LANSING ? Michigan government agencies are developing contingency plans, in case the state employee unions decline to reopen their contracts for the coming fiscal year, which could involve layoffs, officials said Wednesday. It would take some 2,500 layoffs to reach the $265 million gross, $145 million general fund, which has been designated as cuts from
LANSING - The Michigan Economic Growth Authority Tuesday approved four brownfield redevelopment projects, a High Technology MEGA tax credit for a company choosing to locate in Michigan and amended several prior agreements that could generate $198.2 million in new investment and create 1,142 job. ?Today?s actions will help transform blighted, contaminated or functionally obsolete properties
LANSING - Vibrant ethnic communities are idea and jobs makers, Governor Rick Snyder said Monday in a major speech outlining his goal that the state embrace the immigrant population. Michigan can look at its industrial past to learn about the large role immigrants played in the state's last major reinvention, Snyder said, and that can
LANSING - After months of wondering whether their party would be able to mount a credible challenge to Democratic U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow in 2012, Republicans exulted Tuesday with the news that former U.S. Rep. Peter Hoekstra has changed his mind and will run. No official word came from Hoekstra or anyone on his behalf,
LANSING - While the economy remains tough across the state, a growing number of Michigan's small-and mid-sized business owners believe things are beginning to move in the right direction, according to a recent survey. The survey further indicated that Michigan business owners are expressing less concern over the challenges they have been facing that impact
LANSING - The headlines have been written about the federal government allocating hundreds of millions of dollars to support a high-speed passenger rail line between Detroit and Chicago, but residents won't see that speedy service until the state wraps up negotiations with Norfolk Southern, which owns most of the rail line Amtrak uses. Amtrak's Wolverine
LANSING - The Michigan legislative redistricting map is almost on the desk of Governor Rick Snyder, but the head of the Eastside Republican Club is joining with Rep. Tim Bledsoe (D-Grosse Pointe) to protest the lines. Under the new map, Grosse Pointe Shores and Grosse Pointe Woods would fall under the 1st House District, while
LANSING - Governor Rick Snyder supports the basic thrust of a letter from the National Governors Association urging federal budget negotiations not to transfer additional costs in the Medicaid program to the states. In a letter to President Barack Obama and congressional leaders as they attempt to work out an agreement on extending the nation's
LANSING - Governor Rick Snyder promised Thursday to the Detroit City Council that the area of Detroit where a new bridge to Windsor, Ontario, would be built would receive at least comparable treatment in community benefits as Port Huron did when the Blue Water Bridge plaza was redone. Snyder spoke by phone during a council
LANSING - It will still take concurrence from the Michigan Senate, but the House on Thursday signed off on a change to public employee health care cost sharing that would provide the options of both a hard dollar cap and 80/20 split. But the chamber failed to win the two-thirds support required on SJR C