WobblyReport

Finding an outlet willing to publish my latest piece was a challenge and I'm grateful to Gina at DistillSocial for agreeing to run it. Numerous outlets (ProPublica, for example) expressed concerns that I was misrepresenting myself somehow even though I assured them that I fully intended to do the best work I could in the role for which I was applying. Here's an excerpt: In an online application submitted in late January, I’d truthfully submitted my five most recent employers, three of which are media companies, and other basic background information. Less than a week later I received messages inviting me to call in for prescreening. I called the number provided January 28 in the early afternoon. The GEO Group representative, who speaks with a slight accent from some other continent, asked what qualified me for the position and I leveraged clerical support work for a hospital system, which involved handling and examining many sensitive documents. I mentioned a few other relevant...

Federal incentives fuel closer ICE partnerships with police agencies Local law enforcement agreements with ICE not yet impacting operations in Michigan Originally published at  MichiganAdvance.com   /2026/01/08/federal-incentives-fuel-closer-ice-partnerships-with-michigan-police-agencies/ The fatal shooting of a Minneapolis woman by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer on Wednesday—after the agent fired through the window of her car—has renewed national scrutiny of ICE’s expanding role and the growing involvement of local law enforcement in federal immigration operations. As federal immigration enforcement expands nationwide, a growing number of local law enforcement agencies, including in Michigan, are entering formal agreements with ICE, potentially reshaping the relationship between federal and local policing. The Minneapolis shooting, reported as ICE officers were attempting to stop a vehicle, has intensified concerns among civil rights advocates about accounta...

We maintained a local focus at the newspapers I co-edited, reporting on what happened in and immediately around our designated coverage areas. Happenings farther off may have received mention if they had a more or less immediate impact on the aforementioned areas. To decide whether to report on activity in the state capitol or even Washington, D.C., we monitored and analyzed other media. Here are my views on some recent, trending Michigan news topics. Data centers Around the state, local residents have been responding to data center construction proposals in or near their communities. Recently in nearby Kalkaska County, residents loudly opposed plans by Rocklocker LLC to develop a data center on 1,400 acres of public land. The company ceased their pursuit of the development after numerous public fora at which residents were overwhelmingly opposed. Developers are meeting similar opposition to plans in Saline Township, Howell and Lansing. Michigan is already home to over 40 data cent...

The first substantial snow accumulation in northern Michigan is an opportunity for myriad adventures and experiences unavailable to Michiganders at any other time of year. Scarcity means value, according to prevailing wisdom, so our experiences at this time of year must be highly valuable. Toward this (ad hoc, in the old tongue), we offer the following valuable opportunities attending the season’s first offerings of accumulated snow and ice. Rediscovering what we had hidden All those cold-weather garments were getting musty and weird in our basements and the backs of our closets. Even the ugly sweaters that are in plastic storage containers functioning as tables and/or shelves are desperate for air and light, despite their nearer proximity to more versatile textiles. Here is one more opportunity to reshuffle — or reorganize, for those of us believing in personal progress — belongings and reassess needs. Some of that summer-wear, too, might be more suited for donation than storage u...

Riding a motorcycle in Northern Michigan during the month of November is neither for the ill-prepared nor the faint of heart. A body must be prepared both for an initial shock and, depending on circumstances, an endurance challenge. A blast of 60-mile-an-hour cold wind, its chilly tendrils reaching into any part of a rider’s outfit that isn’t airtight, testing the layers underneath, tends to cause one’s face, neck and shoulders to tense up. Full-face helmets are the best remedy but I haven’t yet replaced one I left in the Pacific Northwest in 2008. On a solo mission in early October this year, the cold crept up and took me by surprise. Attending a meeting in the southeast of our coverage area led to a return ride to home base after dark on one of the first nights the temperature sank below 50 degrees Fahrenheit (10 degrees Celsius). Consistent, unseasonably warm temperatures in the days and nights just prior had lulled me into overconfidence and I was without gloves. Between pockets...

The Immigration Act of 1918, also known as the Alien Anarchists Exclusion Act of 1918, was signed into U.S. law by President Woodrow Wilson on October 16, 1918. It expanded upon the Anarchist Exclusion Act of 1903 to further target anarchists, anti-war protesters and members of radical labor unions. The 1903 law had come in response to the assassination of President William McKinley in 1901. The assassin, Leon Frank Czolgosz, was a 28-year-old born in Detroit to a Polish-American family. Colgocz moved with his family to Alpena in 1880 and to Posen in 1883. He began his working life in a Pennsylvania glass factory at the age of 16. At 17 he found work at Cleveland Rolling Mill Company in Ohio. He worked there through an economic crash and labor strikes in 1893 and more violent strikes in 1898, before going to live as a recluse on a farm his father had bought in Warrensville, Ohio. President McKinley himself was born and raised in Ohio to English and Scots-Irish parents, whose famili...

I tagged along with circa 240 5th graders this week on a farm and forest educational event hosted through a joint effort by a county conservation district, local U.S. Forest Service staff, farmers and other volunteers. Here I am 10 minutes before I found the farm.

Michigan’s Public Act 451 purports to require school to begin after Labor Day. Most Michigan schools do not. The law was a gift to the tourism industry lobby, passed by the state legislature in 2005. Educators were against it from the start, preferring local control. Exceptions within the law have allowed most schools that control. Current, local, prevailing wisdom on when to start the school year was not forthcoming last Friday afternoon, a few days before school started in Standish, Au Gres, West Branch and Mio and a few days after students’ first day in Fairview. Phones at administrative offices went to voicemail, sometimes without so much as a ring. The same went for the Michigan Association of School Boards. A representative of the Michigan Department of Education was careful to explain the department only issues waivers to districts that request them and that they do not analyze any resulting data. Off the record, he suggested collective bargaining contracts are influential i...

After Sunday’s 5k jog around the south side of Omer City, around noontime, my body was desperate to shed accumulated heat. The Rifle River Public Access provided opportunity to fully submerge. People preparing for or packing up after a float downriver were bustling around both sides of my vehicle as I returned. Using a towel, I changed into a pair of bottoms with pockets, dropped my key into one of them and locked the car doors, readying to head back down to the river for an extended cool-down. As the door swung shut and the alarm system chimed its activated status, I patted my front pocket and felt instant regret. There on the driver’s seat of the vehicle lay the key. Its friends, wallet and phone, sat in the passenger seat. As I voiced my dismay, the lot around me quickly cleared out and within minutes of the tragic blunder, I was quite alone, with nothing to do but start walking with extended thumb in the direction of the spare key, in West Branch. An Omer resident picked me up not ...

Running shorts On runs, sentences... July was a month of making up for lost training time. My log after 22 days showed more than 92 miles jogged. Here are brief reflections on some of those miles. Rifle River Recreation Area The temperature was close to 90 F (32 C) on July 5 for this jaunty two-miler through the hilly, difficult section of Rifle River Recreation Area’s trails, beginning from the parking area near Grousehaven Lake. The route is fully shaded and runs along several ridges, with the feel of a coastal trail. Two others hiked the route in the opposite direction to my own. The route is easily navigable. More loops, longer ones extending south that I explored last year, are accessible from the same parking area and trailhead. But those were for another day. The lake access was teeming with people relaxing, barbecuing and cooling off. Entry is free with a Recreation Passport, which is available as an opt-in on license plate renewal. Loud Creek Non-Motorized Trail Sys...

The petition to bring ranked choice voting to Michigan elections began circulating last week. Director Pat Zabawa reportedly logged his own signature as the campaign's first last Thursday. “One down, 446,197 to go,” said Zabawa. “Obviously, we have our work cut out for us: when we qualify for the ballot, it will have taken the biggest signature collection campaign in Michigan history. That might intimidate some campaigns, but it’s what this team is built for. We have thousands of volunteers who are very eager to win this with shoe leather and hard work. We’re now in the stage of the campaign where progress is measured in how much ink we put on paper and how many conversations we have with our friends and neighbors.” Conversations with our friends and neighbors indeed. Circulating petitions, and engaging with circulators when we encounter them in public, provide simple and direct opportunities to establish and reestablish community connections. Whether or not we agree or disagree...

Multiple petition drives gearing up in the Mitten Michigan’s Board of State Canvassers (est. 1850) has been busy throughout late spring reviewing numerous petition proposals that state residents are likely to see when we are out and about in public this summer. Here are a few of the petition drives being reviewed and my views on their substance. RANK MI VOTE Summary: Constitutional amendment to guarantee voters in Michigan the right to: rank candidates in order of preference in most federal, state, and certain local elections; require that candidates for major offices receive a majority of votes to be elected; receive timely notice of changes to polling places or voting procedures; cast a ballot if in line at the time polls close; use secure and accessible paper ballots in all elections, preserved for certification, recounts, and audits; vote for eligible write-in candidates not listed on the ballot; participate in primary elections held at least 140 days before the general election....

The shoestring-budget defenses around the kitchen garden off the side of the house are less than totally effective against deer. Plastic fenceposts and mesh survived the winter and are holding up better than expected, with lengths of twine fixed to nearby tree limbs and light, metal stakes in the ground for reinforcement. Protected from human predation within city limits through various ordinances and common sense, North American deer become remarkably emboldened. People are warned against treating them as nonhuman companions and videos from rutting season corroborate. So despite additions of bamboo poles, fishing line and strips of plastic for visibility, they have yet made incursions into the kitchen garden and trampled or eaten young plants. Additional defense measures will be necessary. We haven’t observed them in the act. Motion-activated, outdoor cameras have become more affordable but the information collected may not be worth the sensation that comes with seeing hard work de...

Michigan consistently has ranked at or near the bottom of U.S. states in government transparency and accountability for over a decade. Journalists and government watchdogs have been sounding alarms while statutory remedies have stalled in legislative limbo or faded entirely from view. Two policy reforms would go a long way: banning legislators receiving gifts from lobbyists and ending the total exemption from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests currently enjoyed by the office of the Governor of the State of Michigan and by members of the Michigan State Legislature. Given the incentives at play, Michigan residents cannot rely on representatives to enact the necessary reforms. In a response to an investigation published by the Detroit News in 2024 that revealed Lansing politicians receiving gifts from lobbyists unchecked, retired litigator Bob LaBrant said a ballot measure through a citizen-initiated petition drive may be Michigan residents’ only hope. “The December 2024 lame...

A run for the trees On runs, sentences... Half an hour was not a winning time in last week’s Happy Little Trees 5k race but it was good enough to place in the top 15% of finishers who had reported results as of Monday morning. Late reports are likely to be added—28% more results were submitted in 2024. The nearest meet-up for the event was on Earth Day in Bay City State Park. Unfortunately, Earth Day fell on a production day at the newspaper this year. Fortunately, the race could be completed anywhere outdoors between Earth Day and the weekend of Arbor Day, which fell on a Friday. Registration fees support invasive forest pest control as well as tree planting, care and maintenance. Presumably they also support the purchase of race kit contents, which comprised a racing bib, tee shirt, sticker and finish medal. Friday afternoon the weather was close to ideal for a run, after a bitterly cold start to April that made training more challenging. Some runners in humid-continental climate z...

Security and stability of one’s shelter is a fluid situation, as so many Midwest residents were reminded this spring. But three months before the 2025 ice storm, in late January, nonprofit workers and volunteers in the Midwest and across the nation made efforts to contact and count people living without stable and secure housing. Known as the Point-in-Time (PIT) Count and coordinated by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the goal is “a count of sheltered and unsheltered people experiencing homelessness on a single night in January.” “It’s basically like the homeless census,” said Chad Lytle, Northeast Michigan Community Service Agency (NEMCSA) Street Outreach Director. Lytle coordinates homeless prevention in Crawford, Iosco, Ogemaw, Oscoda and Roscommon counties. “During that time, we're counting those who are literally homeless,” he said. “Literally homeless has a little tighter definition than people might think.” The federal government’s definition is simple ...