Tag Archives: Michigan

Michigan couple blessed with 2nd Leap Day baby

Since Leap Days only occur once every four years, the odds of giving birth to a child on Feb. 29 are relatively small to begin with. So what are the odds of parents having two Leap Day babies?

That’s exactly what happened to one Michigan couple.

Columbus residents Chad and Melissa Croff welcomed their daughter, Evelyn Joy, into the world at 3:06 a.m. Monday, the Henry Ford Health System announced in a news release.

The 6-pound, 9-ounce girl was born four years to the day after her big sister, Eliana Adaya.

Henry Ford officials said both sisters were natural births. Evelyn was born at the system’s Macomb Hospital, while Eliana was born at the system’s hospital in West Bloomfield.

“It’s quite the miracle,” Maureen Heinz, the nurse midwife who delivered Evelyn, said in a statement. “It’s not something they tried or planned to do, and she wasn’t induced. It was all by chance.”

The hospital said Evelyn was due on Feb. 19, but arrived 10 days late.

In a statement, Melissa Croff said she went into labor while attending church on Sunday.

“I didn’t expect the possibility of them being born on the same day, let alone on Leap Day, until I went into labor,” the mother said.

Flint Mayor Declares State of Emergency As Lead Seeps Into Water Supply

The new mayor of Flint, Michigan, declared a state of emergency earlier this week, the latest development in the embattled city’s ongoing battle with elevated levels of lead in its water.

Karen Weaver, who became mayor in November, said in a statement on the city’s website that she made the declaration to raise awareness that the water still isn’t safe to drink, almost two months after the city stopped taking problematic water from the Flint River and reverted to its old supplier, the city of Detroit. Weaver said Flint was experiencing “a man-made disaster.”

“It’s been going on for over a year now,” Weaver said in a televised interview on The Rachel Maddow Show. “We have problems with our infrastructure. We have children that have been damaged by this lead. They have permanent brain damage. We know that Flint is not in a position to bear this burden alone, and we are asking and looking for state and federal assistance. The only way we were going to have this happen was to declare a state of emergency.”

According to MLive.com, which covers news in Michigan, the problem started in April 2014. That’s when the city stopped taking water from Detroit and started taking water from the Flint River as it awaited the construction of a new pipeline to Lake Huron. City officials decided not to ink a short-term contract with Detroit, which gets water from the lake, and use the river instead.

But in her interview with Rachel Maddow, Weaver said that the river water was corrosive and damaged a protective part of the city’s pipes, allowing lead to leach out into the water supply. Michigan Radio reported that city and state officials continued to insist the water was safe, even as scientists from Virginia Tech found higher levels of lead in the city’s tap water. MLive.com reported the city finally issued a lead advisory in September 2015, 17 months after the switch.

The city reverted to Detroit’s water system in October, but the danger of lead exposure is still very much real. The problem is no longer with the water source, but Flint’s damaged pipes.

“We don’t want people to feel that because we’ve made the switch back to Detroit water that everything is fine now, because it’s not,” Weaver said in her interview with Maddow.

The World Health Organization, an arm of the United Nations, says that lead poisoning is particularly harmful to children. It’s known to damage nervous and reproductive systems, as well as cause high blood pressure and anemia. If enough lead gets into the blood of children, it can lead to irreversible consequences like learning disabilities, retardation and even death.

In September 2015, the day before the city issued the lead advisory, doctors from the Hurley Medical Center released a study that found that more of Flint’s children were displaying elevated levels of lead in their blood since the switch. The percentage of children with elevated lead levels went from 2.1 percent to 4 percent citywide, though it was as high as 6.3 percent in some areas.

Speaking to British newspaper The Guardian on Thursday, one of the doctors responsible for that study, Mona Hanna-Attisha, said up to 15 percent of children in certain parts of the city now have high levels of lead in their blood. Hanna-Attisha called the water situation “an emergency” and said it was “a disaster right here in Flint that is alarming and absolutely gut-wrenching.”

“We are assuming that the entire population of the city of Flint has been exposed, if you drank the water or cooked with the water,” Hanna-Attisha told the newspaper, noting that cooking with the water would actually concentrate the levels of lead. According to Flint’s website, the levels of lead “remain well above” federal safety standards for drinking water “in many homes.”

In her interview with Maddow, Weaver said some kids under the age of six have neurological damage, and the city would have to attempt to provide services to them and their families.

The city encourages residents to keep using water filters while it works on a long-term solution.

Greek Immigrant Gives Back on Thanksgiving

Every Thanksgiving people all of the United States gather together to share a meal.  For many it is with their family and friends.  For many others who are alone on Thanksgiving their meal comes from caring people that know how much food served with love means to their life.  

One such caring man has made it a tradition at his Northville, Michigan restaurant, called George’s Senate Coney Island by opening up his popular place of business to those that are alone over the Thanksgiving holiday.  Every Thanksgiving(or Easter!) for the past 10 years if you are homeless or even just alone for Thanksgiving , you can get a free meal at George’s.

Each year George serves 75 to 100 people.

“The reason I do this is because I was alone one time,” Dimopoulos told ABC news. “I remember the good times and bad times.”  

“I see people coming into the restaurant, and I say, ‘Are you by yourself?’ and they say, ‘I am, I’m alone,'” Dimopoulos told Today.com. “They need a little attention and help. That’s what I believe. I don’t care how much it costs. I make good money, so I can help those people.”

Recently a passerby posted a photo of the sign advertising the event to Reddit.  

“If anyone is home alone, come eat with us for free! All day,” the sign reads.

In a recent article, Huffington post said that for George, helping others in this way is quite personal.  The Greek-born Michigan immigrant who came to the country when he was 23 was once homeless in Athens when he was 12 and relied on strangers to help him find ways to eat.

This is a man that understands the meaning of paying forward in a warm, welcoming and delicious way!

Flint Michigan’s Water Crisis Prompts Emergency Filters

Residents of Flint after increased pressure by the EPA are getting free water filters from the state along with donations of bottled water, as local officials take steps to ensure that residents have safe drinking water. Tests showed that the city’s water supply is causing elevated levels of lead in children. These tests followed months of complaints.  Residents are unhappy with the taste, smell and appearance of water from the Flint River and have reported rashes, hair loss and other health concerns.

After months of resisting complaints about the water, and even a press conference by local doctors warning of potential effects, officials relented this week, declaring a public health emergency.

The spike in lead occurred last spring after Flint changed the source of its drinking water. Conducted by a pediatrician with Hurley Medical Center, the newest study examined the lead levels of hundreds of children, comparing blood tests taken before and after April 2014, when Flint stopped using Detroit water and started drawing water from the Flint River as a temporary cost-saving measure.

Residents also pay some of the highest water rates in the U.S., in the community known for its economic decline. Most pay an average of $140 per month.

About 5,500 filters have already been distributed through private donations. And on Tuesday, Flint officials announced bottled water donations from a grocery chain as well as a monthlong water donation drive for distribution to senior citizen centers and schools.

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder announced that the state will spend $1 million to buy water filters and immediately test water in public schools in Flint. He also announced expanded health exposure testing, continued free water testing, and quicker steps to ensure that water from the Flint River is effectively treated.

On Thursday, the Genesee County health department declared a public health emergency, recommending that people not drink the water unless it has been filtered and tested to rule out elevated levels of lead. More steps will be announced Friday.

County Commissioner Brenda Clack told residents that infants and children should not use the water coming from the taps in the city of Flint.

“Individuals who have respiratory conditions should not use the water, pregnant women should not use the water – it’s imperative that they not use the water,” she urged.

Michigan Patient Tests Positive for Plague

A Michigan resident who had been vacationing in Colorado has tested positive for bubonic plague.

The Michigan Department of Health says the unnamed resident is the state’s first ever recorded case of the disease.  They said it’s likely the contracted the disease in Colorado because they visited an area “with reported plague activity.”

The confirmed infection is the 14th case of the life threatening disease this year.  Three people have died from the plague this year: two in Colorado and one in Utah.

The Centers for Disease Control said that the plague has been reported almost exclusively in New Mexico, Arizona and Colorado since 1970.  Only one infection has been confirmed to have taken place outside of those states, and that was in a lab environment.

Doctors say the disease is still extremely rare.

“Now, it’s very rare, especially in the U.S. There are only about 7 to 10 cases a year, but it still exists,” medical contributor Dr. Holly Phillips told “CBS This Morning.” “Think of rodents in very rural states — western states, southwest, ranches, farms — that’s likely what happened here.”

The number of overall infections this year is more than double the national average of seven cases.

Police See Wheelchair Bound Man Trying To Mow Lawn; Take Over The Job

Three police officers in Kalamazoo, Michigan took a break from enforcing the law this week to mow the lawn.

And no one in the community is complaining about it.

Officer Joe Hutson discovered a man in a wheelchair trying to mow his lawn.  Officer Hutson radioed his partner, officer John Khillah, asking him to bring a second mower and weed trimmer and then took over the mowing job from the wheelchair bound man.

Officer Khillah brought the mower, trimmer and a leaf blower from the nearby Public Safety Station #2 along with Sgt. Ken Skibbe.  The three men then mowed, trimmed and took care of the lawn trimmings for the homeowner.

“We are showing people our officers are committed to a service-oriented style of policing,” Capt. Jim Mallery said in an interview with the Kalamazoo Gazette last month.

The KPD reported the man’s lawn was “manicured to perfection” on the department’s Facebook page.

Scientists Puzzled By Michigan Earthquake

Scientists are trying to explain a 3.3 magnitude earthquake that struck 13 miles southeast of Battle Creek, Michigan Wednesday.

The quake was recorded 20 miles from the epicenter of a 4.2 magnitude earthquake that struck on May 2nd, the strongest recorded in Michigan in 67 years.

The Wednesday quake was far enough apart from May’s quake that scientists say it’s not an aftershock of the first.  Apparently there are two separate fault lines in the region. The first quake revealed a fault line that had only been previously speculated by scientists but had not been proven.

“After the May event, I suspected we wouldn’t see another event, so I was a bit surprised by this one,” said Harley Benz, a seismologist with U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). “What more surprised me is that they weren’t in the same locations.”

John Yellich of the Michigan Geological Survey concurred the two quakes were not connected.

“Two separate ones today. That’s what it looks like,” Yellich said. “Nothing unusual and the fact that we are getting two of them in the same area, it could be that it’s all of this movement just readjusting. It appears to be two different areas.”

Benz said the quakes could be “glacial rebound”, a conditions where land masses pressed down by tons of ice during Michigan’s last glacial period are starting to rise.

While some environmentalists were quick to related the quakes to the process known as “fracking”, Benz said that evidence shows the quakes are tectonic, or related to the natural movements of the earth’s crust.

Supreme Court Throws Out Ruling Against Catholic Group

A Catholic organization that was being threatened with fines by the IRS because they were not providing insurance coverage including contraception has been given a reprieve by the Supreme Court.

The court granted Michigan Catholic Conference their request for an exemption for religious regions against the mandate by the Department of Health and Human Services.  The ruling means that the previous decision against the group was vacated and the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit must consider the Hobby Lobby decision in reviewing the case.

A counsel for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty praised the ruling in a message to the Christian Post.

“That’s what is so bizarre about the government’s position,” said Mark Rienzi a senior counsel with the Becket Fund.

“The government says they are not a ‘religious employer’ and therefore they have to sign forms to authorize and require other people to give out contraceptives for them. That makes no sense at all.”

Rienzi said the Court will likely have to take up one of these cases in the future.

I think that the Court will continue the path it has set in the long string of mandate cases to date … and it will protect religious ministries from this mandate,” said Rienzi.

“This whole fight is unnecessary and silly. Obviously the government can distribute contraceptives without the forced involvement of the Catholic Church and its ministries. The government can put a man on the moon — they can distribute pills without religious ministries.”

The group is the sixth the justices have sided with on the issue since December 2013.

Michigan Mayor Retaliates Against Anti-Christian Protesters

After a group of anti-Christianists sued to have a “reason station” placed in a city facility to counter a “prayer station”, the mayor of Warren, Michigan announced a new city campaign.

The city will be handing out free posters that say “In God We Trust” and will be hanging them throughout the facility where the anti-Christian group will be sitting.

The decision by Mayor James Fouts comes after the city lost a court battle with the anti-Christian groups Freedom From Religion Foundation, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State and the ACLU.

“Obviously, I was concerned about the court order that forced the city of Warren to have a reason station within our city hall atrium,” Fouts said in a statement.

“The prayer station had been functioning for years without any problems or any controversy. They’re now allowed to have an atheist station under the euphemistic guise of a reason station.”

The mayor said all religions were able to place displays, noting a Ramadan display that was set up during that period of the Muslim calendar.

“However, this group is a non-religion, and I don’t know what display they’re going to put up unless they are attempting to disparage our prayer station, which I cannot tolerate,” Fouts said.

“I will not allow either a racial hate group to go up, a religious hate group to go up, or a group that disparages a particular ethnicity to go up on the city hall atrium.”

Christian Sign Returned To Park But With Disclaimer

Officials in Ottawa County, Michigan are returning a sign to a public park that contains Psalm 13:1.

The catch is that it will have a disclaimer to satisfy a resident who complaint of its presence.

The sign had been in Hager Park over 40 years stating “the heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.”  Last year, a resident who chose to hide their identity complained about the sign saying they were illegally promoting Christianity.

The sign was removed by Ottawa County Parks and Recreation director John Scholtz who said he removed the sign to “reduce potential conflicts.”

The County Board of Commissioners voted 9-2 to return the sign but also to include a sign that would talk about the history of the sign’s placement.  The sign was part of an agreement with the landowner who deeded the land to them.

The anti-Christian Freedom From Religion Foundation has sent a letter to the county demanding they do not return the sign.