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Urban Exile: Poll—88 Percent of American Voters Say Candidates Should Focus on Poverty
by J.D. Berman
Now that we're officially in the 2012 election cycle, candidates for office may want to take note of a new poll on voter attitudes toward poverty and opportunity. According to a survey commissioned by Spotlight on Poverty,…
Michigan Backs Financial Scheme of Convicted Felon & Now Taxpayers on the Hook for $18 Million
by P.D. Lesko
Guess what you can get in Michigan for a $10,000 donation to Rick Snyder's campaign? You can get $18,000,000 in state money to bail you out when your project crashes and burns just 10 months after it's launched. You can also…
Pollsters Ask: Get Rid of Michigan’s EM Law? Voters With College Degrees Say “Keep It.”
by P.D. Lesko
Jesse Jackson, Rachel Maddow, Michigan blogger Chris Savage and a host of left-leaning pundits have been punditing and writing themselves blue in the face over the past 10 months since Public Act 4 was passed by the Michigan…
Residents Say “No Go” to Mayor’s Plan To Pay For County-Wide & Regional Transit With City Millage
by P.D. Lesko
The public speaker, an older woman who rides the bus regularly, recounted a conversation with a friend who lives outside of Ann Arbor: "My friend said to me that she wished the AATA buses would run near her house so she could…
MoveOn.org Urges Ann Arbor Residents to Run for Local Office To “Fight Cuts to Crucial Services”
by P.D. Lesko
MoveOn.org sent out a mass email this afternoon to thousands of members of the group's Ann Arbor email list. The first sentence of the email reads: "If you were mayor of Ann Arbor, what would be the first thing you'd do? Make…
Council Members in Open Revolt: Challenge Mayor & Insist Transit Proposal Is Seriously Flawed
by P.D. Lesko
Third Ward Council member Stephen Kunselman has been a pain in John Hieftje's butter dish ever since Kunselman knocked off Leigh Greden in the 2009 stunner of a primary election. While Kunselman won by a 6 vote margin, Greden…
Michigan Rising: Aiming to Recall Snyder—While Disgruntled Former Volunteers Target Michigan Rising
by Chris Savage
Michigan Rising, the group formerly known as the Committee to Recall Rick Snyder (CRRS), was unsuccessful in its bid to recall Michigan's governor last year. The challenges the group faced, discussed in my previous piece,…
Head of AATA Admits in Email That “Many Folks” Prefer That Millage Money Fund Existing City-Wide Transit, Not Proposed County-Wide Plan
by P.D. Lesko
In September 2011, former Ann Arbor News reporter Tom Gantert did what he does best: published the truth. In point of fact, writing for Michigan Capitol Confidential, Gantert published information about the pay of staffers at…
Politico Who Understated City Debt By $215,000,000 In Open Letter To Newspaper Complains About “Misinformation”
by P.D. Lesko
Fifth Ward Council member Mike Anglin sent out an email on January 15, 2012 in which he urged Ann Arbor residents to vocally oppose John Hieftje's proposal that Ann Arbor enter into a regional transportation agreement under…
Via Email Blast Local Politicos Urge Public To Rise Up & Stop Mayor’s Anti-Democratic Scheming
by P.D. Lesko
In 2004, the Ann Arbor News Editorial Board published an endorsement of Hieftje's mayoral opponent that included this zinger, preserved for posterity by Google:
“Hieftje’s largest failure is not one of vision, but leadership.…