Market Purist
UAW trainer Luis Vazquez is planning a protest. Not at GM–what’s the point?–but at the Ann Arbor Farmer’s Market. The former market commission chair says he plans to target Kapnick’s Orchards, which...
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Insiders vs. Outsiders
In dark blue Ann Arbor, the August Democratic party primary is the local vote that matters. No Republican has won a seat on city council since 2003.But the end of partisanship hasn’t meant the end of politics....
Read MoreBloggernews
AnnArbor.com has far fewer journalists than its predecessor, the Ann Arbor News, but far more bloggers. Ed Vielmetti, the social media pioneer hired to wrangle the independent web publishers, expects the site to launch with...
Read MoreCrime Map: June 2009
Click here to view a zoomable map of June crime reports.Burglaries, a seasonal crime, rose slightly in June compared to May. Vehicle thefts also increased slightly month-to-month, but both crimes remained well below last...
Read MoreU-M Law Clinic Wins Release
Two Ecorse men wrongfully convicted in a 2001 shooting finally were set free from prison today when the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office dropped the charges against them.DeShawn Reed and his uncle, Marvin Reed, gained...
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Closely Watched Trains
Mayor Hieftje was brimming with optimism when he unveiled his ambitious plan for a train to Howell in the summer of 2006. “No passenger train had run the route in decades,” he recalls. “I wanted to demonstrate...
Read MoreSharing the Trail
If you take a hike on the Potawatomi Trail in the Pinckney State Recreation Area, you’ll see majestic trees, lovely wildflowers, twittering birds, skittish squirrels—and waves of mountain bikers approaching head-on. Such...
Read MoreCrime Map: May 2009
Click here to view this month’s Crime Map.Sexual assaults and burglaries both rose in May compared to May 2008, while vehicle thefts and robberies declined.#PAGEBREAK#May 2009 Crime totals (including attempts)Burglaries...
Read MoreReduced Tolerance
Last fall, two Chelsea teens died in a motorcycle crash, and a nineteen-year-old Chelsea resident later was charged with supplying them alcohol.It was the latest in a series of accidents involving area youths, vehicles, and...
Read MoreThe 11 percent solution
Faced with a $26 million revenue shortfall over the next two years, the Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners voted in early June to cut its own $600,000 budget by 11 percent. But at first glance, even the new $534,000 figure...
Read MoreThe U-M Innocence Clinic
This morning, two men who were wrongfully convicted of attempted murder finally got the news they’d been waiting for years to hear. And the U-M Law School’s Innocence Clinic won a spectacular victory.On a Sunday...
Read MoreFiat + Chrysler = ?
Jerry Colone tested trucks at the Chrysler Proving Grounds for thirty-four years. Now, he says, the huge complex southwest of Chelsea is “like a ghost town.”Employment at the grounds has fallen from 700 five years...
Read MoreDefusing Mental Health Crises
It’s a weekend night, and Ann Arbor police respond to a call about an agitated man expressing homicidal thoughts. When they get to the scene, though, they realize he’s doing nothing illegal—he’s made no...
Read MoreAnnArbor.com competition
Heritage Newspapers, which publishes the Saline Reporter, the Chelsea Standard, and other area papers, will debut its weekly A2 Journal on July 9, less than two weeks before AnnArbor.com ‘s July 20 launch. Heritage, whose...
Read MoreBankruptcy Boom
“I fear for my community and my state,” says bankruptcy trustee Doug Ellmann.Ellmann sees Michigan’s raw economic wounds in Ann Arbor’s federal bankruptcy court. “I’m definitely seeing a lot...
Read MoreRon Olson’s Challenge
It’s not easy being Ron Olson these days. Olson, who headed Ann Arbor’s parks system for twenty years, now runs the parks and recreation division of Michigan’s Department of Natural Resources. And managing one...
Read MoreGO Ask Voters
Pat Lesko has a simple but radical idea: require voters’ permission before the city issues “general obligation” bonds. She got the idea after working on a petition drive last year that tried to force a vote on...
Read MoreShakeup at Car and Driver
It’s been a tough year for the world’s most popular car magazine. In the past twelve months, Car and Driver has shed its longtime Ann Arbor location, some veteran staff members, and its editor, Csaba Csere.Csere...
Read MoreFixed up, finally
As the Ann Arbor Farmers Market prepares to celebrate its ninetieth anniversary, the market will get new lights, a PA system, and a paint job. But it will not get more stalls, a pavilion, or a storm-water management system....
Read MoreGreat Lakes Google
Early versions of Google’s Earth-imaging software were mocked as “Google Dirt” by renowned marine explorer Sylvia Earle, because they showed topography on land, but not the ocean floors. Google fixed that in...
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