On the latest episode of WKTV Journal In Focus is a follow-up with the Grand Valley State University Veterans Upward Bound program. In 2018, as the program was just started, we talked with its new director. Now we bring you two veterans working for and as part of the program — each with unique and moving stories to tell — to find out how it is working.
The Veterans Upward Bound program aims to provide academic and other services to military veterans with the goal of supporting their enrollment and success in postsecondary education.
With us are two members of the Upward Bound staff, Air Force veteran and soon-to-be college student Russell Coon, and Army veteran Belinda Coronado, who already has a degree from GVSU but is not yet done with her higher education efforts.
And Coon’s story is more than simply a vet finding help with higher education — his story is one of a vet finding his way in the world thanks to veterans support programs.
WKTV Journal In Focus airs on cable television in the Wyoming and Kentwood areas on Comcast WKTV Channel 26 and on AT&T Channel 99 Government channel (see our Weekly On-air Schedule for dates and times). All individual interviews included in episodes of WKTV Journal In Focus are also available on YouTube at WKTVvideos.
Mitten Brewing Co. north, in Northport in the Traverse Bay area, will be a great place to stop by — summer or winter. (Supplied)
By K.D. Norris ken@wktv.org
It is unclear which Grand Rapids area craft brew U.S. Sen. Gary Peters likes to order when he makes a stop in the area, but he probably has one on the house coming from Mitten Brewing Company.
Thanks to some federal-level advocacy from Sen. Peters’ office, Mitten Brewing Co. has a new Traverse Bay area craft brewing brewery and pub after Chris Andrus, co-owner and co-founder of the Mitten Brewing Co., was able to expedite a license from the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau.
Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, shown with Sen. Joni Ernst at Washington, D.C.’s annual Rolling Thunder First Amendment Demonstration Run in 2018 (Supplied)
The story, as given by Sen. Peters’ office recently, is that Mitten Brewing Co. discovered that a brewery in Northport, Mich., was going out of business and “They saw this as an opportunity to expand their brewery as well as protect the jobs of those employees. In order to do so, Mitten Brewing Co. needed to obtain their licensing quickly from the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau to open in time for the (past) summer season.”
Andrus reached out to Sen. Peters’ office for help, we are told, and “The office helped cut red tape for Mitten Brewing Co. by contacting the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau regarding the brewery’s licensing application. Chris soon thereafter received approval for the necessary license. The Northport location was able to open in time and is now a thriving part of the Northern Michigan community.”
Don’t know about you, but I love Mitten Brewing’ local locales and brews. Maybe I’ll buy the senator one next time we belly-up to the bar together.
Mitten Brewing’s Andrus shared his story in a video released by Sen. Peters’ office, and can be seen here.
Sen. Peters office states that Michiganders in need of assistance with a federal agency to contact his Detroit office at (844) 506-7420 (toll-free) or can visit his website at peters.senate.gov.
Grand Rapids, regional distillery choices growing all the time
It is no secret that Michigan is a booming market for craft distilled liqueurs, but the quality of Grand Rapids area, or nearby, sources might surprise you as much as they continue to surprise me.
In Grand Rapids, there is Long Road Distillers, with cocktails, small-bites, and bottles to-go are available — you can also take a tour for a behind-the-scenes look at the distilling process and get to know what is in your glass from a distilling expert.
Eastern Kille (once known a Grey Skies, FYI) has a downtown tasting room to sample their whiskey, gin, or coffee liqueur. A seasonally revolving menu of cocktails are available to highlight the spirits made onsite.
Nearby, in the great day-trip location of Saugatuck, the New Holland Spirits offer tasting flights and cocktails made with award-winning spirits, along with light snacks and a retail area with bottles to go. Holland, too makes a good stop as Coppercraft Distillery not only has small batch cocktails but an extensive dining menu.
And in the summer, when you are really in the mood for a road trip to the Traverse Bay area, we are told “Michigan’s oldest award-winning ‘Grain to Bottle’ Craft Distillery” is Grand Traverse Distillery. Grand Traverse Distillery distills all of their vodkas, whiskies, gin, and rum in a 1,100 liter Holstein twin column copper reflux pot still.
And I can personally vouch for the idea of getting a “Latitude Adjustment” at Northern Latitudes Distillery in Lake Leelanau, where their gin is to die for and their limoncello — aptly named Limoncello di Leelanau — is worth living for. The tasting room is open seven days a week, and tastings are free and you can buy your favorite selection by the bottle and/or have it mixed into an incredible cocktail.
OK, sharing a bottle of Northern Latitudes is a good reason to spend the night or weekend out of town.
Feel a dark mood coming on? Wearable technology could one day alert you in advance, aiding in management of depression or other mood disorders. (Courtesy Spectrum Health Beat)
A high-tech wristband is being developed along the same lines, potentially helping patients who struggle with mood disorders.
The smart wristband would use a person’s skin to track their emotional intensity. During a mood swing, either high or low, the wristband would change color, heat up, squeeze or vibrate to inform the wearer he might be in the throes of depression or anxiety, the researchers said.
“As the feedback is provided in real time, our devices encourage people to become more aware of their emotions, name them, potentially reflect on what causes them and even learn how to control their emotional responses in order to change the visual or tactile feedback provided by the device,” said researcher Corina Sas. She is a professor of human-computer interaction and digital health at Lancaster University in the United Kingdom.
About 10% of U.S. adults struggle with a mood disorder, such as depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder or seasonal affective disorder, according to the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health.
Part of the treatment for a mood disorder involves becoming more aware of emotions and then learning to regulate emotional response, the study authors said in background notes in their report.
Co-author Muhammad Umair, a Lancaster research associate, explained, “We wanted to create low-cost, simple prototypes to support understanding and engagement with real-time changes in arousal. The idea is to develop self-help technologies that people can use in their everyday life and be able to see what they are going through,” he said in a university news release.
To that end, the U.K. researchers are developing wristbands that use sensors to detect changes in a person’s emotional intensity by tracking the electrical conductivity of their skin.
The devices then communicate those emotional changes either through materials that change color, heat up, vibrate or squeeze the wrist, the researchers said.
“Depression has a range of emotions, but if we talk about sadness, then as this is associated with low arousal—or what we call emotional intensity—the device will most likely reflect low arousal,” Sas said. “On the other hand, anxiety tends to be associated with high-intensity arousal, so that device will most likely reflect this.”
However, Sas noted, the device does not differentiate between positive or negative emotions, but between high- and low-intensity ones.
The researchers tested six wrist-worn prototypes with 12 people who wore them over two days.
Participants said the wristbands effectively prompted them to evaluate their emotions.
One participant told the researchers: “When I see the feedback, I feel present, I start to reflect what I was doing before and try to think how I am feeling at that moment.”
Another said: “It made me more aware of my feelings and made me think what feelings I have. But if I didn’t have the device, I wouldn’t be probably as aware as I am when wearing it. It did give me a way to think of my own emotion; made me aware of my own emotions.”
But participants were also concerned that negative feedback from the device might pose a potential hazard.
One said it could “be used as a trigger and might push you down the negative path.”
That’s a concern shared by Jessy Warner-Cohen, a health psychologist with Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New Hyde Park, N.Y.
“I caution against letting a device dictate to a person their own emotions,” she said.
On the other hand, such a device is consistent with a long-established tradition of biofeedback, in which people use “physiological cues to help us actively try to regulate our minds and bodies,” Warner-Cohen said.
The device could help people recognize specific habits or tics that occur when they have a mood swing, she added.
“For example, if a person can identify that they clench their jaw when stressed then, in reverse, noticing when they clench their jaw can help a person recognize they are getting stressed and take proactive steps to alleviate such,” Warner-Cohen explained.
Dr. Victor Fornari, a psychiatrist with Zucker Hillside Hospital in Queens, N.Y., said the wristbands may be the beginning of “a new frontier” in helping to identify and regulate anxiety and depression.
“Increasing awareness about emotional reactions and improving the way individuals can self-regulate their emotions can be very helpful and important for everyone, but particularly for individuals with a mood or anxiety disorder,” Fornari said.
The technology is not yet patented, Sas said, and it is some ways off from being available to consumers.
“We need about another year to develop a more robust version of our research prototypes so that we can integrate both visual and tactile feedback, for which we will need increased computational power,” she said. “At that stage, we will look into running clinical trials to explore its value for people living with affective disorders, such as depression or anxiety.”
The researchers were scheduled to present their work at the Designing Interactive Systems conference in San Diego, Calif.
Research presented at meetings is typically considered preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal.
The Wyoming Kentwood Area Chamber of Commerce kicked off its 40th Anniversary with its Annual Meeting and Awards Dinner on Jan. 25 at the Amway Grand Plaza. At the event, several individuals and two local businesses were honored including The Candied Yam for Retail Business of the Year and WKTV for Service Business of the Year. To read all about it, click here.
Fast and Shiny
Sports cars, along with SUVs and trucks, are expected to be the big draw at the 2020 Michigan International Auto Show , as they were last year in this photo. (Supplied)
If you didn’t score “Hamilton” tickets yet or not planning to go, you’ll be happy to know another favorite American past-time is in town: the 2020 International Car Show. The annual event is taken place this weekend at DeVos Place. Mixed with some of the newest cars coming out are a few classics from the Gilmore Car Museum. For more about the show and where to park, click here.
Filling the Shelves
Our giving spirt sometimes ends when the holidays are over. Pantries such as the Family Network of Wyoming are in need of food and especially personal care items such as toilet paper. Have a few hours to spare? Volunteers also are needed. To learn more about how Family Network of Wyoming has been helping its community for the past 15 years, click here.
Fun Fact: Some say Soda, we say Vernors
While Dr. Pepper and Coke Cola like to battle it out as the oldest soda the title actually goes to Michigan’s Vernors, which was created in 1866 by Detroit pharmacist James Vernor (hence the name Vernors.) The popular ginger ale was sold outside of the pharmacy starting in 1880, five years before Dr. Pepper even came on the market. And for those Vernors lovers, try a Boston Cooler, which is a twist on a float using Vernors and vanilla ice cream.
It’s a hard habit to break—sinking your teeth into a favorite fast-food breakfast sandwich.
But your drive-thru addiction could be making a big dent in daily calorie and fat limits without giving you the nutrients needed to fuel your day.
Take these steps for a healthy breakfast sandwich remix, great taste included:
Skip the sausage
When you must buy a ready-made sandwich, skip the bacon or sausage. Replace a croissant, white roll or biscuit with a whole-wheat English muffin or whole grain wrap, like a corn or whole-wheat tortilla or a pita pocket.
Go homemade
Here are other do-it-yourself steps that shouldn’t take more time than driving to a chain restaurant:
If you’re feeling adventurous, make a batch of crepes with whole-wheat pastry flour to use as the wrap. Store leftovers between sheets of wax paper in the fridge—they’ll be ready for a grab-and-go breakfast the rest of the week. If you’re short on time or you’re cutting back on calories, use a broad leafy green, like red leaf lettuce or romaine, as your wrap.
Fill your wrap of choice with 3 to 4 ounces of protein, such as eggs, a turkey sausage, your favorite smoked fish or even lean meat leftovers—nowhere is it written that you can’t have chicken for breakfast.
Now load up on the fixings. This is a great way to get in vegetables. Go beyond tomato slices with bell pepper rings, mashed avocado and even sautéed onions and mushrooms. Add crunch with arugula, spinach or kale shreds.
And for extra flavor without extra calories, top with salsa, hot sauce or fresh herbs. Then roll up your wrap and dig in.
Exalta Health provides health care to an underserved population at two clinics, one in the 2000 block of Division Avenue. (WKTV)
By WKTV Staff ken@wktv.org
A new contract between Exalta Health and the Kent County’s Women’s Health Network will benefit both Exalta Health and its patients. Exalta Health is located at 2060 Division Ave. S., Grand Rapids, but serves patients from Wyoming and Kentwood as well.
The Women’s Health Network program contracts with 30 medical sites in Kent, Muskegon, Barry and Ottawa counties to offer the Breast and Cervical Cancer Control and Navigation (BCCCN) program, according to supplied material. This is both a national and State of Michigan program that offers free mammograms, clinical breast exams, Pap smears and pelvic exams to women who qualify, as well as follow-up care, medical referrals and cancer treatment.
Through this new contract, which could be worth up to $20,000, Exalta Health becomes one of those 30 sites and those critical and often life-saving exams will be made available to its patients with the contract now covering the costs.
Exalta Health’s Andrea Cervantes said in supplied material that the organization has offered these tests in the past, but essentially took a loss on them. The new contract means Exalta Health will not only be able to provide the tests but also will break even in doing so. For a small nonprofit that depends on donations to fund its services, access to a fund is a big deal.
In addition, access to the funds means Exalta Health will be able to serve more of its patients who need these exams and will be able to work with its patients in a more direct and more proactive way to make sure critical exams and screenings aren’t being missed.
“We’re really grateful to the Kent County Women’s Health Network,” said Cervantes, a registered nurse. “This grant is going to allow us to serve our patients better and serve more of them. We see a lot of female patients at Exalta Health, so BCCCN is really important to them and to us.”
Fifth-grader Jerzey Wright didn’t want to part with her candy, but alas, her hoodie had a zipper. King George III had declared such an accessory be taxed one M&M.
Jerzey slid under her desk dramatically at the news that her once ample allotment of candy pieces would dwindle to two. She reached one arm up from below the desk as tax collector Jo’ Vaughn Grover came for payment. “Give me my M&Ms back!” demanded the Wyoming Intermediate School student.
At the front of the classroom in his office chair-turned-throne, King George, played by Principal Kirk Bloomquist, showed no empathy as he taxed shoelaces, jewelry and buttons to pay off England’s debt from the French and Indian War. As students handed over more and more candy pieces to tax collectors, they began to cry foul.
King George enters the class. (School News Network)
The king, however, proved relentless. “If you are a girl, please pay one M&M,” he ordered.
The Colonists’ Side of Things
Students were assigned roles of tax collectors, parliamentarians and colonists. After each decree from the king, collectors came for colonists’ candy-coated chocolates and brought them back to the king and parliament.
The social studies lesson on taxation without representation taught students about events leading up to the Revolutionary War while giving a sense of how colonists felt when taxed on goods by a faraway king. It was a tactile lesson about historical themes that audiences will see played out onstage in “Hamilton,” the hit Broadway musical that opens at DeVos Hall tonight, Jan. 21.
“M&Ms are something the students love and will work for,” said teacher Anna Limbeck. “When they are taken from them unfairly, they feel it a lot more… It develops a connection between this activity and taxes in real life.”
As the king imposed more and more taxes, students’ M&Ms dwindled. (School News Network)
As they move on in the unit, students remember the injustice they felt when learning why colonists sought independence when they didn’t have a voice in what was taxed.
“It would have been more fair if they would have had a say and voted about what they were taxed for,” said fifth grader Ashonna Fudge.
Ashonna pointed out how the taxes didn’t benefit the colonists. “When your parents pay taxes they are used to build different buildings and pay for things in the city.”
Tax collector Lucy Renteria said it was exciting collecting the candy-coated chocolate, but she felt bad too. “It was sad because it really wasn’t fair for them. Their faces were mad and sad when I was taking their M&Ms.”
For more stories on area schools, visit the School News Network, schoolnewsnetwork.org.
King George III (Wyoming Intermediate School Principal Kirk Bloomquist) addresses the colonists (fifth-graders). (School News Network)
Oh, Marcus! He’s always crushing or dropping his cell phone, and now he’s broken another one. His parents won’t buy him a new one, unless he can convince them he will keep it safe.
Renae Hackley, sixth grade science teacher at Godwin Heights Middle School, asked her students to help the fictitious Marcus, and over the last several weeks they’ve been hard at work designing protective gear for his phone.
“We’re trying to make a cell phone case that makes it easy for the phone to come out, and it won’t break from dropping it from 70 centimeters or be crushed with seven books on top,” explained Higinio Rolon-Rosado who, along with partner Juan Granados, demonstrated how their foam and fabric design met the challenge.
Renae Hackley, sixth grade science teacher at Godwin Heights Middle School, asked students to design a phone case as part of a recent physics unit
Tinkering Thinkers
The activity was part of the class’ eight-week physics unit using Mi-STAR, a science curriculum that incorporates real world challenges into every unit. It introduced force and motion, and then let students get their hands dirty — dropping raw eggs on different materials to see if they’d break, for example — before designing the case.
Experimentation involved dropping, crushing and trying to understand the effects of forces on different objects. Weeks of tinkering and observation led to the final challenge of creating the case.
During the experimentation period, Higinio said, his team noticed that an egg did not crack when dropped on a sponge, so they looked for sponge-like materials to use in their design.
For more stories on area schools, visit the School News Network website, schoolnewsnetwork.org.
Higinio Rolan-Rosado and Juan Granados show off the cell phone case and poster they made as part of a physics unit on force and motion. (School News Network)
The OMA requires the following, subject to exemptions:
“All meetings of a public body shall be open to the public…”
“All decisions of a public body shall be made at a meeting open to the public…”
“All deliberations of a public body constituting a quorum of its members shall take place at a meeting open to the public…”
This seems straightforward, however, the attorney general has ruled that a committee empowered to make a decision, that deprives the full board of the opportunity to vote, is subject to the OMA even though the committee is made up of less than a quorum of the board. An example of this might include an assignment to narrow from four to two options,
The public body is required to post notices of its meetings at its principle office and may post at other locations it considers appropriate. The OMA also provides requirements for timeliness of meeting postings. The annual calendar must be posted within 10 days after the first meeting and changes to the calendar within three days of the meeting at which the change is made. Rescheduled meetings must be posted at least 18 hours before the meeting and meetings recessed more than 36 hours require a new notice.
There is an emergency provision which allows a board, by a two-thirds vote, to meet without the normal notice when a “severe and imminent threat to health, safety or welfare of the public” exists and “delay would be detrimental.”
The OMA also addresses minutes of meetings. In general, minutes must contain the date, time and place of the meeting, members present and absent, any decisions made at the meeting and any roll call votes taken. OMA does not require that minutes contain the contents of speeches or general discussion, although greater levels of detail may be required by other statutes for certain types of meetings.
The minutes must be available within eight business days of the meeting, open to public inspection and copies must be made available at a reasonable cost. Corrections must be made at the next meeting and the minutes must show both the original entry and the correction.
The Office of the Attorney General for the State of Michigan has for many years published an excellent Open Meetings Act Handbook, which can be found here.
Sports cars, along with SUVs and trucks, are expected to be the big draw at the 2020 Michigan International Auto Show , as they were last year in this photo. (Supplied)
By K.D. Norris ken@wktv.org
People attend the annual Michigan International Auto Show, running this week at the DeVos Place in downtown Grand Rapids, for many reasons, including to find their next new car or just to get a glimpse of the muscle car or luxury car they’ve always dreamed about.
Many people, however, go to see what’s next in automobile technology or innovation — from space-age rear-view camera systems, to self-driving and self-parking features that almost make the driver a passenger.
But when it comes to innovation and new technology, it could be argued that one must understand, and appreciate, the past to fully embrace the future.
And so it is only logical that the Gilmore Car Museum will be on-hand with a display called “The History of Station Wagons”, which showcases vehicles which may be out of vogue today but were often considered innovative if not technological marvels of their time.
The Gilmore Car Museum’s 1950 Skyline Deluxe Station Wagon at the Michigan International Auto Show. (WKTV/K.D. Norris)
“I always think it is very important for people to appreciate the new but also to look back and go ‘Mmmm? How did we get here?’,” Jay Follis, Gilmore Car Museum marketing director, said to WKTV on Jan. 29 at a media preview. “Today we have SUVs and crossovers. We do not think of station wagons. The auto industry has actually said ‘We are not going to produce sedans any more.’ So we decided we are going to bring station wagons to the auto show to tell people where we have been and how we got here.
The Gilmore Car Museum’s Jay Follis, marketing director. (WLTV/K.D. Norris)
“We’ve got a 1919, one of the first station wagons. It was nothing more than to pick you up at the train station. … all the way up to a muscle car that is actually a station wagon (and an Indy 500 pace car). … A lot of the cars we have on display here, and a lot more at the museum, have their own unique innovations.”
The presence of the Gilmore Care Museum is nothing new for the auto show, too.
“We come down to the car show every year, 15 years now,” Follis said. “Our mission is to evoke memories and tell great stories … We are only 50 miles south of Grand Rapids and we are North America’s largest auto museum. So this is a perfect place to introduce people to auto history and the car museum.”
The new cars on display by the Grand Rapids New Car Dealers Association will include spectrum of sedans, vans, hybrids and sports cars, but the field will be dominated by Sport Utility Vehicles (SUVs) and trucks, the two biggest sellers, according to the association.
One of the Million Dollar Motorway cars on display at the 2020 Michigan International Auto Show. (WKTV/K.D. Norris)
Among the highlights of this year’s auto show is the latest in automotive technology by Gentex, a Michigan based company which develops and manufactures “custom high-tech electronic products for the automotive, aerospace, and commercial fire protection industries.” Also returning, and always worth drooling over, is the Million Dollar Motorway, featuring luxury brand cars this year valued at $4.5 million collectively.
And, as shown during the media preview, some of the new technologies — and all the luxury brand cars — are nothing short of amazing.
The 22nd Annual Michigan International Auto Show will open to the pubic Thursday, Jan. 30 and run through Super Bowl Sunday, Feb. 2 — 11 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday (to be over in time for the big game, of course).
Thursday, Jan. 30 is also a special First Responders Day, with free admission for active EMS, fire, police, public safety, U.S. Coast Guard and other active military and retired veterans who can show valid I.D., badge or other verification.
Admission is $12 for adults and $5 for children 6-14. Kids 5 and under are admitted free.
There is parking beneath DeVos Place, across the street and nearby but connected by the skywalk. Be aware, though, of “Hamilton: An American Musical” also playing at DeVos. For more information on parking and directions visit here. You can also take the complimentary trolley by parking in the Dash Lot Area 9 (on Seward Avenue) for $2 and hop aboard the Trolley which will be making runs on an 8-minute loop for an hour before the show opens to an hour after the show closes each day.
A four-pack of toilet paper. That is one thing that Family Network of Wyoming volunteer Phyllis VanderSloot would love to see each of the organization’s clients walk out with.
“They get one roll of toilet paper for the whole month,” the Byron Center resident said, adding who can last a whole month with one role of toilet paper?
And while the shelves of the Family Network food pantry are well stocked of food items and the freezers, thanks to area businesses, are full, the personal care items like toilet paper, barely at times take up half of a shelf. So the toilet paper is handed out sparingly so as everyone who comes in can get at least a roll.
Dale Echavarria, the retiring co-executive director of Family Network of Wyoming, is the first to admit collecting food is much easier than getting personal care products.
“Unlike food items, personal care products do not have an expiration date and so they can stay on a store shelf for a longer period,” Echavarria said.
Echavarria is grateful for the community support and donations to the Family Network of Wyoming, which comes to the organization in various ways. Local organization such as SpartanNash, Car City, and Shannon Orthodontics bring much needed personal care products and food items to the pantry.
“I remember the first year that Shannon Orthodontics contacted us,” Echavarria said. “They said they had had a food fight with other area dentists and was wonder if they could drop the items off. We were expecting a few boxes and instead had a parade of stocked mini vans.”
Even those in need have contributed back, Echavarria said.
“Recently the Wyoming Wolves had a food drive bringing in more than a 1,000 cans of food,” Echavarria said. “It was moving because some of the families who gave have been or are our clients.”
The fruit and vegetable section in the Family Network of Wyoming. (Photo by WKTV/Joanne Bailey-Boorsma)
What’s in a name?
Because of the name, Family Network, most people think it is a counseling center,” Echavarria said. And while there is some counseling along with a medical supply closet and a Christmas store, the main focus of Family Network is its food pantry.
The former Faith Community Christian Reformed Church at 1029 44th St. SW serves as the headquarters. The worship area is the storage room where volunteers pull items. The entrance way is where residents line up for their monthly supplies. The downstairs serves as offices, meeting area, and storage for the medical supply closet.
The main hub of activity takes place in the the worship area, where food is distributed two days a week to about 10,000 residents yearly in the Wyoming, Grandville, and Jenison areas. Residents are usually assigned a pantry to visit once a month based on where they live, Echavarria said, adding that Family Network will take a person or family in distressed and help them get connected to the right pantry.
Before distributing, the volunteers gather for a brief meeting and prayer and then Echavarria heads to the foyer to talk to the clients. He lets them know of opportunities while seeing if there is anyone new to the pantry or anyone with special needs. From there, one-by-one, the residents meet with staff and volunteers who help fill out food sheets and assist them in shopping.
It takes about a person 30 minutes to make their way from fruits/vegetables to receiving their meat items and selecting bread. Once and while there are extra items such as flowers donated by one of the stores.
“Many of the people who come through here would never have money for flowers,” said Sandy Jenkinson of Wyoming. “So it is a nice treat to be able to give them something like that.”
Family Network of Wyoming brings items out from the food area to a client. (Photo by WKTV/Joanne Bailey-Boorsma)
Taking the lead
Family Network of Wyoming is a lead pantry. Echavarria said they saw a need to streamline the process with stores to make it convenient and constant for food pick up or for trucks to drop items that can not be delivered. Family Network then reviews all the food that comes and redistributes it, providing other pantries connections to items they might not be able to get because of location, staffing, or lack of resources.
“We believe there is not a scarcity mentality, it is a team work mentality,” he said.
Nothing is wasted. Fresh produce or dated items not used at Family Network are sent to other area pantries and even items that don’t make the cut for distribution are set aside for area pig and chicken farmers to use as feed.
Volunteers pull food items for clients from the shelves. (Photo by WKTV/Joanne Bailey-Boorsma)
Always in Need: Volunteers
“I meant many of the people during a food drive,” said volunteer Burt Ponstein. “Everybody was so nice and friendly that I just called one day to see about volunteering.”
To do all that the Family Network does takes a village, so volunteers are another need for many pantries like the Family Network of Wyoming. About 43 people currently volunteer at Family Network.
“Many of us, well, we’re not 22 anymore,” Echavarria said, adding that as the current group ages out, he is concerned about filling the gaps with new volunteers.
Part of the obstacle is that Family Network of Wyoming is one of the best kept secrets in the area, Echavarria said, referring again to how people keep thinking it is a counseling center. However with a peek through its doors, Echavarria hopes people will see the good it has been doing for the past 15 years.
“We just need people to consider if they can help,” Echavarria said. “It might just be an hour or two, picking up food, helping to organize the pantry. There is something for about every skill level.”
Or it just be just dropping off some personal care products, like toilet paper, on the way to the next destination.
For those who wish to volunteer or donate, go to fntw.org.
Difficulties with daily activities such as dressing, walking and eating can be seen in rheumatoid arthritis patients a year or two before they’re diagnosed, a new study shows.
“This is a new finding, and a finding that is quite intriguing,” said lead author Dr. Elena Myasoedova, a rheumatologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.
“It may reflect an accumulation of symptoms between the time of first onset and the time required for providers to actually diagnose patients,” she said in a Mayo news release.
The study also found that chronic increased levels of difficulty with daily activities (functional disability) continued even after patients were diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis and began treatment.
That may be due to a number of factors, including increasing physical and mental pain, use of treatments such as glucocorticoids and antidepressants and anticipation of relief from symptoms, she added.
For the study, the researchers looked at 586 rheumatoid arthritis patients and 531 people without the disease in the Rochester Epidemiology Project database of medical records.
The rate of functional disability was more than two times higher among rheumatoid arthritis patients than in those without rheumatoid arthritis. In most age groups, rheumatoid arthritis patients had a 15% or higher rate of functional disability than those without the disease.
The findings show the importance of early treatment for rheumatoid arthritis patients, according to Myasoedova.
“Alerting your health care provider to difficulties in daily living can assure that patients receive the help they need,” she said.
About 1.5 million Americans have been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, an autoimmune disease that most often affects the joints but can also impact other parts of the body.
Rheumatoid arthritis is one of the most common chronic conditions associated with functional disability in the United States and has a significant impact on well-being and quality of life.
Symptoms can include joint pain or swelling, but 40% of patients have symptoms that don’t involve the joints, such as fatigue, fever and loss of appetite.
The study will be published in an upcoming issue of the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings.
Wyoming Kentwood Area Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Bob O’Callaghan and Board Chair Keith Morgan sit-down with WKTV’s Ken Norris to discuss the Chamber’s 40th Anniversary. (Video by WKTV)
Sometimes we do not fully appreciate when a business turns 40, said Wyoming Kentwood Area Chamber of Commerce Board Chair Keith Morgan as he gave his report during the Chamber’s Annual Meeting and Awards Dinner on Friday, Jan. 25.
About 80 percent of small businesses survive the first year and only about 50 percent will make it to year five, Morgan said.
“Any idea of how many will make it to 10 years?” Morgan asked the crowded Amway Ballroom where the dinner was taking place. “About half of a percent. So that means that if there were a 1,000 business that started today, only about seven would make it to the ten-year mark.”
Which means, according to Morgan, getting to 40 is a pretty big accomplishment.
Much of the Chamber’s Annual Meeting and Awards Dinner was a celebration of the Chamber marking its 40th anniversary. U.S. Rep. Bill Huizinga along with representatives from Senator Gary Peters office were at the event. Several state legislators were there such a Michigan House Rep. Tommy Brann and State Senator Peter MacGregor, who presented the chamber with a state proclamation for its 40th anniversary. Both the mayors of the City of Wyoming and the City of Kentwood, Jack Poll and Stephen Kepley respectively, were in attendance and congratulated the Chamber for marking its 40th anniversary as well.
The evening also served as an opportunity to celebrate the many accomplishments of area businesses, business leaders and Chamber volunteers.
Jessica Ann Tyson, owner of The Candied Yam. (Photo by WKTV/Joanne Bailey-Boorsma)
Receiving the Retail Business of the Year award was The Candied Yam, owned by Jessica Ann Tyson.
The Candied Yam opened in 2016 offering a menu of “delightful southern cuisine.” Originally a takeout restaurant, around its one-year anniversary, The Candied Yam had to knock down a wall to accommodate a sit-down space. The expansion allowed the restaurant to offer even more to its community, Tyson said, adding that more importantly, it provided a way for the restaurant to give back. The Candied Yam has participated in a number of community programs such as The Pantry, Young Life of East Kentwood High, Taste of Kentwood, Job Corp, Grand Rapids Public Library Taste of Soul Sunday and the AARP Foundation to name a few.
“This award reminds us that we don’t exist without customers and this is our opportunity to show our customers who spend money with us through great customer service and great food that we are being recognized for what we do,” Tyson said. “We are honored and grateful to receive this award.”
WKTV General Manager Tom Norton and Board President Judy Bergsma. (Photo by WKTV/Joanne Bailey-Boorsma)
Receiving the Service Business of the Year award was WKTV, a community television station dedicated to covering the cities of Wyoming and Kentwood.
On Nov. 11, 1974, WKTV was incorporated and will soon be marking its 50th anniversary, said WKTV General Manager Tom Norton. It is one of the oldest, most continuously operated community television stations in the United States. In 2002, the station moved to near the border of Wyoming and Kentwood into its own permanent home. The 10,000-square-foot facility features two studios, multiple edit bays, public spaces, classrooms for media instruction and a 35-foot television production truck, one of the largest in Michigan.
Accepting the award for WKTV were Norton and Board President Judy Bergsma. Bergsma told the audience that WKTV is proud to be apart of the dynamic communities of Wyoming and Kentwood, offering an array of exciting programs. She thanked the chamber on behalf of the staff and volunteers for recognizing WKTV with this honor.
During the Annual Meeting and Awards Dinner, which was emceed by WOOD TV8 Rachel Ruiz, an East Kentwood High School graduate, the chamber also recognized several chamber volunteers.
Tony Marion, left, who received the Gerald E. Fessell Distinguished Service Award, is with Chamber President and CEO Bob O’Callaghan. (Photo by WKTV/Joanne Bailey-Boorsma)
Receiving the Daniel T. McLaren Committee of the Year Award was the Chamber’s Marketing Committee. Selected as the Daniel VanDyke Volunteer of the Year was Summer Vasquez, from Williamson Employment Services and receiving the lifetime achievement award, the Gerald E. Fessell Distinguished Service Award, was Tony Marino, of Mitten Water Solutions.
After the event, Chamber President and CEO Bob O’Callaghan said the chamber was thrilled with the attendance, which forced the Chamber to move the event to a larger room. O’Callaghan said the chamber will be marking its 40th anniversary with special events throughout the year.
Summer Vasquez (left), who received the Daniel VanDyke Volunteer of the Year award is with Chamber President and CEO Bob O’Callghan. (Photo by WKTV/Joanne Bailey-Boorsma)
Are you an educator looking for a creative, fun opportunity for your students to practice their filmmaking skills? Or a student excited about the possibility of using your talents to compete for thousands of dollars in prize money?
The Meijer Great Choices Film Festival each year challenges high school students and K-8 classrooms across the state to create 30-second Public Service Announcements focused on either Healthy Living, Building Character orCelebrating Diversity. The goal is to encourage students to focus on positive, great choices that can be made in daily life. The PSAs can be as creative or as simple as competitors choose. Today’s technology makes filmmaking possible utilizing anything from a small video camera to a cell phone camera. Animation is also an option.
Individual student PSAs are judged anonymously based off technical merit by a panel of college judges, while PSAs produced by K-8 classrooms are judged through an online public voting process each spring. Those involved in the classroom competition are encouraged to get their friends and families to vote.
In the competition for individual high school students, six 1st place awards of $1,500 each will be given, along with six 2nd place awards of $1,000 each, and six 3rd place awards of $500 each. Additionally, 42 finalists (4th-10th place) will each receive $75. Winners will be announced at an awards ceremony in May 2020. In the classroom competition for grant money, there will be three 1st place awards of $500 each, three 2nd place awards of $200 each and three 3rd place awards of $200 each for top vote earners. There will also be three Judges Choice $200 grants awarded.
Participating K-8 classrooms are invited to register and upload their PSA videos online between Feb. 1 – 28. An online public voting period will run from March 4 – 29, with winners announced after. There are no submission fees in the K-8 classroom competition. Videos can be submitted through 11:59 p.m. Feb. 7 for the full $10 fee.
The Top 10 PSA films in each category will be made available on the Meijer Great Choices Film Festival website for schools to use as tools for their character education, health and diversity programs. We encourage teachers to showcase students’ PSAs in peer-to-peer education on these important topics.
In 2019, the East Kentwood High School Asian Student Union showcased the kaleidoscope of Asian cultures during its first Asian Festival.
Chinese dragons performed (courtesy photo)
The night of festivities planned by students, included ethnic foods, dances and games.
The Asian Student Union is a club at East Kentwood High School whose purpose is to educate the community about Asian cultures and celebrating their accomplishments.
“In a community riddled with hundreds of cultures, languages and ethnicities, it is of paramount importance that the community understands their stories,” said Thang Lian, a student officer in the club. “The Asian Festival took inspiration from streets lit by hundreds of lights, food stands littered about, and the general familial, laughter-infested atmosphere of the giant Asian cities.”
Students paint Chinese lanterns durning the East Kentwood High School Asian Festival (Courtesy Photo)
Repetitive strain injury can affect anyone who uses his or her hands a lot and repeats the same movements over and over again. It can develop whether you’re working at a computer all day or spending hours of leisure time immersed in handicrafts.
At first, symptoms—like pain and tingling—may go away once you stop the motions or the activity.
But without treatment, including lifestyle changes, symptoms are likely to become so severe that you could become unable to continue with your work or hobby.
Recognizing symptoms
Pain or burning
Tingling
Numbness
Weakness
Swelling
Soreness
Don’t hesitate to see your doctor if you experience one or more of these symptoms—don’t assume that a few days off is enough to stop repetitive strain injury.
If the source of pain isn’t addressed, symptoms can become irreversible.
Part of the solution is to take regular breaks from problematic but necessary activities throughout the day. Get up and move around for at least five minutes every half-hour, and stretch your arms, wrists and fingers.
Practice good posture.
When sitting, your head and back should form a straight line from ears to hips. When at the computer, don’t let your wrists bend to one side. Keep them in line with your forearms, fingers slightly curved over your keyboard.
Don’t self-treat by wearing a splint or using a wrist rest—both can interfere with natural movement and blood circulation.
Typing tips to try
Use all fingers to type, not just one
Use keyboard shortcuts
Take advantage of voice recognition software
Also, consider investigating the Alexander Technique, an approach to movement aimed at better posture and body mechanics helpful for repetitive strain injury.
Could your personality as a teen forecast your risk for dementia a half-century later?
Very possibly, say researchers, who found that dementia risk is lower among seniors who were calm, mature and energetic high schoolers.
“Being calm and mature as teen were each associated with roughly a 10% reduction in adult dementia risk,” said study co-author Kelly Peters, principal researcher at the American Institutes for Research in Washington, D.C. “And vigor was associated with a 7% reduction.”
The finding has its origins in the 1960s, when more than 82,000 students in roughly 1,200 U.S. high schools took a personality test. More than 50 years later, their personality traits were compared to dementia diagnoses.
While Peters said there’s plenty of evidence that personality changes near the time of a dementia diagnosis, the lingering question has been whether personality or some aspects of it actually causes dementia.
“That’s the big question,” she said. “Is it only that personality can be affected by dementia? Is it just an expression of the disease?” By focusing on teens who didn’t later develop dementia, Peters said, “this study really starts to tease that out.”
At an average age of 16, the students were assessed for 10 traits: calmness, vigor, organization, self-confidence, maturity/responsibility, leadership, impulsivity, desire for social interaction, social sensitivity, and artistic and intellectual refinement.
By 2011-2013, when they were almost 70 years old, more than 2,500 had developed dementia.
Enter lead author Benjamin Chapman, an associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Rochester in New York.
After stacking 50-year-old personality profiles up against current medical records, he and his team found that the risk of dementia was notably lower among seniors who were calm, vigorous and mature as teens.
Calmness was defined as being stress-free and not neurotic, vigor as being energetic and outgoing, and maturity as being responsible, reliable and conscientious.
Peters said the findings could guide policy thinkers to develop improved social support systems “to help kids build up protective qualities.”
But she highlighted some reservations.
For one thing, the team “only looked at traits that were protective,” she said.
And money seemed to matter: Calmness, vigor and maturity did not appear to protect against adult dementia among teens who grew up in relatively poor households.
Chapman’s study also tracked dementia only around age 70. That, said his Rochester colleague Dr. Anton Porsteinsson, means “there’s a lot more work to do.”
He was not involved in the study.
“The average age of an Alzheimer’s diagnosis is around the early 80s,” said Porsteinsson, director of the university’s Alzheimer’s Disease Care, Research and Education Program. “So it would be really good to repeat this in another 10 to 15 years, to see what’s happening when dementia risk is really at its peak.”
While the findings highlight a link between dementia and personality, he said that it’s hard to draw a direct correlation.
“If you’re calm and conscientious, do you make better health choices in your life? And if so, are specific personality traits directly decisive with respect to dementia? Or does your risk for dementia indirectly reflect those better decisions?” Porsteinsson said.
Heather Snyder is vice president of medical science relations at the Alzheimer’s Association.
“There are a wide variety of social, environmental and genetic factors that may contribute to our risk for dementia, and more research is needed to determine what those are and how they interact,” said Snyder.
But she said that “there is not enough evidence at this time to suggest that an intervention strategy for personality type in high school would be effective.”
Porsteinsson warned against using the study to conclude that there’s clearly a “good” personality and a “bad one.” It could be, he said, that impulsiveness and neuroticism, while bad for dementia, “bring a different skill set to the table” that has value.
“We don’t necessarily want all kids to be calm and composed at all times. We don’t want everyone to fit into the same mold,” Porsteinsson said.
“So we have to be very careful about how we interpret these findings until we really understand a lot more about what this is all really about,” he said.
The study was published recently in JAMA Psychiatry.
Teenagers living in cohesive neighborhoods—where trusted neighbors get involved in monitoring each other’s children—experience fewer symptoms of depression and anxiety, a study suggests.
The researchers also found consistent results across different cities regardless of family composition and neighborhood income, indicating strong neighborhoods help teen mental health across various populations.
Along with common risk factors, neighborhood environments should probably be given more attention when looking for potential factors linked to teen mental health problems, said study author Louis Donnelly. He’s a postdoctoral research associate at the Bendheim-Thoman Center for Research on Child Wellbeing at Princeton University in Princeton, N.J.
“Notably, whether a child grew up in a higher- or lower-income household, the associations were similar. The findings can be generalized across different city contexts,” he added.
About 14 percent of adolescents in the United States have had depression or a mood disorder. Eight percent have been severely impaired from an anxiety disorder, the study said.
The study included information on more than 2,200 children born in large U.S. cities. The information was collected between 1998 and 2000.
The study authors wanted to see if “neighborhood collective efficacy”—a blend of social cohesion and shared expectations for social control—was linked to better teen mental health.
The teens evaluated their own mental health at age 15. Parents provided “collective efficacy” information when their children were 3, 5 and 9. Parents ranked their agreement with statements such as, “People around here are willing to help their neighbors,” or “People in this neighborhood generally don’t get along with each other.”
Another scale asked parents to express their belief in statements demonstrating that neighbors would be likely to intervene or get involved in scenarios such as, “Children were spray-painting buildings with graffiti,” or “Children were showing disrespect to an adult.”
The researchers found that the “neighborhood effect” offered a protective effect similar to depression prevention programs targeting teens.
“There are really two (measurements) that are distinct, one being social cohesion and mutual trust. This is the idea of believing that people in your neighborhood share similar values and can be relied on for support,” Donnelly explained.
“The second dimension relies on informal social control,” he added. “We measured that based on the extent to which families and other adults can be relied upon to intervene … (such as) if a fight broke out in the street or children are not attending school.”
Maurice Elias said he wasn’t at all surprised by the study findings. He’s a professor of psychology at Rutgers University in Piscataway, N.J.
“The idea that being in a supportive environment would be good for children’s mental health shouldn’t be a revolution,” said Elias, also director of the Rutgers Social-Emotional and Character Development Lab. “It’s always nice when research helps confirm common sense. I see this as one of those examples.”
The new Kent County North County Campus will be located on 14 acres of County-owned property at 17 Mile Road NE near US-131. The approximate address will be 4223 17 Mile Road NE., and it will be located in open land on the north side of 17 Mile Road. (WKTV)
WKTV Staff ken@wktv.org
Kent County’s infrastructure for service delivery and operational needs will grow dramatically in the next 24 months as the The Kent County Board of Commissioners on Jan. 23 approved nearly $18.7 million for three strategic capital funding projects — all without the need for any issuance of bonds.
The projects include a new North County campus for various service delivery located just outside Cedar Springs , a permanent Kent County Parks and Recreation Department office at Millennium Park, and an expanded county vehicle repair and maintenance facility at the county’s Fuller campus.
The new Kent County North County Campus will be located on 14 acres of County-owned property at 17 Mile Road NE near US-131. The approximate address will be 4223 17 Mile Road NE., and it will be located in open land on the north side of 17 Mile Road. (WKTV)
The project expenditures include $12.5 million for the North County campus, $2.68 million for the parks department office, and $3.5 million for a fleet vehicle facility.
The funding for these projects was allocated from the county’s Capital Improvement Program Fund, established in 2015 to “reserve funding for future capital needs and to reduce the size of debt associated with large capital projects,” according to a county statement.
“I am very proud we were able to address the needs of the community and offer better, more efficient services without the need to issue bonds,” Kent County Board of Commissioners Chair Mandy Bolter said in supplied material. “Our fiscal team has been very responsible with taxpayer dollars over the years so we could make that possible. These projects wisely invest taxpayer dollars in areas that will not only improve access to County services but prepare our infrastructure for the future.”
The new North County Campus will be located on 14 acres of County-owned property at 17 Mile Road NE near US-131. The approximate address will be 4223 17 Mile Road NE., and it will be located in open land on the north side of 17 Mile Road.
The site’s conceptual master site plan includes a full-service sub-station for the Sheriff’s Office, a clinic for the Health Department, and additional space for other county services. This new shared facility is expected to “improve response times by the Sheriff’s Office and increase access to services in northern Kent County,” according to the county.
“By consolidating and upgrading our facilities and operations, we are focusing on the county’s quality of life and addressing long-awaited projects to better serve our residents now and into the future,” Kent County Administrator Wayman Britt, said in supplied material.
As for the new parks department office, the offices currently are located in modular facilities near Millennium Park. Initial design challenges and the economic recession delayed the development of a permanent parks department office, according to the county. However, “the Board felt it was important to create a new, permanent setting for employees and for residents to access park services.” The new office will be located in the same vicinity as the current facility.
“Our parks system is a true gem for the region, and we are committed to making it more accessible for families and visitors and more functional for our employees,” Bolter said.
Last, the county needs a larger and more modern fleet facility for the repair and maintenance of County vehicles. When the original facility was constructed, it serviced 35 vehicles, and today it maintains more than 290, according to the county. The location for the new 16,100 square foot facility will be located on the county’s Fuller campus and “will increase the efficiency of maintenance operations and address the physical limitations and safety issues associated with the current facility.”
The Kent County Building Authority will assume project management responsibility for the projects, and all are scheduled to immediately commence with architectural and engineering services. The projected timeline for the North County campus is 24 months, 15 months for the parks department office, and 18 months for the fleet facility, according to the county.
The decision to move into an assisted living community is a big transition for aging adults. Seniors often fear losing their independence, but a quality senior community will promote autonomy and independence for its residents.
Caregivers and family members do many tasks around the home to help aging adults function well. However, it’s all too easy to fall into the habit of doing too much to help, which can impair seniors’ sense of autonomy. Caring for ourselves is an essential element of retaining our health and mental faculties as we age. Sadly, if an aging adult loses their independence, the will to live may diminish as well.
However, this doesn’t need to be the case! Even the most frail patients can still benefit greatly from completing a few simple activities and feeling more accomplished afterward. With patience and careful attention, you and your loved one’s medical team can develop a safe, balanced approach. Here are a few ways that caregivers and family members can support senior living while still allowing aging adults to maintain their autonomy:
If a senior can’t complete every step of an activity on their own, it is still beneficial to help them do as much as possible on their own. Family members and professionals can supervise to ensure safety and offer assistance when necessary.
Don’t stereotype your loved one. Automatically assuming that someone is weak and incapable can negatively impact the way they view themselves, producing more dependence.
Recognize what a significant achievement it is for your loved one to complete even a small task, like washing a few dishes or getting dressed on their own. A sense of pride and accomplishment will foster independence.
Remember that there’s no need to rush. Sometimes, seniors are perfectly capable of doing activities they’ve done their whole lives, they just need more time on each task. Be patient and always remember that your loved one’s independence and sense of accomplishment is more important than how fast they get dressed.
Tailor expectations to each individual’s ability. By working with your family member’s assisted living staff, you can ensure that their daily activities are appropriate to their health conditions.
Assisted living communities sometimes offer group activities or community classes for residents. Encourage your loved one to participate in a daily routine that will help them feel more confident and social.
It’s impossible to overemphasize how much daily exercise can support happy, healthy senior living. Including even minimal levels of physical activity in their routine helps aging adults stay fit, flexible, and alert.
These are just a few of the ways that senior living can benefit from an assisted living community. While moving into a new community can be a huge change, family and staff members can work to ensure that seniors maintain a dynamic, self-reliant lifestyle. With these ideas in mind, your aging loved one will enjoy a sense of independence long into their golden years.
Leaders at Bank of America, the Consumers Energy Foundation, and The Right Place, Inc. will be developing the New Community Transformation Fund. This will be an investment fund based in Grand Rapids, Michigan to support diverse business owners. The fund aims to increase ethnic and racial diversity in business ownership in West Michigan. In addition, it will focus on businesses that intend to provide multigenerational wealth creation within historically disadvantaged groups.
In 2020 the fund consultant team will focus on the design and development of the fund, including the goal of raising $15-$25 million in capital. The team will primarily be seeking family offices, institutional investors and corporate partners. The fund is aiming to launch in 2021.
Bank of America and the Consumers Energy Foundation have each provided $200,000 in initial startup capital. These funds will support the design and development of the fund, including creation of the fund’s legal structure and operational systems, and establishment of a management team, advisors, a board of directors, and securing local and national portfolio growth partners.
An experienced consulting team will lead design and development of the fund:
Skot Welch, General Partner. Recognized as a leader in utilizing the principles of global quality standards for the development and implementation of sustainable, systematic and measurable diversity initiatives.
Kwame Anku, Fund Consultant. The CEO and Chairman of the Black Star Fund. His responsibilities include fundraising, portfolio building, portfolio management and strategic partnerships.
Birgit Klohs, Senior Advisor. The President and CEO of The Right Place, Inc. a position she has held since 1987. The Right Place, Inc. is the regional economic development organization for West Michigan.
Birgit Klos, president and CEO of The Right Place, discusses the new fund during a press conference on Thursday. (Supplied)
“West Michigan has one of the strongest performing economies in the nation,” said Birgit Klohs, President and CEO, The Right Place, Inc. “Yet, this economic growth has not been shared by all members of our community. By investing in companies that will create long-term economic prosperity in communities of color, this fund will increase upward mobility and ultimately build a more diverse and globally competitive economy.”
The fund will focus on scalable early to midstage businesses and transitioning succession companies in the industries of advanced manufacturing, food processing and agribusiness, life sciences and medical devices, and information technology. This fund will invest in both current and prospective West Michigan companies, but will require founders and portfolio companies to locate and operate in West Michigan.
“The goal of this fund is to increase ethnic and racial diversity in Grand Rapids’ business ownership,” said Renee Tabben, Grand Rapids Market President, Bank of America, who sits on the Board of The Right Place, Inc. “Bank of America strives to help local economies prosper and one way we do that is by supporting business ownership to create sustainable, financially healthy and diverse communities.”
“While the West Michigan economy is booming, communities of color have not shared fully in our region’s success,” said Garrick Rochow, Executive Vice President of Operations for Consumers Energy and a member of The Right Place, Inc. Board’s Executive Committee. “In order to truly ‘win’ as a West Michigan community, our success must be collective. And to do that, we must go beyond talking about our good intentions and take action.”
A UCOM staff person checks out the new Hydroz purifying water filing station located in the organization’s lobby. The station is open to the public during business hours. (Supplied)
United Church Outreach Ministry (UCOM) recently partnered with Hydroz to provide a free purified water filing station in its neighborhood. The station, installed last week, is in the lobby at UCOM, at 1311 Chicago Dr. SW Wyoming. It will provide endless hot and cold purified water for those in the UCOM neighborhood.
The purified water filing station will be available to the community during UCOM’s regular hours, Monday through Wednesday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Thursday from 2 to 8 p.m. Hydroz has generously donated this station for the neighbors to enjoy clean, pure drinking water. Hydroz is a locally owned water purification company, certified by the Better Business Bureau and Local First.
They filter the water using reverse osmosis to remove 98% of impurities from tap water. This includes lead, arsenic, chromium-6, mercury, PFAS, chlorine, and more. Hydroz uses a four-stage filter process to remove impurities from the water and then stores it in a stainless steel holding tank, waiting for neighbors to fill their bottles. The water at UCOM was tested prior to the installation and was found to be within normal range of solid particulates for city drinking water, with just over 130 part per million. However, after the installation, water coming from the system was tested again and had less than 15 parts per million. Also, according to staff, it also tastes great.
UCOM’s Culture of Health recognizes water is the best beverage for healthy living. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) report that drinking water helps your body regulate your temperature, protect your spinal cord, joints, and other tissues, and helps in all of your bodily functions. Drinking water instead of sugar-sweetened beverages reduces the amount of calories a person takes in and the amount of added sugars. With obesity-related diseases like diabetes, heart disease, and kidney disease on the rise, drinking more water is a way to cut those added sugars and lower the risk of developing these diseases, according to the CDC.
In 2018, UCOM hosted neighborhood listening sessions. The UCOM team hoped to learn more about what people in the community enjoyed seeing at UCOM and also find out if there were things the community wanted to see done differently. One topic brought up by several participants was how proud they are of where they live and how sad they are to see empty water bottles or other garbage find its way into the streets, parking lots, and yards of the neighborhood. UCOM hopes that having a refiling station for water bottles will cut down on some plastic waste in the area and improve the beauty of the community we call home.
UCOM invites neighbors to stop in and fill their water bottles and help us thank Hydroz for bringing this service to our neighborhood! Hydroz has a commitment to philanthropy and is proud to give back to this community.
Mum’s the word the next time you have your blood pressure checked.
Talking while the cuff is on can boost your blood pressure reading. So can a full bladder or crossing your legs, the American Heart Association says.
“These simple things can make a difference in whether or not a person is classified as having high blood pressure that requires treatment,” said Dr. Michael Hochman, a member of the heart association’s blood pressure task force. He’s also an associate professor of clinical medicine at the University of Southern California.
“Knowing how to measure blood pressure accurately at home, and recognizing mistakes in the physician’s office, can help you manage your pressure and avoid unnecessary medication changes,” Hochman said in a heart association news release.
Here, the heart association outlines seven common culprits that can alter your blood pressure reading.
Having a full bladder can add 10 to 15 points to a blood pressure reading. Always try to use the bathroom before getting a reading.
Poor support for your feet or back while seated can raise your blood pressure reading by 6 to 10 points. You should sit in a chair with your back supported and feet flat on the floor or a footstool.
Crossing your legs can add 2 to 8 points to your reading.
If your arm hangs by your side or you must hold it up while getting a reading, your blood pressure numbers may be 10 points higher than the actual figure. Your arm should be on a chair or counter so that the blood pressure cuff is level with your heart.
Having the cuff placed over clothing can add 5 to 50 points to your reading. The cuff should be on a bare arm.
A too-small cuff can add 2 to 10 points to a reading.
Talking can add 10 points to your reading. Remain still and silent while your blood pressure is taken.
The box-shaped, motor-propelled robot scuttled across the floor of Buck Creek, with Valleywood Middle School eighth grader Amaya Eggleston controlling it via remote.
“That’s so cool!” said Amaya, who helped build the marine ‘bot with classmates Ajla Lelek, Sarah Vokoviak and Sumayah Hanson and teacher Bobbijo Zoerhof.
The robot took its first dip on a recent afternoon. It will play a significant role in an eighth-grade community project, a year-long environmental study of the creek and its levels of pollutants. Teachers and students are working on the project with funding help from Groundswell, a coalition of community partners creating opportunities for hands-on environmental learning.
Sumayah Hanson controls the underwater robot. (School News Network)
The robot is powered by three motors and equipped with a camera that shows images of the creek floor onto a fish-finder screen. The girls are using a 3D printer to make sensor boxes and tube endings. While they are still tweaking and tinkering, the robot can already move through the creek and record underwater images on its camera.
The robot will soon be used to test the water for phosphates, nitrates, turbidity, pH level and temperature. Social studies teacher Bobbijo Zoerhof and English teacher Jane Van Hof have classes assigned with studying and recording levels throughout the year, which they expect could vary due to water runoff. They will present findings to neighbors and post readings on a website.
“I love making this stuff with my team,” Amaya said. “It’s exciting to know we can help more than ourselves just doing this. I hope it helps people — the students at our school — to know what our water’s like.”
The project is cross-curricular, involving reading and writing in English Language Arts and mapping a region and environmental laws in social studies.
Students read the book “A Long Walk to Water”, about an 11-year-old African girl who regularly walks eight hours to fetch water from a pond.
Valleywood students correlated the story to the mapping of fresh water, and also the robot with water quality testing. In social studies, they focus on how humans interact with their environment.
“The robot connects with fresh, healthy water, where to locate the water and how to keep the water supply healthy,” Zoerhof said.
The underwater robot includes motors, a tether, fishfinder and camera. (School News Network)
Multifaceted Outdoor Learning
Zoerhof and VanHof partnered with Groundswell, which is housed in the College of Education at Grand Valley State University, by attending an outdoor learning session in October at Garfield Park.
Zoerhof said she learned about remote operated vehicles from a workshop years ago, and came up with the idea to use one to collect water samples. The girls will head to the creek several times this school year to control the robot as it gathers samples. This eliminates the need for students to gather icy samples themselves.
The robot will collect water samples over the course of the school year. (School News Network)
“We thought, ‘Why don’t we use the robot to test the water year round instead of having a student do it? Plus, with the camera, it can see to the depth that we can’t,” Zoerhof said.
Before the robot began its submarine-like mission, students this fall mapped the schoolyard, sketching and with Google Maps to analyze water runoff patterns and natural features of the landscape. They will also plant a native nursery, also funded by Groundswell, on the creek’s edges and study whether the plants impact pollutant levels.
Zoerhof chose the girls to work with the robot because of their interest, both in STEM-related learning and the outdoors. The girls have also worked with 3D printing.
“I hope we can show all the pollution that’s in there and people will help clean it and get rid of what causes more pollution,” said Ajla.
Added Sara: “It’s a big privilege to know you are a part of something that can make things better.”
For stories on area schools, visit the School News Network website, schoolnewsnetwork.org.
This Saturday marks the most important and celebrated holiday of the year for cultures rooted in a lunar calendar — the Lunar New Year.
Widely referred to as the Chinese New Year, many other Asian countries honor the special holiday, In fact, the Chinese often refer to the new year festival as the Spring Festival. In Vietnam, it is called Tết. In Korea, it is called Seolial. Most of these countries observe the Lunar New Year from when the new moon rises on Jan. 24 and concludes with the full moon on Feb. 9. There are some Asian countries, such as Thailand and Laos, who observe the Lunar New Year in April, usually around April 13.
This year, 2020 is the year of the rat according to the Asian Zodiac. While the rat is not considered by most as adorable, it ranks first on the Asian Zodiac, meaning it starts the 12-year cycle of the Asian Zodiac. The rat, as described on the Vietnamese American Community of West Michigan’s website page, is clever, quick thinkers, successful in reproductive and survival, but content with living a quiet and peaceful life. People born under the Rat hold a strong community value and depend on each other.
To learn more about the Asian Zodiac, click here for a story by resident Adrian Ɖặng Bảo Oánh.
While Asians celebrate the Lunar New Year in different ways, all celebrations have one common feature: family reunions. The Lunar New Year is in fact one of the biggest migration of people, with hundreds of thousands of people returning home to see their family.
Tết, the Viet Lunar New Year is Saturday, Jan. 25. Photo supplied by Adrian Ɖặng Bảo Oánh.
Tết: Viet Lunar New Year Celebration 2020
One of the longest running community Lunar New Year celebrations is the Vietnamese community’s annual event. The event is Saturday, Jan. 25, at Wyoming’s Knights of Columbus Hall, 5830 Clyde Park Ave. SW.
Hosted by the Vietnamese-American Community of West Michigan, the Children Tết Festival is from 1:30 – 3:30 p.m. and includes games and fun for the entire family, such as face painting, a dragon dance, animal balloons, music, foods, and arts and crafts.
Starting at 4 p.m. is the traditional ceremony which will run until 6:30 p.m. The program will include the New Year’s message, the ancestors commemoration ceremony, the Lion Dance Welcoming the Year of the Rat, and community awards. The New Year Concert and Dance, featuring numerous local performers, is from 7 to midnight.
This event is free and open to the public. Authentic Vietnamese food will be available for purchase. According to organizers, the festival is designed to highlight the richness and diversity of Vietnam by featuring a variety of traditional performances including the dragon dance, traditional musical instruments, children dances, games and much more.
For more about Tết, check out this article written by resident Adrian Ɖặng Bảo Oánh by clicking here.
WKTV will be at the annual Tết event. Check the wktv.org website for air dates of the annual celebration.
Students prepare for the Dragon Dance. Photo by Erika Townsley.
Lunar New Year Festival 2020: Grand Rapids
“We spend most of the day with our families,” said Kim Nguyen who with Kathy Bui are organizing the Lunar New Year Festival in Grand Rapids. “Just like Americans do at Christmas and other holidays, during the day we spend time with our family and in the evening, we attend community events.”
It was the reason the Grand Rapids Asian-Pacific Festival, the Grand Valley Asian Student Union, Zeeland Christian Schools, Com 616, and the Downtown Grand Rapids, Inc. came together to host this year’s Lunar celebration which is set for Saturday, Jan. 25, from 5 – 9 p.m. at the community space located at 555 Monroe Ave. NW.
“It is in a tent, a heated tent,” Nguyen emphasized.
“The festival is a community experience,” Nguyen said, adding that it is a family-friendly event. “What I am hoping is people come and see the diverse culture that we have in the Grand Rapids area.”
One the largest Asian populations is located in and around the Greater Grand Rapids area, she said. The Lunar New Year 2020 will feature a number of traditional activities representing many of the different Asian cultures. This includes a dragon dance, lion dancers, and performances from many area residents such as hip-hop dancer Heather Truong, musician Caleb John Lawson and Friends, the children of the Lao Buddhist Temple, Lakeshore Taekwondo Academy, and the Grand Valley Asian Student Union.
At the event, there will be a variety of traditional foods such as bubble tea along with many traditional food items such as dumplings, spring rolls, rice cakes, veggie soup, and an Asian sandwich. The event is a fundraiser for the annual Grand Rapids Asian-Pacific Festival, which will be June 12.
Also at the Lunar Festival, there will be a variety of children games, traditional Korean and Japanese ones as well as painting rat piggy banks, a ring toss, and face painting. Tokens will need to be purchased for the games and activities. For more about the Lunar New Year celebration, check out the Facebook page, Lunar New Year Festival 2002.
In 1936, Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev was invited by Central Children’s Theater in Moscow to write a new musical symphony to cultivate “musical tastes in children from their first years of school.”
Prokofiev got to work and completed Peter and the Wolf in just four days. The piece for narrator and orchestra debuted in May of 1936 and, in Prokofiev’s own words, was poorly attended and little noticed.
Despite its rocky start, this children’s tale has become a classic in literature and music, arguably becoming the best-known, best-loved work ever composed for symphony orchestra to perform for its youngest audiences.
Students get a chance to check out the instruments and meet the musicians at the Saturday concert. (Supplied)
Grand Rapids Symphony presents the classic tale of Peter and the Wolf at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, Jan. 25, at the Dan Heintzelman Fine Arts Center at Wyoming Junior High School, 2587 Boulevard Drive SW in Wyoming.
Associate Conductor John Varineauconducts the opening concert of the Grand Rapids Symphony’s PNC Lollipop series.
Local actress and singer Edye Evans Hyde narrates the story that introduce listeners to specific musical instruments that represent each character in the story. The bird is represented by the flute, the cat by the clarinet, and the duck by an oboe. Peter is portrayed by the string instruments, his grandfather by the bassoon, and the wolf by a trio of French horns.
Peter and the Wolf has been narrated and performed by a number of famous faces and voices over the years. Just a few include actors such as Sharon Stone, Ben Kingsley, and Boris Karloff; musicians David Bowie, Stingand Alice Cooper, and political figures Eleanor Rooseveltand William F. Buckley.
Tickets
Tickets are $5 for all seats and are available at the door. Tickets also are available at the Grand Rapids Symphony box office, weekdays 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across the street from Calder Plaza). Call 616-454-9451, ext. 4 to order by phone. (Phone orders will be charged a $3 per ticket service fee, with an $18 maximum).
Paul Isely discusses the positives of the West Michigan economy. (GVSU)
By Dottie Barnes Grand Valley State University
In 2020, the West Michigan economy will see flat employment growth, weakening sales growth and strengthening export growth, according to a Grand Valley State University economics professor.
Paul Isely, professor of economics and associate dean in the Seidman College of Business, unveiled his benchmark survey of the regional economy Jan. 23, during the 2020 Colliers Annual West Michigan Economic and Commercial Real Estate Forecast event at DeVos Place in Grand Rapids.
The economic survey of the greater Grand Rapids economy (Kent, Ottawa, Muskegon and Allegan counties) was conducted in November and December of 2019. The survey was mailed to more than 1,000 organizations based on a representative sample.
Paul Isely talks about the West Michigan economy at the 2020 Colliers Annual West Michigan Economic and Commercial Real Estate Forecast event. (GVSU)
Isely said weakness in manufacturing has become the biggest issue in West Michigan. He said the number of manufacturing workers has increased nationally, but the hours that they work has decreased.
“By some measures, this puts the manufacturing sector and the corresponding transportation sectors in a mild recession,” Isely said. “The data for West Michigan and the United States both show 2020 will likely continue a measured slowdown. It is possible that the annual growth will be positive, but a recession occurs for part of the year.”
Isely said exports have traditionally been a bright spot in the West Michigan economy, however, over the last few years, export growth has been weak.
“The expectation for 2020 is a moderate improvement in exports compared to 2019,” said Isely. “The optimism in exports is being helped by some positive news about trade agreements.”
Isely said the primary uncertainty for 2020 surrounds the presidential election. He said the uncertainty created by the Republicans and Democrats moving further apart also generates problems for business leaders trying to plan for the coming year.
Overall findings for 2020:
• The Current Business Confidence Index for 2019 was 81 percent, essentially the same as the year before;
• The Forecast Business Confidence Index for 2020 is 77.5 percent, a drop from the expectations seen in the last few years;
• Employment is expected to grow by 0.3-0.7 percent in 2020, an expectation that is less than half the expectation was for 2019;
• Overall nominal sales are expected to increase by 2.2-2.8 percent in 2020, a slowdown from 2019;
• Exports are expected to grow by 1.0-5.0 percent in 2020, increasing from 2019;
• All indicators signal the West Michigan economy will continue to slow in 2020, particularly employment growth.
The West Michigan economic survey was conducted by Isely, along with staff members from the West Michigan Regional Small Business Development Center, housed in the Seidman College of Business.
For more information, contact Paul Isely at 616-331-7418 or iselyp@gvsu.edu.
The Grand Rapids Art Museum (GRAM) opens its exhibition, A New State of Matter: Contemporary Glass Saturday, Jan. 25. The exhibition is on view until April 26 and features the work of 19 artists working in glass including Grand Rapids artist Norwood Viviano. Go here for the story.
Fruition is Jay Cobb Anderson, Kellen Asebroek, Jeff Leonard, Mimi Naja and Tyler Thompson (drums). (Supplied by the band)
Coming to Fruition
Portland, Oregon’s roots/rock band Fruition will be in town Sunday, Jan. 26, as the band, with opener The Mighty Pines, visit Grand Rapids’ Pyramid Scheme, with doors open at 6 p.m. show. Tickets are still available. Go here for the story.
British installation artist Rebecca Louise Law working on a previous work. (Supplied by the artist)
But time is running short
Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park’s amazing exhibit, “Rebecca Louise Law: The Womb” — a site-specific exhibition that includes about 10,000 flowers and plants gathered from the Gardens’ massive gardens and strung together in delicate wire strings by local volunteers and staff, and then added to Law’s existing collection of approximately 1 million flowers and plant material — will close March 1. Go here for the story.
Fun fact:
1,000 … and on and on
The biggest named number that we know is googolplex, ten to the googol power, or (10)^(10^100). That’s written as a one followed by googol zeroes.Source.
Kathey Batey in the WKTV studios talking about her various counseling and mediation and training efforts. (WKTV)
By K.D. Norris ken@wktv.org
Kathey Batey is known for many things in the West Michigan community, including as an on-air volunteer at WKTV and as moderator of several Wyoming-Kentwood Area Chamber of Commerce programs including its Government Matters.
But her day job — and her passion — is helping people overcome hardships as a domestic relations councilor and meditator.
That passion, late last year, earned her an award as Volunteer Meditator of the Year as part of the Dispute Resolution Center of Western Michigan 2019 Peacemaker Awards.
While she has a history in counseling and public speaking, in the last decade she has focused on mediation.
“My interest (in mediation) began when a man in my support group (Divorce Support Anonymous) about nine years ago, stated his legal fees were $129,000 and he wasn’t done with his divorce yet,” Batey said to WKTV. “I was so taken aback, since divorce is destructive enough for the individuals, the family, and especially the children, why should they devastate their finances as well?
“I had heard of mediation so I set out to find out how. I went through mediation training eight years ago and, since, have found mediation as a wonderful challenge that helps people, giving them control over their future with the power to self-determination of their future. And it saves them a lot of money. They can mediate with an attorney or on their own. When they mediate on their own I always advise they have an attorney review it prior to signing. Because the Mediation Agreement is legally binding.”
Also honored at the event, held in October 2019, was Grand Rapid Mayor Rosalyn Bliss.
The Dispute Resolution Center, at the time of the award ceremony, said of Batey:
“Kathey specializes in domestic relations mediation. She has been mediating with the Center since 2012 and has donated over 500 hours of her time. Her passion and dedication shine though everything she does. One recent mediation participant summed it up in her post-mediation survey, ‘I was appreciative of Kathey’s demeanor, skill in facilitation, and ability to keep on task . . . She was thorough and compassionate.’ Kathey is committed to helping those who find themselves faced with Divorce.”
The kind words from the center at the time of the award was an honor, Batey said.
“To be recognized for your commitment to this valuable organization and recognized for your skill as a mediator is very rewarding,” she said. “I believe in their cause and they provide mediation services on a sliding scale, the most it will be is $150 per person for 3 hours. So those without a lot of means can get these services and minimize legal costs.
“Plus, the only way to truly be skilled in any profession is to work at your skill continuously. There is a lot to know in the many facets of divorce. There are the individual needs, self-determination, financial issues, co-parenting children, the law, critical thinking. The art and science of a good question, discipline of the mind, dealing with multiple personalities, managing fears, tears and still maintaining professionalism.”
For Batey, however, there is also a very simple, and personal, reason for her mediation work with the Dispute Resolution Center and on her own — a reason that makes her earning a Peacemaker Award all the more fitting.
“It is a part of my giving back into the world,”, she said, referencing the biblical passage “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.” (Matthew 5:9)
The Dispute Resolution Center, also at the time of the Peacemaker Awards ceremony, said of Mayor Bliss:
“Bliss is the first woman mayor of Grand Rapids, MI. In honor of United Nations International Day of Peace, she declared September 21, 2019 as the International Day of Peace in Grand Rapids. Grand Rapids Public Schools participated in activities throughout the week in honor of the occasion. The Dispute Resolution Center of West Michigan is all about helping to create community and repairing broken relationships. Mayor Bliss understands that, ‘[H]aving a safe community is critical to our success, and that requires our continued commitment to strengthen community-police relations,’ Bliss said. ‘This requires building a strong foundation of trust between community members and our police officers.’”
For more information on the Dispute Resolution Center of Western Michigan, visit drcwm.org.
Batey is the author of “Suddenly Single: Rebuilding Your Life After Divorce” and, among other projects, is the founder of Divorce Support Anonymous. For more information on Batey and her other efforts, visit StayMarriedAmerica.com and/or spiritedpresentations.com.
If you struggle with anxiety, you might want to skip that second cup of coffee, new research suggests.
For some people, caffeine may help with concentration and provide an energy boost, but it can cause problems for those with general anxiety disorder, said Dr. Julie Radico, a clinical psychologist with Penn State Health.
“Caffeine is not the enemy,” she said in a university news release. “But I encourage people to know healthy limits and consume it strategically because it is activating and can mimic or exacerbate the symptoms of anxiety.”
Low doses of caffeine are in the range of 50 to 200 milligrams. Consuming more than 400 milligrams at once may lead to feeling overstimulated and anxious and bring on symptoms such as racing heart, nausea or abdominal pain.
Anxiety is a common problem, but many patients and their doctors don’t think about caffeine as a potential contributing factor, said Dr. Matthew Silvis, vice chair of clinical operations in the division of family medicine at Penn State Health.
“We want people to consider whether there may be a connection between their caffeine consumption and anxiety,” he said.
As well as being a potential problem for people with anxiety, caffeine can interact negatively with medications for seizure disorders, liver disease, chronic kidney disease, certain heart conditions or thyroid disease, Silvis noted.
“Medical disorders that a patient may already have can become more difficult to control,” he said.
In terms of amounts of caffeine, an average cup of home-brewed coffee has about 100 milligrams, compared with 250 milligrams in a tall Starbucks coffee and as much as 400 milligrams in energy drinks.
A can of Mountain Dew has 55 milligrams while a can of Coca-Cola has 35 milligrams.
Many vitamin and sports or nutritional supplements also contain caffeine, but many people don’t think to check the labels of those products, Silvis added.
Michigan’s first constitution, written in 1835, when speaking of the “Legislative Department” states that “the doors of each house shall be open.” It is this spirit of openness of government that inspired the Open Meetings Act. In fact, nearly all of the court decisions and attorneys’ general opinions addressing the act have interpreted it liberally in favor of openness. It has been said that for government to be “of the people, by the people, and for the people,” it must be open to the people. In this article series, which includes “Michigan’s Open Meetings Act: Explore the details” and “Michigan’s Open Meetings Act: Understanding closed Sessions,” we’ll explore the Open Meetings Act in more depth.
The Open Meetings Act (OMA) was written in 1976, as was the Freedom of Information Act. These two laws, known as Michigan’s “sunshine laws,” are designed to make government processes and information more open to the public. Both laws were written in the post-Watergate, post-Vietnam war era.
A former Michigan State University Extension colleague referred to the following general rule: “Any person has a right to attend a meeting of any public body at any time unless the meeting is declared to fall under one of eleven statutory exceptions.” It is a pretty good one-sentence guide to a sometimes complex combination of law, court interpretations and attorney general opinions relating to OMA.
It is important to keep in mind that the OMA applies to governmental bodies, those “empowered by state constitution, statute, charter, ordinance, resolution or rule to exercise…governmental authority.” It does not apply to corporations, nonprofits, churches or the like.
The law guarantees several rights of residents. The public has a right to record meetings, within the bounds of reasonable rules which the public body may write to minimize disruption of the meetings. The public, likewise, has a right to address the public body, also within the bounds of rules written to facilitate orderly meetings and protecting everyone’s right to address the board. An individual can only be removed from a meeting for a breach of the peace committed at that meeting.
Social and chance gatherings, or conferences which are not intended to avoid the OMA, are exempt. These types of gatherings often are treated with suspicion by the press and the public. It is important for public bodies to be careful not to deliberate or make decisions about government business during these gatherings. This can be accomplished by paying careful attention to what the OMA says about deliberations and decisions.
The Office of the Attorney General for the State of Michigan has for many years published an excellent Open Meetings Act Handbook, which can be found here.
It’s the same each semester. At least half of the women taking a business ethics course with Grand Valley State University professor Michael DeWilde have stories to tell about receiving inappropriate remarks or unwanted advances while at work.
Reactions to these stories from the men in class include looks of embarrassment or disbelief, while others seem a bit oblivious or said they didn’t realize the issue of sexual harassment was that bad.
This led DeWilde, professor of management and director of the Koeze Business Ethics Initiative in the Seidman College of Business, to begin using role play as a teaching tool at both the undergraduate and graduate level when discussing sexual harassment and misconduct in the workplace.
In the #MeToo era, DeWilde has developed an innovative approach to help men more deeply understand the impact of sexual harassment. DeWilde demonstrates the role playing technique at conferences and it is the focus of his research on cognitive and emotional empathy.
During the role play, DeWilde plays the part of the “bad-guy harasser.”
During one training session at a Grand Rapids business, he noticed the technique was more effective when targeting a man instead of a woman.
“The feedback from this participant, and from other men in attendance, was ‘Sheesh, is that what it feels like?’ I finally got the desired effect,” DeWilde said.
In his business ethics courses, DeWilde started choosing men for the exercise and their reactions were immediate.
“Some get really nervous and become quite agitated and I have to back off,” he said. “I don’t think men appreciated the toll it takes on women emotionally and how long the effects can last, or what it means to feel a sense of dread to go to work because of harassment.”
Research in cognitive and emotional empathy is one of the Koeze Business Ethics Initiative’s major focuses. DeWilde recently conducted research at The Neuroimaging Lab at Texas Tech University, testing his role play methodology and the best ways to increase empathy. He said initial results from the lab are promising.
Recently, a conference attendee asked DeWilde, jokingly, “So, your solution to the sexual harassment of women is to sexually harass men?” To which DeWilde answered, “Well, in a controlled environment, yes.”
DeWilde said this type of role play he’s developed may or may not prove to be the only or best solution, however, men need to get it at a deeper emotional level in order to change things.
The World Affairs Council of Western Michigan’s annual luncheon at the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel Tuesday, Jan. 14. (Supplied/World Affairs Council)
By WKTV Staff ken@wktv.org
Birgit Klohs, president and CEO of The Right Place, Inc., was at the World Affairs Council of Western Michigan annual luncheon to be honored with the group’s locally-focused inaugural Hillman-Orr Award, at the same event when the inaugural Vandenberg Prize for work on the world stage was presented.
The Vandenberg Prize was given to retired Ambassador Jon M. Huntsman at the World Affairs Council of Western Michigan’s annual luncheon at the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel Tuesday, Jan. 14. (Supplied/World Affairs Council)
The Vandenberg Prize went to retired Ambassador Jon M. Huntsman, who was honored in person at the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel, where a large crowd was in attendance Tuesday, Jan. 14.
But Klohs, who was raised in post-war Germany, spoke poignantly in her acceptance speech about Michigan Sen. Arthur Vandenberg (1881-1951), who forged bipartisan support for the Marshall Plan and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and was appointed one of the first U.S. delegates to the then new United Nations.
“I grew up in the safety of NATO. I grew up with … (a German economy) predicated on the Marshall Plan,” Klohs said as she accepted her award but also honored the Vandenberg legacy. “So for that, every time I walk by the (senator’s) statue (near Rosa Parks Circle), I salute a little ‘Thank you’.” But Klohs’ path of learning about the man who was a key figure in the Marshall Plan and NATO was not simple.
The World Affairs Council of Western Michigan’s Hillman-Orr Award was presented to Birgit Klohs, president and CEO of The Right Place, Inc., by Renee Tappen, market president for Bank of America. (Supplied/World Affairs Council)
Hank Meijer “wrote the definitive book on a senator I’d never heard of when I moved here,” Klohs said. “When I first met Hank, many years ago, he said to me ‘Birgit, there needs to be a Vandenberg Square in Germany.’ And I’m like ‘Who is Vandenberg?’ Another Dutch guy? And he’s like ‘No. Let me tell you about Senator Vandenberg.’
“And I was stunned. Growing up in Germany, in a divided Germany, we always lived in the shadow of the Soviet Union. Right? We all learned about the Marshall fund, and how it helped West Germany and the rest of Europe get back on its feet. Learned about NATO. But I’d never heard of the senator who was really the person behind the scenes the made the Marshall fund happen, who made NATO happen, who made the UN happen.
“And who brought along senators who were isolationists. (Other senators) who said ‘It is 1945, we won the war. We all go home and be done with it and leave those Europeans to themselves.’ But he (Vandenberg) had learned that after World War I, that didn’t work. He, who was an isolationist himself, became a globalist. And, frankly, we could use more globalists today.”
Vandenberg was also the inspiration for founding the local World Affairs Council in 1949 by Grand Rapids attorney (and later Federal Judge) Douglas Hillman and businessman Edgar Orr, for whom the Hillman-Orr Award was named, according to the council.
The Hillman-Orr Award was presented to Klohs by Renee Tappen, market president for Bank of America.
“There is likely nobody in this room who has not heard from Birgit Klohs on the importance of global economic ties between West Michigan and world partners,” Tappen said. “Under her leadership, as the CEO of 32 years, The Right Place has created 47,000 new jobs and spurred nearly 5 billion dollars in new investment in our local the economy.
“Birgit is a leading economic development strategist, collaborates with our local, our national and our state government on critical issues related to economic development.”
Klohs, however, pointed out that much of her work is encouraging local leaders to embrace internationalism, in business and in all things.
“I also wanted to spread the word in our region, that embracing international, that embracing people from other parts of the world, will enrich us. It does not make us poorer, it makes us richer,” she said. “And that, in fact, your competition today is no longer in Iowa or Indiana. But it is in Mexico. And it is in India. And it is in China.
“The more we embrace that competition, we will be stronger as a region for it. And so, the World Affairs Council has really modeled this thinking for the last 70 years. … It has always been the strength of this community to gather and embrace new thoughts.”
Delta Air Lines passenger Keith O’Brien and Southwest passenger Karen Burleson were surprised as the “GRRand Passengers” as the Ford Airport celebrated its record setting 2019. (Supplied)
The Gerald R. Ford International (GFIA) Airport has set a new all-time passenger record for 2019, marking the seventh consecutive year that the Airport has seen record- setting growth.
In 2019, 3,587,767 passengers flew in and out of GFIA, an increase of 9.88 percent from 2018. December growth helped cap the record-setting year with an increase of 12.85-percent year-over-year. December 2018 saw 275,681 total passengers, but 2019 surpassed that with 311,111 enplaned and deplaned passengers. The Ford Airport has seen growth in 77 of the last 84 months, and 27 straight.
“Our record-setting growth is a testament to the support of our community, and the growth of our region,” said GFIA President & CEO Tory Richardson. “We have grown tremendously over the last seven years because we continue to add nonstop routes, state-of-the-art amenities and technology, and our guest first focus. We appreciate our loyal West Michigan passengers and visitors for choosing the Ford Airport in their travels. You are not only supporting local jobs and our local economy, but the more you fly with us, the more we will grow.”
GFIA celebrated the milestone by surprising two lucky passengers on Tuesday afternoon.
Karen Burleson from Caledonia, a Southwest Airlines passenger, and Keith O’Brien from Comstock Park, a Delta Air Lines passenger, were chosen as the “GRRand Passengers” as they deplaned their flights. The two were each met with a balloon bouquet, cupcakes, cheering employees and guests, along with an array of prizes. Each received two $350 travel vouchers – good for travel from the Ford Airport any time in 2020. Additionally, they received three free days of parking, a Hudson News & Gifts travel package valued at more than $350, gift cards and goodies from Starbucks and HMS Host, and more.
“I did not expect this today,” said a surprised Burleson. “I love this airport and my daughter just moved to Texas so I’m looking forward to going to see her with my voucher.”
The growth over the last few years started in 2013 with a passenger record of 2,237,979. In 2018, the Ford Airport surprised its 3 millionth passenger. GFIA has served over 80 million passengers since January 1, 1964, and March 2019 was the single busiest month in Airport history with 341,534 total passengers.
Continued upward trends has meant changes in the facility and ongoing construction projects for the Ford Airport. Phase one of the Gateway Transformation Project concluded in September 2017, and phase two is slated to complete in Summer 2020. The project’s main feature includes upgrading airline ticket counters, baggage claim space, and eliminating TSA screening machines in the front-facing areas of the lobby. Construction also includes new terrazzo flooring, lighting fixtures, new restrooms, new food & beverage space, and much more.
Spring 2020 will also see the beginning of Project Elevate – a three-development expansion that commences with a $90 million extension and reconstruction of Concourse A to accommodate projected passenger growth over the next 20 years.
“It is crucial that our facilities keep up with our growing passenger demand,” said Richardson. “We are committed to not only offering more options for nonstop flights and competition when searching for travel, but our amenities, technology, customer service and infrastructure all need to keep pace with that advancement. We are excited to see what the future brings, and we appreciate the partnerships with all of our airlines and tenants.”
Many women come into the ER with chest pain, and they never thought they would be in that situation. But most heart attacks are preventable, and we need to be more active in telling women what they can do to avoid a heart attack.
The same is true with breast cancer—the more we know about preventing breast cancer, the more women we can help avoid being diagnosed with the disease.
Although breast cancer is far too common, breast cancer survival is improving due to more advanced treatments and early screening for women at high risk.
Do you know your risk, and do you have a plan for when you should be screened? If I asked you if you want to get breast cancer, of course you would answer with an emphatic, “No!” If you don’t want cancer, then you must know your risks, live a lifestyle that decreases your risk, and take your checkups seriously.
Several years ago, I read a story about a young woman who had metastatic breast cancer, and the article described her situation in detail.
There was a picture that showed her being comforted by her sister, who also had breast cancer five years earlier. Both women talked about their mother who had died of the same disease in her mid-40s.
As I read the story, I felt both sad and mad at the same time. Of course, I felt sad for them for all they had gone through, but I was also mad to think their cancer could have been prevented, or at least detected before it spread.
Here’s what I wish they would have known about the genetics of breast cancer:
Ten percent of breast cancer is associated with family history.
The risk of getting breast cancer increases two times if one first-degree relative has/had breast cancer.
The risk of getting breast cancer increases three times if two first-degree relatives have/had breast cancer.
In addition, 50 percent of breast cancer diagnoses are associated with known risk factors.
A patient I’ll call Kelly came to see me for a routine visit recently. In taking her history, several factors caught my attention: she was 48 years old and had never been pregnant; her mom had been diagnosed with breast cancer at 49; and she had regular mammograms that were always negative, but her breasts were very dense, decreasing the likelihood of diagnosis of a small cancer.
I recommended advanced screening with a special mammogram and ultrasound by a breast surgeon.
When she had the testing done, they detected several suspicious areas, and a biopsy showed pre-cancer. Kelly decided to have definitive surgery, and when she had a bilateral mastectomy, they detected early, almost-invasive cancer.
We were able to avoid invasive cancer by doing three things: 1) being proactive; 2) knowing her individual risk factors; and 3) acting early to save her from worrying about recurrence, and having to go through chemotherapy or radiation.
The lifetime risk of breast cancer for most women is 1 in 8. The risk at age 30 is 1 in 250 and increases as you get older. Other risk factors include being female, white and obese (having a BMI over 30). The risk is even greater if the weight is gained after the age of 40 and is in the form of belly fat (especially after menopause). In addition, your risk is greatest if you are diabetic and overweight.
So, what can you do to lower your risk of breast cancer? For starters, lifestyle matters:
Women who consume 10 or more alcoholic drinks per week have a higher risk for cancer of the colon and breast.
Women who started smoking early and have smoked for a long time are at higher risk.
Women who breastfed their children and are physically active have a lower risk.
Two other risk factors that may not be in your control include the following:
Women who work the night shift seem to experience more cancer, according to several large studies.
Women who received radiation for Hodgkins Lymphoma as a child have an increased risk of breast cancer.
If you have any of these high risk factors, get screening early and talk to your doctor about special screening with a Tomo mammogram or adding an ultrasound to your routine mammogram.
I had a patient who put off her mammogram because she had small breasts and thought she would easily be able to see any lumps, plus she had no family history of breast cancer. When her friend finally convinced her to get a mammogram, it showed she had breast cancer.
I’ve given you plenty of statistics and information about breast cancer in this blog, but there are a few takeaway points I want to make sure you remember:
Know your individual risk factors.
If you are at higher risk, talk to your doctor about special testing.
Be active! Exercise a minimum of 150 minutes per week.
