Transit agencies to test thermal cameras to beef up traffic safety
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By Anna Rossow
Capital News Service
Federal grant money will help Michigan’s Department of Transportation implement increased safety measures for public transit drivers and pedestrians. MDOT will receive over $500,000 in funding to install thermal imaging cameras on public transit vehicles to help prevent collisions with people and animals in a variety of weather and light conditions. According to MDOT, the cameras will be installed on up to 60 vehicles at four rural and urban transit agencies: the Blue Water Transit Area in Port Huron, the city of Alma, the Community Action Agency of South Central Michigan based in Battle Creek and the Regional Transit Authority of Southeast Michigan. The state’s application for the technology started when Janet Geissler, a mobility specialist at the department, saw a news release on such cameras being used on cars to detect pedestrians, cyclists and animals
She said it is a good technology that is applicable to transit vehicles.
The Buzz
West Michigan timber fraud earns prison term
By Eric Freedman
Capital News Service
The former owner of a West Michigan timber harvesting business has been sentenced to 41 months in federal prison for cheating investors of more than $2 million. Authorities said Trent Witteveen of Montague ran a Ponzi scheme involving phony documents and misusing some investors’ money to repay others.
U.S. Judge Robert Jonker also ordered Witteveen, who pleaded guilty to wire fraud, to pay $844,282 in restitution. The grand jury’s indictment laid out the background this way, saying Witteveen “earned his living in the timber harvesting business, initially as a subcontractor or independent contractor to sawmills:
He registered a company called Tall Timber and ran the fraud scheme from June 2018 to January 2021, the indictment charged.
It described how Witteveen approached landowners whose property had hardwood and softwood trees for purchase by the lumber industry and sawmills, mostly around Pentwater and elsewhere in Northwest Michigan
“Had he operated his business in a lawful manner, Witteveen would have used the investment capital to pay the landowners and harvest timber, including by subcontracting the cutting of the timber,” the indictment said.
Wildlife
Robins may be a predictor of dangerous lead levels in soil, study finds
By Eric Freedman
Capital News Service
Remember the canary in the coal mine? If the caged canary died, that was an urgent early warning for miners that the air was too dangerous to breathe and to get above-ground as quickly as possible. Now there’s evidence from Southeast Michigan that the American robin can provide an early warning about dangerous lead levels in the soil.
Waste
Minnesota debates what counts as carbon-free energy
By Ruth Thornton
A recent decision by Minnesota’s Public Utilities Commission could mean that wood and trash will be considered “carbon-free” energy sources under the state’s new climate law. The law, passed in 2023, requires all electricity to come from carbon-free sources by 2040, with interim goals defined for 2030 and 2035. However, it did not define which energy sources meet that definition and instead tasked the PUC to make that decision with public input.