Intergovernmental collaboration on sustainability and energy issues among Michigan local governments
This report presents the opinions of Michigan’s local government leaders regarding current and potential local government collaboration on a range of sustainability and energy policies. These findings are based on statewide surveys of local government leaders conducted in the Fall 2019 Michigan Local Energy Survey (MiLES), a special wave of the Michigan Public Policy Survey.
Key findings
- Over a third (38%) of Michigan local governments report they are currently collaborating with other local governments on recycling issues, while 36% do not collaborate on recycling now, but would be interested in doing so.
- Intergovernmental collaboration on recycling is most commonly reported by the state’s larger jurisdictions, including almost half (48%) of communities with more than 10,000 residents.
- Even among Michigan’s smallest jurisdictions, 34% currently collaborate, and only 18% have no interest in doing so.
- By region, recycling collaborations are most common in the Northern Lower Peninsula (55%), and least common in the Upper Peninsula (26% of jurisdictions). However, 43% of UP jurisdictions express interest in pursuing collaboration on recycling.
- On other topics, relatively few local governments statewide currently report collaborations on non-motorized or public transportation (17%), green purchasing programs (7%), or shared staffing for energy issues (3%). However, local government officials express considerable interest in pursuing these opportunities, particularly for green purchasing programs (44%).
- As with recycling, collaboration on these other issues is more frequently reported by larger local governments, especially jurisdictions with more than 30,000 residents among whom 42% currently collaborate on non-motorized or public transportation, 19% do so on green purchasing programs, and 8% on shared staffing for energy issues (with another 48% interested in doing so).