Up North Progressive
Politics and commentary for Northern MichiganMeet The Candidates State Legislature District #104: Betsy Coffia and Penny Larcom
Sunday , 27, July 2014 Candidates Leave a commentThe state legislature district with an August 5 primary is District #104, Grand Traverse County. Two candidates are running for this office in the primary, Betsy Coffia and Penny Larcom, both of Traverse City.
Betsy grew up in Kalkaska County. She has extensive experience as a reporter and editor for local newspapers. She worked her way through college while earning a Bachelor’s degree in social work. Her work experience comes from working at Northwestern Michigan Community Action Agency. She volunteers at Traverse Heights Elementary School and has volunteered at other elementary schools in the region. She’s a graduate of Leadership Grand Traverse.
Betsy Coffia believes politics work best when politics are about people instead of large sums of money. All campaign donations made to Coffia’s run for office are from individual donors. She has accepted no PAC money for her campaign. This philosophy extends to the issues Betsy believes are most important for the people of state house district 104. A stronger economy will only happen when long-term repairs are made to infrastructure and technology. Jobs that can support families rather than just getting by are also important. Restoring educational funding to meet the costs of education for our children so they are competitive in the job market is also important. This includes putting money back into universities and colleges so tuition can be affordable again.
Betsy Coffia’s campaign is powered by people and not by special interests and their money. To learn more about Betsy and why she wants to represent the 104th district in Lansing, you can go to her website to read about the issues, sign up for her newsletter and ask her questions.
Penny Larcom was born and raised in Traverse City. She has three children and lives in the town her birth. Larcom is new to politics but her motivation comes from being disappointed by the people she has voted for in the past. Larcom didn’t like being lied to so she decided to run for state representative in the 104th district because it’s her duty as an American.
Her campaign is different because she claims not to have a platform but rather a passion for issues important to her, such as education and jobs that pay well. She’s passionate about farming, and finally she’s passionate about the crumbling infrastructure that needs more attention. Larcom believes the best way to find solutions to these issues is make people aware of them so they can fix them. Larcom believes this is the purpose of being a state representative. If you are interested in learning more to contact Penny Larcom you can visit her campaign page on Facebook.
Support The Reed City Area District Library: Vote Yes and Yes On August 5th
Thursday , 24, July 2014 Community Leave a comment
Public libraries offer more to their community than just a place to keep books. Libraries are media centers which provide newspapers, magazines, documents, and online media. Libraries today are where many people access the Internet. The library is a place to find government documents such as income tax forms. If you want a book and the local library doesn’t have it, you can request the book be sent to you from a different library. There’s movie rentals, family movie nights, reading programs for kids and book clubs for adults. The public library provides space for people to hold meetings and book sales where you can buy books for a fraction of their original cost.
Day to day operations cost money, but it’s an investment worth making for the community. The yearly cost for households in the Reed City library district is equivalent to buying one new hardcover book or one pizza and movie night at home. Keeping the library funded is a value for Reed City.
The second ballot proposal is a bond issue for renovations of a building located at 829 South Chestnut so the library would have a permanent home. Currently, the library is housed in the basement of a building that is part of the county sheriff/court complex on Upton Street. Space is limited there with no room for expansion. The benefits of approving the bond issue would mean more off-street parking, more room for computers, more meeting space, a new teen area, and updated facilities. The library would have access to $75,000 in grant funds to help with the renovations. The cost of this bond issue is one pizza. How many pizzas do you buy in a year? Can you give up one pizza for a new library with more space and facilities? Sounds like a great deal.
Primary elections often have low turnout, that’s why it’s important for everyone to go to the polls on August 5th in Reed City and vote YES on both the library millage and bond issue. Keep the public library funded and provide a new home.
What The Financials Really Tell Us About Michigan Congressional District #2
Monday , 21, July 2014 Candidates Leave a comment
Bill Huizenga and Dean Vanderstelt disclosed campaign fund raising to the Federal Election Commission. Huizenga raised nearly a million dollars, while Vanderstelt raised twenty thousand. On the surface, the money may appear to favor Huizenga, but it’s important to pay attention from whom the candidates receive their money.
Bill Huizenga is running for a third term in Congress. His financials look impressive, until you dig deeper and discover most of his money comes from a few people and companies, and they’re related.
Individual members of the DeVos family gave Huizenga $5,000 each. This contributes to a large portion of his contributions, but it still only shows us part of the picture. The DeVos family also runs a company called Amway/Alticor, and Amway donated $21,600 to Huizenga’s campaign this year. There are other contributions from Steelcase in Grand Rapids, Haworth of Holland and members of the Haworth family giving Huizenga money. In fact, Huizenga enjoys a larger war chest thanks to these very rich people and their corporations donating money to his campaign. And we also can’t forget the PACs.
Dean Vanderstelt on the other hand has raised money through small individual contributions. The DeVos family is not giving Vanderstelt money. The Haworth family is not giving Vanderstelt money. The Koch Brothers are not giving Vanderstelt money, but they did give Bill Huizenga money. Dean Vanderstelt’s contributors are individuals living in the 2nd District and money from the Michigan Democratic Party. No PACs have contributed to Dean Vanderstelt either. Just individual people, who Congressmen are supposed to represent in Washington DC.
The DeVos family are responsible for Michigan becoming a freedom to freeload state. The DeVos empire is devoted to union busting in Michigan and it was their behind the scenes check writing in December of 2012 that pushed Michigan legislators to vote in favor of a law that the DeVos family benefits from. Patrick Colbeck bragged about the money flowing from the DeVos family into the chambers of the Michigan Capital. The DeVos family are also responsible financially and politically for Michigan being a leader in for-profit charter schools, using organizations such as GLEP to push for eliminating public education in Michigan.
So as you look at this information on who is giving these candidates money one thing is for certain; Bill Huizenga represents the DeVos family et al when he is in Washington. Dean Vanderstelt will represent the people of Michigan’s 2nd District. Do the people of the 2nd District want someone on Washington who only represents the DeVos family, or do we want someone who represents all of the people of the 2nd District? My choice is obvious, The 2nd District deserves someone who respresents the people, not the DeVos family’s large bank account. Your vote for Dean Vanderstelt will make sure all of the people in the Michigan’s 2nd District are represented in Washington.
Meet The Candidates State Senate District #38: Christopher Germain and Chris LaMarche
Sunday , 20, July 2014 Candidates Leave a commentFor the 38th state senate district in the state there are two candidates running as Democrats in the August 5 primary election. They are Chris LaMarche of Gladstone and Christopher Germain of Escanaba.
Chris LaMarche has been a Yooper his entire life. Growing up he was an Eagle Scout and a member of the Order of the Arrow. He graduated from Michigan State University with Bachelors’ degrees in Biology and Genetics. LaMarche’s background in science he believes gives him a unique outlook on politics, and wants to bring that unique ability to Lansing. He was named to the Demmer Scholars program and worked as an intern for Senator Debbie Stabenow helping with her work in the Senate Agriculture Committee. He had experience watching a senate bill go through the process of becoming law.
Issues Chris LaMarche feels very strongly about are the lack of opportunities for young people in the upper peninsula of Michigan. Providing what young people need to want to move to the 38th district. There needs to be better high paying jobs for skilled workers. Raising the minimum wage would help other people living in the area and boost the local economy. Right to Work has not helped the people of the 38th district because it contributes to lowering wages. Schools are underfunded, which contributes more to people looking for opportunity falling behind. LaMarche also wants to see improvements made to Internet and wifi accessibility in the region. This is another issue that discourages young people from staying in the upper peninsula.
LaMarche has seen first hand how Lansing’s bad decisions have hurt the people of Northern Michigan. Staff cuts, privatization of the food service at the Marquette Branch Prison have meant more people losing jobs while the costs to run the prison have risen.
To learn more about Chris La Marche and his campaign, you can visit his campaign page on Facebook.
Christopher Germain was born and raised in Escanaba. His career over the past ten years has been selling real estate in Delta County. He is also captain of the local volunteer fire department where he facilitates all of the fire department related training programs. He is also a member of the Delta County Jaycees and the Delta Lodge 195 of the Free Masons. Through his work as a real estate agent and being involved with the community as a volunteer, he knows what the people of the 38th district want. Germain believes he is the best candidate because he cares about the people. He also believes that the upper peninsula of Michigan doesn’t get a fair chance or has a loud enough voice in Lansing,
Germain believes there is too much government waste and all government departments need to have cuts made to them to make them run more efficiently. He especially wants to see more cuts to welfare because there is too much abuse of the system. Other issues important to Christopher Germain include a world class education, having enough jobs for the highly skilled workforce in the upper peninsula, such as more mining, and putting an end to unfair tax hikes on the elderly and less fortunate.
Germain has focused on meeting as many people as possible during the primary election period, and to share his message on how to get Michigan to work for all Michiganians. To learn more or volunteer you can visit Christopher Germain’s website.
Rick Snyder Needs To Start Campaigning So His Staff Have Something Constructive To Do
Thursday , 17, July 2014 Nerd Problems Leave a comment
Rick Snyder found out yet again this week what happens when you’re too busy being governor to campaign, but you’re paying for a campaign staff anyway.
Snyder is so darn busy, he can’t even be bothered to fill out MLive’s candidate questionnaire for their online voter guide. It’s a very nice tool; you put in your address and find your voting precinct. It automatically loads the candidates you will vote for and read their positions on important issues.
Or at least you can read about the issues for those candidates who filled it out. Rick Snyder hasn’t bothered, because he’s far too busy being governor and doing his job being governor to waste time doing pointless things, like campaign for another term. He’s the governor, what do you want from him, a debate? What are the Tigers’ chances of making the playoffs?
His campaign staff believe infiltrating Mark Schauer and Lisa Brown’s campaign uninvited and gathering important intel should be their top priority. Their rationale of course is “they did it to Mitt Romney in 2012,” except it wasn’t a member of President Obama’s campaign staff at that private fund raiser, it was the bartender hired for the evening.
The conversation in the car before Natalie Collins and Kyle Anderson crashed the private event in Bloomfield Hills hints at the fact that this is happening often enough they complain about how hard it is to make transcripts when the only audio they have is from a cell phone. After they ditch the event because they get nervous they talk about at least staying away from Schauer events for a while and making their twitter accounts private.
The Nixon-era antics makes anyone ask if the Snyder campaign staff were doing this in 2010. Probably, but back then Snyder wasn’t governor and had to do actual campaigning stuff. It also helps that nobody on the 2010 campaign staff is on the 2014 campaign staff, because the 2010 campaign staff either left politics or work for Americans For Prosperity now. Snyder’s not-an-election-I’m-too-busy-to-campaign staff is full of fresh, new faces.
So what did Snyder’s campaign that isn’t really campaigning because he’s too busy doing his job as governor to waste time being a politician and campaign learn?
“They don’t make Saturns anymore.”
Get your lies straight. Telling one person you ‘heard about’ this event at last week’s event, then telling someone else you ‘googled it’ is a sure sign you don’t belong there.
“I just want pineapple.” Maybe Snyder can serve pineapple at his private fund raisers, if he ever gets around to doing any of that campaigning he doesn’t have time to do. Because he’s the governor.
And then there was the most important information of all:
This is the third time these Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy wannabes have been caught spying on Mark Schauer’s campaign. From their conversation within the non-union made Honda it’s likely that this is going on far more often than only three times. Collins and Anderson discuss at least staying away from Schauer events for a while. Now they’re permanently off the gate crasher list.
Meet the Candidates District #37: Jimmy Schmidt and Dr. Phil Bellfy
Sunday , 13, July 2014 Candidates Leave a commentThe 37th state senate district will have a Democratic primary race on August 5. Two candidates are running to be the Democratic Party nominee.
Jimmy Schmidt of Central Lake graduated from Fenton High School in 1964. Business experience includes operating a Black Angus ranch and an apple orchard of 467 apple trees which he planted with his father. For college Schmidt attended Mott Community College wher he earned an associates degree in 1968, From there he attended Henry Ford Technical Trade School where he earned journeyman in tool and dye. Jimmy Schmidt attended Detroit College of Business and Baker College in Flint, completing a degree in accounting in 1992. He also holds a paralegal degree which he earned from Northwestern Michigan College in 2007. Schmidt has worked in the military sector, industrial machinery. The Schmidt Foundation is a nonprofit organization that helps people with disabilities.
Jimmy Schmidt is a conservative Democrat heavily leaning toward Republican Ideals. His values include family first, integrity matters, justice should prevail, service above self, honesty is a given, and humility is a gift. On the issues Schmidt supports eliminating personal property taxes and the state sales tax and replace it with a goods and services tax. Each senior citizen should receive a check from the state for $167.00 per month. He also supports alternative sources of energy such as wood chip burning. He also wants to revise the agreement with Ontario that currently only allows only three of the ten generators at Sault Power and Electric to operate, and allow all ten to generate power. Jimmy Schmidt wants a double wall on the Enbridge Pipeline under the Mackinac Bridge. Finally, Schmidt will work in Lansing for a light rail passenger train to be constructed from Grand Rapids, to Lansing and Ann Arbor, then north to Traverse City, Petoskey and Mackinac City by 2016.
For more information on Jimmy Schmidt, you can visit his website.
The second Democratic candidate for the 37th state senate is Dr. Phil Bellfy. A resident of Sault Ste. Marie, his family has lived in the area for ten generations. Dr. Bellfy is an environmentalist first, and he wants to be the next state senator representing the 37th district in order to fight to protect the environment in the eastern Upper Peninsula. He attended Lake Superior State on the GI Bill and earned a Bachelor’s in Psychology. From Michigan State University he holds a Master’s in Sociology and a Ph D in American Studies. Colleges Bellfy has taught at include Lake State, Bay Mills Community College, Wayne State and Michigan State, where he retired from teaching in 2012.
Dr. Bellfy’s main issues are the environment, jobs, and energy. His work in environmentalism spans 40 years and he has worked with Native American tribes, at international, national, state, and local levels promoting important environmental issues. There are many things threatening Northern Michigan’s environment, the Enbridge Pipeline under the Mackinac Bridge; fracking in the northern lower peninsula, and a proposed cellulose ethanol refinery that would have deforested the eastern upper peninsula. That project has been scrapped as of July 14, 2014.
Other issues Dr. Bellfy will fight for in Lansing include a woman’s right to choose. Women’s reproductive health care is under attack from the right. What a woman discusses with her doctor is between her and her doctor and no one else, especially the state. He also will work to overturn the very unpopular Right to Work legislation passed in Lansing in December of 2012. Raising taxes on poor people and old people in Michigan hurt the most vulnerable of all in the state. It was wrong and needs to be overturned. Finally, preserving public education in Michigan which will in turn build an educated work force to fill jobs our state still needs. We are third in the nation in unemployment. Solar and wind power would create more jobs in Michigan. A healthy environment provides the forests, lakes and rivers many people travel to Northern Michigan to enjoy. Dr. Bellfy supports sustainable forest management that can provide wood for manufacturing as well as help reduce carbon emissions in our atmosphere.
Dr. Phil Bellfy is endorsed by Cheyboygan County Democratic Party, Straits Area Concerned Citizens for Peace, Justice and Environment, Chippewa County Democratic Party, Charlevoix County Democrats Executive Committee, Antrim County Democratic Party, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Michigan PAC, and Michigan NOW PAC.
For more information, you can visit Dr. Bellfy’s website.
Children-Hating Vassar Makes National News And The Rest of Michigan Cringe
Friday , 11, July 2014 Community 4 Comments
On Wednesday, July 9, 200 citizens of Vassar, Michigan, held a meeting to discuss the possibility of a closed detention center being opened to house 120 immigrant children being held on the southwestern border of the United States. Wolverine Human Services would run a program at the facility that would last a month and help immigrant males between the ages of 12 to 17 receive shelter, food, medical care, and life skills and ESL education during their stay. The people of Vassar at the meeting voiced strong objections to the plan, with some comments revealing an alarming level of vitriolic hatred toward children.
Derrick McCree of Wolverine presented his company’s plan to the people at the meeting, giving details of what their program would include and how many of the immigrant children would be at the facility. None of the children would ever leave the facility or attend local schools. When the Wolverine representative finished his presentation, jeers could be heard from a couple of attendees.
Next came the local citizens to voice their opinions. The mayor of Vassar, Dan Surgent, said he was sick of listening to Obama’s lying mouth. Tom Wassa, a Republican candidate for the 84th district in the Michigan House of Representatives called President Obama a domestic terrorist. Tamyra Murray insisted that the children were “a game to control our nation. It’s an invasion, nothing less than an invasion.” After Murray said that, someone from the audience shouted the children would stay permanently and vote for Democrats. Terry Mocny suggested putting a mine field on the border. Some people wore surgical masks to demonstrate their concern that the children were carrying infectious diseases that could spread to their community.
Vassar, Michigan, isn’t an isolated case. All over the country Americans are saying ugly things about these children who fled their own countries in Central America out of fear of their lives. Vassar residents’ words are vile and smacks of nativism this country hasn’t seen since the days of the Know-Nothing Party. Gadsden flags and racist-fueled rage have become the emblems of ignorant people out of their minds. Shame on Vassar, Michigan, and shame on everyone who agrees with them. These same people insist they’re Christians, but have they ever taken the time to think about these tired, poor huddled masses arriving at the border because they don’t want to be murdered and asked themselves: WWJD?
State Senator @gretchenwhitmer Flips On Proposal 1
Thursday , 10, July 2014 Uncategorized Leave a comment
On July 9 the political group Michigan Citizens for Strong and Safe Communities issued a statement that State Senator Gretchen Whitmer had changed her mind on her previous objections to Proposal 1 and would be voting yes for it on August 5 during the primary election. Senator Whitmer was one of two Democratic Party senators who voted against the bill that requires the citizens to approve the change to the tax code in a referendum vote.
Proposal 1 will approve or not approve a package of bills currently waiting in the state senate to eliminate the personal property tax on businesses and instead shift the money local municipalities rely on to function to the state use tax. The problem with this plan is there is no way the state use tax can ever come close to raising as much revenue that the PPT raises. When there is a shortfall, the state government insists the rest can come out of the general fund.
This would be the same general fund that earlier this year the state learned would suffer a $900 million shortfall over the next two years and require even more cuts to the state budget. Cities, townships, and school districts all over the state already struggle to keep police, firefighters, and schools open, so this tax cut for business appears to make the situation even worse.
Senator Whitmer however believes this won’t be a problem:
“The Senate bill to put this proposal on the ballot left large questions that I felt needed to be answered, particularly addressing the potential financial impacts on local schools and first responders,” said Whitmer. “With the improvements that were made to this proposal in the State House and subsequent analysis by local government officials and fiscal agencies, I am comfortable that my concerns have been addressed and that this move won’t put our local communities at further financial risk.”
Senator Whitmer’s concerns have been addressed, but the concerns many in the state should have as the primary election is only weeks away need to be put to rest. How can Michigan, a state that can’t fix it’s roads or properly fund public schools be able to rely on a tax that in some circumstances is a voluntary tax not everyone pays? Revenue sharing from the state to local cities and townships has a very poor track record with a dismal outcome we are witnessing in our largest city, Detroit, right now. Insisting that the “job creators” need another tax cut in this state is obtuse at the very least.
Perhaps Senator Whitmer could share with the citizens of this state what specifically changed her mind about Proposal 1? Until then, Up North Progressive emphatically recommends the state vote NO on this proposal on August 5.
Fundraiser Announcement For Our Next Governor Mark Schauer
Tuesday , 8, July 2014 Candidates Leave a comment
State Superintendent Mike Flanagan Says A Thing: Doing Anything Remains To Be Seen
Tuesday , 8, July 2014 Section 16 Leave a comment
UPDATE: Mike Flanagan announced he will retire when his contract ends in 2015. Another reason it’s vitally important that Mark Schauer is our next governor.
In the days since the Detroit Free Press published their eight-day series on charter schools in Michigan, the talk in the state has been how to make charter schools more accountable to the parents of the students they’re supposed to teach, and also to the taxpayers of Michigan who they’re not supposed to rip off. State Superintendent of Schools Mike Flanagan issued a statement on July 7with a laundry list of items he wants the state school board to implement on charter schools to hold authorizers accountable. These measures have the appearance of taking away the all-reaching power of the management company, the primary source of the mismanagement in charter schools, and giving it to the charter school board. The only bad thing about this is often members of the board are closely associated with the owners and employees of the management company, as is the case with Grand Traverse Academy and their current and former management companies.
- Clearly identify the school governing board as the party ultimately responsible for the success or failure of the school, and clearly define the external provider as a vendor of services;
- Prohibit the management company from selecting, approving, employing, compensating, or serving as school governing board members. In Michigan, management companies are allowed to recruit board members and are free to hire friends and relatives of board members without disclosing that information;
(That means you, Grand Traverse Academy. The Detroit Free Press exposed this as being very wide spread among state charter schools)
- Require the school governing board to directly select, retain and compensate the school attorney, accountant and audit firm. In Michigan, management companies can and often do perform this function;
- Require that payments from the authorizer to the school go to an account controlled by the school governing board, not the management company. Michigan already requires this, but management companies can and do immediately move the money out of the board-managed account;
(Steve Ingersoll routinely helped himself to charter school money in “advance payments”)
- Require all instructional materials, furnishings, and equipment purchased or developed with public funds to be the property of the school, not the management company;
(What about Steve Ingersoll’s schools, which all have full optometry clinics in them? Will they be the property of the school too?)
- Condition charter approval on authorizer review and approval of the management contract;
- Grant charter school renewals only to those that have achieved the standards and targets stated in the charter contract; are organizationally and fiscally viable; and have been faithful to the terms of the contract and applicable law;
- Clearly communicate to schools the criteria for charter revocation, renewal, and non-renewal decisions that are consistent with the charter contract;
- Require evidence of a management company’s educational and management success;
(If this is actually enforced, things could get very interesting)
- Require a proposed agreement with a management company to include performance evaluation measures, fee structures, financial controls, oversight and disclosure, and renewal and termination details;
(The fact that this is something only now being considered should make lots of Michigan taxpayers really angry.)
- Require a management company to disclose and explain any existing or potential conflicts of interest between the charter school governing board and proposed service provider or any affiliated business entities;
(provisions like this make me hopeful that the MDE is paying attention to Steven Ingersoll, family and close friends)
If Flanagan and the MDE really make good on enforcing these provisions, it would be a good thing for the state. Unfortunately, Flanagan must understand that big and powerful people like Betsy and Dick DeVos don’t want this to happen and have plenty of money to make sure it doesn’t. Don’t be surprised if there’s rumblings about appointing a new state superintendent in the near future.