A welfare recipient in Flint is four times more likely to be kicked off cash assistance next month than a welfare recipient in bucolic Luce County — even though the Upper Peninsula county has a higher poverty rate. In rural northern Lake County, 36 percent of children lived below the poverty threshold, the highest rate […]
Cuts don't fall evenly across Michigan
Posted inMichigan Government
What will they do?
More than 11,000 families will be banned from cash assistance next month, in the biggest one-day dumping of welfare recipients in the state’s – and possibly the nation’s – history. Will those families blend into the work force? Will they lose their homes? Will they find help from charities, churches and nonprofits? Over the next […]
Posted inMichigan Government
Rep to recipients: 'Man up' and feed family
State Rep. Ken Horn, R-Frankenmuth, tried for four years to reform Michigan’s welfare system for cash assistance. On his fifth try, bolstered by the solid Republican majorities in the House and Senate and a Republican governor brought in via the 2010 elections, Horn shepherded a massive reform effort into law. The keystone of that reform […]
Posted inMichigan Government
You want police and trash service, right?
The news remains grim on the financial front for Michigan local governments. More survey data from local officials reported by the Center for Local, State and Urban Policy at U-M find Michigan’s city, township and village governments are still being battered by a confluence of negative trends: 1. Declining state aid due to political decisions […]
Posted inQuality of Life
Detroit is, indeed, 'rising'
For the longest time, I have opened my morning paper only to find some negative articles about the city of Detroit. Indeed, these bearers of bad news heralded the city as the fattest, the angriest, the most crime-ridden, and, yes, even the city with the most STDs. My morning ritual of reading the negative press […]
Posted inLand O Links
Land O Links
“Knowledge is the treasure of a wise man” — William Penn, founder of the colony of Pennsylvania, and the ultimate cause of many incorrect answers on grammar-school spelling exams. * More worries from local government leaders about their finances if Gov. Rick Snyder and allies in the Legislature engineer a repeal of the personal property […]
Posted inBusiness Watch
How 'flushed' is your hometown?
In May 2010, in the teeth of the worst Michigan economy in a generation, Fortune Magazine came to Grand Rapids to proclaim, “A Michigan Success Story.” Grand Rapidians have much to point to with optimism and pride, from the construction on “Hospital Hill” to the revitalization of its downtown. But there’s more to the story. A Bridge […]
Posted inBusiness Watch
U.P. escapes property value fall
The Upper Peninsula stands above the rest of Michigan on the map — and above the rest of the state when it comes to property value trends. From 2007-11, nine of the top 10 counties seeing a percentage increase in property value (residential, commercial and industrial) came from the part of Michigan north of the […]
Posted inBusiness Watch
SW Michigan: 'Best of both worlds'
Beaches, festivals and farms are luring Marian Cioe from the streets of Chicago to Michigan’s southwestern shore. Forty-five years after first visiting Southwest Michigan on a business trip, the 66-year-old nurse plans to “live happily ever after” in the Great Lakes State. Cioe is just part of a real estate trend that has set Southwest […]
Posted inPhil's Column
Two movements, one core
To most observers, the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street movements could not be more different. The right-of-center Tea Party tends to be tightly focused on taxes and the size and intrusiveness of government. And it has been steadily growing in power, driving its parent Republican Party to the right. It’s a movement with […]
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