Book Review: Sing for Your Life, a Story of Race, Music, and Family
by Harold C. Ford In 1994 at the age of 12, Ryan Speedo Green was taken forcibly to Virginia’s infamous DeJarnette Center after he threatened to kill his mother and his brother. The lowest point for Green at DeJarnette may have been when his downward spiraling behavior landed him in solitary confinement, as related by Daniel Bergner in the 2016 book Sing for Your Life, A Story of Race, Music and Family: “He stood at the door...
Flint residents face water uncertainty amid council chaos, state lawsuits, indictments
By Jan Worth-Nelson The month of June delivered a series of blows to progress toward clean drinking water and restoring trust for the city’s weary residents. At a June 26 meeting, after four hours of raucous infighting, the City Council declined to sign on to Mayor Karen Weaver’s proposal for a 30-year-contract with the Great Lakes Water Authority, an option for continuing water delivery to the city that had been under consideration...
Commentary: Flint’s Aug. 8 primary affects the city and your life
By Paul Rozycki In light of recent terrorist threats at Bishop Airport, criminal indictments of state water officials, continuing squabbles between the Flint City Council and the mayor over the source of Flint’s water, the hype over a $50 million election in Georgia, and endless tweets from the president, this August’s election in Flint may seem of little consequence. Perhaps by comparison it is. And I suspect that unfortunately the...
Flint native, photographer Dan White, comes home to capture larger-than-life “Flint Folks”
By Jan Worth-Nelson Pulitzer Prize winner Dan White, 60, has spent decades photographing Kansas City jazz musicians, cowboys, the Lost Boys of Sudan, Zapotec women of Oaxaca, and aboriginal peoples of Australia. And now he’s come back to Flint, where he grew up in a well-known extended Vehicle City family, to fall in love again with the faces and stories of his hometown. He says he hopes his work — to be featured in the...
Five indicted on involuntary manslaughter charges in Flint water crisis; sixth charged with obstruction
By Jan Worth-Nelson Charges of involuntary manslaughter related to the Flint water crisis have been slapped on five past or present state officials for their alleged “failure to act,” leading to deaths from the Legionnaires Disease outbreak of 2015. Highest ranking among the indicted was the state’s Director of the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, Nick Lyon, charged along with four other principals...
The Latest Edition of East Village Magazine Is Available For Download Here (pdf)
