State Rep. Beau LaFave, of Iron Mountain, weighed in on Tuesday night’s State of the State Address by reiterating the need for crafting a solution to Michigan’s highest-in-the-nation car insurance premiums, and holding the governor accountable for her promises made.

Michigan’s highly controversial no-fault car insurance system forces more than seven million motorists into paying out-of-control rates nearly twice as much as in neighboring states such as Wisconsin. LaFave has been a strong advocate for reform, and has recently been appointed to the bipartisan House Select Committee on Reducing Car Insurance Rates to pursue a solution, with the authority to report legislation directly to the House floor for consideration. LaFave said the governor has failed to provide any meaningful plan on how to save Michigan drivers money.

“Governor Whitmer designated just one sentence of her address to talk about the need for reducing car insurance rates for Michigan drivers,” LaFave said. “The governor couldn’t have been clearer reforming our state’s car insurance system is at the bottom of her to-do list. While she spent 20 minutes talking about the $562 the average driver faces when repairing their damaged vehicles from the pesky potholes scattered across our roadways, she seemed to have forgotten about how much Michigan drivers pay just to drive on our roads insured.”

During the address, the governor reaffirmed her promise to “fix the damn roads,” yet failed to elaborate on how she actually plans to repair the state’s roadways. Michigan is projected to spend more than $4 billion on roads and bridges overall in this budget year – the most in state history. While more can be done, LaFave said he’s curious to see where the governor expects to draw out more funding when the Legislature approved an additional $600 million in road repair funding in 2018.

“The state allocated record funding toward our roads and bridges just this year,” LaFave said. “For the governor to say the Republican-led Legislature should start prioritizing in fixing our state’s roadways – without even laying out her own specific plan when she has had the past two years and a delayed address to come up with one – is disappointing.”