A group pushing to repeal Michigan's law that requires higher "prevailing" wages on state-financed construction projects has lost a bid for the state to certify its petitions without pulling a larger sample to review.
The bipartisan Board of State Canvassers denied the request at a meeting Tuesday.
Now the elections bureau will move to a second stage of sampling because of 535 signatures reviewed, 370 were valid. That is just shy of the 373 required by a statistical model to automatically be recommended for approval.
A ballot committee backed by the nonunion Associated Builders and Contractors of Michigan says it turned in more than 380,000 signatures for the veto-proof legislation. About 252,000 signatures must be valid for the proposal to go before the Republican-led Legislature and potentially voters.
