Steve Carmody

A large crowd of dog owners packed a Lansing city council meeting on the city’s vicious dog ordinance.  The city council's public safety committee heard from about a dozen speakers during its hour long meeting.

Mayor Virg Bernero wants Lansing to adopt a new law that requires additional insurance and fencing requirements on the owners of specific breeds of dog, including pit bulls.

Beth Contreras is the vice president of Voiceless Michigan, an animal welfare group. She says the mayor’s proposal is the wrong approach.

Union workers at the Macomb Daily and Royal Oak Tribune newspapers are contemplating a possible strike and other job actions at the end of the month.

The Journal Register company owns the papers. It has announced plans to end its union contracts and probably make deep cuts in its union and non-union workforces, more than 800 people statewide.

Lou Mleczko is the president of the Newspaper Guild of Detroit. He says the unions, representing the union 175 members involved, met Sunday to agree on a strategy.

“We are not just going to sit idly by and let them terminate these contracts….and strip pay and benefits away from our members,” says Mleczko. 

Mleczko says the unions plan to start telling advertisers about their plans.

He says the unions may hold strike authorization votes before March 19th.

That’s the date of the next bankruptcy hearing for the Journal Register company.

A state House committee this week will discuss whether to prevent local cities and towns in Michigan from passing laws requiring businesses to offer paid sick leave to their employees.

San Francisco, Seattle and several other major cities have passed ‘paid sick leave’ ordinances in recent years.  The intent is to protect people in low paying jobs, who stand to lose their job, if they try to take a sick day.

A new Michigan State University study finds a link between autism and a brain abnormality in low birth weight babies.

Tammy Movsas is an assistant professor of pediatrics at MSU and medical director of the Midland County Department of Public Health.

She’s been studying ultrasounds of low birth weight babies. She discovered babies were seven times more likely to develop autism if they had enlarged cavities in the brain that store spinal fluid.

Local governments and businesses are waiting to see how they will be affected by automatic federal budget cuts that take effect today.   

In Grand Rapids, the city’s plans for a new rapid bus service may end up being delayed by the sequester cuts.

Peter Varga is the CEO of The Rapid.   He says 80 percent of the funding for the nearly $40 million project is slated to come from the federal government.

Varga says if the federal funding is held up, the project will be delayed beyond its 2014 completion date. He says a delay will add to the cost of the project.

Michigan nearly lead the nation in ‘short sales’ last year.

The head of the state’s realtors’ association says that’s a positive sign for home sales in 2013.

Realty Trac reports 33% of homes sold in Michigan last year were short sales. Alabama lead the nation with 34% of its home sales coming through short sales.

A ‘short sale’ is when a bank agrees to let a home sell for less than what’s owed on the mortgage.

Short sales in Michigan have surged in recent years, as banks have struggled to unload a backlog of foreclosed homes.

The Michigan Court of Appeals has tossed a big jury award in a former Detroit school teacher's whistleblower lawsuit.

In 2004, Beverly Garvin claims a fourth grade student told her that two boys had forced her to perform oral sex. Garvin says she reported the alleged assault to her superiors and nothing happened. Garvin says when she persisted, including contacting police, she was transferred and eventually fired. 

A jury awarded Garvin $750 thousand in damages. 

State lawmakers will discuss legislation tomorrow inspired by the disappearance and death of a Florida toddler.

Two year old Caylee Anthony was missing for a month before her mother informed the police. The mother, Casey Anthony, was later acquitted of the child’s 2008 murder, though she was convicted of providing police with false information. 

State Representative Tom Hooker says his bill would require parents or guardians to report missing children to law enforcement agencies after 24 hours.  If they don’t, they could face up to four years in prison.

Detroit’s real estate market posted some of the strongest price gains in the nation in 2012.

The just released S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index charts home sale prices in the nation’s twenty largest cities.

Detroit home sale prices rose more than 13 percent last year, the third highest percentage increase in the survey.

Craig Lazzara is the head of Index Investment Strategy at S&P Dow Jones Indices. He compiled the report. Lazzara says, despite the rise in prices, homes in Detroit are still selling for about what they did in 1997. 

The city of Flint is once again hiking water rates.

The move is likely to stir controversy.

Beginning March 1st, the city of Flint is raising the deposit required for water service to rental properties, from 100 dollars to 350 dollars.

A city spokeswoman says the 350 dollar deposit will begin to reduce the current $2.8 million owed the system.

Water rate increases have been highly controversial in Flint.

Since 2011, the city has hiked water rates by more than 100 percent.

Michigan hospitals could be among those hardest hit by automatic federal budget cuts this week.

Under the sequestration, Medicare reimbursements to doctors and hospitals would be cut by two percent.

Laura Appel is the vice president for federal policy and advocacy with the Michigan Health and Hospital Association.  She says sequestration would add up to tens of millions of dollars a year in loss reimbursements to Michigan hospitals. 

Feeling the blues?

University of Michigan researchers say so called ‘retail therapy’ can help.

Legislation to allow tourists to hold and pose for photos while holding bear cubs is being criticized by Michigan’s zoo keepers.

The state senate passed a bill this month that would allow exhibitors to let people come into very close contact with bears less than nine months old and under 90 pounds.

The legislation is intended to help a bear sanctuary in the Upper Peninsula that funds its operations, in part, by letting tourists hold and pose for pictures with bear cubs.

Tara Harrison says that’s a bad idea.  She’s the veterinarian at Lansing’s Potter Park.

The American Civil Liberties Union is raising questions about how Michigan police officers and sheriff’s deputies use tasers.

Tasers have become an important tool for law enforcement agencies across Michigan.    The devices are used to incapacitate individuals with a high voltage electric shock.

But the ACLU says there is not a uniform policy among Michigan law enforcement agencies for when to use a taser.