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.
Tomorrow’s meeting of the Detroit City Council offers another opportunity for the city to chip away at the estimated $300 million budget deficit. This time employee benefits are set to be scaled back, according to a story in today’s Detroit Free Press. Specifically, new polices set for a vote will require employees to purchase generic [...]
The story I wrote that was published earlier today focused on the number of juvenile sex offenders on the state’s burgeoning sex offender registry. But behind the big picture revelation — that nearly 8 percent of registered sex offenders in Michigan are juveniles — there’s a more detailed accounting of the state’s youngest sex offenders [...]
Nearly eight percent of Michigan’s sex offender population is made up of juveniles, according to statistics compiled by the Michigan State Police in response to a public records request from Michigan Messenger.
The tangled saga that has engulfed the Ambassador Bridge and the adjacent $230 million Gateway Project got even more tangled today as Canadian government officials confirmed their interest in buying the bridge, North America’s busiest international crossing. According to Canada’s National Post, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has instructed his ministers to explore buying the [...]
In one of the more interesting political ads in recent memory — especially for a Republican — Ann Arbor venture capitalist and first-time candidate Rick Snyder branded himself “one tough nerd” in the 60-second spot that ran during the Super Bowl coverage yesterday. Typically, Republican candidates don’t embrace their intellectual sides, instead often preferring to [...]
Detroit’s latest public corruption production is, mercifully, almost over. In fact, closing arguments over political consultant Sam Riddle’s alleged scheme to extort thousands in bribes were entered into the record just a couple hours ago. Summing up the prosecution’s take on the self-described “political pirate” (courtesy of extensive wire tapped phone calls), Assistant U.S. Attorney [...]
Does Detroit need a Food and Flowers Freedom Act? That’s the question I’m left with after reading this story in today’s Washington Post. While the story focuses on a particularly determined urban gardener/entrepreneur in Los Angeles, there may be some lessons here for Detroit’s ongoing efforts to promote urban farming as the urban planner’s version [...]
On Thursday, President Obama formally nominated several new judges to serve for lifetime appointments on the federal bench — including Oakland County Circuit Court Judge Mark A. Goldsmith. Goldsmith has served as a state judge since 2004, and before that he was a private attorney with the Detroit law firm Honigman Miller Schwartz & Cohn. [...]
Wayne Newton — a.k.a. Mr. Las Vegas — has apparently abandoned his private plane at the Oakland County International Airport for the past three years. According to several news stories making the rounds today, the legendary singer owes the airport more than $60K in storage fees. Even the Washington Post has picked up on the [...]
In the wake of a multi-front catastrophe that Toyota is being consumed by at the moment, a Democratic political consultant is giving Detroit’s Big Three automakers some unsolicited campaign advise: Rev up the nationalism. So says Andy Ostroy in a commentary published on the Huffington Post earlier today entitled “Toyota’s gift to Detroit.”
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