Downsizing for the Future

How prevalent is the shrinking city phenomena in Michigan? Habitat for Humanity is tearing down houses in Saginaw.

Monica Davey of The New York Times reports:

Volunteers are learning to rip down plaster, pull apart walls and tear off roofs. To the nonprofit group’s long-held aim of constructing houses for those in need, Saginaw’s affiliate has lately added to its mission by doing the opposite.

As part of an agreement with the city, and with at least $500,000 from the state and federal governments, the Habitat volunteers and paid workers plan to deconstruct and demolish two vacant, dilapidated houses here a week, every week, over the next two years. As for creating homes, they will build or refurbish eight houses this year.

Layed Off But Not Leaving

There's a sit-down strike, of sorts, taking place in Chicago, except this time the workers have already lost their jobs.

Monica Davey of The New York Times reports:

"Scores of workers laid off from a factory here that makes windows and doors have refused to leave, deciding to stage a “peaceful occupation” of the plant around the clock this weekend as they demand pay they say is owed them.

"Workers at Republic Windows and Doors, which laid off about 250 people, said they were notified Tuesday that the plant, more than four decades old, would close Friday. They said they were given insufficient notice and were never paid for vacation days or severance.

"The workers, many of whom were sitting on fold-up chairs on the factory floor Saturday afternoon, said they would not leave.

"'They’re staying because the fact is that these workers feel they have nothing to lose at this point,' said Leah Fried, an organizer for the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America Local 1110, who said groups of 30 were occupying the plant in shifts. 'Telling them they have three days before they are out on the street, penniless, is outrageous.'"

As Bad As It Gets?

Susan Saulny and Monica Davey of The New York Times report on just how bad the economy is in Michigan:

"Around the state, home foreclosures are commonplace, the trust fund that pays unemployment benefits is millions of dollars in debt, food banks are struggling and health agencies are reporting an uptick in people with symptoms like anxiety and depression. Suicides were up in recent years, although officials caution against drawing any direct links between deaths and the economy.

"In one sign of distress, in the first nine months of this year, some 130,000 Michigan residents who had lost their jobs remained out of work so long that they ran out of regular unemployment benefits. By the middle of this month, 63,000 people (who had already run out of their ordinary maximum benefit — as many as 26 weeks, at as much as $362 a week) also ran out of an extension authorized by Congress."