A Northern Michigan business coalition is hoping to solve the staffing shortage in the area by pushing lawmakers to change current immigration policies.
The Northern Michigan Chamber Alliance recently adopted an immigration policy reform proposal for Congress geared towards filling critical workforce gaps which is a major concern and is impacting area businesses.
The organization says the policy proposal would give lawmakers a clear set of objectives that would help the business community here.
“We know that our visa programs at the federal level help with that. But what this policy proposal says is that we could use more of those visa programs. We could use more options for workers in critical industries and to expand the scope of some of those visa programs. That would really help our businesses in Northern Michigan,” said Henry Wolf, director of Government Relations for Traverse Connect.
The alliance says that at the rate workers are leaving the region they need all the help they can get.