Michigan’s Promise Legislation Fails St. Clair County

Posted on February 27, 2009 by Randy Maiers

Since news of the Kalamazoo Promise first reached the newswires, communities, counties and entire states around the country have been exploring how they could capture some of that magic.  However, without the huge philanthropic generosity that created the Kalamazoo Promise, most other areas have had to drastically reduce their hopes and aspirations for their own “promise.”

For the last few years our Foundation, along with several other community partners and stakeholders, have been exploring the feasibility of creating our own St. Clair County Promise, but with our own twist….the premise behind our program was to guarantee an associate’s degree, or some type of formal post-seconday technical program, for every graduating high school senior in the county.

Our hope was that through a combination of a large, dedicated scholarship endowment, supplemented by a small county-wide millage, we could make such a promise.  Knowing that other people and organizations around Michigan were also exploring similar scenarios, we had hoped that any new “promise type” legilsation that was passed would at a minimum allow our residents to vote either “yes” or “no” at the polls in response to our plan.  We felt a St. Clair County plan should be left up to our local residents to decide….not Lansing.  Despite the efforts of our elected officials, particularly the hard work of Rep. Phil Pavlov and his staff, our efforts went to waste as the Michigan House and Senate passed promise legislation that will prohibit St. Clair County from participating.  The rationale?  St. Clair County didn’t have an overall poverty level below the state average.  Despite the fact that only about 12% of our residents have any type of college degree and that our unemployment rate has always been higher than the state average, which itself is near the highest in the country, we cannot participate in this new Promise legislation. 

For now, our Foundation will concentrate our efforts on fortifying a pathway to some type of college education.  Through our College Access Pilot program and the efforts of several other partnering organizations on efforts like the TIP program, we will have to focus on maximizing resources already available, and supporting those children who otherwise might feel that a college degree is out of reach.