Much like Michigan’s roads, the state’s roughly 210 public dams are falling apart with no clear plan from the governor for addressing what’s quickly ballooning into a $500 million problem.

An MLive analysis of dams owned by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources found that out of 125 structures regulated by dam safety inspectors in 2024, just 37 were rated satisfactory, while 66 were rated fair, 10 poor, and one unsatisfactory.

In 2022, 76 were rated satisfactory, 40 fair, five poor, and three unsatisfactory.

DNR officials contend the rapid deterioration stems in large part from a lack of resources to manage and maintain the 210 dams it owns across the state, many of which were built by the DNR in the 1950s and ‘60s.

“We are not designed to maintain dams, like we’re not funded that way,” David Caroffino, the DNR’s Lake Superior basin coordinator told the news site.

“When these things were put in, we were not planning on what would happen 50 to 70 years later when they all needed to be replaced or removed,” he said.

DNR Public Lands Policy Specialist Jon-Paul Shannahan told MLive most of the state-owned dams, which account for about 10% of the more than 2,500 in Michigan, are “earthen structures that someone put a bulldozer out 50 years ago and pushed a wall up.”

Go Ad-Free, Get Content, Go Premium Today - $1 Trial

With a focus on removing as many as possible, the DNR is now undergoing a dam-by-dam analysis with input from department staff and the public to develop a strategy for addressing the degrading structures before it’s too late.

Officials estimate the total bill to upgrade the dams at $300 million to $500 million, though the DNR has only thoroughly reviewed about 50. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer proposed spending $15 million on dams in her budget for the next fiscal year.

Caroffino described Whitmer’s proposed funding as “a drop in the bucket compared to what the needs are for infrastructure across the state.”

The squeeze follows record state budgets approved by a Democratic government trifecta that burned through a $9 billion surplus in recent years.

Go Ad-Free, Get Content, Go Premium Today - $1 Trial

Spending in the record $82.5 billion 2025 budget includes about $411 million in pet projects for lawmakers, also known as pork, mostly focused on downstate communities.

The 2025 projects include $10 million for a youth sports complex in Frankenmuth, $10 million for Lansing’s Potter Park Zoo, $2.5 million for an indoor sports facility in Shelby Township, $2 million for Detroit’s Downtown Boxing Gym, and $300,000 to provide Wi-Fi to Detroit casino patrons.

The budget also includes $156.2 million for a low-income solar program, $68 million for a solar factory, $30 million for EV charging infrastructure, $6.4 million to expand Medicaid services for migrants, $5.8 million to hire 31 new state employees to implement climate change policies, $3 million for e-bike incentives, $1.4 million for a “Menstrual Product Pilot Program” to put tampons in state-owned men’s and women’s restrooms, $1 million in legal services for “asylum seekers.”

There was plenty of other questionable spending in 2024, from $1 million for an Ann Arbor splash pad, to $7 million for community pools, to $5 million for the Jim Crow Museum of Racist Imagery.

In 2023, Whitmer spent more than double her current $15 million proposal for dams on a 2023 grant program that bribes Michigan communities to host solar, wind and energy storage projects that help meet her climate goals.

Regardless, the consequence of inaction on dams is obvious, with four failing in 2020 following heavy rain and flooding, an event that forced the evacuation of 11,000 people and damaged 2,500 structures in Midland and Gladwin counties.

Earlier this month, the Michigan Supreme Court denied efforts by residents there to avoid a special property tax assessment to help pay to fix those dams, estimated at $200 million, Michigan Public reports.

Last year, it was the Black River Lake dam in Gogebic County.

The dam collapsed in June, draining the 110-acre lake upstream. DNR officials are now assessing whether it’s worth the cost to repair it.

“That’s the unknown,” Caroffino told MLive. “If we’re going to throw $3 million at this one, then are we going to throw $3 million at the next one? And the one after that? And the one after that?”