MI: Michigan House votes to abolish regional transit opt-out communities in Wayne County

The Michigan House voted 56-52 Tuesday to advance a bill to the Senate that would end the ability for Wayne County communities to opt out of votes and participation in the regional public transit system.

The bill, sponsored by state Rep. Alabas Farhat, D- Dearborn, would require the 17 Wayne County communities that currently opt out from the SMART bus system to participate in a vote with the rest of the county the next time the millage comes up for a vote. Currently, the millage rests at about 1 mill and will come up for a countywide renewal vote in 2026.

"Right now, we have a patchwork of transit systems in Wayne County," Farhat said. "That's causing real problems for residents to get around."

The 17 communities are unlikely to overcome the general support from the rest of the county in an election, making it likely that those communities — some of which have been opted out for nearly 40 years — would be opted into the tax and transit service.

Among the largest communities in the county that have opted out are Livonia, Canton Township, Northville and Detroit, which has its own bus system.

Other opt-out communities affected by the legislation include Belleville, Brownstown Township, Flat Rock, Gibraltar, Grosse Ile Township, Huron Township, Northville Township, Plymouth, Plymouth Township, Rockwood, Sumpter Township, Van Buren Township and Woodhaven.

Of the 17 opt-out communities, Detroit is the only one that does not pay the 0.994-mill levy for SMART bus service but gets the service anyway through buses that run along major corridors in Detroit's suburbs, such as Michigan and Grand River avenues.

Farhat argued the eventual millage the communities would pay, if approved by voters, would go toward an authority that could redistribute the funds to SMART or to other local transit programs, such as the Detroit Department of Transportation or Livonia's transit system.

In 2022,  Oakland County voters approved a SMART millage renewal that eliminated the opt-out choice over the objections of elected leaders in the northern and Oakland County opt-out communities.

Macomb County never allowed communities to opt-out of its countywide SMART millage.

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