Health

Jails, prisons struggle with mentally ill inmates

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING — It started slowly, when the Traverse City Regional Psychiatric Hospital shut its doors in the mid-1980s. Then in the 1990s, 10 more folded in rapid succession. And like the last teetering blocks in a long line of dominoes, Northville Regional Psychiatric Hospital fell in 2003 and the Mt. Pleasant Center in 2009. Now, the state continues to grapple with lasting effects of those closures.

Environment

New study questions river sand trap strategy

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING — Researchers based in Marquette have potentially grave news for Michigan anglers: Hundreds of shallow basins dug into riverbeds to collect trout- and salmon-harming sediment might be more like fish coffins than protectors. After two reportedly successful experiments in the 1980s, sand traps were constructed worldwide in an attempt to save fish populations hurt by excessive sand in freshwater streams. Michigan has more than 250. But now, researchers from the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) say they doubt whether these measures have had any benefit. In some cases, sand traps could even harm river ecosystems, experts say. Popular species like salmon and brook trout need coarse riverbeds of gravel or small pebbles.

Government

False alarms rile police agencies

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING – Flash. Veins of white light spread through the sky. Crackle. A blast of 100 to 120 decibels assault your ears. But then something happens:
The pitter-patter of rain before the next lightning strike is interrupted: Parked cars outside wail as the thunderclap triggers their alarm systems.
But the problem goes beyond annoying noise, law enforcement officials say.

News

Income inequality wide in Michigan

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING – Income inequality – long a social reality in America – may be permanent, a new study by the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., suggests. The study reveals continuing opulence for a few top-earners and an ever-slimmer slice of the economic pie for the rest. And the inequality gap in Michigan is wider than in many other states. It ranks as the 11th most unequal, according to Michigan State University economist Charles Ballard. Shrinking higher education funding, a deregulated financial market and weaker unions all contribute to the disparity, Ballard said.

Health

Medicaid expansion would increase vets' health options

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING — While the Legislature wrestles with a recent House decision not to expand state health care for poor families through the Medicaid program, experts say roughly 20,000 veterans will also be left uninsured if the decision sticks. “They’re going to be left out in the cold,” said Jan Hudson, a health care policy analyst for the Michigan League for Public Policy, which does research and advocacy regarding social issues like poverty, education and health. The House recently rejected Gov. Rick Snyder’s proposal to expand Medicaid coverage despite available federal funding for the program. According to the league, veterans in rural areas would benefit the most from the expansion because they would be able to use local hospitals in addition to sometimes-distant VA clinics. The league says there are 19 rural counties with federal community-based health clinics for veterans, yet there are 57 rural counties with veterans.

Agriculture

Conditions still challenge migrant farmworkers

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING – They work long, grueling hours in the blistering sun. Nearly half of the 90,000 migrant laborers in the state were under the age of 13 in 2010, according to the Department of Civil Rights. And the average migrant family makes between $12,255 and $16,773 a year, according to state estimates – far below the federal poverty line of $27,570 for a family of four. But they are the backbone of the state’s agricultural industry, traveling from Florida to Michigan and back again, year after year. They are migrant workers, And Marylou Olivarez-Mason used to be one of them.

Agriculture

New farm workers come from Eastern Europe

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING – Few people are interested in the hard, dirty toil of farm labor. But hard work is nothing new for some in a transitory lifestyle already long-lived. Experts from the Michigan Farm Bureau say an influx of farm workers from Eastern Europe seeks those gritty jobs because they’re used to doing them. Craig Anderson, who manages the agricultural safety and labor services department at the bureau, said an increasing number of workers from that area of the world are finding jobs involving dairy or livestock. Anderson said the increase is unlikely to make up for a feared labor shortage as the agricultural industry struggles to recover from last year’s unseasonable weather and drought.

Environment

Land conservancies no substitute for state land

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING – Green groups like the Little Traverse Conservancy and Mid-Michigan Land Conservancy are pushing to protect and preserve as much of Michigan’s pristine beauty as possible. That’s what they do. But at a time when a new law limits the ability of the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) to acquire more land, more responsibility might fall on the shoulders of conservancies in the state; a role experts say conservancies can’t fill. The law that took effect in July 2012 caps the amount of state-owned land to roughly 4 million acres. That’s disconcerting for environmentalists, who call the limit arbitrary and argue it will render the state potentially unable to cope with rising demand for public land.

Government

Should driverless cars get the green light?

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING – This isn’t the remote controlled car you played with as a kid. Companies across the state are in the process of unveiling cars that drive themselves, while a bill that would allow testing driverless vehicles revs through the Legislature. If passed, it would open the roads to companies like Google and General Motors – and smaller Michigan-based firms – to try their shiny new toys on the road. Sen. Mike Kowall, R-White Lake, is sponsoring the bill, which is in the Transportation Committee. Cosponsors include Sens.

Government

Push on to toughen sex trafficking laws

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By MICHAEL GERSTEIN
Capital News Service
LANSING – In the midst of what experts call the second-fastest growing criminal industry in the world after drug trafficking, some legislators are pushing for tougher punishment for sex traffickers. The new legislation would ensure that defendants convicted of coercing children ages 16 and 17 into prostitution are more stiffly punished, said Senate sponsor Judy Emmons, R-Sheridan. Sex trafficking is widely considered a form of modern-day slavery. When Michigan’s human trafficking laws were bolstered in 2010, sentences for those exploiting 16- and 17-year-olds were shorter than for younger children, Emmons said. Emmons said the bill, pending in the Judiciary Committee, would change that and set a maximum sentence of five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.