City of Flint Customer Service still closed Monday, May 18
Notice from the City of Flint, announced today (Sunday) For Immediate Release: City of Flint Customer Service remains temporarily closed The City of Flint’s customer service department will remain temporarily closed on Monday, May 18 after being impacted by COVID-19....
Commentary: We are NOT equally at risk for COVID-19. Racism makes all the difference
Editor's Note: This essay is a response to a recent commentary by Dick Ramsdell posted here.We welcome the expression of divergent views and hope they will foster respectful discussion. It is reprinted from Woodside World, the newsletter of Woodside Church of Flint,...
Despite inmate releases and lockdown restrictions, Flint crime rate and response time tick down, city reports
By Jan Worth-Nelson As the city adapts to effects of the coronavirus pandemic and prepares for the summer, Flint Mayor Sheldon Neeley and key representatives of local law enforcement convened via Zoom today in a press conference, announcing that while homicides have...
Rehab manufacturing company ramps up production to protect nonprofits, disabled from COVID-19
By Madeleine Graham The coronavirus crisis has created emergency needs to protect people in many sectors of the community. One of those sectors is the nonprofit community employing and serving the disabled. In the face of those escalating COVID-19 demands, a Flint...
Council approves $14.7 million pipeline, reservoir contracts; in scolding email, Mayor calls 11-hour meeting “gross lack of leadership”
by Tom Travis City Council passed two big-ticket pieces of legislation that have been on their agendas for months in their Monday video/telephone meeting. Shortly thereafter, Mayor Sheldon Neeley sent an email scolding the council for the staggering 11-hour-long...
Grants available now for Flint African-American small businesses for COVID reopening costs
Small businesses locally owned and run by African Americans can now apply for $5,000 each to help cover costs for reopening safely as the state eases its coronavirus restrictions. The "Restart Flint & Genesee Grant Program" was launched May 6 with $200,000 from...
Commentary: As the lockdowns end, the responsibility lies with us
By Dick Ramsdell Whether we call ourselves Children of God. lost souls, homo sapiens, or simply human beings, there are almost 8 billion of us on the small ball in space which we call Planet Earth, and we make up a veritable playground for what has emerged as our...
Crim Foundation: new CEO faces COVID response, further focus on mindfulness and community health
By Zach Neithercut Once built almost exclusively around an annual 10-mile road race sustained by a small staff, the Crim Foundation has expanded into a major influence in Flint life, with an $8 million budget, more than 50 employees, many year-round events, a...
East Village Magazine – May 2020
The latest edition of The East Village Magazine is available for download here:
As Atwood COVID testing concludes, Michigan Health Specialists and others continue
By Tom Travis The first location to offer COVID-19 testing in the State of Michigan, Michigan Health Specialists (MHS), has now conducted 200 COVID-19 tests since it began testing March 12. Of the 200 tests performed since then, 50 had positive results and 2 patients...
Flint Neighborhoods United resumes meetings via Zoom
By Tammy Beckett More than 40 community leaders and representatives of neighborhood groups signed onto Zoom Saturday for a remote meeting of Flint Neighborhoods United (FNU), adhering to Gov. Whitmer's stay-at-home orders. The group heard a plea for consideration of...
Commentary: Kent State at 50–no redemption for a failing America
By Jan Worth-Nelson I didn't want to write this. I didn't want to think about it. It was awful, and there was nothing good about it that I can think of. And with the state of the nation the worst of my lifetime and in my view bound to get worse, reflecting on the...
Review: Kent State shootings 50 years later–graphic narrative offers sober account
By Harold C. Ford “Tin soldiers and Nixon coming/We’re finally on our own This summer I hear the drumming/Four dead in Ohio” …Ohio, Lyrics by Neil Young For many, if not most, graphic publications conjure up images of comic books with fanciful tales and accompanying...
Coronavirus Diaries: Seven EVM writers report from their own lives
Editor's Note: Like everyone else, all of East Village Magazine's staff -- none of whom are full-time employees and who juggle many other lives -- have been sheltering in place since late March. We've stayed in touch by email and phone, and had one Zoom writers'...
Commentary: A beloved neighbor and nurse humanizes the COVID-19 crisis
By Paul Rozycki With the 24/7 news coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic, there are days when the story becomes nothing more than a blur of infection numbers, death rates, protests, presidential press conferences, and predictions about when the curve will flatten, or when...
Crossover food giveaways on Mondays in May among recipients of Urgent Relief Fund
A food giveaway funded by the Community Foundation of Greater Flint is being offered from 11 a.m. until the food runs out Mondays through the end of May at the former Gordon Anthony flower shop at the corner of Grand Traverse Boulevard and W. Court Street. The...
Commentary: Maybe music helped Flint in 1918 — and arts and culture can do it for us now
By Rodney Lontine Arts and culture offer much-needed healing in difficult times The Community Music Association was founded by J. Dallas Dort during World War I in 1917. Both J. Dallas and his wife Nellie were accomplished musicians. He played the cello, and their...
From porches and dining rooms, local musicians are playing the pandemic blues
By Tom Travis As the coronavirus pandemic ensues it seems to be unifying the human race. There isn't a person on the face of the earth that can't somehow relate to it. We drive by empty schools in the middle of the day, empty parking lots at movie theaters and...
Local nursery owner coping with restrictions tells gardeners: keep tilling the soil for that “Covid-19 Victory Garden”
By Darlene C. Carey Amid the Covid-19 fears, the protest echoes, and silent spring of 2020, there lie the roots of Michiganders' voices. Deeply embedded is the tradition of doing and going. It is no wonder people are so entrenched in their convictions about what they...
City Council postpones secondary water source pipeline decision and reviews amended 2021 budget
By Tom Travis The Flint City Council voted to postpone to May 11 an important resolution to enter into a contract for a secondary water source pipeline and also voted to receive an amended 2021 Flint city budget from city administration. Both items resulted in long...
Coronavirus Diary #2 — In Pandemic America 2020, Flint knows we are “collateral damage in a rigged deck casino”
Ed. Note: Here is the second of an East Village Magazine's new feature, the Coronavirus Diaries -- personal accounts and commentary from our writers to attempt to capture some of what we've all been going through and reflecting on what it means. By Robert Thomas Like...
Flint Community Schools implementing pandemic response plan with Mott Foundation aid
As the Flint Community Schools (FCS) district grapples with needs for remote learning with all schools closed in the pandemic crisis, a new grant from the C.S. Mott Foundation aims to expand internet access for FCS students and keep them safe through a filtering app....
“Still waiting for justice” — Six years in, water warriors remember Flint water crisis
By Tom Travis Remembering the sixth anniversary of the Flint water crisis, several local water activists gathered on the front lawn of City Hall Saturday. Democracy Defense League members Claire McClinton and Claudia Milton-Perkins led the effort to broadcast an...
Ananich on the water crisis sixth anniversary: Hoping for justice, but “Man, could Flint just catch a break?”
By Jan Worth-Nelson Sitting in a small room in the State Capitol waiting for a floor vote Friday afternoon, State Sen. Jim Ananich, also Senate Minority Leader, made a call to Flint. He had agreed to offer updates to East Village Magazine, all of whose staff are...
