The Ann Arbor Independent - A locally owned newspaper in Ann Arbor

by Kathy Hoekstra | Watchdog.com Driven by a sex scandal at the state Capitol and lead in the Flint water supply, the Michigan House of Representatives approved bills aimed at fixing the nation’s worst open records law. The 10-bill…

by Laura Entis The Ann Arbor Police Dept. this week launched a Twitter account: @A2Police. In two days, Ann Arbor's women and men in blue have Tweeted out three times. In the same time period, one of the seven Twitter accounts of the New…

by Rob C. Smith At the beginning of March, the White House proposed gutting Environmental Protection Agency funding that pays for Great Lakes pollution cleanup by 97 percent, according to a budget document obtained by the National…

by The Ann Arbor Independent Editorial Team Next Monday, the Ann Arbor Board of Review will hear appeals of city tax assessments. To schedule a review, taxpayers are required to call the assessor's office at 734-794-6530. Sessions are…

by Mindy Weisberger Cases of Lyme disease in Michigan have risen dramatically in recent years, and a new study links that trend to larger and more widespread tick populations. Researchers collected data from the Michigan Department of…

by Ari LeVaux The Pho If you've been living under a rock at the bottom of the ocean for the last decade, you might-might-have missed the ascendency of pho, Vietnam's internationally beloved comfort food. The steaming meal is both soup…

by Dave Alexander In recognition of Sunshine Week, a time that highlights the need for transparency and accountability in government, Progress Michigan is rolling out several major updates to the Sunshine Squad, an online tool that now…

by Patricia Lesko In a meeting held at lunch-time on Wednesday Mar. 1, over the objections of both the Main Street and State Street Area Association member business owners, the Downtown Development Authority Board approved the leasing of…

by Jane Briggs-Bunting In 2016, a bipartisan group of 37 Michigan state representatives banded together to introduce a series of bills called the Legislative Open Records Act (LORA). These bill weren’t perfect, but they closed two…

by Sydney Hawkins Wikipedia's gender trouble is well documented. In a 2011 survey, the Wikimedia Foundation found that less than 10 percent of its contributors identify as female. While the reasons for the gender gap are up for debate,…