State Roundup

Ludington Long, slow haul: Man makes 4,100-mile tractor ride LUDINGTON, Mich. (AP) -- A Michigan man has wrapped up a more than 4,100-mile tractor ride through the Midwest to raise money for charity. The Ludington Daily News reports 66-year-old Dave Wolfsen arrived Monday in Ludington from Wisconsin aboard the S.S. Badger car ferry. He's also known as "Tractor Dave." He began the ride in June and traveled on a red 1937 tractor with a 25 mph top speed. Wolfsen had planned to ride 9,300 miles through 48 states. The Muskegon Chronicle reports time and bad weather cut short his plans. Wolfsen owned an agricultural equipment dealership in Fremont before selling it six years ago. He also drives a road commission truck. He used the trip raise awareness and money for the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee and Food Resource Bank. Covert Township Palisades plant inspected after pump part failure COVERT TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) -- A U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspection is taking place at Palisades Nuclear Plant in southwestern Michigan after a water pump component failed last week. The NRC says the plant owned by New Orleans-based Entergy Corp. in Van Buren County's Covert Township is operating safely. Entergy spokesman Mark Savage told The Associated Press that the team arrived Tuesday and is expected to be on site for the week. Savage says the NRC will determine whether proper procedures were followed or whether an additional inspection is needed. The NRC says a pump coupling failed Aug. 9. It was replaced and the pipe is back in use. A similar incident happened in 2009. Pontiac Fab 5er, ex-Raptor in court on child support claim PONTIAC, Mich. (AP) -- University of Michigan "Fab Five" member and ex-Toronto Raptors player Jimmy King said he is working with authorities to resolve a child support claim after being arrested earlier this month. The state says he failed to pay $17,000. "We are working with the attorney general's office," King told reporters Tuesday outside a hearing in Pontiac. "We are going to do everything in our power to make sure that this is taken care of. I'm just going to continue doing what I'm doing to support my family." King, 38, is scheduled to return to court Sept. 9 for a preliminary hearing. King was arrested Aug. 9 at a basketball camp at a northwest Detroit church. He was arraigned the next day on a charge of failing to pay support he owed for one child. The charge carries up to four years' imprisonment but is commonly used to get parents to settle. King's lawyer Andrew Abood said his client has already paid $60,000 in support of his 17-year-old son. Authorities have been working since 2008 to get King to get up-to-date with the payments, and he ignored repeated warnings to get back on schedule, the state attorney general's office has said. King, Jalen Rose, Chris Webber, Ray Jackson and Juwan Howard made up the Wolverines' Fab Five in 1991-92 and 1992-93, when Michigan reached the Final Four of the NCAA men's basketball tournament. King played for the NBA's Toronto in 1995-96 and also played in Europe and for the Continental Basketball Association. Traverse City $1,500 reward offered in July swan beating death TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) -- Authorities say a $1,500 reward is being offered for information related to the beating death of a swan on Traverse City's West Bay. The Traverse City Record-Eagle reports a man attacked the swan July 3. The reward is for information that results in the apprehension and conviction of the attacker. First Lt. David Shaw of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources' Law Enforcement Division says the case likely won't be solved without help from the public. Tips about the case may be reported to the DNR's poaching hotline at 800-292-7800 or an area office of the DNR at 231-775-9727. Lansing Little oversight expected in cost-cut incentives LANSING, Mich. (AP) -- Local governments that want to qualify for incentives under Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder's plan to reward cost-cutting measures will only need to fill out a form saying they're doing all they can to reach the goal and provide some additional documentation, officials said. There will be little, if any, checking on whether communities are doing what they claim to cut spending and consolidate public services to get a portion of Michigan tax revenue sharing being used for incentives, Detroit Free Press reported (http://bit.ly/oogdLY ) Wednesday. "I can't really comment on oversight yet, but our staffing is tight," said Terry Stanton, spokesman for the Department of Treasury. "But we would expect that if a local unit tells us that they're taking appropriate steps, that they're taking that responsibility to heart." Communities submitting false information would forfeit incentive payments and have to pay back what they've already received, Stanton said. Qualifying for the money will be a matter of signing a form and providing additional documentation to the state, said Summer Minnick, spokeswoman of the Michigan Municipal League. She said the approach is preferable to having numerous Treasury Department auditors reviewing information. "The Treasury Department doesn't have to certify it," she said. "As long as the community administrators sign the form, they'll get the money." The Republican governor announced the plan earlier this year to use hundreds of millions of tax dollars for incentives, potentially at the expense of local governments that don't make cost-cutting efforts. That caused worries in communities about whether they would qualify. Snyder has been keen to make the thousands of county, city, town, village and township officials look for ways to combine services, erase boundaries and employ fewer people at less cost -- including themselves. Some of those changes already have been taking place. Birmingham and several neighboring Oakland County communities, for example, have been partners in sewage treatment and recycling for years. Now Birmingham and Bloomfield Township are negotiating a deal to consolidate police and fire dispatch services. Birmingham's city employees also pay 20 percent of their health care costs, and the city has a less expensive defined-benefit pension plan for new hires. "We've been pursuing these things because they're the right things to do," said Robert Bruner, the city manager. Published: Thu, Aug 18, 2011