Daily Detroit

On today's show, we cover the funeral arrangements for former U.S. Rep. John Dingell, who died Friday at age 92. Dingell, a Dearborn Democrat, was the longest-serving member of the U.S. House, having served for 59 years when he stepped down at the end of 2014. And he left a huge impression on generations of Detroiters.

Elsewhere, we delve into sportsball. Forbes says the Detroit Pistons fall one ranking to No. 26 for most valuable NBA teams (out of 30), despite increasing 15 percent to $1.27 billion. And Detroit City FC has released its schedule for the 2019 NPSL regular-season campaign, though it will release its schedule for its inaugural NPSL Founders Cup professional campaign, and four exhibition friendlies, at a later date.

Also:

• The city of Detroit has an improved credit rating from Standards & Poor's, meaning it will cost less for borrowing money
• City officials in Royal Oak may have to eat an additional $877,000 in costs for a new parking deck under construction
• Summit Place Mall in Waterford has a date with the wrecking ball, at long last
• Comcast will begin airing Detroit Symphony Orchestra concerts this season
• Lyft has released the top restaurants, venues and cities for Valentine's Day in Detroit, using data from 2018
• Detroit is once again on a list of most-unhealthy U.S. cities, and we discuss a few reasons why

Thanks as always for listening. Tell a friend about Daily Detroit, and help spread the word about your favorite podcast.

Paul Riser has played trombone, wrote songs and arranged music with some of the biggest names in popular music. As a member of the fabled "Funk Brothers," the mostly anonymous house band for Motown Records during its heyday, he worked with the likes of Marvin Gaye, The Four Tops, The Supremes and Smokey Robinson.

Riser will appear at the Detroit Institute of Music Education on Friday, Feb. 8 from 1-3 p.m., 1265 Griswold, for a "Paul Riser Masterclass" on lessons learned from his incredible 50-year career in music.

In today's episode, Riser talks about how he started with the Funk Brothers, what he learned from playing with them in the studio, and what it's like playing with Stevie Wonder.

I also ask him what the drastic changes in the music industry mean for those trying to make a living on music, and who he likes from the current crop of pop musicians.

We also hear from DIME President Kevin Nixon ("which makes me President Nixon," he quipped to me before we recorded the conversation), himself an industry veteran, on what makes Riser unique.

Whether you're a music lover like me, or just love hearing about Detroit's history, you won't want to miss this episode.

Paul Ajegba, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's nominee to head the Michigan Department of Transportation, faced a grilling in a state Senate committee on Tuesday. And he let slip a rather interesting tidbit, saying that MDOT likely needs another $1.5 billion in funding just to fix state roads. And that doesn't account for the needs of counties, cities and villages.

On today's show, we break down the particulars, including why that $1.2 billion roads package lawmakers passed back in 2015 won't cut it. We also run down:

• GM's planned layoffs of 1,300 salaried employees at the Warren Tech Center, coming on the same day the automaker reported earning $8.1 billion for 2018
• A Detroit police commander who retired after being charged with impaired driving and possessing a firearm while under the influence
• Former Clinton Township Trustee Dean Reynolds, who was sentenced to 17 years in a federal prison in a wide-ranging Macomb County corruption scandal, detailed by The Detroit News
• Former U.S. Rep. John Dingell, 92, has entered hospice care
• And the Downtown Detroit Partnership releases its annual report, featuring some interesting data points

Thanks as always for listening. If you like our show, tell a friend, or consider supporting Daily Detroit on Patreon.

Busy show for you podcast listeners today. Ford is laying off 1,000 employees at the Flat Rock Assembly Plant, but offering them positions in other Ford plants, with about half expected to take jobs at the Livonia Transmission plant. Meanwhile, GM is adding 1,000 jobs at Flint Assembly to make heavy-duty Chevy and GMC trucks. Those jobs will be offered first to workers affected by the looming closure of four plants in the U.S., including two here in the Detroit area.

Elsewhere, Ferndale is doubling rates for all downtown metered parking starting April 1. That's to help pay for the dot, the new $28 million mixed-use parking deck that just broke ground. We talked about that project recently with Ferndale's assistant city manager, Joe Gacioch.

The Ambassador Bridge will slash toll fares by $2, from $4.60 to $2.60, in both directions starting Feb. 18

Turning to buses, the suburban SMART bus system is proposing a new fare system that would eliminate transfers and bring fares in line with the Detroit Department of Transportation. You can email your feedback to [email protected], or attend one of the following meetings:

Wednesday, February 6Dearborn Transit Center, 21201 Michigan Ave., 5:30 p.m.

SMART downtown offices, 535 Griswold Street, Suite 600, Detroit, 12 p.m.

Thursday, February 7 Royal Oak Transit Center, 202 Sherman Drive, 5:30 p.m.

Lots more in the show, and be safe out there with the ice tonight.

Find Daily Detroit wherever you get your favorite podcasts. Don't forget to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.

It was an especially bad start to the week for many salaried employees at General Motors, as the automaker started handing out pink slip in a bid to eliminate 4,000 white-collar employees over the next two weeks. It's part of plans GM announced in November and discussed on our podcast to slash 14,000 jobs and save $6 billion by 2020.

In other news, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer shakes up state government, restructuring and renaming the Department of Environmental Quality as the Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy. She also signed two other measures to address the public's fears about drinking water in the wake of the Flint water crisis and widespread PFAS contamination.

We also rundown:

• The city of Detroit has pushed back the date for appealing new property tax assessments
• Detroit Restaurant Week kicks off later this month
• Shake Shack is unveiling sous vide "Chick'n Bites"
• Google crunches the numbers and finds Detroit is the nation's top pizza-eating market; MSN offers some unconventional entries for Motown's top Detroit-style pizza joints
• The Anna Whitcomb Conservatory on Belle Isle will have limited weekend hours this month due to construction work
• And last but certainly not least, we wade into the talk of the town, the new sculpture in Sterling Heights that some are calling the Golden Butthole of Macomb County

Comments? Questions? Tips? [email protected]

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Well, it's cold out. Anyone noticed?

If you're like us, you no doubt noticed the emergency push alert sent to your mobile device Wednesday night, asking you to dial back your thermostats as the temperatures outside were heading to record subzero lows.

On today's show, we talk about what happened to precipitate that push alert — a fire at a Consumers Energy natural gas storage and compression plant in Macomb County, its largest — and how it illustrates how vulnerable our infrastructure is to climate change. We suspect things will only get worse, if the forecasts for a big thaw by this weekend prove true.

Staying with infrastructure, because we're nerds like that, we run down a new proposal from a bipartisan group of former politicians to raise Michigan's gas tax to help fund road repairs.

Our interview today is with Alexandra Schmidt, public engagement director with the Center for Michigan and a reporter at Bridge Magazine. She tells us about the "think-and-do" tank's new report, "Michigan's Moment of Truth." It reflects the recommendations gleaned from more than 170 meetings across the state with residents about what they want to see out of our new crop of elected leaders (hint: roads are a big topic).

Thanks for listening, tell a friend about us, and have a pleasant weekend.

Of course, if you have comments, tips or questions, email us at [email protected]

You may have seen that Daily Detroit recently made its Detroit Public Television debut with a profile of Rivian, the electric vehicle maker that caught the automotive world by surprise last fall when it unveiled its high-powered, battery-electric pickup truck and SUV.

For today's episode, we're following up on our promise to give you more from our visit to Rivian's Plymouth Township headquarters. We have more from my interview with the company's founder and CEO, R.J. Scaringe, including how the company is founded and why he's confident they can clear the hurdles and start manufacturing their vehicles.

Rivian is now taking orders on both the R1T pickup, which is slated for delivery to customers in late 2020, and the R1S SUV, which delivers in 2021. The former starts at $69,000, or $61,500 after federal electric-vehicle tax credits, while the latter starts at $72,500 ($65,000).

In the meantime, enjoy the photos from our visit.

Like what we're doing? Then leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. And consider supporting our work through our Patreon campaign.

If you have questions or story ideas, hit us up! [email protected]

A new polar vortex is bearing down on Michigan and the upper Midwest, forcing widespread school closures, forcing Wayne State University and Michigan State University to cancel classes and the Detroit Zoo to close.

On today's episode, we run down some of the knock-on effects of the dangerously cold weather, which is expected to produce subzero temperatures and dangerously cold wind chills. Jer speaks with Gary Brown, director of the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department, about the risks to the city's aging infrastructure.

DTE Energy also has a list of warming centers that will be open around the Detroit region.

In other news, we discuss a report that the Trump administration will not set drinking water limits for PFAS, a dangerous group of chemicals that have turned up in public water systems across the country and Michigan. This as the U.S. Air Force thumbs its nose at the state of Michigan's request to expand cleanup of PFAS contamination at a former air base near Oscoda.

Other news:

• GM's vice president of urban mobility and Maven, its car-sharing program, is out.
• Two DMC hospitals face the threat of losing federal funding for Medicare and Medicaid after failing inspections.
• And Third Man Records has opened an analog and digital mastering studio to its Cass Corridor retail empire

Also, it's our 200th episode!!! We couldn't have gotten this far without the support of readers and listeners like you. Please consider becoming a supporter through our new Patreon campaign.

Greetings, fellow snow-bound Detroiters. We didn't let the weather interfere with our podcast plans today and delivered this show from the Royal Oak studio of Podcast Detroit.

On today's show, newly Detroit-based Chemical Bank is merging with Minnesota-based TCF Bank in an all-stock merger of equals. The deal will see TCF vacate its suburban Minneapolis headquarters and join Chemical in being based in downtown Detroit, where employee head count will eventually reach 500. The Chemical name will go away in favor of TCF, which stands for Twin City Federal Savings and Loan Association.

In other news, attendance at this year's Detroit auto show saw a small dip in the show's final wintertime appearance before it moves to June in 2020.

And former Detroit Tigers legend Kirk Gibson has a new title with the team. He'll be a special assistant to General Manager Al Avila in addition to his duties in the TV broadcast booth alternating with Jack Morris.

Then we run down a bunch of food news:

• Royal Oak craft beer bar Ale Mary's debuts cannabidiol-flavored cocktails
• Corktown deli Mudgie's offers a new program to provide hot meals to those who could really use one
• Troy's Camp Ticonderoga wins some national acclaim for its coziness
• The Drive Table Tennis Social Club in downtown Detroit has closed but is reportedly looking for a new location

And, Little Caesars has a new pretzel crust pizza. With cheddar cheese sauce. It's apparently a thing lots of people asked to come back.

Find Daily Detroit wherever you get your favorite podcasts. And don't forget to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.

A bonus pod this Friday, January 25, 2018.

Despite its new owner's promises to build a brewery, office space, a hotel and more, Detroit's infamous Packard Plant is once again subject to foreclosure by Wayne County in 2019, according to notices published in the Detroit Legal News last month.

That's due, at least in part, to unpaid bills to the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department. But the amount shows up as tax liability.

Although we haven't been able to confirm the total owed for the water and sewage bills, adding up records found on Loveland's property website shows that Arte Express owes $302,434 as of August 2018. That's across a variety of properties that make up the north and south sides of the sprawling Packard facility.

The Detroit Water And Sewerage Department said they wouldn't be able to confirm the total amount owed across the numerous properties that make up the plant by the end of today. We've identified 42 parcels owned by Arte Express at the Packard Plant, with 41 subject to foreclosure on March 31, 2019.

This includes the administration building that the pedestrian bridge fell from earlier this week at 1580 East Grand Boulevard. That parcel is listed as owing $5,587.99.

Peruvian developer Fernando Palazuelo and his Arte Express company purchased the complex out of foreclosure in 2013 for $405,000.

More: http://www.dailydetroit.com/2019/01/25/detroits-packard-plant-is-on-wayne-countys-2019-foreclosure-list/