Fixing the Earned Sick Time Act
Lawmakers were unable or unwilling to reach an agreement on making the much-needed changes to the Earned Sick Time Act (paid leave) and tipped wage changes during lame duck. Thanks to the Michigan Supreme Court ruling in late July, these laws are set to take effect Feb. 21. While extremely disappointing and frustrating, there is still a window of time to act. The first bills introduced in the House in 2025 focus on amending the Earned Sick Time Act and addressing the tipped wage for restaurant workers. HB 4002 includes many of the changes that we’ve asked for, such as adding a small business exemption for employers with under 50 employees, allowing front-loading of benefits, and removing the accrual requirements.
For tipped wage, HB 4001 would increase the minimum wage to $12 an hour starting Feb. 21 instead of $12.48 and increase to $15 an hour by 2029 while maintaining the tipped wage at 38% of the standard minimum wage.
While we expect these to move quickly in the House, they will face more opposition in the Senate which introduced its own version of watered-down changes as SB 15 (paid leave) and SB 8 (tipped wage).
Updating ORC laws to combat new kinds of fraud
Organized Retail Crime continues to present a challenge for retailers of all sizes and new forms of fraud have emerged impacting gift cards and loyalty programs. While Michigan has had a strong ORC law on the books since 2012, these new fraud patterns require updates to address one of the fastest- growing elements of Organized Retail Crime; gift card fraud.
Continue funding for the ORC Taskforce/FORCE Team
In December, MRA started meetings with the Senate Appropriations Chairwoman’s office and State Budget Office (SBO) to request the Fiscal Year 25-26 budget include at least $3.5 million to continue funding the ORC Taskforce for another three years. We anticipate Attorney General Nessel’s budget request and the executive budget recommendation from the governor will also include this funding since AG Nessel has been very vocal about continuing to fund this taskforce and having it continue operating under future AGs.
It’s been three years since this one-time funding passed as part of the FY 2022-23 Michigan budget. Michigan AG Nessel used those funds to create the FORCE team (FORCE is an acronym, that stands for Focused Organized Retail Crime Enforcement) and Organized Retail Crime Unit in April 2023 to focus on criminal organizations that target retailers by stealing products to repackage and sell for profit in both illicit and legal, physical, and digital marketplaces.
The FORCE team was a first-of-its-kind in the nation taskforce focused on rooting out organized retail crime across the State of Michigan, and is comprised of two full-time assistant attorneys general working alongside three special agents from the Department of Attorney General, three detective troopers from the Michigan State Police, State Police intelligence and financial fraud analysts, and a special agent from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The team is housed within the Department of Michigan State Police and operates out of their facilities in Metro Detroit and also works closely with various local law enforcement agencies and retailer loss prevention specialists.
In its first operational year, the FORCE team charged 41 defendants in 13 cases representing nearly $13 million in losses to Michigan businesses. They have achieved 10 convictions to date, recovered over $8 million in product, seized nearly $2 million in cash, and negotiated $4.4 million in court-ordered restitution.
Pharmacy reimbursement
In 2023, MRA was successful in having legislation signed into law as P.A. 97 that codified the Federal PREP Act and granted pharmacists independent authority to order and administer vaccines and CLIA-waived tests. Unfortunately, the trailer bill to ensure pharmacies are reimbursed for PREP Act procedures they perform did not make it all the way through the legislative process in 2024. The sponsor of that 2024 bill (SB 993) plans to reintroduce the legislation in 2025. The legislation would ensure that pharmacies are properly reimbursed for various immunizations, lab tests, and dispensed prescriptions.
MRA will also support legislation that seeks to further expand the list of illnesses and conditions that pharmacists can test and treat for under independent authority and that pharmacies will receive fair and adequate reimbursement for these new services.
