 The most recent Michigan Public Policy Survey here at the Ford School asked about the personal property tax in Michigan. This is a tax on businesses in the state. It's not on their property in terms of land and buildings, but instead it's on personal property like equipment, furniture, computers, artwork, and so on. We asked local leaders how important it is for their budgets and what we find is 51% of leaders say the personal property tax is an important source of revenue. That goes up significantly for the state's largest communities. 83% of them say it's important to their funding. There are a lot of arguments against the personal property tax, arguments that it's too complex, that it penalizes economic development and so on. What we find is Michigan's local government leaders are pretty well split over these arguments. About 42% of them think indeed it's difficult to administer because it's so complex. So there are concerns about it, but at the end of the day more of these local leaders think that the revenue the tax raises is worth the difficulties that it presents. Overall about three quarters, 74% of Michigan's local leaders would be okay with eliminating the personal property tax, but only if the revenues are replaced in full. If the state replaces less than the full amount, even if they replace most of it, support drops sharply down to about 44%. And among the state's largest jurisdictions and the ones who say that the revenue is important, it drops even further, only about 23% would support eliminating the tax with partial replacement. There's concern that the state won't follow through on replacement funding. About 67% of leaders don't trust the state to do that in the long run. And so about 68% over all of these leaders think that any replacement revenue should be handled locally. They should raise it locally and retain it there rather than running through the state.