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.
MDOC Director Dan Heyns is cautioning that outsourcing may be an ineffective way to meet the recent budget goal of reducing food service expenses by $7 million a year.
Last week Heyns told the Detroit News that he agrees with the corrections officers who say that allowing food service workers from private companies into the prisons could undermine security and trigger new expenses.
He said he wants to meet the targeted food savings of $7 million, along with more than $33 million in other efficiencies his department is expected to find in the fiscal year that starts Oct. 1. But he hopes lawmakers will allow flexibility in how savings are achieved.
“Meals are extremely important to the stability of institutions,” Heyns said Wednesday. “You’ve got to proceed very carefully.”
It costs the state $2.07 a day to provide prisoners with three meals, down from about $2.60 a year ago, spokesman Russ Marlan said.
Marlan said that while MDOC will solicit bids from companies interested in taking over food service it may not decide to go with any of those bids.
Other states that have privatized food service have seen food quality decline.
In 2009 eight corrections officers and eight inmates at Kentucky’s Northpoint Training Center were injured in a fiery riot that destroyed food service, dormitory and other buildings and guards attributed the disturbance to dissatisfaction over the food served by the Ararmark corporation.
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