By Maren Roeske ’18 | Staff Writer

Local

With new funding from the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG), the Park plans to make changes to sidewalks focusing on the blind and physically challenged.

The money for this project comes not from the taxpayers but through the US Department of Housing and Urban Development allocated by Wayne County. The grant provides $49,477 for the Americans with Disabilities Act for sidewalk ramps as well as $5,497 for administration to keep the project on track.

A majority of sidewalk ramps in the Park, about 90 percent, have been upgraded to more accessible versions in recent years yet City Manager Dale Krajniak said many of those ramps are worn out and need to be replaced.

Construction on new ramps is scheduled to begin in Spring with the placement along Mack Avenue from Maryland to Somerset. Any leftover money will be used to add ramps on Charlevoix.

State

With the state still reeling from the water contamination of Flint, Houston-based petroleum company Plains LPG may soon be moving forward with plans to pump heavy crude oil across the St. Clair River from Marysville to Canada through 98-year-old pipes.

The two pipes, eight inches in diameter, were built in 1918 and are under the jurisdiction of the US State Department, which moved the permit consideration through Federal Registration in mid-January without a public hearing or environmental assessment. The 30-day community comment period expired on Feb. 24 with minimal feedback. Major Michigan environmental groups, learning of the pipeline proposal on that day, are pushing for more time to voice concern.

Ed McArdle, chairman of the environmental nonprofit Sierra Club’s Southeast Michigan group, requested that the State Department extend the comment period and give the public more opportunity to consider and weigh in on the proposal. He’s still waiting for a response.

“This is mind-blowing, really,” McArdle said in an interview with The Detroit Free Press. “We thought Line 5 was bad, but 1918?! Crude oil?!”

Line 5 is the 63-year-old, twin underwater pipelines in the Straits of Mackinac operated by Canadian oil transport giant Enbridge, used to transport natural gas liquids and light crude oil. Line 5 has generated huge controversy, with many concerned what a potential spill could mean to the Great Lakes. Enbridge also controlled the pipelines responsible for the 2010 oil spill near Marshall, Mich. that polluted Talmadge Creek and over 40 miles of the Kalamazoo River, resulting in a four-year, billion dollar cleanup.

“That’s what astonishes us,” St. Clair Township resident Venessa Davis, shocked and outrage at the proposal and how it has proceeded so quietly,. “We knew Enbridge’s pipelines were old, and we had concerns about the Straits pipeline after what happened in Kalamazoo. But then to find out they want to use these existing, old pipelines is just unthinkable.”

McArdle is also worried about the possibility of an oil spill from the pipeline, nestled between Lake Huron and Lake St. Clair.

“The main drinking water intake for Detroit is at the north end of Belle Isle, right downstream from that,” McArdle said. “Water intakes for other communities on both the U.S. and Canadian sides are all just downstream as well.”

Originally, the pipeline was intended for the company to transport only light liquid hydrocarbons, yet Plains LPG plans to use the pipes for crude oil and liquid hydrocarbons transport. Yet because of the The 1918 Presidential Permit, which authorizes the transport of crude oil according to the State Department’s summary on the permit request, Plains LPG can ship crude through the 98-year-old pipes.

Furthermore under federal rules, since the company receiving the transfer of this existing permit intends to operate “essentially unchanged from that previously permitted,” the State Department “does not intend to conduct an environmental review of the application.” The State Department will make an exception if information “is brought to its attention” that indicates the permit transfer “potentially would have a significant impact on the quality of the human environment.”

Many in the community find this lack of inspections worrisome given the possibility of  ecologic disaster that accompanies crude transport.

“My question would be whether the companies can reline the pipes that are that old,” David Barber, a Marysville City Council member and retired fire inspector for the city, adding that the year when the pipelines were given an additional liner “would be nice to know.”

Davis also said she wants the government to stand up and make sure that the pipeline is safe.

“The government appears to just rubber-stamp it,” Davis said. “They take the company’s word at face value and don’t check any facts. For somebody to give this kind of carte blanche permit to a company is really kind of insane.”

Even though control of pipeline has slipped through the communities fingers, there is still a chance for review. In the Plains LPG permit request documents, the State Department states they are also “soliciting the views of concerned federal agencies.” It’s possible the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency or the International Joint Commission, a joint U.S.-Canada agency that resolves Great Lakes and border water conflicts, could take an interest.

Davis hopes that one of these groups looks into the pipeline, resulting in protection of the St. Clair river and the Great Lakes.   

“Is there going to be an environmental review?” Davis said. “New regulations applied? If not, that’s ludicrous for a 100-year-old pipeline. This is our fresh water. We have 44 million people on both sides of the Great Lakes who rely on this water. Who is going to say, ‘No, this is our water, we’re going to protect it?'”

National

On Thursday, Feb. 25 a gunman opened fire at Excel Lawn Care Company in Hesston, Kan. killing three people and injuring 14, ten of whom are in critical condition, before being fatally shot by a police officer. The shooter was identified by coworker witnesses during the massacre as Cedric Ford. Authorities have yet to officially release the identity.

“He just parked and then opened up the door, hopped out with the gun on, strapped-up and everything,” friend and coworker Matt Jarrell said of the beginning of the attack to local CNN affiliate KSNW. Ford yelled “hey” at a bystander nearby and then shot that person according to Jarrell.

“I witnessed him shoot the shots. I saw the shell casings come out of the assault rifle. I mean, that vivid. I can still see it,” Jarrell said.

The police are still looking into the Ford’s  motives. They have not released the names of victims or the officer who shot Ford.

In Washington, there is political turmoil because of the death of late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Mass shooting like that of Hesston often bring up questions of Second Amendment rights, which on more than one occasion were protected by Scalia.

With his death, President Obama has begun the task of appointing a new justice. Yet, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell has announced, among other Republican leaders, they will not approve any candidate the president puts before them.

On Tuesday, Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee said that they would not even meet the president’s eventual nominee and that they had no intention of holding confirmation hearings before the next president takes office in January in hopes of a Republican president being elected and appointing another conservative justice in Scalia’s place.

“It only makes sense that we defer to the American people who will elect a new president to select the next Supreme Court Justice,” Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley said in a statement to back up the decision not to hold a hearing.

Yet in a press briefing on Wednesday, President Obama said that he will nominate a new justice despite what McConnell has said.

“I think it will be very difficult for Mr. McConnell to explain,” President Obama said, “ if the public concludes that this person is very well-qualified, that the Senate should stand in the way simply for political reasons.”