It’s back to school season, and in this era of COVID-19 with the debate over mask mandates, what this looks like depends a lot on where you live. Today, we hear stories of two Michigan families: One family has an unvaccinated seven year old in a school district that is not requiring masks, and the other has a teenager who is vaccinated in a district with a mask mandate.

GUESTS: 

Erin Allen is a producer for Stateside. 

Rachel Ishikawa is Michigan Radio’s podcast producer. 

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Surrounded by protesters on Belle Isle, former Detroit Police Chief James Craig announced his run for Michigan governor as a Republican. This may not be the announcement he had planned or hoped for, but it could work out in his favor. 

GUEST: Zoe Clark, Michigan Radio program director

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After the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, people who hadn’t thought much about domestic security were suddenly painfully aware of what could happen. And people whose business was public safety suddenly had a new set of concerns on their hands. On today’s episode, we’ll get into how that day changed the institutions charged with keeping us safe, and the implications those changes have had on a new era of domestic threats.

GUEST:

Barb McQuade, University of Michigan law professor and former U.S. Attorney for Michigan’s Eastern District

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Tomorrow marks two decades since September 11th. Twenty years later, we’re still trying to wrap our heads around its impact. Today, we’re looking at a specific piece of this story, one that's especially relevant in Michigan. Michigan is home to the largest population of Arab Americans in the U.S. and since 9/11 Arab or Muslims - or people perceived as Arab or Muslim - have experienced intensified policing and discrimitation.

GUESTS:

Zahra Huber, podcaster and photographer

Ali Harb, journalist 

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In 2009, Wayne Count Prosecutor Kym Worthy found out there were more than 11,000 unprocessed rape kits sitting neglected in a Detroit warehouse. Horrified, she made it a mission of her office to make sure all of the backlog of kits were tested, and as many rapists were convicted as possible. That work is finally nearly complete.

GUEST:

Bryce Huffman, reporter, Bridge Detroit

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Everywhere you look, there are eateries—from fast food to fine dining—with help wanted signs in the windows. Some Michigan businesses hope that the end of federal pandemic unemployment benefits this week will push people back to work. But experts say it's not that simple.

GUESTS:

Betsey Stevenson, professor of public policy and economics at the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy

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Today, Governor Gretchen Whitmer called on the state Legislature to repeal a 1931 abortion ban on the books in Michigan. Since the Texas state legislature passed a law that breaks new ground in its pursuit of abortion restrictions many states, including ours, have been re-examining legal precedent that has been part of American life for decades. Today, we’re talking about the ripple effect from Texas’ landmark anti-abortion law in Michigan.

GUEST:

Dave Boucher, Detroit Free Press politics and policy reporter

Notes:

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Journalist Danny Fenster of southeast Michigan was detained in Myanmar by authorities at the airport on his way to see his family back in the US. It's been more than 100 days. Despite having limited contact with Danny, his family in Michigan is working to keep his story alive. On today's episode, efforts to get Michigan journalist Danny Fenster out of a Myanmar prison after more than 100 days in captivity.

GUESTS:

Andy Levin,  U.S. Representative for Michigan's 9th congressional district

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Twenty years ago, Aaliyah released her much-beloved, self-titled red album. And just weeks later, she  died tragically in a plane crash, leaving behind a profound legacy of music, style and rhythm that still resonates across the globe. We’ll talk with writer Imani Mixon about one of the places where this legacy began: Detroit. 

 

GUEST:

Imani Mixon, Detroit-based, multimedia journalist and host of the podcast Subject Matters 

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The sadness, isolation, and loss of the past year and a half can be so hard to talk about, but sometimes poetry provides the exquisitely precise language we need to name our hurt. That’s what writer Peter Markus found when he sat down to process the death of his father. On today’s pod, April Baer talks to Peter about how poetry became a vehicle to process his grief when fiction fell short.

GUESTS:

Peter Markus, writer, novelist, and poet. His first collection of poetry is called When Our Fathers Return to Us as Birds.

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