Tracy Samilton
Energy and Transportation Reporter / ProducerTracy Samilton covers energy and transportation, including the auto industry and the business response to climate change for Michigan Public. She began her career at Michigan Public as an intern, where she was promptly “bitten by the radio bug,” and never recovered.
She took over the auto beat in January, 2009, just a few months before Chrysler and General Motors filed for bankruptcy.
Tracy’s reports can frequently be heard on Morning Edition and All Things Considered, as well as on Michigan Public.
Her coverage of Michigan’s Detroit Three automakers has taken her as far as Germany, and China. Tracy graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in English Literature.
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Facing fiscal crisis, Ann Arbor Public Schools plans cuts, offers Jazz Parks superintendent positionAnn Arbor Public Schools must submit a plan cutting $25 million from its budget to the state by April 15. That urgency was evident in the decision by the district's board of education to offer its superintendent position to current Interim Superintendent Jazz Parks.
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Bills introduced in the state Senate would allow public scrutiny of the Michigan Catastrophic Claims Association — the insurance-run group that manages payments for medical treatment for the most severe and costly car crash injuries.
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The Oakland County trial of James Crumbley has ended with convictions on four counts of involuntary manslaughter. But how was this trial different from Jennifer Crumbley's?
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James Crumbley, the father of the Oxford High School shooter, faces four charges of involuntary manslaughter and four charges of gross negligence, in a trial that began Thursday.
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SB 275 would set a state standard for the amount of carbon permitted in a unit of transportation fuel — and allow companies that exceed the standard to generate and sell credits to companies that don't meet the standard. The Sierra Club of Michigan says it does not support the bill as written because it could inadvertently increase emissions and accelerate environmental damage from ethanol production.
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The number of elections changes stemming from the passage of 2022's Proposal 2 have caused headaches and overtime among township, city, and county clerks.
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An annual report by the County Road Association of Michigan says road commissions in the state face an underfunding problem of $2.4 billion.
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Ann Arbor's city council is working on what it calls a "Sustainable Energy Utility," which would operate as a clean-energy supplement to DTE's electricity.
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Environmental groups are calling a carbon offset credit program available to DTE residential customers a marketing ploy, that offers only an illusion of reducing emissions from gas use in their homes. The utility defends the pilot project as one of many ways it's reducing carbon emissions.
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A now-shuttered metal plating company contaminated a drain in Macomb County last week, and a closed steel plant left corrosive chemicals in puddles in Wayne County. The incidents are leading to renewed calls for the state Legislature to pass recently introduced Polluter Pay bills.