By Max Bryan
The Detroit News
ORION TOWNSHIP, Mich. — A host of rejected public safety millages throughout southeast Michigan in last week’s election have left communities scrambling to find money for services and meet the deadline to put new measures before voters in November.
Voters in at least six Metro Detroit townships — Brandon, Orion, Independence, Highland, Waterford and Sumpter — turned down police and fire millage renewals or increases. These decisions at the ballot have left the communities with the possibility of reduced — and in some cases, eliminated — public safety services.
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Several communities say they have no choice but to go back to voters in November and ask them again for support or they’ll have to make severe cuts or even eliminate some services. Waterford and Orion townships hosted special meetings Friday, where they agreed to put millages back before the voters on the November ballot.
Sumpter Township in Wayne County plans to hold a special meeting at 6 p.m. Monday to consider ballot language. The city’s police department has said that without a dedicated millage, it’d lose 40% of its funding.
“Just to reiterate: if we don’t do that (vote to put renewal measures on the ballot in November), we run out of money,” said Orion Township Supervisor Chris Barnett at an emergency meeting Friday, who predicted the township would run out of savings to put toward police and fire by June next year if the millages aren’t renewed.
But some residents are angry that local officials would go to the voters again in November. They say they’ve already answered and they’ve said no to more taxes.
“I think your effort to undo what was already been voted on is unconscionable. How dare you? How dare you?” Waterford Township resident Beth Leventis told the township board of trustees at a special meeting Friday. “We already voted, and we voted no.”
The clock is ticking. The deadline to submit ballot proposals to be on the November ballot in Michigan is Tuesday.
“We don’t take lightly when we are asking for your hard-earned dollars,” Barnett said at Friday’s meeting.
In many of the Oakland County communities where millages were rejected, the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office provides law enforcement services through a contract.
Eric Lupher, president of the Michigan Citizens Research Council, said voters are often willing to “bite the bullet and pay a little bit more” for police and fire services. But he also said voters have in the past voiced their disapproval for unpredictable property millage rates thanks to laws like the Headlee Amendment.
“As local governments have tried to maintain service levels, the economics haven’t always been in their favor, so there’s a constant path to the voters asking for millage requests — sometimes just for general operating, and sometimes for specific requests like these public safety millages,” Lupher said.
Mike Reitz, executive vice president of the fiscally conservative Mackinac Center for Public Policy, said he believes voters pay attention to whether a local funding proposal renews an existing measure, increases it or is a source of funding.
He noted the rejected public safety millages in Metro Detroit last week are actually an aberration among local tax proposals on ballots across Michigan, which had an unusually high success rate. Of the 900 local funding measures put to voters in cities, townships and counties last week, Reitz said voters approved 94% of them. The rate of passage statewide in a given election tends to be between 70% and 90%.
“That 94% passage rate is actually about as high as we’ve seen for local measure passage in about four years,” he said.
Dedicated police and fire millages
For decades, hundreds of Michigan cities and townships have relied on dedicated millages to fund police, fire and EMS services. Dedicated millages provide set funding for specific services and free up funds in a community’s general fund budget for other expenses.
According to a 2020 analysis by the Citizens Research Council, dedicated police millages are levied in 221, or 12.5%, of Michigan’s 1,773 cities, villages, and townships.
And not every police and fire millage failed in Tuesday’s election. Six of the 11 police millages specifically for police services in Oakland County passed in communities such as Oak Park, Royal Oak and Addison Township. Multiple fire and EMS millages also passed.
In Wayne County, three of the four police millages on Tuesday’s ballot passed, including one in Livonia that some feared would fail after a bond issue in the city to build new facilities was rejected by voters last August. Only the millage renewal in Sumpter Township failed.
Growing inflation has made voters even more leery of tax requests, experts say. A 2022 Congressional Budget Office analysis found lower-income households experienced a larger increase in the price of their “consumption bundle,” which includes food, clothing and shelter, than higher-income households.
Reitz of the Mackinac Center said the squeeze of high prices has an impact at the ballot box. Some may vote to reject a funding proposal out of broader frustration with the economy, he said, not necessarily because they oppose a specific service or infrastructure it goes to.
“If people feel powerless to do anything about inflation or the cost of gas or the cost of groceries, but they do have the ability to say no to some public infrastructure, some level of voter frustration could easily explain it,” he said. “It doesn’t necessarily mean they would be opposed to fire services or opposed to police services.”
Sheriff’s contracts in jeopardy
In Orion Township, where voters were asked to increase the millage rate they pay for police protection to 3.75 mills from 3.5 mills to account for Headlee Amendment rollbacks, the measure was rejected by 59% of the vote — an outcome Barnett said was “wild” to him. Orion Township voters also narrowly rejected a fire and EMS millage increase that would have put that tax at 3.85 mills, 51% to 49%.
Orion Township is currently paying $7.1 million for police services from the sheriff’s office in 2026, according to county records. Of the three Oakland County townships that rejected police millages for their contracts with the sheriff, Orion’s is the most expensive — Independence is paying $6.9 million, while Brandon is paying $2.7 million.
At an emergency meeting Friday afternoon, Orion trustees voted on two smaller public safety measures to put before voters rather than what was voted on last week: a 3.41-mill renewal for police services and a 2.92-mill renewal for fire and EMS.
The police protection renewal and the fire and EMS millage renewal would keep the taxes, which have decreased over the years due to the Headlee amendment, where they currently are.
Orion Township is also placing a separate 0.4-mill fire tax increase on the ballot, which would pay for three additional personnel, firefighting outfits and oxygen tanks. It’s one-third the original personnel ask and a fraction of the original equipment ask in the rejected increase, according to a budget presentation.
While residents were generally happy with the township separating the increase from the renewals, a handful spoke against what they believed to be frivolous spending by the township.
“I can go through a list of spending — $390,000 on two bike paths, $1.2 million on other bike paths. This stuff adds up — $10,000 there, $20,000 there. And it’s a shame that it’s dropped on what the citizens are really concerned about,” resident Paul Cassise said.
One mill equals $1 in property tax for every $1,000 of a home’s taxable value. For a home with a market value of $250,000, the State Equalized Value is generally about half the market value, or roughly $125,000. So if a home’s taxable value is $125,000, a 1-mill tax would cost the homeowner $125 per year, or about $10.42 per month.
In Independence Township, where voters rejected a 3.2-mill police protection millage with 54% of the vote along with a separate millage for a school resource officer in the township, the township’s next steps are unclear. The township board is set to meet Tuesday, but the current agenda doesn’t include anything about putting millage requests back before voters in November.
Supervisor Chuck Phyle said Wednesday that the county would evaluate the financial and operational impact to the township following their police millage rejection.
“I will be requesting a prompt, fact-based review so the Board and residents have a clear understanding of the consequences, the available choices, and the timeline for decisions,” Phyle said on Facebook Wednesday. “No assumptions. No rhetoric. Just the facts, the options, and a responsible path forward.”
Budget gaps in Waterford
While Waterford Township has its own police department, officials say Oakland County’s most populated township would be in a critical situation without dedicated funds for public safety.
Township residents denied a 1.5-mill police millage with 55% of the vote. They also rejected a 1-mill fire operating request by 92 votes, although another 1-mill fire operating tax passed with 53% of the vote. Both millages would have restored the taxes to their original rates when they were passed in 1986, before they were reduced due to the Headlee amendment.
Like in Orion Township, Waterford’s trustees voted to put a straight renewal before voters in the November general election: 1.34 mills for police; 0.88 mills for fire. It would net the police department roughly $4.3 million and the fire department $3 million, officials said.
“This is a different proposal. Now it’s not the same thing. Now it’s a renewal of the current funding,” Trustee Sam Harris said before the vote.
The vote was preceded by more than a dozen residents who were angry at the trustees for trying to put the measures on the November ballot. Some of the residents accused them of refusing to accept what the residents have communicated through their vote.
“When the people have voted — and they have voted — you need to take that and go with it,” said resident Max Thompson.
Thompson added that the board got hit with “a tsunami,” referencing the number of communities that rejected public safety millages.
Several residents said they rejected the police millage because of the department’s use of Flock cameras. The cameras, which scan the backs of vehicles to assist in criminal investigations, have become a point of contention in communities throughout Metro Detroit.
While he has spoken in support of using Flock cameras in the past, Waterford Police Chief Scott Underwood spoke at the meeting solely about the financial impact of the millage on his department. He said the money they would lose if the millage wasn’t renewed represents 24% of his department’s full budget, which could be recouped with savings for a year but then would run out.
“The damage would be irreparable,” Underwood said. “Policing this town with anything less than our current 0.8 police officers per 1,000 is just not possible. Not only is it not possible; it would be unsafe — unsafe for residents, and certainly unsafe for our police officers.”
Waterford Fire Chief Gene Butcher had a similar sentiment, but also noted the cost of fire apparatuses has significantly increased in recent years. He said a fire engine that used to cost $500,000 a few years ago now costs $1 million.
“When people say ‘Budget better,’ they need to understand: no fire chief can budget tight enough to make a fire engine cost what it did two years ago,” Butcher said.
“Consequences could mean slower replacement, reduced staffing attrition, delayed equipment purchases, increased repair costs and greater strain on the very people we expect to respond daily,” Butcher said.
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