Politics

  HOLLAND - Holland Board of Public Works has been awarded the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality's Neighborhood Environmental Partners Program Award for its commitment to environmental community outreach.   The NEP program recognizes community-based projects and the partners who make them possible, including local units of government, non-profits, and others who work together to

LANSING - If anything about the disputed Pipeline 5 that carries oil and natural gas under the Mackinac Straits suggested it should be replaced, Enbridge Energy would look at the process, executives with the company told reporters on Monday. The executives, who spoke to reporters after meeting with leaders of the state's pipeline task force,

  LANSING - Seniors in the state will have easier access to information about services in their area through a new website launched Monday by the Department of Health and Human Services Aging and Adult Services Agency. Among other services, the site lists contact information for area agencies on aging by county as well as

  LANSING - The effort to win approval of new funding for roads ran into the same old problem Wednesday in the House saw negotiations fall apart with no solution in sight.   Without an agreement to bring aboard a large number of minority Democrats, majority House Republicans tried in vain to build up enough

  LANSING - Michigan's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell to its lowest rate in 14 years in July, 5.3 percent, but the decline had nothing to do with the state adding new jobs during the month because figures showed the state had no net gain in employment last month. The number of unemployed individuals declined

  LANSING - The Michigan Environmental Council and the Natural Resources Defense Council were among numerous environmental interests who said Wednesday that, despite great conversations during the 37-member work group, the Senate's renewable energy portion of its energy policy proposal still falls short of expanding the use of renewable forms of energy.   On top

DETROIT - NextEnergy and RecoveryPark Wednesday announced Light-Speed USA as the winner of NextChallenge: Lighting, a lighting technology competition. Light-Speed USA was awarded $80,000 in cash and in-kind services to support the development and demonstration of a next generation greenhouse lighting technology system for RecoveryPark. "NextEnergy developed NextChallenge: Lighting to source ideas to drive technology

HOUGHTON - Michigan Governor Rick Snyder has appointed Michigan Tech President Glenn Mroz to the board of the Michigan Education Trust. MET is a prepaid college tuition plan that enables families to pre-purchase tuition based on today's tuition rates. The plan then covers the future cost of tuition when the child reaches college. "Glenn has