LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Republican lawmakers on Thursday blocked Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's bid to restructure the state environmental agency — the first time the Legislature has rejected a gubernatorial executive order since 1977.
The GOP-led Senate voted 22-16 against the order along party lines, criticizing her attempt to abolish new rule-making and permitting panels, and to establish an "environmental justice" office without defining what the term means. The Republican-controlled House voted down the order last week.
It was not immediately clear how Whitmer would respond.
She is awaiting a legal opinion from Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel on whether the commissions created last year violate federal environmental law. One panel oversees environmental rule-making — though the governor ultimately has the final say — while another can approve, modify or reverse permit decisions that have been challenged by companies or other parties. She has criticized the commissions as a nonessential extra layer of bureaucracy that "keeps us from actually cleaning up drinking water."
GOP Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey, of Clarklake, said Whitmer has a prerogative to reorganize the Department of Environmental Quality.
But, he said, eliminating the commissions "was a step too far" because they were established under 2018 laws that were "rightfully passed and we think were important for the protections of transparency, accountability and giving citizens access for redress. I invite my governor to send us another EO with her recommendations on how to reorganize" the agency.
Democrats slammed the Senate's vote to protect what one legislator called "polluter panels."
The committees have the power to "veto actions that our professional scientists and our governor's appointee have taken to discharge her responsibilities under the law and under our constitution," said Sen. Jeff Irwin of Ann Arbor. "I think that's fundamentally wrong. I think it's a conflict of interest."
Whitmer is empowered by the state constitution to change the organization of the executive branch. But the constitution also lets lawmakers turn down such an order if they do so within 60 days of it being issued.
Whitmer made environmental protection and water cleanup a campaign priority following Flint's crisis and the discovery of chemical compounds in at least 40 locations across the state. Other parts of her order, such as renaming the department and creating a new public advocacy office to investigate complaints about water quality, are not opposed by Republicans or their allies in the business community.
