Original Story: freep.com
Last year, five Michigan residents contracted the measles virus, and one case has been confirmed this year.
By contrast, in 1990, Michigan had 545 measles cases, a spike that coincided with a national outbreak that occurred between 1989 and 1991. There were more than 55,000 measles cases reported in the U.S. over that time. The number of Michigan measles cases has remained at five or lower since 2000, when the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that the measles virus had been eliminated.
Two of last year's measles cases were adults that lived in Grand Traverse County and had just returned from the Philippines. The other cases were an adult and two children who lived in Leelanau County and had been in contact with the adults who had been to the Philippines. None of the individuals was vaccinated, according to public health officials. Visiting nurses in Birmingham provide home care to a variety of individuals.
Statewide, 5.9% of Michigan children entering kindergarten in 2013 had vaccine waivers, the fourth highest rate in the U.S. according to the CDC. Considerable variation in vaccination waiver rates exists by geography. About 1 in 5 Leelanau County children entering kindergarten had a vaccination waiver — the highest rate among Michigan counties. Public health officials note the best way to protect against new outbreaks is to prevent susceptible pockets from developing in local communities and schools.
Showing posts with label Michigan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Michigan. Show all posts
18 August 2015
30 March 2015
HUGE LAND DEAL FOR MINING IN U.P. TO BE APPROVED
Original Story: freep.com
ROSCOMMON – The largest single public land deal in Michigan history will be approved, state Department of Natural Resources Director Keith Creagh said Thursday. A Tulsa renewable energy lawyer is following this story closely.
The state is selling 8,810 acres of surface land or underground mineral rights to Canadian company Graymont for it to create a vast, 13,000-acre limestone mining operation in the Upper Peninsula counties of Mackinac and Luce. The deal calls for Graymont to pay the state $4.53 million.
The divisive proposal has been a subject of debate for 18 months in a naturally beautiful, rural portion of the U.P. Creagh said the DNR faced a "very difficult balance" with its mandates to protect natural resources and allow their beneficial use — as well as balance the opposing viewpoints from area residents. An Austin mineral rights lawyer represents clients in all aspects of negotiations with land and mineral owners.
In addition to the $4.53 million, Michigan retains surface and public use rights on more than 7,000 acres of the sale property. The state additionally will receive a 30-cent royalty on each ton of limestone or dolomite mined by Graymont in the area. The state has also agreed to grant 830 acres of mineral rights to Graymont for the project in exchange for company-held mineral rights in other locations of the U.P.
Supporters of Graymont's Rexton limestone mining project cite the desperate need for jobs and economic activity in an area where young people often move away to find work after completing school. Others fear the mining and traffic will irreparably damage the bucolic setting that called them to live or retire there.
DNR department heads earlier this year sent a memo to Creagh recommending rejection of the Graymont proposal, citing numerous concerns. Company officials continued negotiations with the state and resolved areas of disagreement to the point that the department heads earlier this month reversed their stance and recommended approval. A Houston mineral rights lawyer is reviewing the details of this case.
Changes in the agreement included increasing the mineral royalty from 18.75 cents to 30 cents per ton, Graymont agreeing to a minimum annual royalty payment to the state beginning in 2020 and the company establishing a regional economic development fund of $100,000 per year for five years.
"The chiefs had identified what their concerns were, and the staff rolled up their sleeves and went to work," Creagh said.
P.J. Stoll, plant manager for Graymont's Gulliver facility, said the public process "very much improved the original proposal."
The divided local opinion was apparent from those speaking before the Natural Resources Commission in Roscommon on Thursday. Rexton-area resident Tonya Emerson's nearly 100-year-old family farm will have Graymont mining operations on three sides of the property. She cited concerns about a reduced water table and water contamination.
"Selling the state's greatest asset, allowing a foreign company to destroy our land — while making a huge profit doing so — would be a huge injustice to the residents of upper Michigan," she said.
Rexton resident Dorothy Mills was similarly opposed.
"We purchased our property, we built our houses, in an area that didn't have a limestone mine. So did many others," she said.
But several speakers who made the trip from the U.P. expressed support for the project, saying the economic benefit it will bring to a depressed area is much needed.
"The young people deserve it," area resident Jeff Dishaw said. "Myself, I have a job. But the young people in this community deserve the opportunity to stay and earn a middle-class living."
Hendricks Township Supervisor Russell Nelson told the Free Press before Thursday's commission meeting that it was time to move ahead with the project.
"This has pitted neighbor against neighbor," he said.
Graymont officials say the initial phase of their operation will create 50 mining and transportation-related jobs, along with 100 indirect jobs. The company, the second-largest supplier of lime and lime-based products in North America, also is considering building a $100-million limestone processing plant in Nelson's township years from now.
"We need the jobs," Nelson said. "Our township has about 160 residents over 80 square miles. We have one little convenience store and a couple of restaurants."
The revised deal still does not address Trout Lake Township resident Kathy English's concerns, she said.
"It doesn't change the noise, the traffic, the pollution, the potential impacts to the water table, the changes to our way of life," she said.
The Michigan Chapter of the Sierra Club also opposed the land deal, saying the DNR is failing to follow state law in determining surplus state lands. The land deal involves 10 times more acreage than any previous sale, club officials said.
"As proposed, the Graymont sale would establish a dangerous precedent and undermine our longstanding Michigan tradition of ensuring publicly owned lands that we value today are also there for future generations of Michiganders," Sierra Club forest ecologist Marvin Roberson said.
ROSCOMMON – The largest single public land deal in Michigan history will be approved, state Department of Natural Resources Director Keith Creagh said Thursday. A Tulsa renewable energy lawyer is following this story closely.
The state is selling 8,810 acres of surface land or underground mineral rights to Canadian company Graymont for it to create a vast, 13,000-acre limestone mining operation in the Upper Peninsula counties of Mackinac and Luce. The deal calls for Graymont to pay the state $4.53 million.
The divisive proposal has been a subject of debate for 18 months in a naturally beautiful, rural portion of the U.P. Creagh said the DNR faced a "very difficult balance" with its mandates to protect natural resources and allow their beneficial use — as well as balance the opposing viewpoints from area residents. An Austin mineral rights lawyer represents clients in all aspects of negotiations with land and mineral owners.
In addition to the $4.53 million, Michigan retains surface and public use rights on more than 7,000 acres of the sale property. The state additionally will receive a 30-cent royalty on each ton of limestone or dolomite mined by Graymont in the area. The state has also agreed to grant 830 acres of mineral rights to Graymont for the project in exchange for company-held mineral rights in other locations of the U.P.
Supporters of Graymont's Rexton limestone mining project cite the desperate need for jobs and economic activity in an area where young people often move away to find work after completing school. Others fear the mining and traffic will irreparably damage the bucolic setting that called them to live or retire there.
DNR department heads earlier this year sent a memo to Creagh recommending rejection of the Graymont proposal, citing numerous concerns. Company officials continued negotiations with the state and resolved areas of disagreement to the point that the department heads earlier this month reversed their stance and recommended approval. A Houston mineral rights lawyer is reviewing the details of this case.
Changes in the agreement included increasing the mineral royalty from 18.75 cents to 30 cents per ton, Graymont agreeing to a minimum annual royalty payment to the state beginning in 2020 and the company establishing a regional economic development fund of $100,000 per year for five years.
"The chiefs had identified what their concerns were, and the staff rolled up their sleeves and went to work," Creagh said.
P.J. Stoll, plant manager for Graymont's Gulliver facility, said the public process "very much improved the original proposal."
The divided local opinion was apparent from those speaking before the Natural Resources Commission in Roscommon on Thursday. Rexton-area resident Tonya Emerson's nearly 100-year-old family farm will have Graymont mining operations on three sides of the property. She cited concerns about a reduced water table and water contamination.
"Selling the state's greatest asset, allowing a foreign company to destroy our land — while making a huge profit doing so — would be a huge injustice to the residents of upper Michigan," she said.
Rexton resident Dorothy Mills was similarly opposed.
"We purchased our property, we built our houses, in an area that didn't have a limestone mine. So did many others," she said.
But several speakers who made the trip from the U.P. expressed support for the project, saying the economic benefit it will bring to a depressed area is much needed.
"The young people deserve it," area resident Jeff Dishaw said. "Myself, I have a job. But the young people in this community deserve the opportunity to stay and earn a middle-class living."
Hendricks Township Supervisor Russell Nelson told the Free Press before Thursday's commission meeting that it was time to move ahead with the project.
"This has pitted neighbor against neighbor," he said.
Graymont officials say the initial phase of their operation will create 50 mining and transportation-related jobs, along with 100 indirect jobs. The company, the second-largest supplier of lime and lime-based products in North America, also is considering building a $100-million limestone processing plant in Nelson's township years from now.
"We need the jobs," Nelson said. "Our township has about 160 residents over 80 square miles. We have one little convenience store and a couple of restaurants."
The revised deal still does not address Trout Lake Township resident Kathy English's concerns, she said.
"It doesn't change the noise, the traffic, the pollution, the potential impacts to the water table, the changes to our way of life," she said.
The Michigan Chapter of the Sierra Club also opposed the land deal, saying the DNR is failing to follow state law in determining surplus state lands. The land deal involves 10 times more acreage than any previous sale, club officials said.
"As proposed, the Graymont sale would establish a dangerous precedent and undermine our longstanding Michigan tradition of ensuring publicly owned lands that we value today are also there for future generations of Michiganders," Sierra Club forest ecologist Marvin Roberson said.
20 August 2014
RETIRE HERE, NOT THERE: MICHIGAN
Original Story: MarketWatch.com
Michigan is probably not the first state that comes to mind when people think about retiring on the beach. And yet its sandy, dune-lined shorelines, with coasts along four of the five Great Lakes, have attracted many boomers to the “Riviera of the Midwest.”
Indeed residents anywhere in Michigan are never more than 6 miles from a body of water; the state has more than 36,000 miles of streams and more than 11,000 inland lakes, along with the most freshwater coastline in any state in the nation. This life aquatic gives retirees plenty to do. The state has more than 900,000 registered boats and ranked seventh in the nation in number of registered fishermen—over 1 million—in 2013. Many quaint towns have grown up along the shores, luring retirees with restaurants, locally owned shops and artist communities.
The sporty lifestyle in the Great Lakes State doesn’t end at the water line. Golfers have over 800 public courses to choose from, including three that made the 2013-14 Golf Digest list of America's 100 Greatest Golf Courses: Crystal Downs Country Club in Frankfurt (No. 12); the south course at Oakland Hills Country Club in Bloomfield Hills (No. 20); and Arcadia Bluffs Golf Club in Arcadia (No. 57). The state ranks third in licensed hunters with more than 760,000. Plus, Michigan has the largest state forest system in the nation.
Michigan, and in particular Detroit, are known for cars, and the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn is a shrine not just to the automobile but to American inventors, with sections on aviation and manufacturing, as well as special exhibitions. The state also has a strong reputation for arts and culture. The 658,000-square-foot Detroit Institute of the Arts ranks among the top six art museums in the nation for its multicultural collection spanning from prehistory to the 21st century; it also hosts top traveling exhibitions. The Grand Rapids Art Museum is home to the internationally renowned annual Art Prize competition and has a growing reputation in 19th and 20th century American and European art, works on paper, and crafts and design.
Many of Michigan's smaller towns pack a cultural punch as well. The Ann Arbor Art Fair, which presents crafts ranging from ceramics to paintings to jewelry, attracts more than 500,000 attendees annually; and the area around Saugatuck, nicknamed “the artist's colony of the Midwest,” has dozens of galleries and a small, but engaged, population of retiree artists.
Possibly the best thing about Michigan, particularly for those who want to stretch their nest eggs, is how inexpensive it is. The cost of living is 11.2% below the national average, the median home costs just over $117,000, and both nursing home and assisted-living costs are below average. Income is taxed at a flat rate of 4.32%--the 11th lowest in the nation, according to the Tax Foundation. Boomers who want to keep working may have been reluctant to consider relocating to Michigan, which took one of the hardest job-loss hits in the nation during the auto industry’s decline. But the state unemployment rate is now 7.3%, only a point above the national average, and recent job growth is positive, according to Sperling’s Best Places.
Retirees had better not mind cold winters: In Michigan, they average 58.1 inches of snow. On the other hand, all those flakes make for prime cross-country skiing and snowmobiling, as well as some stunning ice formations on Lake Michigan when the waves freeze in place, says Bill Underdown, an agent with Shoreline Realtors based in Douglas, Mich. “It’s magical,” he adds. Retirees on Lake Michigan’s shores who like the four seasons will find that the water soaks up the summer heat making for “very long usually dreamy falls,” says Mike Norton, media relations manager for Traverse City Tourism.
State crime rates overall are only slightly higher than the national average, although violent crime in Detroit is much more frequent than in the U.S. as a whole.
Here are four budget-conscious retirement destinations which blend the state’s strengths from the outdoors to the cultural:
Traverse City
Traverse City is a hub for hiking, cross-country skiing, cycling and boating. “In the winter, almost all the cars have ski racks; in the summer, they have kayaks on them,” Norton says. This means that the area tends to attract active retirees, the kind of people who “want to be out, who don't want to just sit around and watch the world go by,” he adds.
They'll find plenty to do here: The Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore features long stretches of beach and bluffs that jut up 450 feet above Lake Michigan; it’s a favorite spot for canoeing and kayaking. Hikers and bikers also enjoy the TART Trails system, a network of eight multiuse trails and a crosstown bike route. Traverse City is also one of the leading fly-fishing destinations in America, with four blue-ribbon trout streams within a half-hour drive of town.
To unwind from all this strenuous outdoor activity, retirees can visit the area's thriving wineries. The lake creates a unique microclimate that makes the area near Traverse City excellent for growing fruit like apricots, cherries and grapes. The region is known for its white wines, particularly rieslings, Chardonnays, pinot grigios and gewürztraminers--but it’s also beginning to produce some decent quality reds, like Pinot Noirs and Cabernet Francs. It is also one of the top producers of ice wine, a dessert wine made from winter-frozen grapes. The wineries, along with the orchards and farms, have helped produce a foodie scene, Norton says, with “a lot of farm-to-table restaurants.”
Traverse City offers other perks for retirees, including a compact downtown, lined with local businesses; a lively art gallery scene; and one of the region's best hospitals. The Cherry Capital Airport has direct flights to Chicago, Detroit, Denver and Minneapolis. One downside—the town can get crowded with tourists in the summer.
By the numbers:
Population: 14,702
Median home cost: $165,800
Cost of living: 1.8% lower than the national average
Unemployment: 6.6%
Source: Sperling's Best Places
Marquette
Nestled on the shores of shimmering Lake Superior in the far northern arm of the state, Marquette is rich in outdoor activities. The Noquemanon Trail Network, which runs through town and all along the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, is a favorite for walkers, mountain bikers and cross-country skiers alike. In the winter, “fat tire biking” is a popular way to pedal through the snow. Downhill skiers hit Marquette Mountain, which boasts 169 skiable acres of mostly moderate terrain. Sailors love this town too: A local group, Fleet 35, has sailed on the Bay of Marquette every Wednesday since the early 1970s, and residents gather by the water to watch the local rowing club take their longboats out on evenings during the summer, says Pat Black, executive director of the Marquette County Convention & Visitors Bureau. The lake also offers more relaxing activities like kayaking and fishing. The area has six golf courses and plenty of land for both small- and large-game hunting.
“There are lots of cultural activities beginning to grow here,” Black says. The quaint, walkable downtown is lined with historic sandstone buildings that house eclectic restaurants, bars and shops. The Huron Mountain Club Gallery and Marquette Arts and Culture Center, both in the Peter White Public Library, host exhibits by locally, regionally and nationally known artists. Marquette is home to Northern Michigan University, where people over 62 can take classes free; the campus is also the site of the DeVos Art Museum. The Northern Center for Lifelong Learning offers low-cost classes in subjects like photography and bird-watching, along with social events. From early June to October, Marquette County hosts free events every weekend from concerts to festivals to athletic competitions, Black says.
Marquette does have a small airport with direct flights to Chicago and Detroit. Well-regarded Marquette General Hospital is operated by Duke LifePoint Healthcare, affiliated with Duke University.
By the numbers:
Population: 21,383
Median home cost: $159,900
Cost of living: 2.9% lower than average
Unemployment: 7.4%
Grand Rapids
After a career as a defense electrical engineer mostly in the Los Angeles area, Bob Lindeman and his wife Julie—both age 60—retired to their hometown of Grand Rapids in September 2013, not only to be near their elderly fathers, but because they could find a high quality of life at an affordable price. Their cost to build a 5,200-square foot home on Georgetown Shores Lake is half what it cost them to have a similar size home two blocks from the beach in greater Los Angeles, Bob says. “We were close to the ocean, but now we’re on the water,” he adds. “We’re going to have a boat.”
Grand Rapids made the top five in AARP Magazine’s list of top places to retire for under $30,000 a year in 2013, and it’s easy to see why. The city has a revitalized, vibrant downtown, ringed by historic neighborhoods with surprisingly reasonably priced homes. “In the last 10 to 15 years, Grand Rapids has had a real resurgence, particularly culturally,” says Jeannine Lemmon, associate broker and owner of Grand Rapids-based Patriot Realty. “That’s really pushed Grand Rapids into the forefront as a destination.”
Eclectic shops, art galleries, restaurants and night life have sprung up downtown and in districts such as Eastown, East Hills-Cherry Hill, Midtown and West Fulton, Lemmon says. The Grand Rapids Art Museum is internationally known for its annual ArtPrize competition, which attracts artists from around the globe. The small city has its own symphony, ballet and opera companies, and the DeVos Performance Hall hosts nationally known performers and Broadway touring shows. Retirees have plenty to do outdoors, too: The Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park includes works by artists from Rodin to Calder and a five-story tropical conservatory; and the city is just a 40-minute drive away from Lake Michigan beaches. It will be even easier to get downtown from the suburbs when the Silver Line hybrid bus starts service in September.
Gerald R. Ford International Airport offers direct flights all across the U.S. In the health-care field, the Van Andel Institute is a world-class research institution in cancer and other health topics, and the Meijer Heart Center, part of the Spectrum Health system, also is globally renowned.
By the numbers:
Population: 189,340
Median home cost: $103,500
Cost of living: 11.5% lower than average
Unemployment: 6.8%
Douglas
While sister city Saugatuck, just across the Kalamazoo River, is better known, Douglas shares that city’s white sand Lake Michigan beaches and embrace of the arts—the area has gained the nickname of the Art Coast. Once a sleepy farm town known for peaches and a basket factory, Douglas is a bit more laid back and less touristy than Saugatuck, and it’s easier to find housing there, says Underdown, the local real-estate agent, who lives in a renovated farmhouse that dates back to the 1880s.
The art life and natural beauty are what drew Tom and Janice Krakowski to Douglas. They fell in love with the area when Tom started attending art workshops at Ox-Bow, a nearby art college surrounded by 115 acres of natural forest, and they moved to Douglas from Detroit in July. “We watched the transformation of the entire area,” says Tom, a 62-year-old retired master modeler and clay sculptor for the Ford Motor Company. “Douglas was nowhere just 17 years ago, but now there are great restaurants, wonderful shops, and great art galleries.” They bought a 12-year-old energy-efficient house two blocks from downtown, and are converting the second-floor garage into a pottery studio for Tom. “It’s calm, quiet and everyone knows each other,” adds Janice, a 66-year-old retired teacher. “There’s so much art and greenery; golly, it’s beautiful.”
Douglas doesn’t have chain stores, and its downtown on Center Street is modest, with a few restaurants (including the popular Saugatuck Brewing Company), a bowling alley, art galleries and locally owned shops. Big-box retailers, however, are just a 10-minute drive away in Holland or South Haven. For more cultural amenities and the closest airport, locals head to Grand Rapids, about 40 minutes away. Budget-minded retirees may wish to note that Douglas, while not the most expensive place in Michigan, does have a cost of living 14.1% higher than the national average, according to Sperling’s Best Places.
By the numbers:
Population: 1,097
Median home cost: $246,100
Cost of living: 14.1% higher than average
Unemployment: 6.1%
Michigan is probably not the first state that comes to mind when people think about retiring on the beach. And yet its sandy, dune-lined shorelines, with coasts along four of the five Great Lakes, have attracted many boomers to the “Riviera of the Midwest.”
Indeed residents anywhere in Michigan are never more than 6 miles from a body of water; the state has more than 36,000 miles of streams and more than 11,000 inland lakes, along with the most freshwater coastline in any state in the nation. This life aquatic gives retirees plenty to do. The state has more than 900,000 registered boats and ranked seventh in the nation in number of registered fishermen—over 1 million—in 2013. Many quaint towns have grown up along the shores, luring retirees with restaurants, locally owned shops and artist communities.
The sporty lifestyle in the Great Lakes State doesn’t end at the water line. Golfers have over 800 public courses to choose from, including three that made the 2013-14 Golf Digest list of America's 100 Greatest Golf Courses: Crystal Downs Country Club in Frankfurt (No. 12); the south course at Oakland Hills Country Club in Bloomfield Hills (No. 20); and Arcadia Bluffs Golf Club in Arcadia (No. 57). The state ranks third in licensed hunters with more than 760,000. Plus, Michigan has the largest state forest system in the nation.
Michigan, and in particular Detroit, are known for cars, and the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn is a shrine not just to the automobile but to American inventors, with sections on aviation and manufacturing, as well as special exhibitions. The state also has a strong reputation for arts and culture. The 658,000-square-foot Detroit Institute of the Arts ranks among the top six art museums in the nation for its multicultural collection spanning from prehistory to the 21st century; it also hosts top traveling exhibitions. The Grand Rapids Art Museum is home to the internationally renowned annual Art Prize competition and has a growing reputation in 19th and 20th century American and European art, works on paper, and crafts and design.
Many of Michigan's smaller towns pack a cultural punch as well. The Ann Arbor Art Fair, which presents crafts ranging from ceramics to paintings to jewelry, attracts more than 500,000 attendees annually; and the area around Saugatuck, nicknamed “the artist's colony of the Midwest,” has dozens of galleries and a small, but engaged, population of retiree artists.
Possibly the best thing about Michigan, particularly for those who want to stretch their nest eggs, is how inexpensive it is. The cost of living is 11.2% below the national average, the median home costs just over $117,000, and both nursing home and assisted-living costs are below average. Income is taxed at a flat rate of 4.32%--the 11th lowest in the nation, according to the Tax Foundation. Boomers who want to keep working may have been reluctant to consider relocating to Michigan, which took one of the hardest job-loss hits in the nation during the auto industry’s decline. But the state unemployment rate is now 7.3%, only a point above the national average, and recent job growth is positive, according to Sperling’s Best Places.
Retirees had better not mind cold winters: In Michigan, they average 58.1 inches of snow. On the other hand, all those flakes make for prime cross-country skiing and snowmobiling, as well as some stunning ice formations on Lake Michigan when the waves freeze in place, says Bill Underdown, an agent with Shoreline Realtors based in Douglas, Mich. “It’s magical,” he adds. Retirees on Lake Michigan’s shores who like the four seasons will find that the water soaks up the summer heat making for “very long usually dreamy falls,” says Mike Norton, media relations manager for Traverse City Tourism.
State crime rates overall are only slightly higher than the national average, although violent crime in Detroit is much more frequent than in the U.S. as a whole.
Here are four budget-conscious retirement destinations which blend the state’s strengths from the outdoors to the cultural:
Traverse City
Traverse City is a hub for hiking, cross-country skiing, cycling and boating. “In the winter, almost all the cars have ski racks; in the summer, they have kayaks on them,” Norton says. This means that the area tends to attract active retirees, the kind of people who “want to be out, who don't want to just sit around and watch the world go by,” he adds.
They'll find plenty to do here: The Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore features long stretches of beach and bluffs that jut up 450 feet above Lake Michigan; it’s a favorite spot for canoeing and kayaking. Hikers and bikers also enjoy the TART Trails system, a network of eight multiuse trails and a crosstown bike route. Traverse City is also one of the leading fly-fishing destinations in America, with four blue-ribbon trout streams within a half-hour drive of town.
To unwind from all this strenuous outdoor activity, retirees can visit the area's thriving wineries. The lake creates a unique microclimate that makes the area near Traverse City excellent for growing fruit like apricots, cherries and grapes. The region is known for its white wines, particularly rieslings, Chardonnays, pinot grigios and gewürztraminers--but it’s also beginning to produce some decent quality reds, like Pinot Noirs and Cabernet Francs. It is also one of the top producers of ice wine, a dessert wine made from winter-frozen grapes. The wineries, along with the orchards and farms, have helped produce a foodie scene, Norton says, with “a lot of farm-to-table restaurants.”
Traverse City offers other perks for retirees, including a compact downtown, lined with local businesses; a lively art gallery scene; and one of the region's best hospitals. The Cherry Capital Airport has direct flights to Chicago, Detroit, Denver and Minneapolis. One downside—the town can get crowded with tourists in the summer.
By the numbers:
Population: 14,702
Median home cost: $165,800
Cost of living: 1.8% lower than the national average
Unemployment: 6.6%
Source: Sperling's Best Places
Marquette
Nestled on the shores of shimmering Lake Superior in the far northern arm of the state, Marquette is rich in outdoor activities. The Noquemanon Trail Network, which runs through town and all along the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, is a favorite for walkers, mountain bikers and cross-country skiers alike. In the winter, “fat tire biking” is a popular way to pedal through the snow. Downhill skiers hit Marquette Mountain, which boasts 169 skiable acres of mostly moderate terrain. Sailors love this town too: A local group, Fleet 35, has sailed on the Bay of Marquette every Wednesday since the early 1970s, and residents gather by the water to watch the local rowing club take their longboats out on evenings during the summer, says Pat Black, executive director of the Marquette County Convention & Visitors Bureau. The lake also offers more relaxing activities like kayaking and fishing. The area has six golf courses and plenty of land for both small- and large-game hunting.
“There are lots of cultural activities beginning to grow here,” Black says. The quaint, walkable downtown is lined with historic sandstone buildings that house eclectic restaurants, bars and shops. The Huron Mountain Club Gallery and Marquette Arts and Culture Center, both in the Peter White Public Library, host exhibits by locally, regionally and nationally known artists. Marquette is home to Northern Michigan University, where people over 62 can take classes free; the campus is also the site of the DeVos Art Museum. The Northern Center for Lifelong Learning offers low-cost classes in subjects like photography and bird-watching, along with social events. From early June to October, Marquette County hosts free events every weekend from concerts to festivals to athletic competitions, Black says.
Marquette does have a small airport with direct flights to Chicago and Detroit. Well-regarded Marquette General Hospital is operated by Duke LifePoint Healthcare, affiliated with Duke University.
By the numbers:
Population: 21,383
Median home cost: $159,900
Cost of living: 2.9% lower than average
Unemployment: 7.4%
Grand Rapids
After a career as a defense electrical engineer mostly in the Los Angeles area, Bob Lindeman and his wife Julie—both age 60—retired to their hometown of Grand Rapids in September 2013, not only to be near their elderly fathers, but because they could find a high quality of life at an affordable price. Their cost to build a 5,200-square foot home on Georgetown Shores Lake is half what it cost them to have a similar size home two blocks from the beach in greater Los Angeles, Bob says. “We were close to the ocean, but now we’re on the water,” he adds. “We’re going to have a boat.”
Grand Rapids made the top five in AARP Magazine’s list of top places to retire for under $30,000 a year in 2013, and it’s easy to see why. The city has a revitalized, vibrant downtown, ringed by historic neighborhoods with surprisingly reasonably priced homes. “In the last 10 to 15 years, Grand Rapids has had a real resurgence, particularly culturally,” says Jeannine Lemmon, associate broker and owner of Grand Rapids-based Patriot Realty. “That’s really pushed Grand Rapids into the forefront as a destination.”
Eclectic shops, art galleries, restaurants and night life have sprung up downtown and in districts such as Eastown, East Hills-Cherry Hill, Midtown and West Fulton, Lemmon says. The Grand Rapids Art Museum is internationally known for its annual ArtPrize competition, which attracts artists from around the globe. The small city has its own symphony, ballet and opera companies, and the DeVos Performance Hall hosts nationally known performers and Broadway touring shows. Retirees have plenty to do outdoors, too: The Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park includes works by artists from Rodin to Calder and a five-story tropical conservatory; and the city is just a 40-minute drive away from Lake Michigan beaches. It will be even easier to get downtown from the suburbs when the Silver Line hybrid bus starts service in September.
Gerald R. Ford International Airport offers direct flights all across the U.S. In the health-care field, the Van Andel Institute is a world-class research institution in cancer and other health topics, and the Meijer Heart Center, part of the Spectrum Health system, also is globally renowned.
By the numbers:
Population: 189,340
Median home cost: $103,500
Cost of living: 11.5% lower than average
Unemployment: 6.8%
Douglas
While sister city Saugatuck, just across the Kalamazoo River, is better known, Douglas shares that city’s white sand Lake Michigan beaches and embrace of the arts—the area has gained the nickname of the Art Coast. Once a sleepy farm town known for peaches and a basket factory, Douglas is a bit more laid back and less touristy than Saugatuck, and it’s easier to find housing there, says Underdown, the local real-estate agent, who lives in a renovated farmhouse that dates back to the 1880s.
The art life and natural beauty are what drew Tom and Janice Krakowski to Douglas. They fell in love with the area when Tom started attending art workshops at Ox-Bow, a nearby art college surrounded by 115 acres of natural forest, and they moved to Douglas from Detroit in July. “We watched the transformation of the entire area,” says Tom, a 62-year-old retired master modeler and clay sculptor for the Ford Motor Company. “Douglas was nowhere just 17 years ago, but now there are great restaurants, wonderful shops, and great art galleries.” They bought a 12-year-old energy-efficient house two blocks from downtown, and are converting the second-floor garage into a pottery studio for Tom. “It’s calm, quiet and everyone knows each other,” adds Janice, a 66-year-old retired teacher. “There’s so much art and greenery; golly, it’s beautiful.”
Douglas doesn’t have chain stores, and its downtown on Center Street is modest, with a few restaurants (including the popular Saugatuck Brewing Company), a bowling alley, art galleries and locally owned shops. Big-box retailers, however, are just a 10-minute drive away in Holland or South Haven. For more cultural amenities and the closest airport, locals head to Grand Rapids, about 40 minutes away. Budget-minded retirees may wish to note that Douglas, while not the most expensive place in Michigan, does have a cost of living 14.1% higher than the national average, according to Sperling’s Best Places.
By the numbers:
Population: 1,097
Median home cost: $246,100
Cost of living: 14.1% higher than average
Unemployment: 6.1%
04 March 2013
Great Lakes water levels may be up slightly, but still many boating hazards
Story first appeared on The Detroit News -
Great Lakes Michigan and Huron in February bounced back slightly from all-time record lows set in January, according to preliminary numbers released Friday.
After a month of seemingly-continuous snow and rain, preliminary numbers from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers show that Lake Huron and Lake Michigan finished above the all-time low mean for February.
Through the month's 28 days, Lakes Michigan and Huron posted means of 600.26 feet above sea level. The all-time lows mean for February came in 1926, when the lakes measured 599.60 feet.
That's a far more positive story than the numbers the lakes posted in January.
For that month, Lakes Michigan and Huron recorded their lowest-ever levels, with a mean of 576.02 feet above sea level. It's a number that dipped below the previous all-time low for January — 576.12 feet — as well as the all-time low for any month, 576.05 feet in March 1964.
Low lake levels can spell trouble for boaters who can wreck propellers and damage their vessels by scraping bottom in shallow waters.
"I have a feeling that boaters are going to be shocked how low the lake levels are," Andrey Duzyj said. The 58-year-old Warren resident owns a Sea Ray Sundancer and often ventures out on Lake St. Clair.
"If you own a boat be very, very careful and have your insurance ready. I have a feeling it's going to be a banner year for the salvage industry and those who help boaters get out of trouble."
"There will be no new record set this month," said John Allis, chief of the Army Corps' Great Lakes hydraulics and hydrology office.
In recent years, dropping water levels in each of the Great Lakes have become a major problem. The water loss is the result of years of drought-like conditions compounded by a 2011-2012 winter that was light on snow.
It's a situation that has impacted shore front properties, recreational boating and industrial shipping. And earlier this month, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder announced plans to allot $21 million in dredging funds in the new state budget.
Despite the slight uptick, each of the Great Lakes now sits well below their long-term mean for February.
The snow and ice that accumulate in the upper Great Lakes during the late fall and winter, particularly in and around Lake Superior, create the runoff that dictates how high levels climb or how low they will sink during the year.
While this year's snowfall has been much more Michigan-like that what was seen last year, it will take much snowfall this winter and rainfall this spring to bring the lakes closer to normal.
"It's looking like we've had a pretty much average precipitation over this winter, which is good," Allis said. "So we would expect that would help fuel a typical seasonal rise in the lakes this spring - something we didn't see last year. That's the good news.
"The bad news is since we're still just barely above record lows; it's going to take sustained periods of wet weather for the lakes to get back up near their long-term average."
Great Lakes Michigan and Huron in February bounced back slightly from all-time record lows set in January, according to preliminary numbers released Friday.
After a month of seemingly-continuous snow and rain, preliminary numbers from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers show that Lake Huron and Lake Michigan finished above the all-time low mean for February.
Through the month's 28 days, Lakes Michigan and Huron posted means of 600.26 feet above sea level. The all-time lows mean for February came in 1926, when the lakes measured 599.60 feet.
That's a far more positive story than the numbers the lakes posted in January.
For that month, Lakes Michigan and Huron recorded their lowest-ever levels, with a mean of 576.02 feet above sea level. It's a number that dipped below the previous all-time low for January — 576.12 feet — as well as the all-time low for any month, 576.05 feet in March 1964.
Low lake levels can spell trouble for boaters who can wreck propellers and damage their vessels by scraping bottom in shallow waters.
"I have a feeling that boaters are going to be shocked how low the lake levels are," Andrey Duzyj said. The 58-year-old Warren resident owns a Sea Ray Sundancer and often ventures out on Lake St. Clair.
"If you own a boat be very, very careful and have your insurance ready. I have a feeling it's going to be a banner year for the salvage industry and those who help boaters get out of trouble."
"There will be no new record set this month," said John Allis, chief of the Army Corps' Great Lakes hydraulics and hydrology office.
In recent years, dropping water levels in each of the Great Lakes have become a major problem. The water loss is the result of years of drought-like conditions compounded by a 2011-2012 winter that was light on snow.
It's a situation that has impacted shore front properties, recreational boating and industrial shipping. And earlier this month, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder announced plans to allot $21 million in dredging funds in the new state budget.
Despite the slight uptick, each of the Great Lakes now sits well below their long-term mean for February.
- Lake Superior's February mean was 600.26 feet, below its long-term average of 601.30.
- Lake Michigan Huron's February mean of 576.15 feet, below the long-term average of 578.40.
- Lake St. Clair's February mean of 572.64 feet is below the long-term average of 573.40.
- Lake Erie's February mean of 570.41 feet is below the long-term average of 570.80.
- Lake Ontario's February mean of 244.49 feet is below the long-term average of 244.80.
The snow and ice that accumulate in the upper Great Lakes during the late fall and winter, particularly in and around Lake Superior, create the runoff that dictates how high levels climb or how low they will sink during the year.
While this year's snowfall has been much more Michigan-like that what was seen last year, it will take much snowfall this winter and rainfall this spring to bring the lakes closer to normal.
"It's looking like we've had a pretty much average precipitation over this winter, which is good," Allis said. "So we would expect that would help fuel a typical seasonal rise in the lakes this spring - something we didn't see last year. That's the good news.
"The bad news is since we're still just barely above record lows; it's going to take sustained periods of wet weather for the lakes to get back up near their long-term average."
28 January 2013
Winter Fly-fishing? Zen-like experience on Michigan river
Story first appeared on USA Today -
Anglers know something that tourists don't. You can fly-fish all year round, even in winter.
Beyond skiing, snowshoeing, snowmobiling, skating and winter zip-lining, the latest tourist attraction in northern Michigan is getting in a float boat and having A River Runs Through It experience in the dead of winter.
"People say, 'What?' They think the river freezes," says Ethan Winchester of Boyne Outfitters. He is head fly-fishing guide at Boyne Mountain, which for the first time is offering winter fly-fishing as an activity for its guests. "Rivers don't freeze up like a lake. The trout don't leave. They become somewhat dormant and slow down, but they're still in the river."
This time of year, steelhead and trout are theoretically there for the catching -- but they are elusive.
Winter fly-fishing has other challenges. If it's sunny and in the 30s, conditions are glorious. Great waterproof waders keep anglers dry. Gourmet lunches and hot coffee keep them warm.
"But a lot of times when you come out here and it's 10 or 20 degrees, the rods get covered up with ice, and the reels freeze," says Tom Menas, another guide. "It adds a different element to it."
Which may be the understatement of the year.
Crystal ice and melting snow -
On this January day, we start at Chestonia Bridge, a few miles south of East Jordan.
We are lucky. It is above freezing. And it is sunny.
Winchester backs up the Jeep and its trailer to a snowy embankment and slides the boat downhill like a sled, where it gathers speed and splashes into the water of the Jordan River. Soon, we are floating in the Hyde-McKenzie-style drift boat, with paddles like a river raft. Winchester guides the boat past low-hanging branches, eddies, swirls, minor rapids, sharp limbs and fallen trees. We dodge hollers and shadows, dark water and open areas.
We fish at holes the anglers know, murky spots called Two Logs, Brown Trout Alley, Lawyer's Lounge, Sucker Hole.
We fish. We fish. No bites yet.
The day is all crystal ice and melting snow, at times completely silent except for the sharp cracking snap of our drift lines. A merganser duck honks and flies overhead. The burbling water calls out its winter song. My feet feel warm in their waders with boots, waterproof as a tarp on a roof. I sip hot coffee. I cast my line, again and again. The guides show me how to flick my wrist, cross over, then repeat until it becomes automatic, even beautiful.
Winchester and Menas are ardent fly-fishermen. They have caught plenty of trout in winter. But not every day. Perhaps not this day.
"The fish keep you humble," says Winchester, 25. He used to be a fly-fishing guide in remote Alaska. He grew up in Charlevoix and knows this area like the back of his hand. Still, he doesn't always get lucky.
The Boyne guides prefer to take clients on the Jordan and Sturgeon rivers in winter, adding others in summer. The Jordan is a favorite. Rarely above 52 degrees even in July, it is clear, fast-moving, and the banks are quiet and forested.
"There are a lot of proverbs about fly-fishing, and one says that each river has its own soul and character," Winchester says. "This river has just about everything to put you at ease."
Today, the 3 1/2-mile route takes us six hours. We stop many times to fish from the boat and wade in the water. We stop longer on a riverbank to eat lunch and fish some more.
Winchester grills steaks, asparagus and new potatoes and heats brownies on a portable grill. The sun shines. The river shimmers. Menas and I walk slowly downstream through the frigid January water, casting our lines. You don't want to fall into the river this time of year. We are so careful, especially walking back upstream against the tugging icy current. My boots feel like they weigh 1,000 pounds apiece. But they are stable. It's the oddest feeling, to walk through water up to one's knees in the middle of January and not be cold or wet.
Afloat on the wintry river -
You can do winter fly-fishing all across the state. But mostly it's confined to hard-core anglers "who just need that fix," Winchester says. For newcomers or people who want the help of a guide, a more structured program is definitely the way to go -- and the big ski resorts like Boyne are happy to oblige. Resorts across America are adding other unusual activities to keep skiers busy and attract new guests. Water parks, spas, zip lines, yoga, ice skating, cross-country skiing -- and now winter fly-fishing -- beckon to winter lovers who used to show up just for the downhill skiing.
And I do recommend winter fly-fishing, as odd as it sounds. The winter river, with its bowing cedars, yellowish and curving, is something to see. Newly fallen trunks and limbs lie this way and that (Winchester and Menas bring a chainsaw in case they encounter an obstacle). Snow hugs the banks. A midwinter sun looks as chilly as a circle of lemon sorbet in the sky. Ice clings to bare twigs like glass. You can breathe out here. Deeply.
A Zen-like silence -
I do have one weird question for my guides. Have they ever caught the same fish twice? Yes. If a fish has a scar or special marking, they may recognize it. Also, anglers know these rivers, know where the fish are, at least sort of. Because it's catch and release, fish often return to the same general area where anglers caught them last time.
"We know their address," Menas says. Still. The entire venture to me seems delicate and chancy, the rod so light that it seems it would be torn from your hand should a trout have a notion to eat lunch.
Most new anglers who try fly-fishing can be intimidated, partly because of the 1992 film A River Runs Through It, which made the fly rod seem like Brad Pitt's magic wand. Even today, guides see some people with A River Runs Through It Syndrome, which is a compulsive need to do a figure-8 twirling of the line, "like you're doing a ribbon dance," scoffs Winchester, flicking his wrist and sending the line straight out into the fast-moving current.
Boyne Mountain is going into winter fly-fishing full throttle, plus preparing for spring. There's a stocked trout pond near the ski runs. There are fishing poles available for guests. They teach fly-fishing and fly tying.
After we leave the river and return to the resort, Winchester asks if I want to catch a trout in the pond.
But it seems a violation of the zen of fly-fishing, contrary to the acceptance of the fish's wishes on this day not to be caught.
Anyway, I kind of get a kick out of picturing the lazy steelhead huddled along depressions in the winter river. I picture them watching plankton drift by, the steelhead equivalent of watching "Here Comes Honey Boo Boo" on TLC. They feel a boat passing, hear voices, see that nice juicy bug or clump of eggs dangling above, but ... nah. They'll doze on this January day until they feel spring coming for real. Crazy humans, they murmur as the boat passes, then all becomes silent again.
Contact Ellen Creager: 313-222-6498 or ecreager@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @ellencreager.
If you go:
Winter fly-fishing is offered by many fishing guides in Michigan, but the big ski resort Boyne Mountain has taken it up a notch, offering it for the first time this year to guests through Boyne Outfitters on the property.
Several packages are available, including the classic described in this article, the Traditional Float: Float down the river and fish from the boat and in the water. Instruction, equipment, waders and lunch included in the full-day tour; $375 for two people.
Also offered is a half-day tour for $275.
24 December 2012
Michigan's Right-To-Work and The Hostess Bankruptcy: The Two Non-Stories Of the Year
originally appeared in Forbes:
Op/ed editors are more privy than most to what’s on the minds of opinion writers. There’s no money to be made on this information, but editors know ahead of time what the commentariat considers news.
Over the past six weeks this editor of what is a consciously libertarian page has been inundated with all manner of downcast op/eds on the Hostess bankruptcy, followed by upbeat ones about Michigan instituting a right-to-work law. While the submissions were almost invariably good, it says here that they were a near total waste of time.
Consumers looking for quality home remodeling sources can work with a local professional that stands by it's work.
Considering Hostess, the fact that it’s a great brand with even better snack foods (my favorite are the chocolate chip muffins) means that soon enough someone will buy the company out bankruptcy. Thank goodness. Bankruptcy, though trumped up by bank and car bailout apologists as code for disappearance, really only means a positive change of ownership.
Legal professionals working in the specialty of child abuse defense are located throughout the state of michigan.
Still, amid Hostess’s hurtle toward bankruptcy copious amounts of ink were spilled on how the snackmaker’s decline signaled the horrors of labor unions stuck in the past. About this, labor unions are stuck in the past for presuming that the very investors who set wages will give in to their wage demands, but that’s really beside the point.
Quality refrigeration and walk-in coolers from SRC Refrigeration are available for restaurants and commercial businesses.
Not asked enough amid Hostess’s decline was why its management employed American workers to begin with. Forget about the fact that the workers were unionized and led by unions demanding absurd levels of compensation, the better question was why Hostess snacks were being baked in the U.S. at all.
Mass production of sugary U.S. goods is very much yesterday’s work, so for so many conservative and libertarian commentators to frame the Hostess story as one of profit-seeking management beset by gluttonous unions was for them to miss the real story. It wasn’t one about an iconic brand thrown into bankruptcy by greedy unions; rather the real, unreported story was that Hostess’s decision to bake its goods in the U.S. was a waste of limited labor, and as such, anti-profit.
If not by labor unions, the very presumption of Hostess’s management that it could profitably mass produce Hostess snacks in the U.S. ensured its future bankruptcy, or departure from the U.S. Of course when Hostess is inevitably purchased, it’s a fair bet that its new owners will quickly shift production to Mexico or some reasonable facsimile.
The above will constitute a good story about free trade and the always healthy division of labor, though it’s a near certainty that when this happens, conservatives and libertarians who should know better will frame the out-migration as evidence of the horrors of labor unions. Not defending unions for a second (though individuals should be allowed to sell their labor any way they wish, including from within unions), they’re really not the Hostess story.
Moving to last week, economically depressed and unionized Michigan adopted a right-to-work law that will give the individual the freedom to not pay dues and not join a union in a unionized workplace. Hysterics on the left talked up the cruelty of such an anti-worker law, but the real truth there is that those who feel their needs are better served by unions will still be free to join them.
On the right, those made downcast by Hostess’s bankruptcy were positively ecstatic about what had transpired in the Wolverine state. In a sense their excitement was warranted when we consider that the right to free association is one of our most fundamental ones. The shame is that states can restrict such a right as is.
After that, there’s really no story to the story that captivated so many who lean capitalist. Indeed, if it’s true that investors, not CEOs, ultimately set wages, and it is, good luck finding investors willing to fund such a labor intensive business in today’s United States. Labor intensive production has long been moving offshore, and that’s been a good thing for the economy as U.S. workers migrated to higher value service work.
About the above, those who should once again know better would cite unions as the cause of work being moved offshore, but this would be a false read. The better answer is that basic economics has pushed low value work out of the United States. As evidenced by low factory pay in China, investors have long understood that the work is worth the price of a Starbucks latte – and falling – on a daily basis, so factory jobs would have left no matter the status of labor unions in the United States.
Much as the economic nostalgists in our midst might wish otherwise, factory labor is yesterdays’ work, and the pay is all the evidence we need. If ever manufacturing jobs come roaring back to the U.S., we’ll know we’re in trouble. Investors loathe backwards moving economies, and manufacturing screams blast to the past. Enough said.
Of course union bashers will trot out statistics showing that job creation is greater in right-to-work states, but it seems here the economists who divine these statistics are mistaking cause and effect. Indeed, what investor would commit capital to any kind of business that has the potential to be unionized as is?
Instead, it’s probably a safe bet that states which coddle unions are generally less pro business than are states that don’t. Businesses that can be unionized increasingly don’t make sense (see the bankruptcies of airlines and car companies, plus their friends in Washington) absent political pull, so the existence or lack thereof of a right-to-work law wouldn’t matter much in today’s advanced economy. But businesses to varying degrees migrate to the environments most conducive to business, which likely explains the job disparity.
Back to Hostess, one can only hope it’s sold soon so that its numerous devotees can start enjoying its snacks again. As for Michigan, it should be applauded for embracing a law that is pro business; the problem again that unions lost economic relevance long ago. Because they did, the Hostess/union story is a non sequitur, while the Michigan one is mostly meaningless as it applies to the state’s economic health.
Op/ed editors are more privy than most to what’s on the minds of opinion writers. There’s no money to be made on this information, but editors know ahead of time what the commentariat considers news.
Over the past six weeks this editor of what is a consciously libertarian page has been inundated with all manner of downcast op/eds on the Hostess bankruptcy, followed by upbeat ones about Michigan instituting a right-to-work law. While the submissions were almost invariably good, it says here that they were a near total waste of time.
Consumers looking for quality home remodeling sources can work with a local professional that stands by it's work.
Considering Hostess, the fact that it’s a great brand with even better snack foods (my favorite are the chocolate chip muffins) means that soon enough someone will buy the company out bankruptcy. Thank goodness. Bankruptcy, though trumped up by bank and car bailout apologists as code for disappearance, really only means a positive change of ownership.
Legal professionals working in the specialty of child abuse defense are located throughout the state of michigan.
Still, amid Hostess’s hurtle toward bankruptcy copious amounts of ink were spilled on how the snackmaker’s decline signaled the horrors of labor unions stuck in the past. About this, labor unions are stuck in the past for presuming that the very investors who set wages will give in to their wage demands, but that’s really beside the point.
Quality refrigeration and walk-in coolers from SRC Refrigeration are available for restaurants and commercial businesses.
Not asked enough amid Hostess’s decline was why its management employed American workers to begin with. Forget about the fact that the workers were unionized and led by unions demanding absurd levels of compensation, the better question was why Hostess snacks were being baked in the U.S. at all.
Mass production of sugary U.S. goods is very much yesterday’s work, so for so many conservative and libertarian commentators to frame the Hostess story as one of profit-seeking management beset by gluttonous unions was for them to miss the real story. It wasn’t one about an iconic brand thrown into bankruptcy by greedy unions; rather the real, unreported story was that Hostess’s decision to bake its goods in the U.S. was a waste of limited labor, and as such, anti-profit.
If not by labor unions, the very presumption of Hostess’s management that it could profitably mass produce Hostess snacks in the U.S. ensured its future bankruptcy, or departure from the U.S. Of course when Hostess is inevitably purchased, it’s a fair bet that its new owners will quickly shift production to Mexico or some reasonable facsimile.
The above will constitute a good story about free trade and the always healthy division of labor, though it’s a near certainty that when this happens, conservatives and libertarians who should know better will frame the out-migration as evidence of the horrors of labor unions. Not defending unions for a second (though individuals should be allowed to sell their labor any way they wish, including from within unions), they’re really not the Hostess story.
Moving to last week, economically depressed and unionized Michigan adopted a right-to-work law that will give the individual the freedom to not pay dues and not join a union in a unionized workplace. Hysterics on the left talked up the cruelty of such an anti-worker law, but the real truth there is that those who feel their needs are better served by unions will still be free to join them.
On the right, those made downcast by Hostess’s bankruptcy were positively ecstatic about what had transpired in the Wolverine state. In a sense their excitement was warranted when we consider that the right to free association is one of our most fundamental ones. The shame is that states can restrict such a right as is.
After that, there’s really no story to the story that captivated so many who lean capitalist. Indeed, if it’s true that investors, not CEOs, ultimately set wages, and it is, good luck finding investors willing to fund such a labor intensive business in today’s United States. Labor intensive production has long been moving offshore, and that’s been a good thing for the economy as U.S. workers migrated to higher value service work.
About the above, those who should once again know better would cite unions as the cause of work being moved offshore, but this would be a false read. The better answer is that basic economics has pushed low value work out of the United States. As evidenced by low factory pay in China, investors have long understood that the work is worth the price of a Starbucks latte – and falling – on a daily basis, so factory jobs would have left no matter the status of labor unions in the United States.
Much as the economic nostalgists in our midst might wish otherwise, factory labor is yesterdays’ work, and the pay is all the evidence we need. If ever manufacturing jobs come roaring back to the U.S., we’ll know we’re in trouble. Investors loathe backwards moving economies, and manufacturing screams blast to the past. Enough said.
Of course union bashers will trot out statistics showing that job creation is greater in right-to-work states, but it seems here the economists who divine these statistics are mistaking cause and effect. Indeed, what investor would commit capital to any kind of business that has the potential to be unionized as is?
Instead, it’s probably a safe bet that states which coddle unions are generally less pro business than are states that don’t. Businesses that can be unionized increasingly don’t make sense (see the bankruptcies of airlines and car companies, plus their friends in Washington) absent political pull, so the existence or lack thereof of a right-to-work law wouldn’t matter much in today’s advanced economy. But businesses to varying degrees migrate to the environments most conducive to business, which likely explains the job disparity.
Back to Hostess, one can only hope it’s sold soon so that its numerous devotees can start enjoying its snacks again. As for Michigan, it should be applauded for embracing a law that is pro business; the problem again that unions lost economic relevance long ago. Because they did, the Hostess/union story is a non sequitur, while the Michigan one is mostly meaningless as it applies to the state’s economic health.
14 December 2012
Right to Work is signed into law in Michigan
originally appeared on CNBC:
A trained aerospace engineer applied his penchant for data analysis and systematic approach to his new job in early 2011: a Michigan state senator, recently elected and keen to create jobs in the faded industrial powerhouse.
Those skills paid off handsomely for the first-term Republican this week as Governor Rick Snyder signed into law bills co-sponsored by the new state senator that ban mandatory union membership, making Michigan the nation's 24th right-to-work state.
From outside Michigan Republican circles, it appeared that the Republican drive to weaken unions came out of the blue - proposed, passed and signed in a mere six days.
But the transformation had been in the making since March 2011 when state senator Colbeck and a fellow freshman, state Representative Mike Shirkey, first seriously considered legislation to ban mandatory collection of union dues as a condition of employment in Michigan. Such was their zeal, they even went to union halls to make their pitch and were treated respectfully, Colbeck said.
The upstarts were flirting with the once unthinkable, limiting union rights in a state that is the home of the heavily unionized U.S. auto industry and the birthplace of the nation's richest union, the United Auto Workers. For many Americans, Michigan is the state that defines organized labor.
But in a convergence of methodical planning and patient alliance building - the systematic approach - the reformers were on a roll, one that establishment Michigan Republicans came to embrace and promised to bankroll.
Republicans executed a plan - the timing, the language of the bills, the media strategy, and perhaps most importantly, the behind-the-scenes lobbying of top Republicans including Snyder.
They knew they would likely face an acrimonious battle of the kind they had seen over the last two years in the neighboring state of Wisconsin between Republican Governor Scott Walker and unions. Operating in plain sight but often overlooked, they worked to put the necessary building blocks in place.
This was a risky move across-the-board and I wanted to make sure all of my (Republican) caucus members would come back to serve with me after the next election, said the state senator, who ran for office after whetting his political appetite as a Tea Party activist.
November elections turned out to be key to the December move. House Republicans lost five seats, making passage in January a more difficult proposition than pushing through legislation in the lame-duck session.
But the November elections had also served up a crushing referendum defeat for unions, which Republicans saw as a sign that public opinion would be behind them in their move to curb organized labor's power.
Bottom Up
For his maiden initiative, Colbeck found inspiration in the troubling 2010 census numbers. Michigan was the only state in the United States to see its population fall during the previous decade and he wanted to reverse that trend. People will not come back without jobs, his thinking went. That's when Colbeck concluded that right-to-work was required to bring in new investment.
They built from the grassroots, bottom up, rather than from Snyder and top leaders in the legislature. If anything, Michigan Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville was viewed as an obstacle because he represents a labor-friendly area.
Together with a former Republican member of the Michigan House who supported right-to-work, and a small group of other activists, they founded the "Michigan Freedom to Work" coalition, which sought to capitalize on Republican control of the state legislature and the governorship.
They held press conferences in June 2011 and in September 2011 took their show to the Republican Leadership Conference on Michigan's Mackinac Island. In attendance were Republican presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Rick Perry as well as Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus.
As a sign of growing support among conservatives for right-to-work, there were hundreds of activists in attendance wearing yellow "Freedom To Work" T-shirts.
A group linked to the conservative billionaire Koch Brothers, owners of an energy and trading conglomerate who are reviled by unions and Democrats, held three conferences in Michigan in early 2012 on right-to-work featuring renowned conservative blogger Andrew Breitbart. Three Republican presidential candidates including Romney and some 1,500 activists attended the last conference on Feb. 25 sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, four days before Breibart's death.
The right-to-work campaign gathered momentum when the activists linked up with Dick DeVos, the son of Richard DeVos, co-founder of Michigan-based Amway, and Ronald Weiser, former chairman of the Michigan Republican Party and ambassador to Slovakia under President George W. Bush.
Richard DeVos was listed as the 67th richest person in America by Forbes magazine in 2012 with a net worth estimated at $5.1 billion. Amway sells consumer goods such as skincare and home cleaning supplies through some 3 million people and its parent company had sales of $10.9 billion in 2011.
Dick DeVos and Ron Weiser travel in a certain rarefied atmosphere, Colbeck said, holding his hand above his head to indicate how far above him they are.
The wealthy businessman and the political guru both worked to persuade wavering Republican lawmakers by assuring them they would have financial support if they faced recall elections over right-to-work, as happened in Wisconsin, Colbeck, Hoogendyk and other Republicans said.
Asked if he had promised campaign financial support to nervous Republicans, DeVos, who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 2006, said in a telephone interview that he is pleased if he was able to help encourage legislators to truly vote their conscience without fear of political retribution from the other side, which is known for its heavy-handed tactics.
By the summer of 2012, Colbeck said supporters had gathered enough Republican votes to pass right-to-work in Michigan, but decided to wait until after the November election.
According to Colbeck, we wanted to be able to focus on the candidates during the election rather than have this distraction.
Battle Over Ballot Measure
Republicans said a key factor in passage of right-to-work was what they consider an overreach by unions in Michigan.
On March 6 of this year, a union group including United Auto Workers union president Bob King announced that they would seek a November ballot initiative to enshrine in the Michigan constitution the right to collective bargaining.
It was a power grab. In retrospect it was a huge mistake, according to the Michigan state director of Americans For Prosperity, a conservative non-profit partially funded by the Koch brothers.
At a public meeting of labor and corporate officers last summer, Snyder said he deliberately pleaded with union leaders not to go forward with the ballot initiative.
If you do this, you should anticipate you're going to create a divisive discussion on right-to-work also, Snyder told Reuters in an interview on Wednesday, recalling his remarks.
Unions pressed forward and some Republicans say that this essentially blew up a gentlemen's agreement between the unions and Republicans that neither would rock the boat on labor legislation in Michigan.
UAW President Bob King told Reuters that labor leaders pursued Proposal 2 because they expected a Republican push on right-to-work regardless.
The battle over Proposal 2 was nasty. Protecting Michigan Taxpayers, a group backed by DeVos, spent $22.7 million to oppose it, according to campaign finance disclosures filed with the state. DeVos family members alone provided $1.75 million of its funding, the records show.
Protect Working Families, a group backed by a union coalition that included the UAW, spent $22.9 million supporting Proposal 2, according to reports filed with the state. The UAW contributed about $5.6 million to that committee.
The proposition went down to defeat by 57 percent to 43 percent. Republicans interpreted this as suggesting that the public would support right-to-work, Colbeck said.
THE MOMENT IS NOW
After the November election, activists decided that the time was ripe to bring up right-to-work.
Snyder indicated as soon as the election ended, the dialogue on right-to-work just really ramped up.
Activists viewed Senate leader Richardville as the most hesitant of the Republican leadership. Rather than confront him, sponsors quietly tried to convince him and lobbied other members of the Republican caucus.
Richardville, who says he hails from a union family, admitted that he was hesitant about right-to-work and said he made his mind up slowly as he saw the support in his Republican caucus.
There wasn't a eureka moment in that I finally see the light or a moment to jump up and down, he told Reuters.
Snyder, a former computer executive who had campaigned as a moderate in the 2010 election, had said for nearly two years that right-to-work was too divisive for Michigan, but said he would sign a law if the legislature passed it. After the election he tried to get labor leaders and Republicans together to discuss a compromise but he said those talks failed.
Snyder and Richardville both told Reuters that they had made up their minds to go through with right-to-work legislation after a Dec. 5 meeting with longtime right-to-work advocate state House Speaker Jase Bolger. Snyder announced the decision a day later and the draft laws were given preliminary approval by the legislature within hours.
Sponsors inserted in the laws a provision allocating $1 million to implement the laws, a shrewd way to make it harder to overturn the laws by referendum because Michigan's constitution bars challenges of spending bills.
A media campaign was rolled out. Television advertising appeared across the state extolling the virtues of right-to-work produced by an agency linked to an associate of Dick DeVos.
Democrats and unions were outraged and said they were blindsided. More than 12,000 people demonstrated on the grounds of the state Capitol in Lansing. They floated giant gray balloons of rats named Snyder, Richardville, Bolger and DeVos.
It was too late. Republicans gave final approval to the bills while union members marched outside the building. Snyder signed them into law within hours.
Democrats have vowed retribution at the polls, suggesting possible recall elections of Michigan Republicans.
There's been two or three recall attempts on me already, Snyder said. When you're reinventing a state you're asking for large-scale change and when change comes, some people don't like it.
A trained aerospace engineer applied his penchant for data analysis and systematic approach to his new job in early 2011: a Michigan state senator, recently elected and keen to create jobs in the faded industrial powerhouse.
Those skills paid off handsomely for the first-term Republican this week as Governor Rick Snyder signed into law bills co-sponsored by the new state senator that ban mandatory union membership, making Michigan the nation's 24th right-to-work state.
From outside Michigan Republican circles, it appeared that the Republican drive to weaken unions came out of the blue - proposed, passed and signed in a mere six days.
But the transformation had been in the making since March 2011 when state senator Colbeck and a fellow freshman, state Representative Mike Shirkey, first seriously considered legislation to ban mandatory collection of union dues as a condition of employment in Michigan. Such was their zeal, they even went to union halls to make their pitch and were treated respectfully, Colbeck said.
The upstarts were flirting with the once unthinkable, limiting union rights in a state that is the home of the heavily unionized U.S. auto industry and the birthplace of the nation's richest union, the United Auto Workers. For many Americans, Michigan is the state that defines organized labor.
But in a convergence of methodical planning and patient alliance building - the systematic approach - the reformers were on a roll, one that establishment Michigan Republicans came to embrace and promised to bankroll.
Republicans executed a plan - the timing, the language of the bills, the media strategy, and perhaps most importantly, the behind-the-scenes lobbying of top Republicans including Snyder.
They knew they would likely face an acrimonious battle of the kind they had seen over the last two years in the neighboring state of Wisconsin between Republican Governor Scott Walker and unions. Operating in plain sight but often overlooked, they worked to put the necessary building blocks in place.
This was a risky move across-the-board and I wanted to make sure all of my (Republican) caucus members would come back to serve with me after the next election, said the state senator, who ran for office after whetting his political appetite as a Tea Party activist.
November elections turned out to be key to the December move. House Republicans lost five seats, making passage in January a more difficult proposition than pushing through legislation in the lame-duck session.
But the November elections had also served up a crushing referendum defeat for unions, which Republicans saw as a sign that public opinion would be behind them in their move to curb organized labor's power.
Bottom Up
For his maiden initiative, Colbeck found inspiration in the troubling 2010 census numbers. Michigan was the only state in the United States to see its population fall during the previous decade and he wanted to reverse that trend. People will not come back without jobs, his thinking went. That's when Colbeck concluded that right-to-work was required to bring in new investment.
They built from the grassroots, bottom up, rather than from Snyder and top leaders in the legislature. If anything, Michigan Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville was viewed as an obstacle because he represents a labor-friendly area.
Together with a former Republican member of the Michigan House who supported right-to-work, and a small group of other activists, they founded the "Michigan Freedom to Work" coalition, which sought to capitalize on Republican control of the state legislature and the governorship.
They held press conferences in June 2011 and in September 2011 took their show to the Republican Leadership Conference on Michigan's Mackinac Island. In attendance were Republican presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Rick Perry as well as Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus.
As a sign of growing support among conservatives for right-to-work, there were hundreds of activists in attendance wearing yellow "Freedom To Work" T-shirts.
A group linked to the conservative billionaire Koch Brothers, owners of an energy and trading conglomerate who are reviled by unions and Democrats, held three conferences in Michigan in early 2012 on right-to-work featuring renowned conservative blogger Andrew Breitbart. Three Republican presidential candidates including Romney and some 1,500 activists attended the last conference on Feb. 25 sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, four days before Breibart's death.
The right-to-work campaign gathered momentum when the activists linked up with Dick DeVos, the son of Richard DeVos, co-founder of Michigan-based Amway, and Ronald Weiser, former chairman of the Michigan Republican Party and ambassador to Slovakia under President George W. Bush.
Richard DeVos was listed as the 67th richest person in America by Forbes magazine in 2012 with a net worth estimated at $5.1 billion. Amway sells consumer goods such as skincare and home cleaning supplies through some 3 million people and its parent company had sales of $10.9 billion in 2011.
Dick DeVos and Ron Weiser travel in a certain rarefied atmosphere, Colbeck said, holding his hand above his head to indicate how far above him they are.
The wealthy businessman and the political guru both worked to persuade wavering Republican lawmakers by assuring them they would have financial support if they faced recall elections over right-to-work, as happened in Wisconsin, Colbeck, Hoogendyk and other Republicans said.
Asked if he had promised campaign financial support to nervous Republicans, DeVos, who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 2006, said in a telephone interview that he is pleased if he was able to help encourage legislators to truly vote their conscience without fear of political retribution from the other side, which is known for its heavy-handed tactics.
By the summer of 2012, Colbeck said supporters had gathered enough Republican votes to pass right-to-work in Michigan, but decided to wait until after the November election.
According to Colbeck, we wanted to be able to focus on the candidates during the election rather than have this distraction.
Battle Over Ballot Measure
Republicans said a key factor in passage of right-to-work was what they consider an overreach by unions in Michigan.
On March 6 of this year, a union group including United Auto Workers union president Bob King announced that they would seek a November ballot initiative to enshrine in the Michigan constitution the right to collective bargaining.
It was a power grab. In retrospect it was a huge mistake, according to the Michigan state director of Americans For Prosperity, a conservative non-profit partially funded by the Koch brothers.
At a public meeting of labor and corporate officers last summer, Snyder said he deliberately pleaded with union leaders not to go forward with the ballot initiative.
If you do this, you should anticipate you're going to create a divisive discussion on right-to-work also, Snyder told Reuters in an interview on Wednesday, recalling his remarks.
Unions pressed forward and some Republicans say that this essentially blew up a gentlemen's agreement between the unions and Republicans that neither would rock the boat on labor legislation in Michigan.
UAW President Bob King told Reuters that labor leaders pursued Proposal 2 because they expected a Republican push on right-to-work regardless.
The battle over Proposal 2 was nasty. Protecting Michigan Taxpayers, a group backed by DeVos, spent $22.7 million to oppose it, according to campaign finance disclosures filed with the state. DeVos family members alone provided $1.75 million of its funding, the records show.
Protect Working Families, a group backed by a union coalition that included the UAW, spent $22.9 million supporting Proposal 2, according to reports filed with the state. The UAW contributed about $5.6 million to that committee.
The proposition went down to defeat by 57 percent to 43 percent. Republicans interpreted this as suggesting that the public would support right-to-work, Colbeck said.
THE MOMENT IS NOW
After the November election, activists decided that the time was ripe to bring up right-to-work.
Snyder indicated as soon as the election ended, the dialogue on right-to-work just really ramped up.
Activists viewed Senate leader Richardville as the most hesitant of the Republican leadership. Rather than confront him, sponsors quietly tried to convince him and lobbied other members of the Republican caucus.
Richardville, who says he hails from a union family, admitted that he was hesitant about right-to-work and said he made his mind up slowly as he saw the support in his Republican caucus.
There wasn't a eureka moment in that I finally see the light or a moment to jump up and down, he told Reuters.
Snyder, a former computer executive who had campaigned as a moderate in the 2010 election, had said for nearly two years that right-to-work was too divisive for Michigan, but said he would sign a law if the legislature passed it. After the election he tried to get labor leaders and Republicans together to discuss a compromise but he said those talks failed.
Snyder and Richardville both told Reuters that they had made up their minds to go through with right-to-work legislation after a Dec. 5 meeting with longtime right-to-work advocate state House Speaker Jase Bolger. Snyder announced the decision a day later and the draft laws were given preliminary approval by the legislature within hours.
Sponsors inserted in the laws a provision allocating $1 million to implement the laws, a shrewd way to make it harder to overturn the laws by referendum because Michigan's constitution bars challenges of spending bills.
A media campaign was rolled out. Television advertising appeared across the state extolling the virtues of right-to-work produced by an agency linked to an associate of Dick DeVos.
Democrats and unions were outraged and said they were blindsided. More than 12,000 people demonstrated on the grounds of the state Capitol in Lansing. They floated giant gray balloons of rats named Snyder, Richardville, Bolger and DeVos.
It was too late. Republicans gave final approval to the bills while union members marched outside the building. Snyder signed them into law within hours.
Democrats have vowed retribution at the polls, suggesting possible recall elections of Michigan Republicans.
There's been two or three recall attempts on me already, Snyder said. When you're reinventing a state you're asking for large-scale change and when change comes, some people don't like it.
13 December 2012
Right to Work in Michigan
originally appeared in The Wall Street Journal:
In November, unions lost big in Michigan when voters rejected Proposal 2, Big Labor's plan to canonize collective bargaining in the state constitution. Now they're facing a backlash with the happy possibility that Michigan could become the 24th right-to-work state.
Lawmakers have been preparing to introduce a right-to-work bill in the state legislature, and the labor cavalry is heading to the Wolverine state. According to the United Auto Workers website, the union will rally Thursday in Lansing to spook lawmakers out of going through with the bill.
Target No. 1 is Governor Rick Snyder, who held a press conference on Tuesday to say that right to work was on the agenda for "thoughtful discussion." That's a shift for Mr. Snyder, who has tiptoed around the topic since he was elected, saying it wasn't a battle he was looking for. Unions took his soft touch as a sign of weakness and pushed Proposal 2, which would have given them a virtual veto over all union-related legislation.
Meanwhile, the economy has languished. Michigan is the fifth most unionized state in the country and the birthplace of the UAW. According to the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, Michigan has lost 7,300 jobs since January, while next-door Indiana, which became a right-to-work state earlier this year, has been on the upswing.
According to the Indiana Economic Development Corporation, the state has a record number of businesses choosing to expand or set up in the state, including Amazon and Toyota. The 220 companies will create some 21,000 new jobs and invest $3.6 billion. The growth has come despite a decrease in the average tax incentives offered by the state to $8,900 from around $37,000 in previous years.
Republicans hold a 26-12 majority in the Michigan Senate and a 64-46 majority in the state House. According to a recent poll by Mitchell Research & Communications for a right-to-work advocacy group, 51% of Michiganders support a right-to-work law while 41% are opposed.
That's important because if a right-to-work law passed the legislature, unions could still try to repeal it on the ballot, as they did this year with the emergency manager law, which let the Governor appoint emergency financial managers who could redo collective-bargaining agreements. By the time a similar fight could be waged against right to work, voters could have had more than a year to see the law's economic benefits.
The AFL-CIO has said that politicians who oppose Big Labor would pay a steep political price, but it's not turning out that way. In Indiana, Republicans picked up nine seats after the right-to-work law passed and lawmakers who made the law a key part of their agenda won by wide margins. If that's the price they pay, Michigan's politicians should be all in.
In November, unions lost big in Michigan when voters rejected Proposal 2, Big Labor's plan to canonize collective bargaining in the state constitution. Now they're facing a backlash with the happy possibility that Michigan could become the 24th right-to-work state.
Lawmakers have been preparing to introduce a right-to-work bill in the state legislature, and the labor cavalry is heading to the Wolverine state. According to the United Auto Workers website, the union will rally Thursday in Lansing to spook lawmakers out of going through with the bill.
Target No. 1 is Governor Rick Snyder, who held a press conference on Tuesday to say that right to work was on the agenda for "thoughtful discussion." That's a shift for Mr. Snyder, who has tiptoed around the topic since he was elected, saying it wasn't a battle he was looking for. Unions took his soft touch as a sign of weakness and pushed Proposal 2, which would have given them a virtual veto over all union-related legislation.
Meanwhile, the economy has languished. Michigan is the fifth most unionized state in the country and the birthplace of the UAW. According to the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, Michigan has lost 7,300 jobs since January, while next-door Indiana, which became a right-to-work state earlier this year, has been on the upswing.
According to the Indiana Economic Development Corporation, the state has a record number of businesses choosing to expand or set up in the state, including Amazon and Toyota. The 220 companies will create some 21,000 new jobs and invest $3.6 billion. The growth has come despite a decrease in the average tax incentives offered by the state to $8,900 from around $37,000 in previous years.
Republicans hold a 26-12 majority in the Michigan Senate and a 64-46 majority in the state House. According to a recent poll by Mitchell Research & Communications for a right-to-work advocacy group, 51% of Michiganders support a right-to-work law while 41% are opposed.
That's important because if a right-to-work law passed the legislature, unions could still try to repeal it on the ballot, as they did this year with the emergency manager law, which let the Governor appoint emergency financial managers who could redo collective-bargaining agreements. By the time a similar fight could be waged against right to work, voters could have had more than a year to see the law's economic benefits.
The AFL-CIO has said that politicians who oppose Big Labor would pay a steep political price, but it's not turning out that way. In Indiana, Republicans picked up nine seats after the right-to-work law passed and lawmakers who made the law a key part of their agenda won by wide margins. If that's the price they pay, Michigan's politicians should be all in.
28 November 2012
Michigan Funds Delayed by Detroit City Counsel
story first appeared on mydesert.com
The Detroit City Council delayed a vote Tuesday on one of two key contracts the state said the city had to approve to avoid going broke by year's end, throwing into question whether the state will release funds Detroit needs to meet payroll and pay other bills in a matter of weeks.
The council also unanimously rejected a four-year, $48-million no-bid contract that Mayor Dave Bing's administration sought for a major overhaul of the city's Department of Water and Sewerage that would have terminated 81% of its workers over five years and outsourced hundreds of jobs.
But it was the delay of the contract for the Miller Canfield law firm that ignited a war of words between Bing's administration and council members, who traded blame for a last-minute decision that put the city's cash flow at risk.
Now the city will not receive the first $10 million that had been set for release Tuesday, according to Bing, who hired the firm to advise him on the city's financial stability agreement with the state.
An angry council President Charles Pugh accused Bing of being disingenuous and forced to accept a deal holding $10 million hostage over the hiring of one company.
It wasn't clear what immediate effect, if any, the delayed vote would have on the city's ability to pay bills, but the stakes were colossal, with the Bing administration warning that Detroit risks a cash shortage of $3 million-$5 million by mid-December.
Caleb Buhs, a spokesman for state Treasurer Andy Dillon, said the actions Detroit must take for the state to release $30 million in bond proceeds held in escrow -- $10 million this week and $20 million in December -- were made clear in an agreement on reform benchmarks that the state and Bing's administration released last week.
Buhs said if the milestones are not completed, the funds will not be released from escrow.
Krystal Crittendon, the city's top lawyer, told the council she could not recommend approving a contract with the Miller Canfield law firm because of concerns such as whether there is a conflict of interest.
Specifically, Crittendon said the $300,000 contract for Miller Canfield could pose a conflict because, she and several council members said, the same firm had a role in the so-called milestone agreement laying out reform benchmarks the city must meet in order to be able to get bond-sale proceeds. The firm also had a hand in crafting Public Act 4, the emergency manager law that voters repealed two weeks ago, and in drafting the financial stability agreement.
The council voted 8-1 to table the contract, with council President Pro Tem Gary Brown the sole vote against the delay.
The city's program management director, William (Kriss) Andrews, who spoke in favor of the contract, left immediately after the vote.
Andrews also said it was he, in negotiation with Dillon's office, who crafted the milestone agreement, and Miller Canfield's only role in it was strictly to write its terms into a legal format, not dictate its content.
The milestone agreement is a series of goals the Snyder administration wants the city to meet in the coming months in exchange for millions from the bonds sale. The governor's office wanted the city to approve a nearly $2-million contract extension for the financial firm Ernst & Young, which the council approved, as well as the Miller Canfield contract. The council also approved a $32-million, five-year contract with Automated Data Processing to help modernize the city's antiquated and costly payroll operations.
The council, meanwhile, had little debate when it rejected the water department's proposed contract with EMA of Minneapolis.
It wasn't clear what would happen next. Water department spokeswoman Mary Alfonso said she had no immediate comment on what steps the department's board would take in the wake of the vote. Bing's office also had no comment.
The Detroit City Council delayed a vote Tuesday on one of two key contracts the state said the city had to approve to avoid going broke by year's end, throwing into question whether the state will release funds Detroit needs to meet payroll and pay other bills in a matter of weeks.
The council also unanimously rejected a four-year, $48-million no-bid contract that Mayor Dave Bing's administration sought for a major overhaul of the city's Department of Water and Sewerage that would have terminated 81% of its workers over five years and outsourced hundreds of jobs.
But it was the delay of the contract for the Miller Canfield law firm that ignited a war of words between Bing's administration and council members, who traded blame for a last-minute decision that put the city's cash flow at risk.
Now the city will not receive the first $10 million that had been set for release Tuesday, according to Bing, who hired the firm to advise him on the city's financial stability agreement with the state.
An angry council President Charles Pugh accused Bing of being disingenuous and forced to accept a deal holding $10 million hostage over the hiring of one company.
It wasn't clear what immediate effect, if any, the delayed vote would have on the city's ability to pay bills, but the stakes were colossal, with the Bing administration warning that Detroit risks a cash shortage of $3 million-$5 million by mid-December.
Caleb Buhs, a spokesman for state Treasurer Andy Dillon, said the actions Detroit must take for the state to release $30 million in bond proceeds held in escrow -- $10 million this week and $20 million in December -- were made clear in an agreement on reform benchmarks that the state and Bing's administration released last week.
Buhs said if the milestones are not completed, the funds will not be released from escrow.
Krystal Crittendon, the city's top lawyer, told the council she could not recommend approving a contract with the Miller Canfield law firm because of concerns such as whether there is a conflict of interest.
Specifically, Crittendon said the $300,000 contract for Miller Canfield could pose a conflict because, she and several council members said, the same firm had a role in the so-called milestone agreement laying out reform benchmarks the city must meet in order to be able to get bond-sale proceeds. The firm also had a hand in crafting Public Act 4, the emergency manager law that voters repealed two weeks ago, and in drafting the financial stability agreement.
The council voted 8-1 to table the contract, with council President Pro Tem Gary Brown the sole vote against the delay.
The city's program management director, William (Kriss) Andrews, who spoke in favor of the contract, left immediately after the vote.
Andrews also said it was he, in negotiation with Dillon's office, who crafted the milestone agreement, and Miller Canfield's only role in it was strictly to write its terms into a legal format, not dictate its content.
The milestone agreement is a series of goals the Snyder administration wants the city to meet in the coming months in exchange for millions from the bonds sale. The governor's office wanted the city to approve a nearly $2-million contract extension for the financial firm Ernst & Young, which the council approved, as well as the Miller Canfield contract. The council also approved a $32-million, five-year contract with Automated Data Processing to help modernize the city's antiquated and costly payroll operations.
The council, meanwhile, had little debate when it rejected the water department's proposed contract with EMA of Minneapolis.
It wasn't clear what would happen next. Water department spokeswoman Mary Alfonso said she had no immediate comment on what steps the department's board would take in the wake of the vote. Bing's office also had no comment.
13 August 2012
Wind Energy in Michigan 'On the Edge of a Cliff'
Story first reported from freep.com
With the auto industry on the verge of collapse in 2008, former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm and other state officials were eager to diversify the economy and create thousands of jobs by making a big push into alternative energy.
To capitalize on the state's strengths, they focused in particular on the manufacturing of parts for wind turbines.
But four years later, the drive to grow a new sector built on clean energy has lost momentum with little to show, the victim of turbulent industry conditions, Washington politics and what some critics would call misguided government policies.
Several high-profile projects have encountered significant delays and have yet to launch full-scale production. They include a manufacturing plant for large wind turbines in Saginaw, a new foundry in Eaton Rapids to make iron parts for wind turbines and an innovative ethanol plant in the Upper Peninsula.
In late June, one of the state's major solar industry players, United Solar Ovonic, was liquidated.
Even some of the wind turbine parts suppliers that have successfully launched production have seen a sharp drop in orders because of uncertainty over whether a production tax credit that expires at the end of December will be renewed. Ventower Industries in Monroe started building giant wind turbine towers late last year in a new factory, but its business would be three times larger if the tax-credit situation was resolved, said Scott Viciana, the company's vice president.
"The wind industry is on the edge of a cliff," said Matt Kaplan, associate director of IHS Emerging Energy Research, a consulting firm in Cambridge, Mass. Although, wind turbine repair companies are doing well compared to manufacturing companies, because repair is less costly than replacement.
He and other experts predict that 2012 will be a record year for the installation of wind turbines as companies rush to take advantage of the tax credit before it ends. On the flip side, however, the number of installations could plummet to record lows next year, Kaplan said.
The tax credit isn't the only headwind facing wind turbine parts manufacturers. Just like in the solar industry, the wind industry has too much production capacity, which is driving turbine prices lower. That's good for the growth of wind energy but puts pricing pressure on turbine parts suppliers. Kaplan forecasts that the industry is on the verge of consolidation.
In Michigan, the alternative energy industry lost a key proponent when Granholm left office at the end of 2010. She tried to transform the state into a manufacturing hub for wind and other renewable-energy industries, providing millions in grants, tax credits and other incentives to entice companies to the state. A team of economic development officials worked to grow green jobs.
Today, Michigan has 35 wind-related manufacturing plants, according to the American Wind Energy Association. In 2010, the state had nearly 80,000 green jobs, which accounted for 2.1% of its total employment, a U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics study found.
The growth of the alternative energy industry has always been dependent on government subsidies. Critics, such as the Mackinac Center in Midland, have long opposed this assistance, arguing that these business ventures should be based on market forces.
Under Gov. Rick Snyder, programs specifically designed to spur the growth of the alternative energy industry no longer exist. The state revamped its economic development strategy with the goal of treating all industries equally.
"We're doing what we can to help all industries in Michigan be competitive," said Steve Bakkal, director of the state's Energy Office. He contends that successful companies will be those that are supplying products for multiple industries, not just wind or solar.
But at the moment, several projects that are trying to break new ground in the alternative energy field have run into difficulties.
Two years ago, Northern Power Systems announced plans to manufacture large wind turbines, something that had never been done in the state. So far, the Vermont-based company has made and sold only two prototypes of its next-generation turbines to a wind farm in the Upper Peninsula.
The uncertainty over the future of the production tax credit has caused customers to delay placing new orders, said Douglas Prince, Northern Power's chief financial officer.
The company's leased facility in Saginaw is "kind of in standby mode right now," Prince said. "We're hopeful the market will recover."
In central Michigan, a plan to make iron parts, which are called castings, for wind turbines at a new foundry in Eaton Rapids has also been delayed. The foundry was supposed to open at the end of 2011, promising lower-cost and higher-quality castings. But it ran into management, financing and other problems.
Eaton Rapids Castings hopes to start production this fall but still needs to find additional investors, said Lennart Johansson, the company's CEO and one of its owners.
To offset the uncertainty in the wind business, the foundry plans to make castings for other industries. It has scaled back its initial production volumes.
To be sure, the outlook isn't completely bleak. A few ventures are making progress, most notably Energetx Composites in Holland. The company, which has nearly 80 employees, won an order to build more than 200 large wind turbine blades for a customer it cannot name, said David Slikkers, Energetx's chairman.
He and other family members saw blade manufacturing as a natural fit because they have been building boats for decades as the owners of S2 Yachts. "We have been composite fabricators for 50 years," Slikkers said.
And near the Port of Monroe, Ventower expects to have built 15 towers for large wind turbines by this fall. It occupies a new factory on a former industrial landfill and has hired 53 employees. But the industry slowdown caused by the tax credit situation is holding back its growth.
"I would have orders booked through the bulk of next year if the tax credit was not an issue," Viciana said.
More Details: Hitting a Green Wall
Here are some of the high-profile alternative-energy business ventures in the state that have shut down or run into significant delays:
* Northern Power Systems' large wind turbine plant: The Saginaw plant has yet to launch production and is operating with a skeleton crew.
* Eaton Rapids Castings: Foundry to make iron parts for large wind turbines in Eaton Rapids has been delayed. It is still trying to get financing.
* United Solar Ovonic: The maker of solar roofing materials filed for bankruptcy in February and sold its assets at the end of June.
* Mascoma's cellulosic ethanol plant near Kinross in the Upper Peninsula: Groundbreaking was supposed to occur this summer. The company says construction will start at year's end after engineering design work is completed, contracts are awarded and financing is finalized.
* Astraeus Wind Energy: In 2010, company announced plans to make spar caps for wind turbine blades in Port Huron. It is still in the testing phase.
* Danotek Motion Technologies: Was supposed to start making generators for large wind turbines last year. The company says production will begin this fall in Canton. It has 28 employees, down from 45 at the end of 2010.
With the auto industry on the verge of collapse in 2008, former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm and other state officials were eager to diversify the economy and create thousands of jobs by making a big push into alternative energy.
To capitalize on the state's strengths, they focused in particular on the manufacturing of parts for wind turbines.
But four years later, the drive to grow a new sector built on clean energy has lost momentum with little to show, the victim of turbulent industry conditions, Washington politics and what some critics would call misguided government policies.
Several high-profile projects have encountered significant delays and have yet to launch full-scale production. They include a manufacturing plant for large wind turbines in Saginaw, a new foundry in Eaton Rapids to make iron parts for wind turbines and an innovative ethanol plant in the Upper Peninsula.
In late June, one of the state's major solar industry players, United Solar Ovonic, was liquidated.
Even some of the wind turbine parts suppliers that have successfully launched production have seen a sharp drop in orders because of uncertainty over whether a production tax credit that expires at the end of December will be renewed. Ventower Industries in Monroe started building giant wind turbine towers late last year in a new factory, but its business would be three times larger if the tax-credit situation was resolved, said Scott Viciana, the company's vice president.
"The wind industry is on the edge of a cliff," said Matt Kaplan, associate director of IHS Emerging Energy Research, a consulting firm in Cambridge, Mass. Although, wind turbine repair companies are doing well compared to manufacturing companies, because repair is less costly than replacement.
He and other experts predict that 2012 will be a record year for the installation of wind turbines as companies rush to take advantage of the tax credit before it ends. On the flip side, however, the number of installations could plummet to record lows next year, Kaplan said.
The tax credit isn't the only headwind facing wind turbine parts manufacturers. Just like in the solar industry, the wind industry has too much production capacity, which is driving turbine prices lower. That's good for the growth of wind energy but puts pricing pressure on turbine parts suppliers. Kaplan forecasts that the industry is on the verge of consolidation.
In Michigan, the alternative energy industry lost a key proponent when Granholm left office at the end of 2010. She tried to transform the state into a manufacturing hub for wind and other renewable-energy industries, providing millions in grants, tax credits and other incentives to entice companies to the state. A team of economic development officials worked to grow green jobs.
Today, Michigan has 35 wind-related manufacturing plants, according to the American Wind Energy Association. In 2010, the state had nearly 80,000 green jobs, which accounted for 2.1% of its total employment, a U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics study found.
The growth of the alternative energy industry has always been dependent on government subsidies. Critics, such as the Mackinac Center in Midland, have long opposed this assistance, arguing that these business ventures should be based on market forces.
Under Gov. Rick Snyder, programs specifically designed to spur the growth of the alternative energy industry no longer exist. The state revamped its economic development strategy with the goal of treating all industries equally.
"We're doing what we can to help all industries in Michigan be competitive," said Steve Bakkal, director of the state's Energy Office. He contends that successful companies will be those that are supplying products for multiple industries, not just wind or solar.
But at the moment, several projects that are trying to break new ground in the alternative energy field have run into difficulties.
Two years ago, Northern Power Systems announced plans to manufacture large wind turbines, something that had never been done in the state. So far, the Vermont-based company has made and sold only two prototypes of its next-generation turbines to a wind farm in the Upper Peninsula.
The uncertainty over the future of the production tax credit has caused customers to delay placing new orders, said Douglas Prince, Northern Power's chief financial officer.
The company's leased facility in Saginaw is "kind of in standby mode right now," Prince said. "We're hopeful the market will recover."
In central Michigan, a plan to make iron parts, which are called castings, for wind turbines at a new foundry in Eaton Rapids has also been delayed. The foundry was supposed to open at the end of 2011, promising lower-cost and higher-quality castings. But it ran into management, financing and other problems.
Eaton Rapids Castings hopes to start production this fall but still needs to find additional investors, said Lennart Johansson, the company's CEO and one of its owners.
To offset the uncertainty in the wind business, the foundry plans to make castings for other industries. It has scaled back its initial production volumes.
To be sure, the outlook isn't completely bleak. A few ventures are making progress, most notably Energetx Composites in Holland. The company, which has nearly 80 employees, won an order to build more than 200 large wind turbine blades for a customer it cannot name, said David Slikkers, Energetx's chairman.
He and other family members saw blade manufacturing as a natural fit because they have been building boats for decades as the owners of S2 Yachts. "We have been composite fabricators for 50 years," Slikkers said.
And near the Port of Monroe, Ventower expects to have built 15 towers for large wind turbines by this fall. It occupies a new factory on a former industrial landfill and has hired 53 employees. But the industry slowdown caused by the tax credit situation is holding back its growth.
"I would have orders booked through the bulk of next year if the tax credit was not an issue," Viciana said.
More Details: Hitting a Green Wall
Here are some of the high-profile alternative-energy business ventures in the state that have shut down or run into significant delays:
* Northern Power Systems' large wind turbine plant: The Saginaw plant has yet to launch production and is operating with a skeleton crew.
* Eaton Rapids Castings: Foundry to make iron parts for large wind turbines in Eaton Rapids has been delayed. It is still trying to get financing.
* United Solar Ovonic: The maker of solar roofing materials filed for bankruptcy in February and sold its assets at the end of June.
* Mascoma's cellulosic ethanol plant near Kinross in the Upper Peninsula: Groundbreaking was supposed to occur this summer. The company says construction will start at year's end after engineering design work is completed, contracts are awarded and financing is finalized.
* Astraeus Wind Energy: In 2010, company announced plans to make spar caps for wind turbine blades in Port Huron. It is still in the testing phase.
* Danotek Motion Technologies: Was supposed to start making generators for large wind turbines last year. The company says production will begin this fall in Canton. It has 28 employees, down from 45 at the end of 2010.
For more national and
worldwide Business News, visit the Peak News Room blog.
For more local and
state of Michigan Business News, visit the Michigan
Business News blog.
For more Health News, visit the Healthcare and Medical
News blog.
For more Electronics News, visit the Electronics
America blog.
For more Real Estate News, visit the Commercial and
Residential Real Estate blog.
For more Law News, visit the Nation of Law blog.
For more Advertising News, visit the Advertising,
Marketing and Media blog.
For more Environmental News, visit the Environmental
Responsibility News blog.
05 June 2012
Class Action Suits Against GM Still Out There
Story first appeared in USA Today.
Q: Are there any securities class-action lawsuits filed on behalf of former General Motors shareholders who lost money from the bankruptcy restructuring?
A: Investors in the company formerly known as Motors Liquidation may feel as though they got run over.
These investors had owned shares of General Motors prior to the massive bankruptcy restructuring proceedings in 2009.
The company underwent the restructuring, then re-emerged as a new company called General Motors. This new company sold shares to the public in 2010, raised more than $16 billion from an initial public offering and was reborn, again, as General Motors (GM).
Investors in the pre-restructuring company formerly known as General Motors saw their shares get delisted and end up trading for pennies on an informal trading marketplace under the name Motors Liquidation.
Some investors in the old General Motors continue to be frustrated by the turn of events. And when investors feel wronged, they are able to turn to the courts.
Investors who want to check to see if any securities action lawsuits have been filed can get quick answers from the Stanford Law School Securities Class Action Clearinghouse. This site aggregates securities class-action lawsuits and helps investors see if a stock they own or owned might be involved in litigation.
Not surprisingly, General Motors has been the subject of several securities class-action lawsuits. The cases have been consolidated into a suit filed on Sept. 19, 2005, called Folksam Asset Management, et al. v. General Motors.
Q: Are there any securities class-action lawsuits filed on behalf of former General Motors shareholders who lost money from the bankruptcy restructuring?
A: Investors in the company formerly known as Motors Liquidation may feel as though they got run over.
These investors had owned shares of General Motors prior to the massive bankruptcy restructuring proceedings in 2009.
The company underwent the restructuring, then re-emerged as a new company called General Motors. This new company sold shares to the public in 2010, raised more than $16 billion from an initial public offering and was reborn, again, as General Motors (GM).
Investors in the pre-restructuring company formerly known as General Motors saw their shares get delisted and end up trading for pennies on an informal trading marketplace under the name Motors Liquidation.
Some investors in the old General Motors continue to be frustrated by the turn of events. And when investors feel wronged, they are able to turn to the courts.
Investors who want to check to see if any securities action lawsuits have been filed can get quick answers from the Stanford Law School Securities Class Action Clearinghouse. This site aggregates securities class-action lawsuits and helps investors see if a stock they own or owned might be involved in litigation.
Not surprisingly, General Motors has been the subject of several securities class-action lawsuits. The cases have been consolidated into a suit filed on Sept. 19, 2005, called Folksam Asset Management, et al. v. General Motors.
For more local and state of Michigan Business News, visit
the Michigan Business News blog.
For more national and worldwide Business News, visit the Peak News
Room blog.
For more Health News, visit the
Healthcare and Medical News blog.
For more Electronics
News, visit the Electronics America blog.
For more Real Estate News,
visit the Commercial and Residential Real Estate blog.
For more Law News,
visit the Nation of Law blog.
For more Advertising
News, visit the Advertising, Marketing and Media blog.
For more Environmental News,
visit the Environmental Responsibility News blog.
For information on website optimization or for the latest SEO News, visit the SEO Done Right
blog.
29 May 2012
Detroit Business is Up
Story first appeared in The Detroit News.
Not since the upbeat days of the Archer administration have so many Metro Detroit business and civic leaders shared so much optimism as they again converge on Mackinac Island for their annual confab, starting today.
Despite serious financial challenges at City Hall, a growing amount of private capital is flowing into the beleaguered city to claim first-mover advantage on the ground floor of a new Detroit. Driving the change is an inter-generational entrepreneurialism that sees business opportunity and the chance to reshape positively the city's battered, undervalued assets.
The conditions are right: The hometown auto industry, on the verge of collapse three years ago, is roaring back with profitable sales driven by innovation, new leaders and lean, competitive operations. The state, led by the Governor, is delivering financial stability and more business-friendly policies just as the auto restructuring is taking hold and the national economy is improving, however slowly.
And Detroit? A looming financial collapse that required still-evolving state intervention promises, if nothing else, to arrest a slide that has been accelerating under the pressure of weak leadership and even weaker financial management. Still, that would be progress.
It is a good chance, anyway, if conditions that the region's business and civic leaders cannot control -- the details of Detroit's financial workout, the economic impact of political instability in the eurozone, the outcome of November's elections at the state and federal levels -- cut the right way and quicken an unmistakable sense of momentum.
The emerging set of players do think differently, in many respects, because they've been entrepreneurial.
The optimism is legitimate, bolstered by the fact that the painful economic decline of Michigan's "lost decade" and the automotive meltdown finally are forging the real structural reform that '90s-era leaders in autos and the city failed to deliver. Instead of fleeing a manifestly troubled and poorly managed city, savvy business is investing heavily in the municipal equivalent of an undervalued stock.
They're also bringing more taxpaying employees into a city desperately in need of them, a critical precondition for reversing Detroit's population flight, bolstering its tax base and attracting new investment in retail and other services.
What gives you confidence now is some of those structural issues are fixed at the autos and are on their way to being fixed at the state.
Investment in Detroit, focused on downtown and Midtown, increasingly is less dependent on do-good philanthropy and what Cullen called "huge levels" of public subsidies. It's important to note these things are more market-driven. Do we need some support in Detroit? Yes, we do. But the gap continues to shrink.
And the evidence mounts:
Two hospital systems -- Detroit Medical Center and Henry Ford Health Systems -- together are spending more than $1.5 billion in their respective Detroit locations. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, among other corporate players, is concentrating its workforce downtown.
Gilbert's Quicken Loans Inc. has acquired nine buildings downtown totaling 2.5 million square feet, spent roughly $250 million on renovations, consolidated 5,000 employees in the city and claimed the role as Detroit's corporate change agent-in-chief. Chrysler Group LLC is opening an office in Gilbert's Dime building, to be renamed "Chrysler House," to house its Great Lakes region sales staff and CEO Sergio Marchionne -- when he's in town.
Downtown office buildings, relics of Detroit's golden age, are being eyed for possible conversion to lofts to satisfy growing demand for rental space. Whole Foods, the trendy Texas-based food retailer, is beginning work on a Midtown store that arguably is as valuable for the statement it makes as the fresh produce it will offer the city.
The list goes on: The Ilitches, owners of the Detroit Tigers and Red Wings, are moving ahead with plans to build a new arena near their Foxtown headquarters -- a development that would make that quarter of the city a year-round hub of professional sports and likely spawn a whole new round of spin-off investment in restaurants, bars and small retail.
People see opportunity, not reasons we shouldn't be doing something. There's enough positive momentum. It really is about building that sense of confidence.
And not growing complacent, a recurring malady in a town -- and state -- that has suffered the hard lessons of arrogance, confrontation and ignoring the competition. There is another way, and it's beginning to unspool in the heart of a city given up for dead.
Not since the upbeat days of the Archer administration have so many Metro Detroit business and civic leaders shared so much optimism as they again converge on Mackinac Island for their annual confab, starting today.
Despite serious financial challenges at City Hall, a growing amount of private capital is flowing into the beleaguered city to claim first-mover advantage on the ground floor of a new Detroit. Driving the change is an inter-generational entrepreneurialism that sees business opportunity and the chance to reshape positively the city's battered, undervalued assets.
The conditions are right: The hometown auto industry, on the verge of collapse three years ago, is roaring back with profitable sales driven by innovation, new leaders and lean, competitive operations. The state, led by the Governor, is delivering financial stability and more business-friendly policies just as the auto restructuring is taking hold and the national economy is improving, however slowly.
And Detroit? A looming financial collapse that required still-evolving state intervention promises, if nothing else, to arrest a slide that has been accelerating under the pressure of weak leadership and even weaker financial management. Still, that would be progress.
It is a good chance, anyway, if conditions that the region's business and civic leaders cannot control -- the details of Detroit's financial workout, the economic impact of political instability in the eurozone, the outcome of November's elections at the state and federal levels -- cut the right way and quicken an unmistakable sense of momentum.
The emerging set of players do think differently, in many respects, because they've been entrepreneurial.
The optimism is legitimate, bolstered by the fact that the painful economic decline of Michigan's "lost decade" and the automotive meltdown finally are forging the real structural reform that '90s-era leaders in autos and the city failed to deliver. Instead of fleeing a manifestly troubled and poorly managed city, savvy business is investing heavily in the municipal equivalent of an undervalued stock.
They're also bringing more taxpaying employees into a city desperately in need of them, a critical precondition for reversing Detroit's population flight, bolstering its tax base and attracting new investment in retail and other services.
What gives you confidence now is some of those structural issues are fixed at the autos and are on their way to being fixed at the state.
Investment in Detroit, focused on downtown and Midtown, increasingly is less dependent on do-good philanthropy and what Cullen called "huge levels" of public subsidies. It's important to note these things are more market-driven. Do we need some support in Detroit? Yes, we do. But the gap continues to shrink.
And the evidence mounts:
Two hospital systems -- Detroit Medical Center and Henry Ford Health Systems -- together are spending more than $1.5 billion in their respective Detroit locations. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, among other corporate players, is concentrating its workforce downtown.
Gilbert's Quicken Loans Inc. has acquired nine buildings downtown totaling 2.5 million square feet, spent roughly $250 million on renovations, consolidated 5,000 employees in the city and claimed the role as Detroit's corporate change agent-in-chief. Chrysler Group LLC is opening an office in Gilbert's Dime building, to be renamed "Chrysler House," to house its Great Lakes region sales staff and CEO Sergio Marchionne -- when he's in town.
Downtown office buildings, relics of Detroit's golden age, are being eyed for possible conversion to lofts to satisfy growing demand for rental space. Whole Foods, the trendy Texas-based food retailer, is beginning work on a Midtown store that arguably is as valuable for the statement it makes as the fresh produce it will offer the city.
The list goes on: The Ilitches, owners of the Detroit Tigers and Red Wings, are moving ahead with plans to build a new arena near their Foxtown headquarters -- a development that would make that quarter of the city a year-round hub of professional sports and likely spawn a whole new round of spin-off investment in restaurants, bars and small retail.
People see opportunity, not reasons we shouldn't be doing something. There's enough positive momentum. It really is about building that sense of confidence.
And not growing complacent, a recurring malady in a town -- and state -- that has suffered the hard lessons of arrogance, confrontation and ignoring the competition. There is another way, and it's beginning to unspool in the heart of a city given up for dead.
For more local and state of Michigan Business News, visit
the Michigan Business News blog.
For more national and worldwide Business News, visit the Peak News
Room blog.
For more Health News, visit the
Healthcare and Medical News blog.
For more Electronics
News, visit the Electronics America blog.
For more Real Estate News,
visit the Commercial and Residential Real Estate blog.
For more Law News,
visit the Nation of Law blog.
For more Advertising
News, visit the Advertising, Marketing and Media blog.
For more Environmental News,
visit the Environmental Responsibility News blog.
For information on website optimization or for the latest SEO News, visit the SEO Done Right
blog.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
