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Another change of heart for Snyder

Sometime during their tenure, governors get associated with a phrase that sticks with them like glue almost to the point of being comical.

A member of the Granholm administration worried about their future, knew they were toast when the governor utter, “He is a valuable member of the cabinet” which was code for “you’re fired.”

Gov. Rick Snyder stirs clear of social wedge issues saying, “It’s not on my agenda.”

But there was a pretty good chance, he would be forced to put it on his agenda and then approve it. Think Right to Work.

Now fully aware that the phrase automatically brings a chuckle from the capitol press corps he has shifted to, “This is not on my priority list” which is just a cheap knock off of “not on my agenda.”

At any rate Sen. Mike Shirkey ran into the priority list gambit when he first approached the governor with a plan to force able-bodied Medicaid recipients to find a job or lose their health care coverage. As the GOP senator retells the story, the governor had other things to worry about and the get-a-job-or-lose-your-benefits appeared to be a non-starter with the Boss until it wasn’t.

Never one to lick his wounds and go home, the Clark Lake lawmaker labored on piecing together a package that included some exemptions for those Medicaid folks who were in college, were sick, had a disability, or were caring for someone else who needed home care.

All the time, however, the social safety net lobbyists were flailing away suggesting that this was punishing needy families who needed health care insurance just like everybody else. And the “netters” argued take away their insurance and they’ll get health care in the costly joint on earth … the ER.

The governor was very proud of his Healthy Michigan program which for the first time extended health care to over 600,000 folks who never had it before. Ironically it was Sen. Shirkey who bravely joined with the governor, to pass this thing over the vociferous objections of arch conservatives who blasted the program as a cheap imitation of Obamacare.

Mr. Shirkey, in his pitch for the jobs program, suggested if nothing was done to get some of those folks off the Medicaid roles, that a trigger would kick in to end the program because the cost would surpass the savings. “I’m hear to save Healthy Michigan,” he would tell everyone.

But the governor stuck with his “not on my list stuff” until a fateful meeting.

“It’s tough to get in to see him sometimes,” Sen. Shirkey recalls, but he landed a one on one and found the way to convert the reluctant governor.

“I told him this program dove tails perfectly with his Marshal Plan.” That’s the latest administration brainstorm to train more workers for the jobs of the future. It’s like the light bulb went off and from that point on, the “not on my list” think was inoperative.

In fact it was so inoperative that the governor went by himself to Washington to meet with social service officials on how the state could get a waiver from the federal government to do this.

“I was surprised he did that,” Mr. Shirkey reflects but after the trip, the governor called and the two spent a good chunk of time discussing how to implement this and recently the senator announced he and the once reluctant governor had a deal.

Can the social safety net folks kill it?

Hardly.

This is an election year and what self-respecting Republican would whiff at the chance to go back home and boast that he or she voted to force welfare recipients to get a job or else?

The answer is: none of them which is much to the chagrin of Democrats who were hoping the governor with stick with them. Just like he stuck with them on Right to Work.

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