Skip to content

Oct 30

Warbler_SeeYou V2

DNR dinner spotlights wildlife funding gap

The numbers confirm what we Michiganders know from experience: We love wildlife. Michigan’s 3.2 million wildlife watchers add $1.2 billion to the state economy every year, according to the Department of Natural Resources.

In fact, while hunting and fishing are cornerstones of our state’s outdoor heritage and recreation economy, far more residents pursue wildlife with binoculars or camera than with hook or bullet. A 2011 survey by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found that 39 percent of Michigan residents watched wildlife, compared to 21 percent who hunted or fished.

The DNR aims to tap into that enthusiasm with a Dec. 9 dinner to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Michigan’s Endangered Species Act. The law has been instrumental in protecting and recovering rare species such as the peregrine falcon and Kirtland’s warbler.

More than just a celebration, DNR officials hope the dinner will provide critical funding for the state’s Nongame Fish and Wildlife Trust Fund, which supports management of species that aren’t hunted, trapped or fished, but form the vast majority of Michigan’s web of life. Tickets are $100, with all proceeds benefiting the fund. (Seating is limited, so get your tickets today!)

Karner blue butterfly

Karner blue butterfly.

Many residents may be surprised to learn that, while 80 percent of Michigan species aren’t hunted or trapped, nongame species receive only five percent of the DNR’s wildlife management budget. In 2013, state funding to manage nongame wildlife totaled just under $472,000. (State nongame dollars also help leverage about $1 million a year in federal grants to Michigan.) By comparison, turkey management received $754,000 in state funding, and the Deer Range Improvement Program alone netted nearly $1.5 million. Read more

Sep 26

People's climate march
2 Comments

Historic climate march creates ripples of hope

With the sun setting on the New York City skyline behind us, Bill Latka, a filmmaker and leader of the Traverse City chapter of 350.org, read the following passage over the loudspeaker to the 55 exhausted and exhilarated travelers as we began our 18-hour bus ride home: “Organizing a big march is like throwing a rock in a pond: the splash is exciting, but the real beauty is in the ripples.” It was written by one of the organizers of the People’s Climate March, and it rings so true.

The march was exciting, and it was the kind of big splash that can turn the tide of a movement. There were more than 400,000 people marching through the streets of New York. There were so many people that we filled a city street for four miles. There were so many people that those of us in the middle of the pack didn’t even start marching until two hours after the march had begun.

The march was led by indigenous people and frontline communities—the people first- and most-impacted by climate change. Joining them were New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon, former Vice President Al Gore, and celebrities like Leonardo DiCaprio. Filling the streets were parents with babies, elementary school classes, senior citizens, marching bands, artists, and 50,000 college students. There were people from all over the world and the U.S., including six busloads of people from Michigan. This really was a people’s march.

Kate and Elizabeth

Elizabeth Dell of the Citizens Climate Lobby (left) and MEC's Kate Madigan.

On my bus were physicians, teachers, parents, store clerks, retired couples and college students. We chose to sleep two consecutive nights on a bus because we had to get back to our jobs, classes, and young children. It wasn’t easy, but it was worth it.
Read more

Sep 19

3312904946_f3edd552b2_z
1 Comment

Friday linkaround: Big trees, buses and Ban Ki-moon

With lawmakers back in town following their summer break, the pace of things is picking up here in Lansing.

That said, none of what you’re about to read has much to do with the legislature. Still, we think they’re important stories to keep an eye on, and we hope you enjoy digging into them. Thanks for reading!

Here’s your Friday linkaround:

Bus stop swap. We learned recently that Detroit Metropolitan Airport is planning to change the boarding location for SMART and AirRide, the two public transportation providers that serve the airport. The buses now drop passengers curbside at the McNamara Terminal, but the new location—shared by cabs, charter buses and several shuttle services—is some 500 feet from the terminal, according to MLive. Our colleagues from Trans4M rode a bus to both the current and proposed boarding sites on Monday, along with a transit advocate who uses a wheelchair. As detailed in a blog post, they came away with concerns about how the change would affect passengers, particularly those with disabilities.

We testified and submitted written comments Thursday at meetings of the State Transportation Commission and the Wayne County Airport Authority, requesting that plans to change the boarding location be put on hold pending more public outreach and discussion. Stay tuned for more on this issue.

Latest on Enbridge. There has been interesting news lately about the Enbridge pipelines that carry 23 million gallons of oil a day through the Straits of Mackinac. Read more

Sep 11

9181898422_7b745c994d_z
1 Comment

For a more competitive Michigan, lawmakers must expand civil rights law

Everything we do at the Michigan Environmental Council is guided by our vision of a brighter future for our state. We work every day toward a healthy state powered by clean, renewable fuels; known for an irresistible mix of bustling urban areas and unspoiled wild places; connected by convenient buses, trains and trails; and defined by clean, abundant fresh water.

While a cleaner, healthier environment is a key feature of the future Michigan we envision, that future also will provide greater economic opportunities for residents across the state by creating the kinds of communities young professionals flock to.

So, though environmental protection is MEC’s focus, we occasionally feel compelled to speak up when something outside our usual purview threatens the thriving Michigan we’re trying to build. That’s why we’re urging lawmakers to correct Michigan’s failure to protect the basic rights of all residents.

Surprisingly, current law allows Michigan residents to be fired, passed over in hiring or denied housing based on their gender identity or sexual orientation.

That our state still permits such discrimination is, frankly, embarrassing. It’s also out of step with what Michiganders value.  Polling shows three-quarters of Michigan residents and 60 percent of small business owners support amending the state’s Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act to outlaw those practices.

Legislators should heed calls from the Michigan Competitive Workforce Coalition to amend Elliott-Larsen—which prohibits workplace discrimination against anyone based on their religion, race, color, national origin, age, sex, height, weight, familial status or marital status—to include sexual orientation and gender identity. Read more

Sep 5

IMG_0845
1 Comment

Three key issues to watch as lawmakers return to Lansing

When the leaves begin to turn colors each autumn, the wardrobe around the MEC offices also undergoes an unmistakable change.

Friends, the glorious days of t-shirts, jeans and flip-flops are coming to an end. Now begins the season of the necktie. The Legislature is coming back to town.

Our summer dress may have been casual, but we’ve been working hard behind the scenes on issues we expect to make some waves in the next few months. There’s no time to waste; lawmakers will only be in session for nine days in September, three days in October and a smattering of lame-duck days after the November election.

Some of the fall’s meatiest environmental debates will be hammered out quietly through the administrative rulemaking process, not in the Legislature. And what follows certainly isn’t the only important legislation that will see action in the House and Senate chambers. But for our money, here are a few of the most interesting issues to watch in the new legislative session that begins Tuesday.

Oil and gas.

As oil and gas operations have moved beyond rural parts of the state to more populous residential areas, citizens have begun organizing to call for greater local control over drilling regulations.

A crowd of those advocates will greet lawmakers on their first day back in Lansing. The rally is in support of legislation introduced by a pair of Republican state senators from Macomb County—Jack Brandenburg and Tory Rocca—that would restrict drilling in townships with more than 70,000 residents. Read more

Aug 28

Mackinac Bridge

Labor Day Bridge Walk is an opportunity for action on Straits oil pipeline

Gov. Rick Snyder will lead about 40,000 people on a five-mile walk across the Mackinac Bridge on Monday, continuing a 57-year old Labor Day tradition.

Also on Monday—as happens every day—23 million gallons of crude oil will cross the Straits of Mackinac just west of the bridge, through a pair of pipelines a couple hundred feet below the surface.

The pipelines are older than the Bridge Walk tradition. They were installed in 1953, the first year of Dwight D. Eisenhower’s presidency, when Patti Page’s “The Doggie in the Window” topped Billboard charts and the U.S. Supreme Court was deliberating whether public school segregation was constitutional.

The kids were crazy for this sort of thing when the Straits oil pipelines were installed.

They are owned by Enbridge, the Canadian company responsible for the worst inland oil spill in U.S. history - the 2010 spill of about a million gallons of tar sands oil into the Kalamazoo River, which is still being cleaned up. The Straits pipelines are older than the one that ruptured in the Kalamazoo spill, but Enbridge has made public very little information on their condition. In July, the state notified Enbridge it needed additional support structures to comply with state regulations.

Enbridge was responsible for more than 1,000 oil spills in the U.S and Canada between 1999 and 2013.

MEC and other groups from the Oil & Water Don’t Mix campaign will be at the Bridge Walk to gather signatures from participants on a petition urging Gov. Snyder to protect the Great Lakes from a disastrous oil spill. (Signing the petition is quick and easy; click here.) We’re asking the governor to immediately open a transparent, public process under the Great Lakes Submerged Lands Act to evaluate the threat posed by the pipelines and determine what actions should be taken to prevent a catastrophe. Read more

Aug 14

3751695202_389a5028ee_z
2 Comments

Lifelong Detroiter cautiously optimistic about Belle Isle

Editor’s note: This week the Detroit Free Press ran a story and an editorial providing a checkup on Belle Isle six months after the state assumed control of the park.

As it happened, Sandra Turner-Handy—MEC’s community outreach director and a lifelong Detroiter—visited the island over the weekend for the first time since management by the Department of Natural Resources began. Here is her own assessment of Michigan’s newest state park.

***

Having grown up literally across the street, Belle Isle was my neighborhood playground as a child. My brothers and sisters and I walked across Jefferson Avenue and enjoyed the two-seat bikes, canoes, pony rides and zoo.

As I grew older and moved to a different part of Detroit, Belle Isle became the spot for family picnics on Saturdays. We stayed late into the evening to see the lights on the Scott Fountain change colors. Belle Isle was also the after-church spot, where we enjoyed ice cream treats from an island vendor. And as a teenager it was the dating spot with its beach, tennis courts, baseball diamonds, canoe rides and forest.

That slowly changed as the park lost its amenities and became overrun with trash, loud music and fights. For years I only went to the park for special events, and only in the daytime.

Last Saturday I went back to Belle Isle for the first time since the state took over in February. Because my family settled near the island after coming north from Tennessee in the early 1900s, it made sense to hold our family reunion picnic there. Read more

Aug 8

Fishing UP river
1 Comment

Friday linkaround: Algae, transit, birds and fly-fishing

Welcome to the weekend!

Whatever you have planned, it looks like the weather will be fantastic. Plus, meteors! Before you ask the boss if you can leave early, take a minute to review a few of the environmental stories that caught our eye this week.

Algae. The biggest environmental story in a while, of course, was Toledo’s drinking water crisis. The week began with Mayor D. Michael Collins toasting the half-million people—including some southeast Michigan residents—who endured a weekend without usable tap water after the city’s water supply was contaminated with toxic blue-green algae.

The algae blooms are nothing new, and by now most of us know the story:  Fed by excess phosphorus, they plagued Lake Erie in the 1960s and ‘70s but largely disappeared after public outcry led to sewage treatment upgrades and restrictions on phosphorus in detergents. In recent years, though, the blooms have again become an unwelcome annual visitor. Read more

Aug 1

True leaders needed to make new Michigan Dream a reality

John Austin and the Michigan Economic Center at Prima Civitas (a new and exciting player in Lansing policy discussions that we jokingly refer to around here as the “other MEC”) recently launched the new “Michigan Dream At Risk” project that’s worth a look. In short, it showcases in images, words and numbers the uncomfortable but unsurprising reality of Michigan’s perpetually beleaguered economy.

Using Michigan’s historic and current state and local budget allocations as proxies for priorities, the Michigan Dream at Risk project’s narrative and four-minute video intro highlight our shared shame—potholed roads and shuttered storefronts, struggling families and failing schools—and prescribe a healthy dose of investment in a few critical areas: education, infrastructure and community services, a clean environment, etc.

Coupled with the new “State Policies Matter” report and accompanying “Tale of Two States” blog series from the team at Michigan Future, Inc., a clear case is made for increasing investment in public goods, rather than cutting our way to prosperity.

The problem is that Michigan voters rarely face that kind of clear-cut choice, and our elected leaders seem unwilling to raise revenue themselves. Instead, we get convoluted ballot initiatives like Proposal 1, in which funding is provided for our communities but only if businesses get (more) tax breaks and the actual revenue burden gets shifted (again) into an unknown future. Or for an even more frustrating example, look at the failure of transportation funding initiatives; despite polling with broad support, the issue of raising the basic revenues needed to fix our existing roads gets tied up in knots in the Legislature and goes nowhere – not even to the ballot. The roads stay the same: bad.

Anyone who watches the news—here or anywhere in the country—knows some version of Michigan’s economic and social struggles. Our decades-long fall from grace is a narrative with easy and all-too memorable icons: Big 3 bailouts, bankrupt Detroit, etc., etc.

But Michigan residents are ready to move out of the past. And we need to put some new icons on the map to do it. Read more

Jul 24

Photo: Logan Chadde
2 Comments

5 reasons Michigan utilities should give us solar

The Michigan Public Service Commission recently issued a report summarizing the work of a group assembled to find ways to deploy more solar power in Michigan. The report offers possibilities for expanding the small programs offered by Michigan’s two biggest utilities for customers who want to generate solar power at home, but it doesn’t compel the utilities to take any action.

However, the commission any day will issue an order on Consumers Energy’s plans for renewable power – one that could have some legal teeth. MEC and other allies are urging the commission to use the opportunity to order Consumers and DTE Energy to expand their solar offerings.

If you support clean solar power for Michigan, we urge you to share your thoughts with the commission and the utilities. It’s quick and easy – just fill out this very brief form.

And if you need some convincing, below are the top five reasons—and there are many others not listed here—why it’s so important that Michigan’s two biggest utilities expand their solar power programs.

  1. We’ve already paid for it. DTE and Consumers together are sitting on about $26 million in surcharges they’ve already collected from Michigan customers. That’s because they overestimated the cost of developing renewable energy projects. Read more
Page 8 of 18« First...678910...Last »