North Michigan News

State Rep. Ken Borton on Tuesday criticized Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s decision to approve the Democrats’ school aid budget for the upcoming year. The budget reduces school safety funding by $300 million, a 90% cut, reallocates $670 million from teacher retirement accounts, and does not include a per-pupil funding increase for the first time in years.

“Anyone with children in their lives can see just how real the mental health crisis among our youth is,” said Borton, R-Gaylord. “The amount of trauma every kid carries with them is something we couldn’t have even imagined when we were growing up. Our kids are constantly targeted by social media companies who care more about profit than safety. They face cyberbullies who want nothing more than to reduce their sense of self-worth to nothing. These kids even lived through a pandemic. Democrats know this; they’ve got kids too. They chose to cut school safety and mental health funding anyway.”

The last budget under Republican leadership was passed in 2022. That budget included $150 million for school mental health grants, $168 million in school safety grants, $25 million in dedicated funding for school resource officers, and $2 million for the School Safety and Mental Health Commission – a total of $345 million. Two years later, Democrats are allocating only $26.5 million for school safety and mental health funding.

Borton highlighted that in his community alone, next year’s budget cuts school safety funding by more than $3.5 million. The districts most affected include Gaylord Community Schools, which lost $581,930; Crawford AuSable Schools, which lost $343,961; Lake City Area School District, which lost $244,355; Houghton Lake Community Schools, which lost $242,976; and Roscommon Area Public Schools, which lost $170,266.

“This isn’t some downstate issue that won’t affect us in Northern Michigan. This is a very real crisis that Democrats are not just ignoring but making even worse,” Borton said. “These cuts mean that our students will lack critical access to mental health resources. We can only pray that this budget does not leave a child without a professional to talk to when they need one most.”