PLACES TO EAT: 200 RESTAURANTS • GERAK: SOCIAL LIGHTS 53
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H I L L S
OCTOBER 2017
MICHIGAN HATE GROUPS PHILOSOPHY OF 28 ORGANIZATIONS
DISASTERS FOR OAKLAND HOW COUNTY AND COMMUNITIES PLAN
OAKLAND CONFIDENTIAL PLUS
GOSSIP/NEWS FROM POLITICAL WORLD
DANIEL ELLSBERG HIS TIME AT CRANBROOK, PENTAGON PAPERS, THE NEW BOOK
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Oakland Twp., $714,900. Private setting on cul de sac of custom homes within minutes of downtown Rochester. So many hard to find features ALL in ONE HOME incl: 5 bdrms, 4.5 baths, fin W/O bsmt, 3 car att PLUS 3 car det heated garage w/240 line, 20x42 inground pool w/diving board. Hdwd fl, crown molding, granite & 8 ft. doors. Trex deck, generator, hot tub, central vac., sauna. Spacious master suite, Jack & Jill suite, guest suite & 2nd fl. laundry. W/O bsmt. w/9 ft. ceilings, stone gas fireplace, rec. rm., full kit., home theater, bath & bdrm. Backs to Stoney Creek.
Rochester, $494,900. 3 bdrms., 3.5 baths. New patio, drive, 24x24 garage. New baths & kit. w/quartz counters, SS appls. All new fl. inc. wide plank hdwd. New solid wood doors, fixtures, mechanicals & roof. Fin. bsmt. w/fireplace. Awesome 1st fl. master suite.
COURT LOCATION & GORGEOUS WOODED LOT. Orion Twp., $269,900. 4 bdrms., 2.5 baths. New kitchen with Lafata cabinetry, granite and stainless appliances. Hardwood flooring and crown molding. Charming front porch and expansive deck overlooking tranquil and private wooded setting. Second floor laundry. Won’t last!
GREAT BUY WITH ROCHESTER SCHOOLS Rochester Hills, $189,900. Great rm. w/vaulted ceiling. Fenced yard, oversized 2 car garage, shed and deck.
6 ACRE PARCEL IN EST. SUB. Metamora, $84,900. Last lot left in developed sub of 19 homes. Cul-de-sac lot and very private 6 acre setting. All homes minimum 5 acres, out buildings and horses allowed. Easy access to M-24. All homes $350,000+. Perk test, survey and deed restrictions available. Very beautiful property. Oxford Schools.
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Rochester Hills, $2,300/mo. 3 bdrms., 2 baths, 2000 sq. ft., oversized 2 car side entry garage. Open floor plan. All appliances included. 1st floor laundry. Spacious daylight basement.
Approx. 1500 sq. ft. with 5 private offices, large reception area, 2 baths. May also consider sale. Call 248-601-1000 for more information.
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DOWNTOWN10.17
33
Recognized hate groups in the state of Michigan According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, there are 28 hate groups operating in our state. Downtown newsmagazine profiles all the current Michigan organizations.
FROM THE PUBLISHER
10
With the announcement by U.S. Congressman David Trott (R-Birmingham, Bloomfield Hills, Rochester Hills) that he will not be seeking a third term, here’s hoping we can find someone who will govern from the center if elected.
CRIME LOCATOR
15
A recap of select categories of crime occurring in the past month in Rochester and Rochester Hills, presented in map format.
OAKLAND CONFIDENTIAL
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GOP feeding frenzy for Congressman Trott’s seat; Lena Epstein changes her plans; Rep. McCready House district drawing interest; a new face possible in 45th Michigan House race; plus more.
THE COVER
MUNICIPAL
46
Environmental cleanup part of development project; city defines zoning districts; marijuana operations boxed out; fire station 4 work underway; Silch Gudwara site to host new restaurant; plus more.
The sundial at the entrance to the Rochester Municipal Park, design by Michigan artist Russell Thayer. The monument is part of the city’s Bicentennial celebration. Downtown photo: Laurie Tennent.
Skinny SkinnyJeans Jeans
Photos courtesy of Dr. Mark & The Spa MD
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Preparing for Oakland disasters Downtown newsmagazine takes a look at how well prepared local communities and the county of Oakland are should a natural or manmade disaster strike.
39 The Daniel Ellsberg interview Daniel Ellsberg talks about his years attending Cranbrook Schools, the Pentagon Papers and his forthcoming new book.
18
Doug West
FACES SOCIAL LIGHTS
53
Society reporter Sally Gerak provides the latest news from the society and non-profit circuit as she covers recent major events.
ENDNOTE
58
Our thoughts on the new zoning districts for the downtown Rochester area; and we are raising concern as to whether the disaster plans developed by the county have addressed all issues sufficiently.
18 29 52
Doug West Kelly Jones Gail Kemler
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PUBLISHER David Hohendorf NEWS EDITOR Lisa Brody NEWS STAFF/CONTRIBUTORS Hillary Brody | Kevin Elliott | Sally Gerak Austen Hohendorf | Lisa Rose Hook | Bill Seklar Judith Harris Solomon | Joyce Wiswell | Julie Yolles PHOTOGRAPHY/CONTRIBUTORS Jean Lannen | Laurie Tennent Laurie Tennent Studio VIDEO PRODUCTION/CONTRIBUTOR Garrett Hohendorf Giant Slayer ADVERTISING DIRECTOR David Hohendorf ADVERTISING SALES Mark Grablowski GRAPHICS/IT MANAGER Chris Grammer OFFICE 124 W. Maple Birmingham MI 48009 248.792.6464 DISTRIBUTION/SUBSCRIPTIONS Mailed monthly at no charge to homes in Rochester, Rochester Hills and parts of Oakland Township. Additional free copies distributed at high foot-traffic locations in Rochester and Rochester Hills. For those not receiving a free mail copy, paid subscriptions are available for a $12 annual charge. To secure a paid subscription, go to our website (downtownpublications.com) and click on “subscriptions” in the top index and place your order online or scan the QR Code here.
INCOMING/READER FEEDBACK We welcome feedback on both our publication and general issues of concern in the Rochester/Rochester Hills communities. The traditional “letters to the editor” in Downtown are published in our Incoming section and can include written letters or electronic communication. Opinions can be sent via e-mail to news@downtownpublications.com or mailed to Downtown Publications, 124 W. Maple Road, Birmingham MI 48009. If you are using the mail option, you must include a phone number for verification purposes. WEBSITE downtownpublications.com
FACEBOOK facebook.com/downtownpublications TWITTER twitter.com/downtownpubs OAKLAND CONFIDENTIAL oaklandconfidential.com Member of Downtown Publications DOWNTOWN BIRMINGHAM/BLOOMFIELD DOWNTOWN ROCHESTER/ROCHESTER HILLS
FROM THE PUBLISHER ontrary to what critics of mine may think, I consider myself an Independent when it comes to politics, although I admit on many social issues I may lean toward left of center.
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You can write that off to a number of factors, including coming of age as a political activist during the nationally divisive Vietnam War era; a high school education under the tutelage of Dominican Sisters at the Catholic school I attended where critical thinking and expression of opinion was encouraged and, frankly, the passage of time as a father concerned that my two sons and their generation won’t have some of the rights I – and many of you – enjoyed while growing up. This last item is probably what motivates me most nowadays. I offer this information as a backdrop for this month’s missive which is devoted to my hope – albeit probably not realistic – that a perfect candidate comes to the forefront in the race to fill the congressional seat now held by Birminghambased Republican David Trott, who announced in early September that he will not be seeking a third two-year term in Washington D.C. We did not endorse Trott in the general elections for his first or second term in Congress. We felt when he first ran for office that he was too conservative – not necessarily a reflection of the overall sentiment of this sprawling congressional district that includes Birmingham, Bloomfield Hills, part of Rochester Hills, a large swatch of the west Oakland lakes area and a couple of communities in western Wayne County. For the record, we did not buy into the anti-Trott criticism relative to his success in business which made him a multi-millionaire – more power to him – or the carping about how he made his fortune as a foreclosure attorney. But we did object to positions he took on key issues. Granted, we were all forewarned. Hell, part of his pitch to voters was that ‘What you see is what you get – I won’t say one thing and do another.’ Hence no surprise that he proceeded to jump on board with other House members to gut the Affordable Care Act, public be damned, and joined in the celebration at the Rose Garden with President Trump, who would later change his mind on what Trott, et al had done. And then there was his vote – along with Mike Bishop (R) from Rochester – to roll back an Obama era Environmental Protection Agency rule that essentially loosened restrictions on coal mining waste from ending up in streams and rivers, part of the conservative agenda to gut the EPA wherever they could. We did get an inkling of late that Trott was conflicted in his role as congressman, either out of frustration with being a small fish in a big pond (435 House members) or the realization that the current administration will not improve in the next three years, so why bother trying. Trott told viewers on MSNBC’s ‘Good Morning Joe’ show that he wanted more time with his family and was a bit disheartened that a House member spends most of the 24-month term hustling to raise onethree million dollars to get elected again. One also has to wonder whether there is also some personal embarrassment that he had pledged allegiance to a leader who gives renewed meaning to the term “vulgarian.”
And in his own way he broke with the current administration when Trump made insensitive remarks relative to the alt-right, white supremacist violence at Charlottesville. He even took time, talking to news editor Lisa Brody just weeks ahead of going to press with this issue, to express his disappointment with the mayhem in the current administration and the lack of progress on issues that Republicans hold near and dear. So as members of the GOP started jockeying with the announcement from Trott’s office, I couldn’t help but think that the ideal candidate for this congressional office would be someone – from either party – who can govern from the center. We don’t need a far right conservative, nor do we need someone beholden to some far left agenda. Sorry, the district expects better. This district deserves to have someone represent the voters’ views, not just someone who will march into the halls of Congress and represent their own personal views. What a novel thought – we pay you to represent us. We need someone who has the ability and inclination to represent those living in the district, which more political observers are casting as a tossup or purple district rather than the Republican stronghold party leaders had hoped when they gerrymandered the boundaries for what was supposed to be a safe red district. The 11th Congressional District demands someone who has an inclusive agenda, can use compromise when necessary to reach legislative goals, realizes that we send someone to Congress to assure our health and safety, and not impose moral values as if this was a theocracy. I suspect I am only daydreaming that a perfect candidate truly exists. After all, within the first 24 hours after Trott’s announcement, we had at least one of the Republican hopefuls list as a qualification for congress the fact that he was an early supporter of Donald Trump. Heaven help us. Then we have another GOP candidate (state Sen. Marty Knollenberg) out hustling for money and support so he can try riding into Washington D.C. on the merit of his last name because his father was head of the county GOP at one point, and then parlayed that position into a congressional seat when Bill Broomfield retired from the House. The same congressman, during an election interview I managed when he first ran, who promised to only be in Washington D.C. for two terms – the classic citizen/lawmaker who returns home – but hung around for a decade and a half, all the while denying his earlier campaign promise. On the flip side, we are only familiar with a couple of the Democrats likely running for this office, so we will have to see if anyone fits the bill of my ideal representative as more candidates announce in coming weeks. We recognize media endorsements are not the influence factor they once were decades ago, especially in a race that could be fueled by possibly $10 million in campaign spending. But we will fulfill our role here by making recommendations to voters before the primary and general election ballots are cast in this contest. Hopefully we can come close to an ideal candidate for this district.
In the last few months, Trott seemed to soften his positions on a few issues. For example, during the Detroit Regional Chamber Policy Conference on Mackinac Island this spring, Trott actually expressed disagreement with Trump having pulled out of the Paris climate accord.
David Hohendorf Publisher DavidHohendorf@DowntownPublications.com
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INCOMING Fourth Estate assaults I read with interest in the "Incoming" section of your publication from a couple of your reader's commentaries which you published. They were criticizing pubisher David Hohendorf for being biased and divisive and not "representing facts.” I had to laugh. I hope they will look up the definition of "Editorials.” They are opinions based on interpretation of facts. We live in a time of extreme assault on the Fourth Estate. Journalism is sometimes not perfect, but is one of the pillars of Democracy. Without it, where would we be? Timothy Kozak Birmingham
Medical marijuana So Rochester is bowing out of the new Medical Marijuana Act that mirrors the Liquor Control Commission regulation of liquor. It's okay for all the bars and restaurants in town to serve liquor and put up with drunk drivers in town, fights at Main Street Billiards, people urinating in parking lots, etc. Medical marijuana doesn't cause any of these events to happen. George Taylor Rochester
Practice what you preach Recently our Rochester Hills Mayor, Bryan Barnett, signed a national pact that states that “America's mayors have taken a strong position in the support of civil rights for decades, and, that in recent years, cities have undertaken efforts to integrate immigrants into their communities and have adopted a variety of policies to influence fully and treat equitably their LGBT residents." "Today, however, we are being challenged again," the document states. "Dark forces of extremism and violent bigotry are rearing their ugly heads. We are now seeing efforts in our states and at the highest levels of our government to weaken existing civil rights policies and reduce their enforcement. We have seen an increase in hate violence, xenophobic rhetoric and discriminatory actions that target Muslims, Jews and other minorities. We will not permit them to succeed." My hope is that Mayor Barnett has changed his views regarding LGBT civil protections and intends to introduce a human rights ordinance with protections for LGBT citizens in Rochester Hills. However, Barnett's history tends to make me believe that his signing of the pact was for political optics to further his political career. In 2012, a group of citizens downtownpublications.com
SPEAK OUT We welcome your opinion on issues facing the Rochester/Rochester Hills communities. Opinions can be sent via e-mail to news@downtownpublications.com or mailed to Downtown Publications, 124 West Maple Road, Birmingham MI 48009.
attempted to work with Mayor Barnett to establish a human rights ordinance in Rochester Hills. Such ordinances have been passed in many municipalities across Michigan including Grand Rapids, Ann Arbor, Jackson, Detroit, East Lansing and, even in small towns like Howell, Michigan. The resolution that Barnett refers to in your publication's article (September/Downtown) just affirms the civil rights were on the books at the time (and still exist) which exclude civil rights for LGBT citizens at the local and state level. So, it appears that while the mayor will sign a pact (statement) that promotes civil rights with other mayors at the national level, he doesn't practice what he preaches where he governs. Timothy J. Maurer Rochester Hills
Spousal abuse imprisonment High praise to Lisa Brody for traveling to Huron Valley Women’s Correctional Facility in Ypsilanti to meet prisoners Nancy Seaman and Karen Kantzler face to face, both of whom are serving life sentences for killing their abusive husbands (Behind The Curtains/September). One never knows how a story like hers might reach just the right person or persons who can help release them from their prison walls. My husband Tom and I are long-time friends of retired trial judges Norman Lippitt and Jack McDonald. To see them both try every avenue to help these women is enough impetus for me, especially where Nancy is concerned, to do what I can to urge Governor Snyder and the Michigan Parole Board to commute their sentences. It is Nancy with whom I can identify–a former teacher like myself, and a woman subjected to abuse, like my mother. I went to visit her primarily
because of Jack, for who could forget the outcome of Nancy’s 2003 sensational trial and the great courage it took on his part to try to overturn her life imprisonment sentence? If Jack McDonald believed Nancy’s crime was not pre-meditated, then I felt compelled to do what I could to help her. I understand spousal abuse. My mother was a willing victim. How she continued to live her life under the dominance of my stepfather never made any sense to me. Since childhood, I angrily blamed her for not leaving him, but I now understand how a life-time of abuse causes a woman to lose her selfconfidence in her own abilities. With each passing year of financial dependence and intermittent abuse, my mother chose to put up with the abuse. Perhaps she found some relief in getting her punches in, too, physically or verbally, during a text book case of a love-hate relationship. Just like Bob Seaman – when my stepfather was good, he was very, very good – charming, humorous and sweet when things in his life were to his liking and exceedingly brutal when they were not. Someone really needs to penetrate the psyche of abusers to reveal why they hurt their victims one day and love them the next. This thing called “Make-up Sex” is senseless to me, but it’s actually a factor in some abusive relationships. I know that Bob Seaman never once verbally apologized for his violence, but he would do nice things for Nancy – take her whole family out for dinner, lavish her with material goods, happy times on their boat and who knows what else. When his financial and health status truly spiraled, toward the end of his life, the beatings intensified, but with the college graduation of her youngest son imminent and money from her father to buy a condo, Nancy optimistically finally felt free to leave Bob Seaman. In my mother’s case, there were no such plums to sweeten her sour life. She simply accepted her fate. As the two grew older, the physical wars metamorphosed to wars of bitter words, and when she died of natural causes, their house became a shrine. Her grieving husband placed photos of her everywhere, surrounded by votive candle and holy cards, replaying their Frank Sinatra love songs over and over, tears welling in his eyes during the ten years of his life without her. What wasted lives. We all know there are many reasons women live with abusive husbands…economic dependence, religious convictions, welfare of the children, lack of a safe place to run, emotional and sexual neediness, loss of self esteem, embarrassment, guilt and
DOWNTOWN
fear. There, but for the Grace of God, my mother could have been a Nancy Seaman, finally fighting for her life, only to face another kind of imprisonment, if all the facts of her mental state were not brought to light. Pat Hardy Bloomfield Hills
Deer plague in city In January of this year we had some coyotes in the forest behind us. Letters were written by other concerned residents and the Rochester Hills Council published a reply advising us that the coyotes were nature’s way of controlling deer and other forest creatures. In conclusion, they advised us to keep our children and small pets indoors. The council has an ordinance prohibiting the feeding of deer which they appear incapable of enforcing. They also have an ordinance prohibiting hunting in the city which I’m sure they would vigorously enforce. So, we are seriously considering feeding the coyotes in the hopes that they will keep the deer from ruining our attempts to grow some flowers to beautify our home. I trust that feeding coyotes is not in defiance of the council’s ordinances. Merton Wreford Rochester Hills
Excellent article Excellent article. Our society – and justice system – need a better understanding of the very limited options abused women have. This article helps. Leslie Hewig Milford From our website
Heartbreaking choices Anyone who has supported the spouse, and victim, of an abuser knows how heartbreaking their choices are every day. Never give up offering them your time, your resources and support through the legal process. Elaine McLain Birmingham From our website
Asset rather than threat Having known Nancy Seaman, having seen Nancy with bruises, it makes my heart hurt seeing her still in jail. She is still so capable of being an asset rather than a threat, to society. Pamela Brown Novi From our website 13
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CRIME LOCATOR
Map key
NORTH
Sexual assault
Robbery
Larceny from vehicle
Drug offenses
Assault
Breaking/entering
Vehicle theft
Arson
Murder
Larceny
Vandalism
These are the crimes reported under select categories by police officials in Rochester and Rochester Hills through September 19, 2017. Placement of codes is approximate.
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OPPORTUNITY
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OAKLAND CONFIDENTIAL Oakland Confidential is a periodic column of political gossip/news, gathered both on and off-the-record by staff members at Downtown newsmagazine. We welcome possible items for this column which can be emailed to: OaklndConfidential@DowntownPublications.com. All sources are kept strictly confidential. The gossip column can be viewed online at DowntownPublications.com or at OaklandConfidential.com. FEEDING FRENZY (PART I): The September announcement by Michigan’s 11th District Congressman David Trott (R-Birmingham, Bloomfield Hills, Troy, Rochester Hills) that he would be stepping down from his seat after two short terms has set off a wild scrum on both sides of the aisle to see who’ll run. Republican Lena Epstein, who had announced she was taking on Sen. Debbie Stabenow for Senate in 2018, announced she is definitely switching races and is now running for Congress instead – but some Republican insiders doubt she has any better chance in this race than in the RACZKOWSKI contest for the Senate. As an interesting aside, in 2012, after Jim Thienel appointed her as chair for the Lincoln Day dinner, she turned around and ran against him as Oakland County Republican Party chair. Unfortunately for her, “I stacked the deck, and I won. We went out to dinner, and became great friends. Now I’m co-chairing her campaign,” Thienel said. Then there is former state Rep. Andrew “Rocky” Raczkowski of Troy, who also announced he is going for the seat despite losing to Sen. Carl Levin in 2002, as well as by a narrow margin to then-Rep. Gary Peters in 2010 in the 9th District. A veteran, he planned to take on Levin again in ‘08, but was called back to active duty. “I will take the military attitude into Congress. I’m running and we’re going to win. Period,” he said in his announcement. FEEDING FRENZY (PART II): Still debating their decisions are state Sen. Mike Kowall (White Lake), majority whip in the Senate, who had said he’d run for Secretary of State, but announced he is “discussing this unexpected opportunity with my family and supporters and will make an announcement in the coming days.” Although he’s a popular politician who has been White Lake supervisor, state representative, and senator, at least one top party official does not believe he has the magnetism to win the congressional, nor the secretary of state, race. A connected Democrat said, “He’s practical and formidable.” Term-limited Rep. Klint Kesto (Commerce, West Bloomfield) has been burning the phone lines in the Chaldean community, of which he is a part, lining up support for a run. And then there’s state Sen. Marty Knollenberg, son of Joe, who held the congressional seat for part of this district for so many years some voters think he’s still there. “He won’t care if he gets anything done or not, he just wants to sit in that chair,” a fellow Republican noted. “He really wants it, and he’s been working the phones.” Marty told Downtown, “It is certainly something I’m interested in – COX who wouldn’t be interested in running for Congress?” but that he recently opened a restaurant in Troy, wife Lori just became a grandmother, and they have “a lot of balls in the air” to consider before committing. Lots of folks believe that the Knollenberg last name could take him all the way there. Our insider has his money on Laura Cox (Livonia), wife of former Attorney General Mike Cox, who is currently chair of the House’s Appropriations Committee, and may not want to give that power up to run for Congress. SHARKS IN THE WATER: Without an incumbent in the congressional seat, Democrats are taking another look at the 11th District, which has gone from “leaning Republican” to “in play,” according to the Cook Report. Former Obama Auto Task Force chief of staff Haley Stevens has been raising lots of dough with the field primarily to herself, and Fayrouz Saad, a former Homeland Security advisor and Director of Immigrant Affairs for Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, has jumped into the race. So has perennial candidate Dr. Anil Kumar, who recently announced he will once again go for this seat after Trott overwhelmingly beat him. Will the third time be the charm for Kumar, even though Democratic Party folks begged him to look GREIMEL at races closer to home? We hear he held a Democratic Party fundraiser at his Rochester home to try to convince them. Term-limited state Rep. Tim Greimel (Auburn Hills, Pontiac, Keego Harbor, Sylvan Lake, Orchard Lake) has informed fellow Dems he is taking another look at running for the seat after Trott’s announcement, rather than running for downtownpublications.com
Michigan Attorney General, as he told Downtown last month, “because it’s a totally different race; a different calculation,” a Democratic politico said. “It’s rare to beat an incumbent.” Hear tell Democrats think very highly of him. Expect, too, for political novice Dan Haberman, a Birmingham businessman, to (finally) officially announce his candidacy, which he has been mulling since Trump came to office. He’s lined up a strong team with a national pollster. On both sides of the aisle, expect to see blood before it’s all over. BET ON THIS: Here is the latest of who is NOT going to be running for that coveted 11th District seat, and you can take it to the bank. Despite likely being a lock in the Republican primary, and one of Oakland County’s most beloved Republicans, Sheriff Michael Bouchard is a definite “no.” He may eye L. Brooks Patterson’s seat as county executive in 2020, when Patterson is expected to step down, or he may stay put as sheriff, where he commands a bigger budget than the executive office, and chairs national sheriff organizations, and with that, a national stage... BOUCHARD Republican state Rep. Mike McCready (Birmingham, Bloomfield Hills, Bloomfield Township, West Bloomfield) is also a definite no. Although term-limited in the House 40th District, he has spent the summer campaigning and raising money for the state Senate’s 12th District, which he will be announcing for in October. If Knollenberg leaves his 13th Senate seat to run for Congress, McCready may have a tough decision to make, because he has lived in Bloomfield Hills for years... On the Democratic side, Gongwer, a political news service, asked former U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade if she would run for the seat, and she was a firm “no,” telling them she doesn’t even live in the district and wasn’t interested.... And in the U.S. Senate race, to take on three-term incumbent Debbie Stabenow, Bob Ritchie – aka Kid Rock – is definitely not running. While the purported “campaign” to run as a Republican for the Senate against Stabenow is good for business, an actual one would be terrible for biz, an in-the-know Republican noted, because Rock would have to divest a bunch of his businesses and holdings, which are considerable. Rock on. STAB AT SENATE: With Republican Lena Epstein out of the U.S. Senate race, that currently leaves only former Michigan Supreme Court justice Bob Young Jr. and businessman and Iraqi war vet John James to take on the mighty three-term Senator Debbie Stabenow. Word is that Grosse Pointe businessman and financier Sandy Pensler has dipped nine-out-of-10 toes in the water, and is getting ready to commit fully to the race. Pensler has formed an exploratory committee to look at the race, has criticized Stabenow’s “vision,” saying the country is at a “tipping point.” We don’t know which way the country is ready to “tip,” but Pensler, who has a Harvard law degree and masters from Yale, is clearly a smart guy. He grew up in Detroit, and through his private investment group Pensler Capital PENSLER Corporation, of which he is general partner, provides capital, management experience and financial expertise to a wide range of corporations, including Chrysler, Sprint, GE and Navistar, as well as owning a buyout firm and Korex Companies, which makes lots of household products. BIRMINGHAM OPENING: The 40th state House seat that Rep. Mike McCready will be vacating in January 2018 due to term limits will also provide opportunities for fellow Republicans in the GOP-leaning district. Republican Melissa Bossadart was the first to announce for the seat but she is now joined by Mike Banerian, who runs the day-to-day operations at his family’s wine distribution company. Democrat Nicole Bedi, a volunteer activist who lost to McCready in 2016, announced her candidacy in midSeptember. MOVING CHAIRS: Word is that if (when) state Sen. Marty Knollenberg jumps into the 11th congressional race, Rochester/Rochester Hills Republican state Rep. Michael Webber, 45th district, will run for Knollenberg’s seat, leaving his House seat vacant. Current Oakland County Republican Chairperson Theresa Mungioli, a former Rochester School board member, is said to be planning on running for the seat, which would get the support of many local Republicans, who view her as one of the most competent local MUNGIOLI Republicans on the horizon. It would leave a giant hole at the local county party level, though, one former chair acknowledged.
DOWNTOWN
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FACES Doug West ochester Hills artist Doug West has produced sports artwork for decades, earning him a spot as the official artist for the National Baseball and Pro Football Halls of Fame. His work is now taking a different focus, opening up new doors and a new-found personal freedom. "I did my first portrait of Al Kaline and sold it the next day. From there, it's been a train ride," West said. "I ended up in the Baseball Hall of Fame, where for about seven years I did the yearbook induction program for the Hall of Fame. In the early ‘90s, I did lithographs of Steve Yzerman... and now the Pro Football Hall of Fame for their Superbowl event." In 2016, West started transitioning from sports and into expressionist paintings that focus on rock stars. West said change in both subject matter and style has served as a start to a secondpart of his career. The change, he said, came after finishing a complex life portrait he was commissioned to make. "It was a family portrait, with kids and cars, and a large oil painting. I thought it would probably take a week to finish. That turned into 10 weeks," he said. "Sometimes it comes together beautifully and sometimes it’s brutal. This turned out beautiful, but you can't predict with art how long it will take. I felt like I was stuck in this box and painting details." As a side project, West made an expressionist-style painting of Jimi Hendrix, which spun into a completely new project. "It was so freeing, so then I did Jim Morrison," he said. "I did 13 pieces over the summer, and it's grown. I'm doing another six for The Art of Custom Framing, in Troy." West's first round of paintings resulted in his "Forever 27 Club" series, which focused on rock icons who died in their 27th year. His transition from sports to rock 'n roll expressionism was featured on Detroit Public Television's Emmy Award series, Detroit Performs. His work has also been exhibited at Art Prize in Grand Rapids. His latest work will be featured in January at The Art of Custom Framing for a dual show with photographer Ed Bembas for "Detroit Through Lens and Brush,” which will showcase West's rendition of Detroit musical artists from Motown to Eminem and Kid Rock. Another recent project of West's includes a large, 61-foot mural at Rochester's Emagine Entertainment Theater, where owner Paul Glantz commissioned him to paint characters from timeless movies. Raised in Warren as the son of a painter, West said he knew from an early age he would be an artist. However, the specifics weren't always clear. "From the egg, I knew I was going to be an artist," he said. "My dad was an artist, and I have three brothers. He poured his dream into us." West said he recalled portrait paintings by baseball painter Dick Perez, where he and his father walked into a sports collector's show one day in the 1980s that was void of any art. It was then that he knew he could make a living as a sports artist. "I'm a Christian guy and my forté, or my God-given gift, is to do portraits. At 6-years old, I could do portraits," West said. "Ask me to draw a building – no way. But portraits, yes."
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Story: Kevin Elliott
Photo: Jean Lannen
READY FOR ANYTHING: OAKLAND COUNTY’S EMERGENCY PREPARATIONS BY LISA BRODY
In the last few weeks, Florida and Houston have faced down catastrophic hurricanes, California, Washington and Oregon have battled devastating wildfires, and numerous western states dealt with unprecedented heat for months on end. Meanwhile, those of us in Michigan enjoyed a beautiful summer and an early, crisp fall. Michiganders are fond of saying that if you don’t like the weather, just wait an hour. We complain about long, bitterly cold winters and boast of the beautiful four seasons. But if we were confronted with a major emergency, whether a natural event or from a manmade occurrence, would our local law enforcement, homeland security, water authorities, hospitals, and municipal leaders be ready and equipped to handle anything thrown at them?
Oakland recently submitted its 2017 version to the state and once approved it will go before the county board of commissioners for final approval of the updated plan. The 2013 plan evaluated over 50 potential hazards, based upon historical research, intelligence reports, surveys, community workshops and meetings.
The answer is a mix of both good and bad. Oakland County Homeland Security has extensive emergency plans and hazard mitigation preparations, as do all of our local municipalities. On the converse, if a total catastrophic event occurred and there were massive power outages and cell phone towers were out, the ability to get communications to the public would likely be reduced to the “good neighbor policy” of letting neighbors and friends know what is going on. And that is quite worrisome. Whether planning for a once-in-a-500-year flood, which is occurring on more frequent basis, an active shooter, or a hacking event to our infrastructure, all management preparations begin with Oakland County Homeland Security, which oversees emergency planning and hazard mitigation for all Oakland County government departments and all municipalities except Birmingham, Bloomfield Township, Southfield and Farmington Hills, which have their own emergency operations plan and emergency manager and works directly with the state, as any municipality with a population over 25,000 is permitted. They continue to coordinate with the county and train for many eventualities. “We’re not first responders – we’re the support system for multiple agencies, such as police departments and fire departments, in emergency management,” said Tom Hardesty, manager, Oakland County Homeland Security. “We act as the liaison with the state and provide services to communities. Communities have to have confidence in our plans and abilities, and that their tax dollars are being used in an efficient and wellthought out manner.” The county plan, which is mandated by both the federal and state governments to be updated every four years, was last done in 2013. It states, “The goal of hazard mitigation is to eliminate or reduce the loss of life and property from hazards that occur in the county by protecting the health, safety and economic interests of its residents.” Emergency planning stems from federal legislation passed in 2000, as part of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), called the Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000. It is also known as the Disaster Relief – Public Health and Welfare Act, where Congress declared that because “disasters often cause loss of life, human suffering, loss of income, and property loss and damage; and because disasters often disrupt the normal functioning of governments and communities, and adversely affect individuals and families with great severity; special measures, designed to assist the efforts of the affected states in expediting the rendering of aid, assistance and emergency services, and the reconstruction and rehabilitation of devastated areas, are necessary.” The law revised and broadened the scope of existing disaster relief programs after FEMA was created in 1979; encouraged the development of comprehensive disaster preparedness and assistance plans, programs, capabilities and organizations by states and local government; and encouraged hazard mitigation measures to reduce losses from disasters. First plans had to be completed and submitted in 2005.
Oakland County recently submitted its 2017 version, Hardesty said, to the state and once approved it will go before the Oakland County Board of Commissioners for final approval, allowing them to move forward with that updated plan. The 2013 plan evaluated over 50 potential hazards, based upon historical research, up-todate information and intelligence reports provided to them, surveys, community workshops and public meetings. Significant hazards it recognized include high winds and tornadoes; hazmat incidents, both from transportation and at fixed sites; ice and sleet; snowstorms, which interfere with traffic and power; infrastructure failures; flooding; public health emergencies; and petroleum and natural gas pipeline accidents. “There are constant updates (thoughout the four years), but not huge changes,” Hardesty said. The biggest update in the 2017 plan includes dealing with lone wolf rogue drivers, mass shooters, and computer and infrastructure hackers, all emergency situations which have become critical around the world in the last four years. The county is divided into four zones for preparation of a disaster, and then into state districts, allowing for coordination of police departments, fire and EMS rescue plans, road capacity and direction to and from population centers, hospitals and health care planning. Changes from the 2017 plan have been made based on population changes, preparations and information updates of law enforcement, hospital capacity, and support from federal agencies. “That part is continual – getting grant funding for projects we support. We work a lot with the feds, with FEMA,” Hardesty said. “We get a little each year. The intention of the Trump Administration is to seek a 25 percent grant match for all emergency preparation grants.” Hardesty said the desire to force local counties to match federal grants could puts them in a tough spot. “The difficulty of that here is that it’s not just one community – it’s a consortium for law enforcement and training, which doesn’t have the money to match because there’s no funding base,” he said. “Same thing for fire departments – 43 different groups are sharing this equipment. How do you figure out who is paying for what? It will make it so that no one gets any equipment. It will make it so there is a decrease in acquiring equipment and resources for the county.” Currently, Oakland County Homeland Security is in the midst of grant funding for thwarting terrorist attacks. The county was recently awarded money for the Integrated Emergency Management Course, which specifically trains first responders for coordinated and complex terrorist attacks. “It means that the federal government will support our sending a group of 70 to Emmitsburg, Maryland, to the Emergency Management Institute for training for four days with a wide ranging group of first responders – law enforcement, fire, hospital workers, EMS, health officials, emergency managers – in training and developing plans. The fifth day is a large exercise to test knowledge and identify gaps.” The state of Michigan also provides a lot of grant money to the county, as well as acting as a funnel for the federal grant awards.
“FEMA has specific books on tornadoes, floods, hazmat (hazardous materials) terror, severe weather situations, and they prescribe we look at every situation,” said Kevin Schein, Oakland County emergency management coordinator. He said they have specific forms and checklists “for as many things as we can think of to prepare for.” “Everything is mitigation, preparation, response and recovery,” said Birmingham Fire Chief John Connaughton, who is also the city’s resident emergency manager coordinator. He said Birmingham chose to develop their own emergency plan in order to control actions from the ground, and in order to get funds back from the federal government for emergencies. “At the mitigation part, where you’re trying to mitigate what damage can happen, it’s at the federal, or even the state level, like a hacker getting into the power system. For a large power outage, like in Houston, boots have to go out on the ground. Each member of our emergency operations center has a role and one purpose. The 911 dispatch is responsible for warning the public, for example. If it’s weather related, we can use sirens, cable TV, the city website, Twitter, Facebook and other social media.” “The municipal websites are really popular, as is the state’s website, and there’s local media. Local municipalities can do their best to get information out, but being a good neighbor and advising your friends and family that a state of emergency has taken place is the most reliable way of communicating in an emergency (if all the power goes out),” said Rochester Hills Assistant Fire Chief/Fire Marshall Bill Cooke. “The best way may be going outside and telling your neighbor.” FEMA advises everyone to stock their homes with at least three days worth of water, food, medicine, and pet food, and to have an emergency radio with a three-day supply of batteries available in the case of a catastrophic event and power outage. An emergency radio can access weather radio stations and news radios, which inform the public. “Ultimately, people are responsible to do the right thing. Like in Houston (and Florida), there’s not enough resources to evacuate everyone by emergency services. The most important thing is to stay calm, listen for information, and don’t panic,” said Birmingham Assistant Fire Chief John Donohue. “We do joint training with Oakland County, and we’re integrated in with other communities in case we’re called to assist one another. There are situations where, in sharing of resources, any one of us could become a public information officer for another.” Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard, a veteran of both Hurricane Katrina and the aftermath of 9/11, understands the needs for communications in the event of a complete power failure. “We found communications are non-existent. We had to set up portable communications towers, because all power, telephone, and cell towers were down post-9/11 and Katrina,” he said. While preparations are improved in the last dozen years, there are still holes in the system, he acknowledged, urging people to make preparations, just as the county is constantly improving their systems and coordination.
Hardesty said they coordinate with other counties, routinely meeting and training with other counties as part of the Urban Area Security Initiative in the state. Oakland County, along with Macomb and St. Clair counties, are in Region 2N, part of the Urban Area Security Initiative with Wayne, Washtenaw and Monroe counties and the city of Detroit. “Grants go to the district to benefit the region and support regional intiatives,” he said. While they prefer not to release evacuation and jurisdictional plans due to security concerns, Hardesty said they have very detailed plans of intersections, including aerial photographs, of who goes where and which department directs what specific part of a plan. Local municipalities have been given evacuation plans in the event of severe weather or major event, where they could shelter large crowds, Rochester Fire Chief John Cieslik said. “There are things in the plan, but they’re confidential. But some places, like if there were a tornado or severe thunderstorm, we would evacuate people to Rochester City Hall because it has a lower level, as well as to the lower level of our parking structures because they’re concrete.” David Hendrickson, Bloomfield Hills City Manager, noted that Cranbrook Education Community, which is within the city’s boundaries, has a collaborative arrangement with the city. “They let us train on their grounds,” he said of the city’s public safety department, which does mock exercises with Bloomfield Township and Troy. In return, “If we had to move a lot of people f rom Cranbrook, we have an agreement with Oakland Community College in Auburn Hills to use Cranbrook busses to take students to the OCC parking lot and have parents pick them up there.” He said Cranbrook uses a phone app to notify parents in the event of an emergency. If there were a large scale power outage or cell tower outage, his officers have 60 two-way radios that allow them to communicate. Birmingham would move large groups of the population to its schools, notably the two high schools, city manager Joe Valentine said. Regionally, Oakland County works with its neighboring districts in the event of major events. “For example, Fermi II in Monroe, we are listed because we’re in the 50-mile emergency planning zone,” Hardesty said. “If there were some kind of radiation issue, we would likely have people shelter in place, and if you had a garden, you’d have to have your garden checked out. People within the the 10-mile radius would need much more detailed plans, preparations, and knowledge of what to do.” If there were a nuclear detonation in the metro Detroit area, or the release of a dirty bomb, or radiological dispersal device that combines radioactive materials with conventional explosives, the response would be different – but not revealed now due to the sensitive nature of the plans. “Our job is to do a lot of ‘what if’s’ – and plan first to prevent, second to respond, and third, to recover from,” Hardesty responded. Rochester Hills’ Cooke echoed that sentiment. “You can do your
FEMA advises everyone to stock their homes with at least three days worth of water, food, medicine, and pet food, and to have an emergency radio with a three-day supply of batteries available in the case of a catastrophic event and power outage. An emergency radio can access weather radio stations and news radios.
If there were a nuclear detonation in the metro Detroit area, or the release of a dirty bomb, or radiological dispersal device that combines radioactive materials with conventional explosives, the response would be different – but not revealed now due to the sensitive nature of the plans, according to the county.
best to prevent unfortunate circumstances from happening, but they’re going to happen,” he noted. “The best that you can do is plan for them and prepare.” Cieslik said, “Just because we’re in Rochester does not mean we’re not necessarily immune from everything. We have plans for civil disturbances and terrorism. We have to prepare for everything. That’s where the group from Homeland Security at Oakland County and Police Chief (Steven) Schettenhelm are a big part, because they keep up with law enforcement. We have to be prepared, whether it’s a civil disturbance, an act of nature, or an active disturbance. The good news/bad news is, we spend a lot of time planning for a situation and hoping we never have to use. But if we never prepare for a simple disaster, it could easily turn into a massive disaster.” While Detroit Metropolitan Airport is not directly within Oakland County’s jurisdiction, “it wouldn’t matter,” if something happened at the airport, Detroit or in Macomb County, Hardesty said. “Our response would be the same based on what the circumstance is.” The Southeast Michigan Council of Goverments (SEMCOG), which aids in the development of the region’s long-range transportation plan, works with a task force of first responders on significant traffic crashes, especially when there may be a hazmat situation causing a fire on a roadway, or a truck hits a bridge on a highway, said Carmine Palombo, deputy executive director, SEMCOG. While they have not yet been involved with terrorist preparation, their next initiative will be dealing with the resiliancy of the region’s transportation system to weather events, notably with flooding after large rain events. “We haven’t had anything like Houston or Florida, but we do have significant rain events and flooding,” Palombo said. “We’re working with MDOT (Michigan Department of Transportation) on where the areas are that have the most prevalent issues, and working on what can be done to minimize flooding, on capital and maintenance projects, to lessen the impact.” Oakland County Sheriff Bouchard is someone who has experienced two of this country’s most catastrophic events, having been called to action at the Twin Towers after 9/11, and after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. “We prepare for all risks and all hazards, not just terrorism, whether it’s a mass casualty or weather events. You examine everything from every aspect,” he said. “As national chairman of Major County Sheriffs of America, we talk about this all of the time, how we can coordinate equipment, communications, planning. We have a better national system than when I was asked to go to Katrina, and certainly on 9/11, but there are better ways to do that.” Bouchard, who also coordinates with Oakland County Homeland Security and local Oakland County municipalities and police departments, saw first hand what is needed when power grids are down, the water system is compromised, and there is a lack of central communication to the public. “I learned at Katrina, we brought our own food, gasoline and sleeping equipment,” he said. “We had everything we needed to subsist so we weren’t a drain on already-strained resources. We
brought from Alabama a whole tractor trailer with a complete kitchen to cook for ourselves and other first responders.” He said that not all first responders were as prepared, and it made him realize how critical it is for first responders to come to a disaster ready for anything, having planned for any eventuality, and with their own needs being met, as well as for the public’s. “We talked (with the federal government) about arranging regional teams pre-equipped and pretrained, so that as an event would unfold, you would just call on the next concentric team,” he said, explaining that mobile hospitals, mobile quarters, shelters, food operations, portable water tanks, mass decontamination units, and other necessary resources would be purchased and equipped and stationed in different parts of the country. “In this way, if an emergency of one kind or another, like Florida, or that region, trained personnel and equipment could be activated. If they were overwhelmed, they could activate the next team with their resources, and so on. “We met for a year-and-a-half with federal agencies. As often happens with the national government, they move on to the next thing,” Bouchard said. “People changed jobs, administrations changed, and it just was dropped.” Locally and regionally, weather events remain the highest risk assessment for emergency managers, with the top risk concerns remaining tornadoes, lightning, high winds, snow storms, hail, flooding, and ice and sleet, Birmingham’s Connaughton said. Passenger transport, with its risk of both accidents and potential hazmat situations, is the eighth biggest risk the city faces, he said. “Snowstorms shut down roads, creates difficulties with transportation and difficulties for emergency responses as well as difficulties for seniors who have to shelter in place who may have issues with food, water and medication,” Connaughton said. “Hail causes damage to automobiles, homes and to people. Flooding, we know the problems. Ice and sleet cause problems with driving and power outages.” Birmingham is contronted with potential hazards of large cargo both on its main thoroughfare, Woodward Avenue, but also by train, where tracks run along the eastern portion of the city, and by air, with the Oakland/Troy airport on Industrial Row Drive in Troy, just on the other side of Birmingham. Connaughton and Assistant Chief Donohue said they are not told what cargo is coming through the city – which could, and likely is, hazardous on a daily or weekly basis. “Only if there’s an accident,” Connaughton said. “There was a huge trainwreck in the late 1990s, where multiple cars derailed, all cargo,” he recalled. “One of the transport cargo cars was automotive, and had pickup trucks which caught fire. One of the cars had chemicals that caught fire. Hazmat responded and took care of that. We’ve had no major hazmat incident in years on any of our major roads.” “But anytime there’s a vehicle accident, there’s potential for a gasoline spill, which is a hazardous material, but it’s not a classic hazmat incident,” Donohue said, noting they still take hazmat precautions.
Bloomfield Township, which like other municipalities conducts drills for any and all possible risks, is most concerned about flooding, which affects a good amount of the township. Their Hazard Mitigation Plan, revised in February 2017, and approved by their board of trustees this summer, focuses on flooding, hazmat incidents, fire hazards, infrastructure failures, including gasline and petroleum accidents, severe weather incidents, and transportation accidents. Included are also technological hazards, such as power outages, infrastucture failures, nuclear power plant accidents, oil and gas well accidents, pipeline accidents, and sewer problems. Human hazards include civil disturbances and criminal acts, including vandalism and arson. It touches on terrorism, from explosions, biological and chemical threats, nuclear blasts, and radiological dispersion device, or dirty bombs, but states, “these hazards were addressed in the Oakland County Threats and Needs Assessment, which is a homeland security and law enforcement sensitive document, and therefore, not available to the public. For this reason, the information in these documents is not included in this plan.” Instead, Bloomfield Township’s focus is on saving local lives and protecting property while preserving and protecting the local environment and its economy. The plan, developed by engineering consultant Hubbell Roth & Clark, “The Hazard Mitigation Plan was created to help Bloomfield Township better understand the natural, technological, and human hazards that may affect the community, and the impacts they may have. Also, this report identifies ways to mitigate these impacts to protect the health, safety, and economic interests of the community.” The plan identifies almost 1,100 properties in the township either wholly or partially within a 100-year floodplain, and several other properties and intersections in flood hazard areas, and the township has determined these to be their biggest risk assessment. They acknowledge a transportation incident with hazardous materials could occur at any time, with major roadway arteries of I-75, Woodward and Telegraph within its boundaries, as well as CSX railroad in the eastern portion of the township, with the potential for evacuations, road closures, and environmental contamination. The plan assumes adequate planning for such an event. What each community is quietly planning for, more and more, are lone wolf active shooters and hacking of computer systems. But not the hacking of individual computers – hacking of large scale disrupters. “They’re not hacking individual computers. The goal is to hack corporations and financial institutions, to gain funds and disrupt business, or to access information,” Connaugton said. As for hacking into the power grid? All officials acknowledge that possibility, but are silent. Off the record, they acknowledge government systems, whether national, state or local, are targets. Located as the Great Lakes state, amidst the wonder of inland lakes, the water system is a different situation, officials assure. Unlike in Beaumont, Texas, where the city of 110,000 residents found themselves with their water system non-functional after
Hurricane Hugo, and in areas of Florida after Hurricane Irma, where water systems were flooded out and dysfunctional without power, “The water systems have always been required to have contingencies. It’s a Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) requirment,” said Tim Price, chief manager with the Oakland County Water Resources Commission. “They all got beefed up because of natural and manmade hazards, from small situations that would impact one systems, which would be handled locally, to emergency interconnections between water systems that could be between two different communities.” While the specifics are kept internal and not made public, he said there are specific plans that “pretty much spell out what needs to be done.” Any concerns about the quality of water is mitigated, Price said, because water can be sampled at all hours. “It depends on the type of catastrophe, but we have independent contractors on hire. If there is a power outage, there are certain sites that have emergency generators that can kick in. It avoids structural failure.” He noted that after the widespread power outage of 2003, when the eastern portion of the United States was hit by a power failure, “we beefed up our contingency plans after that with an awareness that a large scale situation could happen.” The Water Resources Commission is part of a WARN agency, a first weather warning system around the country, “so if a big enough disaster happened, other WARN agencies would be contacted to come to Michigan and help us,” Price said. “Emergency preparation is a big responsibility we have,” said Sue McCormick, CEO of Great Lakes Water Authority (GLWA), which was created in January 2016, and is responsible for the drinking water for the region. “One of the first things we did was hire an emergency management director, who reviewed vulnerabilities in our cities. By June 2016, we had our first plan from a regional perspective, and by fall 2016, we were doing a tabletop exercise.” What about a terrorist dropping a toxin or chemical into the water system? “Our source waters are Lake Huron and the Detroit River, and we belong to the Lake Huron to Lake Erie monitoring system,” McCormick said. “There are various points of monitoring along the way. In addition, intakes are being monitored ongoing online, which was put in place since 9/11. If there are changes in a reading, it will indicate if there are any chemicals anywhere along the way. To my knowledge, nothing has been detected along the way or at any intakes.” She explained that GLWA monitors intake and their transmission system daily, and in the event of any chemical detection, “we can mitigate it by shutting down a portion of the system at a time by taking a water plant offline and supplementing it with another facility. “How unique a system is it that the quality and monitoring is done and mitigated,” she said. “Many systems only have one plant, one facility, one source. That GLWA’s system has five different water treatment plants and three different sources allows
Our source waters are Lake Huron and the Detroit River, and we belong to the Lake Huron to Lake Erie monitoring system. There are various points of monitoring along the way. In addition, intakes are being monitored ongoing online. If there are changes in a reading, it will indicate if there are any chemicals anywhere.
Local hospitals are the next, and usually last, level of emergency preparation. The biggest key is having proper emergency response codes, like active shooter, system utility disruption, amber alert, facility alert, mass casualty, hazardous materials – this way staff can respond in the appropriate way.
for the flexibility on a daily basis, as well as in a disaster, that few other regional systems have.” “The water system is pressurized. That means when you open your faucet, water comes out,” Price said. “Someone can’t just drop something in. It’s detected.” If there were a major power failure, such as in 2003, GLWA is beefed up to complete operations without fail. “When the entire grids go down, there were some operations (in 2003) that did not have standby generators,” McCormick said. “But today, all the stations have adequate backup generators.” She noted that even in the summer of 2016, which was a hot dry summer, with southeast Michigan in a drought, “we were processing 518 million gallons of water a day. GLWA is able to process and deliver 600 million gallons a day, so even under the most difficult situations, we can operate. “There is always the possibility of a situation we’ve never had before – like in 2003, and we learned from it. We will always have lessons learned and update vulnerabilities. But we continue to exercise them and respond to lessons learned.” What worries local emergency managers the most as they plan, practice, and prepare? “I go back to the lone wolf shooter. If they don’t tell anyone, it’s difficult to find them and prevent an attack,” said Oakland County’s Tom Hardesty. Oakland County’s Kevin Schein concurs. “It hits you personally, as individuals. It’s the randomness of it.” “But the response to the lone wolf, whether because of mental illness or radicalization is similar,” Hardesty said. “Our first response is to stop their effort. We’ve been doing active shooter training with law enforcement for years. The next level is the rescue task force – getting medics from EMS into what we call the warm zone. The attacker may not even be disabled. It’s getting them in to treat the injured while law enforcement is working to disable the attacker. “In Columbine, we learned we couldn’t wait for the SWAT Team to go in,” he continued. “One of the lessons of Aurora (Colorado, a mass shooting in a movie theater) was we had to get medical treatment in to victims. That’s what rescue force does.” “A lot these days, both the threat matrix, and natural hazards,” said Bouchard. For Rochester Hills’ Assistant Chief Cooke, it’s a rogue driver, despite lots of preparation working with the Oakland County Sheriff’s Department. “How do you really prevent that? How do you prevent a vehicle from driving into a crowd in a large event?” he asked rhetorically. “You can use police or fire vehicles to prevent it. But if you bring out concrete barriers or trucks with gravel, then what is too much? You create public uneasiness, and can deter the public from wanting to come to an event. We certainly don’t want to do that. We want the public to come and enjoy events, and live a life of comfort and ease.” “What keeps me up at night? Everything,” said Rochester’s Cieslik. “We always have to plan for the worst and pray for the best. The city council has given us the best equipment, and we pray it just rusts away because we never have to use it. But the reality is,
we do use it. So, we have to make sure people are well-trained and know how to use the equipment, and the equipment is positioned where it can be easily accessed, and they’re executing our plan.” Local hospitals are the next, and usually last, level of emergency preparation. “The biggest key is having proper emergency response codes, like active shooter, system utility disruption, amber alert, facility alert, mass casualty, hazardous materials – this way staff can respond in the appropriate way,” said Judith Wheeler, Royal Oak Beaumont Health System emergency management specialist. “The key is having education and training.” Beaumont sends people down to the Center of Domestic Preparedness in Anestan, Alabama, where a hospital on an old Army base now offers one week health care leadership classes for mass casualties. “They throw every possible scenario at you, knowing you’re going to be overwhelmed and still can run your emergency room and manage your patients. They make it so real you’re prepared for anything from a drug overdose to a 9/11 situation. It’s a phenomenal training opportunity,” Wheeler said, where they use lifelike mannequins that can spit and take medicine as well as actors, who are often veterans, playing casualty victims. She said they have revised their whole decontamination process for patients for hazmat, as well as if there were a horrific mass casualty event along the lines of the Boston Marathon situation. Communications are foremost, with coordinations with Oakland County and Royal Oak fire and police. Glenn Garwood, administrator, emergency and radiological services, Ascension Crittenton Hospital in Rochester, said they have an emergency management committee which meets every other month, as well as representatives that sit on various Oakland County committees, “so we can be collaborative on health care specific needs.” He said they regularly conduct drills to be prepared for any and every contingency of influx of patients, “whether it’s an active shooter, decontamination of patients, communicative diseases, mass casualty incident planning, or other things on the horizon we will look at in the future. Ever facility has to have a hazard vulnerability analysis, to see where are the gaps, where are the weaknesses. That’s where we train and put resources toward. It’s good for everyone. “We like to think we’re prepared,” Garwood continued. “We could spend all day, every day preparing. We take emergency management very seriously, as we see it all around the globe, whether it’s weather, violent acts, computer scenarios – we have to be prepared.” “A terrorist is a terrorist. Just like nature – there’s nothing we can do to compare with nature,” said Birmingham’s Donohue. “If the system is hacked because of terrorism, well, nature’s done that many times. We’re ready. FEMA, the Red Cross, and larger agencies are put into place so people are cared for and shelters are available and set up in case of a longer term power outable. They would (take over) and coordinate regionally.”
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FACES Kelly Jones ochester native Kelly Jones will tell you she has everything but common scents. On her 16th birthday, Jones walked into Rochester Adams High School and was greeted by her gal pals who presented her with a gift of Lou Lou perfume by Cacharel. “It came in such a pretty bottle,” says Jones, who now lives in New York and is the Founder of Kelly + Jones, a fragrance company that combines one’s love for wine tasting with the aromatic experience of perfume. “Now when I smell it, it takes me back to the halls of Adams High School, apple picking at the Yates Cider Mill and your first date.” Jones looks back on her days at Adams High and the rage perfumes of the time – like Drakkar Noir, Dior Dune and YSL Paris. There was even a fresh cut grass fragrance from the Gap. “It was so yummy, it smelled like a lawnmower,” she recalls fondly. “We had a 1931 Model A Ford growing up, and the smell of that car made me just really appreciate what fragrance does to your memory.” Recently, on a return trip home to visit her parents, Jim, a retired electrical engineer, and Pat Jones –“The best English teacher ever at Adams” – they took a road trip to the Stahls Automotive Museum in New Baltimore to check out its vintage car collection. “You start smelling the cars and it totally reminds you of home. Fragrance always has a way of taking you back to Michigan,” says the self-professed ‘gearhead,’ who graduated with an International Relations degree from the James Madison College at Michigan State University and has an International MBA from the Thunderbird School of Global Management at Arizona State University. She landed a dream job that took her to Mexico to help launch Toyota. She was the only female executive by day, and at night she experimented with fragrances. “I’d be in my super-creative, sensorial magical world. I wanted to make a scent bar where people could make their own custom fragrances,” Jones said. So she left Toyota after 10 years and realized her second dream when she opened her scent bar, Salude, on the campus of the University of Arizona in 2006. When the recession hit two years later, she had to close Salude. Ultimately, she was lured permanently away from the auto industry and became a marketing consultant and communications director for various fragrance houses until she had an epiphany. “I want to be the next Jo Malone,” she declared about the highly successful British perfumer. So she quit her job, sold her Toyota Forerunner and all her possessions, sublet her Harlem apartment and started Kelly + Jones last year. Her company’s pure perfume oil blends are inspired by wine aromas that can be worn singularly or combined and are beautifully packaged in bottles with a convenient roll-on applicator. “You can create your own vintner’s blend,” Jones says. “In our original RESERVE collection, each fragrance – sensual spice, luscious fruits, fresh citrus, oak and florals – enhances the nuances of your favorite wine in the glass with the scent on your skin.” The RESERVE collection has perfumes based on Pinot Grigio, Riesling, Cabernet, Merlot, Chardonnay and the recently released Rosé 2017 Vintage, including a new Rosé body oil. In late September, Kelly + Jones’ released two new vintages – a Pumpkin Prosecco candle and its first tequila-inspired scent for men, based on mezcal. “My mantra is ‘crushed with love.’”
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Story: Julie Yolles
Tom Zibkowski Realty Executives Midwest
586-532-6700 Ex 114
Tom@TomZibkowski.com www.TomZibkowski.com
When Experience Counts. Over 4,000 Closed Home Sales Since 1982 FULL FINISHED WALKOUT BASEMENT ON A PRIVATE 3.06 ACRE LOT WITH 2 PONDS
RANCH WITH FINISHED WALKOUT BASEMENT ON 1.25 ACRE LOT
Awesome Custom Built designer showcase great room ranch with full finished walkout basement on a private 3.06 acre lot with 2 ponds, great open floor plan with 2 bedrooms on 1st floor and 3rd bedroom & library in the finished walkout lower level. Featuring a beautiful sun room overlooking rolling land to pond, almost 4,000 sq. ft. of finely appointed living area, open staircase to lower level makes floor plan feel as one living area, custom built by original owner and maintained second to none. 4601 Rosy Drive, Leonard, $539,900
Excellent condition great room ranch with finished walkout basement on 1.25 acre private lot, renovated kitchen with granite counter tops and built-in Viking Appliances, year round sunroom overlooking private yard, library has built-in cabinets and 3rd fireplace, formal dining room with butler's pantry, beautiful hardwood floors throughout most of 1st floor, awesome owners suite with sitting area and access to sunroom, finished walkout features 3rd 1/2 bath, bar, open entertaining area and fireplace; 3.5-car garage, extensive landscaping and large deck overlooking grounds. 4535 Valley View Pointe, Oakland Twp, $629,900
1 1/2 STORY HOME WITH WALKOUT BASEMENT TO PRIVATE YARD WITH BASKETBALL COURT
FINISHED WALKOUT BASEMENT ON PINE KNOB GOLF COURSE
Very clean well cared for 5 Bedroom, 1 1/2 story home with a fully finished walkout basement to heavily landscaped private yard with basketball court. Home features over 6,000 sq. ft. of finely appointed living area, all high end finishes throughout, all bedrooms have bath access, dual wrought iron staircase to 2nd floor, hardwood flooring entire 1st floor, lots of crown molding, vinyl clad windows; finished walkout has 2nd kitchen with additional full bath and theater room. 1372 Clear Creek Drive, Rochester Hills $769,900
Finished walkout basement on Pine Knob Golf course in the exclusive gated community of The Bluffs of Pine Knob. Fantastic views from walls of windows overlooking pond & Golf course, gourmet island kitchen w/built-in appliances & large hearth room, stunning entrance foyer with circular staircase and loft overlooking great room, awesome owners suite with his & hers walk-in closets, fireplace and great views, huge deck overlooking private yard with pond and golf course. Home is in absolute mint condition! 5528 Saint Andrews Drive, Independence Twp $799,900
5,200 SQ. FT. COLONIAL W/ WALKOUT BASEMENT TO WOODED RAVINE
1 1/2 STORY HOME WITH A FINISHED WALKOUT ON PRIVATE 2.92 ACRE PARCEL
Stunning Model Show Condition 5,200 sq. ft. colonial w/walkout basement to wooded ravine, 4.5-car garage, granite counters throughout, custom trim & moldings, 2-way fireplace between library and family room, dual staircases, pub room with wet bar between great room and dining room, large owners suite with huge walk-in closet and luxurious bath, large cedar deck backing to a wooded ravine located in Clear Creek Subdivision. 877 Quarry, Rochester Hills $899,900.
Mint condition custom built 1 1/2 story home with a finished walkout basement on a private 2.92-acre parcel close to Rochester and Romeo. Home features over 8,000 sq. ft. of finely appointed living area that only the discriminating buyer can appreciate, garage parking for 6 cars, all high end finishes throughout, 4 fireplaces, park-like backyard with pond. Finished walkout features 2nd kitchen, wet bar, 5th & 6th bedrooms, and entertainer’s gourmet island kitchen with built-in appliances, absolute move-in condition. 1100 Creekside Drive, Addison Twp $979,900
FINISHED WALKOUT TO BUILT-IN POOL ON ALMOST AN ACRE LOT W/POND
ROCHESTER HILLS PRIVATE GATED COMMUNITY
Custom built Georgian colonial w/finished walkout to built-in pool on private almost acre lot w/pond, 4.5-car garage & circular drive, all high end finishes throughout, entertainers huge gourmet island kitchen w/commercial grade appliances, all bedrooms have private baths, finished walkout w/wet bar and wide open entertaining area, extensive landscaping with waterfall, awesome yearround sun-room overlooking private yard, This is a great home to raise a family! 1683 Chieftan Circle, Oxford Twp $1,049,000
Stunning Estate Home with finished walkout to built in pool on private 1 1/2 acre lot backing to Stoney Creek, garage parking for 6 cars, plus covered parking for 4 more cars, over 10,000 square feet of finely appointed living area located in Exclusive gated community at 6532 Cornerstone Rochester, MI 48306 Offered at $1,299,000.
Tom@TomZibkowski.com www.TomZibkowski.com
Tom Zibkowski Realty Executives Midwest
586-532-6700 Ex 114
When Experience Counts. Over 4,000 Closed Home Sales Since 1982 A RARE FIND 12 ACRE PRIVATE ESTATE - OAKLAND TWP
12,000 SQ. FT W/FINISHED WALKOUT TO BUILT-IN POOL BACKING TO STONY CREEK
Private 12 Acre French Country Manor featuring 12,000 sq. ft. of finely appointed living area. Featuring terraced patios leading to parterre gardens adjoining built-in swimming pool. Helipad provides convenience to land helicopter in backyard and store in state-of-the-art hangar, entertainers gourmet kitchen, finished walkout features lap pool & gaming areas. 5350 Brewster, Rochester Hills $4,950,000.
Custom built 1 1/2 story featuring almost 12,000 sq. ft. of finely appointed living area w/finished walkout to built-in pool backing to Stony Creek Park, awesome floor plan, beautiful gourmet kitchen plus 2nd galley kitchen on main floor, 4 fireplaces, 5.5-car garage plus covered carport area between garages, 56' x 16' theatre room, game room combination on 2nd floor, 3rd full kitchen in finished walk out, 40' x 20' built-in pool plus hot tub area on very private lot backing to Stony Creek Metro Park, Brazilian cherry & travertine floors throughout home. 61871 Bradbury Run, Washington Twp $2,350,000
1 1/2 STORY / FINISHED BASEMENT / 4 CAR GARAGE
1 1/2 STORY HOME WITH A FULLY FINISHED BASEMENT TO PRIVATE YARD WITH BASKETBALL COURT
This Stunning Custom Built home boasts of 2 Master Suites on separate levels. Vaulted ceilings with intricate crown molding set off all the high end materials used throughout. In the Kitchen, no expense was spared with high end appliances and top of the line cabinets and counter tops. The 2 staircases add to the unique design. The finished basement has a full Gourmet kitchen and plenty of space for guests with a bedroom and full bath. 62834 Somerset, Washington Twp $849,900
Stunning completely redone 1 1/2 story with finished walkout basement to private yard backing to woods, home is a designer showcase featuring all todays decor & features, huge gourmet island kitchen, all high end finishes throughout, extra deep finished walkout lower level with wet bar, 2way fireplace, additional bath and walks out to huge brick paver patio; walls of windows overlooking private yard, 8' doors throughout and custom moldings and trim. 4971 Brookside Lane, Washington Twp $929,900
FINISHED WALKOUT TO BUILT IN SWIMMING POOL BACKING TO POND
STUNNING COLONIAL / PRIVATE LOT / WASHINGTON POINTE
Beautiful 3,250 sq. ft. ranch with full finished walkout to built-in swimming pool on a private almost acre lot backing to pond. Gourmet kitchen with commercial grade appliances, fireplace in living room with 2nd fireplace in owners suite, lower level features full kitchen, bar, exercise room and a McCoy Dry Sauna with room for 8-10 people located off bathroom, 2-tiered deck leading down to private (fenced-in) swimming pool area, professionally landscaped, largest lot on the pond, and a 2.5-car over-sized garage with room to add another garage. This is a one of a kind home!! 6718 Pond Drive, Washington $774,900
Stunning colonial on private lot featuring a great floor plan w/2-way fireplace between Great Room & Kitchen Nook, formal dining room & den, dual staircases, wrought iron staircase, all bedrooms have walk-in closets, all closets have professional installed organizers throughout, granite countertops throughout, unfinished extra deep basement with entry from garage, extensive professionally landscaped private yard with custom lighting in front/back yard, 3-car attached garage w/extra high ceiling, located at the end of quiet dead-end/cul-de-sac & backs to nature preserve. 61398 Barclay Drive, Washington Twp, $574,900
FINISHED WALKOUT TO IN-GROUND POOL ON 1.47 ACRE CUL-DE-SAC LOT
BRAND NEW RANCH CONDO ON GLACIER GOLF COURSE
Stunning custom built home with finished walkout to in-ground pool on 1.47 acre cul-de-sac lot, designed by Renowned architect Dominic Tringali, home features 10,000 sq. ft. of finely appointed living area, entertainers dream gourmet island kitchen with built-in commercial grade appliances, 5 custom fireplaces, 4.5 car attached garage plus additional detached garage, 6 bedrooms all with private bathrooms, awesome owner's suite with balcony overlooking grounds, 40' x 22' in-ground swimming pool with electric cover and extensive landscaping. This is truly a one-of-a-kind residence.. 11268 Dino Drive, Bruce Twp $1,380,000
Brand new great room ranch condo with finished daylight basement overlooking 2nd green & fairway of Glacier Golf Course. All the latest design and decorating schemes from todays modern trends. Home features 3 bedrooms and 3 1/2 baths. Ready for immediate possession. 6962 Rawling Drive Washington Twp offered at $514,900.
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STATE HATE GROUPS 28 ORGANIZATIONS MAKE THE LIST OF THE SPLC
BY KEVIN ELLIOTT
cross the country and throughout the state, hate is on the rise. Nationally, there were 917 hate groups identified in 2016 by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), up from 892 the previous year. Those figures include an additional nine such groups operating in Michigan, bringing the state’s number of hate groups to 28 in 2016. Those figures are part of the SPLC’s most recent Hate Map, which lists Ku Klux Klan, Neo-Nazi, white supremacist, black separatist and other hate groups by name and location in each state. The SPLC defines hate groups as any group that has beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their immutable characteristics. The list was compiled using hate group publications and websites, citizen and law enforcement reports, field sources and news reports. Hate group activities can include criminal acts, marches, rallies, speeches, meetings, leafleting or publishing. To be included in the list, each hate group must have participated in at least one hate group activity in 2016. That means some of the additional groups added to the list – which includes four KKK groups, three anti-Muslim and one black separatist group – may have been in existence prior to 2016 but inactive in terms of monitoring. Between 2000 and 2016, the overall number of hate groups in Michigan rose from 14 to 28, with there being the most active groups in 2010 with 35 groups. That increase followed a national trend in the rise of hate groups since the turn of the century, driven in part by anger over Latino immigration and demographic projections showing that whites will no longer hold majority status in the country by about 2040. “That rise accelerated in 2009, the year President (Barack) Obama took office, but declined after that, in part because large numbers of extremists were moving to the web and away from on-the-ground activities,” the SPLC said. “In the last two years, in part due to a presidential campaign that flirted heavily with extremist ideas, the hate group count has risen again.” Included in the most recent rise are new numbers of “anti-Muslim,” black separatist and some other groups while others have declined. For instance, the number of NeoNazi groups in Michigan dropped from 11 in 2007 to four in 2016, due in part to larger groups essentially absorbing some smaller ones. The numbers reflect the actual number of groups in the state, not necessarily the number of members of any one group or category. Also, not all “groups” are actual groups, but
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may include a single individual, or a blog, website or business. For instance, NS Publications, based in Wyandotte, is listed by the SPLC as a Neo-Nazi hate group. The group is a website and online source of National Socialism materials available to purchase. The SPLC also has expanded the number of categories included in its hate map, bringing in additional groups that may have already been active. Deir Yassin Remembered was listed by the SPLC for the first time in 2016 as a Holocaust denial hate group active in Ann Arbor. However, Henry Herskovitz, an advisor on the group’s board, said he has been picketing outside of Ann Arbor’s Beth Israel Congregation for more than a dozen years, with another small local group he formed. Formerly an attendee of the congregation, Herskovitz said he began weekly protests in front of the synagogue after its leaders refused to let him share his photos and views of Palestine with the community after a visit to the region. The group’s name, Deir Yassin, is a reference to the former Palestinian Arab village where more than 100 people were massacred during the 1947-48 civil war. Herskovitz rejects the label of Holocaust denier, instead calling himself and the group “revisionists” who question specifics of the Jewish Holocaust. “None of the revisionists deny that there was widespread suffering in many communities. What they question is the socalled Final Solution that was meant to be ethnic cleansing and extermination,” he said. “They (revisionists) claim there was no homicidal gas chambers used by the Third Reich, and there were far fewer than six million deaths.” Herskovitz said while he’s never been a very religious person, he was raised in a very conservative Jewish home. He said he attended the Beth Israel Congregation for high holiday services from 1970 to 1985 because it brought back memories of his father. “There’s been so many claims about the Holocaust that have been proven false. ... But if these claims that I and many others were raised on are false, then it leads you to ask what else is false, and that leads you to almost question religion.” Earlier this year, Deir Yassin Remembered paid for a billboard near Whitmore Lake that stated, “America First Not Israel.” Outfront Media later called the billboard an “attack ad” and declined to run additional spots, Herskovitz said. Still, he said he doesn’t understand why the SPLC listed the group on the same map as the KKK and Neo-Nazis. “The only thing we hate is mendacity; that’s the whole thing that drives me,” Herskovitz said. “I’ve been lied to my whole life. ‘A land without a people (for a people without a land)’ – what a crock.” Radical Right expert Mark Potok, a former
senior fellow at the SPLC for 20 years prior to departing the center in March 2017 to work on independent projects, said violence or outright slurs alone aren’t qualifiers for a group to land on the SPLC’s Hate Map. “There is no official arbiter, at the end of the day; it’s a matter of opinion,” Potok said. “For the SPLC’s list, it’s a group that espouses doctrines that attack whole groups of people based on a class of characteristics that are unchangeable. The bottom line is that it’s strictly about ideology. Does a group in its writings and speeches of its leaders somehow say someone is less by virtue of their class characteristics? The basis is to understand that it’s not about violence or criminality, and that may be controversial in some minds.” With several of the groups rejecting the “hate group” label and disavowing violent ideologies, those on the list share a common bond, with each claiming to be victims of political correctness whose freedom of speech has been oppressed. Defending that right has become a rallying call for many landing on the SPLC’s map, with the latest battleground in Michigan. A recent lawsuit filed by Clinton Township attorney Kyle Bristow against Michigan State University (MSU) claims the school violated the constitutional rights of a Georgia State University student trying to plan a speech by a prominent white nationalist. Michigan State University denied renting the student accomodations to allow Richard Spencer, head of the National Policy Institute, to speak. The university said the decision wasn’t an attempt at censorship, but out of concern for the safety of its students. Spencer is credited with coining the term “alt right” as a mainstream description of white nationalist ideology being spread throughout college campuses across the country. While not the organizer, he has been considered key to the Unite the Right rally in August that left one person dead and several injured in Charlottesville, Virginia at University of Virginia. The rally is considered by white supremacists and the groups that monitor them to be the largest gathering of Neo-Nazis, KKK members, skinheads and other white nationalist groups in recent history. Michigan State University cited violence at the rally as cause for denying Spencer accommodations in East Lansing. “With the efforts on campuses, there’s a huge hubbub about free speech, and five universities have refused Richard Spencer, and now one is being sued,” Potok said. “These groups are quite cleverly using the battle as if it were some sophisticated discussion of free speech. I’m not arguing they shouldn’t have free speech, but it’s a cynical effort to make their voices louder than they already are.” Foundation for the Marketplace of Ideas is listed by the SPLC as a white nationalist website based in Clinton Township. Founded
in March 2016, its self-described mission is to “educate the public about the freedoms guaranteed by the United States Constitution and people who and organizations which strive to usurp said freedoms.” Executive Director Kyle Bristow is the attorney who recently filed suit against MSU for denying a speaking engagement for white nationalist Richard Spencer, who is listed as one of the group’s board members. Bristow, who failed to return multiple requests for comment to Downtown newsmagazine, caught the attention of the SPLC while still an undergraduate student at MSU. He is also president of the Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) group and served on the student government council. The SPLC said Bristow was recalled after pushing an agenda to capture undocumented immigrants in the area and cut school funding for non-heterosexual groups. As head of the YAF, he planned a “Catch an Illegal Immigrant Day,” a “Koran desecration contest” and led a “straight power” rally in front of Lansing City Hall where protesters held signs saying “End Faggotry” and “Go Back in the Closet.” In 2010, Bristow released “White Apocalypse,” his self-published “semifictional” novel based on a claim that North America was settled by European whites 17,000 years ago, but systematically murdered 5,000 years later by dark-skinned “Amerindians.” To expose the truth, the hero of the book – “a fiery lawyer” – battles in the courtroom and in the streets to squash the “Center for Diversity and Multiculturalism,” which, like the SPLC, maintains an active legal staff and hate group list. Potok said one of the book’s characters, David Greenberg, is based on a version of himself. In the book, Greenberg is described as an “oily, curly haired troll” who works for the Center for Diversity and Multiculturalism before his assassination by the novel’s hero. Laid out in graphic and bloody detail in the novel, the SPLC said Bristow denied the assassination description or that the victim are meant to represent Potok. American Freedom Law Center is an Ann Arbor-based law office that bills itself as “the national’s first truly authentic Judeo-Christian, public-interest law firm.” It was listed by the SPLC as a hate group for the first time in 2016 under the “anti-Muslim” category. “I’m a conservative Catholic and my colleague is an Orthodox Jew from New York. The very suggestion that we are a hate group is an absurdity,” said Robert Muise, the firm’s co-founder. “The Southern Poverty Law Center has a history of going after the KKK, but it has since taken a hard leftist view. They now go after anyone on the conservative right. They don’t like our viewpoint. They don’t like our politics, so they marginalize us and push us off to the fringe. All the SPLC does with their hard left, secular agenda is peddle lies about
organizations such as mine, and many others on the list. It’s an absolute absurdity what they are doing.” Muise, a 13-year veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps who served in Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm in the Persian Gulf War, started a second career as an attorney in 2000. He joined New York attorney David Yerushalmi in 2012 to form the American Freedom Law Center. The SPLC specifically lists Yerushalmi as an anti-Muslim activist “who is a leading proponent of the idea that the United States is threatened by the imposition of Muslic religious law, known as “Shariah.” “For good or ill, the battle of America’s soul is being waged in courtrooms across America, pressed forward by secular progressives and sharia-advocating Muslim Brotherhood interests,” the firm states on its website. In its legal work, the firm is involved in free speech cases involving pro-life advocates and freedom of religion issues, including those pushing for extreme vetting for Islamist Sharia ideology. In March, the firm filed a civil rights suit against the city of Sterling Heights on behalf of residents opposing the construction of a mosque in the city. The firm, according to the SPLC, has also pushed for anti-Shariah laws in legislatures across the country, arguing that America has unique values of liberty and freedom that don’t exist in foreign legal systems. Muise, frustrated by the hate group designation, said it’s the SPLC who is the real hate group, a claim made by dozens of groups who have found themselves on the Hate Map. “They are the ultimate of hate groups. They hate our message and they hate our Christian view and hate our Orthodox Jewish message,” he asserted. “They are enemies of the First Amendment, and they are trying to shut us down by employing tactics like this. “Why not add Al Queda, ISIS and all the other terrorist groups to their list... Guess what, it’s the Muslims who are doing the global terrorism. Go on the FBI most wanted list right now. I’ll tell you what, none of them are conservative Christians. One is a Black Liberation Party person, and one is an environmentalist. I don’t see one conservative Christian on there.” Nationwide, the SPLC said there has been a 197-percent increase in anti-Muslim hate groups in the country from 2015 to 2016, and it has increased from just five in 2010 to 101 in 2016. ACT For America is one of the largest organizations listed by the SPLC as an antiMuslim hate group, with more than a quartermillion members and 1,000 chapters, including those in Detroit and Grand Rapids. In 2008, ACT began a campaign called “Stop Shariah Now,” which aimed to “inform and educate” the public about Shariah and how the group claims it’s creeping into American society and “compromising our
constitutional freedom of speech, press, religion and equality.” ACT worked with Yerushalmi prior to his formation of the American Freedom Law Center to draft antiShariah legislation, which has been passed in a handful of states. Founder and president of ACT for America, Brigette Gabriel, failed to respond to a request by Downtown newsmagazine for comment. Gabriel in the past has said the group was launched in response to the 9/11 attacks to educate officials on national security and defeating terrorism. In 2006, she released her book, “Because They Hate: A Survivor of Islamic Terror Warns America.” The SPLC describes the book a call to action based on the “truth” behind Islam that Gabriel says she learned as a child during the civil war in Lebanon, essentially claiming the religion is inherently violent and that true believers cannot assimilate to American culture and society. Recently, Gabriel has attacked the “radical left” on the organization’s website, stating: “The radical left is organized and dangerous. From violent mobs trying to silence freedom of speech at our universities, to liberal judges endangering all of us by blocking the president from vetting refugees, to the complicit media pushing an anti-America, anti-national security and pro-Islamic, politically correct agenda. The leftist Islamic coalition is waging war against the rule of law and against you and me.” Secure Michigan, based in New Baltimore, operates the website www.securemichigan.org, which brands itself a refugee resettlement monitor that is “monitoring the fundamental transformation of America.” Listed by the SPLC as an antiMuslim hate group, the site is a local offshoot of Maryland activist Ann Corcoran’s blog, Refugee Resettlement Watch. A request for comment from the Michigan site didn’t receive a response. The Secure Michigan website’s domain is registered to Gary Kubiak of Shelby Township, who is the director of the southeast Michigan Tea Party. Phone and email messages left for Kubiak weren’t returned. Content on the website includes an interview with “anti-Islamic whistleblower” Philip Haney by Troy resident Janice Daniels, who was recalled as that city’s mayor in 2012 following anti-homosexual remarks she made to high school students. Secure Michigan also posted a link to Cocoran’s blog and a “Letter to Media” dated September 8, 2017, in which she and about 40 other representatives from SPLC-designated hate groups urge members of the media to ignore the SPLC and its “discredited” map. “To associate public interest law firms and think tanks with Neo-Nazis and the KKK is unconscionable, and represents the height of irresponsible journalism,” the letter states. “All
reputable news organizations should immediately stop using the SPLC’s descriptions of individuals and organizations based on its obvious political prejudices.” Ku Klos Knights of the Ku Klux Klan in Battle Creek is a local chapter of the Klan’s national headquarters in Lugoff, South Carolina. The group’s national website lists Wade Keegan as the Exalted Cyclops in the Battle Creek/Ann Arbor area. The site also lists Keegan as the group’s “National Kleagle,” or the member responsible for recruiting new members. Requests for comment to Keegan weren’t returned. The group describes itself on its website as “white Christian patriots” representing a traditional white klan who believes in the teachings of Jesus, but is against homosexuals. “Therefore, we do not hate,” the group states. Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, listed by the SPLC in Trenton, is a southeast Michigan chapter of the national group headquartered in Pelham, North Carolina. The group claims to be a new KKK that rejects the hate label, instead claiming to be a nonviolent, pro-white civil rights group. The group’s website isn’t functional. Great Lakes Knights of the Ku Klux Klan operates a website and lists its mailing address in Alpena. On its website the group describes itself as “a militant order of White Aryan patriots dedicated to living by the ‘14 words.” Coined by the leader of a white supremacist terrorist group who died in prison, the “14 words” phrase is a slogan adopted by the majority of white supremacist groups around the world, which states, “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children.” The term, according to the Anti Defamation League, reflects the white supremacist worldview in the late 20th century and early 21st centuries that unless immediate action is taken, the white race is doomed to extinction by an alleged “rising tide of color” purportedly controlled and manipulated by Jews. The Great Lakes group states on its website that it’s a “brotherhood of politically motivated individuals” that welcomes both Christians and non-Christians and fully subscribes to National Socialism. Membership, the group states, is open to any “White Aryan individual who is proud of their heritage and ready to fight to preserve their race.” However, the site stipulates that members must be 18 or older and of “sound moral character,” specifically heterosexual, against race mixing and without “any type of record of sexual assault, animal abuse or other crimes deemed inexcusable.” Militant Knights of the Ku Klux Klan is listed by the SPLC in Alpena. A Twitter account for the national group describes itself as an action-oriented racial and political brotherhood that is inspired and motivated by the “heroic deeds and sublime beliefs of the
original KKK.” The group’s website listed on the Twitter page is void of any content. The last visible tweet by the group was made in November 2015, and states “it’s a scientific fact that the white race is superior.” Another tweet includes a photo of the Confederate flag with the words: “In 1861 we went to war over our rights. We have no problem doing it again. Remember that.” Other tweets urge people to march at rallies, such as one protesting a statue of Martin Luther King, Jr., in Stone Mountain, Georgia; and another promoting a march in Tupelo, Mississippi with the National Socialist Movement. National Socialist Movement (NSM), headquartered in Detroit, is considered to be the largest and most prominent Neo-Nazi group in the United States. Once known for its theatrical protests with members wearing full Nazi SS uniforms and swastika badges, the group has rebranded itself in recent years. However, the underlying ideology is rooted in a white supremacist view that aims for a nation of “pure white bred” citizens excluding full rights to Jews, homosexuals and any racially mixed occupants. Formerly the National Socialist American Workers Freedom Movement, leadership was passed to Jeff Schoep in 1994, who renamed it the National Socialist Movement. Going by the moniker “commander,” Schoep expanded the group’s membership by recruiting younger members and allowing members of other white supremacist groups to join. By 2009, the NSM had 61 chapters in 35 states. “I think Detroit is a pinnacle in the movement,” said Schoep, who said he moved a decade ago to the city. “With the economy crumbling and taking a big hit, Detroit has suffered a lot. Movements like ours tend to do well in areas like this because people are looking for answers, and they are tired of the Republican and Democrat stuff.” To broaden the group’s appeal to new members, Schoep said the NSM stopped using the swastika and Nazi dress in its official dress – symbols he said that raised questions from potentials recruits about German heritage requirements. “I don’t care if people call us Nazis, but we aren’t really,” Schoep said. “It had a negative connotation for a long time, but it has lost some luster. I don’t think it has the bite anymore that it used to. Now, people say if you voted for Donald Trump, you’re a Nazi. It doesn’t bother me, but I don’t like it – we are white nationalists.” Setting aside specific labels, the NSM has networked with other white supremacist groups that don’t necessarily subscribe to the National Socialist ideology. In April of 2016, the NSM and members of several KKK, racist skinhead and others groups met to form the Aryan National Alliance. “The name changed to the Nationalist
Front. We changed that in November last year to make it more inclusive. To make it more nationalist. That’s something we came up with to bring the groups together,” Schoep said. “In Charlottesville, we weren’t organizers there, but we did participate. We brought in Nationalist Front groups for that as well.” Online, NSM maintains a comprehensive website featuring the group’s newsletter, downloadable leaflets for printing and distribution and field reports from NSM chapters. In 2007, the group purchased “New Saxon,” a white supremacist social networking site. The group also operates its own record label, NSM88 Records, which the SPLC has labeled as its own hate group. For all the effort, Schoep said, the NSM and other white nationalist groups, as well as he himself, have been targeted by groups trying to censor their message, particularly since the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville. He noted the fate of “Stormfront,” a leading white supremacist website that was forced off the world wide web by its commercial host. More recently, credit card companies blacklisted NSM and other white nationalists groups, making it impossible for them to conduct credit card transactions through their websites, Schoep said. “I have been put on something called the ‘match list’ by MasterCard, meaning I am blacklisted from running any sort of business that accepts credit cards, so my business NSM88 Records can no longer accept credit cards. I do have mainstream businesses that also sells things, but nothing to do with white nationalism, and since my name is on the list, my other business is basically run into the ground,” he said. “Ninety-nine percent of all our business is done through credit cards for both companies, and business is what I know, and what I do for a living, so they have now robbed me of my ability to make a living.” Schoep claims he and other white nationalists are the victims of “political persecution,” and “racial profiling against white people who take an active political stand that certain people do not like or agree with.” “Like our politics or hate it, this is so evil and wrong on any and every level, and I’m not the only one affected by this, almost all of the other nationalist companies I know of in the USA, including newspaper publishers and book publishers have been hit with this same problem.” While the First Amendment protects even deeply offensive and hateful speech, the law only prohibits censorship by the government, said Professor Len Niehoff, a professor of First Amendment law at the University of Michigan Law School. “Private individuals and entities censor things all the time,” he said. “For example, a private employer is generally free to fire an employee for saying things on social media
that embarrass the employer. A government has less latitude to do so. “That’s why private entities are free to decide they don’t want to do business with neo-Fascists and similar organizations. GoDaddy is not a government entity and is free to refuse to continue a domain based on the speech there.” Gallows Tree Wotansvol Alliance, headquartered in Grand Rapids, is identified by SPLC as an active Neo-Nazi group with members in at least nine other states. Calling itself a religious tribe, the group uses the beliefs of Wotansvolk, a Nordic pagan religion founded in the 1990s in-part by white supremacist leader David Lane. The group’s leader, Mike Peterson, has denied in media reports that Neo-Nazi ideology is connected to the group, despite the use of a modified swastika in the group’s symbol. Clarifying his remarks, Peterson said on the group’s website that he embraced white supremacy during a nine-year prison sentence he served as a means for protection from other violent, racially-based gangs. “People that have been to prison have a different set of experiences than what you have. We have met true evil and I have made it a life goal of mine to help people succeed back into society with my outreach efforts,” he said. “This environment followed me out. It was ingrained in me. I had a few bumps trying to merge back into normal society. I carried with me a lot of racial and territorial type elements with me. They weighed on me as I tried to adapt to my new environment.” The American Nazi Party is a white power, Neo-Nazi group based in Westland. Claiming to be from the same party founded in 1960s that subscribed to the ideals and policies of Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Party, the party subscribes to the “14 Words” and the core belief in the “struggle for Aryan racial survival” and “social justice for white working class people.” Requests for comment to the group’s leader, Rocky Suhayda, weren’t returned. A longtime figure in the white supremacy movement known for his extreme rhetoric, Suhayda has said in the past he once represented a Livonia chapter of the KKK. He has also ran unsuccessful attempts for public office in that city’s school district and city council. White Rabbit Radio, is a website dedicated to “exposing white genocide,” and operated by Timothy Murdock, of Dearborn Heights, who the SPLC said in 2013 is an “avowed anti-Semite” who lives in his parents’ basement, where he says he cares for his terminally ill mother. Murdock failed to respond to a request for comment for this article. Murdock is the creator of “Horus the Avenger’s Follow the White Rabbit, an online allegory patterned after Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, a cartoon he publishes on the
website. The idea behind the “white genocide” proposition is that white people are being subjected to a genocide that will ultimately wipe out their race. The site also features a podcast and subscription service. The Social Contract Press (TSCP) in Petoskey is identified by the SPLC as an antiimmigrant, white nationalist hate group for its routine publishing of race-baiting articles written by white nationalists. The SPLC said the group is a program of U.S. Inc., a foundation created by John Tanton, a principal ideologue of the nativist movement. “The TSCP puts an academic veneer of legitimacy over what are essentially racist arguments about the inferiority of today’s immigrants,” the SPLC said. The White Boy Society, which the SPLC said operates throughout Michigan, describes itself on its webpage as a “white brotherhood aimed towards bikers.” Characterized by the SPLC as a white nationalist hate group, the white boys state they are dedicated to uniting “brothers with similar beliefs and ideologies” but isn’t a hate group or supremacy group. “We do not want nor intend to rule supreme over any other race or culture,” the group states on its website. “We know that if the white race is to survive, we must separate and rule over our own destiny.” Core to that goal, the group said, is the opposition of all outsourcing of American jobs, employers that hire illegal aliens to take American jobs and “all media that is detrimental to our children.” Specifically, the group opposes any magazine, newspaper, television show, movie, radio program or website that “constantly shoves black culture down our throats and promotes race mixing with our white children.” The Northern Hammerskins, based in Detroit, is a regional chapter of the Hammerskin Nation racist skinhead group. Self-described as a “leaderless group” of men and women who have adopted the white power skinhead lifestyle, the Hammerskin Nation is considered one of the best organized racist skinhead groups in existence. The SPLC describes the Hammerskin Nation as the “most widely dispersed and most dangerous” Skinhead group known. Hammerskins first emerged in the 1980s as the Dallas-based Confederate Hammerskins, then considered street gangs. Through its growth and the development of a national presence, the group formed additional chapters around the country, absorbing smaller skinhead groups along the way. The Northern Hammerskins chapter was created about 1988 when one of the former Confederate Hammerskin leaders moved to Detroit, eventually picking up locally established crews, such as Detroit Area Skin Heads (DASH), according to the Hammerskin Nation’s website. Now a dominant racist skinhead group in
the country, Hammkerskin Nation and the Northern Hammerskin members are known for violent crimes both inside and out of the prison system. Requests for comment through the group’s national website weren’t returned. Yahweh’s Truth in Linwood is categorized by the SPLC as a hate group led by minister James Wickstrom, which the center said “may be America’s hardest-line preacher of the racist and anti-Semitic movement of Christian Identity.” The movement’s theology is based in the belief that the return of Jews to Israel is essential to the fulfillment of end-time prophecy. Known for his violent, raging sermons calling for the extermination of Jews, Wickstrom is a former tool salesman who once protested the Vietnam War on grounds it was being fought for “Jew bankers,” according to the SPLC. In the past, he has been a popular speaker at Neo-Nazi gatherings. Today, he broadcasts Yahweh’s Truth, a weekly internet radio program. “Thank you for writing, but I am not interested in any interview with you at any time, nor in the future,” Wickstrom responded to Downtown newsmagazine’s request for comment. TC (Traverse City) Family, labeled by the SPLC as an anti-LGBT hate group, is a nonprofit organization claiming to “defend family” in Traverse City and Northwest Michigan. The group’s founder, Bill Wiesner, said he exposes the agenda of adult homosexualists who are promoting dangerous homosexual behavior to our K-12 children. As the sole operator of TC Family, Wiesner said he has handed out about 8,000 pamphlets on the dangers of the LGBT lifestyle. “I’m mostly doing it on my own, he said. “I have given hand-outs at (city) commission meetings, school board meetings, human rights commission meetings, and I send them to the local press,” he said. “I’ve been doing it on the street since about 2007. I’ve never harmed anyone. I’ve had my signs attacked three times.” Wiesner has been kicked out of several public meetings for sharing anti-LGBT comments. In April 2016, several Traverse City city commissioners walked of their own meeting while Wiesner spoke during the public comment portion. Referencing his own experience and the writings of other anti-LBGT activists, Wiesner typically blends opinion and religion, along with what he considers facts on health and wellnes, to craft his message. “I was part of the sexual revolution back in the 1960s and 70s, until I devoted my life to God in 1975,” he said. “I lived through it, and I didn’t find anything to me that was good about it.” Wiesner said his message isn’t one of hate, rather it’s about sharing “the truth.”
“We don’t hate, we love them enough to share the truth in love. It’s not hateful to tell the truth,” he said. “No matter how wellmeaning a person is, those who say they are so-called ‘allies,’ they are not real allies if it’s not based in truth.” The Nation of Islam, with chapters in Detroit, Grand Rapids and Benton Harbor, is designated by the SPLC as a Black Separatist hate group. Founded in 1930, the Nation of Islam is one the best known organized hate groups in black America, and subscribes to a theology of innate black superiority over whites and racist, anti-Semitic, anti-gay rhetoric, the SPLC said. The Nation of Islam teaches that intermarriage or race mixing should be prohibited, a point specifically made on its official platform, published in 1965. The SPLC said the groups’s leader, Louis Farrakhan, has been willing to tie himself to authoritarian and violent repressive foreign leaders for the sake of furthering black and Islamic administrators worldwide. In general, the SPLC states that black separatists oppose integration and racial intermarriage, and desire separate institutions, or in some cases a separate nation, for blacks. While some forms of black separatism are strongly anti-white and antiSemitic, not all are. Others are religious versions that assert that blacks are the “chosen people” of God. The Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge (ISUPK) is headquartered in Darby, Pennsylvania, with a local chapter in Detroit. The group holds the belief that American blacks are descendants of the 12 Tribes of Israel, along with Hispanics and Native Americans. The SPLC categories the ISUPK as a black separatist hate group. Captain Labon Yahawabah, with the Detroit chapter of the ISUPK, said the SPLC’s designation as a hate group is about trying to silence the group’s speech. “Our message to black people is that it’s time to wake up out of stupor,” he said. “The message from (Martin Luther King, Jr.) was that if we just love, we would receive that back. We express that on how we support other nations, but we receive no love back.” Yahawabah said the ISUPK urges blacks to support blacks on philosophical and economic levels. He said supporting black-owned businesses in a majority-black city is one example of separation. Blacks also need to separate their religion from traditional Christian beliefs, which means separating black holidays from traditional American holidays, he said. “From a religious point of view, America describes the devil as being a beast of the kind with horns, but the Bible says hell is captivity. Under that, the monster would do things that we’ve experienced in America – all the things the Bible describes as hell,” he said.
“So, when we say the white man is the devil, we mean he is the deceiver... they see that as hate speech.” Israel United In Christ, according to the SPLC, is national black separatist group with a chapter in Detroit. Founded in 2003, the group subscribes to a black Hebrew Israelite theology, similar to that of the Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge, in that black Americans and Hispanics are the biblical 12 Tribes of the Nation of Israel. The group states disobedience to God’s laws have been the root of all its members troubles, calling for racial, social and economic change based on separatism. The Black Riders Liberation Party is headquartered in Los Angeles with a local group operating in Detroit. The SPLC designates the group as a black separatist hate group. The group was unable to be reached for an interview prior to the publication of this article. The group’s website describes the Black Riders Liberation Party (BRLP) as a “new generation of the Black Panther Party for Self Defense,” with its roots in the California prison system. From the group’s California-based website, the main focus of the BRLP has been “organizing to educate the masses of Afrikan people in this country and all throughout the diaspora, to stop beging this system for freedom and to just take it.” All Eyes on Egipt Bookstore has several bookstores across the country, including one in Detroit, which has been designated a black separatist hate group by the SPLC. The stores are operated by the Nuwaubian Nation of Moors. Nuwaubianism, the SPLC said, is best understood as a cult that promotes a bizarre and complicated ‘theology.’ In its description of Nuwaubians, the SPLC says the group mixes black supremacist ideas with worship of the Egyptians and their pyramids; a belief in UFOs and various conspiracies related to the Illuminati and the Bilderbergers; and the belief that Nuwaubianismnot isn’t a theology, but a “factology,” also called “Right Knowledge” and other names. Founded in 1970, the SPLC states the group’s leader, Dwight York, took advantage of his followers by sexually abusing their children and conning the adults out of their possessions. In 2004, York was sentenced to 135 years in prison for child molestation and other crimes. While there are more than two dozen designated hate groups operating in Michigan, the level of monitoring by law enforcement isn’t released to the public, with the FBI’s Detroit office declining to comment on investigation activity. “The FBI investigates activity which may constitute a federal crime or pose a threat to national security. Our focus is not on membership in particular groups or adherence
to particular ideologies or beliefs, but on criminal activity,” said Timothy Wiley, public affairs officer for the FBI’s office in Detroit. “The FBI cannot initiate an investigation based solely on an individual’s race, ethnicity, national origin, religion or the exercise of the First Amendment or other Constitutional rights, and we remain committed to protecting those rights for all Americans.” Other groups, such as the SPLC and the Anti Defamation League, however, are able to gather information about hate groups in ways that law enforcement can’t, said Heidi Budaj, regional director for the Anti Defamation League (ADL). “Law enforcement is bound by certain laws, for instance they can’t follow someone on social media or other online places unless they have a reason. We aren’t bound by that,” she said. “If we see someone is moving toward some kind of action, we inform law enforcement.” Budaj said they began following two young people in a Detroit-area chartrooms a couple of years ago who were following ISIS and were trying to join the terrorist group. “They said if they couldn’t join ISIS, they would bring ISIS here,” she said. “At that point, we informed law enforcement and they brought them in.” Monitoring is just part of the work the ADL does, which is the largest nongovernmental trainer of law enforcement in the country. But Budaj said that just because a group isn’t committing a crime doesn’t mean citizens shouldn’t be concerned. People who espouse these kinds of ideologies – anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant and homophobic beliefs – are more willing to use hate speech than we have seen in a long, long time,” she said. “One of the things I do is take complaints. We used to get two or three calls a month that would be egregious enough for us to get involved. Now, we get two or three every day. And every day I say there is no way I could hear something worse than the day before, and I do.” With the increase of protected hate speech is an increase of hate group membership, with the groups taking more mainstream recruiting efforts in an attempt to appeal to socially isolated kids or those tired or white students tired of hearing about white privilege. However, rather than attempting to censor hate speech, Budaj said it should be countered with the type of speech that reminds people we are nation of immigrants. “We as a society have to look at what we are teaching our children. If they are being exposed to hate speech in our homes or among their peers, we are doing a great disservice to them,” she said. “They will be working in diverse organizations with diverse team members. If we don’t give them the tools to work with others who are different, it will hold them back, not just society.”
DANIEL ELLSBERG GROWING UP IN MICHIGAN, THE PENTAGON PAPERS, CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND HIS CONTINUED IMPACT
eemed "the most dangerous man in America" by former United States Secretary of State and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger for leaking a top-secret defense study now known as The Pentagon Papers, Daniel Ellsberg risked his freedom to reveal government lies that started and escalated the war in Vietnam. Raised in metro Detroit and graduating from Cranbrook Schools in 1948, Ellsberg's later studies led him to work as a consultant on the country's war strategy, including nuclear plans still in use today. His most recent book, set to be released in December 2017, "The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner," promises to release new secrets about the country's nuclear war policy. Ellsberg recently spoke to Downtown reporter Kevin Elliott about the book, as well as his life before and after the release of the Pentagon Papers in 1971.
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How did you come to Michigan, to Cranbrook Schools? How did that come about and what were your plans at the time? I didn’t have a lot of plans when I was 12. Actually my mother had very specific plans for me to be a concert pianist, and I had been working on that since I was 5. I had gone to grade school in Highland Park, Michigan, at quite a good public school. I’ve always regretted what I heard about our country and the decline of its public schools in my lifetime. My mother arranged for me to go to school only half-days, which was the time that I was about 7 or 8. I took an I.Q. test, I don’t know the results of it, but they allowed me to go only in the mornings so I could practice in the afternoons. I spent all of my time, essentially, from basically 5 to 15 when my mother died, and even a couple of years after that, doing nothing but playing the piano, as I recall it. I had recitals every year. My teacher was an accompanist to the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, and we had various recitals, but one big one every year that I had to practice for all year. By the time I was 8 or 9, and certainly 10, I was practicing for four hours a day, then I got up to six hours a day. She wanted me to go to a good school, and she heard about Cranbrook somewhere. I took another test for Cranbrook, and was accepted when I was 12, I think, for the 7th grade. I started that year in February in grade school. They started me in the beginning of the year, so I actually went back half a year in the 7th grade at Cranbrook as a full-scholarship student. My father had been an engineer at Albert Kahn, in the Fisher Building in Detroit. He worked during the year as the chief structural engineer on the Ford Willow Run plant, which built B-24s on an assembly line, hanging from hooks. As a little boy, he took me out to Willow Run when it got into operation, and there were B-24 bodies in a line. Altogether, the line was a mile-and-a-quarter long. It was a very impressive sight, and I was very proud of my father. He went on to be chief structural engineer on the Dodge Chicago plant, which made engines, for I think, for B-29s. When these planes would come off the line, by the way, they would just be lowered to the ground and filled with gas, and fly away. It was an impressive operation – Detroit, the arsenal of democracy. My mom, she just wanted me to go to a good school, and Cranbrook was a very good school, and as far as I know, still is a very good school, really excellent. When I went to Harvard, I found the classes relatively easy in a way because I had five years of quite strict academic upbringing, and a lot of homework. I was very well prepared for that. The future that stretched before was that of a pianist, even though I became aware, I didn’t think I was going to have the career of my hero, Vladimir Horowitz – I just wasn’t up to that. My impression then was that it is hard to make a living as a concert pianist unless you were in the very top, and I didn’t expect to be there. In my last years at Cranbrook, my brother, who was 11 years older, my half-brother was quite radical, introduced me to economics. He actually bought me an economic textbook for my Christmas present in my junior year at Cranbrook. I got very interested in economics, especially in labor economics. I read books about the labor movement in Detroit. Walter Reuther was my hero, as a matter of fact. I remember very well being just
thunderstruck when he was shot in Detroit during that period by what turned out to be, later, a coalition of manufacturers who hired several gunmen from Canada to come over and shoot him with a shotgun. It didn’t kill him. It wounded his arm, forever. I actually was regarded as pretty radical, for my interest in the labor movement, at Cranbrook. The non-scholarship students were nearly all children of auto executives from Bloomfield Hills or elsewhere, and were quite Republican or right wing. So, when I was interested in Henry Wallace, for example, my senior year there, they regarded me as very leftist. I also wrote a humor column for “The Crane,” the Cranbrook newspaper, and I wrote a column every week anonymously, and loved watching people read it and laugh, and not know who the author was until our graduation. I was the class valedictorian. Oddly enough looking back on it, I was voted “most likely to make a contribution to human welfare,” which was interesting. I think that happened. I think they were right. Thank you. Anyway, I did what I could. I took an SAT for a competition run by the Pepsi Cola Corporation, which had a foundation for sending two students from each state on the basis of tests to a college of their choice anywhere with all expenses paid. The Pepsi Cola Scholarship. It was based on two SATs, one for the state or one nationally, or something like that. I did well on both of those and was one of the two from Michigan who could go anywhere they wanted. I chose Harvard. The summer that I graduated from (Cranbrook), 1948, I did two things. I thought I was going to have a career in the labor movement as a labor economist. Or, a labor organizer, romantically. That summer, between Cranbrook and Harvard, I actually spent all summer at the Dodge Hamtramck plant on the night shift. The day shift was entirely occupied by Polish Americans, and southerners, blacks and acolytes like me, were on the afternoon shifts. It was very, very hot in the summers in Detroit. That was a very interesting summer. It permanently damaged my hearing. I worked in the press shop of a car manufacturer, and if you’ve never been in a press shop, it’s very noisy. You open the door and you go into this huge loft-like building where they have several-story high presses that press out the entire top of the car. Then others press out the fenders and sides and so forth. I think its three or four stories high, and the press would come down: eeeeeyra – crash! Stepping into that building was like diving into a pool of sound. We didn’t, in those days, have something for our ears, that was something the union brought in later. So, my high-pitched frequencies got cut off at that age, and I’ve been wearing hearing aids now the whole time. It was the next year that I worked on a ranch in Wyoming stacking hay. Very, very hard work. The hardest work I ever did, physically. I haven’t had a life of hard physical work. I’m a very white collar person, but that was very hard.
I ACTUALLY WAS REGARDED AS PRETTY RADICAL, FOR MY INTEREST IN THE LABOR MOVEMENT, AT CRANBROOK. THE NON-SCHOLARSHIP STUDENTS WERE NEARLY ALL CHILDREN OF AUTO EXECUTIVES ... AND WERE QUITE REPUBLICAN OR RIGHT WING.
Your work in economics and the Ellsberg Paradox, did that transition well into your work with Rand? I was working on labor economics my first few years at Harvard, then my academic advisor said I should write a better thesis in theory. I wrote an honor’s thesis on that subject. I got summa cum laude at Harvard, and people that read it, the Harvard
Society of Fellows, which is an alternate to the PhD program, but in between there, I did get a Woodrow Wilson scholarship, which I could take anywhere. I went to Cambridge University in England, following a professor of mine who moved over there. I spent that year with my wife. I had got married in the middle of my junior year, so we went back to England in ‘52-’53. Meanwhile, the Korean War was still on, or the Korean Emergency, and I had been deferred on a student fellowship in 1951. So I had a couple of years of deferment and felt that I would eventually pay that by going into the service. I chose the Marine Corps. My wife, who I married when I was 19, had a Marine colonel for a father who became a brigadier general when he retired. She’d grown up on Marine bases, and loved the Marines. I thought it would please her to be back on a Marine base. I went in the Marines in ‘53 for two years, then extended for a year because my battalion was going to the Mediterranean and we had indications, including from the Alsop Brothers columnists, that we would be at war with Egypt over the Suez Canal. I couldn’t stand the thought of being back at Harvard for the Society of Fellows while my battalion was fighting possibly in the Middle East. We were there for six months during the Suez Crisis. We evacuated all of the Americans from Alexandria at one point while the British and French were attacking Egypt. Then I came back to the Society of Fellows. To answer your question, I had written this thesis on game theory. I wrote several articles based on that, and I remember I was correcting proofs by torchlight, flashlight and moonlight in a foxhole in Vieques during several months of maneuvers in the Marines. When I was back in the Society of Fellows, I got interested in an off-shoot of game theory. I have been a critic of game theory, almost the first one, and one of the few up to this day to criticize the foundations of game theory. But that spun off into a field called decision theory, which deals with decisionmaking under uncertainty – not only against an advisory, like game theory, but against nature, in effect. Decisions like, do we evacuate Houston in the face of uncertain warning of a hurricane coming along? A hurricane isn’t a conscious adversary, except in the case of about a third of our country who can only understand that in terms of divine will. But just any kind of decision under uncertainty. I wrote my PhD thesis at Rand (Corporation). I took six months off from my work at Rand and did a PhD theory on decisionmaking under uncertainty. I concluded in that thesis that the reigning theory at that time, which was that people should act as if they assign precise probabilities to events; like say, it’s 35 percent likely that the hurricane in Houston will make landfall on a certain day, or something like that – I felt that was unrealistic, not only in terms of their expectations, but everybody admits they were more vague than that. They even act as if they assign post-probabilities to events, and I had a different theory of how that worked, which I called ‘situation ambiguity,’ which is where you don’t know enough to assign even close probabilities to events.
Machine.” In light of that, we wanted to ask you how from your own life the importance of the Pentagon Papers and your work as a defense analyst at the Rand Corporation led you to write a book about the country’s nuclear war strategy from the 1960s to today, what that strategy involved then and where you believe we are today? I went to Rand one summer when I was in the Society of Fellows. It was sort of the Vatican of decision theory. So, I was drawn to Rand not because of their defense work for the Air Force, but because their mathematics department, in particular, and their economics department, had done a lot of work in decision theory and game theory. I went as an economist, which was my field at that point. The economics department was working on nuclear strategy a great deal for historical reasons I won’t go into. I was drawn to the particular problem of a decision, which was the president’s decision whether to go to nuclear war or not on the basis of uncertain warning. We had, and have, an elaborate warning system of radars and eventually satellites – infrared satellites and communication satellites – to give us warning of the Soviet, in those days, attack. Or Russian attack, now. Or, anybody else. Big radars in Alaska and Greenland and elsewhere. The problem was though, that this warning would never be certain. It would never say an attack is on the way – it would say here are the indications, that it may be, and how many missiles and so forth. It turned out that these were subject to a great deal of mistakes and errors; say mistaking a flock of geese for a flock of planes, for example. Or sunlight glinting off clouds as being the infrared plumes of missiles rising. That happened exactly in 1983. In 1983, the Russians had exactly that experience, and a colonel in the Soviet Union was faced with the question of whether to tell his superiors that an American attack was on the way, which is what his satellite warnings were telling him. He wasn’t sure, and rightly so. It was a false alarm. He chose not to reveal the full degree of evidence to his superiors because he suspected it was not right. Fortunately, he was right, and his decision was right, so we are still here. Soviets at that time were poised, in the same way that we would have been at that time, for a pre-emptive attack based on that, to get their missiles off the ground before ours arrived. This is very close to the subject of my book. Also, to get our remaining missiles before they got launched. The assumption being that there weren’t just empty holes for them to get, but that some missiles were on the way but others hadn’t yet been launched. They would have launched that to limit the damage, supposedly, to their country from the oncoming attack, and to prevent their retaliation from being destroyed on the ground. That was an exact imitation of our plans from the late ‘50s on, from the time they had nuclear weapons to threaten us with. Our countries have always been fixed on the idea of pre-emption, even though they try to be very foggy about this to the public. It’s what’s called “launch on warning.” You press the button here before the enemy warheads have arrived. That is the basis of our planning, and always has been. That is extremely dangerous because if false alarms continue as they have until not too long ago, that means potentially, the world as we know it can be destroyed by that effect.
YOU PRESS THE BUTTON HERE BEFORE THE ENEMY WARHEADS HAVE ARRIVED...THAT IS EXTREMELY DANGEROUS... BECAUSE IF FALSE ALARMS CONTINUE AS THEY HAVE UNTIL NOT TOO LONG AGO... THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT CAN BE DESTROYED...
When we initially spoke, we thought we would talk about the Pentagon Papers, of course that was before the presidential election and the completion of your book “The Doomsday
Since the Russians imitated our own strategic forces in the mid ‘60s, really after Khruschev under Brezhnev, after the Cuban Missile Crisis had humiliated them, they spent an enormous amount of money buying what amounted to a strategic air command of their own based mainly on missiles, where ours started with bombers. Until that time, they had very little that could hit the United States, just as North Korea doesn’t have that now in its missile capability, and is striving to get it so they will have the retaliatory ability against the US. When I went to Rand and got top secret clearance, I was working on deterring a Soviet surprise attack that would wipe out our strategic air command and leave them essentially with a monopoly of nuclear weapons. That was an entirely illusory problem, which I was working on night and day. I was working 70 hours a week at Rand to deter or pre-empt a Soviet attack, which could not have happened. The Soviets in 1960 and ‘61 had exactly four ICBMs (Inter Continental Ballistic Missiles) that could hit the United States, which could have been wiped out by a single plane on our part, compared to thousands of warheads on planes and missiles, and submarine missiles within range of the Soviet Union. They essentially had nothing. It was like the Germans in World War II, where the Manhattan Project had worked night and day to deter a German capability of nuclear weapons, which didn’t exist because they had stopped their program in June of ‘42, about the time we started ours. They had nothing. And, North Korea today has nothing against the United States, but will as things go on, unless we launch a catastrophic war against North Korea. During that period, there were false alarms that could have led us to attack the Soviet Union, in which case they did have a huge capability against Europe. Nothing against the US – but huge against Europe. Had we attacked them, west Europe would have (been) annihilated, and the Soviets would have been annihilated. In the early days, we would have not have been (annihilated), so our calculations showed. Our calculations were wrong. In 1983, nearly 40 years into the nuclear era, a bunch of environmental scientists discovered that the attacks on cities – which we planned from the very beginning starting with Hiroshima and Nagasaki – they discovered that the smoke from those burning cities would have been lofted by the nuclear attack into the stratosphere. There the smoke would remain and be lofted further over time by sunlight as it warmed. It would girdle the globe and prevent most sunlight – 70 percent, perhaps of sunlight reaching the earth – which would have led to a nuclear winter all year round, killing all harvests and destroying all our food supplies. So, everything depending on vegetation – all the primates, all the vertebrates – would have died. Probably not all humans would die. We are so adaptable, we can live on mollusks in the south seas down near Australia and probably around the tip of Africa. Probably humans, the most adaptable mammals, would survive to some extent. Less than 1 percent of the current population, but that’s a lot, many millions. Maybe 100 million. Everything else goes. That would have happened, I show in my book, as early as 1950 or ‘52, when we had a thousand fission warheads trained on cities in the Soviet Union. We wouldn’t have gotten off scott free. Like everyone else, we would have starved in about a year. You’d be dead.
The Cuban Missile Crisis, as I go into in the book, had that gone into large scale, US-led surprise attack, in the course of fighting with Russians it would have most certainly escalated, we would have died from it. Although, we didn’t know that at that point. I was involved in the Cuban Missile Crisis at a high staff level as a consultant. The idea of preempting on either side, Russia or the US, has been a hoax all this time. When I look now at the possibility of war arising between Russia and Americans in the Ukraine, as has never happened. Or in a more limited way in Syria, that just leads to a cold war that will eventually end up in a hot war. If fighting starts in the Ukraine and we end up shooting at Russians and they at us, that’s never happened, ever, ever. I mean except, you know, the troops we sent over in 1918 and 1917 against the Russian Revolution for a few months. But other than that, there’s been no fighting between Russians and us. We both have this doomsday machine, as I call it using (Herman) Kahn’s term, my colleague at Rand. But a system that destroys most all life on earth. Actually it won’t destroy the bacteria, the microbes. That’s not a joke. They will survive, mostly. But the larger animals will not, even if some humans do. So it’s fairly called, I think, a “doomsday machine.” It’s doom of the 7 billion humans. A war between the US and Russia right now would mean starvation within a year or so, with our stocks of food. Starvation of about 7 billion of them – we have about 7.4 billion. That’s the system we are threatening, and building up. Obama decided to program a trillion dollars worth of new weapons over 30 years in order to get Congress to sign on to his START II Treaty, which in the end has never been ratified. We promised them we would build up these weapons. Hillary promised to do it, and Trump is in the process of doing it. He’s in the process of rebuilding at the cost of a trillion dollars a machine, that if it were set in motion planes, missiles and submarine missiles on the basis of, let’s say, a mistaken electronic warning. In 1995, after the Cold War, Yeltsin is told a missile may be coming toward Moscow. He’s looking at his briefcase that has the nuclear code, and some of his generals are telling him, ‘go, before this thing wipes out Moscow and our command and control.’ He hesitates. It seems too long for this thing to hit. They finally decide it’s not real. In fact, it was a Norwegian weather rocket. A weather rocket. One. Why would NATO be sending one rocket against them? And some people thought it was an attack. If he would have listened to his generals, what some of his generals had told him to do, we would not be talking. We – you and I – would have starved to death with our children by 1995 or 1996. That’s the system both sides are rebuilding now. Two doomsday machines. It’s the most insane and immoral policy in the history and prehistory of our species.
EVEN WHILE MAINTAINING NUCLEAR DETERRENCE, WE HAVE NO RATIONAL, STRATEGIC OR MILITARY OR ANY KIND OF HUMAN INTEREST, OTHER THAN THE JOBS AND PROFITS THAT ARE INVOLVED, WHICH ARE MORE THAN SUFFICIENT TO GET IT BUILT.
In your book, do you come to a conclusion on how it can be reversed? They should not exist, our ICBMs. And they haven’t had any rationale (to keep them) for 50 years, since we have had submarine-launched missiles, which are not vulnerable (to attack). These are vulnerable. We already have the ability, very accurately, to destroy Russian-based land missiles, if we want to get them off
the ground fast if there is warning, a false warning for example. Suppose the warning isn’t false. That they really are attacking. Do the ICBMs do anything for us if we send them off? Zero. A Russian attack would be suicidal for them, and for us. Our response would be suicidal for them and for us, and for everybody else. There’s absolutely nothing to be said for these (missiles), except that they provide jobs and real estate values and votes in Montana, North Dakota and Wyoming. The senators from those states formed an ICBM caucus so that they don’t get rid of these ICBMs. Secretary of Defense William Perry under Clinton has written in op-eds that we should get rid of our ICBMs and we should have done it long ago. Heads of staff, like General Cartwright, or General Lee Butler, who was head of Strategic Air Command, said get rid of the ICBMs. But no. As I said, someone has to build them, and that’s jobs. Should the Russians attack them? No, that’s totally irrational. The same with us. But here we are, ‘decision making under uncertainty,’ which is the mark of a species that should not be trusted with nuclear weapons. ‘Mutually assured destruction’ is still the strategy? That was just a phrase that McNamara used, but it describes the reality. In view of that reality, he should have recommended, in strategic terms, cutting down our warheads to a level that would be sufficient to deter. Here’s a question: Herb York, director of Livermore Laboratory, one of the two campuses at the University of California that has designed all of our nuclear weapons. He was the first director of that, then he was the director of research and engineering for the Defense Department. He asked, “How many explosions on our enemy’s territory are needed to do that. How many survivable hits are needed to deter attack?” How many cities do you have to destroy, or have the capability, to deter an attack. What would you say? Think about it. You’re president, what would it take you to deter attack on another country? How many cities are you prepared to lose?
announcing it. Sign a peace treaty with them and say ‘we are not going to do regime change in this tyrannous country of North Korea.’ Stop talking about overthrowing them and get them to freeze their warhead program and their missile program, so they don’t get an ICBM and they don’t get an H-bomb. It can only be done by reaching concessions of the form of ceasing to announce to them that we are preparing for regime change and for invading them. That’s where we should go, and where I hoped Trump would go, but it’s not where he’s going. He’s going toward confrontation. If there is war with North Korea, millions of South Koreans, and probably Japanese, will die, including tens of thousands of American soldiers in South Korea. No civilians in the US will die, probably. Only our allies. But it won’t cause nuclear winter. Even a war between India and Pakistan would not cause nuclear winter, but it would cause a nuclear famine, it’s been shown, that would affect about 2 billion of our people in the world who are most malnourished by the loss of sunlight. It wouldn’t be enough to stop all harvests, just enough to shorten harvests and to kill some, and lower the food supply enough to kill 2 billion people. A war between the US and Russia kills nearly everybody. So, we shouldn’t be talking about preparing for war with Russians, period. So, no ICMBs, no launch on warning, no first use of nuclear weapons – several states are not going to give up that ship – but we have no rationale for first use of nuclear weapons, and the Russians don’t really. Greatly lower number of SLBMs (Submarine Launched Ballistic Missiles) because those are accurate and they do threaten any remaining land-based forces you could have, and you want to remove that threat for our own security and world security because it encourages the other side to launch on warning, or false warning, which is a danger. Take away that threat, the way that Gorbachev took away the threat to NATO by removing 5,000 East Line battle tanks from East Germany in 1986 or ‘87. Take away the threat, then negotiate. Dismantle the doomsday machine, and of course dismantle the Russian’s. They should do that. But, even if they didn’t, it would remove the threat of these two hair-trigger doomsday machines that now are each threatened to go off on the basis of false warning. We can take that away, and we should. Obama was interested in doing that, by the way, but his own defense people opposed it, for reasons that are rather obscure, but in the end, came down to this: There’s a lot of money making these missiles and these weapons, and people’s jobs depend on them, regions depend on them, and votes and campaign donations. That’s enough to keep it going. And that’s why we live on the brink of a kind of final catastrophe. As I say in the book, “For years, our strategic weapon forces have posed a catastrophe waiting to happen.” Like Katrina, where effects of the hurricane on the levies was foreseen years ahead. Houston, just now, where the total paving over of the entire area has been predicted for years meant that a large hurricane would flood the place. The decisionmaking under that, which is to disregard the catastrophe, the low probability, but not a zero probability of a catastrophe. To just disregard it. That’s the way humans make decisions under uncertainty. And the result is the flooding of New Orleans, the flooding of Houston, the near
EVEN A WAR BETWEEN INDIA AND PAKISTAN WOULD NOT CAUSE NUCLEAR WINTER, BUT IT WOULD CAUSE A NUCLEAR FAMINE, IT'S BEEN SHOWN, THAT WOULD AFFECT ABOUT 2 BILLION OF OUR PEOPLE IN THE WORLD WHO ARE MOST MALNOURISHED.
I would say one would be enough. That’s what he said. Then he said, you might want more than one to assure them you had at least one to go. By the way, how many survivable warheads did Saddam Hussein have to have – he didn’t have any – or Iran, to deter an attack? Well, one would go very far. Ten maybe. That’s roughly what North Korea has now. Ten, maybe 20, maybe a little more. And they may not have any, by the way. We don’t know if they have weaponized anything to go on a missile, but they probably have, and they certainly do have the warheads. They have enough for maybe 10 or 20 warheads – pretty good deterrence for most people. None yet to get the United States, which is what they are working on, and it would be good to stop them from that. But the only way you’re going to do that is by concessions by negotiations in which you induce them, for instance, by stopping exercises rehearsing invading North Korea, which is what we just did a month ago. And, by not talking about decapitating them in a surprise attack, or otherwise, which was in the news just yesterday about South Korea going into a special decapitation mode, but we have been exercising that for years and
evacuation of Tokyo by Fukushima. Those are all tiny, tiny warnings of what a nuclear war would be. A large nuclear war. Have some of your thoughts changed since releasing the Pentagon Papers? At one time you referred to it as civil disobedience. I have known since ‘64 when the president lied us into the Vietnam War, my president, LBJ, lied us in. I know presidents are more than capable of lying us into catastrophes – a very small catastrophe by comparison, but not so tiny in human terms. A president who lies us in is prepared to make decisions that are very reckless, and dangerous. Unnecessary and unjustifiable. I also know, from nuclear planning, which I had known about to some degree since 1958 or ‘59, 1960, but in particular, 1961, that our nuclear decisionmaking had the seeds of catastrophe in it. But I kept my mouth shut, like everybody else, which I regret. As I say in my book, “I regret very strongly not saying what I’m saying in the book with documents, which I had then, or in ‘61. Just as I regret that I didn’t reveal the lies about the Tonkin Gulf that I talk about in my previous book, ‘Secrets.’” The first chapter in that is about the Tonkin Gulf, which was my first night in the Pentagon, by coincidence. It was my first day, but it went into night because we launched our first bombing raids against Vietnam that night, August 4. It was just a coincidence that I started that day. So I spent the night in the Pentagon, following those raids because there is a 12hour time difference between the Pentagon and the Tonkin Gulf. Daytime there when we were bombing was nighttime in Washington. I knew right then that we were being lied to. I knew about the lie. I then go to Vietnam, I’m there for two years. I got hepatitis, or I would have stayed on. I came back and warned people that we should get out of Vietnam in 1967, a widely held view in the Defense Department, and held by Secretary of Defense (Robert) McNamara when I came and talked to him in the summer of 1967. But, how to do it without losing face politically. McNamara finally recommended we do it. And he was fired for it by LBJ, who wasn’t ready to do that. So, the Tet Offensive occurred, etc., etc., the war goes on after McNamara leaves for seven years, until 1975. By 1969, I had the example of young Americans who were resisting the draft on Ghandian principles, that they should nonviolently tell the truth and resist. They just had their own lives. Their own freedom to give, and they went to jail by thousands to resist that war. I realized that was something I could do – go to prison – and that I had secrets. This is what I reveal in the book for the first time. You might be the first reporter I’ve talked to about it. I will say that I realized then that I should be telling dangers of nuclear war, the same way I intended to tell the dangers of continuing in Vietnam, which was the Pentagon Papers. I decided the example of Americans like Randall Kehler, who was going to prison. I go into this in “Secrets” If you want to know how we got into Vietnam and how we got out of Vietnam in 1975, that’s a good book. The point is, I realized that telling the truth could be the right thing to do. It could be the right decision to make, even if the consequences were prison for myself. In comparison of consequences of not telling, the consequences could be millions of deaths, as in Vietnam for the Vietnamese, tens of thousands, 58,000 for the US. But in terms of nuclear wars, we
are talking not of hundreds of millions, but of billions. Billions and billions, up to 7 billion. I wasn’t even aware of that in 1969 when I decided to do this. We didn’t know about nuclear winter. But I did know that something like a billion lives were at stake, something like a third of humanity. In reality, nearly everybody, but we thought a third. That’s a lot more than Vietnam. Was that something that was being considered in Vietnam? When you said there was something else you reveal in the book. My plans for putting out information on nuclear wars didn’t come about at that time for reasons that come out in the book. I planned at that time to be a truthteller, a whistleblower about nuclear war, and that didn’t happen. I thought that would put me in prison forever. But that didn’t happen for reasons of a natural catastrophe, actually. A hurricane kept me from doing that. We are in hurricane season now, but Hurricane Doria, or Tropical Storm Doria, kept me from doing what I planned to do then. You were inspired by people willing to go to jail, and you were planning to spend your life in jail. In recent years, you’ve defended Edward Snowden. Does it diminish at all how people view it if they don’t stay and answer for their alleged crime releasing documents? Does it diminish the importance or legitimacy of what he did in terms of releasing documents? Absolutely. I don’t have any doubt of it. Now, where there risks in what he did? Might it have hurt us? They claim it did, but they claimed that about me, and it wasn’t true. I haven’t seen any evidence that Snowden actually did cause us any real damage to our interests. Nor Chelsea Manning, who was also accused of that. If they come up with evidence, I have an open mind on that, but I do know they lie all the time about the probable effects. I identify totally with Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden. These are three very different people, actually different backgrounds and a lot of differences between us, including age. In terms of motives, there’s more important similarities and identities there. I identify with those two people, Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden, more than with anyone else on earth. Each of us saw great wrongdoing going on – illegal, but dangerous to democracy and the people. We each thought someone should tell the public about this and warn them. And we each thought ‘nobody else is going to do it, so I’ve got to do it.’ That last part turns out to be a very unusual decision under uncertainty: ‘No one else will do it, it has to be done, it’s got to be done, so I’ll do it.’ It was the example of people going to prison on that basis without expecting they would have any great effect on the war but that it might help – that’s what encouraged me to give the Pentagon Papers. I don’t think I would have without that example. Snowden has said that my example played a role in his own decision, which I’m very glad to hear. I’m not aware that’s true with Chelsea Manning, she was too young.
I HAVE KNOWN SINCE '64 WHEN THE PRESIDENT LIED US INTO THE VIETNAM WAR...I KNOW PRESIDENTS ARE MORE THAN CAPABLE OF LYING US INTO CATASTROPHE — A VERY SMALL CATASTROPHE... BUT NOT SO TINY IN HUMAN TERMS.
I would think that what you’ve done with the Pentagon Papers had to have an enormous effect. I think National Affairs Magazine said in 2010, “no other episode in history has had a
greater influence on the conflicted politics of national security/secrecy.” It so happens that Snowden has said to me, and in public, that he and his partner saw the movie “The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers,” and that had an effect on strengthening his decision to go ahead as he did. I was very happy to year that. I told the directors of the movie about it, and they were happy. Do you think there are others that followed, including, even Daniel Schorr (former TV reporter) in 1976 when he leaked the Pike Report findings of the Intelligence Committee investigation into questionable CIA activities, leading up to current times and the leaks of classified information by Edward Snowden and Private Manning? Well, I think we need more such people right now. Not only in this country but in others. But it turns out to be very rare that even one can make a very big difference. I’ll give an example: I suspected that there must be documents in the Exxon Corporation that revealed that they had been lying for years about the effects of fossil fuel burning on the climate. Just as there were documents in the Pentagon that foresaw what a stalemate and disaster Vietnam would be, the Pentagon Papers, I was sure that Exxon had the same. Well, some reporters picked up on that. They investigated and they found some whistleblowers and they actually came up with these studies that I had predicted. I happen to be rather proud of that chain of events, which of course almost nobody knows. The person in charge of the investigative team went out of his way to tell me that he had been influenced by what I said. They found this, and that’s the basis for suits right now against Exxon, which – who knows – may have some effect eventually on climate. If (Trump) he decides that he is going to attack North Korea, that would be a catastrophe for the people of South Korea and North Korea, and Japan. Possibly, Guam. I think we have a lot — tens of thousands of Americans there who are all at risk. If he decides to do that, I would hope that somebody would reveal that to Congress and to the public beforehand with the utmost resistance and opposition, and try to get that stopped.
Revolution. Another third, according to John Adams, were indifferent. So that’s two thirds who didn’t feel very strongly about fighting for the republic. You have a lot of people right now who are willing to live under a king, as we essentially do. We have an elected king, and it’s not a good system. It’s not the system the founders had in mind. And, the ability to go to war without Congress is not what they had in mind. That’s now been done by a number of our presidents, and Trump certainly feels he has that capability. Talking about the president and other administrations, when Obama came into office, he said he was going to have increased transparency and have a little more enlightened administration. He went in the opposite direction. Now with Trump in office saying he wants to crack down on leakers. I’ve talked to people very high in the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) and in the journalistic field who are certain that with (Jeff) Sessions as Attorney General will bring indictments and prosecutions against journalists, which has never happened, and is a clear violation of the First Amendment. I don’t have any basis for feeling certain about this, I thought it was probable for some time. I was very struck to hear some of these very high journalistic authorities say, ‘no, it’s inevitable, he’s going to do it.’ That’s a path that Obama paved by prosecuting more sources – three times more than all previous presidents put together. I was the first to be prosecuted under the Espionage Act, or any other act, for revealing information to the American public, not to a foreign power. There have been two other cases before Obama. One of them involved several people, and that one was dropped. One person went to prison, Samuel Loring Morison, for a leak, as of course Nixon tried to do to me, but failed. Morison was pardoned, in retrospect by Clinton after he had been in prison. He has been out for quite a while. Obama came in and holds nine or 10 cases, depending on how you count. Three times as many. Will Trump do that? There’s no doubt. He will surpass that. That will be a great threat to reporting on national security, which will decrease our security significantly. That’s what lies ahead. But, there will be some people who will tell the truth, like Snowden and Chelsea. Unfortunately, all too few, but better than nothing. If my book can encourage people in the field of nuclear planning – which is life with insanity – to come out about that, that is my highest hope. Among my highest hopes, that the example that this can make a difference might encourage someone to say, ‘nobody else is going to do it, so I’ll have to do it.’ Then go to prison for it, and they may save countless lives. The symbol of Cranbrook is meaningful to you. They give out a medal to the valedictorian, which I got. It’s a little medal for achievement. Scan for audio Daniel Ellsberg The symbol at Cranbrook is an archer who is interview. aiming at the sky. The story of the Greek myth or something is of an archer who the people before him have aimed at the target and hit it right in the middle, so he aims straight up and its high. The motto of Cranbrook is “Aim High.” And that stayed with me. Cranbrook had a good influence on me.
I HAVEN'T SEEN ANY EVIDENCE THAT SNOWDEN ACTUALLY DID CAUSE US ANY REAL DAMAGE...NOR CHELSEA MANNING...IF THEY COME UP WITH EVIDENCE, I HAVE AN OPEN MIND...BUT I DO KNOW THEY LIE ALL THE TIME ABOUT THE PROBABLE EFFECTS.
Do you think we’ll see more leaks? We will see more. Will we see enough that we need? Nothing tells us that will happen. We just haven’t had anything like enough. The ones we’ve had, in some cases, have had some good effect. I’m sure you had a mixed reaction from the public when you released information, and we’ve seen that before. Yes. It was a mix between “patriot” and “traitor.” I didn’t think I was a traitor and I’m not anymore of a traitor that Edward Snowden is, or Chelsea Manning, but they’re called ‘traitor’ too. There are people who think the president’s secrets should be kept no matter how dangerous or crazy or criminal his actions might be. There are people that say ‘well, if he decides to do it, then that’s the president’s (choice).’ But that’s not a very democratic frame of mind, but frankly, there are a lot of Americans who’ve never felt very strongly about living in a democracy. A third of the country supported staying in the British Empire at the time of the
MUNICIPAL Zoning changes to expand land uses By Kevin Elliott
Rochester City Council on Monday, September 25, approved and adopted reading two of several zoning changes planned in the city to create new districts intended to expand the types of land uses surrounding the city's downtown area. The proposed Mixed Use 1 district, which will run from just north of University Drive to the Clinton River, between Water Street and the Paint Creek; and the Downtown Edge 2 District, which includes sections of land west of water Street to the alley on the edge of the Downtown District, are part of five new districts that are being rezoned to move away from industrial and manufacturing uses in the areas to more commercial friendly and office uses that work well with the downtown area. Rochester Planning Consultant Vidya Krishnan, with McKenna Associates, said both of the districts have been through several revisions at the planning commission level prior to being introduced to council. The city has already approved the River's Edge district earlier this year, making the two districts proposed three of five that will be introduced. "In the context of the master plan, the city has adopted the River's Edge district, which was the first," Krishnan said. "This is the second and there's the Downtown Edge. There will be five all together. Once we have five districts lined up, the best way to do it under state law is to do a zoning map amendment change. It would be a single change that would incorporate the five districts. They would become effective immediately after that." Krishnan said the uses are in line with what the city would like to see, opposed to the industrial uses, such as warehouses, manufacturing and other similar uses "which aren't exactly what we want to see in our downtown." Council unanimously approved the two districts. Councilwoman Kim Russell suggested altering the language of the ordinance to prohibit dry cleaning processing facilities that would have a heavy industrial use, but allowing for dry cleaning storefronts. City council also on September 25 approved a request to schedule public hearings on Monday, October 23, to present two additional districts, including a Transition District and Downtown Edge 1 District. Rochester Planning and Economic 46
Medical marijuana ordinance finalized ochester City Council on Monday, August 28, finalized revisions to its ordinances in order to restrict medical marijuana businesses or commercial growing facilities from operating in the city. Council in July authorized the introduction of an amendment of the city's zoning code to eliminate references to grow operations and medical marijuana facilities. The previous ordinance, enacted in 2014, allowed applicants to operate such facilities if they received a special exception use permit by city council in certain districts. "New state laws were enacted in September 2016, establishing a series of medical marijuana uses that were available with a license from the state of Michigan. Such licenses would only be permitted in communities that specifically allow any or all by ordinance," said Rochester City Attorney Jefrey Kragt. "As a result, if the city does not want to allow medical marijuana uses, it is recommended to remove the language." Kragt also included specific language in the ordinance that states the city prohibits such uses. The zoning ordinance doesn't refer to personal use or production of medical marijuana which is permitted under the state's Medical Marijuana Act. Council voted 6-0 in favor of the ordinance amendment, with councilwoman Kim Russell absent. The vote came following a public hearing on the proposed amendment. One resident, Sue Douglas, thanked the council for making the change to the ordinance and prohibiting such businesses from operating in the city.
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Director Nik Banda said Krishnan will be providing council with a larger map of the districts to layout where the city is currently with the rezoning projects. Additionally, Banda said he will be requesting authorization for an economic development analysis of the district, which will help guide development in the new districts. The analysis, if approved, he said would likely be ready before the end of the year, possibly in mid-December.
Two cities approve RARA, OPC budgets By Kevin Elliott
The cities of Rochester and Rochester Hills on Monday, September 25, approved $2.8 million in budget expenditures for the Rochester Avon Recreation Authority (RARA) for its 2018 budget. The expenditures are part of RARA's overall budget, which receives about 22 percent, or $633,510 of its total revenues, from the city of Rochester Hills, and about three percent, or $88,000, from the city of Rochester. The largest portion, 66 percent, of RARA's revenues come from program fees charged by the authority, which are projected to amount to about $1.8 million in 2018. Rental fees, interest and other miscellaneous revenues make up the
remaining portion of RARA's budget. While the recreation authority's board approves its own budget, it must receive approval from the cities of both Rochester and Rochester Hills. Ron Jewell, executive director of RARA, said the organization's board adopted its 2018 budget at an August 1 meeting. He said the budget reflects a balance between anticipated program revenues and municipal contributions versus building and program expenditures. The budget also represents the first full year of anticipated revenues and expenditures after the purchase and development of RARA's newly acquired building at 480 E. Second Street in Rochester. The building includes two multi-sport gyms, a fitness area and a group multipurpose room. It's also the fifth year in the organization's main headquarters, equipped with four large dance rooms, two multi-turf fields, gymnastics areas, an early childhood room and multi-purpose room. The 2018 budget includes 10 fulltime employees that oversee program and building needs, as well as the addition of a second maintenance advisor and replacing its dance coordinator, who recently retired. The budget includes a two percent salary increase for its full time employees. Both Rochester and Rochester
DOWNTOWN
Hills city councils questioned Jewell about salary increases, which he defended and referenced an ongoing salary and compensation study as justification for the increases. Both councils also questioned the proposed lease of a space in RARA's new building to a physical therapy provider, and whether it fit within the scope of RARA's vision. "We have had pushback from Rochester businesses that say they feel it’s competition, and it’s not clean recreation," Rochester councilman Jeffrey Cuthbertson said. The comment echoed similar questions from Rochester Hills city council members in September, who said such a business has a built-in advantage strictly by the nature of its location. Jewell said the proposed lease is competitive for the market, and would provide information to the councils to illustrate that the lease is appropriate. The office lease will still be required to be approved by the Rochester Planning Commission, which is scheduled for consideration in October. In addition, both Rochester and Rochester Hills councils in September approved a $4.2 million budget adopted by the Rochester Older Person's Commission (OPC), which also receives funding from both cities. That organization's budget includes a 1.7-percent increase from its 2017 budget. The OPC budget was approved by Rochester on Monday, September 11, and by the Rochester Hills council on Monday, September 25.
Hearing set regarding fate of landmark tree The request from a developer in the city of Rochester to remove a 30.5-inch Landmark Red Oak tree in order to continue with a construction project has prompted a public hearing set for Monday, October 9. Jake Bolyard, of Bolyard Lumber, sent the request to the city regarding the tree, located on Pine Street, in the Pine Knoll Estates. Tree #216 is a 30.5 inch Landmark Red Oak and is currently in the way of construction," he said in the letter to the city. "We would like the removal of the tree so that we can continue with construction." Deputy City Manager Nik Banda said the developer of the Pine Knoll Estates wants to remove the tree on his property due to evaluations of the impact of the pending new sewer and 10.17
water lines along with the proposed footprint of the first home, which indicates it will have major impact on the tree, resulting in its demise. Under the city's ordinances, removal of any landmark tree or historic tree is prohibited without a resolution passed by the city council approving such a removal. Any person who wishes to remove such a tree must submit a written request to city council with the reason seeking its removal, prompting council to set a public hearing and notify all neighbors within 300 feet of the tree. The city's ordinance states it's the burden of the applicant to demonstrate there's good reason to remove the tree such that the public interest in retaining it is outweighed by the applicant's need to remove it. Councilman Jeffrey Cuthbertson said he believed the tree was at issue about two years ago during the planning process of the Pine Knoll Estates, and that he thought the applicant's engineers would be able to work around the removal of the tree. Council requested minutes and plans regarding the tree be available, as well as other relevant information about the tree at the October 9 meeting.
Booster station to help water pressure The construction of a new water booster station on Adams, just north of Tienken, approved on Monday, August 28, by Rochester City Council, may help to even out water pressure fluctuations in the system and improve safety and long-term reliability of the Rochester Hills water supply system. Council unanimously approved a $1.8 million contract agreement with Trojan Development of Oxford, to construct the new booster station,
which is located between Adams High School and Van Hoosen Middle School on property owned by the school district. The new station will replace an existing booster pumping station, with the contract calling for demolition of the existing booster station, restoring the site and designing and building a new station. Rochester Director of Public Services Allan Schneck said the existing station is housed below ground and is reaching the end of its operating life. The new station, which will be above ground, will increase the longevity of equipment, as well as the safety of workers needing to access the booster pumping facility. Further, he said the updated station may help to improve fluctuations in water pressure experienced in the nearby area. The booster pumping station and facility work will include foundation work, installation, water main site work, building veneer and roof field installations, sidewalks, driveways, storm water management improvements, site restoration and other work. Rochester Hills city engineering consultant firm Hubbell, Roth & Clark recommended awarding Trojan the contract out of four that submitted proposed agreements. The project, however, is estimated to cost $500,000 more than had been budgeted for the project. About $1.35 million had been budgeted for the project in the city's existing budget. However, additional facade improvements to the building housing the facility were one of the reasons for the increase in cost. "The facade is part of the cost overrun, so I'm just trying to understand if it was needed," councilman Thomas Wiggins asked Schneck. Schneck said the additional improvements to the aesthetics of the building came at the request of the
School police liaison program approved ochester Hills City Council on Monday, September 25, unanimously approved spending more than $280,000 to participate in a program to provide school liaison officers to the Rochester Community Schools district for the 2017-2018 school year. The program, which provides three Oakland County sheriff's deputies and two Rochester police officers to schools at various points in the year, is paid for each year by the cities of Rochester and Rochester Hills, as well as Oakland Township and
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school district, which granted the city an easement for the project at no charge. He said constructing the building above ground also increased the cost, but it adds safety and longevity. "This is much safer for ingress and egress into the building. Electronics also tend to fail quicker below ground," he said. "This also has a back-up generator that the existing (building) doesn't have." Schneck said additional construction costs may be paid for through excess funds budgeted for the city's WS-36 project, which was completed about $2.1 million under its budgeted amount.
Eatery to occupy Sikh Gudwara site Longstanding plans were approved by Rochester Hills City Council on Monday, September 11, to tear down the long vacant Sikh Gudwara property and construct a 4,000 square-foot Italian restaurant at 6780 Old Orion Court, west of Rochester Road and north of Tienken Road. Rito Lisi, owner of Silver Spoon Restorante Italiano, first sought approval from the city to rezone about 3.3 acres of land on the west side of Old Orion Court in order demolish the former place of worship, which has been vacant for about seven years. The city approved the rezoning of the land in 2015. In August, Lisi returned to the city, requesting conditional use permission, a natural features setback modification and site plan approval for the project. Plans include demolishing the existing 4,023 square-foot building and replacing it with a 3,986 square-foot building, along with patio areas totaling another 1,400 square feet. The rear portion of the property is zoned as residential.
Rochester Community Schools. Rochester Hills Chief Financial Officer Joe Snyder said the cost of the program has dropped by about 1.3 percent from the previous year due to a reduction in rates charged by the Oakland County Sheriff's Office. The entire cost flows through the city's special police budget and was included in the city's 2018 fiscal year budget. The cost distribution of the program is made by community census counts and determined by Rochester Community Schools. Under the police school liaison program, Rochester Hills will pay about 68 percent of $592,428 of the total cost of the program, or $281,778. Oakland Township will be asked to pay
Wetlands at the property won't be disturbed, and instead will be utilized for a buffer area between neighboring residential properties. The owners of about four neighboring properties on August 19 spoke in opposition of the project during a public hearing held during the city's planning commission meeting. Those who spoke said they weren't aware of the rezoning of the property and were concerned that wetlands would be disturbed and that a restaurant would bring heavy traffic to a residential neighborhood. Rochester Planning Director Sarah Roediger said the zoning approved in 2015 allows for restaurants with a conditional use approval, as are civic and educational uses. She said the flexible business overlay zoning district was designed to foster a lively and sustainable development that creates an imageable neighborhood identity, and that a restaurant was considered at the time of the rezoning. However, Roediger said zoning regulations ensure that whatever use went in the space will be blended and not adversely affect the adjacent properties. Those requirements include screen walls, landscaping and additional public spaces. Planning commissioners recommended on August 29 that city council approve the request from the applicant. City council members on Monday, September 11, unanimously approved the request, with councilman Thomas Wiggins absent. Councilwoman Stephanie Morita, who serves on the planning commission, said the owner worked with the planning commission to address their concerns and those of neighbors. The new location will allow the restaurant to relocate from its current nearby location, at 6830 N. Rochester Road, due to increased business.
about 20.8 percent, or $86,078; and Rochester will be asked to provide about 11.2 percent, or $46,464. The school district will pay about $138,107, plus $40,000 in overtime costs, for a total of $178,107. Rochester Hills city council members discussed the possibility of Avondale Schools participating in the program. However, Oakland County Sheriff's Office Capt. Michael Johnson said that school district opted out of participating in the program nearly a decade ago. Councilwoman Stephanie Morita, who serves on the Avondale Youth Assistance board, suggested the city's administration contact the Avondale district to see if their position has changed.
Agreement reviewed for Rewold project By Kevin Elliott
A development agreement between the city of Rochester and developer Frank Rewold that will allow for an estimated $2.3 million environmental cleanup project and subsequent office building construction at 400 Water Street was reviewed on Monday, August 28, by city council members. Rewold, who owns the Royal Park Hotel and existing offices on the east side of the Paint Creek between E. 2nd and E. University Drive, is proposing a 45,000-square-foot office building at 400 Water Street, on the west side of the creek. The project includes the environmental cleanup and mitigation in the area that was formerly home to ITT Automotive. Environmental issues at the site have hampered its development for years, particularly since the site was purchased by Rewold in 1997. Contamination at the site stems from historical industrial uses at the Western Knitting Mills building in the 1940s, after the knitting corporation was dissolved. It was later purchased by McAleer Manufacturing, which was the largest producer of flash bombs and flares in the United States during World War II. It was later used by ITT Automotive, which produced push rods and tubing until 1994. Today, the site has contaminated soils with lead and trichlorethylene, according to the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ). Contamination at the site has migrated over the years to the Paint Creek, forcing ITT to work with the DEQ to build an underground containment wall and install monitoring walls to ensure pollutants aren't moving to the creek. However, the land can't be developed without remediation conducted, which is ultimately the responsibility of the city of Rochester. Attorney Jeffrey Haynes, of Beier Howlett PC., which is representing the city in the matter, said at the council meeting that he had met with counsel for Rewold and drafted a development agreement to be considered by city council. The agreement is a key step in the city procuring a $1 million grant and a $1 million loan from the state of Michigan to assist in the redevelopment of the site, and spells out how the loan will be repaid, as well as about $300,000 in costs paid upfront by Rewold. "The agreement takes effect only when several preconditions occur, including approval of the brownfield 48
Water, sewer rates finalized by council ew water and sewer rates in Rochester were finalized by city council members on Monday, August 28, by a vote of 6-0, with councilwoman Kim Russell absent. The rates, which amounted to an estimated increase of less than $20 per year for the average water and sewer customer, were approved about a month after more significant rate increases went into effect on July 1. Those increases, which were part of a major infrastructure overhaul to the system, were approved in January. Rochester City Manager Blaine Wing said in August that the city has historically passed along sewer rate increases from the Oakland County Water Resources Commission, including the six-cent increase approved this year. The increase raises the citywide sewer rate from $3.09 per cubic 100 feet to $3.15. The increase amounts to about $6.24 to $9.12 annually for the average customer. Water rates in the city vary depending on whether customers are positioned to receive water service from the Great Lakes Water Authority or the city's well water system. Under the increases approved on August 28, customers on the well water system will see a three-cent increase. Customers on the Great Lakes Water Authority system will see a decrease from $5.24 per 100 cubic feet of water to about $4.84. The new rates went into effect on September 1.
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plan by the Rochester Brownfield Redevelopment Authority, an inter-local agreement to authorize assignment of tax recapture by the Rochester DDA to the Brownfield Authority, and a satisfactory letter of credit against which the city may draw to repay the loan if Rewold defaults," Haynes said. "The city doesn't repay the grant and loan until draws are made against them." City funding to repay the $1 million loan and estimated $300,000 additional cost will come through the establishment of a tax increment financing (TIF) district that captures any new taxes generated after redevelopment for a set number of years. However, city council on Monday, August 28, said the agreement presented to them didn't clearly specify the length of time the TIF district would operate. "I think there should be some more meat on the bone," said councilman Jeffrey Cuthbertson. "There should be a discussion about the duration (of the TIF) that is missing." Council voted to delay approval of the agreement until further discussion and clarification could be completed at its next meeting in September.
Rochester Hills approves budget Rochester Hills City Council on Monday, September 25, approved the city's 2018 fiscal year budget, which includes nearly $130 million in projected revenues and expenditures,
an overall decrease of about 9.5 percent from the previous year. The annual budget cycle runs from January 1 to December 31 each year. The 2017 budget was approved last September at about $130.3 million. Council also approved millage rates for the city, at 10.4605 mills, which makes up about 25 percent of the city's overall revenues, or about $32.6 million in 2018. That millage rate is the same as the previous year, meaning the budget includes no tax increase to property or business owners. City council members met with city department heads at a special meeting in August to hash out details of the budget. Council met again on Monday, September 11, to approve millage rates and hold a public hearing on the proposed 2018 budget. On Monday, September 25, council unanimously approved the 2018 budget. Of the nearly $130 million in expenditures, about 34 percent consists of public services, such as water and sewer; 18 percent will go to public safety, which includes police and fire; and 15 percent to general government operations. About 13 percent, or $16.9 million, is dedicated to capital outlay projects; and three percent ($3.67 million) to parks and recreation. Rochester Hills Chief Financial Officer Joe Snyder said public service, public safety and capital outlay represent about 65 percent of expenditures. He said that amount – about $84 million – represents the city's commitment to public safety and infrastructure management. Council, during the budget process,
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agreed to set aside funding from the city's local street fund to support a $5 million local street rehabilitation program over the next three years. The city is also redirecting funding from its cemetery perpetual care fund for a cemetery maintenance barn. "Both of these changes were made to preserve funding for the general fund balance," Snyder said.
Renovation work on Fire Station 4 begins A $4-million renovation of Rochester Hills' Fire Station No. 4, located at 2723 Walton Boulevard, began in September following council's approval on Monday, August 28, of a construction management contract with George W. Auch Company of Pontiac. Plans for the renovation, which includes a 5,600-square-foot addition to the existing 4,055-square-foot structure, were approved in February by city council. The work will upgrade the original footprint of the building, which was built in 1976, to accommodate the needs of the city's growing population. Council opted to update the building, rather than demolish it and construct a new one from the ground up, an option the city previously determined to be too costly. Plans for the updated building were initially approved in 2015, but were later revamped to reduce costs. The updated plans were presented in August of 2016, and approved by council the following February. Council voted unanimously on Monday, August 28, to retain George W. Auch Company to oversee the work, which is expected to total about $4.2 million. Rochester Hills City Council President Mark Tisdel said funding for the project was established in 2016. Aaron St. Dennis, project manager for George W. Auch Company, said the goal was to break ground on the project in September and be able to enclose the new addition by the winter. Completion is targeted for October 2018. Rochester Hills operates five fire stations spread out in each corner of the city, as well as one central station. The upgrades at Station No. 4 are intended to help maintain response times for current and future fire and medical calls. The city operates a combination department with full-time firefighters/paramedics and paid-oncall firefighters and EMTs who provide emergency response. The updated fire station will allow for a separate visitor entry and room for additional fire apparatus, as well as the ability to retain an existing cell tower at the station location. 10.17
PLACES TO EAT The Places To Eat for Downtown is a quick reference source to establishments offering a place for dining, either breakfast, lunch or dinner. The listings include nearly all dining establishments with seating in the Rochester area, and then some select restaurants outside the immediate area served by Downtown. The complete Places To Eat is available at downtownpublications.com and in an optimized format for your smart phone (downtownpublications.com/mobile), where you can actually map out locations and automatically dial a restaurant from our Places To Eat.
Rochester/Rochester Hills 112 Pizzeria Bistro: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. 2528 S. Adams Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.289.6164. 2941 Street Food: Mediterranean. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Beer & Wine. 87 W. Auburn Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.606.4583. Alex’s of Rochester: Italian, Greek, & American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.852.2288. Antoniou’s Pizza: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 918 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, MI 48307. 248.650.2200. Avery’s Tavern: American. Weekend Brunch. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 2086 Crooks Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.270.4030. B Spot Burgers: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 176 N. Adams Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.218.6001. Bangkok Cuisine: Thai. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. 727 N. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.652.8841. Bar Louie: American. Weekend Brunch. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations, 10 or more. Liquor. 1488 N. Rochester Road, Rochester, 48307. 248.218.5114. Bean and Leaf Café: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 439 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.601.1411. Bigalora Wood Fire Cucina: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations, parties of 8 or more. Liquor. 6810 N. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48306. 248.218.6230. Big Boy: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No Reservations. 3756 S. Rochester Road., Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.852.5540. Also 90 E. Tienken Road, Rochester Hills, 48306. 248.601.7777. Bologna Via Cucina: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 334 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.651.3300. Buffalo Wild Wings: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 1234 Walton Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.651.3999. Chadd’s Bistro: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No Reservations. 1838 E. Auburn Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.293.0665. Chapman House: French-American. Dinner, Tuesday-Saturday. Reservations recommended. Liquor. 311 Walnut Blvd., Rochester. 48307. 248.759.4406. Cheng’s Restaurant: Chinese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. 2666 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.299.9450. Chicken Shack: BBQ. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 213 W. University Drive, Rochester, 48307. 248.656.1100. Chili’s: Tex-Mex. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 2735 S. Rochester
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Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.299.5281. Chipotle Mexican Grille: Mexican. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 2611 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.402.0047. Also The Village of Rochester Hills, 84 N. Adams Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.402.0047. Chomp Deli & Grille: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 200 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 888.342.2497. CJ Mahoney’s Sports Grille: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 3260 S. Rochester Road, Rochester, 48307. 248.293.2800. CK Diggs: American & Italian. Lunch & Dinner, Monday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 2010 W. Auburn Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.853.6600. Clubhouse BFD (Beer-Food-Drink): American. Lunch, Saturday & Sunday. Dinner, Tuesday-Sunday. Reservations, 10 or more. Liquor. 2265 Crooks Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.289.6093. Dickey’s Barbecue Pit: Barbecue. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. 1418 N. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.266.6226. Downtown Café: American. Breakfast & Lunch, daily. No reservations. 606 N. Main, Rochester, 48307. 248.652.6680. Einstein Bros. Bagels: Deli. Breakfast & Lunch, daily. No reservations. 2972 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, MI 48307. 248.606.4519. Five Guys Burgers & Fries: American, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 2544 S. Adams Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.299.3483. Ganbei Chinese Restaurant & Bar: Chinese. Lunch, Monday-Saturday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 227 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.266.6687. Georgio’s Pizza & Pasta: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Italian. 117 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.601.2882. Gold Star Family Restaurant: American & Greek. Breakfast & Lunch, daily. No reservations. 650 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.652.2478. Golden Eagle: American. Lunch, Sunday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 1447 N. Rochester Road, Rochester, 48307. 248.651.6606. Grand Tavern: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 12 Marketplace Circle, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.289.1350. Half Day Café: American. Breakfast & Lunch, Monday-Saturday. Reservations. 3134 Walton Boulevard, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.375.1330. Hamlin Pub: American. Breakfast, Sundays. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 1988 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.656.7700. Hibachi House Bar & Grill: Japanese Steakhouse. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 335 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.266.6055. Honey Tree Grille: Mediterranean. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 2949 Crooks Road, Rochester, 48309. 248.237.0200. Jimmy John’s Gourmet Sandwiches: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 1186 W. University Drive, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.651.3527. Johnny Black Public House: American. Weekend Brunch. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 1711 E. Auburn Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.606.4479. Kabin Kruser’s Oyster Bar: Seafood. No reservations. Lunch, Monday-Saturday. Dinner, daily. 306 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.651.2266.
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Kerby’s Koney Island: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. 2552 S. Adams Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.844.8900. King Garden: Chinese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 1433 N. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.656.3333. Krazy Greek Restaurant: Greek. Breakfast & Lunch, daily. No reservations. 111 E. University Drive, Rochester, 48307. 248.652.0089. Kruse & Muer In the Village: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 134 N. Adams Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.375.2503. Kruse & Muer on Main: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 327 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.652.9400. Lebanese Grill: Lebanese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 2783 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.606.4651. Lino’s Restaurant: Italian. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 50 W. Tienken Road, Rochester Hills, 48306. 248.656.9002. Lipuma’s Coney Island: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 621 N. Main Steet, Rochester, 48307. 248.652.9862. Lucky’s Prime Time: American. Weekend Breakfast. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations, weekdays. Liquor. 1330 Walton Boulevard, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.656.8707. Main Street Billiards: American. Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 215 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.652.8441. Main Street Deli: Deli. Lunch, MondaySaturday. Dinner, Thursday, Friday. No reservations. 709 N. Main Street, Rochester, MI 48307. 248.656.5066. Mamma Mia Tuscan Grille: Italian. Dinner, Tuesday-Saturday, Sunday. Reservations. Liquor. 543 N. Main Street, Suite 311, Rochester, 48307. 248.402.0234. Mezza Mediterranean Grille: Mediterranean. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor at The Village location only. 1413 N. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.609.2121. Also The Village of Rochester Hills, 188 N. Adams Road, Rochester Hills. 248.375.5999. Miguel’s Cantina: Mexican. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 870 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.453.5371. Mitchell’s Fish Market: Seafood. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 370 N. Adams Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.340.5900. Mr. B’s Food and Spirits: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 423 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.651.6534. Noodles & Company: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 184 N. Adams Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.375.5000. North Shack: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 990 E. Auburn Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.853.3366. O’Connor’s Public House: Irish Pub. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 324 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.608.2537. Oceania Inn: Chinese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. The Village of Rochester Hills, 3176 Walton Boulevard, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.375.9200. Olive Garden: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 2615 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.853.6960. Outback Steakhouse: Steakhouse. Lunch, Friday-Sunday. Dinner, daily. Reservations, eight or more. Liquor. 1880 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.650.2521.
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Paint Creek Tavern: American. Lunch & Dinner, Tuesday-Saturday, Sunday. Reservations. Liquor. 613 N. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.759.4205. Panda Express: Chinese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 3105 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.853.9880. Panera Bread: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 37 S. Livernois Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.601.2050. Also 2921 Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.853.5722. Also 2508 S. Adams Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.853.7430. Park 600 Bar & Kitchen: American. Weekend Brunch. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. Royal Park Hotel, 600 E. University Drive, Rochester, 48307. 248.652.2600. Paul’s on Main: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 630 N. Main Sreet., Rochester, 48307. 248.656.0066. Pei Wei: Asian Fusion. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 1206 E. Walton Boulevard, Rochester, 48307. 248.601.1380. Penn Station East Coast Subs: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 146. S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.601.4663. Penny Black Grill & Tap: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 124 W. 4th Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.841.1522. Pudthai & Sushi: Thai & Japanese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. 2964 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.299.6890. Qdoba Mexican Grill: Mexican. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 1198 Walton Boulevard, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.608.2603. Also 3014 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.844.3668. Ram’s Horn: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 1990 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.651.7900. Red Knapp’s Dairy Bar: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 304 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.651.4545. Red Lobster: Seafood. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 2825 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.299.8090. Red Olive: Mediterranean & American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 1194 Walton Boulevard, Rochester, 48307. 248.656.0300. Rochester Bistro: American-Continental. Lunch & Dinner, Tuesday-Saturday, Sunday. Reservations. Liquor. 227 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.923.2724. Rochester Brunch House: American. Breakfast & Lunch, daily. No reservations. 301 Walnut Boulevard, Rochester, 48307. 248.656.1600. Rochester Chop House: Steakhouse & Seafood. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 306 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.651.2266. Rochester Diner & Grill: American, Greek & Italian. Breakfast & Lunch, daily. Dinner, Monday-Saturday. 1416 E. Walton Blvd., Rochester Hill, 48309. 248.652.6737. Rochester Mills Beer Co.: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 400 Water Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.650.5080. Rochester Tap Room: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 6870 N. Rochester Road, Rochester, 48306. 248.650.2500. Rojo Mexican Bistro: Mexican. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 401 N. Main Street, Rochester, 48307.
248.601.9300. Sakura Sushi: Japanese. Lunch & Dinner, Monday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 6866 N. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48306. 248.608.3867. Shish Palace: Mediterranean. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. 165 S. Livernois Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.453.5464. Shogun: Japanese. Lunch, MondaySaturday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 173 S. Livernois Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.453.5386. Silver Spoon Ristorante: Italian. Dinner, Monday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 6830 N. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48306. 248.652.4500. Soho: Japanese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 2943 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.289.1179. Sumo Sushi & Seafood: Japanese & Korean. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations, 24 hours in advance. Liquor. 418 N. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.601.0104. Tapper’s Pub: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 877 E. Auburn Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.852.1983. Tim Hortons: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 940 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.656.8292. The Jagged Fork: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 188 N. Adams, Rochester Hills, 48306. The Meeting House: American. Weekend Brunch. Dinner, Tuesday-Sunday. Reservations. Liquor. 301 S. Main Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.759.4825. Too Ra Loo: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 139 S. Main St., Rochester, 48307. 248.453.5291. Tropical Smoothie Café: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 2913 Crooks Road, Rochester Hills, 48309. 248.852.4800. Val's Polish Kitchen: Polish. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, Tuesday-Saturday, Sunday. Reservations. 224 E. Auburn Rd., Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.293.2660. Wayback Burgers: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 1256 Walton Boulevard, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.453.5746. Also 2595 S. Rochester Road, Rochester Hills, 48307. 248.844.2717. Willoughby’s Beyond Juice: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 120 E. 4th Street, Rochester, 48307. 248.841.1670.
Troy Capital Grille: Steak & Seafood. Lunch, Monday-Saturday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 2800 West Big Beaver Rd., Somerset Collection, Troy, 48084. 248.649.5300. Cafe Sushi: Pan-Asian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 1933 W. Maple Rd, Troy, 48084. 248.280.1831. Kona Grille: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 30 E. Big Beaver Rd., Troy, 48083. 248.619.9060. Lakes: Seafood. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 5500 Crooks Rd., Troy, 48098. 248.646.7900. McCormick & Schmick’s: Steak & Seafood. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. Somerset Collection, 2850 Coolidge Hwy, Troy, 48084. 248.637.6400. Mon Jin Lau: Asian. Lunch, MondayFriday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 1515 E. Maple Rd, Troy, 48083. 248.689.2332. Morton’s, The Steakhouse: Steak &
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Seafood. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 888 W. Big Beaver Rd, Troy, 48084. 248.404.9845. NM Café: American. Lunch, MondaySaturday. Reservations. Liquor. 2705 W. Big Beaver Rd, Troy, 48084. 248.816.3424. Ocean Prime: Steak & Seafood. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 2915 Coolidge Hwy., Troy, 48084. 248.458.0500. Orchid Café: Thai. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. 3303 Rochester Rd., Troy, 48085. 248.524.1944. P.F. Chang’s China Bistro: Chinese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. Somerset Collection, 2801 W. Big Beaver Rd., Troy, 48084. 248.816.8000. Ruth’s Chris Steak House: Steak & Seafood. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 755 W. Big Beaver Rd., Troy, 48084. 248.269.8424. Steelhouse Tavern: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 1129 E. Long Lake Rd., Troy, 48085. 248.817.2980. Tre Monti Ristorante: Italian. Lunch, Thursdays. Dinner, Tuesday-Sunday. Reservations. Liquor. 1695 E. Big Beaver Road, Troy, 48083. 248.680.1100.
Birmingham/Bloomfield 220: American. Lunch & Dinner, MondaySaturday. Reservations. Liquor. 220 E. Merrill Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.646.2220. Andiamo: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 6676 Telegraph Road, Bloomfield Township, 48301. 248.865.9300. Bagger Dave's Legendary Burger Tavern: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 6608 Telegraph Road, Bloomfield Township, 48301. 248.792.3579. Beau's: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 4108 W. Maple, Bloomfield Hills, 48301. 248.626.2630. Bella Piatti: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, Tuesday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 167 Townsend Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.494.7110. Beverly Hills Grill: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. Liquor. No reservations. 31471 Southfield Road, Beverly Hills, 48025. 248.642.2355. Big Rock Chophouse: American. Lunch & Dinner, Monday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 245 South Eton Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.647.7774. Bill's: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, Daily. Reservations, lunch only. Liquor. 39556 Woodward Avenue, Bloomfield Hills, 48304. 248.646.9000. Bistro Joe’s Kitchen: Global. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Sunday brunch. Liquor. Reservations. 34244 Woodward Ave., Birmingham, 48009. 248.594.0984. Café ML: New American. Dinner, daily. Liquor. Call ahead. 3607 W. Maple Road, Bloomfield Township. 248.642.4000. Cafe Via: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 310 East Maple Avenue, Birmingham, 48009. 248.644.8800. Cameron’s Steakhouse: American. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 115 Willits Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.723.1700. Churchill's Bistro & Cigar Bar: Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 116 S. Old Woodward Avenue, Birmingham, 48009. 248.647.4555. Eddie Merlot's: Steak & seafood. Dinner,
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daily. Reservations. Liquor. 37000 Woodward Avenue, Bloomfield Hills, 48304. 248.712.4095. Elie’s Mediterranean Cuisine: Mediterranean. Lunch & Dinner, Monday-Saturday. No reservations. Liquor. 263 Pierce Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.647.2420. Flemings Prime Steakhouse & Wine Bar: American. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 323 N. Old Woodward Avenue, Birmingham, 48009. 248.723.0134. Forest: European. Dinner, MondaySaturday. Reservations. Liquor. 735 Forest Avenue, Birmingham 48009. 248.258.9400. Griffin Claw Brewing Company: American. Dinner, Tuesday-Friday, Lunch & Dinner, Saturday and Sunday. No Reservations. Liquor. 575 S. Eton Street, Birmingham. 248.712.4050. Hyde Park Prime Steakhouse: American. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 201 S. Old Woodward, Birmingham, 48009. 248.594.4369. Joe Muer Seafood: Seafood. Lunch & Dinner daily; Sunday brunch. Reservations. Liquor. 39475 Woodward Avenue, Bloomfield Hills, 48304. 248.792.9609. Luxe Bar & Grill: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily; Late Night, 9 p.m.-closing. No reservations. Liquor. 525 N. Old Woodward Ave., Birmingham, 48009. 248.792.6051. Mandaloun Bistro: Lebanese. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, Daily. Reservations. Liquor. 30100 Telegraph Rd., Suite 130, Bingham Farms, 48025. 248.723.7960. MEX Mexican Bistro & Tequila Bar: Mexican. Lunch, Monday-Friday, Dinner, daily. Liquor. 6675 Telegraph Road, Bloomfield Township, 48301. 248.723.0800. Mitchell’s Fish Market: Seafood. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 117 Willits Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.646.3663. Phoenicia: Middle Eastern. Lunch, Monday-Friday; Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 588 South Old Woodward Avenue, Birmingham, 48009. 248.644.3122. Roadside B & G: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 1727 S. Telegraph Road, Bloomfield Hills, 48302. 248.858.7270. Salvatore Scallopini: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Beer & Wine. 505 North Old Woodward Avenue, Birmingham, 48009. 248.644.8977. Social Kitchen & Bar: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations, parties of 5 or more. Liquor. 225 E. Maple Road, Birmingham, 48009. 248.594.4200. Streetside Seafood: Seafood. Lunch, Monday-Friday; Dinner, daily. Reservations, Lunch only. Liquor. 273 Pierce Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.645.9123. Tallulah Wine Bar and Bistro: American. Dinner. Monday-Saturday. Sunday brunch. Reservations. Liquor. 55 S. Bates Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.731.7066. The Bird & The Bread: Brasserie. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 210 S. Old Woodard, Birmingham, 48009. 248.203.6600. The Franklin Grill: American. Lunch & Dinner, Monday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 32760 Franklin Rd, Franklin, 48025. 248.865.6600. The Rugby Grille: American. Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 100 Townsend Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.642.5999. The Stand: Euro-American. Dinner,
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Monday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 34977 Woodward, Birmingham, 48009. 248.220.4237. Toast: American. Breakfast & Lunch, daily; Dinner, Monday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 203 Pierce Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.258.6278. Townhouse: American. Brunch, Saturday, Sunday. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 180 Pierce Street, Birmingham, 48009. 248.792.5241. Triple Nickel Restaurant and Bar: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Liquor. Reservations. 555 S. Old Woodward, Birmingham 48009. 248.480.4951.
North Oakland Clarkston Union: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 54 S. Main St., Clarkston, 48346. 248.620.6100. Holly Hotel: American. Afternoon Tea, Monday – Saturday, Brunch, Sunday, Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 110 Battle Alley, Holly, 48442. 248.634.5208. Kruse's Deer Lake Inn: Seafood. Lunch & dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 7504 Dixie Highway, Clarkston, 48346. 248.795.2077. Via Bologna: Italian. Dinner daily. No reservations. Liquor. 7071 Dixie Highway, Clarkston. 48346. 248.620.8500. Union Woodshop: BBQ. Dinner, Monday – Friday, Lunch & Dinner, Saturday – Sunday. No reservations. Liquor. 18 S. Main St., Clarkston, 48346. 248.625.5660.
Royal Oak/Ferndale Ale Mary's: American. Weekend Brunch. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 316 South Main St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.268.1917. Anita’s Kitchen: Middle Eastern. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Beer & Wine. 22651 Woodward Ave., Ferndale, 48220. 248.548.0680. Andiamo Restaurants: Italian. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 129 S. Main St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.582.0999. Assaggi Bistro: Italian. Lunch, TuesdayFriday. Dinner, Tuesday-Sunday. Reservations. Liquor. 330 W. Nine Mile Rd., Ferndale, 48220. 248.584.3499. Bigalora: Italian. Weekend Brunch. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. No Reservations. Liquor. 711 S. Main Street, Royal Oak, 48067. Bistro 82: French. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 401 S. Lafayette Ave., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.542.0082. The Blue Nile: Ethiopian. Dinner, TuesdaySunday. Reservations. Liquor. 545 W. Nine Mile Rd., Ferndale, 48220. 248.547.6699. Bspot Burgers: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 310 S. Main St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.268.1621. Cafe Muse: French. Breakfast & Lunch, daily. Dinner, Tuesday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 418 S. Washington Ave., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.544.4749. Cork Wine Pub: American. Sunday Brunch. Dinner, Monday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 23810 Woodward Ave., Pleasant Ridge, 48069. 248.544.2675. D’Amato’s: Italian. Sunday Brunch. Dinner, Tuesday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 222 Sherman Dr., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.584.7400.v Due Venti: Italian. Sunday Brunch. Dinner, Tuesday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 220 S. Main St., Clawson, 48017. 248.288.0220. The Fly Trap: Diner. Breakfast & Lunch,
daily. Dinner, Monday-Friday. No reservations. 22950 Woodward Ave., 48220. 248.399.5150. Howe’s Bayou: Cajun. Lunch, MondaySaturday. Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 22949 Woodward Ave., Ferndale, 48220. 248.691.7145. Inn Season Cafe: Vegetarian. Sunday Brunch. Lunch & Dinner, TuesdaySaturday. No reservations. 500 E. Fourth St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.547.7916. Inyo Restaurant Lounge: Asian Fusion. Weekend Brunch. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 22871 Woodward Ave., Ferndale, 48220. 248.543.9500. KouZina: Greek. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 121 N. Main St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.629.6500. Lily’s Seafood: Seafood. Weekend Brunch. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 410 S. Washington Ave., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.591.5459. Local Kitchen and Bar: American. Weekend Brunch. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 344 W. Nine Mile Rd., Ferndale, 48220. 248.291.5650. Lockhart’s BBQ: Barbeque. Sunday Brunch. Lunch & Dinner, MondaySaturday. No reservations. Liquor. 202 E. Third St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.584.4227. Oak City Grille: American. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 212 W. 6th St, Royal Oak, 48067. 248.556.0947. One-Eyed Betty: American. Weekend Breakfast. Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 175 W. Troy St., Ferndale, 48220. 248.808.6633. Pronto!: American. Weekend Brunch. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 608 S. Washington Ave., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.544.7900. Public House: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 241 W. Nine Mile Rd., Ferndale, 48220. 248.850.7420. Redcoat Tavern: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 31542 Woodward Ave., Royal Oak, 48073. 248.549.0300. Ronin: Japanese. Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 326 W. 4th St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.546.0888. Royal Oak Brewery: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 215 E. 4th St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.544.1141. Strada: Italian. Dinner, Wednesday Sunday. Liquor. No reservations. 376 N. Main Street. Royal Oak, 48067. 248.607.3127. Toast, A Breakfast and Lunch Joint: American. Breakfast & Lunch, daily. No reservations. 23144 Woodward Ave., Ferndale, 48220. 248.398.0444. Tom’s Oyster Bar: Seafood. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 318 S. Main St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.541.1186. Town Tavern: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 116 W. Fourth St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.544.7300. The Morrie: American. Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 511 S. Main St., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.216.1112. Trattoria Da Luigi: Italian. Dinner, TuesdaySunday. Reservations. Liquor. 415 S, Washington Ave., Royal Oak, 48067. 248.542.4444. Vinsetta Garage: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 27799 Woodward Ave., Berkley, 48072. 248.548.7711.
West Bloomfield/Southfield Bacco: Italian. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, Monday-Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 29410 Northwestern Highway,
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Southfield, 48034. 248.356.6600. Beans and Cornbread: Southern. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 29508 Northwestern Highway, Southfield, 48034. 248.208.1680. Bigalora: Italian. Weekend Brunch. Lunch, Monday-Friday. Dinner, daily. No Reservations. Liquor. 29110 Franklin Road, Southfield, 48034. Maria’s Restaurant: Italian. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 2080 Walnut Lake Road, West Bloomfield, 48323. 248.851.2500. The Bombay Grille: Indian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. 29200 Orchard Lake Rd, Farmington Hills, 48334. 248.626.2982. The Fiddler: Russian. Sunday Brunch. Dinner, Thursday-Sunday. Reservations. Liquor. 6676 Orchard Lake Rd, West Bloomfield Township, 48322. 248.851.8782. The Lark: American. Dinner, TuesdaySaturday. Reservations. Liquor. 6430 Farmington Rd, West Bloomfield Township, 48322. 248.661.4466. Mene Sushi: Japanese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Beer & Wine. 6239 Orchard Lake Rd, West Bloomfield Township, 48322. 248.538.7081. Meriwether’s: Seafood. Lunch, MondaySaturday. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 25485 Telegraph Rd, Southfield, 48034. 248.358.1310. Pickles & Rye: Deli. Breakfast, Lunch, & Dinner, daily. No reservations. 6724 Orchard Lake Rd, West Bloomfield Township, 48322. 248.737.3890. Prime29 Steakhouse: Steak & Seafood. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 6545 Orchard Lake Rd., West Bloomfield, 48322. 248.737.7463. Redcoat Tavern: American. Lunch & Dinner, Monday-Saturday. No reservations. Liquor. 6745 Orchard Lake Rd., West Bloomfield Township, 48322. 248.865.0500. Shangri-La: Chinese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. Orchard Mall Shopping Center, 6407 Orchard Lake Rd, West Bloomfield Township, 48322. 248.626.8585. Sposita’s Ristorante: Italian. Friday Lunch. Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 33210 W. Fourteen Mile Rd., West Bloomfield Township, 48322. 248. 538.8954. Stage Deli: Deli. Breakfast, Lunch, & Dinner, daily. No reservations. Liquor. 6873 Orchard Lake Rd., West Bloomfield Township, 48322. 248.855.6622. Sweet Lorraine’s Café & Bar: American. Weekend Breakfast. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 29101 Greenfield Rd., Southfield, 48076. 248.559.5985. Yotsuba: Japanese. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 7365 Orchard Lake Rd, West Bloomfield, 48322. 248.737.8282.
West Oakland Gravity Bar & Grill: Mediterranean. Monday – Friday, Lunch & Dinner, Saturday, Dinner. Reservations. Liquor. 340 N. Main Street, Milford, 48381. 248.684.4223. It's A Matter of Taste: American. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 2323 Union Lake Road, Commerce, 48390. 248.360.4150. The Root Restaurant & Bar: American. Lunch & Dinner, Monday - Saturday. Reservations. Liquor. 340 Town Center Blvd., White Lake, 48390. 248.698.2400. Volare Ristorante: Italian. Lunch & Dinner, daily. Reservations. Liquor. 48992 Pontiac Trail, Wixom, 48393. 248.960.7771.
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Gail Kemler t nearly 100-years old, longtime Rochester-area resident Gail Kemler is a busy lady. And, that's just the way she likes it. "I don't feel like I thought you are supposed to feel at 100," said Kemler, who becomes an official centenarian on October 28, 2017. "The secret, I think, to longevity is keeping busy – particularly my head. I do crosswords. I started those after I retiring in 1984 from selling real estate. I do two every day." Born in Illinois, Kemler visited her grandparents in Rochester as a young child when her mother was recovering from an illness. At the time, her grandfather ran the Idle Hour Theatre on Main Street. Her family moved to the city when she was in 9th grade, sending her to Rochester High School, where she graduated in 1935. She got her first job when she was 17, working at the Western Knitting Mill, now home to the Rochester Mills Beer Company, making glove liners for the Civilian Conservation Corps. Some of the money she made was given to her father, who owned a dry cleaning business, to repair the family car. "People couldn't afford dry cleaning," she said. "It's impossible for anyone who didn't live through the Great Depression to really understand." It was after marrying her childhood sweetheart, Don, in 1938, and raising their four children that she became more involved in the community. In the 1950s, she worked with Michigan State University's Home Extension to help patients discharged from the state hospital in Pontiac learn new life skills. As her children went through school, Kemler got involved with the school district, serving on the Rochester Community Schools school board during its expansion from 1964 to 1972. "We were very fortunate to have a good superintendent," she said of the rapid expansion of schools during that time.
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Some of Kemler's other work in the community involved helping to found the Rochester Area Neighborhood House and the Helping Hands Food Pantry. She's been a member of the Congregational Church for more than 85 years, where she served on its board of trustees. She was also a longtime member of the Rochester Historical Commission and Rochester-Avon Historical Society, serving as its president. She most recently served on the city's 2017 Bicentennial Committee, as well as Rochester's historic study committee, which was tasked with identifying properties with historic value in the city. "I am interested in saving the good things that we have here, and preserving and encouraging other people to do the same," she said. "The problem has been educating everyone on the historic value (of buildings) and what can be done to preserve it. But people are afraid of costs. We just don't want to see anything happen to our history – we want to help preserve it." In 2014, Kemler was given a special recognition award for her work on the Rochester Historical Commission. Earlier this year, she was inducted into the Rochester Hills Wall of Fame to commemorate her contributions to the community. While not currently serving on volunteer boards, Kemler's phone rings everyday with calls from those in the community looking for information or advice. And she's always ready to offer help. "If I see something I can help with, I will," she said. "I like to encourage others. When you see someone that shows an interest, you encourage it." Story: Kevin Elliott
Photo: Jean Lannen
SOCIAL LIGHTS/SALLY GERAK Here is the update on the recent social scene. Many more photos from each event appear online each week at downtownpublications.com where readers can sign up for an e-mail notice when the latest social scene column is posted. Past columns and photos are also archived at the website for Downtown.
MOCAD Interchange Art + Dinner
Sally Gerak
MOCAD Interchange Art + Dinner The Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit and Library Street Collective gallery owners JJ and Anthony Curis collaborated on a remarkable event that turned their home – the Hawkins Ferry house – into a museum. Under the title “Unobstructed Views,” 39 pieces of art, all available for bids, had been installed throughout the modernist gem on the shore of Lake St. Clair. More than 200 guests ($175, $200 ticket) and their conversation invigorated both floors of the museum and the lakeside terrace. Guests included legendary sculptor Glen Michaels, who recalled creating many installations for the home’s architect Bill Kessler. Art collector Shirley Piku was another guest with specific memories. She recalled she and her sailor husband Frank giving Ferry a ride in their boat so he could see, for the first time, what the house looked like from the lake. By evening’s end, 14 pieces of art had new owners. Ten days later, when the subsequent online auction closed, 32 of the 39 lots had been sold, raising nearly $350,000. The artists received 40 percent of the purchase price with the remainder supporting MOCAD’s 200 free, creative community programs plus its cutting edge exhibitions. Kids Kicking Cancer Golf Outing The first annual Kids Kicking Cancer Celebrity Golf Outing started with Karen Newman singing the national anthem. Then some young participants in the KKC martial arts pain therapy program demonstrated a “breath break” for the 128 golfers before they headed out for their shotgun start at Knollwood Country Club. Not known is whether or not any of the golfers benefited from the kids’ tip, but there were winners. Two teams tied for first place: the Phillip Fisher Foundation team and the Neuman, Anderson, Grieco, McKenney team. Other prize winners included: Men’s Longest Drive – Scott Goldman; Women’s Longest Drive – Maryann Cromwell; Men’s Closest to the Pin – David Croskey. Josh and Darryl Kaplan chaired this inaugural golf fundraiser for the extraordinary, free program Rabbi G (Elimelech Goldberg) founded in Michigan in 1999. It has since expanded to six states and four nations and also includes patients with other pain-causing illnesses. They are empowered beyond the pain by karate, breathing techniques and meditation. Following the golf, 234 supporters convened for drinks, Sean Blackman’s music, a silent auction, dinner and the award program emceed by KKC board president Lila Lazarus. The event raised more than $160,000 which will help keep this miracle program free for all the patients. ORT Rub-a-Dub “You have given many children a dream,” said World ORT president Connie (Dr. Conrad ) Giles. He was speaking to approximately 100 of the educational organization supporters gathered at Franklin Hills Country Club for the Rehmannsponsored Rub-a-Dub patron reception. They had just seen a video that showed the exceptional results of their largess – the renovations at the Kfar Hassidim village school in Israel. It serves 300 impoverished children who arrive without hopes or dreams. Scott Marcus, event co-chair with Jason Brooks and Mark Tapper, had previously thanked especially generous donors like the William and Audrey Farber Family Foundation, The D. Dan & Betty Kahn Foundation, Andi & Larry Wolfe, Doreen Hermelin, The William Davidson Foundation, Dorothy and Dr. downtownpublications.com
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1. JJ Curis (left) of Grosse Pointe, Elyse Foltyn of Birmingham. 2. Maggie Allesee (left) of Bloomfield, Anthony Curis of Grosse Pointe. 3. Keith Pomeroy (left) of Birmingham, Karen & Jeff Carroll of Bloomfield. 4. Rebecca (left) & Alan Ross of Bloomfield, Marian & Stephen Loginsky of Birmingham. 5. Mike Curis (left) of Grosse Pointe, Roz & Scott Jacobson of Bloomfield. 6. Glen Michaels (left) of Birmingham, Naaman Rosen of Hazel Park. 7. Mike Curis, Jr. (left) of Bloomfield, Theresa & Anthony Selvaggio of Grosse Pointe. 8. JJ Curis (left) of Grosse Pointe, Linden & Michelle Nelson of Bloomfield. 9. Amy Zimmer (left) of Bloomfield, Jordan Bronk of Detroit, Sheida Soleimani of Providence, RI.
Kids Kicking Cancer Golf Outing
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6 1. Tamara Tazzi (left) of Rochester, Morehall Smith of Detroit, Kevin Dietz and Maryann Cromwell of Bloomfield. 2. Jim (left) and Alex Relle of Bloomfield. 3. Brian (left) & Vanessa Fanrich and Gary Fields of Bloomfield. 4. Hedy & David Blatt of Bloomfield. 5. Melissa Lucas (left) of Farmington Hills, Jason Coleman of Birmingham, Andy Roisman of Beverly Hills. 6. Danielle Raquet (left) of Plymouth, Linda Hatfield of Farmington Hills, Paul Toepp of Birmingham. 7. Michael Griffie (left) of Detroit, Sean Moran of Bloomfield, Gust Kowaris of Troy, Bob Foss of Commerce.
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SOCIAL LIGHTS/SALLY GERAK ORT Rub-a-Dub
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1. Jason Brooks (center) of W. Bloomfield and Matt Tapper (left) and Scott Marcus of Birmingham. 2. Robbie Sherman with Dr. George Blum of Bloomfield. 3. Doreen Hermelin (left) of Bingham Farms, Larry & Andi Wolfe of Bloomfield, Jeff Cooper of Marlboro, NJ. 4. Lynda & Connie (Dr. Conrad) Giles of Bloomfield. 5. David (left) & Nanci Farber with Wendy Dabalo of Bloomfield. 6. Josh Fisher (left) of Royal Oak, Rhonda and Matt Ran of Bloomfield. 7. Roger & Hailey Goodman of Birmingham. 8. Howard (left) & Brenda Rosenberg of Bloomfield, Lorain & Joe Borgesen of Clarkston. 9. Linda Singer (left) of W. Bloomfield, Sue Kaufman of Bloomfield. 10. Jordan Broder (left) of Birmingham, Lei Frankel of Bloomfield and Kete Brie of Lake Orion.
Bates Street Block Party
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3 1. Steve Flagg of Rochester. 2. Brad, Caleb & Katie Shepler of Birmingham. 3. Claire (left) and Rachel Dietz of Birmingham, Angela Rea of Bloomfield. 4. Terry Olson (left) of Grosse Pointe, Janice Degen of Bloomfield and Grace Farr of Beverly Hills. 5. Mark Fishman (left) of Bloomfield and Jackson, Cindi Morris of Birmingham.
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Hershel Sandberg, Joyce and Dr. George Blum, and Keith and Sonia Pomeroy. New arrivals swelled the guest count to almost 400 who bid nearly $65,000 in the large silent auction of great donated packages before convening on the tented terrace for the grilled dinner, accompanied by energetic NUCLASSICA music, and the live auction Brian Hermelin conducted. He got $72,750 for 12 super items. Combined with raffle proceeds ($45,000) and all the charitable sponsors, the 42nd Rub-a-Dub raised more than $500,000 for the education services to disadvantaged people around the world. Guests could also fill paper sacks with old fashion candies and found a real goody bag in their cars. Bates Street Block Party Counting attendance at The Community House’s annual al fresco event was reportedly difficult, but the people we saw were having a splendid time sampling the fare offered by the 27 vendors who supported The Community House project. Groups of girl friends and multiple generations of families were spotted among those who strolled the streets around the house and relaxed on the terrace where singer/guitarist Steve Flagg provided tunes for all tastes. We noticed repeat customers at the Zim’s Vodka station which was serving up a drink named Infusion. Other popular offerings on the terrace included TCH’s fried mac n’ cheese balls, Sedona Taphouse’s garlic whipped potatoes with flat iron steak and Mitchell’s Seafood’s tuna poke. DIA Founders Junior Council Fash Bash For the 2017 Fash Bash, Founders Junior Council and Neiman Marcus expanded the fashion show runway from the DIA Great Hall into the Rivera Court. This enabled more people than ever (620 @ $250 - $1,500 tickets) to sit runway-side for NM’s Art of Fashion show after they cocktailed in Prentis Court, Kresge Court and Romanesque Hall. Event chairs Peter Ghafari, Carolyn and Aaron Frankel, Suzanne and Sean Werdlow and DIA director Salvador Salort-Pons did their best to greet the crush of arrivals. Before the eyepopping show by NM international creative director Ken Downing, NM Troy manager Reneé Janovsky described the looks as “gritty elegance.” Another 300 guests ($150 ticket) came for the Lincoln Motor Company After Glow. It featured music by DJ Jared Sykes with a fill-in 10.17
stint by Detroit Piston Andre Drummond, Forte Belanger’s artistic small bites like buffalo chicken in waffle cones and an interactive key ring-making station where guests could “Punk My Keys”. The punk rock accented party echoed the fashion show look and rolled until midnight. Cruisin’ to Drive Out Hunger Westborn Market’s 15th annual Dream Cruise preview party benefiting Forgotten Harvest got as much energy from Larry Lee & The Back in the Day band as it did from the horse power on Woodward. When they were not car watching, guests (700 @ $150 ticket) could lollygag at tables in the tent or outside on the market terrace where conversation did not have as much competition from the high decibel music. The nine food stations offered yummy sustenance - from Westborn’s endless supply of grilled shrimp to Vinsetta Garage’s outstanding Mac & Cheese. A silent auction and generous sponsors enabled the event to raise enough money to provide 750,000 meals to hungry metro Detroiters. Angels Place Friends & Family Fun Day More than 500 people of all ages ($20 tickets) flocked to the annual happening that Angels Place has been staging for 14 years. Forty of them came early for the run/walk/roll through the Marian High School neighborhood. Then the main, carnival-type event opened at 10 a.m. with a welcome by sponsor Sun Community’s John McLaren and a chorus of the National Anthem led by the Marian Melodies. After that, it was full speed ahead to the giant slide, inflatables, rock climbing wall, pony rides, petting farm, basketball challenge zone, dunk tank, face painting station, raffle booth and everpopular game tent with prizes for all. The latter has been coordinated for all 14 years by Mark and Amy Carroll, who now have three kids to help out. Food breaks offered National Coney Islands, ice cream, snow cones, cotton candy and popcorn. Nora Grabowski won the chocolate chip cookie contest and the Lions’ Roary, Tigers’ Paws and Disney’s Snow Queen Elsa schmoozed everybody. That includes the residents of the 20 Angels Place homes where people with disabilities know lifetime care in a family-like setting. Thanks to generous sponsors, the 14th annual fun day raised more than $63,000. Women’s Fund Summer Soiree Barb Cenko and Maria Trahan downtownpublications.com
DIA Founders Junior Council Fash Bash
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1. Peter Ghafari (left) of Detroit and Carolynn & Aaron Frankel of Bloomfield. 2. Suzanne & Sean Werdlow of Bloomfield. 3. Stephen (left), Noah & Nicole Eisenberg of Bloomfield. 4. Denise (left) & Richard Victor and Heather & Ron Victor of Bloomfield. 5. Gail Rashid-Pope (left) of Bloomfield, Rachelle Nozero of Novi, Becky Sorensen of Bloomfield. 6. Kappy & Dave Trott of Birmingham. 7. Mark (left) & Shelley Polega of Birmingham, Howard & Brenda Rosenberg of Bloomfield. 8. Christine & David Colman of Birmingham. 9. Sandra Plezia (left) & Ryan Huysnu of W. Bloomfield, Dante & Natalie Bacall of Bloomfield.
Cruisin’ to Drive Out Hunger
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1. Mark Anusbigian (left) of Birmingham, Kirk Mays of Detroit. 2. Lori (left) & Greg Wingeter of Rochester, Patti Sharf of Bloomfield. 3. Mike & Michele Buscaino of Birmingham. 4. Jeffrey Imerman of Birmingham, Ashleigh Dunham of Pleasant Ridge. 5. Nan (left) & Tom Grobbel and Kathy Vargo of Birmingham, Nicki Wyatt of Brighton. 6. Lin Belanger of Birmingham, Don DeClerq of Bloomfield.
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SOCIAL LIGHTS/SALLY GERAK Angels Place Friends & Family Fun Day
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1. Amy (left), Ashley, Charlie, Heidi & Mark Carroll of Birmingham. 2. Joey Jonna (left) and Joe Cassai of Bloomfield. 3. Taylor Remski of Birmingham. 4. Drake (left), Crystal, Troy & Bobby Semaai of Bloomfield. 5. Colleen Burtka (left) of Rochester, Mike Cassiday of Beverly Hills, Cheryl Loveday of Pontiac. 6. Andrew Hyde (left) and Mike Lockwood of Bloomfield.
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1. Barb Cenko (left) and Maria Trahan of Rochester Hills, Kathy McCarter and Kathy Bogdziewicz of Rochester, Lynn Florek of Lake Orion, Judy deSteiger of Rochester Hills, Sue Upton of Rochester. 2. Mary Ann Reidinger (left) and Renee Cortright of Rochester. 3. Rick (left) & Karen Lockman and Rob & Toni McConnell of Rochester Hills. 4. Lynn Oates (left) and Nancy Salvia of Rochester, Judy deSteiger of Rochester Hills. 5. Linda Preede (left) Lisa Perry and Phyllis Scroggie of Rochester Hills.
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Rotary Sunday Afternoon with Bob
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1. Bob Allison/Allesee (center) of Bloomfield, Rev. Al Timm (left) and Shirley Roseman of Detroit. 2. Maggie Allesee (center) of Bloomfield, Myra Ford-Jenkins of Belleville and John Keeler of Livonia. 3. Brian & Angie Schumacker of Rochester. 4. Marusa Judy (left) and Patti Sharf of Bloomfield.
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chaired The Women’s Fund annual summer gathering at Arteva’s Idea Show House in Rochester Hills’ Clear Creek Community. Nearly 100 members and their guests toured the more than 7,000 square feet of inspired architecture and cuttingedge design. Socializing and touring paused briefly for WF president Lori Roscoe to share the fund’s accomplishments over the past year. These include grants that help victims of domestic assault; emergency financial assistance; healthcare screening for uninsured women; family crisis assistance due to catastrophic illness; job seeking & retraining initiatives; assistance for seniors with needed home repairs; and scholarship funding for two high school seniors. Roscoe also provided an update on the WF Endowment Campaign whose goal is $1 million by the year 2020 and the Legacy Circle whose members donate $5,000, $10,000 or $20,000. Rotary Sunday Afternoon with Bob A piano on the CUBE stage at Orchestra Hall’s Max & Marjorie Fisher Center made it a perfect place for piano man Bob Allesee (nee Allison) to be honored. The event, which benefited the Detroit Rotary Foundation, was a salute by the Rotarians for the octogenarian’s remarkable fidelity – for 35-plus years Bob has played the piano at their weekly meeting at the Detroit Athletic Club. The relaxed event, chaired by Myra Ford Jenkins and John Keeler, attracted 125. They were welcomed by DSO CEO Anne Parsons who noted the Robert & Maggie Allesee rehearsal hall adjoins the CUBE. They snacked sang-along, and applauded the tributes and presentations. Bob, whose “Ask Your Neighbor” radio show has been running for 55 years, generated approving mummers when he announced his next song as his favorite: “I Married an Angel.” And the room applauded in agreement when a note signed by Sue and Paul Nine was read: “It is not true that the good die young.” Camp Casey’s Gold Rush Gala The Reserve was awash in golden glitter as 200 Camp Casey supporters ($85 ticket), many wearing a shiny nod to Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, gathered there. The Jukebox Junkies supplied toe tappin’, easy listening tunes while people socialized, sipped, supped, bid $12,000 in the silent auction and dropped $1,700 at the whiskey and wine pull station. They paused for a 10.17
brief program emceed by WYCD’s Rachael Hunter. It had highlights: David Brown’s video depicting Camp Casey’s equestrian programs for kids with cancer; testimonials by camper Alyssa Leighton, 15, and her mom Denise (“Molly and her team changed our lives forever”) and moving remarks by Nathan Foote, whose daughter’s losing cancer battle inspired Molly Reeser to found the non-profit 13 years ago. Thanks also to a raffle ($1,170), live auction ($2,800), dessert auction ($1,025) and generous sponsors, the fun-filled evening raised more than $42,000 to provide happy, horsing around times for kids with cancer and their families. Good Samaritan Cruise The 16th anniversary of Holy Cross Services’ Samaritan Center was excuse enough for the Good Samaritan support group to hit the deck of Jack’s River Tour’s Diamond Belle. Many of the 80 guests ($150 ticket) were meeting the new Holy Cross Services president Sharon Berkobien for the first time. She reported briefly about the center’s new comprehensive services meetings with the neighbors in the eastside Detroit neighborhood. Then, as the boat cruised the Detroit River north to Lake St. Clair and back to the Ambassador Bridge, the setting sun and night lights of Detroit and Windsor spurred dinner table conversation. Lilting musical selections by soprano Angela Theis were like frosting on the anniversary cake. Thanks also to a silent auction ($1,750) the evening raised nearly $15,000 for the Samaritan Center. Detroit Dog Rescue benefit The invitation named the event “Fashion, Fashion Food” and more than 60 people gathered at Paula and Randy Slof’s home in Franklin for both. (Chloe, the Australian sheep dog that inspired the hosts to support Detroit Dog Rescue with a percent of the evening’s sales, was at doggy day care.) The fashions, routinely sold via the couple’s Paula&Chlo online shop, were attractively displayed pop-up boutique style in the family room of the European-inspired home. Guests sipped yuzu and meyer lemon martinis and relished shrimp cocktails and cuisine Paula, whose background includes her family’s Peppino’s Restaurant, personally created. Send ideas for this column to Sally Gerak, 28 Barbour Lane, Bloomfield Hills, 48304; email samgerak@aol.com or call 248.646.6390. downtownpublications.com
Camp Casey’s Gold Rush Gala
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1. Katie Patterson (left) of Birmingham, Molly Reeser of Ferndale, Angela Butorac of Clinton. 2. Alyssa (left) and Denise Leighton of Birmingham. 3. Rob (left) & Andrea Karlik of Rochester, Katelyn & Nick Banaszak of Farmington. 4. Veronica Wood (left) of Birmingham, Amber and Vickie Pochron of Bloomfield. 5. Todd & Laura Horner of Bloomfield.
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Good Samaritan Cruise
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1. Sharon Berkobien (left) of Saginaw, Mia Materka and Paul Nine of Bloomfield. 2. Lisa Wilson (left) of Bloomfield, Karen Mersino of Lapeer. 3. Sue Nine (left) of Bloomfield, Msgr. Chuck Kosanke of Detroit. 4. Patti Jessup (left) of Bloomfield, Colleen Nagel of Troy. 5. Sue Spangler (left) and Lisa Stancrak of Bloomfield.
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Detroit Dog Rescue benefit
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1. Randy & Paula Slof of Franklin. 2. Sue Gorang of Rochester. 3. Chris Morrisroe (left) of Waterford, Mariana Keros of Birmingham. 4. Karen Gilbert (left) of Rochester, Kim Shanker of Berkley.
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ENDNOTE
Oakland emergency preparations lacking s we examined in depth in this month’s issue Oakland County and local municipalities’ emergency preparations and hazard mitigation for any kind of serious crisis or catastrophic event, natural or manmade, what we came away with was the realization that they’re not ready for prime time. Frankly, 16 years after the 9/11 terrorist attack, and 12 years after the horror in New Orleans of Katrina, we are not only disappointed in their short-sighted approach, but worried. Just weeks after the massive natural catastrophes that Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma were for the southern portions of this country, it exposed holes in disaster preparation that are transferrable to southeastern Michigan. Every local municipality with an emergency management plan focused primarily on natural disasters – important certainly, but here in Michigan, we are not convinced that winter elements of snow and snowstorms, often considered a top hazard, should be considered a natural disaster rather than winter weather. Yes, ice storms cause all kinds of major issues, including power outages, which require emergency preparations. However, both the county and locals remain less than ready for how to handle massive power outages when they do occur, whether from weather-related events or from a terrorist event, war or any other catastrophe. Last March’s power outage due to strong winds was a prime example, as it took over a week to restore much of the 277,000 people who were left without power.
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One of the most significant issues that appears incomplete in plan after plan is how they would handle communications in the event of a catastrophic event that result in massive power outages and cell phone towers down, with residents incapable of just “turning on the TV to find out where to go.” Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard has seen first hand what is needed when power grids are down, the water system is compromised, and there is a lack of central communication to the public, having been called to action at the Twin Towers after 9/11, and after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He said that not all first responders were prepared, and it made him realize how critical it is for first responders to come to a disaster ready for anything, having planned for any eventuality, and with their own needs being met, as well as for the public’s. He had worked with the feds to create concentric circles of prepared regional teams that were pre-trained and pre-equipped for any kind of disaster, with the right kind of communication devices and skills. Unfortunately, changes in administrations and priorities derailed the efforts. The answer from emergency managers was often for residents to have emergency radios with batteries, or that they would have to talk to their neighbors. That’s not the the kind of regional cooperation that is required for communications and it seems highly inadequate if there were a major event – which all anyone has to currently do is read a headline to know that preparing for an event greater than flooding should be their highest priority.
President Trump spoke to the United Nations General Assembly, threatening “total destruction” of North Korea if it doesn’t abandon its drive toward nuclear weaponry. North Korea continues to threaten to hit the middle of the United States with a missile while testing out its weapons. China and Russia are conducting joint war exercises. Disaffected men around the world, whether they have been radicalized as terrorists or are mentally ill, are acting as “lone wolves” in reeking havoc on the public. If only flooding, ice and snowstorms were really what emergency preparations were all about, Oakland County would be mostly prepared. The reality is that today, we are dealing with a president who could engage in a war with North Korea or Iran, or any number of countries, at any point, and citizenry could be confronted with dangers much greater than clearing snow off roadways. We have to look elsewhere for good examples of emergency preparedness. For example, in Israel, every school child knows where to head in case of war or bombings. Or look to North Korea, where a reporter recently interviewed citizens who said they were preparing for war with the United States, and everyone knew where to go if that happened. When we asked officials about evacuation routes and shelters in case of a major catastrophe, the answers were either ‘confidential’ or non-existent. That is not preparation in the event of a major calamity. Oakland County, you must do better, for all of our sakes.
Smart planning with new zoning districts arlier this year, the Rochester Planning Commission began looking to rezone several areas surrounding the city's core downtown area. The new districts, including a River's Edge District, Downtown Edge District, Mixed Use districts and others, aim to expand residential and commercial uses in the areas surrounding downtown while restricting more industrial uses. Overall, the districts, three of which have already been approved by city council, aim to put an economic and visual focus on the downtown area by creating mixed-use developments that expand and support the city's downtown. The goal of the districts are also to expand the city's tax base, both inside the Downtown Development Authority's (DDA) tax capture area – which is used primarily for infrastructure needs in the downtown area – as well as a portion of land outside of the DDA's Tax Increment Financing (TIF) district. The districts work in conjunction with the city's long-term master plan, which moves the city away from its former industrial and
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manufacturing uses and into more commercial friendly and office uses that work well to support the downtown area. The city is working to implement a total of five new districts. Once all are completed and approved by the city council, the city plans to amend its zoning map and implement all of the districts simultaneously. The new districts show a logical and balanced approach to planning. The most successful downtowns of today, and the foreseeable future, are those that support a mix of residential and commercial developments. By utilizing the natural enhancements, such as the Clinton River Trail, the Clinton River and the Paint Creek, and providing a blend of walkable residential and commercial areas, Rochester will draw in both residents and visitors from other communities. To ensure the success of these new zoning districts, Rochester Planning and Economic Development Director Nik Banda will be asking city council for authorization for an economic analysis to be conducted, which will
include the impact of future development on infrastructure, traffic, business and residents in the downtown and surrounding districts. That analysis will be used to determine more specifics on where and what development projects will work best in the future. The approach being put forth by the city may be new, and possibly concerning to some longtime residents who feel “priced out,” but it represents the future of Rochester. As such, it's important for the city to determine its own future by the types of development it will permit, rather than simply accepting offers to expand the tax base on a first-come, firstserved basis. While industrial and manufacturing may have served the city well in the past, such developments have left environmental problems that the city is still cleaning up, and which have stymied new development. The current approach to planning is one that ensures development well into the future that will benefit all of the community, both inside and out of downtown.
Lynn Baker, Associate Broker Deby Gannes, REALTOR® 248.379.3000 lbaker@hallandhunter.com
248.379.3003 dgannes@hallandhunter.com NEW LISTING
OAKLAND TOWNSHIP 2831 Cranbrook Ridge Ct. | $1,325,000
OAKLAND TOWNSHIP 5475 Jendean Lane | $748,900
ROCHESTER HILLS 3638 Nesting Ridge Drive | $699,900
Luxurious custom home on almost an acre surrounded “Up north” feeling on rare 10-acre lot with spring-fed A true oasis backing to woods, the Clinton River and by lush gardens. Magnificent architectural details. pond minutes from downtown Rochester. Amazing interior conservation area. Every upgrade imaginable! 1700 SF Beautifully finished walkout LL. Rear and side terraces. & out-of-this-world walkout LL with indoor pool. walkout LL. Glass awalled deck jettisons out into woods. 8,643 Total SF | 4 BR | 3.3 Baths | MLS# 217083667
6,618 Total SF | 4 BR | 4.1 Baths | MLS# 217064072
5,801 Total SF | 6 BR | 4.1 Baths | MLS# 217059657
BEST VALUE IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD! OAKLAND TOWNSHIP 5249 Orchard Ridge | $1,899,000
OAKLAND TOWNSHIP 5760 Murfield | $699,900
OAKLAND TOWNSHIP 1840 Rolling Oaks Court | $709,900
Magnificent estate sitting high on a hill in the area’s most prestigious gated community. Lafata hand-painted kitchen. Amazing master suite and in-law apartment.
Impeccably maintained Moceri-built Hills of Oakland former Homerama show house backing to common area. Every upgrade imaginable! Finished walkout LL.
One-of-a-kind, custom raised ranch on 4.79 wooded acres. Master with updated bath. Incredible lower level with 3 BR & 2 baths. In-ground pool & hot tub.
7,870 Total SF | 5 BR | 5.2 Baths | MLS# 217067687
6,347 Total SF | 4 BR | 4.2 Baths | MLS# 217061135
5,399 Total SF | 4 BR | 3.1 Baths | MLS# 217063562
NEW LISTING
NEW LISTING PRICE
OAKLAND TOWNSHIP 3777 S. Century Oaks Circle | $609,000
OAKLAND TOWNSHIP 1700 Schilling Lane | $1,399,900
ROCHESTER HILLS 1849 Old Homestead Drive | $399,900
Better than new in popular Century Oaks sub! Oversized kitchen & nook overlooking family room. Poss. 6th BR/ bonus room on 2nd floor. Ready-to-finish LL.
Custom-built gated retreat on 16.9 acres of breathtaking scenery. Carriage house and loft, pond & 2-tier stone waterfall. Extraordinary amenities!
Elegant custom-built Colonial in Hawthorn Hills sub close to schools, shopping and expressways. Spacious kitchen opens to oversized FR. Large 3-car garage.
4,886 SF | 6 BR | 3.1 Baths | MLS# 217043326
6,136 Total SF | 4 BR | 4.2 Baths | MLS# 217081872
3,072 SF | 4 BR | 2.1 Baths | MLS# 217076413
LynnAndDeby.com |
Lynn and Deby - Hall & Hunter Realtors
Hall & Hunter Realtors | 442 S. Old Woodward Ave. | Birmingham, MI 48009