State Roundup

Lansing
Grants to support fluoridation
equipment offered
LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Michigan is offering grants to communities for reimbursement for fluoridation equipment purchases as part of an effort to improve dental health.

The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services says communities may be eligible if they’re not currently fluoridating drinking water and are purchasing equipment for the purpose of initiating a community water fluoridation program.

Delta Dental of Michigan is supporting the effort. Health experts say drinking fluoridated water from birth can reduce tooth decay.

If funds allow, money also will reimburse communities for upgrading and replacing existing or worn out equipment. Requests may be made for up to $24,000 and must be used for new or replacement fluoridation equipment purchased from April 1, 2016, through Sept. 15, 2016.

Flint
Funding accepted to help with sex assault kit testing
FLINT, Mich. (AP) — Two grants totaling $1.3 million will help reduce the backlog of untested sexual assault kits in Flint.

The Flint Journal reports City Council on Monday accepted the funding, which was announced in September to test several hundred kits.

Police Chief James Tolbert says he believes the funding will allow all of the untested kits, some dating back to 2001, to be processed.

The newspaper says grants include $1.1 million from the U.S. Department of Justice and $163,000 from the New York district attorney’s office.


Detroit
Museum marks  group’s 50th anniversary
DETROIT (AP) — The Detroit Institute of Arts celebrated the 50th anniversary of one of its long-standing auxiliary support groups with an exhibition that opened Tuesday.

Since its founding as the Print and Drawing Club, the group called “Friends of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs” has commissioned, purchased or given the DIA hundreds of works on paper. The group, which has more than 220 members, also organizes educational and social programs.

“This exhibition would not have been possible without the support of Friends of Prints and Drawings,” museum Director Salvador Salort-Pons said in a statement. “The generosity of its dedicated members has enabled us to add important works to the collection for our visitors to enjoy.”

The exhibition titled “Fifty Years of Collecting: Detroit Institute of Arts’ Friends of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs Anniversary Exhibition” runs through June 18.

Friends of Prints and Drawings is involved in openings, previews, lectures, specialized gallery tours, workshops and visits to artists’ studios and private collections as well as trips to U.S. art destinations.

On view for the first time at the museum is James McNeill Whistler’s print “Yellow House, Lannion,” made during the early years of a movement known as the color revolution in lithography. The museum described it as an “exceptionally rare print.”

It also marks the final exhibition organized by Nancy Sojka, DIA curator of prints and drawings and department head of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs. Sojka, who has organized dozens of exhibitions during her career, is retiring in January after 27 years with the museum.

Port Sheldon
Group launches campaign to save high-tech buoy
PORT SHELDON TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — An effort is underway to prevent a high-tech buoy credited with supplying critical information from Lake Michigan from being moved out of western Michigan.
The nonprofit Great Lakes Observing System is managing a fundraising campaign to cover about $25,000 in annual upkeep costs for the buoy. The fundraising campaign has until the end of February to meet that goal.

The buoy has been located in Lake Michigan off Ottawa County’s Port Sheldon Township since 2012. The Holland Sentinel reports that it provides nearly real-time data to anyone interested in knowing about local weather and wave patterns.

Ann Arbor-based company LimnoTech has said it wants to shift the cost of the buoy’s upkeep because a federal grant is running out.

The fundraising campaign has raised $1,500 as of early Tuesday morning.

Grand Rapids
Survey planned along Grand River ahead of dredging
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) — An underwater survey is planned of the Grand River between Grand Rapids and the Bass River Recreation Area ahead of a possible dredging effort.

The Grand Rapids Press reports the Michigan Department of Technology, Management and Budget has approved spending $100,000 to map the river bottom as a first step toward dredging the 22.5-mile stretch of the Lower Grand River.

Dan Hibma, a developer spearheading the dredging push, is partnering on an effort to make the Lower Grand River navigable for recreational boaters between Grand Rapids and Lake Michigan. Hibma says the study could start in January, weather permitting.

Mio
Officials: More than 50 dogs seized in cruelty investigation
MIO, Mich. (AP) — Officials say more than 50 dogs have been seized from a home in Michigan’s northern Lower Peninsula during an animal cruelty investigation.

The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals says the dogs were removed from the home in Mio, about 165 miles northwest of Detroit, after unsanitary and overcrowded conditions were found. They range in age from puppies to adults.

The ASPCA says it’s believed the dogs were being bred for sale and the operation wasn’t licensed. Tim Rickey, vice president of ASPCA Field Investigations and Response, tells MLive.com the overall conditions at the home were “just unacceptable.”

Rickey says most of the dogs were housed in the basement.

Lansing
Bill continues health insurance tax until 2025
LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Michigan’s tax on health insurance would be continued until 2025 under legislation scheduled for a vote in the Legislature.

The Senate plans to vote on Tuesday on extending the 0.75 percent health insurance claims assessment, which helps pay for Medicaid coverage for low-income residents. The tax will go away in two years if legislation is not enacted.

The Michigan Chamber of Commerce calls the bill a “giant tax hike” to pay for “social welfare programs.” But supporters say the measure already approved by the House gives certainty to businesses and funds vital health insurance for the poor.

If the tax is not extended, Medicaid spending could be cut by roughly $1 billion annually starting in the 2017-18 budget year unless another source of funding is used.

Allendale
Grant to help gather historical info on migrants
ALLENDALE, Mich. (AP) — The Kutsche Office of Local History at Grand Valley State University has received an $11,500 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to collect oral histories of Michigan migrant workers.

The office will work with the Oceana County Hispanic Center and the Oceana County Historical and Genealogical Society, in addition to Grand Valley’s History and Latin American Studies departments.
Grand Valley will match the grant, providing the project a total of $23,000.

Michigan has the nation’s fifth-largest migrant population. But director Melanie Shell-Weiss of the history office says young children of migrant families in the area might not be aware of their families’ history.