Signed by Governor Rick Snyder

Vote Smart's Synopsis:

Vote to concur with House amendments and pass a bill that authorizes private harbors on the Great Lakes.

Highlights:

• Authorizes the Department of Environmental Quality to enter into a lease with the owner of riparian or littoral property, occupied only for single-family residential purposes, to use the abutting unpatented lake bottomlands and waters over those bottomlands for a private harbor if all of the following conditions are met (Sec. 32505):

• The private harbor was formed by a breakwater erected on unpatented lake bottomlands;

• The private harbor is used exclusively for private, non commercial recreational watercraft; and

• The full term of the lease is 50 years consisting of two 25-year terms.

• Specifies that for a lease entered into on or after the effective date of the amendatory act, a lump-sum payment at the beginning of the first 25 year-term of the agreement of 0.5 percent of twice the current state equalized value of the lessee’s upland riparian or littoral property or payment of the lump sum pursuant to a schedule as agreed by the department, and a lump-sum payment at the beginning of the second 25-year term of the agreement of 0.5 percent of the current state equalized value of the lessee’s upland riparian or littoral property or payment of the lump sum pursuant to a schedule as agreed by the department (Sec. 32505).

• Requires, unless otherwise requested by the lessee and agreed to by the department, for a lease entered into prior to the effective date of the amendatory act that amended this section, the department to credit any lease payment made in 2016 against the future payments owned (Sec. 32505).

Full Bill Text