Bill Ford Jr. urged swift action on a variety of fronts during keynote remarks Thursday including national energy policy, a new business tax plan in Michigan and implementation of Road to Renaissance plans to transform the state economy.
Ford, executive chairman of Ford Motor Co. used his address at the Mackinac Policy Conference as an opportunity to offer his view on a variety of economic issues, including thoughts on what Michigan can do to capture opportunities even as the automotive industry is going through a wrenching restructuring.
“Our industry is restructuring, causing plant closings, layoffs, rising unemployment and a falling tax base,” he said. “At the same time, legitimate concerns about global warming, energy security and the cost of gasoline have created a rush toward arbitrary and poorly conceived solutions.
“Clearly, it’s up to automakers to address the challenges we face, and that’s what we are doing. But the issues confronting us are bigger than any one industry, and they impact everyone in Detroit and the state of Michigan. It doesn’t matter if the leak is in someone else’s boat; we are all going to sink or float together.”
On energy policy, Ford said that while it is good news that many people finally understand the urgency and the business case for environmental stewardship, “no one person, company or industry can solve these problems by themselves.
“The automobile industry is getting a lot of attention in regard to CO2 emissions and global warming. But the fact is cars and trucks contribute about 20 percent of CO2 emissions in the U.S. and 10 percent of the worldwide total. We need to do our part as an industry, but we are only one piece of a much bigger puzzle.”
Ford called for a national consortium of auto and energy companies, utilities, nongovernmental entities, government agencies, universities and others to develop a more integrated plan. Europe, for example, does not have a perfect plan but has a more integrated framework for action, including tax incentives and the beginnings of a carbon trading program, Ford said. And policies target consumer and industry behaviors, he added.
“We are not shirking our duty, or asking for handouts, just relief from uncertainty and from a fragmented patchwork of arbitrarily set standards,” Ford said.
On the Michigan Business Tax plan, Ford offered strong support.
“This plan promotes a more competitive tax structure for manufacturers in Michigan,” he said. “It broadens the base of business taxpayers by including out-of-state companies who sell their products and services in Michigan but don’t invest here. It also encourages the retention of research and development in Michigan through tax credits.”
Michigan needs to pounce on opportunities for its R&D industry to play a part in alternative-energy industry growth, Ford said. The Road to Renaissance Plan from Detroit Renaissance has the organization, resources and detailed planning and vision needed, Ford said.
“Frankly, too often in the past lofty goals were announced without the resources or careful planning to make them happen,” he said. “Road to Renaissance is different.”
Ford also credited his cousin Edsel Ford for leading the One D collaborative effort that incorporates Road to Renaissance planning.
“We can transform ourselves into a leading center of technical innovation and sustainable mobility, but only if we act swiftly and boldly,” Ford said. “Before our engineers and scientists move somewhere else to find better jobs, before our tax base is too small to support a first-rate education system, before our children and grandchildren leave our state in search of greater opportunity … ”
“If we don’t change ourselves, the world will do it for us.”
Ford said he’s convinced Michigan can make the case for creating the next generation of high-tech jobs. The intellect and university resources are here. When Silicon Valley start-ups in environmental technology talk about planning sales offices in Detroit, Ford’s reaction is, “Why settle for just having sales offices? Why not encourage the development of research and development centers here?”
During the question-and-answer portion of his remarks, Ford said another problem plaguing the automotive industry is perceptions abut quality. Even though American products have proven on par with Toyota, for example, there’s a perception problem with the average American.
“It’s going to require us to be bold and up-front,” Ford said.
On mass transit, Ford said Ford Motor Co. would like to be helpful in crafting a solution and believes mass transit and auto makers can co-exist.
“There’s room for both,” he said.
On upcoming United Auto Workers negotiations, Ford said health care costs are a big concern.
“I’m not suggesting national health care, but we need a change,” he said. “It’s a broken system.”
Larry Alexander, president and CEO of the Detroit Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau, said Ford’s comments were direct and specific, and applauded the mass transit support.
Richard E. Dauch, chairman and CEO of American Axle & Manufacturing, said Ford Motor Co. has the leadership, product plans and energy policy stance it needs to have. Dauch said he agreed the U.S. government needs a comprehensive energy policy overhaul.
“Bill Ford is very crucial to our industry,” he said. “We’re all rooting for him.”
New TV commercials and plans for the business-to-business application of the new brand for the region were rolled out at a Thursday morning session at the Mackinac Policy Conference.
The region’s new brand is both a project to boost tourism and part of the One D collaborative effort that includes among its goals improving perceptions about Detroit. It is a project being led by the Detroit Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau.
The 30-second ads launching in June, initially in Cleveland and Grand Rapids, depict men and women whose friends send video of the fun they are having in Detroit to their friend’s cell phone. In one spot, a man is suffering through dinner with his girlfriend’s parents. In another, a woman is on a nightmarish blind date.
The ads, created by bureau agency The Berline Group of Bloomfield Hills, are to run on Comedy Central and MTV. The TV spots are part of a larger media mix that is heavily weighted with exposure on the Web through various channels such as MySpace and Google.
“A campaign like this will be all over the Internet and will be talked about,” said Christopher Baum, bureau senior vice president of sales and marketing.
The campaign reaches out to potential visitors age 21-34 by promoting Detroit’s assets, namely cars, culture, gaming, music and sports. The graphic for the campaign lists the assets under a brushed metal “D.”
The campaign seeks early adopter individuals who like to try new things first and share experiences with others, said Eric La Brecque, principal of bureau consultant Applied Storytelling.
The bureau also is reinventing its Web site, visitdetroit.com, with features like YouTube videos, and conceptual maps of the region that make it easy to see entertainment districts.
The idea is to give a better understanding of the entire region at a glance and provide the opportunity to drill down further for information about specific destinations.
On the business-to-business side, the bureau is working with three organizations, the Detroit Tigers, Strategic Staffing Solutions and the Detroit Regional Chamber’s new young professions group, Fusion.
Each plans to promote the D “brand” in specific ways. For the Tigers, the D brand story will be in team publications. For Strategic Staffing, the brand is being used to sell the city to potential future employees.
“From a business standpoint we view this as a recruitment tool,” said Cindy Pasky, CEO of Strategic Staffing. By selling the city, the company can gain the 400 employees it needs, particularly IT specialists under age 30. In turn, the company continues to become more profitable and grow.
The bureau and its Tourism Economic Development Council are working with the three organizations to gain some specific success stories that will be used to recruit the next wave of participants, said Larry Alexander, president and CEO of the bureau.
Businesses that seek to learn more can participate in a Webinar on June 15 and a brand summit to be held at The Henry Ford in mid-October, the bureau said.
Free June 9 Foreclosure and Financial Assistance Fair Offers
Press Release
MEDIA CONTACTS: Cara I. Belton, 313-226-9484 or cell, 313-520-8454 Laura L. Rodwan, 313-226-9484 or cell, 313-477-2750
COMMUNITY ORGANIZATIONS COME TOGETHER TO PROVIDE ASSISTANCE, ANSWERS, AND HOPE TO RESIDENTS
Given the alarming rate of foreclosures in Macomb County, many families are finding themselves in need of assistance and answers from experts. In an effort to address residents’ needs, community organizations, government and human service organizations, and financial institutions will host a free foreclosure and financial assistance fair on Saturday, June 9 from 9am – 2pm at the Warren City Hall, One City Square, ¼ mile north of 12 mile, east of Van Dyke.
The event, “Keeping Your Home in Troubling Times,” is designed to provide options and essential information to those experiencing financial challenges. Guests will able to meet with foreclosure counselors from Michigan State University Extension and Lighthouse Community Development. In addition, the fair will feature family activities such as learning how to garden or cook on a budget. Guests may also attend any of 15 presentations during the morning and afternoon, including “Selling a Home When Faced with Foreclosure” and “Negotiating with Mortgage Companies.”
“We’re finding that many individuals are not only facing foreclosure, but struggling to manage a number of other issues at the same time,” said Greg Sterns, Manager Financial Education Counseling, Lighthouse Community Development. “We’re hosting the fair in order to help consumers feel empowered, and realize that there are solutions and valuable resources available to them.”
Throughout Southeast Michigan, foreclosure rates have increased dramatically over the past year. Wayne County experienced a 143% increase, Oakland County – 64% increase, and Macomb County experienced a 234% increase. The State of Michigan experienced an overall increase of 141% in its foreclosure rates.
According to Michael J. Brennan, president and CEO of United Way for Southeastern Michigan, the June 9 fair is an example of the type of proactive approach that is needed to combat high foreclosure rates in Macomb County and the region overall. “This fair is part of United Way’s ongoing effort to develop a unified approach in educating the community about the root causes of financial crisis. We believe that collaboration is a key component to preventing foreclosure, and we remain committed to addressing the underlying causes of our region’s most pressing issues.”
WHAT: A Fair on Foreclosure and Financial Assistance
WHEN: Saturday, June 9, 9am – 2pm
WHERE: Warren City Hall, One City Square, ¼ Mile north of 12 Mile east of Van Dyke
For information on foreclosure assistance please call United Way’s 2-1-1 by dialing 2-1-1 or 800-552-1183.
Donations Provided by:
C & G Newspapers • Central Macomb Credit Union • Fifth Third Bank • First State Bank • Flagstar Bank • Huntington Bank• Metro Credit Union• Metropolitan Consolidated Association of REALTORS •National City Bank • Paramount Bank • United Way for Southeastern Michigan• Warren Bank
Community Partners
City of Warren • City of Roseville •Department of Human Services • Good Shepherd Coalition • Internal Revenue Service• Leaps and Bounds Family Services• Legal Aid and Defender Association •Lighthouse Community Development • Macomb County Asset Building Coalition • Metropolitan Consolidated Association of REALTORS •Macomb County Department of Planning and Economic Development •Macomb County Community Services Agency• Macomb Care Connect •Macomb County Michigan State University Extension • United Way for Southeastern Michigan•
Source: The Detroit News By: David Josar Published: May 31, 2007
MACKINAC ISLAND -- All children in Metro Detroit will read at grade-level and a true regional transit system will be in place by 2015. Those are two specific goals the fledgling One D hopes to achieve.
For the first-time Thursday morning, the people driving One D, a consortium of six powerful Metro Detroit civic organizations, gave details of what they wanted to accomplish in their initiative to bolster southeastern Michigan.
"We don't want young people leaving and no one coming here," said Dick Blouse, president of the Detroit Regional Chamber, one of the groups behind One D.
The group has promised solid benchmarks that will measure the group's success or failure.
Among those goals for Metro Detroit:
*Job growth would be in the top 25 percent of the 50 largest metropolitan areas in America.
*Per capita growth would be in the top 25 percent of the 50 largest metropolitan areas in America.
*Increase the percentage of residents who are self-sufficient.
*By 2010 improve by 20 percent how the region is viewed nationally.
*Move into the top 10 ranking of largest metropolitan areas in terms of the number of individuals with post-secondary education.
*By Dec. 2008, have support for regional transit and the supporting legislation in all communities to establish a regional transportation authority.
The goals may seem lofty, but the group believes that focus and mobilization make the benchmarks achievable.
United Way of Southeastern Michigan president Michael J. Brennan noted that 8,000 people volunteered during Super Bowl XL last year to guide visitors along the streets of Detroit toward Ford Field. That total is the same as the number of 3rd graders in the region who can't read at grade level, he said.
"If you can get those same volunteers working with those children you can have change," Brennan said.
One D, spearheaded by Edsel Ford II, involves the Detroit Regional Chamber; Detroit Renaissance; New Detroit; the Detroit Metro Convention and Visitors Bureau; the Cultural Alliance for Southeastern Michigan, and the United Way for Southeastern Michigan.
Leaders promised to issue annual report cards on progress in five areas residents agreed are important: economic prosperity, educational preparation, quality of life, race relations and regional transit.
Despite the gripes area residents may have, the region has many assets, such as a low cost-of-living and top-notch health care, said Larry Alexander, president of the Detroit Metro Convention and Visitors Bureau.
"There are things we have in our region that other places would love to have," he said.
And while metro Detroit remains one of the most segregated areas of the United States, One D leaders touted the racial diversity as an asset.
"Young people don't want to live in a place where everyone looks like them," said Shirley Stancato, president of New Detroit.
Stancato said the area needs to attract and keep adults between the ages of 21 and 34. "Racial diversity is a key," she said.
You can reach David Josar at (313) 222-2073 or djosar@detnews.com.
Source: MetroMode By: Maureen McDonald Published: May 31, 2007
Ali Ayoub
Vital stats:
Ali Ayoub, 17, graduates this June from Fordson High School and expects to pursue a career in medicine, starting at Wayne State University. The Dearborn youth already completed over 500 hours of volunteering at Oakwood Hospital and conducted fundraisers for victims of Hurricane Katrina and recipients of aid from the World Medical Relief in Detroit. He is a research intern at the United Way for Southeastern Michigan with a yen to help the world.
Background:
In fifth grade Ayoub decided he would become a volunteer while watching the fine work of older students who came to assist his teacher. He became vice president of the Fordson KEY Club, joined a group of Oakwood hospital volunteers and earned its Gold Presidential Service Award this year for his work in guest services and the emergency room. "I've seen people being admitted into the ER while they are ill and walk out feeling better than ever. If I could have just a little part in achieving that goal I will be a better person in the end."
Personal:
Thriving on five hours of sleep a night, Ayoub loves dining out with his fellow study group members at Tim Horton. Friends want him to turn up his i-pod for a sampling of French, new age, soft rock, techno and hip hop so they can dance in the parking lot. In quiet hours he reads the latest Harry Potter and other fantasy novels. Since he arrived at the United Way he found it a complete shock that many children don't have clean clothes nor sufficient food to eat.
"More than once I've taken off my sweater and given it to a homeless person who stands outside in winter, shivering in a T-shirt. It isn't pity, just a hand. Through my boss I have learned where the issues lie, and what I can do as a citizen to improve it," he said.
Volunteer history:
Ayoub began working as a research assistant intern for the resource investment and community partnership at the United Way in July 2006. He compiles lists of issues around literacy, education and economic status of metro Detroiters and conducts data entry for his boss, Kurt Metzger. "Working at United Way I have discovered that Detroit was once booming city, thriving on many economic and social activities that can be re-established through a little help from its citizens and future leaders."
On the United Way:
"I have always known that United Way existed from the commercials with "that guy" [former United Way campaign chair Dieter Zetsche] who said "Keep the flame. . .alive." I am part of a new revolution in changing the way the community in which I live functions. Because of this organization, I have decided that I must stay in the community in order to make it thrive once again."
Mentors:
"My mother is the biggest and most important person in my life. She is by far the strongest person that I have ever known. Although she is not active in civic affairs she is very productive and outstandingly involved in our education (my three siblings and I.) She is our support system in anything that we want to pursue.
Photos:
Ali Ayoub
Kurt Metzger of United Way and Ali Ayoub Photographs courtesy of United Way
MACKINAC ISLAND — An opening session for the Mackinac Policy Conference served as a rallying cry for the One D collaborative effort with participants urging more business and government leaders to join in.
In his opening remarks Wednesday, One D champion Edsel Ford II asked for audience members to make regionalism a way of life. Afterward, a panel of members from the participating groups in One D discussed progress and challenges.
“Parts working together in harmony is an apt description of the communities of the Detroit region, when we are at our very best,” Ford said. “The way we pulled together for last year’s Super Bowl is just one recent example. But that was an effort built around an occasion. For the communities of regional Detroit to shine their brightest, we need more than an occasional effort … we need to embrace regionalism. We need to make it a way of life.”
For One D, a group of six regional civic groups that are working together on five priorities for the region, to succeed, each organization needs to exhibit organizational selflessness, Ford said. The groups behind One D are the Detroit Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau, the Detroit Regional Chamber, Detroit Renaissance Inc. , New Detroit Inc., United Way for Southeastern Michigan and the Cultural Alliance of Southeastern Michigan.
The five priorities are economic prosperity, educational preparedness, regional transit, race relations and quality of life, with regional collaboration as an umbrella over all.
Maud Lyon, founding director of the Cultural Alliance, said “One D is about eliminating duplication of efforts.”
And, by laying regionalism over the top with Ford as “the guru of regional collaboration,” said Richard Blouse, president and CEO of the Detroit Regional Chamber, the interrelated priorities can move along faster.
Doug Rothwell, president of Detroit Renaissance, said the five priorities are at different stages of evolution and some will require more change. And Michael Brennan, president and CEO of the United Way, compared the region’s movement to a One D framework to a technology upgrade.
“We’ve operated for a long time on DOS,” he said. “We’re trying to move to Windows.”
Ford, when interviewed after the panel discussion, said One D next needs to get more corporate leaders, nonprofit leaders and elected officials behind the effort. County executives, for example, would be a great addition. Ideally, Ford said, even after progress is made on priorities, the One D work plan can be updated and continue instead of disbanding.
“The theory is: This is a process,” he said.
For now, until more specifics about business support are announced, including two additional sessions planned at the conference, supporters can speak positively about the region and find ways to collaborate more often, panelists said.
Mackinac Island lives in the past. The Detroit area cannot afford to any longer.
So the historic island between Michigan's peninsulas seems all the odder a setting this year for the Detroit Regional Chamber's annual policy conference. But maybe, as they share horse-drawn taxis and watch fudge being made by hand, the 1,700 attendees from business, politics, education and labor can find a shared path to the future.
While the Mackinac meeting is not known for accomplishing much, the gathering that begins today will focus on something that started on Mackinac a year ago. One D: Transforming Regional Detroit is a unified effort of the chamber, New Detroit, United Way for Southeastern Michigan, Detroit Renaissance, the Detroit Metro Convention and Visitors Bureau and the Cultural Alliance of Southeastern Michigan to assure that the area works together to achieve measurable goals in six key areas. Those are: economic prosperity, educational preparedness, regional transit, race relations, regional cooperation and quality of life.
The effort is unprecedented, but then just about every region-wide undertaking in recent history has been, too, with little to show for it. Hence the emphasis of One D on measurable goals. All conference participants ought to be leaving Mackinac with a clear idea of what One D is all about and a job to do in one of the six areas.
United Way has been conducting a series of e-mail surveys on those issues and, while not drawing a scientific sample, did ask about 1,000 people about their satisfaction with the quality of life in southeast Michigan. Not surprisingly, nearly 80% said they were unhappy with public transportation and more than 60% did not like the way suburban growth and development have been managed. Both are regional issues, best tackled on a region-wide basis, and both are historically divisive.
And if going up to Mackinac Island is what it takes to lay that history to rest and start planning a better future, this conference could be well worth the trip.
By: WWJ and the Great Lakes IT Report Published: May 30, 2007
One D isn't yet another redevelopment initiative for metro Detroit.
Instead, it's literally a state of mind, according to the opening panel at the Detroit Regional Chamber's Mackinac Policy Conference Wednesday on Mackinac Island.
The high-powered group of six regional organizations, which has been working together nearly a year, pledged to make regional collaboration in all things their top priority going forward. "It is about a movement," said Shirley Stancato, president and CEO of New Detroit Inc.
And, said Mike Brennan, president and CEO of United Way for Southeastern Michigan: "We want a public, transparent, accessible scorecard" for One D's goals.
The five goals the group espoused Wednesday, and their benchmarks, were:
Economic prosperity, a region defined by an emphasis on attracting and retaining talent and an entrepreneurial culture. Goals include entrepreneurship rankings, business attraction, job growth and per capita income growth in the top quarter of the United States' 50 largest metro areas, and a net in-migration of advanged degree holders.
Educational preparedness, with educational programs that align with current and future work force needs. Goals include all children reading at grade level, regional high school graduation rates in the top half of large metro areas, and moving into the top half of metro areas of people having advanced degrees.
Quality of life, abundant recreation, arts, culture and health care. Goals include boosting the percentage of the population with incomes 200 percent above the poverty level by 10 percetn by 2020, increased greenways and shared public spaces, sustainable arts and social service organizations, and a 25 percent improvement in the region's self-image.
Race relations, becoming a region of racial diversity, inclusion and equal opportunity. Goals include a "significant" reduction in racial disparities in key measures of prosperity and quality of life, implementation of "structured opportunities" to break down sterotypes, and increasing positive media coverage of the region's diversity.
Regional transit, with coordinated, safe and cost-effective transit systems. Goals include a regional transit authority, and implementation of a totally integrated regional transit system, with particular attention to tourism destination areas.
Regional leaders pledged their support for the initiatives.
"The most important thing about One D is that it is not about coming up with another plan," said Edsel Ford II, a One D champion and Ford Motor Co. board member. "Instead, it is about taking the best plans that already exist and giving them the opportunity to work, regionally."
And all One D champions said they'd promote an ethic of putting the regional interest ahead of the interests of their organizations or local communities.
"We are aligned in a common vision," said Maud Lyon, founding director of the Cultural Alliance of Southeastern Michigan. "We want to eliminate duplication of effort."
Source: The Detroit News By: David Josar Published: Wednesday, May 30, 2007
MACKINAC ISLAND -- Promising that One D, a consortium of six powerful Metro Detroit civic organizations, would succeed in improving the region, Edsel B. Ford II vowed there would be public report cards of progress and that the goals would be steered by already-completed surveys of roughly 10,000 area residents.
"We need to make cooperation an on-going way of life," said Ford, the point person for One D, whose members include the Cultural Alliance of Southeastern Michigan, The Detroit Metro Convention and Visitors Bureau, Detroit Regional Chamber, Detroit Renaissance, New Detroit and the United Way of Southeastern Michigan.
The surveys, administered by the individual groups, found five areas residents agreed are important: economic prosperity, educational preparation, quality of life, race relations and regional transit.
"This vision is not by us, but it's by the community," said Maud Lyon, counsel for the Cultural Alliance. "It's about elimination of duplication -- when we go to Washington, it's together."
One D will be a major focus of this year's Detroit Regional Chamber's Mackinac Policy Conference, with sessions daily on what the group can do to execute its goals.
Being willing to share the group's successes and failures with the region is one way to ensure progress is made, Ford said.
Ford said the group's members looked at how regions in Charlotte, Denver, Philadelphia and Houston worked together successfully.
"If they can do it, the region that put the world on wheels surely can do it," he said.
Roughly 1,700 business, union, civic and political leaders kicked off the annual Detroit Regional Chamber's Mackinac Policy Conference with organizers noting this is the first time since the 1980s that organized labor will have a significant role in the next few days of brainstorming.
UAW President Ron Gettelfinger will address the group tomorrow morning and Teamsters President James Hoffa is Wednesday night's featured speaker.
"This hasn't happened in 20 years," said Richard Blouse, Jr., president and CEO of the Detroit Regional Chamber, and then only one representative of organized labor was on the agenda.
Blouse also said that health care reform will be another important topic as well as One D, a new collaborative effort aimed at improving the Detroit region.
"The private sector will be the catalyst" for transforming Metro Detroit," Blouse said. "I believe One D will be the vehicle."
In addition, Blouse said the conference will continue the practice begun next year when committees will be established to ensure that ideas crafted on the island are put into motion.
The conference will address the economic and quality of life issues that are most important to southeast Michigan.
You can reach David Josar at (313) 222-2073 or djosar@detnews.com.
Source: Detroit Free Press By: Tom Walsh, Free Press Columnist Published: May 27, 2007
Auto exec fears Michigan lags in industry's future
The recent explosion of interest and investment in alternative fuels and other so-called "clean technologies" feels a bit like vindication to Bill Ford.
"When I talked about this stuff in speeches 10 years ago, people thought I was some sort of Bolshevik," the executive chairman of Ford Motor Co. told the Free Press in a rare interview last week.
Advertisement Vindication aside, Ford is worried that southeastern Michigan is lagging behind other regions in developing new technologies that will revolutionize the global automotive industry in years to come.
He plans to call for an intensive effort to identify and recruit cutting-edge technology firms to metro Detroit -- even tapping high-powered business leaders to get personally involved -- in a speech Thursday to the Detroit Regional Chamber's annual policy conference on Mackinac Island.
"I've spent a lot of time recently in Silicon Valley, visiting companies and venture capitalists," Ford said, noting that all major California-based technology firms have Detroit offices because the auto industry is a big customer for them.
"But they shouldn't just have sales offices here. Why can't we be the incubators of ideas here? We need to be the intellectual locus of the technology that's going to transform our industry," Ford said.
Ford, 50, has kept a low profile since September, when he hired Alan Mulally as president and chief executive officer of Ford Motor. Ford, CEO for the previous five years, took the new title of executive chairman at the Dearborn automaker. He has done few interviews since then and limited his speeches to Ford employee and dealer groups.
But behind the scenes, he has taken a more active role in Detroit Renaissance, starting a two-year term in January as chairman of the influential CEO group's executive committee, just as it was launching Road to Renaissance, a new economic development strategy for the region.
Goals are to boost entrepreneurship, attract and retain top talent, and enhance Detroit's status as a global hub for automotive and other transportation industries.
"There's no question that, in the next 10 or 20 years, we're going to have very different propulsion systems for vehicles. And there's no reason why Detroit and southeast Michigan shouldn't be where the action is," Ford said.
Problem is, Detroit and Michigan are increasingly NOT where the cutting-edge automotive technology action is.
Not only have hometown car companies Ford, General Motors and the Chrysler Group been downsizing, but the national surge in clean-technology investment is mostly happening elsewhere.
Clean tech is the fastest-growing segment of venture capital. But of $2.9 billion in clean-tech investment in North America last year, only 9% was in the Midwest, said James Croce, CEO of Detroit-based NextEnergy, a nonprofit formed five years ago to accelerate Michigan's activities in alternate energy. Nearly 60% went to the West Coast or to New England, he said, citing data from the Clean Tech Venture Network in Brighton.
Just a few years ago, some pundits were scoffing at the notion of a self-professed environmentalist -- Ford -- running an auto company.
"Now all the automakers are out to prove who's greenest," Ford said.
But Michigan must do more outreach, he said, to attract more of the innovative companies in that field.
Doug Rothwell, president and CEO of Detroit Renaissance, said Ford has been "very intimately engaged in each step of the Road to Renaissance action plan."
Ford returned the compliment, saying he agreed to chair the Renaissance executive committee only because Rothwell and Domino's Pizza CEO David Brandon convinced him that the group was committed to action and measuring progress. "The last thing I needed was another committee studying the problems of the last 20 years," Ford said.
The Road to Renaissance plan dovetails with One D, a broader regional collaboration of groups ranging from United Way to the Detroit Regional Chamber and New Detroit, championed by Ford's cousin Edsel Ford II. Edsel Ford will kick off a series of One D planning sessions at the Mackinac gathering this week.
Other scheduled speakers at Mackinac include Teamsters union President James P. Hoffa on Wednesday and UAW President Ron Gettelfinger on Thursday.
Bill Ford, meanwhile, expects to become a bit more visible in the coming months.
Immediately after Mulally's arrival, "I thought, early on, that I didn't want any confusion, externally or internally," Ford said. "I certainly didn't want anyone internally going around Alan and coming to me."
Ford still consults regularly with Mulally on the car company's turnaround progress.
"You'll start seeing more of me as we roll into the rest of this year," he said.
Contact TOM WALSH at 313-223-4430 or twalsh@freepress.com.
United Way Honors DaimlerChrysler with the 20th Annual Spirit of America® Employee Community Investment Summit Award
America’s Largest Charity Recognizes Auburn Hills, Mich. Company for Achievements in Community Campaigns and Outreach
United Way of America presented Julie McIntosh, Corporate Employee Programs Specialist for DaimlerChrysler, with the 2006 Spirit of America Summit Award for Employee Community Investment last week at a special reception during the SLC in Pittsburg. Julie is pictured with United Way for Southeastern Michigan's Chris Beach, Campaign Director, Jeff Baytarian, Campaign Manager and Michael Brennan, President and CEO.
PITTSBURGH (May 17, 2007) – United Way of America (UWA) tonight honored DaimlerChrysler Corporation with the 20th Annual Spirit of America® Employee Community Investment Summit Award to recognize the company’s commitment to educating and training employees about the United Way and its role in the community, while developing successful fundraising campaigns that earned generous support from donors. The Employee Community Investment Summit Award is one of four categorical Spirit of America accolades, which recognize United Way National Corporate Leaders (NCLs) for exceptional work in the areas of community investment, engagement and leadership. The awards were presented at the 2007 United Way Staff Leaders Conference in Pittsburgh, Pa.
"DaimlerChrysler is establishing a new standard for excellence in community investment, and I commend the employees and retirees for their generous efforts. Their steadfast collaboration with United Way and tremendous investment in the workplace campaign demonstrates a spirit of volunteerism and a commitment to helping all members of their community," said UWA President and CEO Brian A. Gallagher.
Thanks to the dedication of Campaign Co-Chairs Tom LaSorda, Chrysler Group CEO, and General Holiefield, UAW Vice President of DaimlerChrysler Department, as well as hundreds of DaimlerChrysler and UAW campaign volunteers, DaimlerChrysler employees and retirees contributed $8.5 million in 2006. Combined with a corporate gift of nearly $5.7 million, DaimlerChrysler invested more than $14 million in communities across the nation. This was accomplished in part as employees learned about United Way through fun-filled activities including "dunk tanks" and "pie eating contests."
"The employees and retirees of Chrysler Group are dedicated to acting as responsible, actively engaged members of society," said Tom LaSorda, Chrysler Group President and CEO. "United Way programs are critical to many charities and organizations that improve the quality of life for our employees, customers and neighbors. Our partnership with the United Way is an important part of our commitment to helping our communities, and we are pleased to be honored with the Spirit of America Employee Community Investment Summit Award."
The Summit Awards comprise four categorical awards within the Spirit of America Award program that recognizes the exceptional work of corporate partners in the areas of community investment, engagement and leadership. Award recipients were evaluated and selected based on their strength in promoting, volunteering, investing in, connecting with, advocating for, and partnering within their communities.
The Spirit of America program is open to any United Way National Corporate Leader (NCL), leading national and global corporations that partner with United Way to deliver positive results. Award recipients are judged by a panel of NCL peers and local United Ways.
In keeping with businesses’ renewed commitment to sustainable business practices, the 2007 Spirit of America awards – to be awarded in 2008 – will feature a new corporate social responsibility (CSR) component in addition to the traditional Spirit of America criteria. Categorical awards will evaluate the areas of: Sustainability/Impact, Corporate, Workplace, and Volunteerism.
For more information on Spirit of America, NCL, and how corporations can get involved in their communities or partner with United Way of America, log on to unitedway.org/ncl/ or contact Amanda Ponzar at Amanda.ponzar@uwa.unitedway.org.
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About United Way of America United Way of America is the national organization dedicated to leading the United Way movement in making a measurable impact in every community across America by focusing on the root causes of the most serious problems. The United Way movement includes over 1,300 community-based United Way organizations. Each is independent, separately incorporated, and governed by local volunteers. For more information about United Way of America, please visit: www.unitedway.org.
Respondents to our March 2007 Quality of Life survey told us in no uncertain terms that they were dissatisfied with public transportation. 85 percent of respondents stated that they were somewhat or very dissatisfied with public transportation in the region, while a somewhat smaller 75 percent were dissatisfied with public transportation in their own communities.
When asked "Which THREE of these items do you think should receive the most emphasis from community leaders over the next THREE Years?" public transportation was identified as one of the three by 81 percent of respondents, with 38 percent listing it as Number 1.
With gas prices inching toward $4 a gallon, and orange barrels wherever you look, metro Detroiters may begin seeking alternate ways to get around town. Whether that’s by carpooling or riding the bus, public transit options can save both money and energy. In fact, recent statistics show that both SMART and DDOT are experiencing ridership growth.
Local organizations are seeing the trend and investigating ways to bring more mass transit options to southeast Michigan. The Detroit Department of Transportation (DDOT), Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT), SEMCOG and others are in the midst of completing a Detroit Transit Options for Growth Study that will complement SEMCOG’s Ann Arbor to Detroit study. Other local groups, such as Transportation Riders United (TRU) and Metropolitan Organizing Strategy Enabling Strength (MOSES) are advocating for increased transportation options.
United Way, Metromode and our OneD partners are interested in gauging current opinion and use of the region’s transit options. The results will form a baseline and help inform the public’s current use of transportation as well as its hope for future transportation options.
Please take a moment and fill out the survey by clicking on the link below:
United Way for Southeastern Michigan along with the City of Warren, Department of Human Services, Lighthouse Community Development, Macomb County Asset Building Coalition, City of Roseville, Macomb County Department of Planning and Economic Development, Macomb County Community Services Agency, Macomb County MSU Extension, and Macomb CRA Association, will host a foreclosure and financial literacy fair entitled “Keeping Your Home in Troubling Times” on Saturday, June 9th 2007 from 9:00A.M-2:00P.M at Warren City Hall, located at One City Square, Warren Michigan. The fair will be open to the public and is free to all that attend. There will be presentations on financial literacy topics, opportunities to receive individual foreclosure counseling, access to service providers, fun activities, and much more.
What: Keeping Your Home in Troubling Times When: Saturday, June 9th 2007 , 9:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. Where: Warren City Hall, One City Square, Warren, Michigan
Source: Detroit Free Press By: JAVAN KIENZLE, FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER Published: May 20, 2007
Pair creates positive PR for small businesses East-siders are Detroit boosters
It's been said that successful marriages are based on the couple's working together toward the same goal -- like chemists Marie and Pierre Curie and stratosphere explorers Jeannette and Jean Piccard.
Detroiter Kim Monts, 43, and her husband, Rodd Monts, 41, aim to be as successful. They are partners in Media Monts, a marketing communication agency that operates out of their east-side Detroit home.
Kim, a native Detroiter, graduated from Benedictine High and has a public relations degree from Wayne State. Rodd has a degree in advertising/PR from Grand Valley State and a master's degree in PR/organizational communication from Wayne State. He is editorial services manager in the marketing and brand experience department of United Way for Southeastern Michigan.
The two met while working for the Detroiter, the Regional Chamber's magazine. They have a son, Rodd.
QUESTION: Kim, what's your ideal client?
ANSWER: We prefer to work with smaller businesses that typically don't get attention that larger companies get. The ideal client would be an organization that is improving the lives of the residents of the city of Detroit ... assisting people in getting jobs, keeping their homes, getting education; anything that would improve those areas, we would love to work with.
Q: How do you help your clients?
A: We work with their budget; we have an initial consultation to find their needs and goals, their strengths and weaknesses, their competition. Then we draw up a plan or recommend how they can achieve their goals. Rodd is the person who delves into the history of the organization; I'm promoting their work and helping them get their message out.
Q: What is one of your present projects?
A: Visiting Angels of Detroit. It's a national franchise that provides nonmedical home care services. They'll have a booth at Mayor Kilpatrick's Annual Centenarian Luncheon May 30 at Cobo Center. Visiting Angels not only cares for the elderly; they have some clients in their 20s -- people who are convalescing from accidents, for instance.
Q: What is the biggest problem in your business?
A: Managing time with a 2-year-old! We recently decided to hire an assistant to help with clerical work. We like to golf and visit museums. But most of our free time, we're active in our church -- Jefferson Avenue Presbyterian. I'm on the Session -- the governing body; Rodd is a member of the church's Mission and Neighborhood Outreach Committee.
Q: If you had to make a PR suggestion to Detroit's auto industry, what would it be?
A: Make people feel that there are better days ahead, that it's going to get better. I'm not feeling good about the industry; I'd like to know there's some light at the end of the tunnel.
The annual United Way Staff Leaders Conference is winding to an end in Pittsburgh as I type this. I love the SLC... not only is it a great opportunity to learn about new and emerging trends in the United Way system, but it is an excellent networking opportunity. There are over 9,000 folks working for United Way in this country and we try to connect as much as possible - listservs, phone calls, emails, webinars, newsletters, etc. But nothing can replace actually meeting a person face-to-face.
Those who know me might think that last statement out of character. I live a lot of my life online. And it's not just a hobby, it's what they pay me to do here at United Way for Southeastern Michigan - find ways to connect to folks through online tools. Yet the longer I spend researching and implementing new tools, the more I realize that the power of what connects us online is what it can do for us IRL (In Real Life for those of you that don't speak txtspk). This really came to light for me on Tuesday morning.
My Sun Conure, Petey, knows the sounds my eyelids make when I wake up in the morning. Don't ask me how he knows, he just does. And every morning, the very moment I wake, Petey lets out a screech to remind me I have a pet bird who wants to be let out of the cage to sit upon my shoulder.
For the record, I have managed to remember this fact every single morning for the past five years. Petey, however, is not into taking chances.
So, invariably, my first trip each morning is to my home office where Petey's cage sits next to the computer. I open the cage, Petey jumps on my shoulder and I turn to leave the room, always telling myself to ignore the computer - I don't have "time to waste" and need to get to work. But nine times out of ten I plop down in front of my PC and log on because Heavens only knows what happened in the six hours I was asleep that might change my world. (Patience - never one of my strong points.)
This past Tuesday was one of those days and I found myself checking email way before I had even managed to put on the morning coffee.
The first email I opened came from a presidential candidate whom I hope to support in the 2008 race. The message outlined his position on the war. That was pretty cool in itself - I didn't have to do the research, it was being delivered right to me in a place where I went most often - my email. Even better was a call to action in his email that outlined how I could help support his position. The call to action asked that I email 16 senators that were key to an upcoming vote. By clicking on a link in the email I was taken to a web page that was prepopulated with my personal information (taken from a form I filled out when I joined the candidate's online community) and a form letter to the 16 senators. All I had to do was push a button and it sent my letter of concern off to the 16 senators.
And it gets better... After I sent off my email I was prompted to invite my friends to do the same. I was taken to another screen that asked me to enter my email ID and password and, Viola!, my contacts were imported from my Google mail account. I sent the invitation to about 20 people - some family, some friends and some of who I had never even met but had developed online relationships with through years of blogging.
How cool was that? From the comfort of my small home in Dearborn, wrapped in a bathrobe, with a cooing bird perched on my shoulder... I had written 16 U.S. Senators and invited 20 friends, family and otherwise to do the same. I was knee-deep in advocacy and it wasn't even 7 a.m. yet.
Then I remembered that I had to send flowers to my best friend, Sandie, for her 30th birthday. (The fact that I only remembered this after emailing a good portion of the Senate will be our secret, okay?) Last time I had paid a particular utility bill online I had noticed that there was a special offer from an online florist for this utility's customers. So I logged into my provider's website, clicked on a link and was taken to special site for my utility's customers to shop. When it came time to place my order I didn't have to fill in my personal information - it had been transferred from my utility vendor's site - and I paid for the flowers using my PayPal account, so I didn't even have to get up, find my purse and a credit card. (I did however, have to remember my PayPal password and I'm proud to say that I did even without the aid of my first cup of coffee.)
I decided to send an electronic card to Sandie as well, so I went to the Career Builder site and created a Monk-e-Mail. Not only did I get to pick and decorate the animated chimp that was going to deliver Sandie's birthday greeting, but I was able to call the site (through my internet-run phone system, of course) and record myself singing. My recording was imported directly into the greeting and even though Sandie was far, far away (in Pontiac), I still got to sing to her on her birthday. (Click here if you're brave and want to hear my singing.)
Lastly, I went to Absopure's website, placed an order for four bottles of water and then cruised over to Blockbuster.com because I knew that I was sending movies back that day in the mail and there were a few new releases I wanted to add to my que. By then it was 7 a.m. and definitely time for me to get a move on.
As I was driving to work I chuckled to myself about the multitude of "things" I had accomplished in that hour on my computer. It's phenomenal if you think of it, really. Pre-internet how long would it have taken me to research a candidate's position on a topic, find out how to support that position, craft a letter in support, figure out who to send it to and send it, go to the flower store, place and pay for an order, buy four bottles of water and return and rent new movies? I don't really know the answer, but it wouldn't have been just one hour.
More than likely, however... Pre-internet? I probably just would not have done all of it.
See, I love the idea of being an advocate, of being a good person who sings to a far-away friend and sends flowers on her 30th birthday, of providing my family with healthy drinking water and the latest in movies for entertainment. But the fact is that there are only so many hours in the day and something would have suffered if I hadn't had the ease of the internet to help me through it all. It's the power of what I can do online that makes my life "IRL" so much better... fuller... more satisfying and meaningful to me.
So, that why I'm here at United Way - trying to figure out how I can make your connection with us better, fuller and more meaningful through the power of technology. What can we provide you that will allow you to spend a few minutes a morning making your community a better place to live and work? Is it more information about what we are doing delivered to you where you go most often? Is it a tool that allows you to connect? A blog, a bulletin board, a quick and easy way to donate through PayPal? If you have suggestions, I'd love to hear them. And if you're a nonprofit technology provider yourself, I'd love to hear more about what it is you do to help your nonprofit stay connected.
Looking forward to reading your comments.
Ursula Adams, Web Design/Administration Specialist United Way for Southeastern Michigan
Source: The Detroit News By: Mike Wilkinson Published: Thursday, May 17, 2007
For most of this decade, Michigan's anemic growth in population has been fueled entirely by minorities, with every one of the state's 140,000 additional residents either Hispanic, Asian, black or other minority.
Census figures released today also show that the white population in Michigan dropped for the second year in a row, leading to the state's first overall drop in population since the early 1980s.
The census estimates, drawn from birth, death and migration data, paint a picture of a more diverse state, mirroring changes across the country.
Nationwide, the Hispanic population surged by nearly 7 million since 2000, and minorities now comprise nearly a third of the country, with more than 100 million residents.
"There is a trend that metropolitan areas have the greatest amount of diversity," said state demographer Ken Darga. "And almost every part of the state has diversity."
That diversity may stress already strained race relations. Southeastern Michigan is the nation's most segregated region and solving racial discord is considered crucial to Metro Detroit's revival.
Dr. Alvin Poussaint, a teaching psychiatrist at Harvard University and an expert on race relations, cautioned that the initial reaction to a growing minority community can be flight as the majority population feels threatened.
"Often there is not acceptance but resentment and rejection," he said.
State and local leaders, he said, can combat those fears by putting out a "message to the people of Michigan that should be welcoming" and he said the state -- and the nation -- must confront racial issues.
"It has to be solved," he said.
The population estimates show there were just over 19,000 fewer white residents in Michigan in 2006 than in 2005. The black population also fell by about 2,400. Compounding the slow growth is an aging population, particularly among whites, that is having fewer babies. The disastrous economic situation has also caused many to leave the state to find work.
Meanwhile, the Hispanic population rose by nearly 7,000 from 2005 to 2006 and the Asian population grew by 6,100.
"They (Asians) are taking the higher tech jobs that go wanting because we don't have a qualified native population," said Kurt Metzger, a director of research for the United Way for Southeastern Michigan.
In the past, discussions about race in Detroit have centered on blacks and whites, said Ozzie Rivera, director of the multicultural affairs office at Madonna University in Livonia. Although blacks remain the largest minority group in the region and state, the growing Hispanic population must trigger a wider discussion in Metro Detroit about minorities, Rivera said.
"If that discussion is not held, there is room for cultural misunderstanding," he said.
Small steps can aid Pontiac school system's turnaround
Source: The Oakland Press By: Editorial Published: Web-posted May 14, 2007
It's a small step, but it's what is needed to help begin to turn around the Pontiac school system. Community leaders and volunteers seeking to bolster local public school improvement efforts plan to ask administrators in every Pontiac district building how they can help students get off to a great start in 2007-08.
Rick David, vice president for strategic relations at United Way of Southeastern Michigan and facilitator for The Oakland Press' Pontiac Education Roundtable initiative, said he and other roundtable members will meet with school principals in the next two months.
As David terms it, they'll be looking for "low-hanging fruit," or ideas about easily manageable efforts to help students, teachers and administrators make the most of education programs and resources available.
Obviously, Pontiac has mammoth financial problems that aren't going to disappear overnight. There will be no sudden influx of millions of dollars to save the system.
People in the district are going to have to do that themselves.
This need to help themselves became even more obvious last week when several Pontiac Board of Education trustees aired strong concerns over a host of issues they felt demonstrated management shortcomings.
Among these were wasted district resources, poor oversight of vacant school buildings, failure to consistently enforce dress code and attendance policies, failure to put effective curriculum plans in place, ineligible student athletes being allowed to play high school sports and administrative focus not centering on students.
Trustee April Hernandez told colleagues that during a tour of four vacant school buildings, she found hundreds of cases of brand-new text and library books sitting unused. She also found computers, science kits and instruction equipment.
Trustee Damon Dorkins expressed frustration with management issues - particularly the district's failure to enforce dress and attendance codes. He said students are getting away with violations such as wearing halter tops or baggy pants below the waist. He said some violations are serious enough to warrant civil disorderly conduct charges.
Concerns were expressed about student academic achievement. It was noted that 100 high school seniors could fail to graduate this year and that at least one does not know how to read. Also, at least three high school athletes who were academically ineligible to participate in sports were allowed to play this year.
Under these circumstances, seeking "small wins" is one way to at least begin the turnaround and, if nothing else, will help immediately improve some aspects of the school district.
To facilitate auxiliary support efforts, roundtable volunteers will look to understand the school environment in each building, how well the current school year got under way and whether that insight sparks ideas on how better to start the coming school year.
David said that eventually he would like to have one community volunteer assigned as a roundtable liaison to each district building. These individuals would communicate needs and concerns to the full roundtable assembly, which would focus on mobilizing support resources.
It may not seem like much, but whatever progress is made certainly will be better than doing nothing and just letting the schools deteriorate further.
Source: MetroMode By: Tanya Muzumdar Published: May 10, 2007
One of the first things any immigrant learns upon settling in the United States is: the car is king. And no city makes that clearer than Detroit.
While many of us learned to conquer the wheel in Driver's Ed class or from our parents, newcomers seek out companies like Shondhan Enterprises, Inc., a company Hamtramck city council president Shahab Ahmed owns with his wife. Ahmed, who emigrated from Bangladesh to the U.S. in 1986, saw a way to turn his own immigrant experience into an economic opportunity. "Hamtramck, an immigrant city, had no driving school until I opened one in 1998," Ahmed boasts. The couple's firm has since grown to 12 employees; it provides driving instruction, state-required road tests, and immigration legal services for thousands of customers a year in a wide swath of cities from Troy to Ann Arbor. Ahmed attributes his successes and those of other Detroit area immigrants to the ability to capitalize on the opportunities found through hard work.
Success comes to people "brave enough to make the trek into another country with a different culture, language, and set of laws," believes Dr. Karen Majewski, mayor of Hamtramck. Dr. Majewski, who is a former professor of Polish studies and the current executive director of the Polish American Historical Association, continues: "I am a scholar of ethnicity and migration myself, so I'm awed by that leap of faith it takes to get into another world."
For many new arrivals, the wide-awake city of Hamtramck is that world. Shondhan Enterprises is one of the hundreds of businesses which give Hamtramck its beat. Signs translated into languages such as Arabic and Bengali abound, enticing you to pop into ethnic restaurants, clothing stores, and some of the city's 15 bakeries. Ever heard of rasgulla or gulab jamun? Aladdin Sweets and Café sells the freshly made milk and cheese-based Bengali sweets popular with South Asian immigrants and others in the know.
Mixing It Up
"Real cities remain viable by serving their marketplace," says Erik Tungate, Hamtramck's director of community and economic development, who estimates the 2.2 square mile city contains anywhere from 500 to 700 businesses – 30 to 40% of them immigrant-owned. Since the 1980s, the Conant Street district alone, he says, has migrated from a mainly Polish influence to a veritable United Nations, where business owners represent about 30 different ethnicities.
"To be a student of Hamtramck you have to be a student of Detroit," says Tungate. "Over the past five years, it's been miraculous, like raising the dead here. In the next five years I see greater downtown Detroit – the T formed by midtown south to the Detroit River and then east and west along the riverfront – completely gentrifying. Hamtramck will become even more of a hotbed of immigration because it's a walkable, affordable enclave just outside of the greater downtown Detroit area."
According to census records, Hamtramck's population bottomed out in 1990, to 18,000. By 2000, the city scored a 25% increase in residents – to nearly 23,000, 41% of whom were foreign-born. Of those, nearly one third entered the USA after 1990. Today, the long chains of cars parked along the city's residential streets attest to the city's growth and density. The Southeast Michigan Council of Governments (SEMCOG) estimates Hamtramck's population at 25,000, although Tungate says that people close to the city put the number nearer 35,000, a density of about 17,000 people per square mile.
"More immigrants are probably coming now [to Hamtramck] than at any time except for the 1910s and 1920s. It's often a surprise to people that we continue to have a sizable new immigration from Poland, the Ukraine, and other central and eastern European countries, in addition to Bangladesh and Yemen," says Dr. Majewski, who estimates that anywhere from 26 and possibly up to 40 different languages are spoken in the public schools.
Between 2000 and 2007, SEMCOG estimates the population of southeastern Michigan has grown 1.1%; compare that with a nearly 9% increase for Hamtramck over the same timeframe. Much of that trend is due to immigration, which is "our best hope at the moment for southeast Michigan and the state as a whole," says Kurt Metzger, director of research at the United Way for Southeastern Michigan. "When you look at real entrepreneurial neighborhood development and the impact of retail, look at southwest Detroit, Hamtramck, Dearborn, and other areas of new immigrant population. Drive up John R or Dequindre and you'll see Thai and Vietnamese restaurants, Thai video stores, and all of these different new markets opening up," he says. "Whether it's the Arab community, the Chaldeans, Latinos, Albanians, Indians, Chinese, Filipinos, you name it, they're here. Many people don't realize we already have a very diverse population here. A lot of immigrants are arriving while the area still loses its population, which is maintaining itself, really, through immigration."
And southeast Michigan is drawing a very educated new populace, in the desirable 25 to 40 age range that the area needs to attract for its workforce – particularly from Asian countries, according to Metzger, who has found that 75% or more of the Asian Indian arrivals have college degrees.
A new talent pool
Dr. K.P. Ravikrishnan, Director of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak, arrived from India in 1969 in response to the tremendous need for physicians in Detroit – brought on by Medicare and improvement in the provision of services to treat diseases such as tuberculosis. Today, an aging population and expansion of health services perpetuate the local physician shortage.
"We are still in a growth phase of both the influx of international medical graduates and also demand here. The sky is the limit as far as what you can provide in terms of prevention and optimization of medical care," says Dr. Ravikrishnan, who is also an assistant clinical professor of internal medicine at the University of Michigan and Wayne State University medical schools. He estimates that 40% of Beaumont Hospital's medical residents are international medical school graduates. Originally residents from India, Pakistan, and the Philippines composed the majority of the international contingent. Today presents a more varied picture, as residents from the former Soviet Union, Romania, Poland, Korea, Taiwan, China, Syria, Lebanon, and Iran now call Michigan home.
In addition to hospitals, ethnic professional organizations also play an integral part in linking countries together through knowledge. Dr. Ravikrishnan, president of the 1,500 member Michigan Association of Physicians of Indian Origin (MAPI), explains: "Regulations and guidelines are constantly being changed, so the MAPI educates medical professionals on issues in the community, nationally, and India."
The best kind of investment
Immigration has raised the quality of life for countless area residents. So what has been the quantitative impact, as shown by the dollar value of the goods and services, that immigrant residents provide to Southeast Michigan each year? According to the results of the newly released "Arab American Economic Contribution Study" conducted by Wayne State University's Center for Urban Studies, in 2005 Arab American salaries and business activities contributed up to $7.7 billion to the local economy.
This is a good start, but more comprehensive information should be out there. "It would be nice if immigrants wanted to tell their stories and start a program to collect this kind of information, putting it for public consumption to really understand the impact of immigration in southeast Michigan," says Metzger, who cites some groups' reluctance to put themselves in the public eye as a possible reason for the lack of initiatives in this area.
Many, however, are invested citizens who visibly contribute to their local communities and forge ties between countries. Ahmed, who prides himself on his commitment to mingle with society, has served Hamtramck's government since 1998. Various positions included a stint as the city's multi-cultural coordinator, in an effort to make the government more accessible to the people – smoothing the way for even more business and economic investment.
Ahmed's 2003 election to Hamtramck's city council made him the first Bangladeshi-American elected to public office in the USA, extending his influence beyond city boundaries. Afterward, the U.S. State Department invited Ahmed to Italy to speak about how countries can better assimilate immigrants into new countries and cultures.
Southeast Michigan has greatly benefited from the entrepreneurial development, knowledge base, and understanding that comes from sharing with people from different lands – and it needs more. "In trying to make this region more successful, we have to not only think about keeping our young people here, but also about increasing and reaching out to our immigrant population," Metzger says. "We have a good base of population from India and China here to have those kinds of links and to better connect with those growing economies."
United Way launches Financial Stability Partnership
A cross-section of the nation’s most powerful and effective Fortune 500 businesses, non-profit organizations, federal agencies and local United Ways joined United Way of America CEO Brian Gallagher and Board Chair Rodney Slater May 7 to celebrate the launch of the United Way Financial Stability Partnership™, the new national initiative created to empower low- to moderate-income people to achieve long-term financial stability that leads to independence.
Joining Gallagher and Slater in recognizing results already achieved and an ambitious slate of goals for the partnership were Kevin Brown, acting commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service; Ralph Smith, senior vice president of the Annie E. Casey Foundation; Bill Couper, President of Mid-Atlantic Region, Bank of America; Stan Litow, president of the IBM International Foundation; Marc Ferguson, founder and chairman of Nets to Ladders; Mike Durkin, CEO of Mile High United Way in Denver, and Anne Wilson, CEO of United Way of the Bay Area in San Francisco.
Financial Stability Partnership Launch -- Brian Gallagher, President and CEO, United Way of America (part 1)
Brian Gallagher, President and CEO, United Way of America (part 2)
This is the fourth installment of Michael J. Brennan's series, "The Seven Disciplines of a Community of Progress: Creating a New Path." In it, Brennan, the president of United Way for Southeastern Michigan, explores how our region can move forward, and looks at past successes. Discipline Four: The Power of Three
When the public, private and nonprofit sectors find common purpose — headway is made. The potency of these three sectors of society working in alignment provides a winning combination for communities — a trifecta. When the three sectors align around a bold and measurable goal, there is a greater chance of sustained success. Absence of that alignment, a drift of time, energy, and resources takes place throughout the community.
Granted, the barriers often come in the form of turf, politics and cultural differences. Institutional racism, historical mindsets and harsh realities often create obstacles too large to solve. I am not trying to be naive about politics — left, center or right. Nor am I attempting to be simple-minded about the challenges. A look at achievement around the country, one sees that much of it is owed to groups leveraging the intersection of the public, private and nonprofit sectors. The common ground between people and sectors is in abundance. Yet, as individuals, institutions and communities we often leave that bounty on the table.
"Great vision needs to be backed by full commitment from the private sector and also the government." — Roger Penske, Crain's 2006 Newsmaker of the Year
With 150 municipalities, 120 school districts, 230,000 businesses, and 6,000 nonprofits in a 100 square mile area called the metropolitian Detroit tri-county area, there is vast opportunity to leverage and align each other's good work. A community of progress understands that just adding up stellar results of our "silos" does not necessarily result in a powerful cumulative impact.
Integrating diverse goals make solutions better, talent stronger and sustainability more probable. Individual actions are necessary, but without aligning individual actions into a collective force, forward movement can sputter and stall. There must be room in community to find intersections that connect the work of the public, private and nonprofit sectors — the sweet spot of community. The power of three.
"The most effective solutions to social problems are those that engage nonprofit, business, and government agencies in cross-sector partnerships where each sector concentrates on what it does best." — Mark Kramer & John Kania, Stanford University, Stanford Social Innovation Review
There were many reasons the Super Bowl XL was successful. But the key reason mentioned was how business, government, nonprofits and citizens all worked together. The Super Bowl provided a teachable moment for the region, a blueprint to follow for the tasks ahead. This can be done – but only if we are willing to work together on common goals.
Discipline Four in Action
Something happened on October 28, 2005. For the first time in our state's history the three sectors of this region, public, private, and nonprofit came together to help connect resources and jobs to individuals in an unprecedented way and scale at the Southeastern Michigan Employment, Training and Family Resource Expo.
On that single day, the State of Michigan, the three counties of Oakland, Macomb and Wayne, the City of Detroit, 150 corporations, 100 nonprofits and 6,000 potential jobs came together to do what no entity could do alone. With over 6,000 jobs available by employers that day, all partners rallied to help knock down the barriers to employment and bridge individuals to a new path.
Local residents came, 10,000 in all. They came from all walks of life, ages and race with over 25 percent having college degrees.
This was the largest Employment Expo ever in Michigan — and it happened because the three sectors came together around common purpose and to make an impact. The focus was not on turf but on the citizens in Detroit and southeastern Michigan who have been laid off, displaced and looking for work — a job — a career. On that day, regional cooperation trumped partisanship and parochialism. The Expo set a benchmark for how work can be done.
On that day, at that moment, the region got together and did very well. Moving from a single event, to working together day in and day out to produce results must be the ongoing target.
Source: Detroit Free Press By: Patricia Anstett, Medical Writer Published: May 9, 2007
And that has them scrambling for your business
In changes as profound as those in the auto industry, metro Detroit hospital systems are in a whirlwind of restructuring, acquisitions and disagreements as medical systems fiercely compete for limited revenue, prime locations and the most lucrative, best-insured patients.
For consumers, the changes mean the likelihood of fewer medical services within Detroit, but top-of-the-line care and technology in the suburbs -- at a potentially higher cost.
Patients could lose their doctors as health systems compete for physicians, nurses, even billing clerks, and to train the next generation of doctors.
The shifting landscape explains disputes that burst into headlines, such as last year's negotiations between Wayne State University and the Detroit Medical Center over doctor residencies, or a lawsuit filed this month by DMC and Michigan AFSCME Council 25 against the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute.
That lawsuit aims to stop the institute from moving off the DMC campus in Detroit and buying St. John Detroit Riverview Hospital. The union represents workers there.
It explains why a new medical school and a satellite campus are planned for metro Detroit to meet shortages of primary care doctors.
Oakland University and Beaumont Hospitals hope to start a medical school by 2010; Michigan State University's College of Osteopathic Medicine wants to open a satellite campus by July. Two final contenders, the Detroit Medical Center and Macomb Community College, both want the campus. In the latest development, they may team up to run the satellite program.
Every move a hospital system makes has a trade-off.
On the plus side: Patients fare better when care is concentrated at high-volume hospital systems, studies show.
Having fewer health care systems, rather than dozens of community hospitals, may enable employers and insurance companies to negotiate discounts from bigger hospital systems, argued Gerald Fitzgerald, president of the Dearborn-based Oakwood Healthcare Inc.
"We think, through the introduction of technology and the proper placement of facilities that are higher utilized, we'll create more efficient, better-performing facilities," he said. "The best should be rewarded in a competitive market."
The disadvantages include huge initial investments to build suburban facilities, which can drive up health costs and accelerate the exodus of services from Detroit.
"Survival of the fattest, not the fittest" is how Alan Sager, a Boston University public health professor, describes what is happening in the hospital industry, including in Detroit, Washington, St. Louis and Baltimore. Sager has studied hospital closings in 52 U.S. cities since 1936.
Every time a health system opens a new ambulatory care complex, it must pay for the land, buy equipment and hire staff, often at higher wages, compared with fixed costs in older facilities.
"We are slipping into health care anarchy, rising costs, rising health insurance premiums and rising taxes to pay for care, at the same time, more people are losing their insurance coverage," Sanger said. "This is a recipe for political and social trouble, and it's totally avoidable."
'Someone is going to pay'
Michael Slubowski, president for hospitals and health networks of Novi-based Trinity Health, said construction drives up health costs.
Trinity led a legal challenge, but failed, in stopping approval by the Legislature to allow two new hospitals in Oakland County. The Henry Ford Health System is building a $300-million, 300-bed hospital in West Bloomfield, to open next year. St. John Health is building a $224-million, 200-bed hospital in Novi that will open in phases, starting this year.
Each bed at a new hospital can cost up to $1.5 million, compared with $700,000 to $1.2 million a bed to renovate a hospital, Slubowski said, citing what he said are widely accepted industry figures.
"At the end of the day, someone is going to pay," he said.
Trinity estimates that its St. Joseph Mercy Oakland hospital in Pontiac, and others in Oakland and western Wayne counties, could lose $76 million in business to the two new Oakland County hospitals.
But Bob Riney, chief executive officer for Henry Ford Health System, said health systems can't pass along costs to customers or corporations.
"We have to make up costs through economies of scale," he said. "That requires intense discipline."
Competition may hurt other hospitals, but that's good for consumers who increasingly are educated and demand good care, he said.
A threat to Detroit, its residents
One of the biggest shifts is occurring in Detroit, which had 24 hospitals in 1937, according to Sager's research.
By June 30, if Riverview Hospital closes as expected, five Detroit hospitals will be left to carry the burden of caring for the city's greater population of uninsured and poorly insured patients. They are: Henry Ford Hospital in New Center; St. John Hospital & Medical Center, on the border with Grosse Pointe Woods; Harper/Hutzel Hospital and Detroit Receiving Hospital on the Detroit Medical Center campus in Midtown, and Sinai-Grace Hospital, a DMC hospital in northwest Detroit.
The problem of uninsured care would worsen June 1 with 6% across-the-board cuts to Medicaid providers, including hospitals and physicians, now under consideration by Gov. Jennifer Granholm to help offset the state's budget deficit.
The cuts pose a serious threat to Detroit's comeback and raise societal questions, said Kurt Metzger, research director for the United Way for Southeastern Michigan.
"Where you live determines so much of your life's trajectory, whether you have decent schools, jobs or quality health care," he said.
Hospitals are working to relax Michigan laws, known as certificate of need (CON) regulations, to allow more growth in the suburbs, but face business and labor opposition. Certificate of need rules restrict new hospital construction and equipment purchases based on a population formula in order to control health spending.
"If these health systems are successful in bypassing current CON rules and expanding in the outlying suburbs, that would harm the financial stability and viability of hospitals that have long served" Detroit and older suburbs, said Larry Horwitz, president of the Economic Alliance of Michigan, a state labor and business coalition.
T.J. Bucholz, spokesman for the Michigan Department of Community Health, the state partner of the Michigan CON Commission, said Michigan's system "ensures we have equitable distribution of health care resources.
Without it, "health care would look very different in Michigan. It would be driven solely for profit and not for people."
Contact PATRICIA ANSTETT at 313-222-5021 or panstett@freepress.com
Source: The Detroit News By: Kim Kozlowski Published: April 23, 2007
Program for uninsured kids providing coverage to 65K grown Michiganians.
A public program designed for some of Michigan's 160,000 uninsured children is providing more health coverage for adults than youths.
The federal-state initiative is spending more than three times the amount of money for adult coverage as it does for the purpose of the program, according to figures from the Michigan Department of Community Health.
The $198 million program, known as MIChild, is designed to provide insurance to children whose families don't qualify for Medicaid but can't afford private insurance.
As Cover the Uninsured Week begins today, local health officials are attempting to enroll more uninsured children through numerous enrollment fairs. Several outreach efforts also are in place through United Way's 211 help line, Detroit Public Schools and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan.
But health advocates say they lack advertising funds, which is why more could be done to market the program to working families.
"We can and we should and we're going to do it," said Doug Halladay, spokesman for the Detroit Wayne County Health Authority, which coordinates Cover the Uninsured Week, sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
Now in its fifth year, the week highlights the 45 million uninsured Americans, including 9 million children. This year's focus on children comes as Congress debates reauthorizing the State Children's Health Insurance Program, which provides federal funds that cover 70 percent of MIChild's costs.
Jessica Luther of Royal Oak, a stay-at-home mother, wasn't aware of MIChild until a friend told her about it. Luther and her husband, a carpenter, were shelling out $400 a month for private coverage that required them to pay 20 percent of their health services and didn't cover office visits for their daughters, Isabel, 5, and Sylvie, 10 months.
The costs became so overwhelming that the couple dropped the insurance. A few weeks later, they enrolled their daughters in MIChild, which covers all health care costs, including vision and dental, for a $10 monthly premium.
"It's phenomenal," Luther said. "It's so much better. I am not worried if they have to go to the doctor and how can I juggle the bills this month."
In 2006, MIChild provided insurance for 32,782 children who live in families that are between 150 percent and 200 percent of the poverty level, which is a $30,000 to $37,000 annual income for a family of four.
The cost of covering the children was $44 million.. The remaining $154 million in 2006 was spent on insuring 65,273 adults with annual incomes of 35 percent of the poverty level, or $3,430 a year.
Michigan was like many states and lost some of its federal funds when they weren't spent. Between 2000 and 2003, Michigan lost $323 million that was distributed to other states.
To allow states more flexibility in their funding, the federal government approved projects for states to cover other uninsured populations.
In 2003, Michigan received federal approval to use the funding to cover adults with very low incomes -- $3,049 annually -- so it could spend all of its funding. Eleven other states also use their funding to cover adults.
"We had to agree we would never turn away a child and we don't," said Paul Reinhart, Medicaid director in the Michigan Department of Community Health.
Some leaders say more needs to be done to insure all children.
"Health care should be a right to all Americans and particularly for our most vulnerable, our children," said the Rev. Dr. John Duckworth, pastor of Gethsemane Missionary Baptist Church in Westland.
United Way Special Events Coordinator, Jeanette Pierce, named to the 2007 class of Crain's 20 in their 20s
United Way for Southeastern Michigan Special Events Coordinator, Jeanette Pierce,has been named to the 2007 class of 20 in their 20s by Crain's Detroit Business. Nearly 200 people were nominated for consideration for this year’s 20 in their 20s class. A team of editors and reporters checked references and debated merits of all the candidates before narrowing the list to 20.
Jeanette Pierce, 26 Director of Information/Special Events Coordinator Inside Detroit/United Way of Southeastern Michigan Detroit
Education: Bachelor’s degree in communications from Aquinas College.
Claim to fame: Founded an organization to conduct city tours to increase appreciation for the city.
Next step: To work with the Detroit Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau on “Tour: Detroit,” a program that packages tours every Saturday throughout the summer, and to formalize a partnership with City Living Detroit. Also leading formation of a leadership group for young professionals at United Way for Southeastern Michigan
Jeanette Pierce, who was born and raised in Detroit, thought she knew the city — until she took a tour with Preservation Wayne a few years ago. Pierce had returned to live in Detroit’s Harmonie Park after spending a semester in Spain and graduating from Aquinas College in Grand Rapids in 2003.
Her time in Spain had shown her “all the possibilities that living in a walkable, urban community could offer,” she said.
During time off from her Greektown waitressing job, Pierce began taking walking tours with Preservation Wayne.
It wasn’t long before she became addicted to the glimpses of history, architecture and people the tours offered. Soon, she was voluntarily leading tours for the organization.
In 2004, Pierce became a special events associate at United Way for Southeastern Michigan, but she continued taking groups on the tours, trying to show people how wonderful Detroit is.
Downtown Detroit has 37 percent less crime than the national average, Pierce boasts. “People are always surprised to hear that.”
“That’s my biggest achievement, changing people’s opinions or showing them a Detroit they haven’t seen before,” she said.
Her passion for turning people on to all that Detroit has to offer led her to co-found the tour group Inside Detroit in 2005.
The new organization provides guided tours of the downtown area, but it goes well beyond that.
Pierce and her business partner began getting referrals from the Detroit Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau to do customized tours for people interested in various aspects of Detroit, from the restaurants to the neighborhoods to places with significance in blues music to the architecture.
Inside Detroit doesn’t just point out places. It takes its groups in to meet proprietors and to enjoy a free beverage, Pierce said.
Inside Detroit soon began getting referrals from the Detroit-based Hubbell Group to provide tours for people who were interested in moving to the city.
Pierce and her partner also began boarding City Living Detroit buses to point out points of interest in the city to riders as they headed to tour the organizations featured Detroit lofts.
Pierce said she has probably led 75 to 100 tours at a cost of $10 to $40 a person.
Pierce now is working on nonprofit status for Inside Detroit.
She’s also leading an effort at United Way to launch a young professionals leadership society to get them engaged in giving back to the community.
Why she lives in Detroit: "It has all the great things about a big city, but also all the great things about a small city. We have great sports teams, beautiful architecture and a history. At the same time, I can’t walk out my door without running into someone I know. The proprietors of the businesses and restaurants downtown know my name."
HELPING HANDS: From rundown to spruced up volunteers give home a makeover
Source: The Detroit Free Press By: Julie Edgar, Free Press Staff Writer Published: April 30, 2007
Southfield -- An $8,000-home improvement grant from the City of Southfield and the goodwill of volunteers have transformed Judi Irwin's tiny ranch from cluttered and decrepit to a tidy nest for a recent amputee.
Since mid-February, plumbers, electricians and carpenters have mended leaks, built walls, replaced doors and floors, and painted inside and out -- free of charge.
United Way volunteers built a wheelchair-accessible ramp that Irwin joked is bigger than the house. And on Saturday, workers put the finishing touches on the Filmore Street home, putting in a new oven and microwave and sanitizing and painting basement walls.
They were helped by volunteers with Rebuilding Together Oakland County, a church-based organization that rehabilitates the homes of low-income seniors once a year.
"It's a wonderful thing that's been done," Irwin said of how the community came to her aid.
Kerry Comerford, an assistant building official with the Southfield Building Department, suggested that Irwin's home be among six in Southfield on the Rebuilding Together rehab list. But Irwin's situation was so dire, Comerford sprung into action earlier.
"This is the first time we've ever done something like this -- gone to these lengths to help somebody out. She was going to be discharged from the hospital and things kind of came together," Comerford said. "I guess we were looking at this one, scratching our heads and figuring out how we were going to make a $10,000 grant mean something."
Comerford assembled a team of 30 to 40 plumbers, electricians, carpenters and painters who agreed to donate their time. The money was used for materials, or those that weren't donated.
Jason Bachman of Linden, a member of Plumbers Local 98, was among those who responded. Last week, he and a colleague tore out Irwin's bathtub to make room for a new shower.
"I'm a young guy. I like giving back, especially to someone who really needs it," said Bachman, 30.
Irwin's plight first came to light when she called 911 in November after noticing that her toes had lost color. Southfield Fire Department medics saw the condition of the house and alerted the city that the home was too cluttered and possibly too dilapidated for human habitation. Irwin, 60, a chronic diabetic, lived there with her two adult children, who have mental disabilities. Both suffered brain damage as infants, she said.
When Irwin went into the hospital, where part of her right leg was amputated, her two children, 24 and 37, were placed in separate group homes. Irwin didn't leave the hospital until mid-December.
Today, she plans to be in court to argue that she is ready to have them back, given the shipshape condition of her house.
Until her children, Michael and Carolyn, come back, Irwin said, her house won't truly be a home.
Fewer kids being born in Wayne Co., study says, but more of them are poor
Source: The Detroit Free Press By: Jack Kresnak, Free Press Staff Writer Published: April 23, 2007
While the number of births in Wayne County has declined over the past few years, more of the county’s children are living in poverty, according to a study released today.
The demographic study was conducted by the Detroit-based United Way of Southeastern Michigan on behalf of Great Start, a countywide collaborative that promotes programs to help children develop from birth to age 5.
According to Kurt Metzger of the United Way, the number of children who are younger than age 6 and living in poverty rose in Detroit from almost 37% in 1999 to almost 46% in 2005. The number of children in Wayne County living in poverty rose from almost 25% to just under 30% in that period.
Metzger said that there were 40,680 births in Wayne County in 1990 and 27,422 in 2005, a decrease of about a third. Just over 11,000 of that decrease occurred in the city of Detroit.
Metzger also said that 29 of every 100 babies in Wayne County are born to mothers who did not receive adequate prenatal care, and 1 in 4 babies in the county is born to a mother without a high school diploma. Both are indicators that the children will struggle in school, Metzger said.
There was some good news: The number of children found to have lead poisoning decreased to 5.2%, though more children are being tested, Metzger said.
Great Start, a public-private collaborative funded mostly by the Kellogg Foundation, is at the beginning of a 10-year effort to improve the well-being of children in Wayne County. Similar groups exist in about 20 other Michigan counties, including Oakland. They are part of Gov. Jennifer Granholm’s effort to focus on programs for very young children, a response to recent scientific research that says most of a child’s brain capacity develops in the first three to five years of life.
John Colina, president of the Southgate-based Colina Foundation, said that for every $1 spent on early childhood development, the public receives $17 in benefits that include a better-educated and higher-earning workforce and fewer children failing in school and going on to become criminals.
Virginia Burns Saleem, manager of Detroit Head Start, who represented Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick at a Great Start briefing in Dearborn this morning, echoed Colina’s statement, saying, “If there’s no investment, there’s no return.”
Source: The Detroit Free Press By: Jack Kresnak, Free Press Staff Writer Published: April 24, 2007
While the number of births in Wayne County has declined, more of the county's children are living in poverty, according to a study released Monday.
Spending on programs to help children in their first years of life -- when brain development is the most rapid -- will prevent problems later, said officials with Great Start, a Wayne County collaborative.
The study was conducted for Great Start by Kurt Metzger of the United Way for Southeastern Michigan, who said the percentage of children under age 6 living in poverty in Detroit grew from 37% in 1999 to almost 46% in 2005. The percentage of those children living in poverty in Wayne County outside Detroit rose from almost 25% to just below 30%.
Metzger said there were 40,680 births in 1990 and 27,422 in 2005, a 33% drop.
Of every 100 babies born in Wayne County in 2004, 29 did not have adequate prenatal care and one in four babies in the county was born to a mother without a high school diploma. Both are indicators that the children will struggle in school, Metzger said.
There was some good news: The percentage of Wayne County children tested and found to have lead poisoning dropped to 5.2% in 2005; it was 9.5% in 2001.
John Colina, president of the Southgate-based Colina Foundation and a member of Great Start, said that for every dollar spent on early childhood development, the public receives $17 in benefits that include a better-educated and higher-earning workforce and fewer children failing in school and going on to be criminals.
Source: The Detroit Free Press By: Kristen Jordan Shamus Published: April 29, 2007
Graduates of big state colleges won't stick around, poll shows
More than half the students at Michigan's three biggest universities say they'll leave the state after graduation -- with nearly half of those saying they will do so to find jobs.
But while the state's high unemployment rate shapes the opinions of the students interviewed for The Detroit Free Press-Local 4 Michigan Poll, some experts say the perception of a lack of good jobs in the state is worse than the reality for young people looking to start a career in Michigan.
Those experts point to thousands of positions in the health care, financial services and information technology fields -- many at small- to mid-size companies -- among the 34,000 total jobs listed in a statewide job bank.
They also say the promise of Google in Ann Arbor, a major medical complex being built in Grand Rapids and a little-known IT explosion in the Lansing area offer hope for graduates of the state's universities.
"The picture is not as bad as it appears," said Kelly Bishop, director of the career center at Michigan State University.
College graduates are finding jobs in the state, he said.
Michael Casey is among them.
When he tosses his cap at his MSU commencement Saturday, he'll know that he has a job waiting as a financial analyst with an automotive supplier in Troy.
"I had other offers, which weren't as good of pay, out of the state," in Chicago and Tennessee, said Casey, 21, of Redford Township. He begins work in June at Arvin Meritor. His choice came down to family and love for southeastern Michigan.
Although Casey had good luck in his in-state job search, many of his classmates are giving up on the idea of working in Michigan after graduation -- at least for now.
Fifty-three percent of the 640 students surveyed at MSU, Wayne State University and the University of Michigan say they expect to move away, according to the poll, taken by phone April 9-16. The poll was conducted by Selzer & Co. of Des Moines, Iowa, and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points.
At U-M, just one in four students said they expect to stay in the state after graduation.
Excluding out-of-state and foreign students, the number expecting to leave the state dips to 46%. But almost three in four native Michiganders who plan to leave said they are open to returning.
Of those who said they plan to leave Michigan, 47% said they'd go where there are good jobs and 24% just want to try living somewhere else.
"As much as I love Michigan, it really comes down to the job issue more than anything," said Justin Rumao, 22, of Canton.
A mechanical engineering major at MSU, he's interned at the Erlanger, Ky.-based Toyota Motors Engineering & Manufacturing North America. When he graduates next year, he hopes to work there, but he said he'd eventually move back to Michigan for graduate school or a job.
"What's great about living here is the fact that you can experience four seasons year round," he said. "The people are always nice. There's always something to do."
Phil Gardner, director of the Collegiate Employment Research Institute at MSU, said negative talk about Michigan's job picture, mostly by public officials, has convinced many students not to even bother looking for a job in the state.
"We've talked them into this situation," he said.
Attractive opportunities
Here are examples of opportunities that might be attractive to state graduates:
• Google, which opened an office in Ann Arbor last year, says it will hire for 1,000 new jobs during the next five years.
• In the Grand Rapids area, at least 2,800 health care jobs -- and thousands more in related support positions -- are expected to open during the next 10 years, according to a study by Deloitte Consulting. They will come from the Van Andel Institute, which is tripling its lab space, making room for 400 more researchers, as well as the Helen DeVos Children's Hospital expected to open in 2010, St. Mary's new Hauenstein Center for the treatment of neurological disorders slated to open next year, and MSU's expanded Grand Rapids medical school campus.
• Polytorx, a company that makes a new, durable form of concrete reinforcement, is headquartered in Ann Arbor with manufacturing operations in Ypsilanti. It expects to create 1,800 jobs within five years.
• Auburn Hills-based United Solar Ovonic is expanding its solar panel manufacturing business in Greenville, with plans to add five plants -- and 200 jobs per plant -- by 2010.
• An information technology boom in the Lansing area has led to a demand for graduates in that area, said Kate Tykocki, a Capital Area Michigan Works! spokeswoman. She said there are about 300 to 400 IT job openings in the Lansing area.
One problem is that most students don't know about those jobs, said Kurt Metzger, research director for the United Way for Southeastern Michigan.
Some Michigan companies are recruiting in other states and countries to fill their jobs, he said.
"We need to be telling our universities and telling our students that there are a lot of good jobs here," he said. The Michigan Poll found that students attending U-M and MSU are the most likely to leave the state, with 57% and 56%, respectively, saying they plan to go to another state or country when they graduate. WSU students are more likely to stay put, with 44% saying they plan to move.
Imran Usmani, a 23-year-old junior at Wayne State who is studying computer science, said he's likely to leave the state when he graduates next year but hopes to return eventually.
A native of India, Usmani grew up in Saudi Arabia and says his WSU degree will bring a higher salary in those countries. "I've got to go back because I don't think there is a good opportunity for me in Michigan," he said.
"When I have a secure job, and have earned enough money, I probably will come back to start a business or something over here."
Tykocki of Michigan Works! said people like Usmani with degrees in computer science and technical fields are in demand in Michigan, especially at small and medium-size businesses near Lansing.
"Students just don't know that the opportunities are here," she said.
What Michigan is missing
The 24% of students polled who said they'd leave Michigan because they want to see what it's like to live elsewhere exacerbate a so-called brain drain -- the flight of young, educated workers -- that Metzger says is predominant in Midwest and Northeastern states.
"Brains are going where the population is going" to the South and West Coast, he said.
The poll confirmed the popularity of those areas, as well as Chicago and the East Coast.
Wanderlust likely will take Patricia Hines, a WSU freshman, to warmer climes.
"I'd like to see what it's like to live somewhere else," said Hines, 20, of Detroit.
A nursing major, she has her eyes set on Atlanta. She doesn't like Michigan's weather, cost of living and things it has for young people to do.
No matter how well the state markets its job offerings, Robert Camaj, 21, of Farmington Hills said the key is in giving young people other reasons to stay.
Camaj, who graduated Saturday from U-M, wants to live in a community with vibrant shopping, cleaner streets, better public transit and more culture.
"Detroit will always be my home, but for one thing it's kind of scary -- in terms of crime and things like that," said Camaj, who plans to attend law school in New York City in the fall.
Michael J. Brennan is president and CEO of United Way for Southeastern Michigan, an organization dedicated to impacting lives and shaping communities in Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties, with the assistance of more than 20,000 volunteers and supporters across the region.
Brennan came to metro Detroit from United Way of America (UWA), the national organization serving 1,350 United Ways nationwide. He began his United Way career in Detroit as a fundraiser in1985, after graduating from Michigan State University. Additionally, he has completed executive programs at both the Harvard Business School and the Center for Creative Leadership.
Active in a number of regional causes over the years, Brennan currently sits on the board of New Detroit Inc. and served as a member of the Super Bowl XL Host Committee.
Ali Ayoub, 17, graduates this June from Fordson High School and expects to pursue a career in medicine, starting at Wayne State University. The Dearborn youth already completed over 500 hours of volunteering at Oakwood Hospital and conducted fundraisers for victims of Hurricane Katrina and recipients of aid from the World Medical Relief in Detroit. He is a research intern at the United Way for Southeastern Michigan with a yen to help the world.
Ayoub began working as a research assistant intern for the resource investment and community partnership at the United Way in July 2006. He compiles lists of issues around literacy, education and economic status of metro Detroiters and conducts data entry for his boss, Kurt Metzger. "Working at United Way I have discovered that Detroit was once booming city, thriving on many economic and social activities that can be re-established through a little help from its citizens and future leaders."
Michael J. Brennan is president and CEO of United Way for Southeastern Michigan, an organization dedicated to impacting lives and shaping communities in Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties, with the assistance of more than 20,000 volunteers and supporters across the region. 