainable long term solution for local and state roads so folks can get to work, drop off their kids at school, run errands without blowing a tire or cracking the axle.

I'm proud of the Rebuilding Michigan plan.

We fix our most economically critical highways and bridges.

I know, I know.

It's caused a lot of traffic in southeast Michigan.

And yes, I've heard about 696.

I'm sorry.

And you're welcome.

But as I said in my State of the State, rebuilding Michigan was a temporary fix for a long term problem.

We need to fix our local roads, which have been underinvested in for decades.

I'm grateful for the engagement on this issue all year long by members in the legislature of both parties.

We're inching closer to a deal, but we're going to have to compromise to get this done right.

And finally, let's talk about our ongoing efforts to bring more advanced manufacturing to Michigan.

In just the last few years, we've secured projects across the state in several key industries, but I want to focus on semiconductor chips.

We've all seen the devastating consequence of what a global shortage of chips can do.

It forced our automakers to buy up parking lots and fill them with almost-done cars awaiting chips, jacked up prices on phones and computers and appliances.

In the decade ahead.

Being able to on the decades.

I mean, this is a long term play.

Being able to make chips top to bottom in America will allow us to stay on the cutting edge of A.I.. Whoever dominates this technology, from design to production, will win the 21st century.

Education is key to Michigan's future, and improving the outcomes for K-12 students includes addressing issues like truancy.

Missing school affects a child's academic performance, well-being and overall development.

A panel of experts spoke with us about the connection between truancy and mental health.

What is the most significant mental health challenge that is contributing to truancy right now in the state?

I mean, I think some of what happened during the pandemic and kids being away from school for so long contributed to that.

We also have a lot of families that we work with single parent homes where there's not a lot of structure in the home, and that makes it difficult to reinforce the kids going to school.

But we do have a program, youth assistance program, and multiple nonprofits in Wayne County have this program where we focus on kids when there are issues like truancy or other at risk factors and try to make sure that they're attending regularly and follow up with their families and provide all kinds of other supportive services.

So we believe children need to be in school and they need to be able to and ready to learn.

And of course, so does the superintendent.

And you're doing some work within the district.

Dr. Vitti, how are you thinking about and addressing the mental health challenges that we're seeing that are just contributing to students simply not showing up to school?

Yeah, well, when you think of when when I think about some of the greatest challenges that we have as a school district, it's chronic absenteeism, certainly toward the top.

I mean, it's sort of cliché if you're not in school, you can't learn when you just look at our students and in the data, when students have missed 18 or fewer days of school, there are 3 to 5 times more likely to be at above grade level than reading math or to be college ready.

So we know that we're doing the right things in the classroom and it's been a journey and improving systems, processes, recruiting, retaining teachers.

But we're doing all that much better.

We just have to have the kids show up more.

So one of the main reasons, as you've already indicated, is mental health.

So as the district, we've done a lot and I think we're really leading in a lot of different ways across Michigan and what we're doing with our screening.

All of our students are looking at risk adverse survey at the beginning of the year, 3rd to 12th graders and that survey is research-based to determine, you know, what challenges our students face from anxiety to fear to depression based on the trauma they've experienced.

From there, you can identify the students and then we have mental health support now in all of our schools, contracted.

So when students take that survey and and a red flag is raised you can connect them to one on one or small group therapy as long as the parent signs off on that.

And I think that's gone a long way to providing direct for them.

And we've developed Help Hub now across the city.

Free access to mental health support for families and students.

Free dental, medical and vision screening aside from mental health.

But those are just some of the ways we're starting to attack the issue.

And I think it is making a difference.

When we look at chronic absenteeism, we've got a lot of work to do.

But finally at the end of this school year, we're finally going to get put back to at least pre-pandemic levels with average yearly attendance and chronic absenteeism.

But I think we're moving in the right direction.

We often say that kids are our future.

Kids are our right now, so we need to make sure we do everything we possibly can to give them access to resources.

One of the programs that I'm most proud of is our School Success Initiative, where we're in the schools, we're working with our teachers, we're working with our counselors.

A number of our providers are on board with that, just really servicing the whole child.

You know, head to toe.

Dr. Beatty talked about, you know, access to dental, access to health services, but more importantly, access.

And so we're using our mobile crisis vehicles.

We have a mobile clinic that we're rolling out to our community to destigmatize this notion of mental health and making them feel okay about access.

Right.

Just coming in and having a conversation.

Access to safe, reliable transportation is another important factor in Michigan success.

Transportation and security has been a persistent barrier for thousands of Detroiters who need to get to jobs, medical appointments and other critical destinations.

We're still at a point, even though it is 2025, where transportation continues to be a really painful barrier for our residents and needing access to a vehicle, being able to obtain a valid driver's license, being able to pay for repairs.

You know, we have 42% of our families in the state of Michigan who are just one crisis away.

Say that again, 42%?

And our region, south eastern Michigan, parallels where the state is in terms of being able to meet their most basic needs.

Right.

And Ed, I mean, explain what that looks like on the ground.

Right.

Because we can put out sort of the data and the numbers.

But how does that affect someone's daily life and then just sort of solutions for the state as we're trying to move the state forward?

We think about it, you know, you get up to go to work in the morning and all of a sudden, you know, your car breaks down, for example.

Right.

And how do you get to work?

How do you go get groceries?

How do you get your kids to school?

How do you get these life events right, Get through the day?

And so we're excited to support and partner the United Way with Pride United to really help when those issues do come up, when there is that opportunity or that opportunity to help someone that needs a ride to get to a job interview, to get a job as well.

That's what I'm curious about from sort of Bank of America's perspective, I don't want to say it's all just, you know, the economy for you and finances, but I mean, it is an economic issue for the state.

1,000% it is.

And it's it's really a tough economic issue to solve because you've got to figure out a way to get people the transportation they need to get to their livelihoods, take care of their family, to get to food access, etc..

So this is a really a unique opportunity to really help out with a great program with the United Way and really help people.

I think we've helped over 130,000 people.

And we have some advice we've given you, but we've actually helped over 40,000 people now.

But we have a number of folks who come repeatedly getting those rides.

They're referred from our social navigators and we're helping them.

We have a 100 people now who have obtained those 175 excuse me, have gotten those driver's licenses.

Well, so fill us in.

That's exactly where I wanted to go next, because you really I mean, you know, we can all sit around here and state the problem, but you two are working on solutions.

Tell us a little bit about what you're doing and how it's working.

Doctor, I'll start with you.

So Bank of America has been a strong partner of United Way for decades now and Ed has actually been on our board for 13 years.

And the investments really are focused on economic mobility and making sure people have access again to, you know, getting out of crisis and being able to be more stable and finally being on a road to prosperity.

And that's what Pride United allows us to be able to do.

We have partnerships around our VITA program.

That's a volunteer income tax assistance program.

And it's all around getting our people more economically mobile and getting them more stable.

And Bank of America allows us to be able to do that with their continued investments.

So what has that been like then to be able to see some of these changes happening?

I mean, incredible, right?

Obviously, you know, you're trying to make an impact, but when you see it firsthand and you see the impact and you see people getting their life getting through their lives much better off because of this, you can't help but be overjoyed.

There have been conversations on the island about the new policies and changes coming out of Washington, D.C. A few members of Michigan's congressional delegation sat down for a discussion about the current political climate.

Are all have you guys back on a normal sleep schedule yet?

After the budget negotiations last week?

Tom, I'll start with you.

I have four kids, so I've never had no sleep schedule, but more, I guess, more normal than it was for sure.

Debbie, when it comes back to you, if it comes back, are you expecting more midnight sessions?

I think we're going to see a lot of midnight sessions by summer.

You?

That's because Republicans don't want to see us doing business in the light of day.

But I love them both.

Shots, shots fired.

I mean, we we pass this bill and here we go.

And I don't know, in Michigan, it gets light out by like 6 a.m. this time of year.

So we were in perfect broad daylight.

So some in.

Morning, middle of the... We got up at like 4 a.m. Bill for you.

Why start these sessions at 1 a.m.?

Well, first of all, that was a timing issue and a timing decision.

I'd go back, check the tape.

I remember during the Pelosi years of the speakership, having some awfully late nights into the middle of the night into getting done with voting at two, three, 4:00 in the morning.

So this is this is not new, folks.

I just don't think it's reasonable.

The process really was rammed through.

Even the Republican members of the committee, the final bill that we passed in the dark of night, yeah, the sun came out.

But when you're starting to close committee meetings at 1:00 in the morning, that's a pretty clear message that you're not wanting a lot of daylight on it.

And I don't think there was a single person in the chamber who had read the bill when it came when it came to us for a vote.

And there's a lot in it that is going to raise costs for most families in Michigan.

What's the biggest issue facing Michigan and what can all of you do at the federal level to tackle it?

I'm an optimistic guy.

I was actually voted most optimistic of my high school class, I think.

And I think that's because I thought it was the Lions year every year.

And it is this year that it is.

See, you know, I finally you are the most optimistic.

You can start charity golf any time.

Right.

But but I'm I remain optimistic about it.

I think we got the great you know, the fundamental points of what we need to grow our economy.

We've got a workforce.

You know, we need to grow that and develop that.

And you look at the fundamental things that business leaders look at for where they're going to grow and expand their operations.

They look at talent and workforce as their number one and number two probably combined.

Basically our number one consideration, they look at infrastructure.

We need to improve that.

I'm proud and thankful to serve on the Transportation Infrastructure Committee with I represent McDonald Rivet.

We got a Coast Guard ice cutter approved in this reconciliation process for the Great Lakes.

So that's going to be another improvement in advancement that we have.

That's another big win for our region, for our state.

And, you know, we have to look at what those fundamentals are instead of trying to jumped the shark with the new thing every time, what if we just get back to the basics and look at energy costs, infrastructure, talent development, our education pipeline and those things that are disciplined and you need to do them.

And I think that will naturally lead to better economic opportunity for our state.

I feel like I've spent my entire career working on the child care problem, that I hear it really.

Michigan's lost 40% of our child care capacity in the last ten years.

It is it is an economic emerging economic crisis to be able to, you know, and child care costs are somewhere generally between 12 and $14,000 a kid.

Yeah.

So we just have to make it.

There's a lot of work that needs to be done.

But, you know, we're I'm working on a bill with with a Republican member to be able to make on the affordability issue, being able to use 529 to help pay for child care expenses.

So that I think is incredibly important.

And we and and something that we all kind of agree on.

We have to figure out this child care issue.

I think a lot of people don't even understand the unintended consequences of what's happening.

And I know my colleagues join me.

These two are friends.

Tom and I are working on veterans together.

I've got to make sure that our VA hospitals still have the doctors and nurses and our veterans can get care.

We've got and I know that everybody here does You know, I've found out last Friday that some of that some many of our Head Start programs may have been shutting on Friday if they didn't hear about their funding.

Well, sometimes it's finding the right person to help you.

So thankfully yesterday, we got calls to every Headstart agency that was going to be impacted.

This I found the right person at HHS.

But, you know, our universities and the research and the scientific grants and the kind of generational research that's going on, making sure that everybody has access to clean, affordable water is a basic human right.

We all celebrated Flint being taken off that list, but I still want to get the lead out of every pipe in America.

And I could go with 20 more.

It's not a dull time.

The cuts in federal funding are beginning to have a real impact here in Michigan.

The leaders of three local organizations spoke with us about how it's affecting their programs and their services.

The cuts are deep.

It's not something that you can just forego easily and have a have a plan B, Right.

And we're talking about cuts that impact Medicaid.

Right.

And I don't think people understand what Medicaid funds as well.

It's not just health, right.

It's it's people's wellbeing, it's housing, it's social determinants of health that are impacted.

So an organization like Samaritas who is serving 38,000 people a year and a good portion of them are receiving those, the kind of funding that's going to be significant in terms of their their well-being, their ability to thrive, the amount of housing that we know, we're already in a crisis.

We don't have enough.

Right.

And these kind of cuts are not going to help that in any way, shape or form.

Our commitment at Michigan Medicine is, of course, to take care of our patients regardless of their ability to pay.

But the reality is coverage matters.

It matters in terms of being able to access all the services that patients in communities need from primary care to behavioral health.

As I mentioned in pediatrics, and absent continuity of coverage, people wont seek care now.

And we know, as we talked about, understanding the implications of that can only emerge fully with time.

We may see more use of emergency departments.

That may be more difficult for families and more expensive.

We may see avoidance of preventive care that leads to more challenging health outcomes in the future.

So it is difficult to predict the exact impact and what it will mean for patients in communities and their behaviors.

But at that moment you have a health care need and we're at our most vulnerable.

We have to be at our strongest together in ensuring that we have the right access to the right care.

At the heart of what nonprofits do, these are community based organizations.

We're there to serve community.

We are community.

And so anything that does not put resources into local communities becomes really problematic and certainly becomes problematic when there's not nonprofits that are there to provide those supports.

So a lot of the cuts and the things that are happening are of great concern to us.

For communities all over Michigan are rural, are urban, and really it's going to be our rural communities that are likely to be impacted the most right, because in some communities those are core centers, right?

Somebody can go to one nonprofit and get access to housing, food, child care.

If those entities have huge cuts in their budget, that means somebody has got to go miles into the next community before they're able to go to some of those kind of concrete community based institutions that are there supporting a variety of needs.

The Mackinac Policy Conference is known for bringing in prominent national and international speakers.

CNN political commentator S.E.

Cupp and Black Press USAs White House correspondent April Ryan took part in a discussion on national policy and Australia's ambassador to the U.S., Kevin Rudd, spoke about foreign relations with Chamber CEO Sandy Baruah.

Plus, Pete Hoekstra, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, sat down for a conversation on the main stage.

But let's talk a little bit about trade and tariffs.

And I know you were explaining about the outright banning of alcohol and there are some other limitations.

You said there would be speed bumps, but you thought we could get past this.

Is that a short term or long term.

I think the the president and from what I'm hearing from my Canadian sources are that the president and the prime minister would like to get to a resolution sooner rather than later.

I mean, when you take a look at all the the Michigan jobs that are at stake, American jobs, Canadian jobs, you know, this is a this is not an environment that would be conducive.

Say, you know what we can announce at the next, you know, Detroit regional conference in a year.

We can announce the results.

It's got to happen quicker, that there's too much at stake.

Again, the president is focused on economic growth and prosperity for the American people, which means engagement with Canada as our number two trading partner and the interrelationships we have on the auto industry and the interrelationships that we have on energy.

We can become the global powerhouse, not a North American, but the global powerhouse to compete with China on autos that can compete with the Middle East on energy, you need energy for AI.

If you want to be competitive on AI, you need energy.

So you got the whole cabinet working in tandem in making deals and agreements to get America more secure and more prosperous.

And there is a lot of excitement building around the efforts to bring a WNBA team back to the city of Detroit.

Some members of the ownership group had submitted a bid for a WNBA expansion franchise, talked about how it would benefit the Detroit region, both economically and socially.

What is it about a Detroit WNBA team that really is appealing for you?

Well, I think to I think a few things.

First of all I think the momentum and sort of the movement that's happening overall in women's sports, that the time is now and we've always had incredible women athletes and women basketball players, you know, including Swin Cash, among others.

But now I feel like after 25 plus years of the WNBA, now you're starting to see it sort of resonate with everyone.

You know, you have the media partners are starting to pay attention more.

The ratings are higher.

Corporate partners are more engaged.

So it's a it's a great time.

And if you look the NBA and the NFL and sort of the traditional sports, they've been around, you know, for 100 years or 75 years.

For, they've gone through the ebb and flow.

They've grown.

They're here to stay.

And I feel like the WNBA is on this incredible growth trajectory.

And and so its exciting.

So from a business standpoint, I think it's a smart investment.

So I think we're all feeling good about that.

But then for me, selfishly, to do it in Detroit, to come back a city where it all kind of started for me, where I was drafted.

You, Sandy, you're one of our most dynamic business leaders who happens to be a woman.

I'm not going to say our most dynamic women business leaders.

Why did you choose to be an equity investor in this effort around women's sports?

You think about sports.

Sports has always had the power to unite Detroit and look what happens when our teams are thriving.

The restaurants are packed, the streets are alive.

The feeling is really electric.

And long term, the, you know, sports plant the seeds that really help young people see new possibilities.

And you see additional investment in infrastructure hubs being created, small businesses, you know, growing up.

And the legacy that this has an opportunity to lead is way beyond the scoreboard.

Personally, I did grow up in the city of Detroit.

Many people in this room know that my parents owned a bar on Chene Street and we lived in a flat above the bar.

I'm the youngest of ten children, and I was the first one able to go to college because we were poor and I had good grades.

And this is where Ill tear up, I'm sure.

So I am grateful to be able to give back in a small way to the city that raised me.

Swin, you were a Detroit Shock and helped lead them to championships, what was your favorite Shock memory?

Obviously you go to the championships.

I think with any athlete, people always think you're going to say the championships.

It was never the final championship for me.

It was always the journey.

I think with your teammates in that locker room which you build throughout this season, it's truly... to Sandy's point, galvanizes the city when you see 21,000 packing out the palace in Auburn Hills, which still actually holds the record in the WNBA for the most fans ever in a finals game.

So when you see your team having to move from Auburn Hills and you're in another finals and then you're at the Joe Louis and then you're packing that out and they're trying to find standing room tickets, We always knew what the WNBA could be, and my fondest memory right now is not much about me, but it's watching where the league is and understanding how so many women that played in Detroit, sacrificed, won championships loves this city could possibly have another opportunity to cheer on a team that you all will bring back to the city.

Arn, can you talk about the community component of this and plans around youth development?

We plan to build a youth sports youth academy that's going to serve all the kids of Detroit, and it's really to promote youth.

And the idea there is to promote youth sports, to break down barriers to access, which in Detroit there is a lack of quality facilities for all the schools, for junior high schools and for high schools, the field, even teams.

So to break down barriers to access and to give every child in Detroit the opportunity to play, compete, no matter their zip code.

Earlier this year, Detroit PBS launched its Destination Detroit Project for the next year and beyond.

The station is collecting oral histories from the people who migrated to Detroit and Southeast Michigan and helped shape our rich history.

The initiative coincides with next year's 250th anniversary of American independence.

It really kind of got kicked off from the Henry Louis Gates Great Migrations documentary series.

And we thought, you know what better way to tell the story of Detroit and and what better way to honor what is coming up as America 250, our 250th anniversary.

Then to tell Detroits story and the story of Southeast Michigan through the lens of all the people that came here, all looking for a better life, all looking to, you know, move up that ladder.

Right.

And so we enlisted the aid of our friends from the Detroit Historical Museum, my former home where my teams were located, and the Charles Wright to help us, you know, pull all these people.

Its an ambitious undertaking.

So we need partners.

We need help.

The Detroit Historical Society's mission is to tell Detroit stories and why they matter.

And, you know, core to that is how people came to be here at all through immigration and migration.

And those stories, through oral histories, are woven into the fabric of every single exhibit that we put together.

And our mission is also not to just tell some of the stories, but all of the stories of people from every background, which, you know, as you said, huge undertaking.

It doesn't matter where you came from.

If you're here in Detroit, you know, it was your hard work and your grit.

Everything that goes into telling the quintessential Detroit story that has become, you know, such a part of the fabric of what we are doing.

The Wright Museum, you know, founded now 60 years ago, really traces not just Detroit's history, but the history of African Americans in the United States.

And that history is very much so rooted in Detroit.

Can you take look at the period from 1910 to 1930... 1910, 6000 people lived in Detroit and, 1930, 120,000 people, primarily African-Americans, are living in the city of Detroit, along with several immigrants from other cultures, as we know.

Right.

So the Wright Museum tried to take those stories and again, from a lived perspective, not just something you read in a book, or someones analysis of the period, but really listening to the people who actually were here then.

Not in 1910.

But, you know, who have lived in this city, worked in the city and elevates those stories so that we have a complete perspective, I think, of what it meant to be in Detroit, to be from Detroit, and the impact Detroit has had on the United States.

Now, let's bring back Nolan Finley and Zoe Clark to talk about what happens after the National Policy Conference.

Guys, normally up here, the budget is... the state budget is a subject that gets bandied about quite a bit.

Different governors have approached that quite differently.

Rick Snyder always said, We're not leaving until there's a budget.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer hasn't been quite as lucky.

She's got a different makeup in the legislature this year.

Where where do we stand with the budget now?

We're standing in divided government right now, and we are watching divided government.

We should note the governor, of course, put out her budget proposal earlier this year.

That is normal for a governor to do.

$83.6 billion.

The Senate actually just last week before everyone came to Mackinac, passed their budget.

But we're still waiting for the Republican controlled House.

Now, they will often say Matt Hall, speaker, while we passed the anti government prevention shutdown budget, this was $20 billion.

You know, it's sort of this odd thing where the budget came out in one day and it was passed.

But we're still waiting on Republicans leadership in the House to put out what they see as their fiscal year budget.

And we are coming down to the wire.

Yeah, Yeah.

I mean, if you don't make it up here, then it's always, well, before they go on vacation and then it's October 1st, right?

You got to get it done by then.

They think they'll pull that out.

I mean that's the conversation that is happening right now in Lansing.

And folks who rely on those numbers, July 1 is planning.

Yes.

And July 1 is a statutory deadline for a reason.

Right.

It's because higher education, even they'd like to know how much money they can spend.

Yeah.

You know, beginning in September.

And so, you know, we're hearing now that it likely will not be July 1.

And there's been some conversations that are saying, will it even be October 1, which constitutionally mandated budget is meant to be done.

Yeah, yeah, Nolan, you and I had a conversation up here about education.

Yeah.

Which has lots of money right now.

the school aid fund is is spilling coins over the side but it's policy that has this tangled up.

It's lots of money with little accountability here.

And we're at a conference here in business, people who want accountability for the money that spend.

And that's what's missing here.

The answer in this state has never been, let's just add more money.

You know, you've got to make sure that money is applied to improving our education performance.

We're sitting at the bottom ten.

We're sitting with a lot of states that once we considered backwaters.

And that's what we are now.

And this group up here extremely frustrated with the lack of progress on education.

Is that one of the things holding all these things up in Lansing.

The school aid fund budget?

You know, I think it's this idea that that in many respects the Republican leadership, including Speaker Matt Hall, are sort of taking a page really from the federal playbook.

They are calling it “BOGE” after Representative Bollin, who is the chair of the Appropriations Committee, rather than DOGE.

Right.

Right.

No, they are saying they are going through the budget, you know, fine, word by word and trying sort of find waste, fraud and abuse.

I should know as I should.

Well, yes, Although normally it's happened earlier.

I mean, I remember, as you all do, we were all at this conference when Jase Bolger, then Republican speaker of the House, kept lawmakers, kept House lawmakers from coming to the island to finish the budget.

It was a much different conference.

Let's all remember.

Here during the Granholm years, when it was hardly ever done.

It was over and.

There was there was a mini government shutdowns in ‘07 and 09.

You know, we've seen it both ways given that exist govern governors knew sort of expression of bipartisan cooperation.

And I'm very optimistic that they're going to get something done this summer.

Yeah.

Yeah we'll see.

Quickly, we had we hosted a mayoral debate up here from the city of Detroit.

What do you think this race is right now?

There's there's a lot of candidates and it's kind of a crowd formed behind Mary Sheffield, who's the city council president in the polls.

But but what it's going to take to distinguish somebody as the favorite, I guess, as the person that people just decide to line up against.

We haven't seen a whole lot of spending yet.

Yeah, we havent.

And once the candidates start spending, that usually changes things.

Right now, some candidates have far more I.D.

voter I.D.

than some of the other candidates.

So, you know, I suspect we'll soon see a great deal of money flowing into these next couple of months.

And I think that's what will separate.

Yeah.

Yeah.

What is the rest of the state thinking or looking at in Detroit?

I mean, we're focused on it in the city, but it has an effect on all of Michigan.

It certainly has.

I mean, and I think it's been so interesting because of term limits, right?

There are so many lawmakers in Lansing who have not known or worked with anyone that has not been Mike Duggan as mayor and so it's going to be fascinating to watch what that looks like and what that relationship is right now.

Speaking of Matt Hall, the speaker and the mayor, they have this sort of interesting relationship going on right now.

But what was surprising in the chamber poll, 30% of Michigan had not heard of Mike Duggan.

Right.

And only 9% had any interest in Detroit issues.

That break between Detroit and the rest of the state is far more profound than I realized.

Yeah, Yeah.

And it's damaging to both, right?

I think so.

It's not how you do it.

All right, guys.

End of Mackinac.

End of another Mackinac, end of another Mackinac, and I'l All right.

That's going to do it for us here at the 2025 Mackinac Policy Conference.

You can see the sessions and all the interviews on demand at onedetroitpbs.org.

We want to thank our partners at the Detroit Regional Chamber for hosting this important gathering of decision makers.

And as always, Detroit PBS is proud to bring this conference to residents all around the state.

Stay with One Detroit for in-depth coverage of the issues that matter to you from all of us here at Detroit PBS.

I'm Stephen Henderson.

Take care and we'll see you next time.

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