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.
Joel G. Bouwens, chairman of the Hope College Board of Trustees, is calling an effort by a group of alumni to get the college to revise its stand on homosexuality “offensive” and accusing them of engaging in “ambush journalism.”
The group petitioned the board after Hope refused to let Dustin Lance Black, an Academy Award winning screenwriter, speak on campus. The college contended because Black was supportive of gay rights, and authored a screen play about Harvey Milk, that he would advocate for homosexual rights.
That decision set of a maelstrom of discontent not only on the campus, but in the alumni community as well.
So a group of alumni — many of them with high profile backgrounds including a former CIA agent and reporter, a University of North Carolina professor and the daughter of one of the College’s presidents — dropped a letter and petition to the Board asking it to reconsider the institution’s policy on homosexuality.
That policy, according to the Grand Rapids Press, is as follows:
1995 Institutional Statement on Homosexuality, which says the college “will not provide recognition, financial or logistical support for groups whose purposes include the advocacy or moral legitimization of homosexual behavior.”
The alumni argue that this policy is bad for the business of education:
The policy…divides the campus, limits academic and student freedom, breeds panic and results in prejudiced actions, the group contends.
In his letter, Joel G. Bouwens writes
Although I find this attempt to promote ambush journalism to be offensive, Hope’s Board of Trustees is not shy about addressing issues which relate to its core values of providing excellent academic programs in the liberal arts and nurturing a vibrant Christian faith. As a result, all Trustees will be provided with a copy of the petition and it will be on the agenda at the next Board of Trustees meeting.
Bouwens charges the alumni started the move with publicity rather than conversation with the college, something the group denies.
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