I am writing today to announce the closure of the Michigan Messenger. After four years of operation in Michigan, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news into a single site, The American Independent at Americanindependent.com. This is part of a shift in strategy, towards new forms [...]
An abstinence-only presentation provided to numerous school districts in Calhoun and Eaton Counties in October of this year provided false and misleading information to students about HIV, experts allege.
Two county registers of deeds filed a class action lawsuit Monday on behalf of Michigan’s 83 counties alleging that the Mortgage Electronic Registration Services owes millions of dollars in property title transfer taxes.
Despite evidence of the impact of mercury on children and public health, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette last month joined with 24 other state attorneys general in filing a lawsuit to scuttle new EPA regulations that would reduce mercury emissions from power plants.
Macomb County Prosecutor Eric Smith is so incensed at the Macomb County Board of Commissioners over cuts to his office made necessary by a county budget deficit of nearly $16 million that he is considering filing a lawsuit against his own county to have those cuts overturned. The Detroit News reports:
Macomb County Prosecutor Eric Smith said today he plans to meet with an attorney to explore filing a lawsuit against Macomb County because budget cuts have lowered the number of his staff to an unconstitutional level.
“Clearly, our office is the most understaffed in the state,” Smith said.
He said he has been in discussions with the law firm of Geoffrey Fieger, which has agreed to represent his office in any possible litigation against the county. Smith said no taxpayer money would be used to pay for the firm’s services if a lawsuit is filed.
The cuts approved by the commissioners amounted to just over $700,000. It’s interesting to note that the county has also been feuding over the question of whether to establish a public defender’s office because the defense of indigent defendants in that county, like the state as a whole, is seriously underfunded. A 2008 report by the National Legal Aid and Defender Association specifically called out Macomb and Oakland as counties without a public defender office.
Smith opposed the creation of a public defender office to handle indigent defendants, but in November voters in the county approved a new charter that included the creation of that office. It is almost certain that the budget for the prosecutor’s office, even with the latest cuts, is many times higher than the public defender’s office.
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