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.
Of the 14 candidates in the running for Mayor of Detroit, only three were invited to the first mayoral debate forcing the eleven other candidates to find other avenues to inform the public on their agendas.
One of the eleven that was not invited to debate was Nicholas Hood III, who has started campaigning the earliest of any of the 14. With a CBS billboard interstate I-75, another on I-96, a third on Gratiot between McDougall and Chene and numerous bus banner advertisements, Hood has easily spent more than $20,000 on advertising so far. His campaign is the most visible in the city.
But despite Hood’s efforts, he was not invited to the first Mayoral debate. The sponsors of the first debate, The Detroit Free Press, Radio One, and WADL TV-38, picked three other candidates based on a poll conducted October poll that showed Kenneth Cockrel Jr, Freman Hendrix and David Bing in the lead.
The Detroit News reported Tuesday:
Other mayoral campaigns are miffed because the sponsors — Radio One Detroit, the Detroit Free Press and WADL-TV — are basing their selection on a Rossman poll taken in early October before several candidates announced their intentions.
The top three in the poll were Cockrel at 27 percent, Bing at 15 and Hendrix at 6. Attorney Geoffrey Fieger, who is not running, placed fourth at 5 percent.
Al B.J. Williams, campaign manager for Nick Hood seemed disappointed but optimistic about being left out of the first debate.
”To be honest what I think [the media] are trying to do is frame the top candidates,” Williams told Michigan Messenger. “They picked three based on a poll done prior to the filing deadline.”
Williams said that the poll used to decern who was invited to the first debate was taken before Hood, Sharon McPhail or Coleman Young II had filed their signatures with the city clerks office to officially make their bids for mayor.
“They’re trying to get to the issues while excluding people.” He said. “We just came from an administration based on exclusion. It’s time for the city to come together and heal.”
But according to Williams the Hood campaign still plans to follow through with scheduled events and advertisments.
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