The Ann Arbor chapter of the League of Women Voters sponsors candidate debates each election cycle for City Council races. On October 5, 2011, the League gave Third Ward Democrat Stephen Kunselman the chance to strut his political stuff against Republican opponent David Parker. Parker and Kunselman tackled questions about the proposed street millage renewal, the [...]
To hear the various members of the Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners (BOC) tell it, various commissioners have at various times over the past four months: 1. Tried desperately to get rid of per diems (and failed). 2. Voted against getting rid of per diems because, well, there are “financial controls” in place now to [...]
Ann Arbor city staff are always sniffing around for grant money. It’s part of the job for many of them, and we benefit from their hard work. However, it matters where money comes from just as much as it matters where we spend our money. The 2006 film “Blood Diamond” showed quite clearly the connections [...]
I was at the chiropractor not too long ago, and when she walked into the room and groaned I thought she needed an adjustment more than I did. As it turns out, she had just received her letter of renewal from her company’s health insurance provider (Blue Care Network) and learned that insurance rates for [...]
Someone on the Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners (BOC) tried to garrote Commissioner Kristin Judge. I wrote about the sloppy attempt to off the Pittsfield Democrat here. Since one of the emails leaked to Judge’s Republican opponent was sent to Commissioner Barbara Levin Bergman alone, it appears as if Democrat Bergman is a suspect in [...]
Someone on the Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners is trying to off Democratic Commissioner Kristin Judge. The culprit leaked emails Judge sent to a colleague on the BOC to Judge’s Republican opponent. Sean Gray, a high school teacher with, what appears to be, the moral compass and political savvy of a teenager, took the emails [...]
The Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners race for the District 11 seat vacated by 53rd District State Representative-elect Jeff Irwin was, it turns out, more interesting and more instructional than even the two vote margin between the winning and losing candidates would indicate. University of Michigan student Yousef Rabhi beat a man 40 years his [...]
Dr. Michelle Rhee, Chancellor of the Washington, DC public school system for the past three years, is once again in the news. If you’ve never heard of Rhee, have no fear, I’ll catch you up. Michelle Rhee is a heretic, an educator who believes that public schools exist to educate our children, rather than provide [...]
When Google rode into town promising to create 1,000 jobs by 2011, Mayor and Council responded to the racy proposition by taking over $2 million dollars from the city’s already stretched General Fund and creating a new fund called the Economic Development Fund. It should have been called the Rob Peter to Give Away Money [...]
There have been political battles involving The Moravian since B.C. 60. Seriously. Hapsburgs figure prominently in this history, as does Milan Kundera. Here in Ann Arbor, The Moravian PUD went down in flames early this morning with very few of the young professionals (YPs) and students in attendance whom developers Jeff Helminski and Newcombe Clark [...]
