I rise today to express my disappointment that we once again did not solve the problem, but instead we delayed this issue. On Tuesday, as was stated, the Treasury Department will be sending out notices to all businesses within the state of Michigan because we did not finish our job today. Those businesses are going to be very confused, and they are spending, I think the tag that I saw last week was something like $14 million just a day to get ready for implementation of the service tax. So while we are talking, they are spending money trying to figure out how to comply with something that may or may not exist on December 1. So I am very disappointed that we could not solve this problem today and instead have shifted it.

To the Senator from Oakland County the 13th District, the conference committees that we had for our budget shut people out. They did not bring people together. There were conference committees that dealt with only one or two people solving a problem. House Bill No.5408 actually brought a large group of people together, they took testimony, and they took time in committee to come up with a solution that was comprehensive in nature. The conference committee by the nature of it includes very few people; they do not have to talk to anybody else to solve that problem. They simply need to figure out a solution that they think can get passed. It is not the best procedure for solving a problem.

Today was the best procedure for that, I think, where we could have all come together in a bipartisan fashion. I’m very disappointed that we did not do that.