According to a Detroit News' database of Metro Detroit home foreclosures, 1,342 homes in the city of Southfield have been subject of foreclosure filings since January 2006.

Unfortunately, the Southfield Board of Education voted 5-2 Tuesday night to increase that number by as many as 350.

Your employer ordered you to tell them about your wife having cancer. How would you respond?

School employees in the Southwest Michigan community of Lawton recently were faced with that question. Based on requirements put in place by last fall's ill-conceived Senate Bill 418 (which, among other things, requires schools to get competitive bids for health insurance), these employees were ordered to complete an extensive survey about their and their family's health history.

What great news! The following is from a press release issued by the MI AFL-CIO - 

3,500 Anti-Right to Work Activists Assist Presidential Primary Voters at Michigan Polls and Fight Off Petition Effort Lansing -

Over 3,500 activists monitored polling places for a potential Right to Work petition drive on primary day, Tuesday, January 15th statewide.

“The Labor community, along with other allies of Michigan’s working families, is sending a very powerful message to special interests that ‘Right to Work’ isn’t going to happen in Michigan. Although the Right to Work forces are gone for now, we intend to continue educating people on the importance of a good job to our state’s economy. We’re not going to bring the economy back by cutting wages,” stated Mark Gaffney, President of the Michigan State AFL-CIO.

The AFL-CIO and the Michigan Education Association combined forces with the Change to Win coalition and trained volunteers to educate Michigan voters for the primary.

“We want to thank our union affiliates – the Michigan Education Association and the Change to Win unions – who worked alongside the AFL-CIO during this huge effort. Michigan Labor is united once again in our efforts to protect living standards of all union and non-union Michigan workers,” proclaimed President Gaffney.