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 Detroit Free Press editorialized on Tuesday that the state of Michigan should take over direct regulation of oil pipelines in the state from the federal government, something many other states already do.
Michigan already regulates natural gas pipelines in the state but allows the federal government, specifically the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, to inspect and enforce regulations for oil pipelines such as the one that burst in Calhoun County in July, spewing a million gallons of crude oil into the Kalamazoo River.
The problem with the Free Press’ position is that the state government is, for all practical purposes, broke. Funding for the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment has already been cut significantly over the last few years, leaving them unable to perform routine inspections on coal plants, CAFOs and other entities for which it has direct regulatory responsibility.
It’s difficult to imagine the state legislature coming up with funding for new pipeline inspectors and doing an adequate job of enforcing regulations. The current federal oversight is clearly lacking, to be sure, but that may soon be remedied by new legislation sponsored by Rep. Mark Schauer, who represents the district whose waters were blackened by the Enbridge spill.
If his bill passes, we may well be better off letting the federal government continue to enforce those laws — hopefully with new funding and a new urgency in the wake of multiple oil spills this summer.
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