Features Patrick Sullivan The story of how the body of the Traverse City teenager was found in a sand pit on the eve of her 17th birthday was splashed over newspapers across the state, broadcast on television and radio throughout Michigan, and spawned at least four Facebook groups with over 10,000 members.

Letters

H2S poses problems

A little after midnight on Christmas Eve morning, a valve failure at the Beaver Creek gas injection well in Crawford County owned by BreitBurn Energy Partners sent a plume of toxic hydrogen sulfide gas across Northern Michigan. Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) is deadly and often compared with cyanide. It is detected by a rotten egg smell. Higher levels of H2S destroy olfactory senses and can cause coma and death.

Luckily, when sensors at the Beaver Creek injection well site detected a blown needle valve, the H2S being injected into the well was shut down automatically. But sensors did not shut the injection well boreout, and H2S gas spewed back up from the injection well though a 1⁄4 inch hole...

Letters

Gov't not a business

Candidate Romney claims that his qualification for President is that he is a successful businessman. What he does not seem to understand is that government is not a business. A business produces products or services for a profit for its shareholders. A government provides services paid for with taxes collected from the citizens and businesses.

If the government were a business it could privatize the Defense Department. Following the Romney business tactic, the Pentagon Corporation could sell our surplus aircraft carriers to China, as Russia did. We do not need seven nuclear aircraft carrier task forces when no other country has more than one. We could level the playing field, sell off some of our ships and pass on the profits to the shareholders. That’s what businesses do.

If that meant laying off a lot of sailors, taking away their pensions and medical benefits and dumping them onto the distressed labor market, so be it. What matters to business is dividends for the shareholders.

Business thinks in terms of short term gains and quick profits. Governments think long term. It takes years to plan a bridge, for instance, and no private corporation is going to take that long range view...

Letters

Time for gun insurance... Guns are not toys. They are lethal weapons. Just as in order to drive my car it must be registered and insured and I need a valid license, a similar approach to guns should remind people that owning a lethal weapon is a serious responsibility. Instead of banning guns by type and magazine capacity, let’s require liability insurance and registration along with licenses to carry...

Incredible waste of water... A mind-boggling 21 million gallons of groundwater was mixed with toxic chemicals and used to frack State Excelsior well 3-25 HD1, located within the Mackinaw State Forest in Kalkaska County...

Now showing at Northern Express Video Seen: Saving Michigan's Gray Wolves.

Features Patrick Sullivan The U-M study has prompted a call from insurance and medical groups to reestablish the state’s helmet law, but proponents of the repeal argue it’s too early to draw any conclusions about the data and note that last year’s remarkably long period of warm weather led to more motorcycles on the roads.

Features Kristi Kates So. You’re retired, you love Northern Michigan in the summertime, and you still “have enough energy to do something”… but what exactly do you do? Well, if you’re Nancy Vollmar and her husband, Jerry, you take over a restaurant, of course.