Sarah Nicholls said she observes an odd phenomenon every time she takes a flight from her native England to Detroit’s Metro Airport. “The vast majority of people coming from England are making connections in Detroit — very few are staying in Detroit,” said Nicholls, a tourism expert and associate professor at Michigan State University. Nicholls […]
Detroit
Posted inBusiness Watch
Whole Foods exec sees opportunity in Detroit’s urban farming, artisanal food scene
Red Elk Banks, executive operations coordinator for Whole Foods Market, is playing a role in one of the bright spots in Detroit’s tumultuous recent history – overseeing the construction of a Whole Foods Market in the city’s Midtown neighborhood. Detroit has long been (wrongly) perceived as a “food desert” for its lack of any national-chain […]
Posted inGuest Commentary
Guest column: Science ed in Detroit has too high a price
By Kurt Metzger/Data Driven Detroit Detroit area businessman and philanthropist Dexter Ferry founded the Detroit Science Center in 1970. In 1978, the DSC moved to its current facility in Midtown at the corner of John R and Warren, adjacent to the Detroit Institute of Arts and Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History. The […]
Posted inQuality of Life
Detroit group rallies to convert historic townhouses from crime haven to community hub
This slice of Detroit’s North Corktown neighborhood once enjoyed pleasant streets and good neighbors – that is, until a townhouse complex took a wrong turn and jeopardized the safety of the entire community. So says Jon Koller, who took it upon himself to turn around Spaulding Court and, by extension, the neighborhood it serves. Koller, […]
Posted inSuccess
Filmmaker grows ‘antidote’ to ‘ruin porn’ craze
If Detroit were an actor walking a Hollywood red carpet, it would be having a hot year. Two feature-length documentary films, “Detropia” and “Burn,” have gathered national attention for their looks at the deteriorating – and recovering – metropolis, with critics marveling at Detroit’s eye-popping vistas of decay and tarnished grandeur. But to independent filmmaker […]
Posted inBusiness Watch
From light rail to neighborhood rehab, Kresge Foundation pours money, attention into Detroit
Rip Rapson became president of the $3.1 billion Kresge Foundation in 2006. He has since changed the foundation’s focus from providing challenge grants that support building projects in local communities to program-related investments in seven areas, including community development, education, health and human services. Kresge also has taken a high-profile role in the revitalization of […]
Posted inLand O Links
Land O Links
* Regardless of where you stand on gun control, isn’t it always better to do the actual research on an issue? “Now, a huge problem when delving into gun safety research, as I wrote about in July, is that Congress has suppressed, and in some cases explicitly outlawed, the use of government funds to research gun […]
Posted inBusiness Watch
Michigan metros see income boost
Personal income rose in 2011 in all of the nation’s 366 metropolitan statistical areas for the first time since 2007, according to estimates released by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. When adjusted for inflation, however, 44 metros actually experienced income loss. Leading the pack were the Odessa and Midland metros, both in Texas, showing […]
Posted inTalent & Education
Land O Links
* The Nation rounds up data on why U.S. children struggle in comparisons with youth in other industrialized nations: “In one long-term study of roughly 200 children born into poverty in Minnesota, the quality of the mother-child relationship during the first three and a half years of life strongly predicted whether the child would drop […]
Posted inPhil's Column
Legislature poised to act on Right to Work
The Legislature opened its 2012 “lame duck” session this week. Where’s that phrase come from, anyway? Well, it was first used as a down-on-his-luck stockbroker, since an injured duck who cannot keep up with the flock is an easy target for predators. In the political world, lame ducks are something else again: Officeholders who were […]
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