News

People living in homes owned by the Detroit Land Bank Authority should get a chance to buy them back.

That’s the message from the Tricycle Collective, a group that’s been helping Detroit families facing tax foreclosure.

Wednesday is a crucial deadline for city of Detroit retirees.

It’s the last day to file applications for help from a state-backed income stabilization fund.

That fund is meant to help pensioners pushed into or near poverty by cuts made during the city’s restructuring in bankruptcy.

Governor Rick Snyder has signed legislation that forbids athletes at public universities in Michigan from organizing a union. It was one of 17 bills signed today by the governor.

The university athlete bill is an effort to preempt what happened at Northwestern University in Illinois, where football players at the private college voted last spring to form a union. There was no known similar effort at a Michigan university.

Jim Harbaugh displayed a ready wit, apologized for some past mistakes, and refused to guarantee a win over Ohio State at his first press conference as head coach for the University of Michigan football program.

The former San Francisco 49ers head coach and U of M star quarterback says he's dreamed about the job ever since he was a ball boy for the team, who once sat down at Bo Schembechler's desk and put his feet up on it.

Now the coach's desk – and team – are his.

Governor Rick Snyder may soon approve a commission to review the state’s criminal justice policies.

Advocates say the state needlessly warehouses some inmates who would not threaten public safety if released. They say that’s a major reason Michigan spends $2 billion a year on its corrections system.

The commission would make recommendations to the Legislature on ways to safely reform the state’s criminal justice system.

There’s been a spike in the number of people going to the emergency room with flu like symptoms in Kent County.

Brian Hartl is an epidemiologist with the Kent County Health Department.

He says nearly 17% of people coming into the emergency room in the last week reported symptoms of flu-like illness.

Jim Harbaugh will be the next coach of the University of Michigan football team.

UM Interim Athletic Director Jim Hackett made the announcement at a packed press conference in Ann Arbor.

Harbaugh will be paid roughly $5 million a year, plus incentives, over an eight-year contract.

Ring in the New Year with a bell, not a bang.

That’s the message of a campaign to discourage Detroit’s unofficial tradition of celebratory New Year’s gunfire.

The Reverend Nicholas Hood III has spearheaded the campaign since 1997, when a Detroit woman, Sandra Latham, was killed by a stray gunshot.

There’s no real data on the subject, but Hood says there’s some evidence the campaign has worked.

When former Supreme Court Justice Maura Corrigan took the job as head of Michigan's Department of Human Services in 2011, she made it clear she would only serve for four years. Her time is up and she's stepping down Jan. 1. 

DHS is responsible for serving some of Michigan’s most vulnerable citizens. The agency is in charge of foster care, food assistance for Michigan’s hungry, welfare benefits, and child care licensing, among other things.

Director Corrigan has been widely credited for making strides on improving the child welfare system during her tenure. That system is still under federal court oversight assigned in 2008, but the state has asked a judge to re-examine that status. 

Chris Wahmhoff spent hours inside a pipeline under construction in June 2013. He was part of a protest against the construction of a new pipeline across Michigan. While the other protestors eventually left, Wahmhoff spent several hours inside the pipeline, shutting down work for the day.

The Enbridge line was constructed to replace the one that burst near Marshall in 2010, spilling more than a million gallons of oil into the Kalamazoo River. The new pipe is now operating.

He could’ve gotten up to two years in jail for trespassing and resisting police.

LANSING – Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder has signed legislation to take $5.5 million from a state autism fund and redirect it to autism programs at universities and for autism-related family assistance services.  The fund was created in 2012 to reimburse health insurance companies for the cost of benefits covering the diagnosis and treatment of autism spectrum disorders. But insurers haven't filed nearly as many claims as expected. 

Western Michigan University will receive $3 million, while Central Michigan and Oakland universities will continue getting $500,000 apiece.

Gov. Rick Snyder is still interested in passing legislation to increase state intervention in schools with financial troubles.

The plan was one of Snyder’s education goals in 2014. It would increase reporting requirements for schools that risk going into budget deficit. It would also make it easier for the state to assign an emergency manager if districts don’t follow through on promises to get their books in order.

A set of companion bills would have also opened up more money in state grants and loans for eligible schools.

Gov. Rick Snyder has vetoed legislation that would have relaxed restrictions on guns that use air-power to shoot pellets, BBs, paintballs, and other projectiles.

The legislation was supported by the NRA and gun rights groups, but opposed by many local government officials who would have lost a lot of authority to regulate air guns within their borders.

The NRA says Michigan is one of only four states that classify air guns as firearms.

Gov. Snyder says he vetoed the bills because they were part of an incomplete package of legislation. He says they would have changed the definition of what a firearm is in some state laws, but leave them untouched in others.

Four years ago, Michigan changed the way it competes with other states in order to capture new business investment and jobs.

State officials say the changes appear to be working. 

More than a dozen new laws take effect next year which should speed up the child support process in Michigan.

The State of Michigan collects more than a billion dollars a year in child support.

Gov. Rick Snyder will soon consider a bill that could make public records cheaper and easier to obtain.

Proponents have long claimed some agencies that are subject to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) charge exorbitant fees to process requests for public records. They claim the goal is to discourage people from trying to obtain those documents.

Most Michigan patients should be able to access primary care doctors - even though the Affordable Care Act means more people are likely looking for appointments.

Nine out of ten Michigan primary care doctors say they have capacity for new patients. And almost two-thirds say they are accepting new Medicaid patients.  That's according to a 2014 survey conducted by the Center for Healthcare Research & Transformation.

An environmental activist learns tomorrow if he’ll spend time in jail for a protest that had him spend time in an unfinished pipeline. 

Christopher Wahmhoff spent 10 hours in a pipeline in June 2013.

LANSING, Mich. (AP) - Detroit's Democratic mayor will serve as master of ceremonies for the inauguration of Republican Gov. Rick Snyder and Lt. Gov. Brian Calley in Lansing.

  Mayor Mike Duggan joins Snyder and Calley Jan. 1 at the Capitol. Snyder said in a news release that Duggan "has been a great partner in the effort to reinvent" the state and city.

Michigan’s agriculture industry may benefit from an opening of diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Cuba.

Earlier this month, President Obama announced the U.S. would reestablish diplomatic relations with Cuba. The decision is a step in the direction that may end with the lifting of a trade embargo with Cuba.  

There are still many steps before the embargo is lifted.  But people are already planning for that day.   

With snowfall in much of Michigan in November, ski areas got an early start to the season.

“When it’s cold and snowy people go into the retail stores and buy things. So the retail sales were up early this year and our ski areas were able to open early. So yes it was a real, real good start,” said Mickey MacWilliams, executive director of the Michigan Snowsports Industries Association.

She says there are a little more than 100 days, on average, that Michigan ski areas are open each winter. 

Michigan ski areas have been investing to make improvements on the slopes.

HARBOR SPRINGS, Mich. (AP) - An anonymous donor has helped a northern Michigan conservancy buy a large, undeveloped stretch of Lake Michigan shoreline.

The Petoskey News-Review reports this week that the Little Traverse Conservancy has closed on the deal that includes roughly 2,400 feet of shoreline between Harbor Springs and Cross Village in the northwestern Lower Peninsula.

LANSING, Mich. (AP) - Changes in how doctors are paid for treating some injured employees covered by workers' compensation are expected to address the long-term use of pain relievers and help cut medical costs for Michigan job providers.

The Michigan Workers' Compensation Agency says the new rules prevent reimbursements for opioid treatment beyond 90 days for non-cancer related chronic pain unless physicians meet detailed reporting requirements.

Michigan’s largest utility wants to raise rates next year.

DTE Energy has filed a request with the Michigan Public Service Commission to gather another $370 million a year in revenues from its more than 2 million customers in southeast Michigan.

It was a record year for recalls in 2014.  But that didn't appear to hamper new car sales in the slightest.

Analysts expect 16.4 million in car sales for the year.

Governor Rick Snyder has signed a measure to set up a three-county pilot project to try out suspicion-based drug testing of people who apply for welfare benefits.

Snyder says the testing would only occur in cases where there’s a reasonable suspicion of drug use. The governor says people who test positive the first time will be directed to a treatment program without losing benefits.

The American Civil Liberties Union is taking the side of Christian evangelists in a free speech case at a federal appeals court.

The ACLU's Michigan branch says the rights of a group called Bible Believers were violated during a violent clash at an Arab-American street festival in Dearborn in 2012.

2015 may be another slow growth year for Michigan’s housing industry.

A few years ago, as home sales slowly started to recover from the depths of the Great Recession, analysts were predicting a return to strong housing sales by 2015. 

Now that 2015 is a week away, those expectations are not quite as high.