Miller Johnson’s Public Sector Practice Group provides services in all areas of public sector law. Our clients are counties, cities, villages, townships, school districts, and other governmental entities.

Some of the significant kinds of services we provide are as follows:

  • Parliamentary procedure and other operating policies related to planning and conducting meetings
  • Open Meetings Act strategy and compliance
  • Freedom of Information Act strategy and compliance
  • Civil litigation in all substantive areas of governmental practice, including personal injury, contract disputes, civil rights, condemnation, and land use matters
  • Prosecution of ordinance violations and other misdemeanors
  • Employment relations, including personnel matters, collective bargaining negotiation, Act 312 arbitration, and civil rights matters
  • Employee benefit counseling
  • Planning, zoning, and related land use matters
  • Ordinance and resolution review, interpretation, and drafting
  • Economic development, including development agreements, tax increment financing, property tax abatement, and the alphabet soup of local economic development: TIFA, LDFA, DDA, EDC, EDA, MSF, IDB, etc.
  • Public finance matters, including permitted uses of public funds, inter-fund transfers, restricted use funds, bonding, and other budget and finance issues
  • Property tax matters, including annual assessments, special assessments, and Tax Tribunal practice
  • Inter-governmental relations, including contracting with other municipal entities and representing entities created through inter-governmental agreements
  • Election law practice, including referendums, initiatives, and advisory votes
  • Municipal franchise and public utility matters
  • Environmental matters, including solid waste management and local waste collection and disposal
  • Water, sewer, and wastewater contracting, treatment, ratemaking, and compliance with state and federal regulations
  • Public contracting, including bidding requirements, purchase and sale procedures, contract negotiation and drafting, and bonding
  • Monitoring legislation related to local governmental interests

Our Public Sector Practice Group has experience in the unique problems of governmental bodies, which can never act without weighing a whole range of constituent interests against each other, or without weighing local interests against federal and state laws and regulations. We act as both advisors and expediters by helping governments frame clear and effective policies, and by seeing that policies are executed efficiently.

If governmental operations run smoothly, we have served our clients well.