Hospital Deadline, Golf Course Rejection, and Another Frigid Winter

 

WELL, HERE IT is, the end of August, the supposed deadline for a decision on the relocation of Marquette General Hospital, so it should happen this week, right?

Don't count on it, if the city's Roundhouse location is one of the two final candidates, which we hear it is.

The thing is, the City Commission's subcommittee on the hospital would have to approve a possible deal and then the City Commission as a whole would have to vote publicly on it before the city could assure Duke LifePoint that the deal is a go.

That's not likely to happen by the end of this week.

Now, if DLP has already decided it's selecting the Township site behind the Westwood Mall, that's a different story. It could happen this week.

But what we hear is that DLP is still having talks with the city over the Roundhouse site--questions answered, details clarified--while communications with the Township have been silent for about a month. That may mean DLP is totally satisfied with the Township offer while it's got doubts about the city's offer.

Or it may mean...

Oh hell, who knows what it means?
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IN CASE YOU'RE wondering why the Marquette Golf Club ended talks with Duke LifePoint a week ago, here's why.

The club, after building the highly acclaimed but financially taxing Greywalls course almost a decade ago, remains about four million dollars in debt. It's a tough nut to crack.

A substantial offer from DLP for half of the Heritage course could have solved the problem but DLP's offer was somewhere in the neighborhood of three million plus. After taxes and various costs, the club would have cleared maybe two million at most, probably less.

And they would have been left without a clubhouse and a pro shop. If they had rebuilt those and taken care of other maintenance issues, their remaining cash from the sale would barely have made a dent in their debt.

And they would have been saddled with a nine hole course and an eighteen hole course divided by a huge hospital complex which, for the next couple of years, would have been nothing more than an ugly, dusty construction zone.

Hardly a wise strategy to attract new golf club members.

What could Duke LifePoint have offered to change a few minds? "Ten million would have been a good number," according to one member, half jokingly. Or maybe not.
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THE TRIALS AND tribulations of ABC 10 continue.

News director and anchor Rick Tarsitano has left the Ishpeming-based station for a more lucrative position on Lake Michigan--Chicago's WGN.

Bigtime. Big station. And both Rick and his wife are from the Chicago area.

He'll be a sports producer there, not on the air for now, but don't rule that out in the future. He's a talent who provided some much needed stability at the chronically underfunded ABC 10.

"Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be TV journalists..."

Rick's had to walk a rocky path ever since he got into TV a few years back. He was hired as an off camera producer (for peanuts) at TV6 and struggled to get on the air, despite having a strong work ethic and obvious talent. He was frustrated. Then he was explicably canned.

Then, he caught on as a reporter at ABC10 (for fewer peanuts)...at one point considered going back to TV6...then with the departure of ABC 10's news director Cynthia Thompson, he found himself appointed the new news director and anchor and who-knows-what-else (for a few more peanuts).

And now, less than a year into his tenure, he's off to Chicago in an entirely different role.

Ya gotta be flexible as a TV journalist. And willing to live on peanuts. Small market TV does not lead to riches.

Meantime, ABC 10, the little engine that could, will continue to chug forward. A new news director and anchor have yet to be named.
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AS IF POWERHOUSE TV 6 needed any more advantages...

The Sinclair Broadcast Group, which owns TV6, recently announced that it's also taken ownership of WLUK in Green Bay. Yeah, the same WLUK that used to broadcast Fox programming and Green Bay Packer games in the UP.

None of that will change because Fox UP (also owned by Sinclair) now has rights to that, but the ownership change is significant because now the news departments of TV6 and Fox UP will be able to readily trade stories with WLUK. Together, they'll be offering blanket coverage of the UP-Green Bay region.

The rich get richer.
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BY NOW WE'VE all heard the dismaying news that this upcoming winter may be as bitterly cold as last winter. So says the Farmer's Almanac which claims an 80% accuracy rate.

So what says local weather guru Karl Bohnak? Surely, he'll dispel such nonsense.

Well, as a matter of fact...no.

He says water patterns in the Pacific Ocean point toward a cold winter. Looks like we'll have a weak El Nino which also lends itself to a cold winter.

There is a greater likelihood of an eastern US-based frigid winter, rather than a Midwest-based freeze, but here in the U.P, we're still likely to feel it.

Bohnak reminds us that we had a frigid winter in '95-'96, and that was followed by record-breaking cold in '96-'97, so there's precedent for this.

Swell.

One ray of sunshine here: September should be an average month, maybe even a bit warmer and sunnier than average.

Woohoo. Let's throw a beach party just before we head down to Getz's to buy our mittens and swampers.

You got news? Email me at briancabell@gmail.com

 

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TV6 Co-Anchor, Right-to-Farm, Fitness Craze, and Rainwater Toilets

STEVE ASPLUND AND Greg Trick will soon have a female co-anchor sitting across from them at the TV6 anchor desk.

Her name is Sophie Erber, fresh out of a Masters program at the University of South Florida. She'd previously graduated from University of Tampa in the honors program.

A co-anchor? We haven't seen that since the days of Elizabeth Peterson and Jackie Chandonnet.

It's a further indication that TV6's new owner, the Sinclair Broadcast Group, has money to spend and intends to head off the challenges of Local 3, WJMN's new newscast team, and ABC 10.

Dual anchors at TV6 were ditched several years back by the previous owner, Barrington Broadcasting, in a cost-cutting move. Times have changed, ownership has changed.

Erber is scheduled to arrive in the UP in  a couple of weeks. You'll see her on the air as a reporter initially as she familiarizes herself with the area...and then she'll sit down in the 6 pm co-anchor chair. Eventually, plans call for her to appear on the 6 pm, 7 pm and 11 pm newscasts.

One more report, that Asplund won't comment on but everybody else at TV6 will, tells us that morale at the station, especially in the news department, has soared since the former ND Regena Robinson abruptly left late last year, and Asplund took over. 

One staffer referred to Robinson's tenure as "two and a half years of hell."
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A FEW YEARS ago, Forsyth Township and Randy Buchler, a local farmer, were battling each other in a courtroom. Today, they're working together to come up with new and fair zoning ordinances on backyard farms.

Take note, Washington DC. This is a story about how government is supposed to function.

Quick background: Buchler and his wife have been raising laying hens and sheep (for wool), along with vegetables, for the last decade at their Shady Grove Farm in Gwinn. However, a few years ago, the Township Planning Board determined that the Buchlers were in violation of the township's zoning ordinance.

The township took them to court but, surprise, the Buchlers actually won. The judge ruled that Michigan's right-to-farm act trumped the county ordinance. The ruling garnered national attention.

So, was there bad blood between the victors and the losers?

Nope. The planning board is now drawing up new ordinances that will fit in with the township's master plan and it wants Buchler, with his experience and knowledge, to help them. The board also acknowledges that its residents have made it clear they want to loosen the rules when it comes to raising livestock on their property.

How about that? A government that listens to its constituents, doesn't hold grudges, and simply wants to govern.
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HOW MANY FITNESS gyms does Marquette need?

Well, we just got another one. Anytime Fitness, without any fanfare, opened its doors on Washington Street across from Shopko August 1st, and the manager claims they've already signed up 100 members. Mostly by word-of-mouth.

Radio ads are just starting. The official grand opening won't take place until the end of the month.

It's not just some modest little hole in the wall, either. It's a brand new two story facility. Anytime Fitness now boasts 2600 gyms worldwide. It's one of the fastest growing chains in America.

The new gym comes on the heels of Snap Fitness, on US 41, closing down. Not enough clients?

So again, do we need another gym? There are now about a dozen in and around town, some specializing in personalized training, others offering a wide array of activities, still others keeping their doors open 24 hours a day.

We've become a fitness-obsessed society although you'd never know that by looking at our ever expanding waistlines.
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YA GOTTA LOVE this.

Have you seen all the attractive landscaping outside the new Marquette Food Co-op?

It's all being irrigated by rainwater captured on the roof of the store. Simple but brilliant and far-seeing. That's what sustainability is all about.

Oh, one other thing. The toilets at the Co-op are also using water from the roof. Flushing is provided by rain.

It's amazing what you can learn by reading informational signs on the back of the commodes.

You got news? Email me at briancabell@gmail.com

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UP 200 Is Looking for Dogs, Thompson Has a New Job, and Buck's Back

 

Bonanza Steakhouse, one of Marquette's most popular restaurants for the last couple of decades, is shutting down this weekend.  

 

A manager at the restaurant Friday afternoon would only confirm that employees had been told Sunday would be their last day of work. Economic reasons brought about the shutdown.

 

The announcement comes on the heels of two other well-regarded businesses announcing last week that they, too, are shutting down--Penneys at the Westwood Mall and Farmer Q's downtown.

 

Two things seem clear. The economy here is still anything but robust. And operating any business is tough even when customers like your products and your service.   

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The UP 200, one of Marquette's signature events, is shrinking.

With three weeks before the sled dog race, only nine mushers have officially committed to it. Five others might join them, and race officials are searching for others.

Last year there were seventeen entrants. Just a few years ago, the numbers were in the high twenties and low thirties.

So what's happening?

For one, there's competition from races in Duluth, Newberry and the Keweenaw. For another, the prize money--$34,000 total for both the UP 200 and the Midnight Run--isn't turning many mushers' heads, though the money is comparable to other races, if not better.

Pat Torreano, who heads up the sled dog association here, points to a few other factors:

1) The economy. Sled dog racing is an expensive hobby. Tons of dog food, sometimes exorbitant vet bills. You might have noticed that very few hedge fund CEO's and Internet billionaires are into mushing.

2) Some of the veteran mushers are getting old. It's tough work to drive a dog team 250 miles through the snow and cold.

3) The younger mushers are more into "party racing." That's what Torreano calls it. Those are races run in stages, thirty or forty miles at a time, then you stop, rest for the night with great food and accommodations (maybe a drink or two), then get up, refreshed, the next morning for the next stage. That's a far cry from driving a team 125 miles through the snow and cold, then collapsing in exhaustion, only to get up and do it all over again.

The UP 200 may be at a crossroads. Even Torreano admits it may have to change.

She and Marquette city officials aren't panicking yet but they're concerned. The crowds still love the race (we can cheer and ring our cowbells for ten minutes, then duck inside for a cozy dinner), but the mushers not so much.

This year's UP 200 is February 14th, Valentine's Day.
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The public announcement hasn't been made yet but Cynthia Thompson will be the new news director and 6 pm anchor for WJMN.

WJMN, a CBS affiliate, will launch its first ever newscasts in the UP within a couple of months.

Thompson recently resigned as ND and anchor at ABC 10 and a couple of decades ago, she anchored the news at WLUC. She knows the UP, she knows news, she's "old school" which means she cares more about actual news events and proper writing than she does about social media.

Whoa. Could be a trend.
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The investigation into the racist letters received by TV 6 is still open, according to the State Police. Whether the letters actually contained specific threats against the former news director, Regena Robinson, and other members of her staff, is unclear. In any case, no arrests yet and no one's talking.

Meantime, the bigwigs from the station's new owner, the Sinclair Broadcast Group, were in town this week.

Of course, it was a rah-rah session, but many staffers came away impressed. Sinclair seems to genuinely care about news (though with a distinctly conservative bent) and it has plenty of experience running small market TV stations.

A new morning co-host, Sam Bauman, also made his debut alongside Vicky Crystal and Shawn Householder. Bauman's 23, out of Granville, Ohio, and a graduate of Wheeling Jesuit University in West Virginia.

He's getting acclimated. He finds the weather cold and the people warm.

Yeah, that's just about right.
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Buck Levasseur, the creator and star of Discovering, has had a tough couple of years.

Like debilitating back pain, four back surgeries, five months in a nursing home, loss of his job and loss of a lifestyle that he loved.

Well, he's still around and living at home in Skandia but now he uses a walker, a cane or one of those motorized chairs. Thirty-two years of lugging a thirty pound camera and a fifteen pound tripod through the wilds of the UP will do that to you.

You want to see him and thank him for his decades of bringing the great outdoors to us on TV? He'll be at the Marquette Regional History Center's fundraiser at Kaufman Auditorium on January 30th. Jack Deo will present a tribute to him.

You want to help Buck with his enormous medical bills? UP Whitetails Association is holding a raffle for him. Phenomenal prizes.

Buck's not really depressed, by the way. He misses his old life, but he's still got his memories and his friends. And they've all got stories that could take you well into the night.

You got news? Email me at briancabell@gmail.com