A new report from the Detroit Regional Chamber is ringing the alarm with warnings that the house is on fire.

The report states that despite the resurgence of the City of Detroit the region itself is declining in national rankings of key economic areas, including per capita income education and population growth.

Chamber CEO Sandy Baruah says Michigan has fallen further and faster in key metric areas than any other state in the country. He spoke with WDET’s Bre’Anna Tinsley about the issue.

The following interview has been edited for length and clarity

Sandy Baruah, CEO of Detroit Regional Chamber: The state of Michigan and the Detroit region both really need to understand where we are in terms of our national peers. It’s hard to get where you’re going if you don’t know where we are, and our polling shows that Michiganians believe that Michigan is essentially dead average in key metrics such as our K-12 performance, our per capita income, our unemployment rate, our ability to attract high tech jobs. The percentage of our adults in our society that have a college degree, they think we’re dead average, but in reality, in most of those categories, we’re in the bottom 10, and we have to turn this around.

Bre’Anna Tinsley, WDET: Where do you think that disconnect is coming from?

SB: To be perfectly candid, I don’t think anyone has told the Michigan public where we really stand.

We have been dropping pretty dramatically since the year 2000. For example, as recently as the year 2000 we were a top 20 state for per capita income,  we were a top 20 state for fourth grade reading and K-12 performance. In both those categories, we’re now in the bottom 10.

So, we have fallen further and faster in some of these key metrics than any other state in history. You know, Republicans will point to the Democrats, and Democrats will point to the Republicans, and we think that’s just all bunk, because this fall has occurred under Democrat and Republican governors. It’s fallen under Democrat and Republican legislators. It’s fallen under, you know, mixed government over time.

So, we need a bipartisan, long-term path forward if we’re really going to address this issue.

BT: So if it’s not a political issue, do we know what the actual cause for this decline is?

SB: Michigan, as a purple state, has a tendency to ping pong back and forth between different political, economic and education strategies in the old days, you know, the parties would find a way to compromise and and kind of create some long-term solutions.

In Michigan, what we do is we go from a kind of a Republican approach for a few years, and we go to a Democratic approach for a few years.

We shift economic development strategies, we shift education strategies and the ping ponging back and forth, the inconsistency has not allowed us to really create a path forward, because successful change takes time. You can’t expect it in one legislative cycle or even one term as governor, it just doesn’t work that way.

BT: And so do you think that is the biggest change that needs to happen, or are there any other solutions that you have on how the state can improve?

SB: Well, I mean, certainly, you know, as a policy and economic development organization, the Detroit Regional Chamber certainly has our suggested solutions on various policy issues, but we really stress that what is desperately needed in the state of Michigan is the is the ceasing of the ping ponging policy back and forth between what you can call a  left policy or a right policy, because businesses won’t come here. They won’t invest, if one, they’re uncertain about what the policy environment is going to be. Businesses certainly won’t come here if we exacerbate the reputation that what was policy one year will be taken away the next year.

If we want to grow jobs, if we want to grow incomes, if we want to grow the percentage of people with post-secondary degrees, such as a four year degree or a community college degree or a skilled trade certificate, that’s just not going to happen if we just keep ping ponging back and forth.

BT: So the situation, though, is not all doom and gloom. There are some highlights in the state of Michigan, in the Detroit region, where exactly are we succeeding right now?

SB: There are areas right I mean, certainly when you look at some of the municipalities, the city of Detroit, obviously, is a shiny example that has been held up, not just nationally, but internationally, as the turnaround city really, of the globe. It would be hard to think of a place that’s been more celebrated over the last decade than the City of Detroit for all that has happened, but also places like Grand Rapids, they’ve been on a 25-year growth and development trajectory. Kalamazoo has been on a long-term growth trajectory.

The second is that we are an innovation powerhouse. What we’re not good at, however, is really capitalizing on our innovation that occurs from our universities, Michigan, Michigan State, Wayne State and Michigan Tech and in attracting even more new high level young talent that will start jobs, start new companies. You know, that is a huge plus.

And then, thirdly, we have all of these new innovation nodes being developed, Michigan central new lab, the University of Michigan Innovation Center, the Dan Gilbert Health Innovation Center on Gratiot. I mean, these are all amazing new innovation centers.