Committee advances bill to expand school consolidation feasibility grants

Rep. Donnie Steele, sponsor of House Bill 4147, told the House Education and Workforce Committee the bill would broaden eligibility for grants under the State School Aid Act of 1979 so local school districts and intermediate school districts (ISDs) can study additional administrative functions for possible consolidation. "So basically, it's just expanding the opportunity to apply for grants to do consolidating studies for local school districts and ISDs," Steele said during his testimony.

The bill would expand the existing consolidation feasibility program, which Steele said has "roughly $5,000,000 annually available" for districts and ISDs to study consolidation of services. Under current practice the maximum grant per district is $250,000; Steele said about half the funds have been used since January and "there's close to 2 and a half million dollars still available." He listed administrative functions covered "which may include but are not limited to those performed by superintendents and the services included but not limited to food, janitorial, and maintenance services."

Committee members asked how the measure would interact with budget decisions. Representative Weiss noted the FY26 budget passed out of the House last week did not include funding for consolidation and asked "what would the purpose be of having a study if we don't... have funding for consolidating services moving forward?" Steele replied the budget the House had passed was a backup plan and that the study funding and any future action would depend on later budget decisions.

Representative Fox asked whether transportation and impacts from non-public and home schools would be part of the assessment. Steele said the bill's language permits districts to include functions they deem appropriate and added "I think that would be a nice amendment to my bill" to explicitly address non-public and home-school impacts. He also said the draft language "includes, but not limited to the service functions," which he said could allow districts to consider transportation.

Three written supporters were noted on the record: David Randalls (Oakland Schools), Olivia Aponte (Michigan Department of Education), and Beth Deshone (affiliation not specified for this hearing); none took the lectern.

Vice chair Linting moved to report House Bill 4147 with recommendation and the clerk recorded the committee result as 9 ayes, 0 nays. The motion prevailed and the committee reported the bill with recommendation.

What happens next: reporting the bill with a committee recommendation sends it onward in the House process; the transcript does not record any enactment, appropriation, or final implementation steps.