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.
Now that two of the Big Three automakers have survived bankruptcy and returned to profitability, the United Auto Workers say they want the concessions they made to help that process paid back in the next union contracts — with Ford in particular.
Ford did not join General Motors and Chrysler in bankruptcy, but autoworkers still made significant concessions in pay and benefits to the company to help them survive difficult times. And after two years of large profits and major bonuses to executives, the UAW says it’s time to restore those cuts:
As the UAW prepares to head into labor talks this summer with the newly profitable Detroit automakers, several top union leaders say a showdown is brewing over this year’s contract — especially at Ford, which has made $9.3 billion over the past two years.
“If they don’t restore everything (we) gave up, the membership is going to knock it down,” said Bill Johnson, plant chairman for UAW Local 900, which represents workers at the Focus plant in Wayne. “The bonuses that were just announced are just ridiculous.”
The accumulated pay package for Ford President and CEO Alan Mulally, who is credited with rescuing Ford after arriving in 2006, is now valued at more than $300 million.
The current UAW contract with Ford expires in September and 1,200 delegates from the union are meeting this week in Detroit to plan their negotiating strategy for the new contract. The company is obviously going to want to keep labor costs as low as possible to help them compete with other carmakers.
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