Ann Arborites love their downtown library. But do they love it enough to spend $65 million to replace it?Last May, Ann Arbor District Library director Josie Parker and AADL trustees Ed Surovell and Prue Rosenthal invited Ellie...
Read MoreAnn Arbor’s voter turnout explodes during presidential years: two-thirds more people voted in 2008 than 2010. Yet county clerk Larry Kestenbaum says that, barring some fiasco, the local presidential vote should be posted...
Read MoreWhen Eric Hipple quarterbacked the Detroit Lions in the 1980s, he figures he took at least one shot to the head every time he played. “You get tackled, you get hit, your head bounces–so if nothing else, you see stars...
Read MoreInstead of creating more density near downtown, a study may end up limiting it.Talk about awkward. City staff were to present a report to the twelve members of the R4C/R2A Zoning District Study Advisory Committee that was...
Read More“It started last spring when I was backing out of my driveway and I was almost hit by a car,” says Marilyn Tower.Tower, who lives on the 1700 block of Covington on the city’s southwest side, estimates the car...
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Q. In September, trees were being removed by the dozens at the empty site just north of the Broadway bridges. It sure changes the feel of Argo Cascades! What is happening?A. That area has a long history of industrial use. The...
Read MoreIn Brady Hoke, Year One, I was a skeptic about the short-term fortunes of Michigan football, albeit in a schizoaffective way. Regardless of Hoke’s abilities, I didn’t believe he could do much with the defense he had...
Read MoreThough he faced no challenger, mayor John Hieftje lost the August Democratic primary. With Sumi Kailasapathy and Sally Hart Petersen defeating “council party” candidates in the First and Second wards, along with the...
Read MoreThe last decade wasn’t kind to Saline. “Property tax revenues have gone down about 22 percent,” says mayor Gretchen Driskell. “And revenue sharing from the state has been going down since 2002, and it now...
Read MoreIt’s a “scary, exciting time” at the Weather Underground, says co-founder Jeff Masters. In July, the seventeen-year-old U-M spinoff announced its sale to the Weather Channel, a longtime suitor....
Read MoreAt stake in the August 7 Democratic primary is the council majority of mayor John Hieftje–and with it, the future direction of Ann Arbor.A canny politician with a keen sense of the electorate, the six-term mayor has no...
Read MoreThe Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners shrinks this year from eleven members to nine. In the redistricting, Ann Arbor lost one seat, going from four to three. This might’ve set one-term commissioner Yousef Rahbi...
Read MoreThe last time there was an open election for judge of the 22nd Circuit Court was way back in 1988, when Melinda Morris won a four-way race. The next once-in-a-generation opportunity comes August 7, when four attorneys are...
Read MoreEllen and Lowell Fisher have lived at 2100 Churchill off Scio Church Rd. for thirty-eight years and never seen anything like the flood of 2012.”I’m watching the hail come down, really big hail,” Ellen...
Read MoreThe hottest topic in Scio Township is the fate of the proposed fire department merger. After two years of talks, Scio and Webster townships and Dexter Village and Township have a plan to merge the Scio Township Fire Department...
Read MoreIn a landscape littered with the corpses of well-meaning causes, the National Kidney Foundation of Michigan has quadrupled its staff in the past decade. What’s its secret? “We re-prioritized our core functions to...
Read More“If you asked most college students if they know there’s a student-run radio station on campus, they’d say, ‘Wow, I didn’t know we had that!'” acknowledges Ben Yee, the recently retired...
Read MoreNo one’s running against mayor John Hieftje this year—but plenty of candidates are running against his policies.Two years ago, the mayor demolished blogger and City Hall critic Pat Lesko by a you’ve-got-to-be-kidding...
Read MoreInside the AATA’s ambitious plan to spread mass transit beyond Ann ArborWell, it wasn’t the library. That was my best guess as the site of the “u196” meeting I was looking for. I had decided at the last...
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