In the flurry of news coverage about last week’s memorial service for the late Governor William Milliken, there was plenty of talk of days gone by. The Governor left office 37 years ago, and it sometimes seems as though moderation, civility and environmental ethics left office with him. But focusing on that would be the wrong takeaway. The Milliken example is a model for today, not a relic of yesterday.
When a mysterious green slime crept onto the shoulder of I-696 in Madison Heights last year, it shouldn’t have been a surprise at all. Instead, it was the inevitable result of state policies since 1995 that have treated Michigan’s groundwater as an essentially worthless resource. And Michigan residents have been paying both in tax dollars and health risks ever since.
Last week the Michigan Attorney General’s Office chose not to appeal a lower court ruling upholding the constitutionality of a law that facilitates the framework for an oil tunnel under the Straits of Mackinac—forgoing any further challenge, but, in reality, yielding no strategic legal ground.
By Jim Olson In the late 1950s, I would ride my bike from East Bay, on the other side of the ridge that runs along Old Mission Peninsula, to near downtown Traverse City, and I would notice a man on a bike. It seemed odd because in the 1950s no one rode bikes to work,… Read more »
By Dave Dempsey When historians consider the late Governor William Milliken’s place among Michigan’s chief executives, they will note his leadership on behalf of the environment at a critical time, but they will acknowledge even more. In today’s climate of coarse, zero-sum politics, they will recognize his civility and refusal to demonize those who disagreed… Read more »
Photo: Kolke Creek in the headwaters of the AuSable River was protected by MEPA after the Michigan Supreme Court prohibited discharge of 1 million gallons of oil-field treated wastewater. Editor’s note: This is part 1 of a series on the history of import of the MEPA. By Jim Olson Serendipity can mean chance, destiny, and… Read more »
Michigan’s late Governor William G. Milliken was celebrated at a public memorial on August 6, 2020, at Interlochen Center for the Arts. To honor the Milliken legacy, FLOW has launched the “Helen & William G. Milliken Fund For Love of Water.” FLOW also published a series of video interviews in the run-up to August 6 that feature… Read more »
The accounts of the failure of the Edenville dam on the Tittabawassee and Tobacco Rivers and the devastating damage and threat to safety and life beg the question: How did the owner and a dam stamped as a red-zone for hazardous risk escape regulatory enforcement before it failed? Who is responsible? What’s really behind dam failures, infrastructure collapse, and increasing events across the country with catastrophic loss to people, communities, property, and quality of life?
Photo: The clean up on the Zinn family farm in Marshall, Michigan, after Enbridge’s Line 6B failed a decade ago on July 25, 2010, eventually contaminating nearly 40 miles of the Kalamazoo River and its watershed with a million gallons of tar sands oil, sickening more than 300 people, permanently driving more than 150 people… Read more »
Photo of flooding in Fishtown Leland by Isaac Dedenbach Fluctuating Great Lakes water levels are nothing new. Since records have been kept, Great Lakes levels have varied by approximately 6 feet. What is new is a rapid swing from record-low levels as recently as 2013 to record highs today. According to statistics from the US… Read more »
