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« Detroit News Roundup for Thursday and Friday, August 9-10, 2007
» Optimus Subprime

Detroit News Roundup for Monday and Tuesday, August 13-14, 2007


Gore Gore Girls Keeping Busy

Detroit’s Gore Gore Girls have much to celebrate in the wake of their critically acclaimed new album, Get The Gore. This week they head to Los Angeles to perform at the legendary Amoeba Records on Sunset Blvd on August 15th and a free show at Echoplex on August 16th.

The Gores love to rock, so in addition to those shows, they will perform and be interviewed live by Music Plus TV and Dave Navarro for Mania TV. Music Plus TV will host the Girls at 3pm EST on Thursday August 15 for a chat and some turbo-charged rock.

[via antiMUSIC.com]

Michigan’s latest biodiesel plant opens in Adrian

ADRIAN — Michigan’s future as an alternative fuel leader took a step forward Tuesday with the opening of the state’s largest biodiesel plant to date.

The $20 million NextDiesel plant, backed by four West Bloomfield investors, doubles the state’s annual biodiesel production capacity to 40 million gallons a year.

The NextDiesel plant will employ about 25 workers.

NextDiesel adds itself to the 20 ethanol or biodiesel plants operating or in the works in Michigan.

So far Michigan’s biodiesel plants are rising up in the state’s rural communities. That could change in the next year as two companies aim to bring biodiesel plants to Detroit.

Xenerga Inc., an Orlando-based plant operator, targeted Detroit along with many other major cites as a site for one of its planned chain of biodiesel plants.

Xenerga, which is still looking for investors in Detroit, hopes to open a plant next year. It would cost $1.8 million to build and employ 10 workers.

A California company, working with Detroit business consortium NextEnergy, broke ground earlier this year on a biodiesel plant in the city.

[via DetNews.com]

Dee-troit dreamin’-Michigan Business Review

Let’s say you’re visiting suburban Detroit for the first time this week, specifically the Woodward Avenue area from Nine Mile Road north to Square Lake Road. You might think that you’ve gone back 40 years in time.

That’s because Saturday is the annual Woodward Dream Cruise, an event that has managed to expand unofficially to the entire week before the cruise. Even though its only Tuesday, you’re likely to see more cars and trucks from the 1950s and 1960s rolling along Woodward Avenue than new cars.

It may be hard to believe, but more than 1 million people line the sidewalks on Woodward to watch this automotive circus.

[via MLive.com]

Maida dedicates high-tech high school in Detroit

Cardinal Adam Maida dedicated a new high-tech high school building on Detroit’s near west side Tuesday afternoon, part of his ongoing effort to foster new schools in the city in the wake of Catholic school closings over many years.

Touring the building on Tuesday afternoon, guests were shown how a brick wall and locked steel doors separate the main school, which is secular, from a hallway that leads to another part of the facility that adds faith-based resources.

[via Detroit Free Press]

6 firms, including Detroit drug maker, to expand in Michigan

Six companies, including a Detroit-based maker of generic prescription drugs, will get state and local tax breaks to expand their Michigan operations, Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm announced today.

Caraco Pharmaceutical Laboratories Ltd.: will create 598 jobs at the drug maker.

Adaptive Materials Inc.: expected to create 100 jobs directly by the company.

HandyLab Inc.: expected to add 56 employees.

MediaSpan Group Inc.: plans to invest $1.7 million to relocate its headquarters from North Carolina to Ann Arbor and employ 82 workers.

Bolton & Associates LLC.: The civil engineering, land planning and surveying firm will invest $1 million to expand its Southfield operations and add 150 employees.

Kolbenschmidt Pierburg AG (KSPG): will invest $11 million to establish a new technical center in Auburn Hills; it will employ 153 workers.

[via DetNews.com]

An Inside Look At Google’s AdWords HQ

Ann Arbor, Mich., is now host to Google’s third-largest operation after the Mountain View and New York Googleplexes.

Most don’t know it, but Google Ann Arbor is the company’s third-largest operation after the Mountain View, Calif., and New York Googleplexes.

Why Ann Arbor? It’s home to one of the country’s best public universities, and Google wants to snatch that graduating talent before it flees Michigan and a local economy troubled by overreliance on the auto industry. Google Ann Arbor also recruits from other Midwest and East Coast universities, and has lured some Berkeley and Stanford graduates.

[via InformationWeek]

Northern rail idea gathers money

A state official said the rail service likely would be eligible for about $1.4 million in operating subsidies once it starts. And the group leading the effort expects a decision by the end of this month on whether or not it will receive $1 million from the federal government to help operate the line.

Meanwhile, backers are moving forward with establishing a rail authority to run the service. The authority could be in place by the end of September or early October, according to the chairmen of Washtenaw and Livingston counties boards of commissioners.

[via MLive.com]

Commuter rail line faces flurry of questions

The authority — dubbed WALLY, for Washtenaw and Livingston line — would have an eight-member board, four each from Washtenaw and Livingston counties. Its main reason for existing would be to capture federal and state grant money, because such aid can’t go directly to private entities such as the Great Lakes Central Railroad company that would operate the service.

“The bulk of the ridership is coming from Livingston County,” he said. “I would hope you would seriously entertain becoming part of the authority.”

It would also have the power, with voter approval, to levy a 5-mill tax for 25 years at a time under state statute.

“There are no plans to levy a tax,” said James Dunn, an attorney advising the rail project.

The service would be funded by private contributions, fares and a $1 million federal grant that has been requested and is being reviewed in Washington. The state has also indicated it may contribute some money.

[via Livingston Daily]

Inspiration flows at RiverWalk

This is Anderson’s favorite studio.

Several times a week, Anderson, 52, sets up his workspace and his framed paintings alongside the RiverWalk, in the shade of a few trees that grow between Hart Plaza and the embankment where the Detroit Princess is docked.

RiverWalk artists, another reason to be there.
[via Detroit Free Press]

Detroit pill maker plans to expand, creating 600 jobs

Generic drug maker Caraco Pharmaceutical Laboratories Ltd. of Detroit is poised to embark on a $14.5-million expansion that will boost its pill production by 40% to 5 billion tablets per year, and create 600 new jobs during the next five years.

The Michigan Economic Growth Authority board is expected to seal the expansion deal today with approval of a $6.8-million, 10-year tax credit.

[via Detroit Free Press]

Lab to grow science jobs

Ann Arbor-based NSF International is expected to announce today a laboratory expansion that is expected to add about 100 jobs over the next two years in Michigan.

The addition of science jobs is a boon to the state’s efforts to diversify its economy by promoting the growth of high-knowledge jobs in the sciences.

[via DetNews.com]

Increasing number of recyclers in city is RecycleHere’s agenda

The study reports job creation would occur as result of a 50 percent recycling rate and the opening of a ‘material recovery center’ in place of the incinerator.

[via Model D]

TheDetroiter.com tells what came before the galleries

Nick Sousanis has done the city a service by compiling short histories of some of Detroit’s art galleries.

[via Model D]

Chrysler to Kick Off Dream Cruise with New Vehicle Reveal on …

ROYAL OAK, Mich., Aug. 13, 2007 — What: Chrysler will kick off the annual Woodward Dream Cruise in style by revealing a new limited-production vehicle.

[via Autochannel (press release)]

City Votes On Sculptures Along Woodward

The city of Ferndale will vote Monday night whether to use federal grant money to have sculptures built on Woodward commemorating Detroit’s history.

Each sculpture would be about 30 feet tall and cost the city about $100,000 each.

[via WDIV]

Casinos Could Boost Detroit

Detroit is already the nation’s fifth largest gambling market, according to 2006 statistics from the American Gaming Association. Now the city is hoping to position itself as a true gambling-based destination for tourists. The city’s three casinos - Greektown, MotorCity, and the MGM Grand Detroit - are spending $1.5 billion to build sleek new hotels, expand their facilities, and inject some glitz into the gritty Motown landscape.

Until now, the casinos have mostly attracted day-trippers and coach tours from Ontario, outstate Michigan and neighboring states. The new hotels, with 1,200 luxury rooms and thousands of square feet of convention space, will enable them to market to well-heeled gamers willing to spend several days gambling and being entertained, said Frank Fantini, publisher of the electronic Gaming Morning Report.

Detroit is the third-largest cluster of casinos behind Vegas and Atlantic City and is also the only such international gambling market with Casino Windsor/Caesar’s Windsor right across the border. But with talk of allowing gambling and more locations such as Ohio and the city of Chicago, the Detroit casino industry needs to attract more of the Vegas crowd during the summertime while it can. It would help if the Motor City Casino did more to integrate with the surrounding neighborhood like to Greektown Casino.
[via Forbes]

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« Detroit News Roundup for Thursday and Friday, August 9-10, 2007
» Optimus Subprime