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.
The state treasurer of Pennsylvania is urging the private equity firm that owns Hugo Boss to take steps to ensure that the company does not follow through on plans to close its Ohio suit factory and move the jobs overseas.
The treasurer, Robert M. McCord, serves on the board of the Pennsylvania State Employees Retirement System (SERS), which is invested in Permira, the company that owns Hugo Boss.
In an April 7 letter to Permira McCord said:
Hugo Boss’s plan is problematic on many levels. Not only would it cost hundreds of jobs in a neighboring state — therefore affecting a regional economy already hear hit by the recession — it implicates SERS, since SERS has invested in the partnership whose portfolio company is planning to close the plant. Other SERS Board members and I do not wish to invest in regional job loss of in a global “race to the bottom.
McCord continued:
I understand that, under pressure from the National Labor Relations Board, management of Hugo Boss and agreed to resume negotiating with the union representing Hugo Boss employees. This is a welcome development. Carrying out the plant to cease producing suits in the United States, closing a profitable plant, and firing over 300 workers — these actions could only further degrade the Hugo Boss brand in the United States and jeopardize Hugo Boss’s plans to expand sales in the U.S. market.
The public pension funds from more than a dozen states are reportedly invested in Permira, as is the endowment of the University of Michigan.
Last month the Ohio Public Employee Pension System urged Permira to block the closure of the Hugo Boss plant.
Roland Zullo a research scientist with the University of Michigan’s Institute for Research on Labor, Employment and the Economy told Michigan Messenger that public employee pension have an interest in avoiding investments that outsource American jobs.
“When pubic employee pension funds invest in companies that shut down factories and decrease the tax base they are undercutting their own sector because reduced tax base translates into fewer public employee jobs.”
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