Gov. Gretchen Whitmer says she is in talks with Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares about keeping the company’s North American headquarters in Michigan as pressures mount on the automaker and uncertainty looms over its Auburn Hills base.
Whitmer has spoken “frequently” with Tavares as the company reassesses its footprint, and retaining its headquarters in Michigan is a “top priority” for her administration, the governor said Oct. 9 after a tour of the Battery Show at Huntington Place in downtown Detroit.
“We have an open dialogue going on,” Whitmer told Crain’s. “We want to help Stellantis see the wisdom and the opportunities for changing up their headquarters but making sure it stays here in Michigan. That dialogue is robust, continuous and we’re not going to take our eye off the ball. We want Stellantis to continue to call Michigan home.”
The automaker provided a statement to Crain’s in response to an inquiry about the discussions.
“Stellantis has made its home in Michigan for more than 100 years,” the company said. “We appreciate the partnership with Governor Whitmer and the State and have no further comment at this time.”
The discussions are taking place against a backdrop of significant pressure on Stellantis, which produces Chrysler, Dodge, Ram and Jeep brands. Tavares and the company have come under fire recently from suppliers, dealers and the UAW amid operational woes in North Ameri
See WHITMER on Page 28
Megasite development ignites hopes and fears in Flint area
Potential microchip manufacturing project sparks opposition for some, optimism for others
By Kurt Nagl
To Don Ludwig, it feels like déjà vu.
His yard backs up to the megasite in Mundy Township, where his wife Dawn’s grandparents built their house along a tract of
farmland near Flint in 1965.
For the past two years, economic developers have been quietly assembling acreage for what could be a $55 billion microchip factory. It’s giving Ludwig flashbacks.
When he was 12 years old and
WATER RESCUE
An algal bloom crisis in Toledo pushed Michigan and Ohio officials, scientists and activists into action. Ten years later, progress hasn’t been easy. Page 22
living with his grandparents in Detroit’s Poletown, they were forced from their home through eminent domain to make way for a General Motors assembly plant. Around 1,500 homes were seized and the neighborhood leveled. While the law wouldn’t allow that to happen by force today, Ludwig knows the end game is clearing a path for the Advanced Manufacturing District of Genesee County — a once-in-a-lifetime economic opportunity, as
crain’s honorees for 2024. Page 9
Don Ludwig is fighting to keep his family’s property, which backs up to megasite in Mundy Township near Flint. | KURT NAGL
See MEGASITE on Page 31
Slotkin hauls in cash, national groups boost Rogers in Senate race
By David Eggert
LANSING — Democrat Elissa Slotkin raised quadruple what Republican Mike Rogers did over three months and quintupled his spending, but her advantage is being dampened by outside groups that continue to pump money into Michigan’s toss-up U.S. Senate race. Slotkin’s main campaign committee on Oct. 14 reported raising $16.7 million in the third quarter and spending $21.3 million, with $4 million cash on hand as of Sept. 30. Rogers’ primary committee collected $4.1 million, spent $4 million and had a $2.6 million balance. e Senate Leadership Fund, a super political action committee a liated with Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said Oct. 15 it will commit $10.5 million more to helping Rogers, on top of $22.5 million it pledged two weeks earlier.
AdImpact Politics, which tracks political advertising, estimated that the Rogers campaign and Republican groups had $23.2 million in future reservations to $13.3 million for the Slotkin campaign and
Democratic groups.
ABC News’ 538 website polling averages shows Slotkin up 4 percentage points, 48% to 44%. It is a wider margin than in the presidential contest, which is razor-tight — 47.6% for Kamala Harris to 46.9% for Donald Trump — according to 538.
Michigan donors
Some Michigan donors helped to fuel independent expenditures in the Senate race.
Kalamazoo billionaire Jon Stryker gave $250,000 to the Senate Majority PAC, which is linked to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, bringing his total contributions to $950,000 this cycle.
Edward Levy Jr. of Birmingham, chairman of Edw. C. Levy Co., contributed $250,000 to the Republican-a liated Senate Leadership Fund.
Great Lakes Conservative Fund, a separate super PAC aiding Rogers and opposing Slotkin, got donations from Republican former Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land ($50,000); David Fischer, longtime Suburban Collection auto dealer-
ship chairman and former U.S. ambassador to Morocco under ex-President Donald Trump ($25,000); and Steve Brownell of Grosse Pointe Farms, an executive with e Kirlin Co. ($25,000).
10th Congressional District
e Republican-leaning 10th Congressional District in Macomb and Oakland counties features a rematch between rst-term Republican Rep. John James and Democrat Carl Marlinga, who had a close race in 2022.
Marlinga is raising more this time around, $1.6 million between July and September, topping his entire $1 million in receipts in the 2021-22 cycle. He spent $393,000 and had $1.3 million on hand entering October.
James took in $1.3 million last quarter, spent $2.8 million and
had a $2.5 million balance for the closing stretch.
7th District
e open 7th Congressional District, which includes a portion of Oakland County and stretches to the Lansing area, is one of two in Michigan rated as a tossup by e Cook Political Report. It also is one of the most expensive House showdowns in the country, as outside groups ood the zone with ads.
Democrat Curtis Hertel Jr. raised $2.3 million, spent $3.3 million and had $2.2 million in the bank. Republican Tom Barrett raised $1.4 million, spent $1.2 million and had $1.3 million on hand.
Whitmer’s PAC
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a cochair of Vice President Kamala
Harris’ presidential campaign, continued to haul in money via her Fight Like Hell PAC. It has a non-contribution account that can solicit unlimited donations for nancing independent expenditures such as ads and voter drives, and a separate account, subject to limits, that can contribute to candidates.
e PAC raised $2.7 million, outpacing what candidates in competitive U.S. House races collected.
Corrections
A 40 Under 40 pro le in the Oct. 7 issue incorrectly listed the amount of the spending plan Jen Flood helped shape. It should be $82.5 billion. In another 40 Under 40 pro le, the last name of Bruno Olivera Dias was spelled incorrectly in some references.
U.S. Senate candidates Elissa Slotkin, a Democrat (left), and Mike Rogers, a Republican, meet for a debate hosted by WOOD-TV in Grand Rapids on Oct. 15.
Venture capital deal volume drops in Detroit, Ann Arbor
By Anna Fifelski
While Southeast Michigan venture capital deals decreased in the July to September period when compared to the previous quarter, the outlook remains positive for 2025 with more exits and VC investing on the horizon.
Metro Detroit saw a drop in the number of venture capital deals in the third quarter of 2024, with $3.9 million invested across four deals; down from 19 in Q2 and 20 in Q1.
Ann Arbor also saw a decrease in the number of VC deals completed — three deals in the third quarter compared to six in Q2 and 11 in Q1 — but generated a whopping $66.9 million in capital invested across those three deals. The credit mostly goes to one startup, ONL Therapeutics Inc., which closed a recent $65 million Series D funding round.
It’s not uncommon for investing to fall in the third quarter, Adrian Fortino, managing director and general partner of Mercury Fund, a Houston-headquartered venture fund that focuses investments on mid-America, told Crain’s.
The third quarter includes two summer months and peak backto-school season, which means many people — founders and investors alike — are focusing attention on family and personal time. That can lead to a drop in investing, which the area also saw in 2023.
Across Michigan, capital invested fell to $108.48 million over 20 deals in Q3, compared to $166.55 million in capital investments over 38 deals in the second quarter.
So far in 2024, two funds in Michigan have raised funds, collecting $40 million and $60 million, respectively, in the Detroit-Warren-Livonia metropolitan statistical area, according to the PitchBook data.
Despite a slow third quarter, Michigan’s VC ecosystem remains steady compared to national trends, which shows less active investors compared to the same time last year.
Ara Topouzian, executive director of the Michigan Venture Capital Association, told Crain’s that
he’s comfortable with Michigan’s VC numbers remaining consistent the past several years, but the state needs to remain competitive if it’s going to “keep its foot on the gas pedal.”
“What we need is to be able to be competitive with our neighboring states, and that’s a challenge,” Topouzian said. “And things like SSBCI (State Small Business Credit Initiative) helps, the Michigan Innovation Fund helps, but it’s not enough.”
Being competitive includes looking at incentives to encourage limited partners to invest, and continually advocating and encouraging the Legislature on the value of angel and venture investments, Topouzian said.
Michigan had one startup exit in the third quarter, which failed to generate any capital. According to the PitchBook data, the startup was located in the Detroit-Warren-Livonia MSA.
For the first time, PitchBook also provided an initial public offering probability for unicorn startups.
Southeast Michigan’s top venture capital deals netted $70M in Q3
By Anna Fifelski
The total value of capital invested in metro Detroit and Ann Arbor startups reached $124 million so far this year, according to data from PitchBook, a Seattle-based data platform.
The seven deals between the two areas generated around $70.7 million in investments in the regions.
The Detroit area saw a drop in VC deals in the third quarter of the year, falling to four compared to 19 in the second quarter. These four deals totaled just less than $4 million in investments, according to PitchBook, listed below from smallest to largest:
Top metro Detroit deals
Gabriel, Roeder, Smith & Co.:
$93,855
Southfield-based Gabriel, Ro-
Buying spree continues for Jax Kar Wash chain
By Kirk Pinho
Jax Kar Wash has purchased another car wash company.
The Southfield-based chain, which has been expanding following its own 2022 acquisition by private equity, bought Chesterfield Township-based Clean View Auto Wash Inc. for an undisclosed price.
It’s at least the fourth competitor it has gobbled up since Birmingham-based TRP Capital Partners took a majority position in Jax two and a half years ago, buying Oasis Car Wash, Lee Road Soft Car Wash and Super Car Wash locations since.
The Clean View purchase gives
Jax five more existing car wash facilities in Macomb County with another five in the development pipeline — two expected to open this month, and another three to open early next year, according to a press release.
Clean View’s existing locations are at:
50501 Gratiot Ave. in Chesterfield Township
14255 23 Mile Road in Shelby Township
42400 Hayes Road in Clinton Township
45430 Schoenherr Road in Shelby Township
5775 15 Mile Road in Sterling Heights
The company also has two under development at 49720 Gratiot Ave. in Chesterfield Township and 56855 Romeo Plank Road in Macomb Township, according to its website. The locations of the three that are under development and expected to open early next year were not disclosed.
The sale closed Oct. 3 and included the business operations and some of the real estate, said Harry Caruso, founder and CEO of Miami-based Car Wash Advisory LLC, which advised Clean View on the deal. The precise nature of the real estate acquisitions was not disclosed.
Executives including Frank
eder, Smith & Company Holdings Inc. is a national business-to-business actuarial and benefits consulting firm founded in 1938. It raised $93,855 out of its $761,400 round on Aug. 23, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Happi: $500,000 Happi Co., a Birmingham-headquartered cannabis-infused drink company, raised $500,000 of a $2 million funding goal. It was founded in 2020 by Joe Reynolds and Lisa Hurwitz to develop a health-conscious, natural, non-GMO and gluten-free “way to unwind,” according to the company’s website.
Electric Outdoors: $1.3 million Detroit-based off-grid camping company Electric Outdoors Inc. secured a $1.3 million initial
closing of a $3 million priced seed round on Sept. 10.
The round was led by Farmington Hills-based Veolectra Inc., an advanced EV technology product development company, and joined by Michigan Rise and the Michigan Outdoor Innovation Fund, according to a news release.
Electric Outdoors develops solar-powered canopies designed to provide a sustainable camping option and ease the camping experience for EV owners. It was founded by Josef Hjelmaker in 2023.
Uptime Charger: $2 million
Waterford-based EV charging solutions startup Uptime EV Charger Inc. closed a $1,996,008 fund on July 10. The company provides end-to-end EV charger
Toma, founder of Clean View, will not transition over into leadership roles at Jax, although Jax is expected to retain Clean View’s 100 or so other employees, Caruso said.
“This transition marks the next chapter in our business journey, and I have full confidence that Jax
Detroit saw a drop in the number of venture capital deals in the third quarter of 2024 than the year before. GettY IMAGeS
Crews remove tower crane from Hudson’s skyscraper
A fixture of the Detroit skyline is no longer.
No, not that one.
The tower crane at the Hudson’s Detroit development on Woodward Avenue was removed over the course of the weekend Oct. 11-13 after more than four years on the site.
According to Dan Gilbert’s Bedrock LLC real estate company, which is developing the $1.4 billion project approaching its eighth year of construction, the crane was 905 feet and had a lift capacity of nearly 106,000 pounds, or 53 tons.
Bedrock says now that the crane
has been removed, the buck hoist — that’s essentially a temporary exterior elevator moving workers up and down floors — removal can start. That will allow for the last pieces of exterior glass to be installed, not long after the final pieces of exterior glass at the topmost portion of the skyscraper were installed last month.
Large cranes first arrived at the site in July 2020.
Completion is a long ways off.
Although General Motors Co. is anticipated to move its headquarters from the Renaissance Center into the “block” portion of the development on the northern portion of the 2.3-acre site, the skyscraper — which has hotel and condo space by Edition — on the southern end isn’t expected to be completed until 2027.
‘Palatial’ Northville mansion sells at auction for just over $2.9M
By Nick Manes
A tough-to-sell Wayne County mansion found a buyer, at a pretty steep discount.
Castello Montebello, as the Northville mansion is known, closed to a new, unknown buyer on Oct. 7 via an auction process handled by Interluxe Auctions based in Charlotte, N.C.
Listing information from Interluxe shows the 16,000-squarefoot home — situated on more than two acres just outside downtown Northville — sold for just over $2.9 million.
The selling price for the home built in 2000 makes for a discount of about 59% compared with a one-time asking price of $4.9 million.
Realtor and listing agent Dylan Tent with the Northville office of
Signature Sotheby’s International
Realty said the price reduction can largely be attributed to just the home and land selling. Another roughly four-acre vacant and adjacent parcel that had been offered did not sell.
Tent said the final sale price was “definitely low” considering the size and build quality of the roughly 16,000 square foot home. But there’s also a ceiling for homes in the high-end Detroit suburb and “this was a special, unique property,” Tent said.
Tent would only identify the buyer as someone from out of state and who did not tour the home prior to bidding in the auction.
The Northville mansion sold by longtime owner Dr. Thomas Prose boasts a colorful history, having played hosts to presidents
and, for a short time, as consulate for the Czech Republic. The home also contains a replica of the former Paramount Movie Palace in New York City.
“This is a home that only takes one buyer who wants this lifestyle, who wants this location. This is the premier home in western Wayne and eastern Washtenaw counties,” Prose told Crain’s in early 2023. “So if that buyer comes by tomorrow, the home is theirs. But I just can’t judge (the market). It’s going to require somebody that wants that home and that lifestyle.”
Prose will keep the vacant, adjacent parcel for the time being. He also opted against selling a 3-acre lakefront retreat in Livingston County dubbed “Eagle’s Crest,” which had previously been up for auction in August with a starting bid of $1.7 million.
Top Michigan executive leaves Bank of America
By Sherri Welch
Michigan’s top Bank of America executive, Matt Elliott, has left the bank.
Elliott, who’d served as president of Bank of America Michigan and sustainability executive for global commercial banking and business banking for the past two years, shared news of his retirement on LinkedIn.
In his post, Elliot said he was excited to share the news.
“It was an incredible 22 years of combined service to our clients, teammates and the community, and I’m grateful for the privilege of serving as a senior leader at such a remarkable organization,” he said.
Thanks friends, clients, partners and teammates, Elliott said, “I’m looking forward to exploring new ways I can help companies and communities by leading, speaking, investing and advising, so stay
tuned for further developments.” During his career with the bank, Elliott also served as Michigan state president and region executive, according to his LinkedIn profile.
Bank of America expects to name his successor by the end of the month, Naomi Patton, senior vice president, media relations, said, noting Elliott officially retired this month.
Elliott has served on the boards of Business Leaders for Michigan, the Detroit Economic Club, the Michigan Israel Business Accelerator and the Detroit Regional Chamber, where he chaired the 2023 Mackinac Policy Conference.
Charlotte, N.C.-based Bank of America is Michigan’s fourth-largest bank by deposits in the state, with $30.84 billion as of June 2023, according to Crain’s list of largest banks in the state.
Kirk Pinho
Workers remove the crane from the top of the Hudson’s Detroit tower during the Oct. 11-13 weekend. | HUDSON’S DETROIT
Matt Elliott speaks at a dinner during the Mackinac Policy Conference in 2023, which he chaired. DALE G. YOUNG
The Castello Montebello estate in Northville was built more than 20 years ago for about $20 million. | INTERLUXE AUCTIONS
Bobcat Bonnie’s closes restaurant for good as it faces staff complaints
By Jay Davis
e independently owned Bobcat Bonnie’s gastropub announced Oct. 16 it would be closing its Ypsilanti location for good, owner Matt Buskard said in a statement.
Buskard had previously announced the restaurant at 200 W. Michigan Ave. was temporarily closed, while ownership investigated allegations of inappropriate and harassing behavior by managers, and complaints regarding working conditions. e temporary closure was announced in a note to employees that was shared to social media.
“We will not be reopening the Ypsilanti location,” Buskard said on Oct. 16. “Like many small restaurants, we are shrinking our footprint so we can be more focused on our other locations throughout Michigan.”
It is unclear if the closure is related to the harassment claims.
e closure comes as a group of Bobcat Bonnie’s employees have come together in an e ort to get better work schedules, resolve some pay issues and bring better management to the nineyear-old chain.
A group of sta ers calling themselves Bobcats United planned to picket 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Oct. 17-20 outside the Ferndale location at 240 W. Nine Mile Road. Bobcats United on its website wrote that about 30 Bobcat Bonnie’s employees signed a petition and hand-delivered it to Buskard on Oct. 7.
“It’s time we hold the company accountable,” the post reads.
An Oct. 11 statement from Bobcats United states the group is organizing for better work conditions and to resolve ongoing issues the company has ignored for months, and in some cases, years.
Buskard in his statement said a handful of sta ers on Oct. 7 approached corporate with a written statement detailing complaints and demands about working conditions at the Ypsi-
lanti restaurant. He said Bobcat Bonnie’s brass spoke immediately with the employees to address the issues.
“We brought in an employment attorney because we wanted to take the allegations seriously,” Buskard said. “We reached out to these sta members again to investigate the claims further and have been rebu ed twice.”
Bobcats United did not immediately respond to Crain’s request for comment.
Bobcat Bonnie’s director of operations Rachel Fizzell was to handle the investigation at the Ypsilanti location. Buskard said he would not be involved in the name of fairness to everyone involved.
Buskard, in a Oct. 16 text message to Crain’s prior to his announcing the permanent closure, said ownership was evaluating the Ypsilanti location and was committed to taking the time needed to make sound decisions. Buskard is a past Crain’s 40 Under 40 and Notable LGBTQ honoree.
Buskard said his company is open to suggestions and changes.
“It is incredibly hurtful to see negative commentary because we have always taken great pride in our place in the community,” Buskard said. “We are open to suggestions and changes in this ever evolving restaurant industry. Bobcat Bonnie’s will always be committed to being a place folks can take pride in working, in an environment that celebrates them and to address any issue quickly and competently.”
e rst Bobcat Bonnie’s opened in May 2015 at 1800 Michigan Ave. in Detroit’s Corktown neighborhood. Bobcat Bonnie’s has six locations in Michigan: Wyandotte, Lansing, Grand Rapids, Detroit, Ferndale and Ypsilanti. A Clinton Township location inside e Mall at Partridge Creek closed in August. Toledo and Kalamazoo locations are in the works.
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Bobcat Bonnie’s closed its Ypsilanti locatiom. | BOBCAT BONNIE’S
Grit and leadership have benefits beyond the field
Grit. Hustle. Culture. Leadership. These terms, so intangible, are thrown around with abandon in the business world, with varying degrees of sincerity.
But after a long dry spell, Detroit sports fans have been lucky to get a front-row seat at more than one example of what they can mean.
The Detroit Lions have begun 2024 in much the same mode as 2023, their most successful run in many fans’ memory. The franchise has won plaudits for the leadership and culture change that’s happened under head coach Dan Campbell, rising up into the front office with general manager Brad Holmes, team President Rod Wood and owner Sheila Ford Hamp.
But now, an improbable playoff run by the team across the street has given metro Detroit sports fans another window into how turnarounds work and how leadership can matter.
Bringing in manager A.J. Hinch, who had a record of success, was just one step. Tigers general manager Scott Harris has put a heavy emphasis on modern metrics and focused on rebuilding a farm system that had long been one of the weakest in baseball. And during the team’s down years, team Chairman and CEO Christopher Ilitch took untold abuse from fans.
That’s part of the game, but the whole group should get credit for the stunning turnaround. They put the building blocks in place, invested in the stadium and its future, and kept the on-field momentum going when the Tigers got hot. It all goes to building pride.
COMMENTARY
Here’s
a
big
Michigan and Ohio have one of the most intense and deeply rooted rivalries in America today.
That’s leadership.
The Tigers’ playoff run isn’t sufficient evidence they’re in a lasting turnaround, but the signs are there. An extremely young team with a veteran manager and, now, the experience of having already done it. If you can come back from 10 games behind in mid-August, you have to feel you can do anything.
Which has been Campbell’s consistent message to the Lions: Look what you can do. Campbell’s locker room talks have al-
ready fallen into local legend and will live forever on social media. Tigers manager A.J. Hinch’s slogan of “Somebody let the Tigers into the playoffs” will be remembered by many alongside “Bless You Boys.”
That’s leadership.
It’s only sports. We know. But sports are a sector that so many people follow so closely — an arena that is filled with stories — these kinds of successes and the leaders who inspired them can rub off — into communities, into economies, into our daily attitudes.
Why do we follow these games? At the bottom, through all the years of failures, that is why. That little extra swagger, excitement, anticipation.
And pride. It’s “only sports,” so if something goes amiss, you can be assured it will get called out with speed and frequency and vitriol. But for now, we’re on record saying that we hope these bandwagons keep running, and that the Red Wings and Pistons hop on board.
way Michigan is in danger of falling behind Ohio
In football, the Michigan-Ohio State matchup, often dubbed “The Game,” dates back to 1897. Since then, the annual showdown has grown to form one of college football’s most legendary and bitter rivalries. Although the pendulum of wins swings between the two teams, Michigan fans are apt to point out that it’s been 1,756 days since the Buckeyes beat the Wolverines or that Michigan has won 10 National Championships to Ohio State’s eight.
Timothy Nash is the director of Northwood University’s McNair Center for the Advancement of Free Enterprise and Entrepreneurship. Wendy Block is the senior vice president for business advocacy at the Michigan Chamber of Commerce.
Off the field, the two industrial powerhouses also compete economically and share similar demographics. However, key differences are starting to appear — in Ohio’s favor.
While Ohioans recently defeated the efforts to mandate a $15 minimum wage and eliminate the tipped wage (keeping their current minimum wage and tipped minimum wage intact at $10.45 and $5.25, respectively), the Michigan Supreme Court in July issued a monumental ruling to raise Michigan’s minimum wage from $10.33 an hour to $15 by 2029 and fully eliminate the tipped minimum wage.
The Court also ordered a sweeping and nuanced new paid leave mandate to take effect in February of 2025.
In both states, out-of-state groups were primarily responsible for the policy proposals. But while Ohioans said no, Michigan’s Supreme Court said yes. The net effect? Michigan moves into outlier status while Ohio remains competitive.
Only six states, none of which look like
and a phone number for fact-checking purposes.
Michigan or its economy, currently have a minimum wage of $15 or higher: California, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, and Washington. Perhaps of greater concern are the four Midwest states surrounding Michigan. Except for Illinois, which has a $14 an hour minimum wage, ALL have a lower minimum wage than Michigan — and NONE have eliminated the tipped minimum wage.
The good news is that market wages are at a historic high so the impact may not be particularly devastating for most industries or regions.
A big exception is in the hospitality industry. The elimination of the tipped minimum wage equates to a 288% increase in labor costs for Michigan bars and restaurants. With no way to make the math work, many will have little choice but to turn off the lights for good and leave workers without jobs and Michiganders with fewer choices for game day meetups and social outings.
A 2024 operators survey by Michigan Restaurant and Lodging Association (MRLA) estimates that 40,000 to 60,000 jobs will be lost and one in five full-service restaurants will close permanently. Others
yet will cut staffing, move to automation and/or change their business model. Those that survive expect they’ll have to raise menu prices by 25% or more to adjust for the increased labor costs.
Even servers are outraged about the policy change. It’s estimated 600 of servers and bartenders took to Lansing in late September for a rally calling on lawmakers to preserve the current tipped minimum wage scale, arguing that pending changes will dramatically hurt their earnings. Rallygoers argued they take home substantially more pay through tips earned waiting tables or working shifts behind the bar. While it might be easier to play political football with this issue, a touchdown for Michigan and its economic competitiveness would be lawmakers coming together in a bipartisan fashion to fix the Supreme Court’s ruling before it takes effect in February. Beyond flashy headlines, the ruling will create a wave of economic destruction that threatens Michigan’s ability to compete.
It’s time to find that “Michigan Grit” and move a reasonable legislative solution down the field.
The Detroit Tigers pose for a team photo after their wild-card series victory over the Houston Astros. | KEVIN COX/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Michigan’s marijuana market is flooded with product — but sales are down
By Dustin Walsh
Oversupply has come home to roost in Michigan’s marijuana industry.
Michigan legal market marijuana sales plummeted nearly 10% in September, marking the end of the state’s summer vacation season.
Sales for the month totaled $266.9 million, down from the all-time sales record in August of $295.4 million.
The downward trend indicates the heavy toll on the industry from basement low prices — the average price of an ounce of recreational flower hit an all-time low at $78.68 in September, down 15.6% since January.
In Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and upper Lower Peninsula, retailers actually sold nearly 5% more marijuana in September than in August, but sales totals were down 16.9%, reflecting the steep discounts dispensaries offered to maintain summer sales volumes from downstate and Wisconsin vacationers.
But sales volumes, in both pounds sold and total sales, fell everywhere else in the state. Wayne County, for instance, saw a 6.3% decline in pounds of marijuana sold alongside a 23% slide in total sales dollars.
The decline in pounds sold may be an indication of the end of summer’s backyard barbecues and travels and September’s return to routine, especially for working parents with school and youth sports schedules.
New market in Ohio
The 23% decline in pounds sold in the east and Southeast Michigan region could be a result of Ohio’s start of recreational marijuana sales in August.
Through Sept. 28, recreational marijuana sales in Ohio totaled $87.1 million. Ohio sold 5,268 pounds of marijuana in September, according to state data, which could easily account for the 218 fewer pounds of product sold in Southeast Michigan last month.
Flood of product
But product oversupply remains the largest culprit hammering down sales totals in the state.
There were 3.77 million active marijuana plants being grown in Michigan in September, up 45% year over year, leading to a flood of product in the market and compressing prices father. Put simply, growers are growing more plants. In April, growers were only using 56% of their licensed recreational marijuana grow capacity. That figure spiked to 82% in September. More product, lower prices.
Black market’s shadow
Not captured in the state’s data is how much illicit market product is being integrated, illegally, into the legal market.
Law enforcement in the state believes the legal market was flooded
with illegally grown marijuana in the last 12 months, stemming from an October 2023 Michigan Court of Appeals ruling that interpreted the state’s recreational marijuana laws to mean illegal growers and distributors could not face felony charges, only minor misdemeanors under the law. That ruling was recently reversed in a new Court of Appeals ruling this month.
“The dirty product that is infiltrating the licensed market is being sold to unwitting consumers,” First Lieutenant Tom Kish, commander of the Michigan State Police Mari-
juana & Tobacco Investigation Section, told Crain’s last month. “I have real concerns about organized crime coming in Michigan more than it already has and the violent crime that will follow. We’re talking multimillion-dollar operations. Once we’re talking about dollar amounts like that, people are going to get shot. It’s an unfortunate consequence of the way our laws are written.”
The ruling temporarily cut the legs off of criminal prosecution and is believed to have led to a boom of illegal growers flooding the market.
Several legally licensed growers have been caught with suspected illicit market marijuana in recent months.
For instance, the owner, Endrit Cali, of marijuana grower and processor HiCloud LLC in Hesperia, roughly 60 miles northwest of Grand Rapids, was pulled over by
Michigan State Police in November last year with 43.5 pounds of marijuana flower and law enforcement suspected HiCloud was storing and selling illegal market product. However, Cali merely pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge and a $950 fine, leading to the tossing of a felony possession charge.
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UM-MSU-WSU alliance focuses on business advancement
By Sherri Welch
The University Research Corridor and its top-tier research universities are rolling out the welcome mat for businesses.
Leaders of the University of Michigan, Michigan State University and Wayne State University, which founded URC 18 years ago, extended the invitation during a Detroit Economic Club luncheon Oct. 15, along with a charge to businesses to help drive innovation as part of a renewed push to spur the state’s economy.
“For all of you out there, whether you’re a student or you’re a business, for this to work, you need to feel completely comfortable. Don’t be shy. There’s a big welcome mat in front of the URC. We welcome you, want to partner with you,” University of Michigan President Santa Ono said during a panel conversation hosted by the Detroit Economic Club Oct. 15.
“Look to us; look to URC. We can be your competitive advantage, and with that, Michigan will rise.”
Ono joined Michigan State University President Kevin Guskiewicz and Wayne State University President Kimberly Espy for the panel conversation moderated by Matt Elliott, former sustainability executive and Michigan market president of Bank of America.
They talked about how they are collaborating among themselves through the URC, with other educational institutions and with business to develop sustainable economic growth and a talent pipeline for the future.
The URC launched in 2006 to strengthen talent, research innovation and economic growth in Michigan through its anchor universities: UM, MSU and WSU. It
was modeled on the Research Triangle Park in North Carolina, which counts among its anchors the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, where Guskiewicz served as president until he joined MSU earlier this year.
Each of the universities has its own strengths but collectively, the sum is greater than the parts, they said.
The URC is directing its focus to bring about ground-breaking research in four industries: artificial intelligence, advanced manufacturing, life and health sciences and sustainability.
“We’ve really leaned in at the URC to these four areas for a couple reasons,” Espy said.
Those areas take advantage of Michigan’s natural access, whether it’s the natural resources that Michigan is so blessed (with), whether it’s the people of Michigan, the innovators, the creators who have been such a part of our
Home sales decline in metro Detroit as inventory expands
By Nick Manes
Summer in Southeast Michigan has truly come to an end as home sales have continued to decline, despite an ongoing boom of inventory.
Two monthly reports from metro Detroit real estate companies — which track slightly different metrics, but generally show similar trends — show that home sales around the region last month dropped again, as did prices, as more inventory hit the market.
Sales have been flat and trending downwards in recent months as Michigan’s typically busier summer housing market came to a close.
“The market seems to be settling into a familiar seasonal rhythm, with September home sales and median home prices dipping slightly from August,” said Jeanette Schneider, president of Re/Max of Southeastern Michigan, in a statement accompanying the Troy-
based brokerage’s monthly report.
“While the Federal Reserve did cut rates in September, mortgage rates have fluctuated since then, leaving both buyers and sellers cautious about entering the market,” Schneider continued. “In this climate, negotiations are crucial as buyers are more focused on finding price points and terms that suit them, often ready to walk away and wait for another opportunity if a deal doesn’t meet their needs.”
Taken together, the Re/Max report and the monthly report from Farmington Hills-based multiple listing service provider Realcomp II Ltd. show similar trends, both year over year and month over month.
Total sales dropped roughly 10% from a year earlier, according to both reports, while buying activity was down between 8.4% and 11.4% from the month of September.
The decline in sales activity comes as inventory expands, per
story here,” she said.
“But it’s also about the future. When you think about AI and how it’s going to transform not only what we’re doing today, but tomorrow in ways that we can’t envision. This is what the URC is about.”
It’s about research and economic development and faculty, but it’s also about the 125,000 students at the three institutions joining the workforce each year, Espy said.
Each of the universities brings a different lens, she said. WSU works with faculty and has a robust technology commercialization and support arm and through TechTown a community-based approach to building businesses, from barber shops to restaurants.
“When we think about economic development, each of those strategies needs to come together, because 60% of new businesses are small business, right? And so especially for this audience, you
know that it’s important to be spawning and supporting those businesses as well, but the neat thing is, between the three of us, we really play a different part and can contribute to Detroit and continue for it to thrive.”
There’s a need to think more about how to tailor supports and have incubators versus accelerators and the whole network to help more small businesses grow, Espy said. “So I would charge everyone to think a little bit about that, and how do we marshal our resources to be a little bit more intentional and a little bit more organized now that we have us all working together.”
The homework for the business community “is that we need to hear what it is that today’s graduates don’t yet have that businesses need, regardless of your business, banking, health care, advanced manufacturing — what is it that we can help deliver the right grad-
uates to help advance those businesses?” Guskiewicz said.
It’s helping define what the jobs of the future will be, he said. “And we shouldn’t be worrying about AI replacing jobs. We should be thinking about how we can better prepare today’s graduates so that they have the extra skill set.”
That’s something MSU is focused on through its new Engineering and Digital Innovation Center and other initiatives to help drive the economy and bring new businesses to the state of Michigan, Guskiewicz said.
With clear areas of focus and common areas of strength as well as unique areas, the three universities now need to develop specific strategies about what it will do in areas like environmental influences on the health of children and mobility, he said.
In other metropolitan areas, business — especially research and development companies — sit down with universities in their areas and really think about specific technologies and projects that they can work on together, Ono said.
The URC members and Business Leaders for Michigan, which is really focused on the innovation economy and ecosystem, he said, “should be sitting across the table from each other, talking about, what do they need from us? How can we provide technology to help them succeed?”
Business Leaders and the URC are beginning to work together, Ono said, building on some of the joint research already happening with the automotive industry. But all businesses can benefit, he said. “I would like to see all the businesses be comfortable coming to universities with what they need to be nationally and globally competitive.”
the two reports. Per the Realcomp report, the total number of homes on the market in metro Detroit grew 16% from a year earlier to 23,021, and 3.3% from the previous month. New listings also grew year over year, up 4.2%, but declined 11% from last month.
Re/Max’s report does not track the specific number of listings, but does include the number of
months of inventory, which grew from 1.9 months of supply in August to 2.3 months in September.
The expanding inventory of homes is also having an impact on pricing, the reports show.
Median sales price in the region remains elevated from a year earlier, but has been steadily declining on a month-over-month basis, dropping between 0.5% and 2% from September to October, per
the two reports. Should mortgage interest rates see a decline, the market should remain healthy, according to Karen Kage, CEO of Realcomp. “Decreasing interest rates should continue to play a factor in home seller confidence in listing their homes,” Kage said in a statement. “And more homes on the market means more choices for potential buyers — a win-win for all.”
SHERRI WELCH
University of Michigan President Santa Ono, Wayne State University President Kimberly Espy and Michigan State University President Kevin Guskiewicz talk about their collaboration through the University Research Corridor with moderator and former Bank of America Michigan President Matt Elliott during a Detroit Economic Club event Oct. 15.
The metro Detroit housing market is seeing an uptick of homes for sale. NICK MANES
NOTABLE LEADERS IN HEALTH CARE
These 20 Southeast Michigan health care leaders have dedicated their lives to improving patient care for all ages, incomes and locales. They advance medical research, enhance quality of care and shape the future of health care. These notable leaders range from physicians and surgeons to strategic administrators who have made a profound impact in their organizations, on their communities and in their fields.
METHODOLOGY:
Crain’s Notable Leaders in Health Care were nominated by their peers, colleagues, friends and family and selected by a team of Crain’s Detroit Business editors based on their career accomplishments, track records of success and impact. Profiles are based on information in the nomination forms. Notables is managed by Leslie D. Green, assistant managing editor — special projects, and written by Ryan Kelly and Katie Merx. For questions about Crain’s Notables program, please email detroitrecognitions@ crain.com.
Belal Abdallah, M.D.
CEO, Arvon CIN
Scope of work: Dr. Belal Abdallah oversees operations, strategic initiatives and physician engagement for Arvon CIN, formerly named Beaumont ACO, which includes over 4,500 participating physicians. He also leads Pulse Primary PLLC, which has expanded to several dozen facilities nationally and has plans to hire over 500 employees.
Biggest professional win: Under Abdallah’s leadership, Arvon CIN transitioned to a value-based care model that achieved one of the highest savings in the U.S. for Medicare Shared Savings Programs. By building trust and transparency with its participating physicians, he helped save hundreds of millions of dollars and improve care quality. Abdallah’s work also positioned Arvon CIN as a national leader in value-based health care.
Other contributions: He serves as the board chair of Arvon CIN.
Darryl Elmouchi, M.D.
COO, corewell Health
Scope of work: Dr. Darryl Elmouchi is responsible for 50,000 Corewell Health team members and its entire care delivery enterprise. He has promoted new care models, value-based care and health equity, a clinical shared services model for vital services, and has established a framework for quality, safety and patient experience.
Biggest professional win: As an interim president, Elmouchi helped build the Corewell Health East leadership team. He also restructured the leadership and operations of the health system’s eight hospitals in Southeast Michigan, developed an internal communications platform and helped lead Corewell’s creation of a single electronic health record across the state.
Other contributions: elmouchi serves on several boards, including the Michigan Health and Hospital Association and the Hope Network.
Loretta Bush
President and CEO, Authority Health
Scope of work: Loretta Bush manages 119 employees for Authority Health and a budget of $15.1 million. She is also responsible for a medical residency, a humanitarian fellowship, public health internships, four primary care health centers, a Medicaid enrollment and navigation program and a community nutrition program.
Biggest professional win: Bush is responsible for Healthy and Resilient Communities, a nutrition program that encourages fast-food consumers to select healthy alternatives. The program sells healthy “grab and go” food in 20 participating convenience stores and gas stations that sell the products in coolers equipped with smart technology.
Other contributions: Bush is a board member of Insight Youth and Family Connections and an advisory council member of the University of Michigan School of Public Health Practice.
Michael Garrett
President and CEO, CNS Healthcare
Scope of work: With a background in finance in community mental health, Michael Garrett leads the strategy and overall management of CNS, a $43 million nonprofit provider for mental illness and substance use disorders. He is responsible for more than 500 health care professionals and support staff, who serve over 11,000 people annually.
Biggest professional win: Garrett co-led the organization’s federal certification and its challenging merger with Northeast Integrated Health. He also helped secure more than $11 million in grants, most of which came from state and federal governments.
Other contributions: Garrett serves on the board of the Michigan Science Center.
Jerry Darby
Vice President of Planning, Development, Design and Facilities, Henry Ford Health
Scope of work: Jerry Darby is responsible for planning and execution of Henry Ford Health’s major projects. and management and planning for its real estate assets. He manages maintenance support for HFH’s 250-plus facilities and coordinates with strategic partners and stakeholders.
Biggest professional win: Darby is among the team driving the $3 billion Future of Health development in Detroit’s New Center and Midtown neighborhoods. He led HFH and key stakeholders through design and planning for the hospital space, research space with Michigan State University, a green sustainable Central Energy Hub and several parking and infrastructure elements.
Other contributions: At Midtown Detroit Inc., Darby is board secretary and serves on its executive committee.
Michael Genord, M.D.
President and CEO, Health Alliance Plan; Executive Vice President, Henry Ford Health
Scope of work: As a physician, Dr. Michael Genord uses his knowledge of patient care and insurance intricacies to influence health care policies. He is also president and CEO of HAP’s Empowered Health Plan Inc., which addresses issues related to patients who suffer from chronic health problems and cannot afford insurance.
Biggest professional win: Genord led HAP’s collaboration with CareSource to expand HAP’s Medicaid line and grow its products and services to more than 1.85 million Medicaid-eligible people in Michigan.
Other contributions: Genord is chair of the Alliance of Community Health Plans and president-elect of the Michigan Association of Health Plans board of directors.
NOTE WORTHY
8.83% of all U.S. jobs are in health care
$70,000 median annual income
Sources: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment Projections program and U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey.
David Hall, M.D.
President and CEO, Independent Emergency Physicians
Scope of work: Dr. David Hall leads this physician-owned and -led practice of 500 team members, most of whom are physicians. He is projecting revenue of $130 million in 2025. Biggest professional win: Under Hall’s leadership IEP won contracts for emergency medicine services at six metro-Detroit hospitals, which expanded IEP’s footprint to cover 11 hospitals and 565,000 patients annually. IEP also expanded into urgent care and now owns and operates eight urgent care clinics in metro Detroit.
Other contributions: Hall is a founding member, board director and director of the finance committee for the Emergency Medicine Business Coalition. He is also democratic group councilor at the American College of Emergency Medicine.
Steve Higginbotham
CEO, Smile America Partners
Scope of work: Steve Higginbotham has spearheaded Smile America Partners’ transformation into a dental service organization specializing in mobile and portable dentistry. He oversees 1,000 team members who serve 320,000 underserved school children annually in 19 states.
Biggest professional win: During the COVID-19 pandemic when schools shut down, Higginbotham and his team developed a tele-dentistry program to ensure that children continued to receive health education and screenings. Once schools reopened, he led the rebuilding effort for the organization’s in-school program and increased staf ng and outreach to meet the heightened dental needs of children who missed care during the shutdowns.
Other contributions: He serves on several boards, and the organization donated nearly $9 million in charity care in 2023.
Mohamad Khraizat
Director, Regional Alliance for Healthy Schools
Scope of work: Mohamad Khraizat oversees a $6 million budget and leads a team of 65 staff and 10 physicians. He is responsible for sustaining and enhancing levels of care for physical and behavioral health care services for youths, aged 21 and younger.
Biggest professional win: Khraizat led the opening of a school-based health center in a rural part of Jackson County. He also transitioned two behavioral health-only, school-based health centers into full-service health centers in Genesee County, which increased the number of youth patients receiving physical and behavioral health care from 50 to 250 at each site.
Other contributions: Khraizat obtained four certi cations from the Healthcare Financial Management Association to advance the goals of the Regional Alliance for Healthy Schools.
George Kikano, M.D.
Dean and Executive Vice President of Health Affairs, Central Michigan University College of Medicine
Scope of work: Dr. George Kikano manages a $70 million budget and a team of over 100. He oversees residency programs and clinical services and is also board chair of CMU Medical Education Partners. He led the accreditation process for the college, was critical to the school’s af liation agreements and administered the creation of CMU’s Rural Health Equity Institute.
Biggest professional win: Kikano’s leadership on physician shortages in underserved areas landed CMU’s College of Medicine among the 2024 Best Graduate Schools for Medicine in U.S. News and World Report.
Other contributions: He serves on the boards of the Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates and the Michigan Public Health Institute.
David Miller, M.D.
President, University of Michigan Health; Executive Vice Dean for Clinical Affairs, UM Medical School
Scope of Work: Dr. David Miller is responsible for the health system, including its 11 acute care hospitals, 1.3 million patients and annual operating revenue of $7.8 billion.
Biggest professional win: Miller worked with UM Health’s regional system president to integrate newly acquired Sparrow and Health West into the UM health system. He partnered to enhance strategies related to belonging, inclusion, access, safety and quality. And he’s leading the development of its new 264room D. Dan and Betty Kahn Health Care Pavilion and new health centers in Ypsilanti and Oakland County.
Other contributions: Miller is a reviewer for the New England Journal of Medicine and the Journal of the American Medical Association.
of health care workers are in management roles 38% of health care workers have advanced degrees
Sources: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment Projections program and U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey.
Darryl Elmouchi, M.D., MBA Chief Operating Officer
Kelli Sadler, MHA, RN Senior Vice President Chief Nursing Executive
John D. Mitchell, M.D.
Vice Chair of Academic Affairs, Department of Anesthesiology, Henry Ford Health; Vice Chair of Anesthesiology, Michigan State University College of Human Medicine
Scope of Work: Dr. John D. Mitchell is responsible for education, research, professional development and training within Henry Ford Health’s anesthesiology department. He is also director of a skills acquisition lab that provides training for Army and Navy forward-combat units.
Biggest professional win: He established the Henry Ford Education Research and Leadership Development Lab, which published 24 papers in 24 months, driving development of motion tracking and virtual reality technologies for skills training.
Other contributions: Mitchell is president of the Society for Education in Anesthesia and a physician research consultant for the American Board of Anesthesiology.
Adnan Munkarah, M.D.
President of Care Delivery System and Chief Clinical Of cer, Henry Ford Health
Scope of Work: Dr. Adnan Munkarah oversees Henry Ford Health’s clinical and operational functions, including a $4 billion budget, ve acute care hospitals, 200 ambulatory sites, 3,500 physicians and 900 advanced practice providers.
Biggest professional win: He played a leading role in the $3 billion Future of Health project, a partnership involving HFH, Michigan State University, the Detroit Pistons and the Gilbert Family Foundation, that includes a new 20-story hospital tower and 325,000-square-foot research center in Detroit.
Other contributions: Munkarah is on the boards of Health Alliance Plan, the American Medical Group Association and HAVEN. He teaches at Michigan State and Wayne State universities. He chairs HAP’s Clinical & Service Quality Committee.
Mary Naber
President and CEO, PACE
Southeast Michigan
Scope of Work: Mary Naber oversees the strategy, administration and operations of PACE Southeast Michigan (Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly), a government-funded nonpro t that delivers care to eligible chronically ill seniors who want to remain in their homes.
Biggest professional win: In her 10 years at PACE, Naber has grown PACE from two centers with 150 participants to an organization with nine centers and about 2,000 participants.
Other contributions: Naber’s 43 years in health care include being a founding member and the vice chair of PACE Association of Michigan. She also serves on numerous state and national boards and is a member of the American College of Healthcare Executives.
Vasilis K. Pozios, M.D.
Chief Medical Of cer, Oakland Community Health Network
Scope of Work: Dr. Vasilis K. Pozios ensures providers at the Oakland Community Health Network use clinical best practices as they serve patients in the behavioral health system. He also leads the agency’s Justice Initiatives program to divert individuals needing mental health and substance use treatment from the criminal justice system.
Biggest professional win: Pozios led development of the OCHN Community Behavioral Threat Assessment and Management program. BTAM connects OCHN, criminal justice agencies, schools and others to identify, assess and manage threats to prevent targeted violence in Oakland County.
Other contributions: Pozios is a distinguished fellow of the American Psychiatric Association.
NOTE WORTHY
77% of health care jobs are held by women in the U.S. $2 million how much less female physicians earn over a 40-year career compared with male physicians
Source: National Institutes of Health
“Authority
Congratulations to Loretta V. Bush, MSHA
Health’s Board of Directors and staff congratulates Loretta V. Bush, our President and CEO, who has been named a Crain’s Notable Leader in Health Care. We applaud her outstanding visionary leadership, persistence, and innovation in ensuring our organization’s focus is steadfast on improving the health and wellness of our communities.
Goodbye
Say farewell to the Beaumont ACO name, and hello to our new name, Arvon Clinical Integration Network (CIN).
For over a decade our performance in Michigan and across the country has been unmatched. So, why the change?
Because, whether its improving the quality and cost for more than 360,000 patient lives or generating tens of millions in value-based rewards for our physician network every year, Arvon CIN is so much more than a ACO.
We’ve changed our name because we’re elevating physician-led partnerships to new heights, just like Michigan’s highest peak— Mount Arvon.
And as we climb, we remain true to our roots: “Arvon” also means “people’s friend,” a commitment we carry forward to our physicians, patients, and partners.
And while our name may be new, our founding principles of trust, transparency and physician leadership at every level will remain unchanged.
Visit us at Arvon-CIN.org/hello to learn more.
Sonda Rossman
Vice President, Clinical Operations for Michigan Institute for Neurological Disorders
Scope of Work: Sonda Rossman leads operations at the Michigan Institute for Neurological Disorders, a private neurology group with over 200 employees. She played a critical role in creating one of the country’s largest neurology-focused infusion clinics.
Biggest professional win: Rossman, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in her 20s, advocates for patient access to affordable care. She has testi ed before an Food and Drug Administration advisory panel and both houses of the Michigan Legislature to ensure passage of bills to make critical treatments accessible and affordable.
Other contributions: Rossman has served on committees for the Michigan Chapter of the National MS Society.
Scope of Work: Kelli Sadler is responsible for aligning nursing operations, best practices and policies to provide consistent levels of care to patients across Corewell Health – Southeast Michigan’s eight hospitals.
Biggest professional win: Sadler collaborated with departments throughout the health system to lead efforts that increased ef ciency and standardized processes. She identi ed common roadblocks that affect hospitals across the region and enabled the health system to implement a single solution.
Other contributions: Sadler is a member of the American Organization of Nurse Leaders, Michigan Organization of Nurse Leaders and a member of the Midwest Chapter of the American College of Healthcare Executives DEI committee.
Jawad Shah, M.D.
Founder and CEO, Insight Health System
Scope of Work: Under Dr. Jawad Shah’s direction, Insight Health System transforms distressed hospitals in underserved neighborhoods into nancially stable organizations. He has grown the health system from a team of four to a team of more than 4,000. The company generates more than $220 million in annual revenue and serves nearly 300,000 patients annually.
Biggest professional win: In 2021, Insight acquired Chicago’s 414-bed Mercy Hospital, which was nearing foreclosure. His team re-established its emergency department and expanded service into 60 other areas.
Other contributions: Shah is also a neurosurgeon, a faculty member at Michigan State University’s Medical School and co-director of the Center for Cognition and Neuroethics at the University of Michigan.
OAKLAND COMMUNITY HEALTH NETWORK
Luanne Thomas Ewald
COO, C.S.
Mott Children’s Hospital and Von Voigtlander Women’s Hospital
Scope of Work: Luanne Thomas Ewald is responsible for strategy, service, quality and safety, operations and nances for the University of Michigan’s C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital and Von Voigtlander Women’s Hospital, which together have annual net revenue of $750 million and 3,000 employees, staff and faculty.
Biggest professional win: To meet increasing demand for the hospitals’ services, Thomas Ewald and her team formed a joint venture with Trinity Health Oakland to bring pediatric services to Oakland County and partnered with Traverse City’s Munson Healthcare to provide maternal fetal care there.
Other contributions: She serves dozens of organizations, including as chair of the Michigan Health & Hospital Association’s Council on Children’s Health.
30.6% of Black, Latinx and Asian Americans/ Paci c Islanders who are medical and health services managers
10 million number of health care practitioners and related technical employees
Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
OCHN ensures people are aware of and have access to quality behavioral health services. These valuable supports improve health, quality of life, and promotes full community participation for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities, mental health challenges, and / or substance use disorders.
Better access means better care. That’s why we’re making it easier to get the care you need, when you need it. More locations, more specialists, exclusive cancer treatments and the latest clinical trials, means better access to the breakthroughs of tomorrow, today. All tailored to give you your best chance. Because at Karmanos Cancer Institute, your care is our commitment.
Find care at karmanos.org
Detroit’s once-tallest building is up for sale
By Kirk Pinho
What was once Detroit’s tallest building is up for sale. e Ford Building, located at 615 Griswold St. at West Congress Street, does not have a disclosed asking price. It’s been on the market about a month, with the South eld o ce of Dallas-based commercial real estate giant CBRE Inc. handling the listing and marketing.
It has changed hands a few times in the last few years, most recently selling to real estate investor and restaurateur Zaid Elia and developer Matthew Shiman, both based in Birmingham, for $16.35 million in the summer 2017. ey could not be reached for comment Oct. 11. at sale was less than six months after Detroit-based e Sterling Group bought it from the Paglia family for $12 million in February 2017. at sale was contentious, with the parties arguing in court for over a year and, at one point, workers hired by Paglia removing building signage while attorneys met to discuss the case before the sale was nalized.
Today, the 19-story building is home to a potpourri of small pro-
fessional o ces, the largest of which is less than 10,000 square feet, according to CoStar Group Inc., a Washington, D.C.-based real estate information service. Many tenants are law rms. In all, it clocks in at about 241,800 square feet and is 64.6% leased, according to CoStar. e average rent is $24 per square foot, per year.
e building opened in 1908, according to Historic Detroit, a website that tracks Detroit real estate and architectural history. At the time it was built, it was the tallest in the city; and was reportedly declared as the “ rst real skyscraper” by the Detroit Free Press. e Ford Building has no connection to the family that started Dearborn-based Ford Motor Co., but instead takes its name from the Edward Ford Plate Glass Co., according to Historic Detroit. It was designed by architect Daniel H. Burnham, who also designed the famed Flatiron Building in New York City.
For nearly seven decades, it had been home to the downtown location of the storied Sanders ice cream and chocolate shop, which shuttered for good in the early 1990s, according to Historic Detroit.
New York-based jeweler to open its rst store in Michigan
By Jay Davis
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A New York-based ne jewelry brand is planting its ag in metro Detroit.
Monica Rich Kosann opened its rst standalone store outside New York City on Oct. 15 at Somerset Collection in Troy. It has three boutiques in New York City and its products are available at numerous other jewelers around the country.
e 600-square-foot store is on the second level of Somerset Collection South, between clothing retailer Vince and Canadian sportswear brand Moose Knuckles.
Kosann, the namesake founder, designer and chief creative o cer of the jeweler, is excited about the expansion.
“Like our other shops, we will be delivering a high touch, personalized experience to clients at the Somerset Collection,” Kosann said in a news release. “ is will include our exclusive Locket Bar technology, where clients can share photographs from their phones with our store team, and have them added to the Locket they choose from us in minutes.”
Why metro Detroit for its rst store outside New York City?
“We are excited to be part of the Somerset Collection for our rst store in the Midwest,” CEO Rod Kossan, Kossan’s husband, said in a statement to Crain’s. “It is one
of the country’s leading luxury properties. We nd the support of the Forbes Company teams to be exceptional in helping us to create a successful retail and brand experience for our clients.” Founded in 2003, the family-owned business o ers lockets, rings, necklaces, bracelets and earrings. e Somerset store will feature expanded versions of the Kosann collections. e company commissioned painter Danielle Kosann — Kosann’s daughter — to create a custom art piece for the boutique that celebrates Detroit and Michigan.
e jewelry business can be a lucrative one.
e luxury jewelry market is projected to hit $84.6 billion this year, up from $66.8 billion in 2019, according to online data gathering rm Statista. Monica Rich Kosann has annual revenues of around $5 million.
Somerset Collection General Manager Kate Millea said she’s happy to add the jewelry store to the mall’s roster.
“We are thrilled that Monica Rich Kosann has chosen Somerset Collection to place its third brick-and-mortar location nationally,” Millea said in the release. “We are looking forward to welcoming Monica Rich Kosann to the Michigan market and offering our guests the opportunity to experience this exceptional brand.”
Car insurers challenge another aspect of no-fault reform
By David Eggert
LANSING — Michigan insurers have sued the state after a ruling on 2019 changes to auto insurance, saying it means other parts of the law also cannot be retroactively applied to medical payments for people injured in crashes.
The lawsuit was filed on Sept. 20 in the Court of Claims. It seeks a declaratory judgment and injunction to prevent the Michigan Department of Insurance and Financial Services from punishing insurance companies that reimburse hospitals and other providers at higher levels for the treatment and rehabilitation of patients who were hurt before the law took effect on June 11, 2019.
The state Supreme Court in July 2023 invalidated retroactive application of a 47.5% cut to non-Medicare-covered care and a restriction of family-provided attendant care to 56 hours a week.
But there is a dispute over other provisions of the law that the court did not weigh in on — namely a fee schedule for Medicare-covered treatment, occupational therapy and rehabilitative training provided by hospitals, doctors and clinics.
The insurance department says the lower reimbursements that began in 2021, 190% or 230% of
what Medicare pays, remain intact for accidents prior to June 11, 2019.
Thirteen insurers licensed to write auto insurance in the state say complying with that position subjects them to “irreparable harm” either way, forcing them to pay fines and put their licenses at risk if they refuse or to deny benefits to many claimants that would in turn sue the companies.
In January, the state issued a bulletin stating that the Supreme Court decision, Andary vs. USAA Casualty Insurance Co., only addressed two subsections of the law and the remainder of the fee schedule was unaffected. In February, it threatened to sanction insurers, whose lawyers then pointed the state to various post-Andary trial and appeals court rulings they said support their stance, ac-
cording to the complaint.
The high court decision’s holdings, the companies said, “clearly establish that the policies and statutes in effect at the time of a person’s injury are what control their entitlement to (personal injury protection) benefits under MCL 500.3157.”
In a statement Oct. 11, department spokesperson Chelsea Lewis said: “While DIFS cannot com-
ment on pending litigation, our role is to enforce the law set forth by the Legislature and the courts. Additionally, our bulletins are reflective of laws and binding court decisions. We continue to be committed to ensuring that Michiganders benefit from the cost savings under Michigan’s new auto insurance law while ensuring continuity of care for those injured in auto accidents.”
Court of Claims Judge Christopher Yates is handling the case.
The 2019 law was aimed at reducing high insurance premiums. in part by cutting insurers’ reimbursements to providers that treat accident survivors.
The Supreme Court reinstated higher payments for long-term residential and in-home continuous services, rehabilitation and other care. But they have continued to apply for claims from accidents that occurred after the law went into effect.
A few months after the ruling, the Democratic-led Senate passed bills that would raise payments in those cases and in future crashes. They would not touch other facets of the law, such as letting drivers pick among levels of personal injury protection instead of being forced to buy unlimited coverage.
The legislation is stalled in the Democratic-controlled House.
Huntington Place looks to turn profit for first time since 2020
By Kurt Nagl
Huntington Place is on a hot streak when it comes to landing splashy industry events, and operators of the downtown Detroit convention center believe that could lead to profitability for the first time post-pandemic.
This month, more than 19,000 people attended the Battery Show, which has grown to be a staple for global automotive and tech suppliers — so much so that it outgrew its original Suburban Collection Showplace home in Novi this year, according to event organizer Informa.
The move means an estimated $1 million in profit for Huntington Place, which has operated in the red since the pandemic and is expecting a $7 million loss for fiscal year 2024, which ended Sept. 30, said Claude Molinari, chairman of the board for the Detroit Regional Convention Center Authority, the entity that controls the public convention center.
Perhaps more importantly, it was expected to have brought record revenue for hotels in Southeast Michigan, to the tune of $30 million for the week, said Molinari, who also serves as president and CEO of Visit Detroit. The four-day corporate event was likely to be even more meaningful for area hotels than the NFL Draft, Molinari said.
“For the largest battery show in North America produced by the largest show management company in the world deciding that Detroit is the best place to hold it, I think that’s a great validation of our destination and our convention center,” Molinari told Crain’s in an interview. It’s not just the Battery Show.
Huntington Place will play host to the Detroit Auto Show in January, in addition to a host of new and returning events such as Rapid + TCT scheduled for April and Automate, set for mid-May. MOVE America, another prominent mobility conference, announced this month it will make its Detroit debut at the exhibi-
tion hall in September.
The slew of seven-figure profit events beginning with the auto show, which typically brings in $3 million to $5 million profit, has the convention center eyeing an operating surplus after a dismal past few years for the events business.
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and the facility has been treading water,” Molinari said. “I’m hoping for a more sustainable future for the convention center. That’s what we’re working on.”
A proof point is the construction site next door to the convention center on the former Joe Louis Arena site, where a JW Marriott hotel is being erected, Molinari said. Not only will that help drive revenue directly for the convention center, it will entice more big events to come to town.
Convention center operators have met with other developers about a possible second hotel on the site, which has the space to accommodate, Molinari said. He declined to offer specifics.
While sustainability is a top priority, the convention center’s purpose is not to turn big profits itself, but to serve as an economic engine for hotels, restaurants and other local businesses, Molinari said.
“Ninety percent of convention centers around the U.S. lose money,” he said. “They run at a deficit, but they drive tourism and fill up hotels.”
Now in its 14th year, the Battery Show has become a must-attend for the automotive industry, which is undergoing a seismic albeit uncertain transformation to electric vehicles.
The event features more than 1,250 exhibitors across the main 723,000-square-foot showroom floor, Shamara Ray, group event director for the show, told Crain’s. Informa rented the entire center, including the myriad ballroom and meetings rooms, for the event.
“We outgrew the space (in Novi),” she said. “We were filling every corner that you could possible imagine.”
Rick Davis, head of auto sales
for laser machine tool supplier Trumpf, said the Battery Show is the most important on his schedule of roughly half a dozen events each year. The company, which employs about 100 at its regional base in Plymouth, shelled out around $250,000 for exhibitor space on the floor.
“This battery space is really broad and all over the country in all kinds of different areas,” Davis said. “Here, from one vantage point, you can meet a lot of different people in the space. It helps us to connect with people.”
The increased attendance is a testament to the success of the show, nurtured by Suburban Collection Showplace, Ray said. The privately-owned convention center was hit hard by the loss of one of its largest events.
Operators of that venue are “working vigorously to fill the gap with additional events,” Blair Bowman Sr., owner of Suburban Collection Showplace, told Crain’s in an email.
“The Battery Show was an incredibly important event, not only for our operations, but for the entire surrounding hospitality and business environment,” Bowman said.
The Novi showplace is unique in that it operates without subsidies while driving economic benefits to local businesses, she said. Operators are in talks at the state and local levels about ways to support the center.
“We at the Suburban Collection Showplace strongly support regional success and are truly pleased that the Battery Show producers chose to stay within the Detroit Metropolitan region,” Bowman said. “We are proud that the battery show began at our facility and grew to the scale that it has.”
The Battery Show in downtown Detroit is expected to attract 19,000 to Huntington Place this month. | MARISA MARCINKOWSKI/AUTOMOTIVE NEWS
Nonprofit to pour $2M into homeless services expansion
By Sherri Welch
Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries is putting in place a plan to work outside the current federally required system for homeless shelter referrals and plugging in millions of dollars in outside funding to do it.
The goal is to help those in need right away instead of having them wait weeks and even months for emergency shelter, as they do under the current referral system that is operating with a shortage of beds, said Chad Audi, the nonprofit’s president and CEO.
Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries plans by Nov. 1 to launch a 24hour hotline for people experiencing homelessness and add 100 beds, triage services to get people referred to whatever services they need and two vans to transport those in need to shelter around the clock. It will operate all of those things for a projected $2 million annually, Audi said, outside of the existing Coordinated Assessment Model that takes shelter requests, prioritizes them based on the degree of need and makes referrals to area shelters with open beds.
“Every day I receive many emails from people I never heard of. They go to our (site) and send heartbreaking stories,” Audi said.
DRMM’s receptionist shares the phone number for the CAM hotline, which is required by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development as a condition of receiving funding for homeless shelters and services. The people calling and emailing DRMM say they have called the hotline but get no answer or a runaround, Audi said.
“Some of it is true; some of it is not … But the truth is people out there are suffering and we need a solution. That’s the bottom line. If they have to be waiting, they can wait with us.”
The CAM call center operates 8 a.m.-6 p.m. Monday-Friday along with three in-person sites operated by Noah at Central, Cass Community Social Services and the John D. Dingell Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Detroit during weekday staggered hours. The CAM is operated by Wayne Metropolitan Community Action Agency as a subcontractee to the lead agency for the Detroit referral system, the Homeless Action Network of Detroit.
At all locations and call centers, Wayne Metro does an initial assessment, working with clients to find their best temporary or permanent housing option and assisting with things like bus tickets and Lyft rides to get to and from intake sites, shelters and friends’ and families’ homes, Wayne Metro CEO Louis Piszker said.
Wayne Metro strives to provide a robust approach to coordinated shelter entry and client care is of the utmost importance, Piszker said. As such, it focuses on keeping wait times low — less than seven and a half minutes in September, he said. Audi said he’s asked the city why there isn’t a 24/7 CAM call center and has been told the contract doesn’t have enough money to
fund that. Most cities have 24-hour call centers for people experiencing homelessness and do street outreach as part of their CAM system, Audi said. DRMM, Cass Social Services and NSO do outreach in Detroit, but they are not linked to CAM directly.
Extending the hours for the CAM hotline alone won’t solve everything because the number of homeless in Detroit, Highland Park and Hamtramck is outpacing available beds, Homeless Action Network’s Executive Director Tasha Gray said.
The trend really took hold in 2022, with shelters shifting beds that served men to homeless women and families, the loss of overflow shelters that would provide cots or mats to additional people experiencing homelessness and a growing number of people seeking help after housing assistance issued during the COVID-19 pandemic expired, she said. All of that has led to longer wait times for a shelter placement.
The shortage of beds led HAND, in collaboration with Wayne Metro, the city and the Detroit Continuum of Care, to launch a shelter prioriti-
zation approach early this year. The model prioritizes shelter resources for those who are most vulnerable, Gray said. That could be someone who is fleeing domestic violence or sleeping outside or in a car vs. at a hotel or couch surfing at relatives’ houses.
CAM call center operators ask questions of callers to see if there are other options available to them, even providing bus tickets and other assistance to help them get to a family member’s house instead sending them to a shelter.
“In an ideal situation, we would have a line that operates 24/7, 365 and also have resources to be able to make referrals via that line,” Gray said.
HAND is working with the city of Detroit and the Michigan State Housing Development Authority, which are the funders of shelter beds in Detroit and have been working to bring more online, she said. “But we all see limitations in the funding available to be do that,” Gray said.
HAND’s current contract to fund CAM is $1.3 million for the year beginning Sept. 1, Gray said. That’s up from $959,000 last year.
By the numbers
Currently, there are 1,210 emergency shelter beds in Detroit, Highland Park and Hamtramck, Gray said. That compares to 1,070 in 2023 and 1,279 the year before.
The point-in-time count that takes place each January, per HUD, counts the number of people touching the homeless system, from the streets to the shelters to supportive housing. This year, the count found 1,725 homeless people in Detroit, Highland Park and Hamtramck, up from 1,280 last year, Gray said.
The annual count based on homeless clients entered into the area’s Homeless Information System found 6,221 people experiencing homelessness for the year in 2022. HAND has not yet released the annual count for 2023, but early indications are that it trended down.
Audi said he approached the city about funding support to establish the on-demand shelter beds and triage at Detroit Rescue Mission, with a 24-hour call center and transportation to the shelter and intake when police, fire and EMS officials need to drop someone experiencing homelessness off at a shelter.
The city’s Housing and Revitalization Department was very receptive to the idea, he said, and issued an RFP in early August for a contract of up to $1.14 million to operate a drop-in and/or triage center with overflow capacity to get people off the street while they are waiting for more resources to become available.
The center would help reduce the number of people sleeping outside, an action area the city identified in its five-year “Strategic System Improvement Plan for Detroit’s Homelessness Response System” plan it released in August.
Among other things, the 119page plan identified the need for
reduced referral times to housing through CAM and for another 275 emergency shelter beds to meet need on the front end and 870 permanent housing units for people moving out of the shelters.
The city did not comment directly on DRMM’s plan or the winning bidder(s) for the RFP in advance of Detroit City Council approving the contract.
“At the City of Detroit, we are steadfast in our commitment to transforming our approach to homelessness. This RFP reflects our dedication to providing not just immediate shelter, but a pathway toward stability and resilience,” Julie Schneider, the city’s director of housing and revitalization, said in an emailed statement. “By partnering with qualified organizations, we aim to ensure that homelessness is not just addressed, but actively prevented, allowing every Detroit resident the opportunity for a brighter future.”
DRMM, which is operating on a $22 million budget with about $2.6 million in reserves, already has 40 beds across its eight shelters in Detroit, Highland Park and Port Huron that aren’t in the CAM inventory system so it can hold to its mission of not turning anyone away, Audi said.
CAM won’t be able to refer people to the beds DRMM is adding, either, because they won’t be added to CAM’s inventory system. But DRMM is hopeful CAM officials will come to help make assessments for the people taking the incremental beds added at its two shelters, he said.
“We’re open to partnership, but we can’t continue to have a non-working system and have people being on the street in their cars and under the bridges,” Audi said. “We can’t tolerate that anymore. Even if we have to take it as DRM itself, we’re moving forward.”
Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries plans to launch a 24-hour hotline for people experiencing homelessness and add 100 beds to its existing shelters. | GETTY IMAGES/ISTOCKPHOTO
Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries operates eight shelters in Detroit, Highland Park and Port Huron. | COSTAR GROUP INC.
LAKE ERIE HEALTH
WATER
RESCUE
An algal bloom crisis in Toledo pushed Michigan and Ohio officials, scientists and activists into action. Ten years later, progress hasn’t been easy. | Dan Shingler
It’s not easy being green.
That’s surely the case for our Lake Erie, where green (or blue) clouds blooming in the summer are telltale signs of algae that can and have threatened the lake’s health generally, and with it the 12 million or so people in the U.S. and Canada who rely on the lake for their water. That includes 17 cities with populations of more than 50,000, including Cleveland and Toledo, and smaller cities in Southeast Michigan like Monroe — but not Detroit, which is upstream and pulls water from the Detroit River or Lake St. Clair, which has algae issues similar to Lake Erie.
Ten years ago, about half a million of those people lost their water, when algae-produced toxins forced Toledo to tell residents it was not safe to drink for nearly three days. Suddenly
an entire city and its service area had no tap water to bathe, cook or run businesses.
That was a shock. It shocked the city of Toledo, the region, the state and much of the nation. It woke people up to the vulnerabilities of the lake and our dependence on it to meet our basic needs.
Environmentalists and others hoped the Toledo algae water crisis would be a shock that ignited action, like the 1969 fire on the Cuyahoga River. That now-legendary incident in Cleveland prompted creation of the federal Environmental Protection Agency.
But, while we had the will to keep rivers from catching fire again back then, it remains to be seen if we have the will to keep a lake from becoming poisonous.
So far, say those studying Erie, we haven’t
flexed enough muscle to live up to commitments made in the wake of the 2014 Toledo water crisis.
A year after Toledo’s infamous “do not drink order” went out, on June 15, 2015, the governors of Ohio and Michigan, along with the premier of Ontario, agreed to help the lake by cutting the phosphorous sent to it 40% by 2025.
Today, none of them is anywhere close to meeting that commitment.
“I haven’t seen any concrete numbers, but I have heard we’re about a quarter of the way there,” said Emily Kelly, agriculture and water coordinator for the Ohio Environmental Council, who is based in Port Clinton on the lake. Michigan is not meeting those goals, either; nor is Canada, say those who monitor the efforts to cut phosphorous.
An algal bloom is seen in Lake Erie from NASA’s Aqua satellite in 2011. | NOAA
COMMENTARY | LAKE ERIE HEALTH
Farms and fertilizer
A chief reason achieving the cut is so difficult, they say, is that the phosphorous is coming from what are known as non-point sources. In other words, there’s not just a few factories and water treatment plants along any given stretch of coastline that is the problem — those have almost all been addressed, many decades ago after the U.S. EPA was formed.
Today’s phosphorous comes from the land itself and enters the lake via virtually every stream and river that feeds it, especially after a heavy rainfall washes more phosphorous off the land and into those waterways.
And that’s because phosphorous is the chief ingredient in fertilizer. So, the burden has largely fallen on farmers and the agricultural industry to change practices.
Many farmers have made efforts to better manage their fertilizer applications and participate in programs like the H2Ohio program or Michigan’s Lake Erie Domestic Action Plan.
But it hasn’t moved the needle enough for states to come close to meeting their goals.
“Our wastewater treatment plants have largely hit the 40% reduction they’ve promised; (agriculture) has not,” said Tim Boring,
director of the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development.
Not that his state hasn’t been trying. Boring said he and his department work hard to help farmers better monitor their fields and measure the phosphorous that’s on the ground before applying more.
“This is what responsible farm management looks like, and we need to be doing more of it. That’s soil testing, following fertilizer rec-
ommendations, things like this,” Boring said.
But at the same time, farming and farms have been changing. Farms have become bigger to remain economically feasible. Many farmers have also engineered their fields with underground tiling that’s meant to help remove water. Those tiles enable farmers to access fields that might otherwise be too wet to farm during particularly rainy springs, but they also enable phosphorous to migrate from the
field to the nearest stream or river and eventually the lake quicker than before.
“You quickly get into the dynamics of how we engineer farming today,” Boring said, “which a lot of times gets in the way.”
Ohio’s been working hard, too — and it has to, because of its outsized influence on what goes from the Maumee River into Lake Erie’s Western Basin. That’s the lake’s hot spot for fishing and recreation, and also where the shallow water
enables algae to produce large blooms and just-as-large problems.
“We’ve seen great engagement from the agricultural community. We’ve seen more than 2.2 million acres signed up and over 3,000 producers participate,” Ohio Agriculture Director Brian Baldridge said of the H2Ohio program. “In the Maumee watershed we’re seeing almost 50% of the acres” participate.
Most of the phosphorous washing off farmland comes in the form of commercial fertilizer, but these days a lot of it comes from manure, too, specifically pig manure. Many farmers have turned to raising pigs, often in addition to their crops, to make their farms profitable. The manure is used as fertilizer and spread on fields.
Since operations with more than 2,500 hogs require permits and are regulated by the state, a lot of farmers raise fewer than that at operations termed “minus-ones” because they can have as many as 2,499 hogs at once, but never 2,500.
The pig manure contains more nutrients than regular fertilizer, and is often far cheaper. “We’re putting about 25% on in the form of manure and the rest is commercial fertilizer,” Baldridge said.
Thomas Bridgeman is a professor of ecology at the University of Toledo and director of the Lake Erie Center. | DAN SHINGLer
Beyond farmland
There’s controversy around whether such livestock operations, often dubbed Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations, or CAFOs, are having an outsized influence on phosphorous in the lake.
Some environmentalists point to them as chief culprits in the algae problem. Manure is cheap or even free, they say, so farmers have little to no incentive to conserve it.
But Baldridge said the data he’s seen indicates otherwise.
“We track phosphorous sales. … We have seen a decrease in phosphorous purchases, so we know there is less phosphorous being purchased,” Baldridge said. “And we still think manure is only 25% of it.”
Some prominent lake scientists say they tend to agree with that, including Thomas Bridgeman, a professor of ecology at the University of Toledo and director of the Lake Erie Center. He’s as steeped in the water of Lake Erie as nearly anyone, say many who watch the lake closely.
“Some of the environmental groups want to blame everything on the animal operations. … I’m skeptical of that,” Bridgeman said. “Yes, CAFOs came in, but they were still in low numbers in the late 1990s and early 2000s. I don’t think there were enough CAFOs to have caused what we saw back then.”
But if it’s not from pig manure, where is all of this phosphorous still coming from if we’re reducing usage?
A big part of the problem is the complexity of the many systems at work. Farm fields, wetlands, streams, rivers and lakes are not test tubes and pipettes in laboratories. Water and the phosphorous in it flows through those natural features at unpredictable rates that are determined by the makeup of the soil, how many plants are growing in the soil, the topography, artificial and natural barriers, whether there are wetlands and how good those wetlands are, and, last but not least, precipitation.
When a molecule of phosphorous enters Lake Erie at the mouth of a river in the summer, it was probably applied to a field that spring, experts say — but it also could have been applied the previous year, or many previous years earlier.
A really heavy rain, for example, might cause ponding or flooding in areas that haven’t been that wet in years. When that happens, phosphorous that’s been in that dirt for a long time can be dissolved, picked up and added to the lake and its problems.
But there are other reasons to believe the biggest contributor to an August algal bloom was fertilizer applied that spring, said Tom Zimnicki, agriculture and restoration policy director at the nonprofit Alliance for the Great Lakes in Chicago, which has field offices in Michigan and Ohio.
“You’re talking about legacy
phosphorous. Even if we stop adding phosphorous to this farm, so much is going to keep running off. That’s probably true to a certain extent. There is legacy phosphorous,” Zimnicki said “But there was a year, 2018 to ’19, when the spring was so wet that farmers couldn’t get out to plant and fertilize … and that had an immediate effect on the lake that same year.”
The river that runs through it
When it comes to reducing phosphorous, Baldridge and Ohio have some extra responsibility heaped on them due to geography. Not only does Ohio have a lot of coastline filled with farms on Lake Erie, but it also farms near the lake’s Western Basin, which is where most of the algae problems are caused and take effect.
While the lake is fed in the west by the Maumee and Detroit rivers, it’s the Maumee that causes algae blooms, said UT’s Bridgeman.
“The water coming in from the Maumee is only about 3% (of the lake’s water) but it contains about 50% of the nutrients,” Bridgeman said. “The Maumee River has 10 to 20 times the concentration of nutrients as what the Detroit River has. If we could shut off the Maumee River, Lake Erie would not have a bloom. It would be clear, like (Lake) Huron is.”
That’s because, while the Detroit River is mostly carrying cleaner water from deeper upstream lakes, which typically don’t have algae or phosphorous issues, the Maumee is carrying water it gathered from hundreds of thousands of acres of Ohio farmland. Farmland in Michigan — mainly in Hillsdale and Lenawee counties — and in Indiana also is part of the Maumee watershed.
Ironically, that same land was what once protected Lake Erie and kept its water clean. Much of it used to be the Great Black Swamp, which was about 1,500 square miles of wetlands. Before it was drained and turned into farmland in the late 1800s, the swamp extended from Toledo to nearly Fort Wayne, Indiana, and made up the lake’s shoreline from Toledo to Catawba Island.
In other words, today our lake is essentially functioning with its kidneys removed, say environmentalists and lake scientists.
No ‘silver bullet’
Now, Ohio is trying to replace those kidneys, at least in part, by developing new wetlands. H2Ohio has so far funded the creation of more than 180 new wetlands along the lake and drainage areas, the program reports.
But those don’t have near the size or scale that the Black Swamp had and will help but will not solve the problem, some say.
“It’s a tool. The problem is everyone thinks there’s a silver bullet for this problem in the lake, but there’s not,” said Chris Winslow, a fish biologist and director of the Ohio Sea Grant program at Ohio State University’s Stone Lab. “Some wetlands do a good job of absorbing nutrients, some do not.”
But they do help, he said, and Ohio officials say they work hard to determine how to best design and build wetlands so they will slow the water and hold it long enough for plants in the wetlands to take up the phosphorous.
The costs keep rising, though.
Joy Mulinex, executive director of the Ohio Lake Erie Commission, which includes the directors of six state agencies, including Baldridge, said Ohio budgeted $270 million for H2Ohio in its 2023 biennial budget that expires next year. Previously, it put $172 million in the 2019 budget, and another $168 million in 2021, she said.
Mulinex’s commission is one of the partners in the state’s H2Ohio program as well.
Though Ohio is not on track to reduce its phosphorous as promised, Mulinex said improvements have been made and the state at least has not had any repeats of what Toledo went through.
“Lake Erie is a multi-use resource for the state. It provides drinking water for 2.8 million Ohioans. Since 2014 we have not had any additional problems providing drinking water for residents in Ohio,” she said, “so that’s certainly been a good step forward.”
More water treatment
But one reason that Toledo and other cities have been able to avoid a repeat of 2014 has little to do with the quality of the lake water they take in, and a lot to do with how such cities treat their water.
After 2014, Toledo spent more than $500 million upgrading water treatment facilities, adding ozone and carbon treatments and other methods to kill algae and remove toxins.
Buoys loaded with sensors alert operators of algae before it gets to the city’s water intake three miles offshore, so operators know what’s in the water and how to treat it.
Toledo commissioner of plant operations Andrew McClure said the city should be able to handle such an outbreak if it occurs again.
“We probably already have,” he said, noting that there have been big blooms since 2014 that the city handled with relative ease.
Toledo was already preparing for a top-to-bottom upgrade of the plant in 2014, said McClure and the plant’s chief operating officer, Brian Loudenslager. So, it just needed more improvements and added processes than originally thought.
“There was already a plan to update just about every inch of the infrastructure we had here prior to the do-not-drink advisory of 2014,” Loudenslager said.
It did increase the costs, though. McClure said the city had been planning to spend $400 million for which it secured bond funding.
Fortunately, the state provided a low-interest loan to cover the extra $100 million, he said.
To be fair, 2014 was a rare confluence of many events that ended up causing Toledo’s problems. Heavy rainfall led to a large bloom of blue algae, which, unlike green algae, creates toxins in the form of cyanobacteria. (Green algae can still cause problems, like dead zones in the lake, however.)
Wind blew that algae past Toledo toward Cleveland, then the winds reversed and pushed it back to Toledo in higher concentrations. It was also the dreaded blue algae that produced the toxins, so many suspect the runoff that year
also contained a lot of nitrogen, upon which such algae thrives.
But, until the lake is cleaned up further, rare events could happen again — possibly more easily as climate change warms the lake. Toledo needed to be ready long before that happened, and was, McClure said.
Since then, the city has become an adviser to others, with cities such as Akron and Erie, Pennsylvania, as well as states such as Oregon and Iowa, coming to Toledo to learn about methods to treat water impacted by algae and toxins. Other plants are gearing up to handle similar issues, on the lake and elsewhere.
Hope, progress and reality
But, like everyone else, what McClure and Loudenslager really hope to see is a cleaner Lake Erie. Just like farmers don’t want to use more fertilizer than they have to for good yields, water plants like Toledo’s would prefer to use fewer chemicals and processes to treat water.
Will it ever happen? There’s not a lot of consensus, even among those who know the lake and its issues the best.
In Toledo, Bridgeman still has heart, and hope, but he’s been disappointed.
“Unfortunately, I’m probably less optimistic than I used to be,” Bridgeman said. “Following the Toledo water crisis of 2014 I thought, ‘Now people are going to pay attention and now something will happen.’ But it’s been 10 years and we haven’t made that much progress. … I think it’s going to take more than H2Ohio. I hate to say this, but it’s probably going to take more regulation on farming to force practices that will result in less nutrient runoff.”
Erika Jensen, executive director of the Great Lakes Commission in Ann Arbor, is a bit more positive.
“I’m hopeful. I continue to see investment in this issue. Folks care a lot about Lake Erie and want to be good stewards of the environment while also supporting our farmers and the role that ag and food production plays in the region,” Jensen said. “There are a lot of smart people working on this issue. We’ve learned a lot, and I think if we continue on the path that we’re on we’ll see more progress.”
But perhaps the Ohio Environmental Council’s Emily Kelly has the best outlook, one shared by nearly everyone involved in the algae issue. To her, it’s not a matter of optimism or pessimism, it’s a matter of doing something or not.
“If we don’t do something now it really will be worse in the future as climate change continues and the lake warms. They’ll just become larger. We’d see larger blooms now if we hadn’t taken measures,” Kelly said. “So, I have a lot of hope. I wouldn’t be in this line of work if I didn’t. Ohio really has made some great strides in addressing harmful algae blooms from point sources, but we have a lot more to do.”
A project in the Maumee River by the city of Toledo and the state of Ohio focuses on rebuilding two islands near the Toledo Zoo that will restore wetlands and, in part, cut down on nutrient loading in the water on its way from rural farmlands to Lake Erie. STACY SOMINSKI
Great Lake’s future depends on more action, collaboration
Ohio succeeds when Lake Erie — its most treasured natural resource — succeeds. But as long as harmful algal blooms threaten our Great Lake, we will lag behind other states in providing our residents with safe drinking water, recreational opportunities and a strong economy.
toxic algae. While Toledoans should take great pride in their Great Lake, many to this day still avoid drinking their tap water.
Approximately 11 million people, including 3 million Ohioans, depend on Lake Erie for the water they consume each day. Lake-related activities contribute over 150,000 jobs to the state, many in tourism. In fact, more than 11 million tourists visit Ohio’s Great Lake annually, contributing over 30% of Ohio’s total tourism-related dollars, valued at $15 billion annually.
But each summer, we continue to brace ourselves for the severe impact of harmful algal blooms on Lake Erie’s Western Basin: Beach closures that drive away families and tourists. Canceled outings for anglers and kayakers. And concern about the quality and safety of Ohioans’ drinking water.
This August marked the 10th anniversary of the Toledo water crisis, when half a million people lost access to clean drinking water for nearly three days due to
The Toledo water crisis was met with bold declarations of action by elected officials and government agency leaders. In 2015, the governors of Ohio and Michigan, along with the premier of Ontario, made commitments to reduce phosphorus inputs to Lake Erie by 40% by 2025. Yet we failed to meet the interim targets set for 2020, and current data suggests that achieving the 2025 goal is unlikely.
In 2019, Gov. Mike DeWine and the Ohio state Legislature established H2Ohio, a comprehensive water quality initiative aimed at tackling long-standing issues of water pollution — including harmful algal blooms. The Ohio Department of Agriculture plays a pivotal role in H2Ohio, leading efforts to reduce phosphorus runoff by incentivizing farmers to adopt proven, science-based best management practices.
To date, 1.8 million acres of land have been enrolled in voluntary nutrient management plans. These plans allow farmers to tailor conservation practices to
Work to improve Lake Erie should also bolster communities
As we continue to witness the harmful effects of phosphorus runoff and algae blooms in Lake Erie, a pressing question emerges: How can we build a sustainable future that prioritizes environmental health and social justice?
The answer begins with the community — those who live alongside the lake, drink from its waters, depend on its health for their livelihoods and strive for a just and lasting peace.
The work of the Junction Coalition exemplifies how grassroots, community-driven efforts can transform the environmental justice landscape. This transformation unites people, fosters dialogue and promotes active community engagement.
By empowering residents with the skills to take on these roles, we ensure that the solutions to environmental challenges come from within the community itself — creating a bottom-up approach to sustainability driven by the people.
maximize both agricultural productivity and environmental stewardship. Additionally, the Ohio Department of Natural Resources has invested over $130 million in creating or enhancing over 150 wetland projects, particularly in the Western Lake Erie Basin, to filter out harmful pollutants before they reach the lake.
We commend DeWine for the success of the H2Ohio program. Yet in order to match the scale of the problem and restore our great Lake Erie this decade, Ohio needs bolder investments, stronger wetland protections and more aggressive nonpoint pollution reduction strategies from our state leaders.
According to our recent report, co-authored with the Alliance for the Great Lakes, getting ahead of the problems will require significant, sustained additional funding along with major increases in conservation practice adoption (both by several orders of magnitude annually) and, in some cases, shifting the types of conservation practices. To do this, we must effectively collaborate with stakeholders across agricultural, environmental and scientific communities to ensure that we meet our goals to preserve Lake Erie for future generations.
Ohio thrives when Lake Erie thrives — and the health of our economy, our environment and Ohioans depends on it.
The Junction Coalition empowers residents to recognize that the best way to predict the future is to create it. When environmental crises arise, the Coalition serves as a unifying force, strengthening relationships between citizens, government and environmental agencies, while giving voice to those most affected by Lake Erie’s contamination.
At the core of the Junction Coalition’s mission is a deep commitment to workforce development, which is essential to building environmental resilience and economic opportunity. By investing in the education and training of residents, we equip them with the skills needed to become active stewards of the environment. The Junction Coalition’s unique approach fosters both community ownership and responsibility while also creating pathways to employment in the expanding green sector.
The Junction Coalition’s work exemplifies the power of this approach. Through fostering community engagement, the Coalition has helped to build trust between residents and public officials, ensuring that decisions about Lake Erie’s future are made with the participation of those most affected. Their efforts have advanced environmental justice and contributed to holistic social and economic justice in the region — one grounded in collaboration, shared responsibility and mutual respect.
The Coalition’s bottom-up approach addresses the environmental crises we face as a unified community. Rather than imposing top-down solutions that often do not reflect the needs or realities of the people, the Junction Coalition demonstrates that true change happens when the community is empowered to lead.
By investing in the education and training of residents, we equip them with the skills needed to become active stewards of the environment.
Jobs in environmental services, water management, public utilities and ecological resilience are critical to maintaining a healthy Lake Erie. These roles provide tangible economic, health and environmental benefits, while also inspiring imagination and hope within the community. As we continue to embrace sustainable practices, these industries will be vital to both the preservation of our natural resources and the creation of a thriving regional economy.
By coming together, sharing knowledge and investing in one another, we can create a future in which both Lake Erie and the people who depend on it thrive. As we look to that future, we must continue to prioritize workforce development and community engagement as central pillars of our efforts. The health of Lake Erie is not just an environmental issue; it is a matter of justice, equity, fair distribution of services and shared responsibility. By equipping residents with the skills and opportunities to become environmental stewards, we can build a sustainable and just future for all.
Through collaboration and a commitment to environmental and social justice, we can transform Lake Erie from a symbol of environmental crisis into an opportunity for growth, empowerment and peace. This is not merely about saving a lake; it is about saving a way of life. The Junction Coalition’s efforts are about ensuring that all people have the opportunity to thrive in a world where both the environment and the community are
nurtured
and protected.
Melanie Houston serves as managing director of water policy and chief of organizational planning for the Ohio Environmental Council.
Alicia Smith is executive director of the Junction Coalition in Toledo.
A fisherman throws a lead for a fishing net back into the water on Lake Erie off the coast of Marblehead. | bLOOMberG
Action to combat HABs will take time, cooperation
As part of the warmest and shallowest Great Lake, the Western Basin of Lake Erie naturally has summer algal blooms. However, these blooms have been greatly exacerbated by nutrient loading from human activities and have become toxic.
is director of Michigan Sea Grant and a professor in the School for Environment and Sustainability at the University of Michigan.
These blooms are not only unsightly but can affect human and pet health because they are dominated by a kind of blue-green algae (cyanobacteria) called Microcystis that make microcystin, which is a liver toxin, and sometimes include other blue-green algae that make neurotoxins that can affect nerves. These harmful algal blooms (HABs) create a surface scum that looks like spilled green paint, shading out organisms that live on the lake bottom and altering the ecology of the lake.
HABs impair water quality of the lake — for example, during the 2014 Toledo water crisis, the city was without water for three days after toxins got into the drinking water supply, causing $68 million in damages, while impacting tourism, recreation, charter fishing and home sales. HABs are estimated to cause about $50 million in economic damages in the U.S. each year.
Fortunately, over the past decade, we have taken action to reduce these inputs that cause harmful algal blooms, and these
It’s
Lefforts are beginning to pay off.
HABs in western Lake Erie are largely driven by phosphorus and nitrogen loading from agricultural runoff, particularly nutrient runoff in the spring. The majority of the nutrient loading comes from fertilizer and the rest from legacy soil phosphorus and manure application. About half of the phosphorus and nitrogen load to the lake comes in through the Maumee River, from its watershed in Ohio, Michigan and Indiana. In 2015, Ohio, Michigan and Ontario signed the Western Lake Erie Basin Collaborative Agreement, in which they agreed to a 40% reduction in the phosphorus load to the lake by 2025.
In Ohio, Gov. Mike DeWine signed a statewide plan, H2Ohio, into law, which supports farmers in implementing nutrient management practices and funds wetland restoration efforts. Farmers receive economic incentives to implement best management practices, including developing voluntary nutrient management plans, two-stage ditches, drainage water management, subsurface phosphorus placement, and other measures.
The Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) funds restoration and creation of wetlands (as the entire watershed used to be a
swamp) to reduce nutrient runoff through a natural filtering process, reduce flood risks, and provide wildlife habitat. ODNR has funded 171 wetlands to date. Likely due to these management practices, spring nutrient loads in the Maumee River appear to be declining. Michigan largely contributes to nutrient pollution in western Lake Erie through wastewater treatment plants in the Detroit area and through agricultural runoff in the River Raisin watershed. Michigan already has achieved significant reductions in wastewater inputs through optimization actions and upgrades.
However, monitoring by the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) and the National Center for Water Quality Research at Heidelberg University (Ohio) shows that critical spring nutrient loading in the River Raisin appears to be increasing, as opposed to the decrease in the Maumee River, highlighting the need to implement best management practices in agriculture in Michigan.
In Michigan, the focus is on monitoring and implementing best management practices to begin to bring down agriculture’s contribution to HABs. Several or-
ganizations, including the Michigan Quality of Life (QOL) Agencies, which include the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (MDARD), EGLE, and the Department of Natural Resources, have partnered to implement Michigan’s Domestic Action Plan and adaptive management efforts in the western Lake Erie watershed. Their goal is to achieve the nutrient reduction goals set by the 2012 Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement.
Current priority efforts include the work of QOL agencies, such as MDARD’s partnership with the Alliance for the Great Lakes and others to increase water quality monitoring and modeling efforts. The goal of the monitoring is to better understand how nutrients flow through these watersheds so that we know where to focus our efforts with projects like regenerative agriculture and best management practices that build soil health and protect water quality.
In addition, EGLE’s nonpoint source program is providing technical and financial assistance for watershed management planning and implementation, and is working in partnership with western basin Conservation Districts to
complete field-scale agriculture inventories that can assist with onfarm decision-making. DNR is focusing on protecting, restoring, and creating wetlands that capture agriculture runoff and provide important ecosystem services, including enhancing wildlife habitat and recreation opportunities in Michigan’s portion of the western Lake Erie watershed.
Taken together, the combined state efforts from Ohio and Michigan are a solid foundation on which to build future efforts to resolve the growing issue of HABs in Lake Erie. Getting increased farmer participation to implement best management practices in priority subwatersheds is now the key to moving forward and continuing to make progress.
A recent study completed by University of Michigan graduate students showed that this progress can be made by focusing on changing culture and personal attitudes combined with making government programs easier to access and better funded. Although it will take time to reduce Lake Erie’s HABs back to small, nuisance blooms, early results from new management practices are showing promising trends.
time to accelerate efforts on algal blooms
ake Erie has a bad reputation, dating back at least as far as Time magazine declaring it “dead” in 1970 and running a photo of a fire on the surface of the Cuyahoga River. While “dead” is not a scientifically accurate term, and the photo was actually from the 1950s, there is no doubt that the region’s industrial, commercial, agricultural and residential booms over the past two centuries left contamination that we are still cleaning up today and polluted the lake with excess nutrients that lead to massive algae blooms.
More than aesthetic concern, some species of algae in the blooms produce toxins that threaten humans, pets and wildlife. Each summer, the Lake Erie bloom makes regional and national headlines that reinforce the image that the lake is losing the battle. Fortunately, the reality is that, while signifi-
Casey M. Godwin works at the University of Michigan and the Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research.
Mike Shriberg is with the University of Michigan, the Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research and also Michigan Sea Grant.
cant problems remain, we have begun to turn the tide toward more effective management of the issue. Recurrent blooms in western Lake Erie motivated management
strategy and investment at binational, national, state and local levels. Those investments have enabled monitoring and safeguarding against threats posed by the blooms, including by NOAA, the Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research (CIGLR) and the University of Michigan. Monitoring systems — from “smart buoys” to satellites — provide up-to-date, actionable information directly to water intakes and others reliant upon the lake. We are seeing measured progress toward decreased nutrient inputs to the bloom-prone areas, but all indications are that we are unlikely to achieve the goals of decreasing phosphorus pollution by 40% by 2025, as originally planned.
Slow change in the watershed is compounded by interannual variability in weather and precipitation that alters how the lake responds to nutrients. Focusing narratives on
year-to-year patterns — this was a bad year or a good year — confuses management effectiveness with everything else we know, and don’t know, affects the bloom.
While monitoring has improved greatly since the 2014 crisis in Toledo, and new programs are in place in Ohio, Michigan and Ontario to reduce the nutrients from agriculture that are the primary cause of the severity of the annual blooms, much of the changes being sought are behavioral, and thus take time to implement. For example, research on farmer behavior has shown that decreasing nutrient runoff requires not only increased upfront costs for equipment and management practice changes, but also changes in culture and action that only come over time and from peer-to-peer knowledge transfer.
Change on nutrients and blooms has proven slow to develop, but
there is progress and now is the time to accelerate our actions, not to take our eyes off the road ahead. We must take a longer view by planning for and modeling the conditions coming decades from now. Tools and quantitative predictions guiding management to present were based on recent historical patterns of land use, climate, and precipitation, but this leaves us critically underprepared as climate change rapidly transforms regional demographics, agricultural practices, and the lake itself. Future nutrients will not flow into Lake Erie of the past, so a long-view approach requires developing models of a lake and landscape that function differently from what we have experienced. That may seem too daunting a task given the multitude of problems facing the lake, but it is essential if we are to achieve the long-term restoration outcomes the region demands.
Silvia Newell
A wetland restoration site in Delaware County, Ohio, is part of Gov. Mike DeWine’s H2Ohio initiative. | H2OHIO
GM dispute, fallen demand lead wheel supplier to bankruptcy
By Kurt Nagl
A Livonia-based supplier of wheels for semitrucks and passenger cars has led for bankruptcy with $486 million of debt as it seeks to exit an unpro table General Motors contract and recover from depressed demand.
Accuride Corp., along with various subsidiaries in the U.S. and Canada, petitioned for voluntary Ch. 11 bankruptcy protection this month in the District of Delaware as well as restructuring in Canada, aiming to shed debt and money-losing business.
e company, whose board Chairman Jason Luo has plenty of bankruptcy experience, wants out of its contract to supply wheels for GM’s BrightDrop electric vans in Ontario.
e automaker is unwilling to re-negotiate terms, said Grant Hatton, director of marketing for Accuride. About 75% of its business at the Ontario plant is with GM.
“So, with the cost of materials and labor rising due to COVID-19 and in ation, it has basically made that contract unpro table for us,” Hatton said.
A GM spokesman said operations are not impacted and that the company would not comment on negotiations with suppliers.
Underutilization of plants and softening demand, particularly in the freight truck industry, also drove Accuride to seek bankruptcy reorganization, Hatton said. Manufacturers of heavy-duty trucks are its primary customers in North America.
e company is looking to oload its Gunite Corp. business in Rockford, Ill., which produces brake drums, hubs and rotors for medium- and heavy-duty trucks. Hatton said the Gunite business — founded in 1854 and said to be the longest continuously running manufacturer in town — can no longer be run pro tably.
“We have a more diverse customer base coming out of that location, but it’s pricing, demand and aging infrastructure,” Hatton said.
e company is continuing North America operations as usual through the bankruptcy under debtors in possession, according to the bankruptcy ling. Lenders agreed to provide $30 million in new money term loans to fund operations until the company emerges from bankruptcy, which it anticipates will be 90-100 days.
e company’s business in Mexico, Asia and Europe are not part of the bankruptcy. Accuride employs 3,600 globally.
It is owned by New York Citybased private equity rm Crestview Partners, where Luo serves as an operating executive.
Luo is the former CEO of Key Safety Solutions who oversaw a monthlong bid to buy troubled air bag supplier Takata Corp. out of bankruptcy in 2018.
He last made headlines in 2022 when EV delivery van startup Electric Last Mile Solutions led for Ch. 7 bankruptcy liquidation. Luo, a co-owner, and James Taylor, former president and CEO, were forced out of the company after an investigation found they improperly purchased equity in Electric Last Mile before it went public though a SPAC merger.
Accuride has between 1,000 and 5,000 creditors, according to its
bankruptcy ling, which lists assets between $500 million and $1 billion.
Its largest unsecured claims are Brampton, Ontario-based Matalco Inc., owed $22.8 million; China-based Zhumadian Cimc Huajun Casting Co., owed $12.6 million; and China-based Trailer Master Cvs Inc., owed $7.2 million.
e largest unsecured claim in Michigan is to Jackson-based C orrez Industries Inc., owed just over $1 million.
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Accuride’s executive of ces and technical headquarters are housed at the Cambridge Center of ce complex in Livonia. COSTAR GROUP INC.
ca that have led to a sales and profit drop-o and mass layo s, including in Michigan.
e future of the automaker’s North America headquarters — the mammoth 5.4 million-square-foot Chrysler Tech Center in Auburn Hills along I-75 — has been in ux for at least a year. In September 2023, during the UAW strike against the automaker, Stellantis conrmed it was reassessing its footprint in Michigan and elsewhere.
It is not publicly known how many white-collar employees Stellantis has working at the Chrysler Tech Center now, but it is a fraction of the number once housed there.
Around 1,500 UAW-represented employees work inside the building, according to a local union representative.
“ e future footprint doesn’t necessarily look like the past, but we want to make sure that they are grounded here in Michigan, and that’s a top priority for me and my administration,” Whitmer said.
e governor declined to o er further details about the ongoing dialogue with Tavares but said she feels “optimistic” about it.
“We’ve had a lot of very productive conversations,” she said.
“Nothing to announce at this juncture, but as they re gure what Stellantis looks like, we want to make sure that they can see it con-
tinuing here in Michigan.”
Since the merger between Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and Peugeot S.A., announced in 2020, the company that is now Stellantis has increasingly shifted its nerve center to Europe, where it keeps its global HQ in the Netherlands.
e automaker has plenty of company when it comes to reassessing o ce footprints. Most no-
tably in Detroit, General Motors Co. is vacating its longtime Renaissance Center headquarters for far less space as the marquee o ce tenant of the new $1.4 billion Hudson’s Detroit development that Dan Gilbert’s Bedrock is building on Woodward Avenue downtown.
At the same time, GM is investing billions at its Global Tech Center campus in Warren, including a
new $145 million battery cell prototype center. GM’s departure has left the fate of the Renaissance Center uncertain, though the city is in talks about potentially taking space in part of the complex and a partial demolition has also been oated. Wayne County has also been pitched to move its o ces there as well.
Asked about what role the gover-
nor’s o ce and state are playing in plans for the future of the iconic ofce building, Whitmer said: “Obviously, Detroit is our biggest city. What happens in Detroit matters to the whole state of Michigan. ere’s a lot of conversation. We’re one of the parties to that conversation, but no decision has been made from our perspective in terms of … what the state’s role may or may not be.”
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer toured the Battery Show at Huntington Place in downtown Detroit on Oct. 9 with a delegation of state of cials including Michigan Economic Development Corp. CEO Quentin Messer (left) and Michigan Department of Transportation Director Brad Wieferich (center). KURT NAGL
DEALS
support, including installation and maintenance across all 50 states, according to its website.
e startup was founded in 2023 by Lawrence Bergen eld, Patrick Lloyd, David Soens, William Policastro and Nicholas Casas.
Top Ann Arbor VC deals
Ann Arbor-based startups saw a similar drop in the number of VC deals, falling to three from eight last quarter. However, those third-quarter deals totaled more than $66 million in investments, with one startup receiving the majority of the region’s investment, according to PitchBook.
e deals, from smallest to largest, are:
Sniffer Robotics: $535,389
Sni er Robotics Inc. an environmental services company in Ann Arbor, received a $535,389 investment out of its $1.25 million seed round goal on Sept. 5, according to documents led with the SEC. It was founded by Arthur Mohr Jr., David Barron and Bob Dentzman, according to the company’s website.
e startup focuses on climate tech, including emission detection and measurement, odor leak identi cation and revenue generation from increased gas capture for conversion to energy.
Peptinovo Biopharma: $1.3 million
Founded in 2018 by Reynold Homan, Steve Tokaz, Fred Brown, David Romenesco and Bill Elliott,
VENTURE
From Page 3
Just one startup from Detroit made the list, but PitchBook ranked StockX as 97% likely to pursue an IPO at some point. e online marketplace for sneakers and collectibles was founded in 2015 and has raised $625 million in venture capital.
Fortino is con dent that Michigan overall and the Detroit and Ann Arbor areas will see more exits in the coming year. He sees
CAR WASH
From Page 3
Kar Wash will continue to provide the clean, fast, and friendly service that our customers expect,” Toma said in the press release.
Other consultants on the deal were the Birmingham-based Denha & Associates PLLC law rm; the Birmingham o ce of Detroit-based law rm Clark Hill PLC; and Detroit-based law rm Honigman LLP.
e acquisition adds to Jax’s growing portfolio, which prior to the purchase included 45 car washes around the Midwest, but primarily in Michigan,
Peptinovo Biopharma, Inc. focuses on developing nanoparticles targeting anti-cancer drugs to tumors.
Ann Arbor-based Peptinovo Biopharma received $1.32 million in seed funding on Sept. 10, according to an SEC ling. e investment is the rst of a $10 mil-
2025 as an in ection point that will begin a ywheel e ect, resulting in positive change across the spectrum.
“Companies that have been interested in exiting and going public will be able to nally and will be able to be acquired,” Fortino said. “ at M&A landscape will really free up substantially … and once that happens, you’ll see more funds being more active. You’ll also be seeing more LPs get back into venture, so you’ll see some of those funds be able to raise more money.
where it has 37.
When TRP bought what sources said at the time was an unspeci ed majority position for $40 million to $45 million, Jax had just nine locations, all in Oakland and Macomb counties.
Big investors like private equity rms have targeted car wash companies — traditionally mom-and-pop operations — for roll-up as the industry has modernized with things like monthly subscriptions, creating a more stable revenue model.
at follows similar patterns in industries including self-storage, manufactured housing and marinas, where real estate investment trusts have muscled their way in.
lion funding goal, according to the Ford D ling.
ONL Therapeutics: $65 million
Ann Arbor biotechnology startup ONL erapeutics Inc. closed an oversubscribed $65 million Series D fund on Sept. 14, according to a news release. e round was
led by Johnson & Johnson Innovation, the investment arm of New Jersey-headquartered Johnson & Johnson medical devices and pharmaceutical company. e startup, founded in 2011 by David Zacks, Raili Kerppola and Je rey Jamison, is focused on developing novel therapies for pro-
tecting the vision of patients with retinal disease. ONL erapeutics was also backed by a consortium of investors that included Fort Worth, Texas-headquartered Bios Partners, Cambridge, Mass.-based Novartis Venture Fund, Newport Beach, Calif.-based Visionary Ventures and more.
Detroit-based startup Electric Outdoors Inc., which builds sustainable off-grid camping solutions, is among the top venture capital deals in Southeast Michigan in the third quarter. | ELECTRIC OUTDOORS INC.
LARGEST LOBBYING FIRMS IN MICHIGAN CRAIN’S LIST
ResearchedbySonyaD.Hill:shill@crain.com|Thislistoftraditionallobbyingfirmsaswellasbusinessessuchaslawfirmsthatofferlobbyingservicesisanapproximatecompilationofthelargestsuch firmsinMichigan."Lobbyingexpenditures"reportedtothestatecoverallspendingaboveminimumamounts.Thisincludesgenerallobbyingexpensesalongwithtravel,lodging,foodandbeverages providedtopublicofficialsandmassmailingsandadvertising.InformationwasprovidedbythecompaniesandtheStateofMichiganLobbyingFinancialSummary,https://miboecfr.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/ cfr/lobby_stats.cgi. N/A = not available. Want the full Excel version of this list — and every list? Become a Data Member: CrainsDetroit.com/data
proponents present it.
“Eventually, I know they’re going to come for me,” Don Ludwig said, standing next to a “no megasite” sign on his front lawn, which he believes is being targeted as an access point for the industrial complex. “Everybody can be bought out, but I’m gonna fight it to the end for the people who are not fighting it.”
Residents in Eagle Township near Lansing thwarted a similar attempt to develop a megasite, citing many of the same concerns. When local support for that project collapsed, all of the state’s efforts turned toward Mundy.
Activity has picked up at the site near the I-69/I-75 juncture. It is in the mix for a mammoth 10,000jobs microchip manufacturing development, code-named “Project Grit,” by San Jose-based Western Digital Technologies Inc., sources told Crain’s.
Land clearing is expected to start in the coming weeks after economic developers used a $250 million grant, approved in May, to buy and take control of more than 1,000 acres. Developers are looking to put under contract more acreage but say they have what they need for a large project.
A spokesperson for the Flint and Genesee Economic Alliance, which is heading up megasite development efforts, said no one is being forced from their homes and that several property owners have been approached with “more than fair offers that factor in the magnitude of this project and circumstances.”
The microchip project hinges on billions of dollars of funding from the federal CHIPS and Science Act.
The U.S. Department of Commerce has so far announced $35 billion in proposed direct funding for semiconductor investments around the U.S. and plans to allocate all $39 billion by the end of the year.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said Michigan is “well positioned” to win a large semiconductor fabrication plant, and she is optimistic about landing one.
“We’ve gotten a lot of great investment in a variety of parts in our economy, but so much of what we produce here relies on chips,” Whitmer told Crain’s this month on the sidelines of The Battery Show in Detroit. “We’ve got the unique expertise, access to water, workforce. I mean, we’ve got a powerful story to tell. We’ve been in the mix on a number of opportunities. We’re going to continue to put our best foot forward.”
The governor said she couldn’t provide a date for when a funding decision will be made.
“I have found it’s never a good idea to predict when the federal government is going to act,” she said. “Hopeful that we’ll have some news soon, but I don’t have a firm date from the feds.”
Supporters call the Mundy megasite a potential lifechanging economic opportunity for a region that has suffered greatly from job and population loss. If Project Grit were to materialize, it would likely be the largest economic development project in state history, a “game changer” for Flint and “vindication”
for all it has been through, as one local business owner described it.
The Ludwigs and others in its path see things differently.
“We’re not against it. Just put it somewhere not in the middle of subdivisions,” Ludwig said. “I’m fighting just to keep everybody’s water safe. That’s the biggest thing.”
Pollution, depletion of water resources and a seismic disruption to life in the quiet Flint suburb are some of the top concerns of a dozen or so residents near the megasite who spoke with Crain’s. So, too, are bold job claims and promises that many believe will never be met.
It’s impossible to know how valid those concerns might be, but perhaps the biggest issue is that many residents feel left in the dark. Non-disclosure agreements abound, from local and state officials to economic developers. Some farmers and landowners also stopped talking to neighbors after executing purchase options and signing NDAs, creating a divide in the small community, according to some residents.
“We have no confidence or trust in our township or officials,” said Steven Phillips, who has lived across the street from the megasite boundary for 30 years. “They basically turned their back on thousands of people, hundreds of homes.”
From the Ford-CATL battery plant in Marshall to a Chinese battery factory near Big Rapids, largescale development projects have been met with fierce resistance and NIMBY-ism (“not in my backyard”) by Michigan residents directly impacted. The long-term benefits of those projects reach far beyond their footprint and outweigh the negatives, state officials and economic developers argue.
But the distrust of government and industry runs especially deep around Flint, a city that’s been defined by the exodus of GM and automotive jobs — and, more recently, the water crisis. Ten years ago, in October 2014, GM announced it would stop using Flint River water at its engine plant because it was too corrosive for vehicle manufacturing, but state and local officials promised it was safe to drink.
While the impacts of the water crisis still linger in the city of Flint, Mayor Sheldon Neeley said his
community is on the rebound. From the redevelopment of the former GM Buick City site — where a $60 million battery plant is being developed — to the Mundy Township megasite, Neeley said Flint is ready to land “transformational” projects and restore its manufacturing might.
“Remember, we are the birthplace of a billion-dollar corporation,” Neeley said. “At one time, Flint was home to a quarter-million people. Our infrastructure is built for this type of thing.”
While the opposition is strong on the periphery of the megasite, where protest signs like the Ludwigs’ have sprouted up on front lawns, further from the footprint others see the magnitude of the opportunity.
“In my lifetime, this will be the largest most significant project in this area, and probably my three kids’ lifetimes,” said Matt Cramer, third-generation co-owner of Grand Blanc-based Dee Cramer sheet metal contracting company.
The project represents a huge business opportunity for the company, which did the ductwork for GM’s Ultium battery plant in Delta Township outside Lansing and several others around the country. Besides the boost to skilled trades in the region, landing such a large project could be “a real vindication” of all Flint has been through, Cramer said.
Bernard Drew agrees. He and his wife Christel run a property redevelopment company in the city of Flint, giving them a direct line of sight into its hardships and potential. Projects like Buick City and the Mundy megasite have injected a lot of optimism into the community, Drew said.
“Just the sheer prospect that those type of developments are coming to the area, I think it’s extraordinary,” he said.
Given Flint’s history, however, all the promises should be met with some skepticism and there should be a plan to ensure everyone benefits, Drew added.
“There are some underlying levels of distrust, some earned justifiably,” he said. “I think it’s important that there needs to be steady, authentic communication about what’s taking place. There should be advanced planning for the
pathway for some of these smaller businesses that will support this injection of new jobs.”
Local Realtor Kristy Cantleberry said development of the megasite is inevitable, so residents might as well embrace the bright side.
“With change and development, you’re always going to have pros and cons,” she said. “Growth, in my opinion, is a great thing.”
The business owners share an obvious interest in that they stand to benefit directly from the economic development. They also have something else in common: The desire to see their kids stay in Genesee County.
“It’s going to create more jobs, and probably high-level jobs, for the young people in this community,” Cantleberry said. “It’s going to create more housing and excitement. We need that. We desperately need that.”
Tyler Rossmaessler, executive director of the Flint and Genesee Economic Alliance who is heading up development efforts at the Mundy megasite, said the projects have more to do with the future generation.
“What I’m most excited about, as someone who’s raising a family here, is the opportunity that projects like this represent for young people,” he said during a media event for NanoGraf’s planned Buick City project. “Projects like this, with cutting edge technologies, legitimize Flint as a place to do business and will spur more investment.”
History of the megasite
In 2021, a challenge from billionaire real estate mogul Stephen Ross set things in motion.
Ridgway White, president and CEO of the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, wanted to bring a megasite to Flint. Developing shovel-ready sites had become a top priority in Michigan after Ford Motor Co. announced it would invest $11.4 billion for new factories in Tennessee and Kentucky, rather than its home state.
Coming out of the Flint water crisis, White made it his foundation’s mission to spur economic development and job growth in the region.
“We realized that the No. 1 things that were the most import-
ant for residents of Flint and Genesee County was figuring out how you create jobs and how you have quality schools,” White said.
But the nonprofit executive couldn’t find a contiguous piece of land that could accommodate a massive development. He voiced those struggles to Ross when the real estate giant was in Flint for a University of Michigan board of regents meeting to discuss the UM Center for Innovation in Detroit.
“I got to talking to him about the megasite and said, ‘We can’t find a thousand acres, it’s really hard,’” White recalled. “He said, ‘If I can put together Hudson Yards, you can find a thousand acres in Southeast Michigan.’”
That weekend, as White and his family were driving around in search of reclaimed barn wood for the fireplace mantle of his new house, he passed a large stretch of land.
“I looked over and said, ‘That’s a lot of land,’ and pulled my car over and pulled up Google Earth and said, ‘Wow, there’s seven people on about 900 acres …”
White shared his findings with the Flint and Genesee Economic Alliance, and the regional economic development group, along with its Detroit Regional Partnership counterpart, ran with it.
Ludwig, one of the residents in the project’s path, said he has been ignoring calls from a Cooper Commercial representative wanting to talk about property acquisition. He’d rather ride it out as long as he can, and if the development really is inevitable, maybe there’s a pot of gold waiting for him at the end.
“I’ve been told an open checkbook is coming our way,” he said.
Julie Asselin, who lives up the block from the Ludwigs, has about 10 acres of farmland that she said is within the targeted megasite. She and her husband David, a retired GM worker, have lived in their home almost 40 years. She’s not been approached about the property, nor does she want to be. She wishes the developers would go somewhere else for the project.
“They probably want to take it,” she said of her land. “I like where I’m at. We got a good neighbor next to us, and they’re really nice people.”
Genesee County resident Cindy Nolff holds up a map of the Mundy Township megasite as Leah Davis (left) and Julia Asselin point out their properties. | KUrt NAGL
Judge throws out Griffin Claw bankruptcy filing
By Jay Davis and Kurt Nagl
A judge has thrown out a bankruptcy claim initiated by the co-owner of a popular local brewery amid an $8 million legal dispute between families that founded the business.
Judge Mark A. Randon of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Michigan dismissed a Chapter 11 bankruptcy claim filed this summer by Eton Street Brewery LLC, doing business as Griffin Claw Brewing.
Co-founder Bonnie LePage attempted to put the company in bankruptcy this summer as the LePage family faced a lawsuit from the Nicholsons stemming from the sale of Clubhouse BFD in Rochester Hills, which has operated as Griffin Claw since 2019. Griffin Claw is run by Co-owner Scott LePage.
The bankruptcy filing halted the lawsuit, in which the Nicholsons allege they are owed more than $8 million. The LePage family sought to buy Eton Street Brewery out of bankruptcy with an insider stalking horse bid, essentially cutting out the Nicholson family, which has a 50% equity interest in the business, according to the judge’s opinion.
The judge quashed that plan by granting the Nicholsons’ motion to dismiss.
Randon said the bankruptcy pe-
tition, along with preparing a $2.1 million stalking horse bid, violated an operating agreement and could not be executed without the Nicholsons’ approval.
“Membership has its privileges,” the judge said in the ruling.
“Through a chapter 11 (subchapter V) bankruptcy filing and contemporaneous 363 sale motion, Eton Street Brewery LLC seeks to achieve a result unattainable under nonbankruptcy law: the sale of its successful business—without the consent of two objecting members...”
The judge’s decision means the lawsuit filed against Griffin Claw by the Nicholsons can continue. Eton Street Brewery LLC spokesperson Justin Near on Oct. 15 told Crain’s Griffin Claw Brewing ownership will appeal the judge’s decision. Near said business will not be affected by the ruling.
Near said the company was in Chapter 11 bankruptcy for about two months, during which time it proposed to market and sell the business to the highest bidder to save the business from being shut down due to the Nicholsons’ aggressive moves in state court.
“In the state court case, the Nicholsons are trying to appoint a receiver to seize the assets of the business and liquidate them to pay themselves back on their claim, which the LePage’s argue was voluntarily subordinated by Ray Nicholson when the LePages
sold the Clubhouse restaurant to Griffin Claw back in 2019,” Near said. “After Ray died later in 2019, the company says that his heirs disavowed that promise and are now trying to liquidate the company to pay their own note.”
Near said it’s patently false that the LePage family was attempting to “cut out” the Nicholson family through the stalking horse bid.
“The Nicholsons could have made a competing bid for Griffin Claw, as could any other buyer. The company went as far as to hire a financial adviser with experience selling restaurants in Chapter 11s for the specific purpose of running a fair, transparent marketing effort,” Near said. “...even if the Nicholsons were not the winning bidder, their claim would be paid through the bankruptcy process just like it would get paid if they liquidated the company in state court. The assets would have sold for more in the bankruptcy than the state court process, so the Nicholsons would potentially do better in bankruptcy.”
Near said Chase Bank has a secured claim on all of the assets. That makes it likely that neither the Nicholson family or the LePage family would receive any money from the sale or liquidation of Griffin Claw, he said. Chase Bank would get the majority, if not all, of the proceeds, Near said.
Eton Street Brewery LLC filed
for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on July 26. Company co-founder Bonnie LePage is listed in the filing as company manager and president. She founded the company with Mary Nicholson in 2013.
Griffin Claw has two locations: a taproom and production brewery in Rochester Hills and a taproom in Birmingham. Managing Partner Scott LePage runs the business.
The bankruptcy filing came following a lawsuit filed by the Nicholson family related to contributions to the business, LePage family attorney Chris Cataldo of the Taft law firm previously told Crain’s. Cataldo told Crain’s the lawsuit is an internal dispute over claims by ownership. The Nicholson family invested into the business financially, while the LePage family contributed years of services, extensive restaurant assets as well as real estate through a related business, ESM Properties.
Griffin Claw listed 49 creditors in the July filing. Its biggest debt was $95,948.34, owed to the city of Rochester Hills for water and taxes and nearly $43,000 to Birmingham, according to court documents. Milwaukee, Wis.-based malt provider Malteurop is owed $35,000 while DTE is owed $20,000 and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan is owed $15,000.
The company in the filing listed assets of $10 million to $50 million
Longtime Channel 4 anchor Devin Scillian set to retire
By
After 30 years at WDIV-Channel 4, longtime anchor Devin Scillian said Oct. 15 on the station’s news broadcast that he plans to retire from the station in December.
Scillian said his last newscast would be Dec. 13.
In a message posted to the station’s website, Scillian reminisced about how he got to Detroit after a
stint in Oklahoma City — and why he stayed for three decades, even if he didn’t expect to at the beginning.
“Every time New York called, we were shocked to find that our Detroit lifestyle won out. The dangled jobs always involved a lot of travel, and as much as I love far-flung datelines, I didn’t want to be an absent father. And my commute to the WDIV studios downtown was less than 20 minutes. (My com-
mute was longer than that in Tyler, Texas.) Detroit is also a place where the news matters. People care. People watch.”
Besides anchoring evening newscasts, Scillian also has been the primary host of WDIV’s weekend public affairs show “Flashpoint.”
Scillian, 61, has numerous side projects and is known for his success as a children’s book author
and a musician. He was preceded as Channel 4 anchor by Detroit broadcast legend Mort Crim, and Scillian noted he’s almost exactly the same age now as Crim was when Scillian came to Detroit in 1994. “I think that struck me as a sign that it might be time to move along,” he said.
WDIV did not immediately name a successor for Scillian’s anchor role.
and liabilities of $1 million to $10 million.
Filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection under Subchapter V is increasingly popular among smaller companies because it is quicker and less costly.
The fight comes after the two families established a long relationship in the hospitality business.
Norman LePage and Ray Nicholson partnered to own and operate restaurants Mac & Ray’s in Harrison Township, Big Rock Chophouse in Birmingham and East Side Mario’s in Southfield. The two opened the Griffin Claw Brewing Co. taproom in 2011 in Birmingham and expanded to Rochester Hills in 2019. The LePage family sold Rochester Hills-based Clubhouse BFD restaurant to establish the second Griffin Claw.
Ray Nicholson died in 2019. A dispute came up over repayment of a loan to the LePage family from the sale of Clubhouse BFD, and repayment of a loan made by the Nicholson family. The Nicholson family in January 2023 filed a lawsuit in Oakland County seeking more than $14 million from Griffin Claw. No deal has been reached in the lawsuit.
Members of the Nicholson family and representatives for the family did not immediately respond to Crain’s request for comment.
A judge has thrown out a bankruptcy claim filed this summer by the owners of Griffin Claw Brewing. | NEAR PERFECT MEDIA
Crain’s Detroit Business
Ann Arbor ad agency acquired by Grand Rapids marketing firm
By Elizabeth Schanz
An Ann Arbor-based advertising agency whose owner was looking to retire has been acquired by a Grand Rapids firm seeking to expand its capabilities across the state and as a step toward larger growth goals.
Highland Group of Grand Rapids has purchased Brandworks Detroit, now called Brandworks Detroit Powered by Highland Group. The deal was finalized on July 30 and was the company’s first acquisition.
Scott Crowley, owner and CEO of Highland Group of Grand Rapids, said the company has previously looked into acquisition opportunities, but Brandworks Detroit was the first company that was “a natural fit.”
“I think that we are very similar in customer base. We have service offerings that dovetail into each other, so we have more of a digital capability that they didn’t really have in Brandworks, and we really could help their clients grow with our digital capabilities. So that was the premise for our acquisition,” Crowley said.
After a 40-year career, Brandworks founder Jay Kargula sought to retire and find the right buyer for the company. While many companies were interested, Kargula wanted to sell to a company with the right mix of capabilities to service clients as well as a compatible culture, which he found with Highland Group.
“(Highland Group will) get a larger manufacturing (clientele) base,” Kargula said. “They did have some industrial type of clients, so they had a good understanding of that. They also have stronger digital capabilities than what Brandworks Detroit had. So that was always on my list of needs in terms of being able to grow our clients, digital capabilities and needs through whatever company we
decided to join with.”
Since 2009, Brandworks Detroit has served clients in the metro Detroit and Ann Arbor area. Brandworks has a large insurance and manufacturing clientele base, including Amerisure and Danish manufacturer Universal Robots. Founded in 2001, Highland Group serves privately held companies and global enterprises by establishing stronger branding, improving digital experiences, strategic sales and product communications, according to an announcement of the deal. Highland Group of Grand Rapids’ portfolio includes the Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce, office tech supplier Applied Innovation and Steelcase. Its clientele is primarily from education, industrial and light manufacturing, Crowley said.
“(The acquisition) extends our footprint into the Detroit area a little bit more firmly. We have clients over there right now and to extend our service offerings, more or less,”
Crowley said. “We wanted to strengthen our digital capabilities over there and over here, and they extend a really good media capabilities environment that we can partake in that we historically hav-
en’t done at Highland Group.”
With the acquisition, Highland Group will remain in Grand Rapids and Brandworks will stay in Ann Arbor. Crowley said executives are looking for a new office space in Ann Arbor for the Brandworks side of the company.
Terms of the deal were undisclosed.
In addition to growing the business geographically, the Highland Group aims to potentially increase its employee base over the next couple of years.
Currently, Highland Group of Grand Rapids has 27 employees and Brandworks has seven employees who were on the team prior to the acquisition. On his path to retirement, Kargula plans to stay involved with Brandworks on the business development side until May of next year.
“I’m sure this is something that all owners who sell their businesses go through. It can be difficult to sell a company if your employees aren’t along for the ride,” Kargula said. “(The transition has) been better than I could have imagined, quite frankly. I mean, it’s really been terrific, and it gets back to the culture issues and the values and what the people feel are important,
and how they treat other people.”
Crowley said the company aims to hire two more people this year for Highland Group and maintain its employee base until 2025. For Brandworks, there is the potential to hire three to four people.
Acquiring Brandworks is a step in the wider growth effort for Highland Group. Over the next 10 years, executives aim to complete one to two acquisitions a year.
“I think the natural footprint of us would be more of a Chicago, Detroit, Indianapolis, that diamond is what we’re kind of looking for. It’s just to extend beyond our current physical geography into a larger physical geography,” Crowley said. “I’m looking for companies that really can extend our capabilities and really develop new service offerings to lend into all of the client sets that we have as part of the Highland Group brands.”
Internal growth plans, including expanding the employee base, are dependent on what future acquisitions look like and how the partnerships are structured, Crowley said.
Advisers to Highland Group included Frisia Group and Warner Norcross + Judd LLP.
Detroit police chief to resign for top job at DWIHN
By Dustin Walsh
Detroit Police Chief James White is leaving his department to become the next CEO of the state’s largest mental health service provider.
White was selected in a unanimous vote by the board of the Detroit Wayne Integrated Health Network to lead the organization. He replaces Eric Doeh in the role, who resigned in June after accepting a job as the Michigan market CEO and plan president for insurance giant Humana Inc.
White was selected from seven finalists for the role.
“We are very pleased with the choice of Mr. White to continue leading DWIHN and we feel confident that he is the right person for the critical job of leading this organization as we enter this next phase of growth to help our region’s most vulnerable citizens,” DWIHN board chair Dr. Cynthia Taueg said in a press release.
White has served as the top cop for the Detroit Police Department since June 2021 and has been with the department for more than 20 years. He also formerly served as executive director for the Michigan Department of Civil Rights.
By David
Automatic Data Processing Inc. has acquired WorkForce Software, a software provider whose backers included Elliott Investment Management and Insight Partners.
Financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed in an announcement Oct. 15. Bloomberg News reported in September that ADP was in talks to buy the Livonia-based company for about $1.2 billion.
A human-resources software provider, ADP handles paychecks for one out of every six workers in the U.S., according to its most recent annual report.
WorkForce Software helps com-
panies manage unique payroll needs, such as helping workers swap paid time off to colleagues.
“As the needs of today’s global workforce continue to shift, employers need dynamic workforce management solutions that will help them maintain compliance and flexibility while engaging their employees,” Maria Black, ADP chief executive officer, said in a statement.
Elliott’s private equity affiliate announced an investment in the company in 2019 alongside Insight, which had owned it since 2014, according to a statement at the time.
WorkForce Software was founded in 1999 and is headquartered in Livonia. It services more than 1
million clients in more than 140 countries, according to a news release.
“The WorkForce Software team is thrilled to join ADP,” said Jeff Moses, CEO of WorkForce Software, in a news release. “For 25 years we have led the way in developing workforce management solutions that enable many of the world’s most innovative organizations to optimize their work-
force, protect against compliance risks, and increase employee engagement. Now, with the extensive expertise, resources and global reach of ADP, this winning formula will help us deliver an employee experience for the future through powerful, enterprise-grade workforce management solutions.”
— Crain’s Detroit Business contributed to this report.
White earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Wayne State University and a master’s degree in mental health counseling from Central Michigan University.
At DWIHN, he’ll lead the organization that serves 123,000 people in Wayne County with behavioral health services.
The DPD and DWIHN have been working together for years, including a co-response project under White where professionals from DWIHN train DPD’s crisis intervention team, which sends a specialized unit armed with non-lethal weapons to mental distress calls. Behavioral specialists are also embedded in the department’s 911 communications center.
More than 16,000 911 calls in the city of Detroit last year involved someone in mental distress — or more than 43 calls per day.
A start date for White has not yet been determined and a replacement for White at the DPD has also not been announced.
Highland Group’s office in Grand Rapids | ANDY bALASKOVItZ
Carnevali, Ryan Gould and Crystal Tse, Bloomberg
Detroit Police Chief James White appears at a July news conference. | c tY OF DetrOIt FLIcKr
WorkForce Software’s global headquarters are located at 38705 Seven Mile Road, Suite #300, in Livonia. | crAIN’S DetrOIt bUSINeSS
How a Michigan neurosurgeon turned a 4-person practice into a health system
Dr. Jawad Shah, a neurosurgeon, opened his Insight Institute for Neurosurgery & Neuroscience practice in Flint in 2008, seeking to bring neurological care, along with three employees, to the downtrodden city. But that wasn’t enough. As CEO of Insight, Shah has set a new path by buying up distressed hospitals and making them financially stable. The surgeon-led Insight has grown to eight hospitals in five states with roughly 5,000 employees and $450 million in patient revenue. The mission started with the former General Motors Fisher Body plant in Flint, which Shah acquired and moved his small practice into. Now it prepares to open a new 70-bed psychiatric hospital in the building this fall. On Nov. 1, Insight will make third acquisition of the year when it takes over the struggling 71-bed Coldwater Regional Hospital from Toledo-based ProMedica.
Why, as a neurosurgeon, start a full health system?
I think that this was not intentional. The overarching mission was how I wanted to approach my career and my life. What I mean by that, if you look at my early decisions, a lot of my colleagues were setting up practices outside of the city (Flint) in the suburbs. I kept thinking to myself that the vast majority of my patients are actually in the city. I’d rather look inside the city, which was unusual at the time. When we moved into the former GM building, we had neurosurgery; but we knew that requires therapy and special types of radiation and requires other specialists to be around. I knew I could save lives and grow it. So I got myself into areas I wasn’t great at, like property management. But we built multiple practices anyway because we figured we could do a lot of this other work at our facilities. A significant number of our patients are Medicaid or charitable care patients. When we took over Warren (the former 20-bed Michigan Surgical Hospital), I started to understand everything from the top down. We build practices, but vertically integrated into hospitals. We wanted to create true multispecialty integrated programs that have public, private and academic elements in communities that really need them. Private, because that’s a model where people work hard and get paid for that work; public there are people who really can’t afford the same care as others; and academic because we need to create new clinicians motivated by the same mission.
But how does a neurosurgeon know how to run a hospital? When I look at the hospitals that function well, the clinical or medical voice and the administrative voice is equal. Marrying those two bits of the puzzle are the trick to me. I love hands-on with surgery, but I am very passionate about building institutions. The administrative side — these are things that are learnable. We have to study them and make our mistakes. We need more doctors and nurses to put themselves in these administrative mindsets. We need institutions with both sides or having multiple people in that room with equal power. That’s what we’ve done.
By | Dustin Walsh
How have you achieved financial success with failed hospitals?
I’ve had the opportunity to see some of the mistakes hospitals make and I’ve had the buffer of great people around me that could help me understand these issues. We come into a hospital system and it’s a bit of a leap of faith. Coming in, we prepare ourselves to make the tough decisions, whether financial or clinically. There are several hundred things that can make a difference. For example, if you have a maligned contract where physicians are being rewarded for their presence, but not their outcomes, that has to be resolved. Another is there were 61 software programs in a hospital with many not being used. Just sorting through that gave significant cost savings. In another case we found a real problem with patient
access. It can be a great system but when patients call and it’s too difficult to make an appointment, that’s a problem. We solve those problems so they don’t happen again.
What about the Coldwater hospital made it attractive?
There are a few things. We feel there is significant opportunity in the rural space. I don’t mean just financial. When visiting the rural spaces, where there is hospital and need for hospital work, the level of care is not always commensurate with the care in larger cities. Not because of bad medicine, but structural issues. So we saw a hospital that has been through a lot of financial trouble and it’s in our backyard. We knew the community really needed a hospital. We don’t want to go somewhere where there’s another hospital and
competition. It’s really a desert of health care without that hospital.
What’s the long-term strategy?
The question is, what is our motivation and intention. The idea of delivering health care to all those most needed places in America is very much the mission of Insight. Going places where others have found it difficult but the area needs a hospital. It’s too difficult for us to look away. If we can handle it, make it financially viable and bring our expertise to it, we think it can be successful. And we spend a lot of time developing leaders. We’re very intentional about growing the type of that finds opportunities to learn with these acquisitions. We’re always looking for our next leaders. We have to be intentional about growing that team and make superstars everywhere so they can do this work.
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