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 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has released a list of the projects it is considering funding under its $475 million dollar Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, and according to a Michigan League of Conservation Voters analysis, Michigan could potentially receive almost half of the latest funding allotted to projects in the basin.
The biggest single project under consideration by EPA is a $10 million dollar Central Michigan University coastal wetland monitoring program. The cash-strapped Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment has 29 different projects that may receive funding under the GLRI. These include toxic substance reduction in Portage Creek, wetland enhancement and habitat restoration, sedimentation and phosphorus reduction, implementation of mercury reduction strategies, climate prediction and beach monitoring.
Michigan has the most Great Lakes coastline and the most toxic Areas of Concern, so it’s not very surprising that many state projects are under consideration for funding by EPA. Some worry, though, that too many of the projects under consideration involve study rather than action on the region’s many environmental problems.
In August 2009 Great Lakes czar Cameron Davis told the Bay City Times:
“We’re really looking for action-oriented projects and especially those where a plan may already exist so that we don’t have to wait for more studies and more surveys and monitoring to come — things where we know what the problem is, we know what the solution is, and we’re ready to go.”
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