Good Jobs and Reliable Energy
The jobs that built Downriver can be the jobs that rebuild it. You can't run factories on wishful thinking - you need cheap, reliable power and a state that welcomes industry instead of punishing it.
● End the green mandates driving up costs and driving out employers
● Make Michigan a leader in nuclear and next-generation energy
● Rebuild a tax base on production, not paper - jobs where one income supports a family
Schools That Teach the Basics
Michigan's schools have fallen from the top ten to the bottom ten. Too many kids can't read by third grade. It's time to get our classrooms back to what matters - and back to the parents who know their kids best. We don’t need to put boys into dresses. But we do need to put boys and girls into shop class.
● Teach reading with phonics and proven methods, not fads
● Put parents back at the center of their children's education
Rebuild shop class and the skilled trades - a path from high school to a good career, not a lifetime of debt
Safe Streets & Ending the Drug Epidemic
When you gut a community's economy, you breed despair - and despair feeds addiction. Lincoln Park is among the hardest hit in the state. This is a war on our neighbors, and we'll treat it like one.
● Secure the border and stop the flow of fentanyl
● Fully back our police and follow the money laundering and drug trade
● Fund real treatment and recovery for the families this crisis has hit
Life & Family
Being pro-life means being pro-family - all the way through. It's not enough to welcome a child into the world; we have to build a community where families can actually afford to raise one. When a young couple can buy a home and one paycheck goes far enough to support kids, life wins.
● Defend the sanctity of life and stand with mothers and families - before birth and through the hard early years
● Make having and raising children affordable again: good jobs, lower costs, and starter homes young families can actually buy
● Protect the vulnerable - the unborn, the elderly, and the disabled - who are too often treated as burdens instead of people
A Community Worth Coming Home To
People moved Downriver on purpose - for good schools, steady work, and the kind of place you'd want to raise kids. That's worth fighting for. Ron will always stand for the families, the faith, and the hard work that built these towns.
● Neighborhoods where kids can play outside and seniors can stay in their homes
● Real property-tax relief so families aren't taxed out of the houses they've held for decades
● A community with a future - because our kids shouldn't have to leave to find one
Data Centers & AI: How and Where Matters
You already use AI every day
It's probably on the phone in your hand right now — running your searches, your maps, your bank's fraud alerts, your kids' homework help. This technology isn't coming; it's here. And the race to lead it will decide whether America or China writes the rules for the next century.
We can't turn back the clock. And we can't afford to lose. That race runs on data centers, and they are going to get built.
So the real question isn't whether. It's how, and where — and who gets a say. That's the fight Ron Kokinda is taking on.
Ron's Bottom Line
A data center that can't survive an honest, public look at its full impact doesn't deserve to be built here.
The community decides - not Lansing, not the utilities, not the money.
Ron isn't anti–data center. He's anti–getting steamrolled. Done right, these projects can bring investment without dumping the costs and risks on your family. Done in the dark, they leave communities with higher bills, drained water, noise, and broken promises. The difference is entirely in the terms.
Ron's Non-Negotiables
They bring their own power. No building data centers on the back of your electric bill. They generate their own energy - and surplus should feed the grid to push everyone's rates down.
Brownfields, not farmland. Build on old industrial land, not the farms and open space that make this area worth living in.
Away from homes - and quiet. Sited well away from neighborhoods, with enforceable, published noise limits at the property line.
Protect our water. Closed-loop cooling required, verified by independent review of every gallon used.
Local control, period. The state, the "need for speed," and deep pockets don't get to override your community's say.
No tax breaks. No handouts to trillion-dollar tech companies while you pick up the tab.
No secret deals. No NDAs gagging your local officials. The documents stay public while the decisions are still open - not after.
Informed Consent, Not Engineered Consent
Ron isn't asking anyone to take these projects on faith. He's insisting on a process that gives every resident a clear line of sight into the real impacts - good and bad - before anything is signed.
Here's how he'd hold developers to it:
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Bills: Independent, public rate-impact studies. Full cost recovery from the data center. Any system savings flow to lower rates for everyone.
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Water: Public disclosure of projected use and cooling technology, with independent hydrological review so residents can judge the watershed impact themselves.
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Noise: Independent acoustic studies with enforceable property-line limits, published early - not after the concrete is poured.
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Secrecy: Contested, on-the-record utility contracting for big power loads, with real public access - no ex-parte handling and heavy redactions.
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Land & aftermath: Up-front alternatives analysis (brownfields first), cumulative-impact review, and binding decommissioning and community-benefit commitments with clawbacks if promises are broken.
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The ledger: Honest accounting of incentives versus permanent jobs and long-term costs, so the community can see whether the net is actually positive.
Why This Wins
When people can see that their rates are protected, their water is safe, the noise is contained, and the risks land on the developer instead of the public, opposition stops being the default. A well-designed project can earn genuine support - and anyone still opposed is arguing the merits, not fighting suspicion.
That clear line of sight is the whole difference between projects that breed lasting distrust and projects a community can actually get behind.
Ron chooses daylight.