A major union is disputing claims by Michigan’s home builders that there are not enough skilled workers to fill all the jobs in the state’s resurgent construction industry.

New home prices are up in Michigan this year. Building permits are also up.

But the Home Builders Association of Michigan released a survey last month claiming a deep gap between the number of skilled trades workers and the jobs available.

That’s not true, according to Mike Jackson.   He’s the Secretary-Treasurer of the Michigan Regional Council of Carpenters and Millwrights.

Mike Duggan has dropped out of the race for Detroit mayor, a day after the Michigan Court of Appeals removed him from the ballot.

A stocky white guy from Livonia, Duggan moved his family to Detroit last year so he  could run.

But now, he'll likely be remembered as the guy who couldn't wait just two weeks.

A few hundred demonstrators rallied in front of the state Capitol today.

They called for more support for public education. They say Republican policies in Lansing to encourage more charter schools and online learning would come at the expense of students in traditional public school classrooms.
    
Stephanie Keiles is a middle school teacher in the Plymouth-Canton district who helped organize the rally. She says teachers are growing frustrated.

“We just felt like our profession’s been demoralized, that things are being done that are not in the best interest of kids, and we don’t like where everything is headed, and how can we stop it?”

Democratic candidate for governor Mark Schauer was among the speakers who addressed the crowd.

Governor Rick Snyder’s office released a statement that per-student financial support has grown over the past three years since he took office.

This year's vehicle Initial Quality Survey by the business tracking firm J.D Power and Associates is a bit of a stunner.

The survey asks people how many problems they had with their car in the first 90 days of ownership.

The top auto company was GM. 

The company's GMC brand was second only to Porsche.  That's the first time GMC has ranked anywhere near that high in the history of the survey.   Chevy was fifth, also a dramatic rise in the rankings.

We live in a complex world of technology, of instant communication with just about any spot in the world.

So it is all too easy for us to lose track of our roots, our history.

Who were the first people to call Michigan "home" and what can we learn from those first Michiganders?

Bill Lovis is a professor and curator of anthropology at Michigan State University.

“They came from the South,” Bill said of the first state inhabitants.

Around 12,000 years ago, Michigan was under ice, with several lobes of glaciers covering the state. As the ice receded and melted, people moved up into the state and the Great Lakes began to form.

It was still several thousands of years before Michigan’s terrain began to resemble what it is today. Glaciers left the land very cold, barren, and wet, and it took a long time for forestation to begin. The earliest inhabitants were families who moved across this landscape going from resource to resource.

While these early settlers maybe seem very distant to modern Michiganders, they still touch our lives today.

“Anyone who has a corncob with their braut in the summer is being impacted by Native American society,” said Bill. “The food crops are exceptionally important contributions to the world economy.”

Listen to the full interview above.

Its official title is the "Senate Agriculture Reform, Food, and Jobs Act," but feel free to call it "The 2013 Farm Bill." It was passed last week by the Senate on the wings of strong bipartisan support by a vote of 66-27.

This nearly $1 trillion bill has been over a year and a half in the making. Not only does it slash $24 billion from agriculture programs, but it makes substantial changes in the way the federal government spends on efforts like the federal food assistance program.

To get a sense of what's in the Senate farm bill and how it matters to each of us, we turned to David Schweikhardt. He's a Professor in the Michigan State University Department of Agriculture, Food and Resource Economics, and he joined us in the studio today.

Listen to the full interview above.

The U.S. Senate has passed its 2013 Farm Bill, a huge piece of legislation - totaling almost a trillion dollars. We'll found out just what's in the bill, and why, as Michigan Democratic Senator Debbie Stabenow likes to say, "Michigan is written into its every page."

And, we got an update on the Detroit mayoral race after one of the front-runners got kicked off the ballot.

First on the show, we continue our look at the Great Lakes. Yesterday, we talked about the state's "blue" economy, using our water resources to create jobs and boost industry here in Michigan.

So, today, let's turn to some encouraging news about our lakes from the Healing Our Waters-Great Lakes Coalition. They've just released an interactive map that pinpoints success stories across the region, efforts to restore the lakes with projects funded by the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative.

To get an idea of what these success stories are and the challenges to the lakes that still remain, we turned to Andy Buchsbaum, the director of the National Wildlife Federation's regional Great Lakes Office.

Officials from the city of Detroit and the NHL's Detroit Red Wings announced a $650 million plan for a new Red Wings arena and sports and entertainment district in Detroit.

More from the Associated Press:

The project was announced Wednesday at a meeting of economic development officials to approve the deal. The 18,000-seat arena would be at Interstate 75 and Woodward Avenue, near the Detroit Tigers' Comerica Park and the Detroit Lions' Ford Field.

Red Wings and Tigers owner Mike Ilitch has long said that he wants a replacement for the 32-year-old Joe Louis Arena.

The Red Wings say there will be $367 million in private investment and $283 million in public funds in the complex. It also will include residential and retail space.

Ilitch's family also owns Little Caesars Pizza and downtown Detroit's Fox Theatre.

The Illitch family-owned Olympia Development group and officials from Detroit's Downtown Development Authority agreed on a memorandum of understanding for the new development this afternoon.

You can read the MOU here.

Michigan's unemployment rate for May 2013 remained unchanged from the previous month - 8.4%. If you compare it to May 2012, the rate is down - the unemployment rate in May 2012 was 9.2%.

After the Great Recession, the unemployment rate in Michigan began to drop from its high of more than 14% in 2009, but so did the number of people in the overall "workforce" in the state. The workforce, or the total number of people both working or actively looking for work, has only increased slightly in recent months.

This month, the workforce grew by 28,000.

DETROIT (AP) - The Detroit Red Wings and city officials have announced a $650 million plan for a new arena for the NHL team in Detroit's downtown entertainment and sports district.

Plans for the 18,000-seat arena were announced Wednesday at a meeting of economic development officials to approve the deal. Red Wings owner Mike Ilitch has long said he wanted a replacement for the 32-year-old Joe Louis Arena.

Michigan State University broke ground today on a new, $60 million dollar bioengineering building.

The building will serve as place for researchers in different disciplines to share ideas for advancements in medicine and other sciences.

“Let’s not forget that as important as the facility is to our success, it is the people, the researchers, the medical professionals applying their knowledge, curiosity and perseverance that will ultimately triumph,” said Stephen Hsu, vice president for Research and Graduate Studies at MSU.

A search for ex-Teamster boss Jimmy Hoffa was called off this afternoon, Joseph Lichterman of Reuters reported. 

On Monday, authorities from the FBI began digging in Oakland Township, MI in search of Hoffa's body. Anthony Zerrili, an 85-year-old alleged mobster tipped off the agency, saying that Hoffa had been hit with a shovel and buried alive in a field near Detroit. 

At a press conference early this morning, Mike Duggan announced he is officially withdrawing from Detroit’s mayoral race.

Duggan, the former CEO of the Detroit Medical Center, was kicked off the mayoral ballot last week after the Third Circuit Court ruled that he did not meet the residency requirement in Detroit’s electoral law. The Michigan Court of Appeals upheld that decision. Duggan declined to appeal that ruling.

DETROIT (AP) - Detroit City Council member Kwame Kenyatta says he quitting Friday.

Kenyatta didn't give a specific reason to radio station WWJ, but he says the council is virtually powerless now that Detroit is being run by an emergency manager. 

Kenyatta also has been dealing with health problems that he hasn't publicly discussed in detail. After two terms, he didn't plan to run for re-election this year.

Kenyatta has been critical of Mayor Dave Bing and the state's intervention in Detroit's poor finances. He made headlines in 2008 when he gave up on his foreclosed home, one of a handful of council members who had financial problems. 

Detroit council members make about $74,000 a year.

A three day conference is getting underway in Marquette today, looking at the unique needs of cities on the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River.

More than a hundred American and Canadian cities are part of the group organizing the conference.

Dave Ulrich is the executive director of the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative.

He says this year’s conference is focusing on the effects of climate change on Great Lakes cities, particularly on water levels on the lakes.

We didn’t have an early spring this year, but it looks like an early summer. I say that because while it is still technically spring, the authorities are already engaged in what has been a late summer Michigan ritual, digging up a field to look for Jimmy Hoffa.

Usually, it strikes me as strange that this case still gets so much attention, but this year we’ve been so overwhelmed with news from Detroit that we probably need a little escape.

This week in Michigan politics, Jack Lessenberry and Emily Fox discuss the state of Medicaid expansion in the Michigan Senate, Governor Snyder's trade mission to Israel, and the political future of Mike Duggan in Detroit.

Chrysler waves the white flag

Chrysler is now agreeing to recall some 2.7 million older model Jeeps. At first, Chrysler refused to recall the cars and the company maintains the vehicles are not defective. Safety regulators say 1993 to 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokees and 2002-2007 Jeep Liberty Vehicles can catch on fire when they're rear-ended. The design flaw has killed 51 people in fiery crashes.

Michigan counties will receive disaster relief

President Obama has approved a disaster declaration for 16 Michigan counties hard hit by spring floods. The declaration will help communities repair and rebuild roads, bridges and other public infrastructure damaged in the flooding. This does not include assistance for individuals or businesses. State and federal agencies will soon hold briefings across the state to help communities understand and start the application process.  

The Detroit Zoo and the DIA are safe

Legislation was signed into law yesterday allowing the Detroit Zoo and the Detroit Institute of Arts to get millions of dollars in tax revenues as promised from the metro region. Several metro cities were skimming some of the revenue generated by multi-county millages voters approved to support the zoo and the museum.

Our State of Opportunity project focuses on kids and what it will take to get them ahead. At the most basic level, that means ensuring children are healthy. But as Michigan Radio’s Jennifer Guerra reports, nationwide drug shortages could threaten even that most basic task.

We called every neonatal intensive care unit in Michigan, and all but one got back us. Each one has experienced or is experiencing a wide variety of drug shortages in the NICU.

President Obama has approved a disaster declaration for 16 Michigan counties hard hit by spring floods.   

Heavy rains in April and May inundated communities across the state. 

The president’s disaster declaration will help communities repair and rebuild roads, bridges and other public infrastructure damaged in the flooding. The disaster declaration does not include assistance for individuals or businesses.