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I planned to regale you this week with details of the many high-calorie Halloween-related activities we took the kids to over the past week. Thanks to this amazing website for parents, I found something free and fun to do almost every day. And I can’t wait to see my daughter’s reaction to this one on Saturday. (AAO’s crackerjack social media guru Tabi Walters made this spooky sizzle reel for your enjoyment.)
Alas, the real fright this weekend is the fact that millions of Americans may stop receiving Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, aka food stamps, starting tomorrow as a consequence of a federal government shutdown that has no end in sight. I’ll delve into that more below, but I wanted to suggest that if you’re feeling stuffed full of Snickers and Smarties on Saturday morning and feeling fortunate, it might be a good time to make a cash donation to Food Gatherers.
Your news is here. Also, Tuesday is Election Day, so go vote. If you vote at the Dixboro United Methodist Church in Superior Twp., don’t forget to say hi to me as I return to my post as a poll worker. All Washtenaw County residents have this on their ballots, and but you can click here to see if there are races or proposals near you.
This was last week’s most-clicked link.
– Steve Friess, editor
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Morgan Wallen, via Wikimedia Commons
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The next Big House thing: Hot off the record-breaking success of that Zach Bryan-John Mayer concert in September, Michigan Stadium announced yesterday it will host headliner Morgan Wallen for two shows July 24 and 25 as part of his Still The Problem tour. Wallen is the best-selling country artist of this century. Tickets go on sale Nov. 5 for folks who register for presale here; U-M students and football season ticket holders can buy seats on Nov. 6, and, if any are left, the general public can buy tickets starting Nov. 7. That Zach Bryan concert drew 112,408 people, making it the nation’s best-attended live ticketed concert ever. Unfamiliar with Wallen? Go check out two of his biggest hits, “Last Night” and “You Proof.”
That Saline Twp. data center is for OpenAI: The 2.2 million-square-foot, 1.4-gigawatt project that local residents tried mightily to kill belongs, it turns out, to the company behind ChatGPT — a fact publicly undisclosed by developer Related Digital throughout its lengthy battle to secure the necessary zoning. Governor Gretchen Whitmer on Thursday called it the “largest economic project in Michigan history” and touted the 2,500 union construction jobs as well as 450 “high-skill, high-paying jobs” and “1,500 more in the community.” The revelation comes after last week’s announcement that Saline Twp. had agreed to allow the project after initially rejecting it in exchange for the developer giving $14 million to the township and other local governmental entities, among other concessions. It is one of three controversial, mammoth high-tech proposals aimed at rural Washtenaw County; Brooke Black and Anna McLean delve into the drama behind a 150-acre “computing facility” that U-M and the Los Alamos National Laboratory want to build in Ypsilanti Twp. in the November issue of the Observer.
Michigan defense benched: After years of drama and scandal surrounding Jim Harbaugh’s tenure with the Wolverine and a some real sturm und drang over the $30 million punishment assessed by the NCAA this summer, the matter ends with a whimper as university dropped their appeal this week. Both U-M and head coach Sherrone Moore say they have withdrawn their appeal of the fines and other penalties associated with a sign-stealing scheme that the New Yorker called stupid and funny.
SNAP shutdown showdown looms: The USDA says it will stop issuing new credits to people eligible for food stamps starting Nov. 1, a prospect that would leave thousands of local people scrambling and also deprive grocery stores of important revenue. A federal judge in Boston is considering trying to force President Trump to use $5 billion in emergency funds Congress has allocated for this to prevent the benefits stoppage, but the widespread concern prompted the state to create this November SNAP Benefits FAQ site. Also planning for the worst is Food Gatherers CEO Eileen Spring, who says food bank visits have already been up this year and notes that demand will rise either way because November will be the first month that furloughed federal employees don’t get paid. One saving grace, she tells WLBY’s The Lucy Ann Lance Show: “If you have a SNAP card and there’s no federal dollars on it,” some organizations or stores “are going to treat it as if there were.” Among those is the Growing Hope’s Ypsilanti Farmers Market. Keep an eye here for other offers.
Battle lines drawn as CLUP advances: Council began a sixty-three-day review period after approving the third draft of the city’s proposed comprehensive plan, and both sides are hitting the media and elsewhere to make their cases. Neighbors for More Neighbors A2, a pro-density citizens group that favors rezoning residential areas for more multi-family and multi-story dwellings, tells Concentrate it will promote walkability, sustainability, and affordability. Tom Stulberg of Pause the Plan was on Lucy Ann Lance arguing it won’t accomplish much more than driving up land prices and will lead to speculators snapping up middle-market houses to replace with luxury condos. You can weigh here.
Swimming with the tide: Most discourse around trans athletes focuses on the possible physical advantages trans females may have competing with cisgender girls and women. Here’s a twist – Saline High swimmer Alex Lillie, a seventeen-year-old trans male, is on the girls swim team and there’s no controversy. In fact, the senior is team captain and nobody seems to have any trouble using his pronouns. Read more
The Revolution, televised: Ann Arbor’s own Ken Burns is back in the spotlight with his newest PBS documentary, The American Revolution. The Pioneer grad is such a transcendent national cultural figure that he rarely is even asked about his origins anymore, although Newsweek did for this cover story in which he called the colonial triumph of the 1770s “the most important event in the history of the world since the birth of Christ.” Still, he’s everywhere right now – on NPR’s Fresh Air and David Frum’s podcast for The Atlantic, plus the New York Times, the New Yorker, and GQ among others. For a little more about his local ties, listen to this chat from 2024. His latest documentary premieres on Nov. 16.
Scary times: With the exception of Ypsi and Superior Twp., most jurisdictions in the county have designated specific trick-or-treating hours tonight. Here’s a guide:
- Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor Twp., Ypsilanti Twp., and Northfield Twp.: 5 to 8 p.m.
- Chelsea: 5:30 to 7:30 p.m.
- Dexter: 5 to 7:30 p.m.
- Manchester: 5 to 7 p.m.
- Milan, Pittsfield Twp., and Saline: 6 to 8 p.m.
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Tiaras are part of the fun for Ballet & Books students at the Beatty Early Learning Center in Ypsi. After a class that nonprofit founder Talia Bailes describes as “creative movement with ballet influence,” U-M volunteers work one-on-one with the kids on a curriculum that links dance and literacy.
Courtesy: Talia Bailes
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U-M med student’s Amazon travels inspires nonprofit: Talia Bailes, a fourth-year student pursuing pediatrics, tells Julie Halpert in the October issue about how her gap year working at a rural Ecuador health clinic and performing with an Indigenous dance troupe led her to found Ballet & Books. Her national organization recruits college student volunteers to teach dance and mentor children ages three to nine in reading skills. Locally, U-M dance students visit Beatty Early Learning Center in Ypsi for a forty-five-minute creative movement class followed by a forty-five minute session of one-on-one literary tutoring influenced by dance and music.
Firefighter, rock star, dad: Michelle Yang delves into the varied life of Pat Deneau in this month’s Ann Arborite profile for the November issue. His “day” job (though it’s usually a twenty-four-hour shift) atFire Station 5, but he’s also the singer, songwriter, guitarist, and frontperson for The City Lines. Detroit Public Radio host Jeff Milo describes the group as a contender for “the most endearing band in Michigan … charismatic in an unapologetically kind and wholesome and down-to-earth sort of way.” Yang writes about Deneau’s Indigenous heritage and influences from his mother’s side and the outsized impact of his father and paternal grandfather’s role as volunteer fightfighters – his grandfather as an arson investigator.
Poet imagines still living as an act of resistance: In Poet Tree Town, Ciatta Tucker, program director of the Ypsilanti Youth Poet Laureate Program, ruminates on the joys and sorrows associated with places she’s lived. Read it here.
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A Cuban-inspired burger joint grows in Brooklyn. Courtesy: Frita Batidos.
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● A2’s own Frita Batidos opens in Williamsburg. That’s their NYC digs pictured above. Eater is salivating.
● U-M football is bowl- and maybe even playoff-bound as well as back in the Top 25 after its big rivalry win over MSU.
● Ever hear of a peanut-shaped roundabout? I hadn’t, but Dexter is evidently about to get one. Take a look.
● Tahrir Coalition, the consortium of student groups opposing Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, received a letter from U-M threatening a copyright lawsuit. Here’s how they responded.
● There’s an EMU link to the big NCAA gambling investigation that led the FBI to arrest Portland Trailblazers coach Chauncey Billups among others. Apparently, there’s some concern about unusual betting activity in the first half of an EMU-CMU game in January. Read more
● Is the surviving suspect in an attempted ATM tampering in Dexter last week a member of the transnational criminal enterprise Tren de Aragua? The FBI thinks so.
● Pioneer High freshman Hannah Lee won the Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra’s 2025 Young Artist Competition. The fourteen-year-old gets $500 and the opportunity to perform at Carnegie Hall with the A2SO next year. Here she is on YouTube playing the Coleridge-Taylor Violin Concerto in G minor, Op. 80 in 2021.
● Also at Pioneer, the field hockey team just won the state’s first championship sanctioned by the Michigan High School Athletic Association. Meanwhile, Huron’s boys soccer squad heads to its first-ever Division I state final tomorrow night against Portage Central following this shutout on Wednesday.
● Zingerman’s is recalling two candy bars because labels didn’t list two potential “life-threatening” ingredients, peanuts and cashews. Read more
● Curious if your house has legally irrelevant but historically awful racially restrictive covenants? Look it up here.
● Should U-M contract with one campus-wide soft drink provider? If so, which one? Weigh in via this survey.
● Malala was here. Read more
● U-M’s first Black dean has died three months shy of 100. Read more
● These folks aren’t lazy about lawn care, they’re enriching the soil.
● EMU launches an online early-childhood bachelor’s degree program amid a statewide teacher shortage. Read more
● Surveillance footage caught someone spouting anti-Semitic slurs trying to break into the Jewish Resource Center at 2 a.m. Sunday. Watch
● If you own land along or atop a water source flowing into the Huron River, you may be able to sell your development rights to the city to conserve as part of the new Bluebelt. Read more
● Over sixty? There are now three options – Jewish Family Services, People’s Express, or Western-Washtenaw Area Value Express – for free rides. Read more
● Bullying is up in Washtenaw County schools, according to state data analyzed by ClickOnDetroit. Here’s their searchable database.
● The pilot and owner of the vintage fighter jet that crashed during Thunder Over Michigan in 2023 near Willow Run is now suing his passenger for hitting the eject button, which doomed the aircraft but probably saved both their lives. Read more
● The end of Daylight Saving Time, which MLive has inexplicably been hyping since August, is finally nigh. People without small children, enjoy the extra hour of sleep on Sunday.
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Claire Friess, four, agrees with the Michigan Daily that New York Pizza Depot is the best. Credit: Steve Friess
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Michigan Daily names its 2025 Best of Ann Arbor: The student newspaper’s picks include Miss Kim, Literati, Washtenaw Dairy, and Misfit Society Coffee Club. New York Pizza Depot (pictured above) won twice, for best pizza and best late-night bite. Several repeat winners from the 2024 roundup include Quickly (best boba), Campus Corner (best booze shop), Madras Masala (best Indian food), and Totoro (best sushi).
Coffee spot replaced by gift shop: The space vacated by Bitty & Beau’s Coffee on S. Main is now Noteworthy Wants and Wonders, Dave Algase writes in the October issue of the Observer. It’s the second location for Kristina Scobie and Jason Klein, who opened their first near Kalamazoo as an outgrowth of their business offering custom invitations and stationery.
New kids gym opening in Dexter: Just Play Family Fun Center opens to the public Nov. 15, but early-bird members can start popping in on Nov. 8 if they sign up by Nov. 7. The huge dual slides into the mammoth ball pit and other attractions seen here look super fun.
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107,648 gallons of milk on the wall: Busch’s customers have donated that much to food banks via its twice-yearly milk drive, according to the Shelby Report. The donations go to Food Gathers, Forgotten Harvest, Gleaners, and South Michigan Food Bank. In addition, this year United Dairy Industry of Michigan (UDIM) also matched $20,000 in funding to these food banks. Since 2015, Busch’s shoppers have donated 825,983 gallons of milk.
Group erects white crosses to draw attention to suicide: Each day between Oct. 8 and 30, 22 a Day put up an additional cross on a field outside Ypsilanti Twp.’s Civic Center and Veterans Memorial until they numbered twenty-two, WEMU reports. That’s the number of past and current military servicemembers who die by suicide every day according to Veterans Administration data. On Sunday, the group, founded by Vietnam vet Jon Luker, hosts a community gathering by the cross display featuring a free meal sponsored by DTE from Lucky Beez Food Truck “while we think of and talk about those we have lost to veteran suicide and help those who are struggling,” according to the website.
Shelter Association’s new head has deep local ties: Nicole Adelman’s appointment to succeed Dan Kelly as executive director in September is the latest step in a nonprofit career that also includes serving as substance use services director for the Community Mental Health Partnership of Southeast Michigan, executive director of the Corner Health Center in Ypsi, and executive director of the Alpha House family shelter, according to an MLive profile. Among her big goals is a new shelter in Ypsi.
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By Jennifer Taylor
Halloween: Visit the Blast Corn Maze on its last weekend of the year. The maze has 3.5 miles of trails and three exits to allow for routes of various lengths. Also, a U-pick pumpkin patch, hayrides, petting zoo, pedal cars, straw maze, yard games. Donuts, cocoa, and other concessions. 5 to 8:30 p.m. (last admission, 7:30 p.m.), Nixon Farms, 6175 Daly Rd., Dexter. $16 (ages 5–12, $12; age 4 & under, free). Discount for donations to the farm’s Thanksgiving Food Drive.
Saturday: Bring your carved pumpkin to join in the All Hallows Illumination at Frog Island Park in Ypsi. This family-friendly spooky celebration includes a community pumpkin display, dancing to music spun by a DJ, a performance by the Ypsi Youth Choir, a pet parade, and craft and food vendors, all lit by LED lights. Costumes encouraged and LED lights provided. 6 to 9 p.m., Frog Island Park, 699 Rice St. Free.
Sunday: (Daylight Saving Time Ends) Hear U-M musical theater professor Tyler Driskill, a singer-pianist, and U-M musical theater professor emeritus Brent Wagner present “The Great American Songbook: Rodgers & Hart,” a lecture-demo on the writing team of composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist Lorenz Hart, who channeled their temperamental differences into compellingly urbane and popular songs like “The Lady Is a Tramp,” “My Funny Valentine,” and “Blue Moon.” 4 p.m., Kerrytown Concert House, 415 N. Fourth Ave. Tickets $18 (students, $12) in advance or at the door.
See the Observer’s online calendar for many more local events.
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