Michigan municipalities would have to report financial information about their employee retirement systems to the state under new legislation that supporters say is designed to help communities address substantially underfunded pension and health care plans.
The Republican-backed bills, proposed Thursday, could ultimately lead to the creation of a board of state and local appointees to tackle underfunding if a local community has no adequate plan moving forward.
Consent agreements could be reached among the state treasurer, the local government and a financial team.
Unlike legislation that died a year ago, these measures would impose benefit cuts for future and potentially current employees.
But the legislation could possibly result in benefit changes depending on talks at the local level at the end of a five-stage process.
