Michigan’s Echo

Toledo will shut down the nearly empty Southwyck Shopping Mall if its owners do not clean up toxic black mold and asbestos contamination found there last week, the city said Thursday. The management of the mall will receive 72-hour orders, according to a statement from the city.

The Michigan Legislature needs to make the Great Lakes Water Compact an urgent item on its priority list.

Some of the nations largest oil companies have agreed to pay about $423 million in cash to settle a lawsuit brought by more than a hundred public water providers, claiming water contamination from a popular gasoline additive.

Mayor Gavin Newsom is competitive about many things, garbage included. When the city found out a few weeks ago that it was keeping 70 percent of its disposable waste out of local landfills, he embraced the statistic the way other mayors embrace winning sports teams, improved test scores or declining crime rates.

But it is the engine that elevates this car into the next century. It is an environmentally friendly car, run on hydrogen fuel cells and created from scratch by a team of seventh-graders at Derby Middle School.

The ability to get more than $230 million in tax credits and grants to revive blighted buildings and contaminated land is an essential tool that has helped spark billions in Detroit development this decade, said city officials, who were among the 6,000 who gathered at Cobo Center this week for a conference dedicated to "brownfield" redevelopment.

The recent hysteria about using agricultural crops for food or fuel creates a grave risk of setting up a false choice between only food or only fuel.

Michigans state and local road agencies are dealing with funding problems that could reverse the progress weve made in improving our roadways over the last decade.

The state Senate voted today to ban smoking in public places including restaurants and bars, sending the issue back to the House, which has passed a similar bill.

Plans to clean up and contain dioxin along the Tittabawassee River include stabilizing areas of the riverbank in danger of falling into the water and spreading the contamination.

Now that that push to ban smoking in Michigan bars, restaurants and other workplaces has cleared a big hurdle with Senate passage, the measure could be on its way to Gov. Jennifer Granholm's desk for signature as early as next week.

Throngs of worried residents and local officials packed a school auditorium Wednesday night (May 7, 2008) to hear state Department of Environmental Quality and Richfield Landfill representatives explain their plan to control creeping contamination from the 300-acre facility on Mt. Morris Road.

Not only are the little animals keeping trash out of landfills, they're making the trash into rich compost thats being used as soil, fertilizer and fungicide at university greenhouses.

About 50 people turned out Tuesday for the first of two neighborhood block parties aimed at boosting watershed awareness.

A once revved-up initiative to connect all non-motorized trailways across the county and region has lost some steam. County trail advocates have some tough terrain to cover as they pursue different paths in search of money to fund various municipal projects and links; and with a lagging economy, the consensus is that it will remain a tough road ahead.

The future of Delta Countys park system was reviewed Wednesday during an open house hosted by the Delta County Parks Authority. The authority is seeking public input on the five parks owned by the county.

A proposed resolution to form a renewable energy commission in Delta County will be presented for review to every municipal unit in the county, local governmental officials decided Wednesday.

Officials at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore will burn three fields near Port Oneida Road this month.

Area environmentalists will meet tonight with representatives of Walpole Island reserve to discuss the proposed Shell Canada oil refinery in St. Clair Township, Ontario.