HEALTH CARE - Crain`s Detroit Business

Transcription

DETROIT BUSINESS MAIN 08-11-08 A 1 CDB
8/8/2008
5:54 PM
Page 1
®
www.crainsdetroit.com Vol. 24, No. 32
AUGUST 11 – 17, 2008
$2 a copy; $59 a year
©Entire contents copyright 2008 by Crain Communications Inc. All rights reserved
THIS JUST IN
Auto supplier plants work
around Olympics in Beijing
Locally based auto suppliers with factories in the
Beijing area are making
some temporary changes
for the 2008 Olympics.
Van Buren Townshipbased Visteon Corp. halted
production at a climate
control products plant in
Beijing Aug. 4-7 and shuttered its Yanfeng Visteon
Beijing facility on Friday.
That plant will reopen
Aug. 18. Visteon spokesman Jim Fisher said the
company is following the
production schedules of its
customers and was not
asked to close by the Chinese government.
Troy-based Delphi Corp.
said the company’s plants
in Beijing have not been affected by the Olympics.
But because of Olympicrelated road closures and
traffic reductions, the supplier has had to reroute
and consolidate its parts
shipments, according to
Lindsey Williams, corporate restructuring, financial communications, labor and manufacturing
spokesman for Delphi.
“It’s been strictly some
logistical
changes,”
Williams said.
Auburn Hills-based BorgWarner Inc. said a company
plant in Beijing was expected to be closed from
last Friday through this
Saturday.
“The Chinese government suggested we do this
to improve traffic conditions in Beijing,” Dave Peterson, BorgWarner manager of global branding
and media relations told
Crain’s in an e-mail. “Our
facility made a plan back in
April (as many other companies did) to shut down
during the Olympics.”
Peterson added that because this closure was
planned, it would not affect
August sales figures.
He also noted this type of
a shutdown was not unusual, as many companies
have summer shutdowns.
— Ryan Beene
NEWSPAPER
See This Just In, Page 2
Storms cost utilities $48M
DTE, Consumers earnings take 2Q jolt
BY AMY LANE
CAPITOL CORRESPONDENT
LANSING — June storms that knocked
out electricity to more than 760,000 customers of Michigan’s two largest utilities
hit the electricity providers with a combined cost of some $48 million to restore
power.
Detroit Edison Co. spent $36 million when
storms struck in early June, while Consumers Energy Co. spent at least $12 million,
company officials said last week.
The costs bit into second-quarter earnings for
the utilities’ parent compaPSC studies
nies and are another imresponse,
pact from the series of
Page 32.
thunderstorms
that
crossed Michigan’s lower
peninsula and knocked out power to
homes and businesses.
Storm-response costs reduced DTE Energy Co.’s second-quarter earnings by about
$20 million, compared with a $13 million
PROBE
See Storms, Page 32
PHOTO COURTESY OF DTE ENERGY
Repair costs for storms this year have hammered utilities.
Where’s
the cash?
Born for a mission
Exec’s childhood in foster
care drives push for clinic
Mistaken donor still
waiting for money
BY SHERRI BEGIN
BY TOM HENDERSON
CRAIN’S DETROIT BUSINESS
im McElya didn’t always talk much about his
childhood.
But the chairman of Cooper-Standard Automotive has reason to now.
Left on the doorstep of the Salvation Army in
West Chester, Pa.,
when he was
just 6 weeks
old, McElya
has made it
his mission to
help raise $1
million to open a
medical clinic for homeless and uninsured children and
their mothers.
Cooper-Standard and its employees have chipped in $150,000.
McElya and his team have raised another $250,000 through donations from the supplier’s private equity owners, its vendors and peers,
including Lear Corp., BorgWarner Inc., Continental Inc.,
Excel Polymers, Marimba Automotive, GKN Sinter Metals,
Yazaki North America Inc., Deloitte & Touche L.L.P., Ernst &
Young L.L.P., Foley & Lardner L.L.P., Watson Wyatt Worldwide and in-kind or product support from IBM Corp.
and Microsoft Corp.
“My mother couldn’t support me and my older sister,” said McElya, who grew up in nearly a dozen foster homes with families who depended on assistance
from safety net organizations such as pantries and the
Livonia business owner Ross Bates Jr.
hopes that with Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s
legal defense fund running on empty,
there’s enough money left to make good on
a promise to return a donation of $1,500 he
said he made after being
told the money would go
to a youth organization.
Ross is president of Advanced Air Services Inc., a
heating and air conditioning contractor that
was listed on an IRS
form filed in July as having made a donation of
$1,500 on May 14 to the
mayor’s Detroit Justice
Fund.
But when contacted by Should Mayor
a Detroit Free Press re- Kwame
porter last month, Bates Kilpatrick
denied he was a support- resign?
Page 30.
er of the mayor.
On July 16, Chris Garrett, a Washington-based member of the
mayor’s legal team, said the fund was returning Bates’ money as well as $3,000 donated by S.A. Restaurants Inc. Its listed address, 20771 W. Eight Mile Road, is occupied
by a topless bar, the Penthouse Club.
See McElya, Page 31
See Fund, Page 29
J
Jim McElya, chairman of Cooper-Standard
Automotive, is helping raise $1 million to
open a clinic for homeless and uninsured
children and their mothers.
HEALTH CARE
REACTION
Crain’s honors industry heroes,
Page 11
8/8/2008
5:46 PM
Page 2
Page 1
THIS JUST IN
■ From Page 1
Database for cancer care
Blue Cross Blue Shield of
Michigan is working with
more than 180 oncologists in
eight physician groups in
Southeast Michigan and
three other groups in the
state to gather quality data to
improve care for cancer patients in Michigan.
With Blue Cross funding,
the oncologists are submitting information to a database set up by the American
Society of Clinical Oncology to
help physicians identify
what works best in cancer
care.
The groups also will be eligible to receive additional incentive payments from Blue
Cross for participating and
implementing improvements
that lead to improved quality, coordination and efficiency in treating cancer patients.
Michigan’s
oncologists
treat an estimated 16,000 cancer patients annually, one of
the largest numbers of any
state participating in the
data collection.
The eight area groups are:
University of Michigan Health
System, Faculty Group Practice,
Ann Arbor; United Physicians,
Bingham Farms; United Oakwood Providers, Dearborn;
Henry Ford Medical Group, Detroit; Oncology Physician Resource and Quality Partners of
Michigan, Royal Oak; St. John
HealthPartners, Warren; Oakland Physician Network Services, Waterford Township.
— Jay Greene
Dart leases Sears facility
Sterling Heights-based real
estate company and luxury
residential property manager Dart Properties II L.L.C. has
leased the former Sears Holdings Corp. customer appliance
repair center and hardware
store on Mound Road for a
warehouse and office.
The
35,000-square-foot
building south of 15 Mile
Road, which has stood vacant
since early 2006, was sold in
December for $1.1 million to
The Macomb Group, a supplier
and distributor of pipe and
fittings.
The Macomb Group had
originally planned to expand
into the site. Instead, the
company’s real estate entity,
Flint
Acquisitions
L.L.C.,
changed its plans and offered
a lease this summer to Dart.
Real estate broker Grubb &
Ellis represented The Macomb Group in the deal.
Dart’s representative was
Colliers International in Southfield.
— Chad Halcom
Papa Joe’s to open in Novi
Papa Joe’s will open its
metro Detroit store in Novi
as part of the reconfigured retail development 12 Mile
Crossing at Fountainwalk.
The lease was signed last
week for a 30,000-square-foot
store, said Tony Curtis, a partner in the venture, Papa Joe’s
Novi L.L.C. It will include a
10,000-square-foot mezzanine
to be used for wine-tasting
and entrances facing 12 Mile
Road and the courtyard of the
open-air retail center.
CB Richard Ellis, Southfield,
brokered the deal.
— Daniel Duggan
French vodka to be
distributed in area
After navigating a myriad
of applications and forms,
East
Lansing-based
RGI
Brands L.L.C. co-CEOs Jared
Rapp and Moti Goldring have
brought Dragon Bleu, a premium vodka distilled in Grande
Champagne,
France,
to
Michigan and will base its
North American headquarters in Bloomfield Hills.
“Importing alcohol is so
heavily regulated that you
even have to apply to apply
for label approval,” Rapp
said.
RGI Brands is relying on
local businesses such as Ann
Arbor-based Brett Mountain
Photography for photo work,
Birmingham-based Direct Media Concepts for graphic design, Evans Distribution Systems in Melvindale for
logistical support and is storing its inventory at Central
Detroit Warehouse, also in
Melvindale.
— Nathan Skid
Mayor’s aide goes to DTE
Al Fields, who served
Kwame Kilpatrick in a variety
of key posts including
deputy COO for special projects and Fusion Center director, has left the city to return
to DTE Energy Corp. as manager of economic development.
Fields was credited with
successfully
coordinating
city of Detroit efforts with the
private sector in preparation
for Super Bowl XL in 2006. He
previously was a vice president at Comerica/Manufacturers Bank.
— Robert Ankeny
August 11, 2008
CRAIN’S SEEKS BEST MANAGED NONPROFITS
This year has seen continued challenges in the
nonprofit arena that have included changes in
United Way funding in addition to a weak economy.
Therefore, this year’s Best Managed Nonprofit
Contest will continue to look at nonprofits that
have taken specific steps to improve operations
and delivery of services.
We are looking at the following categories:
䡲 Collaborations, including mergers.
䡲 Finding ways to do more with less.
䡲 Strategies for diversifying funding.
䡲 Launches of new programs that help the
organization better meet objectives.
Please focus on only one of the above in your
application.
As always, documentation of results is important.
Applications for the contest are due Sept. 17.
Finalists in this year’s contest will be interviewed in
person by judges the morning of Dec. 2.
Applicants for the award must be a 501(c)(3) with
headquarters in Wayne, Washtenaw, Oakland,
Macomb or Livingston counties.
Each application must include a completed entry
form, a copy of the nonprofit’s most recent audited
financial statements and a copy of the nonprofit’s
most recent IRS Form 990.
Previous first-place winners are not eligible; neither
are hospitals, HMOs, medical clinics, business and
professional organizations, schools, churches or
foundations.
The winning nonprofits will be profiled in the Dec.
22 issue, receive a cash award, a special “bestmanaged” logo from Crain’s for use in promotional
material, and will receive recognition at the Crain’s
Newsmaker of the Year lunch in February.
For a copy of the application form, please send an
e-mail request to [email protected] or visit
www.crainsdetroit.com/nominate. For more
information, call (313) 446-0329.
Within each of us is the ability to inspire others. To expand horizons. To lead.
At Northwood University, we know leadership is a quality that isn’t simply
taught, it’s instilled.
It requires a faculty who are role models. Men and women who are
successful entrepreneurs and executives – who have directed the course
of companies in many industries.
It demands a relevant curriculum that goes beyond textbook learning with
real world case studies, group projects, and small interactive classes that
teach you how to motivate others.
If you have what it takes to be a leader, shouldn’t you get your master’s
degree at Northwood University?
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My experience at DeVos redefined leadership for me and
exponentially elevated my ability to inspire others.
Fadi Baradihi
Senior Vice President and
General Sales Manager
HantzGroup
8/8/2008
4:55 PM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Page 3
Heart care staffing debated
24-7 not critical, some doctors say
BY JAY GREENE
Cardiologists at several hospitals
in Southeast Michigan have raised
questions about the suggestion made
last week by the Detroit Medical Center that having an on-site cardiology
team around the clock at two of its
hospitals is the magic bullet to significantly improve the quality of
care of heart attack patients.
Several area hospitals, including
Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit and
William Beaumont Hospitals in Royal
Oak, considered and rejected hiring
on-site cardiologists because they
were able to reduce potentially lifesaving “door-to-balloon” procedure
times without spending additional
funds to staff their cardiac catheterization lab 24 hours a day, seven days
a week.
Considered a gold standard of heart
attack care, door-to-balloon time
refers to the number of minutes it
takes for a patient who enters the hospital with chest pain symptoms until
a cardiologist opens an artery and begins an emergency angioplasty.
Dr. Aaron Kugelmass, Henry Ford’s
director of the cardiac catheterization
lab, said the hospital looked into
staffing a cardiologist around the
clock but decided
against it. On-call
cardiologists are
required to be at
the hospital within
30 minutes.
“Having an onKugelmass
site cardiologist is
the least-effective way to optimize
door-to-balloon time,” said Kugelmass. “It is one factor, but not most
important. We have in-house doctors
who are not interventional cardiologists but who can get the ball rolling.”
Like most top cardiovascular hospi-
tals, Henry Ford has been implementing a number of process improvements to reduce door-to-balloon time
to less than 90 minutes in more than 80
percent of the cases, Kugelmass said.
The hospital has cut times in half
since 2003, he said.
“We have achieved a lot without
doing that (24-7 cardiologist),” he
said. “We concluded we would be
better off investing in other areas.”
After an Aug. 5 press conference to
announce its new cardiac care program — called Cardio Team One —
DMC officials have been unavailable
for
comment.
Dr.
Theodore
Schreiber is director of DMC’s Cardio Team One.
BY RYAN BEENE
AND CHAD HALCOM
As local auto suppliers feel the squeeze of increased economic pressure on their industry,
some are shaking up operations and laying off
workers. Others are heading to court.
Even a standout second-quarter performance by
Auburn Hills-based BorgWarner Inc. was not
enough to stem staffing cuts.
BorgWarner said in its second-quarter earnings
report released July 31 that it planned to cut 1,000
people from its North American workforce during
the third quarter, including about 80 from the
company’s five Michigan facilities.
ON THE WEB
An interview with Bill
Fetterman from
Advanced
Manufacturing Group,
www.crainsdetroit.com.
Those cutbacks are
coming despite net income that increased 16
percent to $87.5 million
on record revenue of $1.5
billion, up 11 percent
from the same period a
year ago.
The company also had
strong sales in Europe
and Asia, and increased
sales of such fuel-saving
technologies as turbochargers.
“We’re a very diversified company, but we do
have a healthy-sized business with the Detroit 3,”
said David Peterson, BorgWarner manager for
global branding and media relations. “It’s like the
old adage: When GM gets a cut, the rest of us
bleed.”
BorgWarner’s retrenchment is in response to
what the company called a continuing, fundamental market shift in the U.S. auto industry away
from pickup trucks and SUVs to smaller, more
fuel-efficient cars.
BorgWarner’s announcement is evidence of the
strain on suppliers in North America, a reality
noted by CEO Tim Manganello in the company’s
earnings conference call when he said “even our
global success does not make us immune.”
U.S. car and truck sales through July totaled
8.55 million vehicles, down 10.5 percent from a
See Suppliers, Page 33
More than having right last name
Roncelli president
1st outside family
BY DANIEL DUGGAN
NATHAN SKID/CRAIN’S DETROIT BUSINESS
Tom Wickersham (left back row) is being asked by the Roncellis — Gary (right rear), David
(front left) and Scott – to lead the family-owned company into the next decade.
When Skip Roncelli started
his concrete-pouring business in
1966, revenue was roughly
$200,000.
In recent history under his
son Gary’s leadership, the construction company built the $300
million Technology Center for
General Motors Corp., 23 Showcase
Cinemas movie theaters across
the country and the new $142
million Pinnacle Race Course in
Romulus.
The company has grown to
2007 revenue of $236 million.
But an evaluation of the highlevel business expertise it would
take for the company to compete
with the other firms in town led
the Roncelli family to hand operations of the company to Tom
INDEX
Taking Stock: Twilight
book series may help
Borders Group’s bottom
line. Page 4.
Bumpy round: Most of
the 117 applications for
21st Century Jobs Funds
lacked full compliance.
Page 6.
Income in advice:
Financial planning is one
reason why Michigan
Financial Cos. is thriving
in hard times. Page 24.
See Staffing, Page 32
Pinched suppliers cut staff, file suits
Rising costs, changed market spur moves
CRAIN’S
Wickersham in March. It
marked the first time someone
outside the family has led the
company.
“I’m a high school graduate
who went to work for his father
and built a career in the field,”
said Gary Roncelli, 57, former
president of the company. “As
life gets more complex, the need
for
seasoned
professionals
around you becomes clear.”
Wickersham brings a financial background to the company.
As an accountant with Troybased Doeren Mayhew & Co. P.C.,
he was assigned to the Roncelli
account until he was hired on as
controller in 1987.
A client now expects a construction firm to be a consultant
on the finances behind a development as much as the construction, Roncelli said. Wickersham’s presence means the
person handling day-to-day operations of the company will have
a handle on the complex financial structures of the deals the
See Roncelli, Page 33
Revving up: Work crews
are leading the race to
prepare Belle Isle for the
Grand Prix. Page 26.
These organizations appear in this
week’s Crain’s Detroit Business:
Advantage Health Centers . . . . . . . 31
Alcos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Barbara Ann Karmanos
Cancer Institute . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Baseball Heroes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Biggby Coffee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Borders Group Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
BorgWarner Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Cannella Patisserie and Creperie . . 26
Center for Automotive Research . . . 28
Charter Equals County Executive . . 28
Charter One . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Children’s Health Initiative Program 12
Chrysler L.L.C. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Chrysler Financial L.L.C. . . . . . . . . 28
Citation Corp. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Consumers Energy Co. . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Cooper Standard Automotive . . . . . . 1
Co-op Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Delphi Corp. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix . . . . . . 26
Detroit Edison Co. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Detroit Institute for Children . . . . . 12
Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries . 30
DMC-Children’s Hospital . . . . . . . . 12
FormTech Industries L.L.C. . . . . . . . 33
GMAC Financial Services . . . . . . . . 28
Health Alliance Plan . . . . . . . . . . . 19
HealthMedia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Henry Ford Health System . . . . . . . 13
Homeless Action Network . . . . . . . 31
Johnson Controls Inc. . . . . . . . . . . 33
J.S. Clark Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Kickhaefer Manufacturing Co. . . . . 33
LaFontaine Automotive Group . . . . 28
MEDC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Macomb County Chamber . . . . . . . 28
McGraw Wentworth . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
MichBio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Michigan Financial Cos. . . . . . . . . 24
MPS Group Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
National Center for
Manufacturing Sciences . . . . . . . . 6
Oakland Hills Country Club . . . . . . 26
Penske Corp. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Priority Health . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Roncelli Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
St. John Health . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Sterling Heights Dodge . . . . . . . . . 28
Tumaini Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
University of Michigan Health
Management Research Center . . . . 18
UM Health System . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Voices of Detroit Initiative . . . . . . . 15
Walbridge Aldinger Co. . . . . . . . . . 33
Wellco Corp. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
BANKRUPTCIES . . . . . . . . . 6
BUSINESS DIARY . . . . . . . 22
CALENDAR . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
CAPITOL BRIEFINGS . . . . . . 6
CLASSIFIED ADS . . . . . . . . 26
KEITH CRAIN . . . . . . . . . . . 8
LETTERS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
MARY KRAMER. . . . . . . . . . 9
OPINION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
PEOPLE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
RUMBLINGS . . . . . . . . . . . 34
WEEK IN REVIEW . . . . . . . 34
Page 4
8/8/2008
4:56 PM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
TAKING STOCK
NEWS ABOUT DETROIT AREA PUBLIC COMPANIES
Blockbuster book series may
help the bottom line for Borders
BY NANCY KAFFER
www.kpiscorecard.com
Borders Group Inc. (NYSE: BGP)
reported slipping same-store sales
in its last quarterly earnings report — but the nation’s secondlargest bookseller may get a boost
from the publishing industry’s latest phenom.
Breaking Dawn, the fourth and
final installment of author Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series, was
released at 12:01 a.m. Aug. 2 at parties at bookstores across the country, including Borders stores and
Borders-owned Waldenbooks. The
Ann Arbor-based bookseller said
it sold more than 250,000 books on
the first day of sales, with preorders rivaled only by the Harry
Potter septet.
Borders declined to give the number of preorders for either series.
“The book industry will never
see another Harry Potter,” said
Michael Norris, senior analyst at
Maryland-based market research
firm Simba Information. “But for
now, Stephenie Meyer is the next
best thing.”
The popularity of the youngadult-oriented Twilight series,
which tells the story of teenager
Bella Swan and her romance with
a handsome vampire, has grown
exponentially — the initial press
run for Twilight, the first book in
the series, was 75,000; 3.2 million
copies of Breaking Dawn were
printed, according to trade publication Publishers Weekly. A film
version of the first installment is
due in December.
Sales of the highly anticipated
final volume in the Potter series
contributed to a 4.6 percent bump
in same-store sales in Borders’ second quarter last year, but it didn’t
increase the bookseller’s profits
for the quarter.
Borders’ second quarter closed
Aug. 2; an earnings report is expected at month’s end. Borders
CEO George Jones has implemented a number of cost-cutting policies this year, including executive
layoffs, and the first quarter saw
the launch of Borders’ in-house ecommerce site. Online sales formerly were handled by Internet
competitor amazon.com. Jones has
said that such measures will save
money and have improved Borders’ cash flow.
But the popularity of book series like Harry Potter or Twilight
can do more for Borders than just
increase sales, Norris said. Savvy
marketing campaigns like midnight sales, in-store parties and email can point readers to book selections in the same vein.
“It’s about using a blockbuster
book to bring people into the store,”
he said.
Meyer’s series has sold briskly,
Norris said, but Potter remains
the gold standard in book sales.
“Breaking Dawn sold about 1.3
million copies on the first day. …
but Harry Potter (and the Deathly
Hallows) sold something like 8.3
million copies on day one,” he
said. “In some ways, Meyer will
never be in the same area code as
(Harry Potter author) J.K. Rowling, but it’s certainly a big deal.”
Big enough for Borders to feel
the impact?
Borders stock has been falling
for the past year. The company’s
52-week high of $16.66 was on Aug.
9, 2007; it’s 52-week low was $3.87
was four weeks ago on July 14. The
stock closed Friday at $5.66.
Nancy Kaffer: (313) 446-0412,
[email protected].
Cost-cutting helps Noble beat expectations
BY RYAN BEENE
Shares of Troy-based Noble International Ltd. rallied in heavy trading
Thursday as the company’s secondquarter financial results beat analysts’ expectations.
The supplier of laser-welded steel
blanks used by the auto industry
saw its share price shoot up about
98 percent, or $3.15, from its
Wednesday close to hit a daily high
of $6.34 about an hour after the
opening bell Thursday. Noble’s
stock cooled during the day to close
at $5.40, up 69 percent on the day.
The 809,900 shares traded Thursday was the company’s secondhighest volume day since June 22,
2004, when Noble’s stock was
worth $16.60 per share. The stock
closed Friday at $5.05. The company’s 52-week high was $22.74 on
Aug. 9, 2007.
“(I was) extremely surprised at
how they blew away my or anybody else’s expectations,” said
Christopher Bamman, an analyst
and vice president with Morgan
Jones & Co. Inc., a New York investment banking firm.
Noble posted net income of $9
million, or 34 cents per share, on
revenue of $315 million in the second quarter, up 385 percent from
net income of $1.8 million, or 13
cents, on revenue of $183 million in
the same quarter a year ago.
The company focused on cutting
North American costs by reducing
scrap rates, closing a plant in Holt,
making progress on a South Haven
plant closure, and gearing up to
consolidate its outsourced stamping operations into an in-house facility, CFO David Fallon said in
Noble’s Aug. 7 earnings conference call.
Fallon noted that the company
managed its variable manufacturing costs in North America to
match the company’s 21 percent
sales drop in the region from decreasing vehicle production, calling it “a very significant accomplishment.”
Noble’s cost-cutting efforts
helped the company increase its
free cash flow for the quarter by
169 percent to $31.2 million from
$11.6 million a year ago.
Ryan Beene: (313) 446-0315,
[email protected]
STREET TALK
THIS WEEK’S STOCK TOTALS: 40 GAINERS, 20 LOSERS, 9 UNCHANGED
CDB’S TOP PERFORMERS
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Amerigon Inc.
Rofin-Sinar Technologies Inc.
Credit Acceptance Corp.
ArvinMeritor Inc.
Caraco Pharmaceutical
TRW Automotive Holdings Corp.
ITC Holdings Corp.
Pulte Homes Inc.
BorgWarner Inc.
Masco Corp.
CDB’S LOW PERFORMERS
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
TechTeam Global Inc.
First Mercury Financial Corp.
Energy Conversion Devices Inc.
Asset Acceptance Capital Corp.
Rockwell Medical Technologies
FNBH Bancorp Inc.
Saga Communications Inc.
Valassis Communications Inc.
Perceptron Inc.
General Motors Corp.
8/08
CLOSE
8/01
CLOSE
PERCENT
CHANGE
$8.00
41.48
19.05
15.22
15.51
20.01
54.82
12.96
43.31
17.92
$6.45
33.85
16.80
13.71
14.05
18.17
50.40
12.01
40.18
16.64
24.03
22.54
13.39
11.01
10.39
10.13
8.77
7.91
7.79
7.69
8/08
CLOSE
8/01
CLOSE
PERCENT
CHANGE
$8.33
12.41
62.99
10.89
5.44
6.75
5.63
8.36
7.94
10.03
$9.84
14.31
68.41
11.81
5.87
7.25
5.90
8.65
8.18
10.23
-15.35
-13.28
-7.92
-7.79
-7.33
-6.90
-4.58
-3.35
-2.93
-1.96
Source: Bloomberg News. From a list of publicly owned companies with headquarters
in Wayne, Oakland, Macomb, Washtenaw or Livingston counties. Note: Stocks trading
at less than $5 are not included.
DBpageAD.qxd
5/8/2008
10:15 AM
Page 1
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8/8/2008
2:10 PM
Page 1
Page 6
August 11, 2008
Many Jobs Fund applications sent in with errors
LANSING — The
cording to the MEDC.
state’s latest round of
The National Center for
21st Century Jobs Fund
Manufacturing Sciences on
competition has had a
Aug. 20 is scheduled to
bumpy start.
submit a list of proposals
A majority of the 117
that should advance to
applications received by
an interview round, said
the Michigan Economic
Bridget Beckman, public
Development Corp. lacked
information officer at the
full compliance with the
MEDC.
state’s request for proShe said initial review
posals,
leaving
the
of the applications found
agency conducting peer
numerous issues, due in
Amy Lane
review of the proposals
part to apparent ambiguto reconcile differences between ity over what the state’s RFP wordthe RFP’s requirements and infor- ing required of applicants and
mation that was submitted, ac- what applicants thought were sim-
Capitol
B r i e fi ng s
ply recommendations. In addition,
some applicants submitted proposals that exceeded a 25-page limit,
did not indicate a required thirdparty financial match, failed to
outline conflicts with the board
that will make funding decisions,
or had other discrepancies with
the state’s requirements.
Even the total number of applications and amount of money
sought has shifted.
The MEDC initially said it received 112 proposals seeking more
than $475.7 million from Jobs
Fund, compared with the maximum $30 million in awards that
the fund can give out in this year’s
competition.
But that announcement didn’t
reflect applications progressing
through the system that had not
yet been logged in. Inclusion of
those applications boosted the final number of applicants to 117,
Beckman said.
In responses to the RFP, a few
applicants entered their entire operating budget in a section asking
the amount of money they were requesting from the state. That
threw off the funding tally, and
Beckman said the $475.7 million
previously announced is not accu-
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rate. She said the amount of money sought by applicants now won’t
be finalized until interviews are
completed.
She said the state will make
whatever changes are necessary to
ensure that next year’s RFP is very
clear. “There will be no ambiguity
for the applicants.”
Stephen Rapundalo, executive
director of MichBio, an Ann Arborbased organization that drives
growth of the life-sciences industry, said he was not aware of any
major issues with the current RFP,
but he said that in general, specificity, clarity and consistency in
such a process is important.
Of the proposals submitted to the
MEDC, 52 are in life sciences, 30 are
in advanced automotive, manufacturing and materials, 19 are in
homeland security and defense, and
16 are in alternative energy.
This year’s competition targets
awards at for-profit companies
that can provide matching funds
and demonstrate viable, sustainable business opportunities in the
four sectors.
The Ann Arbor-based NCMS is
conducting peer review of most
proposals and declined to comment for this story. A separate
firm has been hired by the state to
review six proposals from applicants that are either members of
NCMS or that are collaborating
with an NCMS member, Beckman
said. She said Business Engines, of
Ann Arbor, will be paid $24,999 by
the state and was hired to avoid
any potential conflict of interest.
NCMS is scheduled to make
funding recommendations on Oct.
8 to the state Strategic Economic Investment and Commercialization
Board, which will select winners
and announce final awards, in the
form of loans or convertible loans.
Comings & goings
■ Stephen Geskey, former chairman of the Michigan Employment Security Board of Review, has become director of the Michigan Unemployment
Insurance Agency. He replaces acting
director Chris Peretto, who resumed
his previous position as the
agency’s director of customer service.
■ Eric Restuccia, former appellate division chief in the Michigan
Department of Attorney General, has
become the state’s solicitor general. He succeeds Tom Casey, who retired in late July.
Amy Lane: (517) 371-5355,
[email protected]
BANKRUPTCIES
The following businesses filed for
Chapter 7 or 11 protection in U.S.
Bankruptcy Court in Detroit Aug. 1-7.
Under Chapter 11, a company files for
reorganization. Chapter 7 involves total liquidation.
Lowe Enterprises Inc., d.b.a. The Fish
Tank,
35114
Bock
Road,
Westland, voluntary Chapter 7. Assets
and liabilities not available.
Reed Law Group, P.C., 1151/2 E. Liberty
St., Ann Arbor, voluntary Chapter 11.
Assets and liabilities not available.
Valentin Co. L.L.C., 4259 S. Corrine St.,
Canton Township, voluntary Chapter
11. Assets and liabilities not available.
— Compiled by Bernadine Stallings
DBpageAD.qxd
8/5/2008
11:57 AM
Page 1
8/8/2008
4:29 PM
Page 1
Page 8
August 11, 2008
OPINION
Granholm: Time for
you to do your job
he chorus of voices calling for Detroit Mayor Kwame
Kilpatrick to resign grew in volume and size last week.
But as we went to press, the mayor did not appear to
be heeding the call.
So it’s up to Gov. Granholm to use the power granted to her
by law and the state constitution to remove the mayor from office. She can remove the mayor for “official misconduct” or
“willful neglect of duty.” Surely the new assault charges and the
jailing for a bond violation can give her the latitude to proceed.
We’re not sure the city — and the region — can afford to
wait until the governor’s scheduled hearing on Sept. 3.
T
Plan better for power outages
A series of storms this summer in June and July cost the companies providing electricity nearly $50 million to restore service.
Of course, that sum doesn’t include the toll on businesses
and residents affected by the power outages.
As Amy Lane reports on Page 1, Detroit Edison has already
spent $62 million for storm recovery; it budgeted $72 million
for all of 2008.
Recovery costs could climb higher if the Michigan Public
Service Commission requires utilities to invest in new outage
remedies. The PSC staff will file a report by Aug. 22 on the utilities’ response to the recent storms.
In its defense, Edison already is blaming the emerald ash borer for some of the problems. Diseased trees were partly responsible for some of the damage to power lines during the storms.
Mother Nature can’t be controlled, but how the state and its
energy companies respond can be. A plan to reduce the impact
of power outages should be a priority before the next high-impact event happens.
McElya’s money needs leverage
Jim McElya, CEO of Cooper-Standard Automotive, wants
to raise $1 million for a new medical clinic for homeless and
uninsured children and their mothers.
The story of this one-time foster child, told on Page 1, shows
how a successful executive can use business skills and connections to make a difference.
To leverage the charity dollars even further, sponsors of the
new clinic might explore how it might eventually become a federally qualified health center. Detroit has fewer such clinics
than most large cities, but the clinics get federal operating dollars and higher Medicaid reimbursements in exchange for providing primary care for the uninsured. The clinics can help reduce the patient load seeking care through hospital emergency
rooms.
LETTERS
Use the new media to inform
Editor:
It’s sad to watch The Detroit
News struggle, though it’s happening to local newspapers across the
country. To simplify Bill Shea’s
excellent July 7 article (“More bad
news for The News”), Internet
sites such as Craigslist are starting to dominate the market for local classified advertising. Publishers have to make up for the losses
by decreasing news and increasing advertising within the paper.
The resulting degradation of the
news product fosters a vicious
negative cycle that depresses the
valuation of the asset and creates
financial jeopardy.
Such a course of events in local
news is particularly damaging
here because good, deep coverage
is the life-blood of a desperately
needed, vibrant civic culture.
Now here’s the rub: The countertrend to the demise of the newspaper is the rise of the Internet. The
shift in power from one to the other
Crain’s Detroit Business
welcomes letters to the editor.
All letters will be considered for
publication, provided they are
signed and do not defame
individuals or organizations.
Letters may be edited for length
and clarity.
Write: Editor, Crain’s Detroit
Business, 1155 Gratiot Ave.,
Detroit, MI 48207-2997.
E-mail: [email protected]
is the primary reason that clumsy
media companies such as Gannett
are in trouble in the first place. The
problem in Michigan is greater
than elsewhere because, for whatever reason, innovation in local
news and information over the Internet using the Web, blogging,
YouTube, and social networking
sites like Facebook lags other
states and metropolitan areas.
Because a vibrant civic culture
is critical here, those that care
about Michigan can and must
make a major push to enable and
encourage citizens to inform one
another through “self-generating
content” platforms such as blogs
and social networking sites. Investment of time, energy and resources by civic, political and
business leaders into this sector
will foster the critical new media
ecology for our state. Such investment will pay off by spurring on a
vibrant civic culture that serves
the information needs of our local
democracy despite the unfortunate demise of competitive markets for local newspapers.
Scott Aikens
Birmingham
Thoughts on recycling
Editor:
I agree with store owner
spokespersons like Ed Deeb
(Michigan Food and Beverage Association) that in the process of
changing our state’s returnable
See Letters, Page 9
KEITH CRAIN: Will Detroit’s soap opera ever end?
We were all supposed to enjoy
the national publicity of the PGA
golf tournament. National television was showing the wonderful
course at Oakland Hills Country
Club in the shadow of the city of
Detroit.
Instead, we were subjected to national ridicule once again caused
by the inappropriate actions of our
mayor.
The mayor was fighting to get out
of jail Friday — just in time to learn
that he was being indicted once
again. This time on an assault
charge, which they say
may go to trial within a
few short weeks.
I was out of town for
some of last week and
will be out of town for
some of this week as
well. The amount of
ridicule that is being
heaped on Detroit and
its people is quite substantial.
It is long past the time for the
mayor to resign.
I don’t know how much it’s go-
ing to take for Mayor
Kilpatrick to understand just how devastating his actions are for
the image of his city. He
has
single-handedly
made this city into a
laughing stock around
the world. That will be
his legacy.
He may feel that he is
being accused unjustly
and that the world is out to get
him, but the truth is that he simply
has brought all of this on himself.
It may take a long time for him to
understand that he alone is responsible for his actions.
It is time for him to acknowledge
that he must step down for the
good of the community as well as
the good of his family.
It would be impossible for him
to do anything other than resign.
The time is long past for any consideration of stepping aside during
all of his court cases. He must
leave office. Then due process can
take its time without further damage to our city.
We have watched this charade
too long; it gets worse with every
passing day. Our sadness has
turned to frustration, and our frustration has turned to anger. We
cannot let our city burn while
Nero plays.
Our governor seems to hold the
only key that will give us the opportunity to adjudicate some of the
issues. She must act.
And our civic leaders, who have
remained silent, have to speak out.
Their voices have been silent far
too long.
8/8/2008
11:45 AM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Page 9
MARY KRAMER: The mayor isn’t our only problem
A lot of ink and online chatter
have been expended on the continuing soap opera of Detroit and its
mayor. But as we went to press last
Friday, my thoughts focused on
two issues not directly related to
the current mayor’s troubles.
First is the major roadblock to
acting regionally: suspicion of corruption in city-related contracts.
Last week, Lou Pavledes, former director of Cobo Center, and Karl
Kado, the contractor Pavledes says
paid him kickbacks in exchange for
work at Cobo, were indicted. Kado
has held many contracts at Cobo,
for food service, electrical and janitorial services, among others.
LETTERS CONTINUED
■ From Page 8
bottle-deposit laws we should put
in place a total recycling program
to include steel, aluminum, plastic, glass, paper, newspapers, paper and other recyclables (“Retailers, trade groups fight expansion
of bottle deposit rules,” June 30;
Letters: “Give sellers more for unreturned containers,” July 14; and
Letters: “Don’t expand deposit
law,” July 21). And rather than
burdening store owners with having to process all of these additional returnables, let’s set up reclamation centers in each community
that would handle all these items.
Let’s allow existing nonprofit
agencies to be the sites for these
centers and in the process earn
some money and create some additional jobs in the process.
I would add two dimensions:
1. At each of the reclamation
centers, provide a special room,
with built-in safety features,
where, for $5, a person could come
in and smash a few glass bottles
against a wall as a means of letting
off steam, a stress reduction exercise. Many cultures over the centuries have had similar “rituals”
to relieve stress, and God knows
we have a lot of stress in our lives
today. And today, also, persons go
to a psychiatrist and the patient is
told to beat on a pillow to relieve
stress and often at a cost of $150 an
hour. And, hey, if the person
brings his/her own glass bottles,
there would be a discount.
2. Water for the arts. Our cultural institutions are scrambling to
find steady sources of funds to support our cultural arts treasures
and resources. Keeping in mind
that Detroit’s water is probably as
pure and healthy as 70 percent of
all bottled water, why can’t we
work out some mechanism whereby Detroit water is bottled, with
buy-in from perhaps Pepsi Cola
and Coca-Cola, and a decent portion of the profits go to the arts?
This means that when you go
into the gas station, convenience
store or supermarket, you have an
easy way to support the arts by
buying a product labeled “Water
for the Arts,” or another catchy
name. If groups like the Michigan
United Conservation Clubs and
ArtServe Michigan could join
forces, it just could happen.
I’m serious.
Richard Thibodeau
Waterford Township
Transparency of contracts — criteria, who
gets them and where the
companies are based —
is an issue in everything
from regional talks on
expanding Cobo to working regionally on water
and sewage operations.
The Cobo case — as
well as the Synagro corruption probe related to
Detroit City Council or
the text messages showing the help
Christine Beatty gave contractor
Bobby Ferguson — provide plenty
of ammo for suburban leaders not
to work regionally.
The second issue is
more
troublesome:
Where will the next generation of leaders for
mayor and council in
Detroit come from? Detroit voters have the
chance to elect new
faces to council and the
mayor’s office in 2009.
I’m a fan of electing
council members by districts or wards. In most
major cities, candidates with good
track records at a neighborhood or
district level can run successfully.
In Detroit, though, you need citywide name recognition, so the sys-
tem favors family dynasties or even
notoriety for the wrong reason.
Remember Alonzo Bates? He’s
in prison for fraud during his City
Council tenure, but he was elected
to City Council after achieving notoriety on the Detroit school board
for booking first-class air tickets
for school board junkets and being
found by a TV crew lounging at
home when he was supposed to be
working as a recreation department employee. He won a council
seat after that.
Unfortunately, a petition drive
to create a ward system has languished. The Detroit chapter of the
League of Women Voters couldn’t
find enough volunteers to circulate petitions to collect the necessary 34,000 signatures.
As a Detroit resident, I’m embarrassed I didn’t pay enough attention
to that drive, which is due Aug. 12.
Democracy is not a spectator sport.
You have to get involved. So in that
respect, we may, in fact, be getting
the leadership we deserve.
Mary Kramer is publisher of
Crain's Detroit Business. Catch her
take on business news at 6:50 a.m.
Mondays on the Paul W. Smith show
on WJR AM 760 and in her blog at
www.crainsdetroit.com/kramer.
E-mail her at [email protected].
DBpageAD.qxd
3/26/2008
11:58 AM
Page 1
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8/8/2008
10:22 AM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Page 11
A CONVERSATION WITH
Wellness programs: Good investment?
Success of company wellness
programs depends on worker
buy-in and patience for return on
investment. Page 11.
Dr. Ronald
M. Davis,
American
Medical
Association
Halfway into his term earlier this
year as president of the
American Medical Association,
preventive medicine specialist
Dr. Ronald M. Davis, 52, was
diagnosed with pancreatic
cancer. As director of the Center
for Health Promotion and Disease
Prevention at Henry Ford Health
System in Detroit, Davis became
a patient while he continued his
AMA duties. He is undergoing
chemotherapy to halt the spread
of the cancer, now in his liver.
Reporter Jay Greene spoke with
with Davis, now immediate past
president of the AMA.
What is the biggest challenge
facing physicians who want to
provide high-quality care? The
nation must have a fair and
affordable health system that
provides access to high-quality
medical care. Preserving and
improving access to care is at the
center of the American Medical
Association’s strategic vision. …
Our long-term view includes
working with government and
private payers so that every
American has health insurance
and can choose their doctor and
health plan.
How do physicians deal with
sometimes overwhelming needs of
treating the poor in economic
down times? Nearly 70 percent of
American physicians provide
charity care, but for many patients
without health insurance, the sad
truth is that they simply won’t
come in for a doctor’s appointment until they are in a health
crisis. The AMA is pushing for
national reform. Physicians refer
poor and low-income uninsured
patients to a variety of programs
that, if they qualify, will offer them
assistance with medical bills or get
them signed up for insurance.
What are the important new
developments or trends that have
the greatest chance of improving
medicine? Advancements in
molecular biology and vaccinology
will have an enormous impact on
medicine over the next decade.
Individual genetic profiles will
improve the ability to identify and
treat those who may be at risk for
diseases. Putting more focus on
preventive care and healthy
lifestyle counseling, and developing
and implementing clinical
performance measures are key.
Has your view of medicine
changed since your diagnosis of
pancreatic cancer? I have a
greater appreciation for team
care. I’ve had wonderful care from
physicians representing many
specialties, and from oncology
nurses, registered dieticians,
genetics counselors, and many
others. Some teams work well,
and others do not. We must
ensure that teams operate within
a framework based on good
communication, coordination and
cooperation.
If you know someone
interesting you
would like Jay
Greene to interview,
call (313) 446-0325
or write jgreene@
crain.com
Health care
OUTSTANDING PHYSICIAN ACHIEVEMENT
Crain’s honors
industry heroes
Winners lead fight against cancer,
child obesity, care for the uninsured
nnovation and compassion are the common qualities in this year’s group
of Health Care Heroes.
One directs new cancer
drug research, providing
new hope to some patients.
One tirelessly works to increase access to care for the
uninsured. Another is leading the fight against childhood obesity. And yet another provides much-needed
hands-on care to Detroit’s
homeless.
The winners were chosen
in four categories: Outstanding Physician Achievement;
Allied Health (honoring exemplary work by a nonphysician caregiver); Corporate
Achievement; and Advancement in Health Care.
This year’s judges were:
Vernice Davis Anthony,
president and CEO of the
Greater Detroit Area Health
Council.
Dr. Manuel Valdivieso,
chief medical officer and associate director, clinical affairs, Barbara Ann Karmanos
Cancer Institute.
Dr. James Forshee, chief
medical officer, Molina Healthcare of Michigan.
Mary Jo Hollebrands, nursing supervisor at Macomb
Oakland Regional Center.
Judges abstained from voting on candidates from their
employer.
I
PHOTOS BY NATHAN SKID/CRAIN’S DETROIT BUSINESS
Dr. Paul Ehrmann, Family Health Care Center of Royal Oak.
Page 12.
OUTSTANDING CONTRIBUTIONS IN ALLIED HEALTH
Dean Carpenter, Tumaini Center. Page 13.
CORPORATE ACHIEVEMENT
Lucille Smith, Voices of Detroit
Initiative. Page 15.
ADVANCEMENT IN HEALTH CARE
CELEBRATE HEALTH CARE HEROES SEPT. 4
Join us as we celebrate the fifth annual Crain’s Health Care Heroes featured in this
section. The Sept. 4 luncheon is from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at the MSU Education
Center in Troy and is to include a panel discussion with the winners. The presenting
sponsor is Fifth Third Bank. Tickets are $40 before Aug. 22; $55 after. Register at
crainsdetroit.com/events.
Dr. Patricia LoRusso, Barbara Ann Karmanos
Cancer Insitute. Page 14.
Page 12
8/8/2008
11:10 AM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
FOCUS: HEALTH CARE
OUTSTANDING PHYSICIAN ACHIEVEMENT
Fighting childhood obesity
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Childhood obesity is a problem
Dr. Paul Ehrmann has seen firsthand in 27 years as a primary care
physician at his Family Health Care
Center of Royal Oak.
It isn’t just the likelihood of diabetes or hypertension later in life
that concerns him, there also are
problems such as low self-esteem
and behavior problems.
In 2002, Ehrmann founded the
Children’s Health Initiative Program, a
wellness initiative that encourages
children to eat healthier and exercise. CHIP brings together schools,
health care providers, businesses
and municipal governments.
In two pilot programs, CHIP has
taught about 60 children in the
third, fourth and fifth grades in
Royal Oak and Southfield how to
buy healthy groceries, make nutritional meals and exercise.
Ehrmann recruits health care
providers and professionals such
as dietitians, trainers, chefs and
sometimes professional athletes to
work with kids in school settings.
“We are trying to work with
school districts to get healthier
choices in vending machines and
in school lunches,” Ehrmann said.
His new book, Generation XL —
The Childhood Obesity Pandemic:
A Community Based Solution, is to
be released this fall. “The book
lays out how organizations can develop this kind of program and
how to sustain it,” he said.
Conquering childhood obesity
would have a huge impact on behavior as well. At least one study
has shown “it is more painful for
kids to be overweight than go
through chemotherapy,” Ehrmann
said. A 2003 survey in the “Journal
of the American Medical Associa-
Dr. Paul Ehrmann leads a program to
encourage healthy lifestyles for kids.
tion” found that obese kids had
slightly greater behavioral problems than children with cancer.
With the rise of the Internet, the
growth of single-parent families
and the de-emphasizing of physical education in schools, the numbers of obese kids also have more
than doubled over the last 25 years.
“There are more socioeconomic
barriers today to exercising and
eating nutritious foods,” Ehrmann
said. “Those who live in impoverished areas may not have access to
healthy food, and the environment
is unsafe for fitness.”
Parents need to be role models
to their kids, he said. Otherwise,
he fears, the number of obese kids
will continue rising.
The Atlanta-based Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention says
the number of overweight children
age 6-11 rose to more than 20 percent in 2007 from 7 percent in 1980.
The rate among adolescents age 1219 more than tripled to 16 percent
from 5 percent during this period.
Jay Greene: (313) 446-0325,
[email protected]
HONORABLE MENTION: PHYSICIAN ACHIEVEMENT
Caring for developmentally disabled children
Pediatric neurologist Dr. David
Benjamins has helped children
with developmental disabilities in
the Detroit area for more than
three decades, and in 2009 he’ll
open Detroit’s
only
developmental clinic for
children with
neurological impairments.
The neurodevelopmental
clinic is still in
the
planning
stages, but BenBenjamins
jamins sees it as
a refinement of what he does at Detroit Institute for Children.
“It would be a clinic to both diagnose the problem, if we can, and to
treat it and then follow up,” he said.
“(Disabilities we treat) could be retardation, cerebral palsy, attention
deficit disorder, or autism.”
Benjamins and the institute are
working to secure funding for the
clinic. The more than $250,000-per-
year project awaits pending grants.
As the only pediatric neurologist
at the institute, Benjamins will run
the new clinic. He’ll lead a team of
nurse practitioners, and maybe other doctors, toward providing comprehensive health care for children
with developmental disabilities. He
also will be able to train interns
and residents — a part of his job he
says is his favorite.
“He could have gone anywhere
he wanted,” said Dr. Eileen Donovan, institute medical director.
“His service in Detroit is the best
testament to how he’s helped make
health care available (in the city).”
Benjamins, 67, began at the DMCChildren’s Hospital of Michigan and
worked at the nonprofit institute
through a charitable arrangement
between the department of pediatrics and a Wayne State University
program. Now he’s contracted at
the institute full time, and the nonprofit has provided a platform for
his neurodevelopmental clinic.
— Christiana Schmitz
8/8/2008
10:23 AM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Page 13
FOCUS: HEALTH CARE
OUTSTANDING CONTRIBUTIONS IN ALLIED HEALTH
Nurse practitioner helps
the homeless, head to toe
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BY JAY GREENE
Dean Carpenter was puzzled
when a 42-year-old woman appeared at the Tumaini Center in Detroit complaining about her feet.
She said they were painful and described the sensation as tingling.
Carpenter, 51, a registered nurse
for 24 years who for the last five has
specialized as a family nurse practitioner, examined her feet. They
were pale, wrinkly and waxy.
“She got caught in a freezing rain
and her socks and boots got wet.
She had been walking around in
them for three days,” he said. “I
knew it wasn’t frostbite because it
hadn’t been that cold. I researched
it and was surprised what I found.”
It was trench foot; the same
trench foot U.S. soldiers in World
War I came down with by the thousands. Severe cases developed gangrene and required amputation.
“It could have been prevented
with dry socks,” he said.
In the summer of 2006, Carpenter
started to collect spare socks to
hand them out at the clinic. He put a
“socks box” on his porch and collected 100 pairs the first year.
Last year, Carpenter enlisted
the support of a local businessman
in his home town of Chelsea. That
effort garnered 400 pairs.
“We pass them out to people who
need them at the clinic,” said Carpenter, who noted he has diagnosed
four other people with trench foot.
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treating a woman with trench foot.
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The Tumaini Center, at 3430
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by the Detroit-based nonprofit
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Carpenter also works three days
a week in the chest pain center in
the emergency department at the
University of Michigan Health System
in Ann Arbor. He works two 10hour shifts at the Tumaini Center
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“We see a host of pathologies endemic to the homeless population,”
he said. “Lice and scabies, also complications from gunshot wounds,
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HONORABLE MENTION: ALLIED HEALTH
A nurse who mentors, inspires
Ana Lawrence has a passion for
mentoring and inspiring fellow
nurses.
In her own words, she’s “done the
gamut.” She’s been a hospital nurse
at DMC Sinai-Grace Hospital. She’s
worked in public health nursing at
the Ann Arbor VA
Medical Center,
the Community
Health and Social
Services Center of
Detroit, and the
Oakland County
Health
Department. She now is
clinical manager
of home health
care at Henry Ford Lawrence
Health System. Her work is mostly
behind the scenes, but she has been
recognized with several awards.
Lawrence heads the maternalchild and wound and ostomy (a surgical procedure that creates an
opening for waste) programs, in addition to the infusion and transplant team and the intake team in
the home and health care division.
“She’s got a trap door mind for
remembering things that I want to
do and goals (that I have) for my-
self,” said Laura Lenihan, a supervisor of the specialty infusion and
transplant team.
When Lenihan went to work on a
new program called SITT, a still-developing transplant- and infusioncare training program, Lawrence
was behind her 100 percent. Despite
hiring mishaps and extra work,
Lawrence never gave up, Lenihan
said. The program has been running at Henry Ford for three years.
She has earned a Henry Ford
Health
Systems
Outstanding
Leader award, a HFHS Shadow of a
Leader award, a HFHS Shadow of
Influence award, and a Wayne State
University Michigan Top Nurse
award. She also won an award for
work on the hospital’s inpatient redesign team.
Lawrence, 59, also interprets for
doctors with Spanish-speaking patients, and has helped translate hospital documents. While at the Community Health and Social Services
Center, she taught Spanish-language nursing classes, and she has
volunteered at the Covenant Community Health Care Clinic in Southwest
Detroit to nurse and translate.
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8/8/2008
11:46 AM
Page 1
Page 14
August 11, 2008
FOCUS: HEALTH CARE
ADVANCEMENTS IN HEALTH CARE
HONORABLE MENTION: ADVANCEMENTS IN HEALTH CARE
Finding options for cancer patients
System helps schedule patient
vaccinations, chronic care needs
for widespread commercial sale.
About 15 percent of patients who
apply for trials are eligible based on
medical criteria, such as having adequate blood counts and functioning organs. Patients who volunteer
for Phase I clinical trials have failed
traditional cancer treatment.
“It takes us three hours to do the
workups on patients to see if they
are eligible, and six hours of tests
before they see us,” she said.
While LoRusso has saved the
lives of many suffering from cancer, she said the toughest job is
telling someone they have no more
options. “I have to tell them their
only other option is supportive care
or hospice.”
But LoRusso lives for the time
during the trial when patients begin to respond to the drugs.
“It is pretty amazing. Many of the
new drugs in development today
are targeted, more focused on the
pathways,” she said.
While controversial to some, one
development is the use of embryonic stem-cell therapy. Early data indicates stem cells can be used to
combat such cancers as leukemia,
breast and prostate.
Jay Greene: (313) 446-0325,
[email protected]
JAY GREENE
Dr. Patricia LoRusso, chief researcher at Barbara Ann Karmanos
Cancer Institute, lost both parents to
cancer during her youth.
“My mother had what is now a
curable lymphoma,” said LoRusso,
52, who has been with Karmanos
for more than 20 years. “Since I was
a teenager, I wanted to develop
anti-cancer drugs.”
As director of Phase I clinical trials at Karmanos, LoRusso manages
a department of about 40, including
another research physician, a
pharmacologist, several medical
scientists and support staff.
The program tests drugs in humans and makes sure they are “safe
in combination with other drugs,
what the food effect is, how the body
responds to the drug,” she said.
LoRusso has been involved in the
early clinical development of five of
the past nine anti-cancer drugs to
become commercially available.
Two include Ixempra, an antibreast cancer drug approved by the
U.S. Food and Drug Administration last
year, and Tykerb, another drug
used for metastatic breast cancer.
“Ixempra works by itself as a
Dr. Patricia LoRusso has been
involved in the clinical development of
drugs such as Ixempra and Tykerb,
used to fight breast cancer.
mono-therapy use, and others work
in combination to shrink tumors
and improve a patient’s quality of
life,” she said. Zometa, a drug
LoRusso’s team worked on, does
not shrink cancer, but it improves
quality of life by delaying or reducing bone complications.
On average, anti-cancer drugs
are tested for eight years in clinical
trials before they receive approval
A University of Michigan Health
System innovation gives doctors’
offices a hand in keeping tabs on
patient immunization schedules
and chronic care needs.
UM Drs. Donald Nease,
Michael Klinkman and Lee
Green developed
ClinfoTracker, now
renamed Cielo
Clinic, a software package
and tracking
system used
for clinical reminders.
“When we
Nease
started in fall
1998, all the guidelines at that
time were getting so numerous
that it was difficult to keep track
of each patient’s schedule,” said
Nease, associate professor at the
UM Department of Family Medicine.
Cielo Clinic is used to alert
doctors when Medicaid patients
under the age of 2 are due for
mandatory lead screenings. The
system also reminds doctors to
give vaccines for pneumococcus,
a form of pneumonia, to older
adults to prevent infection.
Offices can use the system to
mail reminders to patients and
create phone lists for nurses to
contact those in need of screenings or vaccinations.
“It is easy to forget. Most of the
time, primary care physicians
are seeing patients at least every
15 minutes and addressing all
medical issues plus other chronic diseases,” said Nease.
Cielo Clinic is also used to recommend and administer services
for chronic diseases such as diabetes, asthma, congestive heart
failure and depression.
UM licensed the system to
Cielo MedSolutions L.L.C., in Ann
Arbor, through its technology
transfer program. St. John Health
System and practices of the Oakland Southfield Physicians Group
have already upgraded their offices with the technology.
The original developers of the
software remain paid consultants on Cielo’s advisory board,
advising the company on the future direction of the software.
— Bernadine Stallings
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4:25 PM
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August 11, 2008
Page 15
FOCUS: HEALTH CARE
CORPORATE ACHIEVEMENT
HONORABLE MENTION: CORPORATE ACHIEVEMENT
Advocate offers a voice for the uninsured
Alternative cure for back pain
JAY GREENE
As executive director of the
Voices of Detroit Initiative the past
10 years, Lucille Smith is most
proud of the collaborative relationships she has built among the
city’s safety-net providers.
“We have been able to convince
the federal government to increase
the primary care delivery capacity
in Detroit,” said Smith. “We have
the second-largest population in
the region after Chicago, and we
have fewer federally qualified
health centers than cities smaller
than us, like Cincinnati and Indianapolis.
“We started with six clinics (in
1998), and now we are up to 17,” she
said. “We have made good
progress, but our coordination isn’t as cohesive as we’d like because
we have capacity issues at the federally qualified health centers.”
Of Wayne County’s 1.9 million
residents, there are an estimated
300,000 people without health insurance and another 390,000 in the
state Medicaid program.
To help address rising numbers
of the uninsured and underinsured, Voices of Detroit was
Lucille Smith works to foster
cooperation among agencies that
provide care to the uninsured.
formed in 1998. The organization
now includes the Detroit Health Department, the Wayne County Health
Department, Detroit Medical Center,
Henry Ford Health System, St. John
Health System, Oakwood Healthcare
and several of the federally qualified health care centers.
One of the chief goals of the initiative is to link uninsured people
with primary care providers. It
does this by working with hospi-
tal ERs to enroll them in the initiative’s database for follow-up on
primary and preventive care.
Its current project is to create
electronic medical records for the
40,000 uninsured and underinsured people it has enrolled.
Through an $817,000 federal grant,
the initiative is providing electronic medical record information
systems to clinics and primary
care physicians who are participating in the program.
Earlier this year, Smith, 62, coauthored a book, Taking Care of the
Uninsured: A Path to Reform, with
several other Detroit primary care
advocates.
The book describes how a Voices
of Detroit-led project in Detroit
helped provide more than 33,000
low-income uninsured people with
access to health care.
Smith has served as senior vice
president for the now-defunct
Southeast Michigan Health & Hospital Council, program director with
the Greater Detroit Area Health Council and director of hypertension
services for the Michigan Public
Health Department.
Jay Greene: (313) 446-0325,
[email protected]
Chrysler L.L.C., Henry Ford Health
Systems and Health Alliance Plan of
Michigan developed a pilot program to help employees and patients with chronic back pain.
The pilot program, called
“We’ve Got Your Back,” was created by Dr. Robert Levine, director of
the Center for Integrative Wellness at
Henry Ford.
Levine developed the concept and researched
patient benefits and cost
savings of using alternative
medicine
to
treat
back
Levine
pain. Levine
began in 1994 researching cures for
his own back pain, which seemed
to resist standard treatments.
“Traditional medicine was not
offering any good solutions,” he
said. “Often times, it doesn’t always cure people’s pain. Medicine
needs to eliminate pain, not only
manage it.”
Chrysler, based in Auburn
Hills, began trying holistic group
muscle therapy in 2007. Championed by Dr. Teresa Bartlett, senior
manager of Chrysler’s disability
and health care medical programs,
and Matt Walsh, associate vice
president of purchase initiative for
HAP, nearly 100 employees enrolled in the program.
Over six months, participants
learned somatic movement re-education routines that teach the
brain to release muscle tension.
Somatics centers on learning new
patterns of muscle control.
Levine also instructed participants on home healing activities
and guided relaxation. The program is meant to be an alternative,
or a next step, to physical rehabilitation or prescription drugs.
Over the course of the therapy,
program staff collected data to
monitor stress levels, sleep quality
and any reduction of depressive
symptoms that can also cause pain.
Fifty-five percent of participants
reported eliminating discomfort
completely, while 86 percent reduced pain, according to Levine.
National figures provided by
HAP show that “these results
could translate into $1,500 or more
in annual medical cost savings for
each employee who remains painfree.”
— Bernadine Stallings
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8/6/2008
11:54 AM
Page 1
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8/6/2008
11:56 AM
Page 1
RAHUL VAIDYA, MD • JOHN M. BARNWELL, MD •
JOHN R. JACOBS, MD • HO-SHENG LIN, MD • ROBERT H. MATHOG, MD • DAVID L. BOUWMAN, MD •
GEORGE H. YOO, MD • FRANK A. BACIEWICZ, JR
MD • CASSANN N. BLAKE, MD • CHARLES LUCAS,
MD • SHANNON BONGERS, MD • DAVID BROWN,
MD • MADHU PRASAD, MD • ANDRE NUNN, MD •
CHRISTOPHER P. STEFFES, MD • LUCILA ORTIZBARRON, MD • DONALD W. WEAVER, MD • JOHN
N D. WEBBER, MD • MICHAEL L. CHER, MD • HAZEM
ELTAHAWY, MD • MURALI GUTHIKONDA, MD •
UnlessMITTAL,
you surround
yourself
with the
people.
JR.,
SANDEEP
MD
• JOHN
M.right
MALONE,
D • ROBERT T. MORRIS, MD • J. EDSON PONTES,
D • ISAAC J. POWELL, MD • WILLIE UNDERWOOD
,MD • MICHAEL L. CHER MD • GUNTER DEPPE, MD •
MARY A. KOSIR, MD • JEFFREY A. TRIEST, MD •
Every surgeon here is a cancer surgeon. Each one is on the faculty
Wayne State University
School, giving
them access to the
RAHULofVAIDYA,
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• JOHN
M. BARNWELL,
MD •
latest technology and techniques. So when you need expertise, ask
doctor for a referral,
800 -Karmanos or visit LIN,
karmanos.org
JOHN R.your
JACOBS,
MDcall•1-HO-SHENG
MD • ROBERT H. MATHOG,Hear
MDcancer.
• DAVID
L. BOUWMAN, MD •
Think Karmanos.
GEORGE H. YOO, MD • FRANK A. BACIEWICZ JR.
MD • CASSANN N. BLAKE, MD • CHARLES LUCAS,
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MD • MADHU PRASAD, MD • ANDRE NUNN, MD •
8/7/2008
4:26 PM
Page 1
Page 18
August 11, 2008
FOCUS: HEALTH CARE
Wellness programs’ savings depend on participation
BY JAY GREENE
Companies now have two choices if they want to offer wellness
programs to their employees —
convenient workplace programs
or health insurance products that
promise lower costs if healthy
habits are followed.
But which approach is best for
employers?
Both approaches have pluses
and minuses, said Dee Edington,
director of the University of Michigan
Health Management Research Center
in Ann Arbor. The center contracts with employers and insurers to offer online health risk assessments, and it provides
return-on-investment
assessments.
Edington said success often depends on employee participation
and what an employer wants to accomplish — save money quickly
with premium reductions, or offer
employees convenience and save
money over time with lower medical costs.
Health insurers can offer employers immediate savings on premiums — 10 percent to 13 percent
— with the potential of reducing
future medical costs through improved health, said Karen Alter,
associate director with McGraw
Wentworth, a Troy-based employee
benefit firm.
However, employee participation rates typically are lower with
the insurance products than the
more convenient workplace wellness programs, said Edington.
Lower participation rates can limit long-term health and business
cost savings, he said.
“Employers should share premium savings with employees, give
them half of the savings, as an incentive to participate,” he said.
“This can help bring up participation rates” to that of workplace
wellness programs.
Alter said workplace wellness
programs offer savings that are
measured over time.
“In most cases, it is two to three
years before an employer can begin to measure the impact of a
wellness program on health care
claims,” she said.
Workplace wellness programs
have an advantage because they
are on-site and can offer convenient health risk assessments and
screening tests, including cholesterol and blood pressure, Edington
said. “The downside is there can
be high startup costs, and the savSee Wellness, Page 19
Companies see value, but can’t say how much
BY JAY GREENE
While a majority of employers in a recent survey
said they could not identify return on investment for
their wellness programs, three Southeast Michigan
employers said they have achieved positive results.
In a 2008 survey of 376 area employers, 43 percent
said they felt wellness programs offered value, but
just 14 percent of companies said they could identify
ROI, said McGraw Wentworth, a Troy-based employee
benefit firm. Four percent felt costs exceeded savings.
From 2003 to 2006, St. John Health in Warren used a
wellness program designed by Wellco Corp., a Troybased vendor, with 1,000 employees identified as
having high-risk medical conditions.
The seven-hospital system saved 62 percent on medical costs for a 3-to-1 ROI, said Darlene Ephraim, the
system’s corporate director. St. John paid Wellco
about $50,000 annually for the program.
In 2006, St. John brought the wellness program inhouse, opened it to all employees and got similar
positive results.
“The program is designed to get them whatever
services they need to optimize their care,” said Dr.
Andrew Vosburgh, St. John’s corporate medical director for wellness and occupational medicine. “We
work with them with health coaches to break down
the barriers to care.”
While many companies are investing in workplace
wellness activities such as discounted health club
memberships, wellness programs can be expensive
with financial payoffs taking at least three years, said
Hans Brieden, a vice president in charge of wellness
with Alcos, a Sterling Heights-based employee benefits
and financial services company.
“People in HR are hesitant to push these programs ... because of the tremendous expense and the
difficulty in establishing return
on investment,” he said.
During the first year of its wellness program in 2004, Co-op Network, a Southfield-based credit
union service organization, saved
$22,833 in health care costs for a
162 percent ROI, said Michele
Langley, Co-op’s manager of human resources. Co-op paid Wellco
Brieden
$1,200 per month for the program.
Employees improved their health in a number of
areas by signing up for Weight Watchers, joining
walking programs and participating in nutrition
and stress management programs, Langley said.
While the program saved money and was popular
among employees, Langley said, the company terminated the program in 2006 for budgetary reasons.
“We noticed absenteeism and health plan costs
went up in 2007. I would like to bring the wellness
program back,” she said.
Co-op’s experience is not uncommon. Ten percent
to 20 percent of companies will drop out during the
first year because they don’t get immediate benefits,
said Scott Foster, Wellco’s corporate wellness expert.
Jay Greene: (313) 446-0325, [email protected]
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8/7/2008
4:27 PM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Page 19
FOCUS: HEALTH CARE
Wellness: Companies’ savings depend on workers’ participation
■ From Page 18
ings accrue over time,” he said.
But the key to success for both
approaches is ongoing employee
participation coupled with financial incentives.
“It is important to have appropriate incentives that encourage
employees
to
participate in
these
programs,” Alter
said. Incentives
could include
premium savings with employees or $25 to
$100 cash bonuses to take risk
Alter
assessments.
In October 2006, when Blue Care
Network began offering a specialized insurance product — Healthy
Blue Living — that featured a wellness program to promote and offer
financial incentives for healthy behaviors, other Southeast Michigan
insurers took notice.
Within 15 months, Priority Health
in Farmington Hills and Health Alliance Plan in Detroit followed suit
with similar products.
The three health plans said enrollment for the wellness products
are higher than expected and will
continue to grow as more employers offer the programs as part of
their benefit package.
Blue Care’s Kevin Klobucar,
vice president of products and
marketing, said the HMO developed Healthy Blue Living on a request from the Detroit Regional
Chamber.
Within the first six months,
Healthy Blue had signed up 48,000
members. By May, 73,000 members
had joined the HMO plan. The
product is designed to give employers a 10 percent reduction in
health insurance premiums and
cut employees’ co-payments by
about 20 percent.
In July 2007, Priority Health began offering HealthbyChoice Incentives to give employers an opportunity to save 13 percent on
premiums under a combined rate,
dual-benefit design, said Leon
Lamoreaux, vice president of product development.
“The insurance product has
grown very successfully over the
past year,” Lamoreaux said. “We
have 500 employers making it
available to the employees.”
By May, HealthbyChoice Incentives had signed up 18,000 members, and it expects that number to
double this summer, Lamoreaux
said. Employees who choose
healthy habits can cut their copayments in half, he said.
Begun earlier this year as a pilot
project with Ford Motor Co., HAP’s
Health Engagement program offers
members a wellness insurance
product in which they can save on
out-of-pocket expenses by agreeing
to adopt a healthy lifestyle, said
Michael Flasch,
vice president of
product development.
Premium savings can range
from 5 percent
to 12 percent
from the standard
HMO
group
plan
deFlasch
sign,
Flasch
said.
By May, Health Engagement
had signed up five employers with
20,000 members, he said.
“We always offered health improvement initiatives through the
base HMO core product,” Flasch
said. “The HMO product engages
the employee, our member, in improving their health. It also requires the employer to be involved
with having a smoke-free work environment.”
Under all three plans, members
are automatically enrolled in the
benefit plan, which offers lower copays and deductibles as incentives
to stay healthy or become healthy.
The plans also offer financial incentives to encourage their members to take online health assessments.
But members must register for
mandatory health risk assessments online and then, if recommended, register for specific wellness programs. Experts say
participation rates range from 50
percent to 80 percent for the online
health risk assessments, but 30
percent to 40 percent for the online
wellness programs.
“There is only so much the online vendors can do on the phone,”
said Edington. “Some health plans
make one phone call to coach the
member. I question whether that
will change a person’s lifestyle.”
During the first 90 days, members must complete an online
health risk appraisal, see their
doctor and agree to adopt a healthy
lifestyle. If members don’t complete the requirements, they are
bumped to the standard plan and
pay higher co-payments and deductibles.
“This is not a program where
you will see dramatic results the
first year,” Flasch said. “Employers will get immediate results
through premium reductions, but
it takes time to reap the benefits of
healthy lifestyle choices and lower
medical costs.”
Employers that want to offer
wellness programs at the job site
can contract with vendors who offer wellness programs or who help
companies develop their own programs.
HealthMedia in Ann Arbor contracts with employers and insurance companies to offer online
health risk assessments and
health coaches. If the assessment
identifies a high-risk medical condition, that employee is flagged for
intervention.
“We emulate the health coaching session on the Web, but there
is no coach. We do it in an automated fashion,” said CEO Ted
Dacko of HealthMedia. “We appeal
to those interested in privacy and
convenience who don’t want to call
the personal coach.”
Whatever strategy employers
choose, studies show that employers with effective wellness programs can expect to see 500 percent lower absenteeism, 400
percent fewer disability claims
and 350 percent lower health care
costs, according to Watson Wyatt, a
New York-based human-resources
consulting firm.
Jay Greene: (313) 446-0325,
[email protected]
AND THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MY PRACTICE FLYING OR FLOPPING. While other banks just kept
saying, “We’re great at cash management,” my Citizens banker took the time to explain exactly what cash
management was. Now, I know I do need it. I also needed a sweep account, remote deposit
capture and so much more.
8/7/2008
4:28 PM
Page 1
Page 20
August 11, 2008
CRAIN'S LIST: LARGEST GROUP HEALTH CARE PLANS Ranked by 2007 revenue
Rank
Company
Address Phone; Web site
Top executive
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan/
Blue Care Network
1.
8.
American Community Mutual
Insurance Co.
NA
NA
NA
NA
NA
1,611.5
1,677.5
-3.9
537,689
568,711
-5.5
358,980
129,301
2,098
47,310
638.4
595.8
7.1
1,311,259
1,250,513
4.9
0
0
0
560.3
468.6
19.6
209,111
NA
NA
209,111
0
0
0
Medicaid, Medicare
414.0
261.9
58.0
160,502
142,619
12.5
160,502
0
0
0
Medicaid HMO
397.0
332.6
19.4
170,000
172,800
-1.6
NA
NA
NA
NA
345.0
343.2
0.5
146,596
44,467
229.7
0
132,594
NA
14,002
310.8
204.7
51.8
133,250
119,149
11.8
133,250
0
0
0
244.0
306.4
-20.4
60,000
NA
NA
NA
NA
NA
NA
181.7
140.0
29.8
66,059
63,840
3.5
66,059
0
0
0
HMO
166.7
122.2
36.5
64,487
64,000
0.8
64,487
0
0
0
HMO
42.4
29.1
45.4
NA
998,500
NA
NA
NA
NA
NA
Vision insurance
36.0
35.6
1.1
402,000
442,053
-9.1
NA
NA
NA
NA
SVS Vision Managed Care
18.5
17.7
4.4
805,653
NA
NA
600,000
NA
NA
205,653
Co/op Optical Vision Plan
Delta Dental Premier, Delta Dental PPO,
DeltaCare, DeltaVision
HMO, PPO, POS, EPO, Self-Funded,
Medicare plans
1,311,259 Prescription drug plans
PPO and Medicare plans
HSA, HRA and other consumer-directed
health insurance products
Medicaid
HMO, PPO, POS, Medicare, HRAs, HSAs,
and HealthbyChoice
2000 Town Center, Suite 725, Southfield 48075
(248) 350-2082; www.vsp.com
M. Scott Mitchell, account executive
140 Macomb, Mt. Clemens 48043
(586) 468-7370; www.svsvision.com
Robert Farrell, president
Co/op Optical Vision Designs
15.
NA
5050 Schaefer, Dearborn 48126
(313) 581-3700; www.midwesthealthplan.com
Mark Saffer, CEO
SVS Vision Managed Care Inc.
14.
NA
3011 W. Grand Blvd., Suite 1600, Detroit 48202
(313) 871-2000; www.totalhealthcareonline.com
Lyle Algate, Executive director
Vision Service Plan VSP
13.
1.8
34605 12 Mile Road, Farmington Hills 48331
(800) 852-9780; priorityhealth.com
Michael Koziara, vice president eastern regional
office
Midwest Health Plan Inc.
12.
1,939.0
777 Woodward Ave, Detroit 48226
(313) 324-3700; www.hpmich.com
David Cotton, president and CEO
Total Health Care Inc.
11.
1,974.4
39201 W. Seven Mile Road, Livonia 48152
(734) 591-9000; www.american-community.com
Michael Tobin, CEO and president
Priority Health
10.
Traditional Blue Cross Blue Shield, Blue
Preferred PPO, Community Blue PPO,
Healthy Blue Incentives PPO, Blue Care
Network of Michigan HMO, BCN Healthy
Living, Flexible Blue plans compatable with
health savings accounts, MyBlue products in
the under-65 individual market, Medicare
Advantage, Part D Prescription Drug plans
3150 Livernois, Suite 175, Troy 48083
(248) 680-8920; www.humana.com
Denise Christy, president, Humana, Michigan
Health Plan of Michigan Inc.
9.
670,915
17117 W. Nine Mile Road
Suite 1600, North Park Plaza, Southfield 48075
(800) 903-5253; www.glhp.com
Chris Scherer, president and CEO
Humana
7.
62,211
100 W. Big Beaver Road, Suite 600, Troy 48084
(888) 898-7969; www.molinahealthcare.com
Jesse Thomas, president
Great Lakes Health Plan
6.
3,247,693
30200 Telegraph Road, Suite 401
Bingham Farms 48025
(866) 864-9600; www.caremark.com
Jason Klein, vice president, sales
Molina Healthcare of Michigan Inc.
5.
648,278 D
No. of
members in
other plans Name of group health care plans/types
2850 W. Grand Blvd., Detroit 48202
(313) 872-8100; www.hap.org
Patricia Richards, interim CEO
CVS Caremark Corp. L.L.C.
4.
$19,400.0 B $16,300.0 B 19.0% 4,629,097 C 4,570,981 C 1.3%
No. of
enrolled
members in
POS
plan
Farmington Hills and Lansing
(517) 349-6000; www.deltadentalmi.com
Thomas Fleszar, president and CEO
Health Alliance Plan
3.
Revenue
($000,000)
2006
No. of
enrolled
members
in PPO
plan
600 E. Lafayette Blvd., Detroit 48226
(313) 225-9000; www.bcbsm.com
Daniel Loepp, president and CEO
Delta Dental of Michigan
2.
Revenue
($000,000)
2007
No. of
Total
Total
enrolled
enrolled
enrolled
members in
Percent members
members Percent HMO/DHMO
change year-end 2007 year-end 2006 change
plan
2424 E. Eight Mile Road, Detroit 48234
(313) 366-5100; www.coopoptical.com
Jackee Smith, CEO and president
This list of leading Detroit-area group health care plans encompasses medical, dental, optical and other health care organizations. For companies with headquarters in Wayne, Oakland, Macomb, Washtenaw or Livingston counties, the figures are for the entire
business. For companies with headquarters elsewhere, the figures are for business in Southeast Michigan only. NA = not available.
B Total of premiums and premium equivalents that include both fully insured and self-funded business.
C Does not include members that are part of Michigan-based groups but residing outside of Michigan.
D Includes members belonging to Blue Care Network subsidiaries.
LIST RESEARCHED BY ANNE MARKS AND JOANNE SCHARICH
DBpageAD.qxd
8/4/2008
10:27 AM
Page 1
Page 22
8/7/2008
4:29 PM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
BUSINESS DIARY
ACQUISITIONS
Modern Professional Services, a Troybased technical staffing service, has
acquired Quality Technical Services
Inc., a Mobile, Ala.-based staffing and
recruiting service. Quality Technical
Services will continue to operate as
Quality Technical Services L.L.C.
with offices in Houston, New Orleans,
and Greenville, S.C.
CALL FOR APPLICATIONS
The Delta Dental Foundation, Okemos,
encourages nonprofit oral health programs in Michigan to apply for grants
through its third annual Community
Mini-Grant program. Up to $70,000
will be awarded in 2008 with a maximum of $5,000 per grant. Special consideration will be given to applicants
whose programs focus on improving
the oral health of low-income children. Application deadline: Sept. 30.
For applications and more information, visit www.deltadentalmi.com or
call (517) 347-5333.
CONTRACTS
It’s not easy being green..
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S3 Entertainment Group, a Ferndalebased film services production company, has retained the services of Identity Marketing & Public Relations,
Bingham Farms, to provide marketing and public relations support.
Kirco Construction, Troy, has awarded
Soil and Materials Engineers Inc., Plymouth, a contract to provide construction materials services for Village
Lakes in White Lake Township.
H.V. Burton Co., a Livonia manufacturer’s representative firm, announced a sales partnership with the
Joseph M. Day Co., a Saginaw-based
firm that serves customers in central
and northern Michigan. The companies will promote and represent boiler
products, waste heat recovery products, water treatment programs and
related equipment and services.
Ensure Technologies Inc., Ypsilanti,
announced PC Mall Inc., of Torrance,
Calif., will include Ensure’s XyLoc
Solo product on the PC Mall Web site
and in its catalog.
Spin Advertising Inc. of Ann Arbor has
been retained by Elias Cummings Development of New York to create the
Web site for 11 Spring, a historic
restoration and condominium project
in Manhattan.
Hobbs + Black Architects, Ann Arbor,
announced the design and completion
of Oakwood Healthcare System’s
Southshore Medical Center.
NLM, a Detroit logistics company, renewed an agreement with Ford Motor
Co., Dearborn. NLM will remain a
provider for Ford’s critical shipments
(excluding air charter) and truckload
deviations for North America.
Global LT, a language and cultural services company headquartered in
Troy, and Mango Languages, an online language learning software company, jointly announce the appointment of Global LT as an authorized
marketer of Mango Languages’ proprietary Web-based language training
programs. Web sites: www.globallt.com or www.mangolanguages.com.
Tanner Friedman, Farmington Hills,
has chosen to offer The Designate, a
Birmingham-based on-call professional chauffeur service as a new employee benefit. The public-relations
agency is enrolled in The Designate’s
corporate program, which allows a
company-paid ride home in an employee’s own car after an evening out.
Wagner Design Associates, an Ann
Arbor advertising and graphic design
firm, completed a new Web site, capabilities brochure and industry proposals for Krieghoff-Lenawee Co., an
Adrian-based commercial construction company.
EXPANSIONS
,VVXH'DWH6HSW
$G&ORVLQJ$XJ
Federal-Mogul Corp., Southfield, is
-DQ0DUFK0HGLD$XGLW
now producing pistons at its new Powertrain Energy business segment facility in Araras, Brazil. The 10,300square-meter “greenfield” facility
produces pistons, camshafts, and
valve seats and guides for several vehicle manufacturers.
The National Center for Manufacturing Sciences, Ann Arbor, has formed
The Robotics Technology Consortium,
a nonprofit subsidiary to speed the development and deployment of innovative defense ground robotics technology.
Verizon Wireless, Southfield, has
opened at 17370 Hall Road at the Partridge Creek Mall in Clinton Township. Telephone: (586) 228-4977.
Tri-County International Trucks Inc.,
an international commercial truck
dealership, has opened a new parts
and service facility in Ypsilanti. The
21,033-square-foot building features
shop space for 12 trucks with expanded work areas, a paint booth, an extensive parts showroom and an on-site
technician training room.
LITERATURE
The Livingston County Convention and
Visitors Bureau, Howell, has launched
its interactive online visitors guide to
the county’s attractions. The technology allows visitors to flip through the
pages of the guide online. Other technologies are to be added to the bureau’s Web site in the future. Web site:
www.lccvb.org.
MOVES
Bossdev, an interactive company that
develops social media and online applications, has moved its headquarters from St. Clair Shores to Troy.
LaFontaine Buick, Pontiac, GMC and
Cadillac, to 4000 W. Highland Road in
Highland Township.
Tipping Point Inc., an advertising,
marketing
and
public-relations
agency,
from
Birmingham
to
Rochester. Telephone: (248) 955-0007.
Web site: www.tippingpoint.us.
Wynne-Jones Associates to the South
Adams Square, Birmingham. WynneJones Associates are QuickBooks Advance ProAdvisors and a QuickBooks
point-of-sale provider.
NAME CHANGES
Michigan Orthopaedic Specialty Hospital in Madison Heights has been renamed DMC Surgery Hospital.
Saleen Inc., Troy, announced its Racecraft brand has become the Racecraft
Division of performance vehicles.
NEW PRODUCTS
Controlled Power Co., a Troy manufacturer of commercial, industrial and
medical electrical power solutions,
announced its “NetMinder” UPS management and monitoring software
suite. The suite is compatible with the
company’s uninterruptible power
supply products,as well as its centralized emergency lighting inverters.
STARTUPS
Peek-A-Bootique, a children’s clothing
and gift boutique, has opened in the
Boardwalk Shopping Center on Orchard Lake Road near Maple Road in
West Bloomfield Township. Owners
and sisters Marla Bednarsh and Alisa
Berke feature more than 50 designer
names. The boutique also has a special area to entertain children while
their parents shop. Telephone: (248)
935-4503.
DIARY GUIDELINES
Send news releases for Business
Diary to Joanne Scharich, Crain’s
Detroit Business, 1155 Gratiot
Ave., Detroit, MI 48207-2997 or
send e-mail to jscharich@crain.
com. Use any Business Diary item
as a model for your release, and
look for the appropriate category.
Without complete information, your
item will not run. Photos are
welcome, but we cannot guarantee
they will be used.
8/8/2008
11:13 AM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
PEOPLE
CONSTRUCTION
Debi Patrick to
business development
manager,
specialty
contracting division,
Barton
Malow
Co., Oak Park,
from business development manager, TIC-The Industrial Co., Ann
Arbor.
Patrick
DISTRIBUTORS
Gary Hibbler to
corporate
controller, Atlas Oil
Co., Taylor, from
controller, Metaldyne Corp., Plymouth.
EDUCATION
Jane HammangBuhl to dean of
professional studHibbler
ies,
Marygrove
College, Detroit, from chairperson of
the business and computer information systems department. Also, Karen
Wood to director of communications
and marketing, from vice president,
manager of editorial services, Comerica Bank, Detroit.
FINANCE
Chet Mowrey to partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Detroit, from director.
Ron DiCicco to retail senior vice
president for the
Troy area, Independent
Bank,
Troy, from regional president,
Citizens
First
Bank, Farmington Hills.
Aaron Buck to IT
operations manager, Burns &
DiCicco
Wilcox, Farmington Hills, from director of IS operations and technical services, Genesys PHO, Flint.
HEALTH CARE
Sven Gierlinger to
administrator,
hospitality services, Henry Ford
West Bloomfield
Hospital,
West
Gierlinger
Bloomfield Township, from vice
president of museum operations,
the Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit.
Daniel Frattarelli
to director of pediatrics education,
Oakwood Hospital
and Medical Center,
Dearborn,
from
assistant
professor of pediatrics and clinical
pharmacology,
Wayne State University, Detroit;
and senior staff
Frattarelli
physician of pediatrics and emergency medicine, Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit.
MANUFACTURING
Brian McGuire to president of Monogram Aerospace Fasteners, TriMas
Corp., Bloomfield Hills, from president of Norris Cylinder. Also, Jerad
Van Auken to president of Norris
Cylinder, from general manager.
NONPROFITS
Robert Bartlett to president, Michigan
Colleges Foundation, Southfield, from
senior management consultant to colleges, universities and other nonprofit
organizations, Memphis, Tenn.
Elliott Broom to vice president, museum operations, The Detroit Institute of
Arts, Detroit, from hotel manager, the
Page 23
CALENDAR
IN THE SPOTLIGHT
M. Safwan Badr has been named
executive vice president and chief
medical officer of the Detroit
Medical
Center,
effective Aug.
26.
Badr, 49, will
retain his
position as a
professor of
internal
medicine at
Wayne State
University
Badr
School of Medicine and division
chief for pulmonary, allergy, critical
care and sleep medicine. He’ll
step down as associate chair of
the department of internal
medicine.
Badr replaces Thomas Malone,
who was recently appointed
president of DMC-Harper Hospital
and DMC-Hutzel Women’s Hospital.
Badr attended medical school at
the University of Damascus in Syria
and completed his residency at
Cook County Hospital in Illinois. He
completed a fellowship in
pulmonary and critical care
medicine at the University of
Wisconsin in Madison.
Badr is board certified in internal
medicine, pulmonary medicine,
critical care medicine and sleep
medicine.
WEDNESDAY
How to Become a Government Contractor. 9 a.m.-noon. Procurement
AUG. 13
Technical Assistance Center of
Schoolcraft College. A class on doing
business with the state and the federal
government. Schoolcraft College,
Livonia. $40. Contact: (734) 462-4438.
American Business Women’s Association. 6:15 p.m. Meeting of the Novi
Oaks Charter Chapter. Meets every
second Wednesday of the month.
Crowne Plaza Hotel, Novi. Contact:
www.abwa-novi.org.
p.m. Eastern Michigan University
Michigan-Small Business & Technology Development Center. Designed to
discuss the sources of funding including personal savings, family, friends,
second mortgages, credit cards, nonbank microloans, special government
loans, grants from government, angel
investment, and venture capital. Eastern Michigan University MI-SBTDC,
Detroit. $30. Contact: (313) 967-9295.
THURSDAY
AUG. 14
Third Thursday Networking. 4-6 p.m.
Aug. 21. The city of Southfield, Southfield Chamber of Commerce and The
Engineering Society of Detroit. Pi
Restaurant, Southfield. Free. Contact:
Rochelle Freeman, (248) 796-4161.
MONDAY
AUG. 18
How to Finance Your Business. 6-8
lister, (248) 855-7799.
Java/Grub
Events.
5:30
p.m.
Java/Grub & Community, Re/Biz
Net, and Community/Urban Transition Ltd. Real estate, business, and entrepreneur networking events on various financial topics. Java/Grub
events are held every Monday except
holidays. The JavaExchange Cafe,
TechOne Building, Detroit. Free. Contact: (313) 832-4211.
COMING EVENTS
Alfred P. Sloan Awards. 11:30 a.m.-2
University of Michigan After-hours
Networking. 5:30-7:30 p.m. Aug. 20.
p.m. Detroit Regional Chamber. The
Alfred P. Sloan Awards recognize
businesses with 10 or more employees
which exhibit exceptional workplace
flexibility and employee effectiveness
programs. MGM Grand Detroit. Free.
Contact: Robert Troutman, (313) 5960478.
UM Greater Detroit Alumni Chapter
and Oracle. David Olivencia, an Executive Insight Program director and
member of last year’s class of Crain’s
Detroit Business 40 under 40; and Soojin Kwon Kho, director of admissions
at the Ross School of Business. OracleTroy, Troy. Free. Contact: Dana McAl-
How to Market Your Business. 8:45 a.m.12:45 p.m. Aug. 27. Service Corps of Retired Executives. Southfield Public Library. $45. Contact: (313) 226-7947.
Detroit Lions Kickoff Luncheon. 11:30
a.m.-1:30 p.m. Aug. 27. Detroit Economic Club. Rod Marinelli, head
coach, the Detroit Lions. A portion of
the proceeds benefit Think Detroit
PAL. Cobo Center, Detroit. $55 members, $60 guests of members and nonmembers. Contact: (313) 963-8547.
CALENDAR GUIDELINES
More Calendar items can be found
on the Web at www.crainsdetroit.
com. Please send news releases
for Calendar to Joanne Scharich,
Crain’s Detroit Business, 1155
Gratiot Ave., Detroit, MI 482072997, or e-mail jscharich@
crain.com. You also may submit
Calendar items in the Calendar
section of crainsdetroit.com.
Hotel Palomar, Dallas.
Petie Davis to business unit manager,
sustainability programs, NSF, Ann
Arbor, from business unit manager of
environment, health and safety services.
REAL ESTATE
Geoffrey Linden to director of finance,
Agree Realty Corp., Farmington Hills,
from senior financial analyst, Brookdale Senior Living, Chicago.
William Robinson Jr. to president, Attorneys Title Agency L.L.C., Farmington Hills, from Michigan manager,
Talon Group, Okemos.
SERVICES
Gerie Greenspan
to director of community relations,
Glacier Hills Inc.,
and director of annual fund, communications and
Glacier
events,
Hills Foundation,
Ann Arbor, from
associate director
of development,
Greenspan
University
of
Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor.
Steve Dion to president, Droste Group,
Troy, from chief human resource officer, Credit Acceptance Corp., Southfield.
PEOPLE GUIDELINES
Announcements are limited to
management positions. Nonprofit
and industry group board
appointments can be found at
www.crainsdetroit.com. Send
submissions for People to Joanne
Scharich, Crain’s Detroit Business,
1155 Gratiot Ave., Detroit, MI
48207-2997, or send e-mail to
[email protected]. Releases
must contain the person’s name,
new title, company, city in which
the person will work, former title,
former company (if not promoted
from within) and former city in
which the person worked. Photos
are welcome, but we cannot
guarantee they will be used.
Introducing David Yurman to Tapper’s Twelve Oaks
Join us for a launch party on Saturday, August 16th
.
.
West Bloomfield . 248.932.7700 Novi . 248.465.1800 www.tappers.com
Page 24
8/8/2008
11:36 AM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Strategy set up Michigan Financial for growth in hard times
BY JAY GREENE
In a thriving economy, many people don’t
often think about their long-term investments and retirement planning.
But when economic times turn sour, they
are more inclined to seek financial advisers
as they worry their nest egg won’t sustain
them in an uncertain future.
While most financial planners bemoan
this phenomenon, a down economy in
Southeast Michigan is one reason why
Southfield-based
Michigan Financial
Cos. is flourishing.
On the Grow is a
Over the past
feature that will
four years, Michiappear in most issues
gan Financial’s
highlighting growing
revenue growth
companies, large and
small. Know of a
increased 211 percompany you think
cent, to $8.1 milCrain’s should write
lion in 2007 from
about? Contact
$2.6 million in
Managing Editor
2004.
Andrew Chapelle at
The company is
[email protected].
an
insurance
agency specializing in financial planning and wealth management. It also has offices in Sterling
Heights, Dearborn, Birmingham and two in
Ohio.
But there is another reason why Michigan Financial is doing well: The growth
strategy that CEO Nick Valenti implemented in 2004.
“Our business plan was to grow by hiring
OntheGrow
experienced (insurance
sales) reps and add more
services that would be appealing to them,” Valenti
said. Since 2004, the company has grown from 29 to
49 reps with 55 total employees, he said.
Aside from hiring additional reps, Valenti said
three of the company’s
Valenti
key growth strategies included hiring a financial
planning
coordinator,
Bryan Mulvihill, to advise the representatives;
a vice president of marketing and operations,
Kim Stine, to promote the
business; and a vice president of new business development, Kevin Kneip,
to coordinate growth
Stine
strategies.
Financial planning at
the company is a process
that begins with an analysis of an individual’s investment portfolio and
economic situation.
The analysis includes
several meetings to evaluate the client’s specific financial goals and objecKneip
tives, Kneip said.
“We are the quarterback,” said Kneip.
“Our approach is to help you and give you
great ideas.”
Besides insurance, Michigan Financial offers a variety of other services, including
employee benefit design, asset management,
individual money management and estate
planning. About one-third of the company’s
revenue comes from insurance and the remainder from asset management services,
Kneip said.
But the growth strategy required a major
capital infusion, and a business affiliation
name change.
For eight years, Valenti headed the Farmington Hills office of W.S. Griffith Securities
Inc., a broker-dealer based in San Diego.
At the time, Michigan Financial was affiliated with Phoenix Life Insurance Co. But in
May 2004, Phoenix Life decided to sell W.S.
Griffith and leave the investment brokerdealer business.
“It was difficult for a few months simply
trying to decide who we wanted to affiliate
with and the uncertainty,” Valenti said. “In
our business, you have to be affiliated with
someone to stay in business.”
Several suitors quickly materialized, including New York Life Insurance Co. and John
Hancock Life Insurance Co. of Boston.
“We chose John Hancock because of their
stability and they helped us with access to
capital,” Valenti said. The company signed
the agreement with John Hancock in June
2004.
The growth strategy now employed by
Michigan Financial has caught the eye of
competitor Kathy Elston, COO of J.S. Clark
Agency, a Southfield-based broker-dealer
specializing in life and health insurance.
“We are just getting to understand what
they are doing with financial planning,” Elston said. “Generally, agencies focus on
health and life. There also is the financial
side and the property casualty line. It is not
unusual for an agency to expand into any
one of those three.”
Elston said one reason Michigan Financial may have decided to expand into financial planning is because of the competitive
market in Southeast Michigan.
“It is very difficult to acquire new business with companies downsizing and going
out of business,” she said. “It all comes
down to service. We are doing more customer service than before. We have 99 percent retention rate with our clients.”
With the automobile industry contracting, another growth line has been offering
career transition services, Stine said.
Family-business succession planning also
has been a key growth area, said Kneip.
For example, Valenti said a former client
in his 50s, who was the founder of a manufacturing business, died unexpectedly.
“Four years before we did a financial,
business and estate plan for him. This allowed the business to stay in the family because he had thought about who his successor would be,” Valenti said.
Without a succession plan that included a
life insurance policy, the 25-employee business could have closed, Valenti said.
“The insurance money allowed them to
pay their bills and buy them time to work
through the change,” he said.
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Greene:
(313)
446-0325,
[email protected]
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8/8/2008
11:13 AM
Page 1
Page 26
August 11, 2008
Crews lead race to prep Belle Isle for Grand Prix
BY BILL SHEA
While crews today are repairing
the well-trod fairways and greens
at Oakland Hills Country Club in
Bloomfield Township, site of last
week’s 90th PGA Championship, others are hastily preparing Belle Isle
for metro Detroit’s next big sporting event.
The Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix is
set for Aug. 29-31, and everything is
ahead of schedule, said Bud Denker,
race chairman and a senior vice
president for Bloomfield Hillsbased Penske Corp. His boss, Penske
Corp. founder Roger Penske,
brought the open-wheel auto race
back to Detroit last year after a sixyear hiatus.
“We’re ahead of plan, about four
or five days, in terms of getting
things set up on the island,”
Denker said. “We learned a lot
from last year.”
Crews have been setting up 2,000
concrete barrier walls, 10,000 tires
for barriers and 50,000 feet of temporary fencing along the 2.07-mile,
14-turn street circuit track. The
old race, run
from 1982 to
2001, used downtown streets.
Six
grandstands to hold
some of the
100,000-plus people expected for
the races already are up.
Denker
Penske ordered
the seats increased from 18 to 21
inches wide, Denker said.
Corporate sponsorship also has
grown, despite the PGA Championship’s presence earlier in the
month and Michigan’s tough economy, Denker said.
Just a single 50-person corporate hospitality chalet remains
available out of the 45 on the island. Construction is already com-
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plete on 35 chalets.
Chalet rentals range from
$27,500 to $105,000.
This year’s races will have 69
corporate sponsors, up 10 over last
year, Denker said.
“It’s amazing, especially with
the PGA right in front of us,” he
said. “Companies have stepped up
and helped this year.”
He declined to offer a specific revenue projection, but did say revenue is up 9 percent over last year.
As for the wider economic impact,
the races should bring $60 million
to $75 million into the area, he
added. It was estimated last year at
$53 million by the Detroit Metro Convention and Visitors Bureau.
One significant Grand Prix
sponsor is Charter One, which has
119 branches in Michigan and has
teamed with parent Royal Bank of
Scotland to use both the Grand Prix
and PGA Championship as marketing opportunities.
“We were always planning on
being involved in both,” said Sandra Pierce, president of Charter
One. “The Grand Prix further solidifies Detroit as a host of world-
renowned sporting events. We’re
going to be in front of hundreds of
millions of households over a
three-week period.”
The race and golf tournament
are good for the area, which Pierce
said helps the bank beyond just
marketing efforts.
“It’s another initiative that helps
us in regional revitalization,” she
said. “Our organization wanted to
support that. Yes, it’s branding and
great marketing, but frankly, it drives our local economy.”
Ticket sales are ahead of last year.
Seventy-five percent of the 27,000
daily tickets have been sold, Denker
said. Race officials declined to give
an attendance number for last
year’s races, which included American Le Mans Series and open-wheel IndyCar Series, but did say it was more
than 100,000 for the three days.
A new attraction for fans this
year is the addition of a SCCA Pro
Racing SPEED World Challenge
GT Championship race on Sunday.
The race features Cadillacs,
Vipers, Mustangs, Corvettes and
Porsches.
Denker said another reason
sales are up is because Toronto
and Cleveland won’t have openwheel auto racing for the first time
in 20-plus years, and fans will be
taking special trains to Detroit
from Ontario. Rock bands Sugar
Ray and Everclear will be performing on the island, too.
Ticket information is available
at detroitgp.com.
After spending $5.5 million on infrastructure and aesthetic improvements on the island in 2007, Penske
is laying out $500,000 for further upgrades this year, Denker said.
“After the race, we’re going to
repave the back of Belle Isle.
We’re going to fix the drainage system there.”
The Albert Kahn-designed casino is getting spruced up, and there
will be more lighting added and
landscape work done.
Penske and DTE Energy Corp. are
working together to repair the
vandalized Scott Fountain to the
tune of $100,000. Denker said the
fountain will be operating in time
for the race.
Bill Shea: (313) 446-1626,
[email protected]
Even big-name coffee shops
need good locations to thrive
BY NATHAN SKID
Seattle-based Starbucks Corp.’s
recent decision to close eight
stores here as part of a nationwide
retrenchment was a reminder that
location still matters, even when
you have one of the nation’s bestknown brand names.
Matt Knio, owner of Birmingham-based Cannella Patisserie and
Creperie, knows that lesson well.
Knio is a graduate of the Academie de Versailles in France and began his career as a pastry chef for
the Ritz-Carlton in Paris.
In 2002, six months after moving
to the Dearborn Ritz-Carlton, he
decided to open a pastry and coffee
shop in the Applegate Square
Shopping Center at 29681 Northwestern Highway in Southfield.
“Honestly, I believed in my
product to the point that I thought
people would continuously buy my
product if they just tried it,” Knio
said. “The reality is that location
is the most important factor. You
can’t just trust your product, you
have to trust your location.”
The site wasn’t very visible from
the road, which meant he couldn’t
take advantage of the heavy traffic
that passes by each day.
By the end of 2004, just 1½ years
after opening, Knio had drawn
only $110,000 in total revenue. He
considered returning to the RitzCarlton or leaving Michigan to reopen in France.
“The only reason I didn’t make
the move was because a customer
came to me and said, ‘This needs to
be in Birmingham.’ ”
Knio opened at 300 Hamilton
Matt Knio of Cannella Patisserie and Creperie found out the hard way that
location is critical to survive in business.
Row and last year generated
$580,000 in revenue and expanded
operations to include selling pastries wholesale. This year, he expects to surpass $600,000 in revenue.
He has opened an industrial
kitchen in Hamtramck, and a second store at 711 S. Main St. in Royal Oak is due to open in January in
a joint venture with Cloverleaf, a
premium wine seller.
“Our previous location had no
foot traffic. It would have taken a
lot of advertising to succeed
there,” he said. “Honestly, I did
not have enough money for that.”
Tom Butz, vice president of operations for East Lansing-based
Biggby Coffee, has a somewhat different view.
“Location is important, but we
have a store in Kalamazoo that is
not on the best piece of real estate,”
he said. “However, word of mouth
marketing, great operators, and a
great product can make a B or a C
property perform like an A site.”
Biggby continues to double in
size every two years. Its 100 stores
in nine states generate $40 million
in revenue; 66 more are in some
stage of completion.
And even Starbucks plans more
stores here.
Joe Dallacqua, regional vice
president of Starbucks’ Great
Lakes and New England regions,
said the company will open two
new stores in metro Detroit by the
end of the year.
“Real estate is a lot more art than
science. When looking for a location, a most educated guess is
made,” Dallacqua said. “But sometimes markets move and economics
change. Many factors go into the
sales life of an individual store.”
Nathan Skid: [email protected],
(313) 446-1654
8/8/2008
10:27 AM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Page 27
Plans for Waterford Twp. baseball team round second, head for third
BY CHRISTIANA SCHMITZ
SPECIAL TO CRAIN’S DETROIT BUSINESS
Plans for a minor-league baseball team are coming together for
Baseball Heroes of Oakland County
L.P., a group formed in January to
bring a $9.5 million ballpark to Waterford Township.
Baseball Heroes purchased the
Midwest Sliders, a Frontier League
team, in January. They’re operating the Sliders as a travel squad
during the 2008 season.
Come opening day 2009 — scheduled for mid-June — the Midwest
Sliders will become the Oakland
County Cruisers. They’ll be based at
the new stadium, called Diamond at
the Summit, next to the Summit
Place Mall, according to the plans.
A financial package to fund the
stadium and team is in progress.
Baseball Heroes hired Leonard Capital Markets of Troy and Dickinson
Wright P.L.L.C.’s Ann Arbor office to
work on an equity and debt financing package.
Rob Hilliard, president and COO
of Baseball Heroes of Oakland
County, said that the package will
make up the difference between
the cost of the $9.5 million stadium
and the $4 million that Baseball
Heroes has already invested.
Baseball Heroes also hired
Dave Miller as a
part-time consultant,
Hilliard
said. He retired
in 2004 after 37
years with the
Hilliard
Detroit
Tigers.
Miller had been director of baseball
administration and senior adviser
of minor leagues for the Tigers.
The effort will bring 15 full-time
and 60-80 part-time jobs to Oakland
County, Hilliard said.
Stadium construction is expected to begin this month or in September.
In the off-season, the Cruisers’
manager and some players will staff
a baseball academy across from the
team’s retail outlet in Summit Place
Mall. Baseball Heroes signed a 10year lease for the 14,576-square-foot
space in July. The business is to
open in November.
A shared parking agreement for
the stadium was finalized last
month. Baseball Heroes made a
deal with Timina L.L.C., which owns
Summit Place Mall, for 800 spaces,
and with Summit West Investments
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8/8/2008
11:40 AM
Page 1
Page 28
August 11, 2008
Auto sales slow down after rush for lease deals
BY NANCY KAFFER
Following a rush in sales at the end of
July, some metro area auto dealers say August is shaping up to be slow.
Chrysler Financial L.L.C., the financial services arm of Chrysler L.L.C., announced last
month that it would end its leasing program
Aug. 1, and GMAC Financial Services said it
would restrict its lease offerings, reducing
the number of below-standard-rate leases in
the U.S. and ending GMAC-financed leasing
in Canada.
At Sterling Heights Dodge, Chairman Tony
Viviano says he attributes slow traffic in part
to a late-July rush of customers eager to snag
a deal before the leasing program ended.
“It hasn’t been a rip-roaring week,” he
said. “But it’s not surprising, coming from
doing 15 to 20 a day, that you’d drop to one or
three or four.”
Viviano said he’s confident that a healthy
package of Chrysler incentives will lure
lease customers into purchase agreements.
“We’re still doing leasing,” Viviano said,
with lease financing through banks.
But the low interest rates and lease incentives Chrysler Financial offered are absent
from bank-financed leases.
“We took one car, ran a lease, and ran the
same car as buying it,” he said. “It was almost identical. We can sell you a truck at 50
percent off right now.”
Chrysler is offering zero percent interest
for 72 months on select vehicles, steep discounts off sticker prices, cash back and
lease loyalty incentives toward purchase,
while GMAC is offering cash incentives on
GMC trucks and on some new crossovers
and cars.
Such discounts should drive business
from leasing to buying, said David Cole, executive director of the
Center for Automotive Research, an Ann Arborbased nonprofit automotive think tank — but Cole
cautions that such prices
won’t be the new norm.
“The buys on new vehicles right now are unbelievable — why lease
when you can buy for the
Cole
same monthly payment?” he said. “But you
can count on prices going up once we get
better balance between market and capacity.”
Matt LaFontaine, general manager of
Dearborn-based LaFontaine Automotive Group,
said sales at the dealer’s Chrysler shops
have been slow, but he’s not sure that’s tied
to the end of Chrysler-backed leasing.
“I think it’s consistent with early-month
traffic,” LaFontaine said. “Typically, regardless of what happens over last 30 days,
you’re busy at the end of the month and always slow to get started. There are still a lot
of customers out there.”
LaFontaine said dealers will have to work
hard to keep customers.
“One of the most important things leasing
did over the last 15 to 20 years was disconnect a lot of people from their loyalty,” he
said. “They’re just loyal to their monthly
payment, not a car, manufacturer or dealer.
… We’ve done a real good job of keeping customers loyal to us, but it’s going to make it
important for dealers to work hard.”
Look for used car sales to increase, Viviano said.
“When you could get leases at ridiculously low prices, who would buy a used car? But
now used car business is going to perk up,”
he said.
Chrysler’s announcement came the week
before Viviano launched a new 14,000square-foot truck and fleet commercial center, a three-year, $6 million investment.
“It was a long half-hour drive from (a
meeting where Viviano learned of the
change),” he said. “I thought. ‘Wow, you
dummy, what are you doing now? Three
years of planning, and your work is for nothing.’ ”
But once the smoke cleared, Viviano said
he expects his dealership’s renewed emphasis on commercial sales to bear fruit — commercial vehicles are often business necessities, not discretionary spending, he said.
Cole said the Detroit 3 are well-positioned
to move forward.
“The domestics have taken so much of the
costs out, that once the new labor contracts
kick in they should be profitable,” he said.
“It’s a much more robust business model for
the longer term. With the cost-down that is
occurring, they’re positioning themselves finally to be profitable on everything.”
Viviano, who estimated that 90 percent to
95 percent of his monthly business had been
leasing, said there’s a re-education element
involved in shifting back to buying — similar to the introduction of leasing programs.
“When they came in with leasing, nobody
wanted to lease, then everybody started
thinking this is the way to go,” he said.
“We didn’t get into this overnight, and
you don’t get out of it overnight.”
Nancy
Kaffer:
(313)
446-0412,
[email protected].
CAREER MOVES Broad range of candidates advance to
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Working with the President and CEO, the Fundraising Director is responsible for building
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through successful fundraising. The Director will coordinate fundraising efforts with Roundtable staff and volunteer staff. The Director will work closely with program directors to understand the Roundtable’s mission and programs and develop strategies for funding such
programs. The Director will also assist the staff in other fundraising and public relations
activities as needed. Position requirements include: Degree from an accredited university or
the equivalent of 3-5 years of work experience related to fundraising, strong and proven ability to relate with individuals and institutions, excellent verbal and written communications
skills, and a passion for the Michigan Roundtable’s Mission and humanitarian causes.
Send Resume to:
Executive Coordinator
Michigan Roundtable for Diversity and Inclusion
525 New Center One
3031 W. Grand Boulevard
Detroit, MI 48202
fax: (313) 870-1501
ADMINISTRATIVE
SALES
Portfolio Administrator
GROUP HEALTH INSURANCE SALESPERSON
Growing Troy agency seeks group health producer,
preferably with an existing book of business. Exciting
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This position requires strong written and
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Compensation is commensurate
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Please submit Cover Letter and Resume
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Macomb County politicos may have to collaborate on
a charter commission to create an executive form of
government, since no single group managed to dominate primary elections last week.
Candidates with support from business and labor
leaders in the ballot action committee Charter Equals
County Executive met with mixed results among the field
of 151 candidates seeking the 26 commission seats.
So did a group of local attorneys, some officials and
members of a few prominent political families in the
same race.
“I definitely think we need a commission that involves every one of those groups in the process — and
based on the election results it seems maybe we’ll have
that,” said attorney Carrie Fuca of Carrie Fuca P.L.L.C.
and Democratic primary winner of District 18 in Harrison Township. “We’ve got a little bit of everybody advancing to (the general election), and that’s great.”
Fuca, a former chairwoman of the Macomb County
Bar Association Young Lawyers Section, advances with
1,261 votes to face Adam Wit, the Republican primary
winner and Harrison Township deputy supervisor,
who enjoyed some backing from the charter group
members.
Turnout was low in the primaries. Of the 151 candidates vying for commission seats, not one garnered
more than 2,500 votes and just 18
claimed more than 1,000.
The election winnowed the field of
candidates to one Republican and
one Democratic nominee for every
district. Winners face off in the Nov.
4 general election.
The commission, when elected,
will craft a charter to define the
structure and duties of the government, including creating a county
executive, after voters passed the ini- Davis
tiative by ballot action committee in May.
Melanie Davis, president of the Macomb County Chamber, edged out three other Republicans for District 7 in
Sterling Heights with 482 votes. She will face off against
Democratic winner Elisabeth Sierawski, who also defeated three other contenders with 1,125 votes.
“Running for a political office is unlike anything
I’ve ever done, in that you are putting in a lot of activ-
ity and investment and you don’t know until the ballot box what effect or return there is on that,” Davis
said. “In private sector activity, you sometimes get at
least incremental results from your work. But I’m
pleased at (these) results.”
Out of contention following Tuesday’s primary are
the charter committee’s two co-chairs — Grace Shore,
CEO-COO of the Macomb County Chamber, and
Ronald Robinson, owner of Ronald E. Robinson CPA Inc.
in Clinton Township.
Shore was among seven candidates eliminated in District 15 for Macomb and Ray townships. Robinson finished second to Clinton Township Fire Marshal Robert
Smith Jr., a Democrat who will face Republican winner
and Clinton Township Supervisor Robert Cannon.
Other candidates with charter committee support
who succeeded in the primaries included: Vincent Viviano, community development officer for Warren
Bank, who edged out five other Republicans in Shelby
Township’s District 12; and Donna Cangemi, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 411 and Democratic winner for
Sterling Heights’ District 8.
Lawyers who advanced to the general election included Fuca, attorney and former county commissioner Tom Rombach, former bar association president Gary Anthony, Jacob Femminineo Jr. of
Femminineo Attorneys P.L.L.C. and defense attorney
James Maceroni. Fuca and Rombach both said the opportunity to craft a legal document like a charter was
an obvious lure for many attorneys.
Lawyers eliminated last week included George
Constance, former Warren city attorney and current
human resources director; J. Russell LaBarge Jr.,
partner, Johnson Rosati LaBarge Aseltyne & Field P.C. in
St. Clair Shores; and retired Warren district Judge
Robert Chrzanowski.
Alisha Baker, a customer service director for
DuPont Automotive who had support from charter committee members, lost to Femminineo in District 17 by
897-848 votes, in one of the closer races. Baker said she
now expects Femminineo as the Democrat to easily
defeat Republican winner Lyle Koch.
Davis said the chamber is arranging interviews
with all the primary winners and will release a list of
contenders the organization recommends or deems
qualified for the commission before the Nov. 4 election.
Chad Halcom: (313) 446-6796, [email protected]
8/8/2008
5:55 PM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Fund: Where’s the cash?
■ From Page 1
As of Friday, though, Bates hadn’t got his money back. “I have not.
It did not happen,” he told Crain’s.
Bates said when he heard he had
donated to the mayor’s fund instead of to a children’s organization, “I felt like an idiot. How
would you feel?” He declined to
elaborate about how the donation
came about but said that the solicitation to him was not made by anyone on the mayor’s staff.
“I live in Detroit and I want good
things to happen for the city, but
he’s not one of them,” said Bates, referring to the mayor. “I don’t think
he’s done anything for the city.”
As Kilpatrick’s bills accelerate —
now that he has two felony assault
charges to fight in addition to his
Textgate perjury, obstruction of justice and misconduct in office
charges — the money coming into
his legal defense fund has slowed to
a trickle.
The fund, announced on March
27, had raised $185,600 by the end of
June, according to the form filed
with the IRS. But it raised only $800
in June and didn’t collect a dime in
the last three weeks of the month.
In April, the fund raised
$101,300. The fund reported raising
$83,500 in May, although that total
is in dispute.
July figures aren’t available.
By the end of June, the fund listed payments to attorneys of
$165,000 — $10,000 to the James C.
Thomas Client Trust of Detroit,
$75,000 to James C. Thomas P.C. of
Detroit and $80,000 to the Cochran
Law Firm of Farmington Hills.
Not listed were any payments to
the mayor’s highest-profile and reportedly highest-paid attorney,
Chicago-based Dan Webb, who supposedly bills $700 to $750 an hour.
If the mayor wants to know who
to blame for his fund’s shortfall, he
can look to its membership committee. Of the original 11 members
of the committee, only two have
made contributions.
Gregory Eaton, a co-owner of
the Metro Cars passenger service
and a lobbyist with the Lansing
firm of Karoub & Associates who is
listed as the fund’s custodian of
records, donated $5,000 on May 14,
and Donald Davis, chairman of Detroit-based First Independence National Bank, is listed as having
made contributions of $25,000 on
April 4 and $25,000 on May 22.
But Davis told the Detroit Free
Press in July that he didn’t make
the second contribution and had
resigned from the membership
committee because fundraising
was too difficult.
Thursday, Davis and his partner
in Queen Lillian L.L.C., Chris Jackson, sued the city of Detroit after
officials decided to sell a section of
Tolan Park to the Detroit Medical
Center instead of to their development company.
The city’s Planning and Development department had said recently that it had brokered a deal
to have DMC and Queen Lillian
share the land for their projects.
But Davis and Jackson say there
was no deal.
The DMC wants the land for a
parking lot next to its proposed
Children’s Hospital Pediatric Center.
Davis’ bank and two other minority-owned banks, City National Bank
of New Jersey and Liberty Bank &
Trust of New Orleans, own West
Bloomfield Township-based Minority
Alliance Capital L.L.C., which in May
was awarded a $4.5 million contract
by the city of Detroit to provide software and services for a new cashmanagement system.
Original membership committee
members whose names don’t show
up on the IRS form among the 31
who made donations are:
The Rev. Horace Sheffield III,
pastor of New Galilee Baptist
Church in Detroit; Reginald Turner, past president of the National Bar
Association and State Bar of Michigan;
David Baker Lewis of the prominent Detroit law firm of Lewis &
Mundy P.C., which by the time the
defense fund was formed had already run up a bill of more than
$300,000 defending the mayor; S.
Martin Taylor, retired executive
vice president of DTE Energy Co.;
Donald Watkins, a banker based in
Alabama; Willie Brown, the former
mayor of San Francisco; Marianne
Spraggins, president of Buy Hold
America, a New York consulting
company; Michael Eric Dyson, a radio talk show host and professor at
Georgetown University; and Danny
Bakewell, a California real estate
developer.
When the fund was formed, Detroit native and TV personality
Judge Greg Mathis was briefly listed as a committee member, but his
name was taken off the Web site
when he denied participation and
called for Kilpatrick’s resignation.
Turner is also no longer a member of the committee.
The biggest donations were
$50,000 from Clinton Townshipbased Medici Homes Inc., on April
29; the nondisputed $25,000 from
Davis; $10,000 each from Brian Jeffries, president and CEO of Detroit-based Ambassador Capital Management, PricewaterhouseCoopers
partner Darrell Burks of Bloomfield Hills and the Waste Management Service Center in Houston.
Conspicuous by their absence
were donations from prominent
leaders of the local business community who have been past supporters of the mayor, including
Jim Nicholson, president and CEO
of Detroit-based PVS Chemicals Inc.;
Penske Corp. Chairman Roger
Penske and Peter Karmanos Jr.,
chairman and CEO of Detroitbased Compuware Corp.
In March, following the formation of the defense fund, Jason
Vines, a senior vice president at
Compuware, told Crain’s that he’d
talked to his boss, who was on vacation in the Bahamas, and “Peter did
not give any money to the mayor’s
defense fund, and Compuware didn’t give any money. But if we would
have been asked, we would have.”
On May 16, during a Compuware celebration in downtown
Detroit, Karmanos told the Free
Press that Kilpatrick “certainly
should not resign because he’s the
best we have.”
Sheffield, Davis and Lewis did
not return calls Friday.
Tom Henderson: (313) 446-0337,
[email protected]
A bad week
for the
mayor
Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s legal troubles continued to mount Friday when he
was charged with two counts of
assaulting or
obstructing a
police officer
in the furtherance of
his duties on
Friday.
The
charges
came in conKilpatrick
nection with
a confrontation between the
mayor and Wayne County
Sheriff’s Detective Brian White
last month, who was attempting to serve a subpoena on Kilpatrick’s friend Bobby Ferguson.
Each count is punishable by up
to two years in prison or a fine
of $2,000, the Associated Press
reported.
Kilpatrick was arraigned via
closed-circuit video Friday afternoon from the Wayne County
Jail. Bond was set at $25,000, and
he must pay 10 percent.
The day before, Kilpatrick
was sent to jail by 36th District
Court Judge Ronald Giles, who
said Kilpatrick had violated
terms of his bond concerning
the text-messaging scandal
July 23 when he traveled to
Windsor without getting the
court’s permission.
After spending the night in
jail, the terms of Kilpatrick’s
bond were changed by Wayne
County Circuit Court Judge
Thomas Jackson, who said Giles
had overstepped his bounds
when he sent the mayor to jail
without considering other options. Jackson said the mayor
had to post a $50,000 cash bond,
was banned from travel outside
the state and had to wear an
electronic tether. Kilpatrick
was released from jail at about
2 p.m.
Also:
䡲 Gov. Jennifer Granholm says
she would preside over the tentatively scheduled Sept. 3 hearing on the request to remove
Kilpatrick from office if such a
hearing is deemed necessary,
the Associated Press reported.
Granholm said the hearing
would be in the Detroit area.
䡲 Detroit City Council on Friday unanimously approved
rules to be followed during upcoming hearings designed to
force Kilpatrick from office, the
Associated Press reported. The
rules include allowing him legal representation and crossexamination of witnesses.
The forfeiture hearings begin
Aug. 18. The council accuses
Kilpatrick of violating the city
charter by not revealing a confidentiality agreement tied to a
council-approved $8.4 million
whistle-blowers’ settlement.
Page 29
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DETROIT BUSINESS MAIN 08-11-08 A 30,31 CDB
Page 30
8/8/2008
5:58 PM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Reader comments on Kwame
range from anger to sadness
Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s cascading legal troubles continue to
baffle and anger metro Detroit
businesspeople, many of whom are
calling for his resignation.
Others are mostly saddened.
“It is a tragic, unfolding story
that we couldn’t write if we were
writing fiction,” said N. Charles
Anderson, president of the Detroit
Urban League and chairman of
Health Alliance Plan, a 546,000-member health plan owned by Henry
Ford Health System. “At some point
we will have to see what decision
he makes to bring relief to him and
the community.”
Anderson said he won’t advocate for a resignation, saying
that’s a conclusion Kilpatrick has
to come to on his own.
“I think he is thinking about it.
This morning in my staff meeting,
we chatted about it for 10 minutes.
Everybody is shaking their head.”
The issue also is distracting in
Lansing.
Sarah Hubbard, vice president
of government relations for the Detroit Regional Chamber, said if a resolution urging the governor to remove the mayor gets attention, that
could “consume a lot of energy from
the Legislature that should be directed at improving Michigan.”
One such measure, House Resolution 362, was introduced in May
by Rep. David Law, R-Commerce
Township.
Another, House Bill 5923, introduced in March by Rep. Brian Calley, R-Portland, would allow the
city to sue Kilpatrick to recover
the $8.4 million settlement in the
whistle-blower trial involving former police officers if he is convicted of a felony and it’s determined
the felony led to the financial loss.
Readers who responsed to a
Crain’s e-mail query on Friday
were mostly in the “resign now”
camp. The mayor did have a handful of supporters, and there was this
from an anonymous reader:
“If Kwame Kilpatrick was GM’s
CEO, he would be getting a multimillion-dollar bonus.”
Following are some representative comments:
“There is such hope and
promise for the city of Detroit and
the state of Michigan, but … no
other city would tolerate the mayor to still be employed after having
multiple criminal charges brought
against him. … How can we expect
new businesses to put faith in a
city run by a felon?”
Jody Jenkins, account manager,
Avis Budget Group
“This has dominated the news
the past couple of days and
brought great embarrassment and
further negativity to our state. Little, if any, leadership is coming
from the governor. … Just when
we thought we had seen the bottom, the bottom moves.”
Phill Orth, Lansing
“It’s a sad day for Detroit. The
mayor should take the high road
and do what’s right, which is step
down and allow the city to move
forward with some dignity intact.
He’s made some poor decisions,
though he’s also done some good
things for the city. ... He should acknowledge the embarrassment
he’s causing the city, realize his
situation is hopeless, and exit with
as little fanfare and as much grace
as he can muster.”
Timothy Mistry,
second vice president-wealth management, The Mistry Group,
Smith Barney-Citigroup
Global Markets
“I do not believe that the Kilpatrick story will hurt business in
Detroit unless he is let go without
any consequences. If the business
world sees that our courts will not
be influenced by the irresponsibility of the mayor … we will be able
to help Detroit grow and prosper to
its full potential.”
Connie Carr, account executive,
Red Level Networks, Novi
“It is my contention that Kwame
Kilpatrick has done enormous
harm. ... Detroit’s resurgence has
been put back quite a few steps by
all of the negative publicity which
has made Detroit a target for slander, teasing, and all-out verbal
abuse.”
Melanie Markowicz,
marketing assistant, Redico,
Southfield
“Kilpatrick needs to step down
and prevent any additional damage
to the city of Detroit and the great
state of Michigan. I think these legal concerns are definitely hurting
both current and future business in
Detroit and Michigan.”
Craig Ireland, executive director,
ACS Healthcare Solutions
“The charges will greatly affect
the image of an already troubled
city. His emperor attitude has set
this city back years. I appreciate
the hardworking people from the
city and they deserve better.”
Craig Minolette, Re/Max
in the Hills, Bloomfield Hills
“Business leaders who were tenuous about investing in the city
will now pause and wait to see
what happens. And while they
wait, other opportunities will
arise and divert their attention
and money away from Detroit and
its problems. … The mayor needs
to resign from office, clean up the
positive face that Detroit is trying
to present to the investment community and let us start to rebuild
investor confidence in the city.”
Kenneth Meskin, CPA,
Bloomfield Hills
“It’s time for Kwame to text in
his resignation. For the good of the
city, for the health of his family,
for crying out loud, just quit!”
Curt MacRae, president,
Midwest Leasing Group Inc., Livonia
“I don’t believe his case would
hurt business in the city if the media wasn’t sensationalizing every
little tidbit. Everyone deserves
their day in court, but the media
and suburbia have already convicted him.”
Franklin Walker Jr.,
engraving director,
Motor City Creative Design L.L.C.
DETROIT BUSINESS MAIN 08-11-08 A 30,31 CDB
8/8/2008
5:47 PM
Page 2
August 11, 2008
McElya: Pushes for clinic
■ From Page 1
Salvation Army.
“Those were tough times in the
’40s,” he said. “But the good news
is there were resources around —
people willing to give food, clothes
and their time. … That’s what got
me through.”
Something clicked last fall when
McElya, reading an in-flight magazine, came across an article that
mentioned Super All Year Detroit,
the charity started by Detroit Free
Press columnist Mitch Albom in
2006 during Super Bowl XL to help
Detroit’s homeless.
McElya called Albom. The Novibased supplier and its employees
pick a charity to support each
year, and this year, McElya said,
they wanted it to be SAY Detroit.
McElya knows “what’s it like to
be put aside in society. … I think,
particularly with the kids, this is
like a straight line of him looking
back to his childhood,” Albom
said.
In January 2007, there were approximately 18,000 homeless in Detroit, Highland Park and Hamtramck, according to the Homeless
Action Network of Detroit. But the organization’s biennial count did not
include a breakout of how many
were women or children.
By offering immunizations, the
new clinic will be a first step toward getting homeless kids into
school, said Chad Audi, CEO of Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries and a
member of SAY Detroit’s board.
And need for other preventive care
and medical treatment for those
children and their mothers is high.
But the center has a long-term
objective, too, Audi said.
“We’re hoping through this
clinic to … find a permanent solution to their problems,” he said.
The clinic “will be like a triage
area for us to find out why they are
homeless and to try to help get
them back on their feet.”
Case managers will offer referrals for addiction treatment, housing assistance, and job training
and placement.
Detroit Rescue Mission is offering space for the clinic on the first
floor of a former St. John Health System medical building in Highland
Park it purchased five years ago.
The outpatient counseling program for people who have completed treatment is also in the building, along with continuing education in areas such as computer
programming and repair and Web
design, offered through Wayne
County Community College. Four
physicians also lease space.
The nonprofits hope to open the
24-hour clinic before the end of
September and plan to include 12
beds nearby so people who are under care can rest for up to a week
and then be seen again by a doctor.
With $400,000 in hand, there is
enough to open now, McElya said.
But opening the clinic and giving
hope, then closing it for lack of ongoing funding, is “almost more cruel than not having it at all,” he said.
The clinic will need $1 million
for its first two years of operation,
which will include a shuttle to
bring the homeless and the uninsured to the clinic, Audi said.
For his part, Albom makes pleas
for donations through his radio
show on WJR 760 AM. He also is raising money through a number of oth-
JAMES MCELYA, 61
Title: Chairman, Cooper-Standard
Holdings Inc. and Cooper-Standard
Automotive
Inc., Novi,
which had
sales of $2.8
billion last
year.
Background:
CEO of both
CooperStandard
companies
from 2004
McElya
through June
this year; former vice president of
Cooper Tire & Rubber Co.; president
of Cooper Tire & Rubber Co. and
Handy & Harman.
Education: Attended West Chester
(Pa.) University
er initiatives.
According to its IRS Form 990,
SAY Detroit collected $287,697 in
2006 and made grants of $130,100 to
nonprofits that include Capuchin
Soup Kitchen, Cass Community Social
Services, Neighborhood Service Organization, Michigan Veteran Foundation
and New Day Multi Community Center.
SAY Detroit and Detroit Rescue
Mission plan to hire four nurses
and contract with a pediatrician, an
obstetrics-gynecology physician
and an internist to start, Audi said.
That should give the clinic the capacity to see about 30 people daily.
The groups are also in talks with
the Wayne State University Medical
School, William Beaumont Hospital
and Oakland University — which are
in the process of developing a new
medical school — about providing
interns or volunteer physicians
and physician assistants. They
also plan to approach the Detroit
Medical Center to establish a referral process for patients who need
surgery or trauma care, Audi said.
It’s critical to have a medical
home for children to make sure
they are developing properly and
to provide preventive care, including hearing and vision testing, immunizations and monitoring of
lead levels, said Patricia Soares,
interim executive director of Detroit Health Care for the Homeless,
which does business as Advantage
Health Centers.
Children with undetected high
levels of lead, for example, can develop learning disabilities, Soares
said. But with detection, those conditions can be treated and abated.
Overall, homeless children are
sick more often, have more emotional problems and more likely to
repeat a grade than other kids.
The organization provides care
through a clinic on West Grand
Boulevard and a mobile clinic that
goes to church soup kitchens, drug
treatment centers and Latino Family
Services in Southwest Detroit.
McElya said he is asking several
automakers for grants and plans to
go to foundations for help next.
Unfortunately, not everyone
gets it, he said. One tier-one automotive supplier McElya approached for help wrote a letter
asking if McElya realized how
poor the economy was.
“If it’s tough for us CEOs, imagine how it is for the homeless people,” McElya said.
Sherri Begin: (313) 446-1694, [email protected]
Page 31
8/8/2008
4:57 PM
Page 1
Page 32
August 11, 2008
Staffing: Some docs say 24-7 cardio staffing may not be needed
■ From Page 3
DMC officials have said its Cardio Team
One program can cut average response time
to between 45 and 60 minutes, depending on
the type of case, at DMC’s Harper University
Hospital and Detroit Receiving Hospital.
“This is a significant investment in the
program that will deliver significant results,” said Tonita Cheatham, Harper’s director of public relations and marketing.
For optimal care, the American College of
Cardiology and the American Heart Association
recommend that 75 percent of emergency
heart attack patients should have what is
called a percutaneous coronary intervention, or PCI, within 90 minutes of arrival at
the hospital. Studies indicate most hospitals’ average time is 100 to 150 minutes.
Commenting on DMC’s claim that it can
be ready to cut into an artery in less than 60
minutes, Kugelmass said, “I am not sure
they can do that.”
But having a 24-7 cardiologist may allow
DMC to improve door-to-balloon times, several cardiologists said.
In 2006, Detroit Receiving reported that 61
percent of 23 Medicare patients had begun
treatment for heart attack within 90 minutes; 56 percent of nine similar cases began
treatment within 90 minutes at Harper, according to the federal Centers for Medicare
and Medicaid Services. The numbers were
based on a small number of cases and were
not considered statistically significant.
Beaumont reported to the centers that 82
percent of its 71 Medicare patients in 2006
were under the 90-minute mark, while St.
John Hospital reported 69 percent of its 64
Medicare patients were. Those numbers were
considered statistically significant, CMS said.
SPEEDING UP CARE
In a Nov. 30, 2006, study published in the
New England Journal of Medicine, which is
cited often by cardiologists, six key
strategies were found to reduce door-toballoon time. They are:
䡲 Having emergency medicine physicians
activate the cardiac catheterization
laboratory (saves 8.2 minutes).
䡲 Having a single call to a central page
operator activate the cath lab (saves 13.8
minutes).
䡲 Having the emergency department activate
the cath lab while the patient is on the way to
the hospital (saves 15.4 minutes).
䡲 Expecting staff to arrive in the cath lab
within 20 minutes after being paged
compared with more than 30 minutes (saves
19.3 minutes).
䡲 Having an attending cardiologist always on
site (saves 14.6 minutes).
䡲 Having staff in the emergency department
and cath lab use real-time data (saves 8.6
minutes).
— Jay Greene
But generally less than 20 percent of angioplasty procedures are considered emergencies. For example, 10 percent to 20 percent of Henry Ford’s heart attack cases
require emergency angioplasty with a reaction time of less than 90 minutes, Kugelmass
said. These emergency heart attack cases
are called acute myocardial infarction with
ST-segment elevation.
In a press statement, DMC said it is the
only hospital in the nation with an on-site
cardiac team of cardiologists, nurses and
Storms: Earnings hurt
■ From Page 1
to $16 million impact that spring
storms usually have in the second
quarter. For the three months ended June 30, DTE posted earnings of
$28 million, or 17 cents a share.
At CMS Energy Corp., storm costs
had a $4.5 million impact on net income. CMS’ second-quarter earnings were $46 million, or 19 cents a
share.
Both companies say they build
storm costs into their budgets and
are looking internally to absorb
the expense, through cost-cutting
or operational efficiencies. Consumers Energy also has insurance
coverage for catastrophic storms
that enables it to submit claims for
costs above $10 million, said Jeff
Holyfield, CMS director of news
and information.
Still, large storms pose a strain.
Consumers Energy annually budgets about $20 million for storm-related restoration costs and reached
that level with the June storms. The
company faces an additional $12
million to $13 million tab from early
July, when 240,000 Consumers customers lost power when a major
storm hit the Ludington area and
brought nearly a foot of rain in 12
hours, washing out roads and causing heavy damage.
Detroit Edison budgets for
around $76 million annually in
storm costs and has already spent
$62 million through 2008’s first six
months, which included a large ice
storm in January, said Vince Dow,
DTE vice president of distribution
operations.
The June storms had the fifth-
largest customer impact in Detroit
Edison’s history, cutting power to
more than 400,000 of Edison’s 2.2
million Southeast Michigan customers.
The storms brought down about
5,000 power lines in Edison’s territory and prompted 14,000 restoration jobs, many stemming from
trees that blew over and downed
power lines.
“We ended up having to rebuild
neighborhoods,” Dow said.
Edison installed nearly 400 new
poles, more than 250 new transformers and more than 70 miles of power
lines. Labor costs, including about
600 line workers who came from
other utilities in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Missouri, represented the majority of the utility’s
storm expense, Dow said.
At Consumers Energy, about
360,000 of Consumers’ 1.8 million
electricity customers were affected by the June storms. Damage
was widespread throughout Consumers’ territory and included
about 6,500 downed wires. Factors
were direct lightning strikes to
power lines, equipment and trees
and high winds that damaged
poles, pole cross arms and wires
and sent tree limbs onto wires.
Restoration efforts used 181 multiperson Consumers Energy repair
crews, 62 Consumers teams to
identify the extent of damage to
circuits, 167 crews of outside contractors and 85 crews from out-ofstate utilities, Holyfield said.
Amy Lane: (517) 371-5355,
[email protected]
technicians at the hospital 24-7.
That’s apparently not quite true, but it is
unusual. The NEJM study indicated that 14
of 365 hospitals surveyed have on-site cardiologists 24-7. The median door-to-balloon
time of the 365 surveyed hospitals was 100
minutes. The 14 hospitals with on-site cardiologists averaged 92 minutes, the study said.
Dr. David Haines, Beaumont’s chair of the
department of cardiovascular medicine,
said he is concerned that DMC’s claim could
confuse patients into thinking having a cardiologist on site saves significant time and
offers optimal care.
“It is a good marketing ploy,” Haines said.
“If you have a problem in getting cardiologists in promptly for cardiac cases, you need
to have people in-house. Maybe they live in
the (suburbs) and can’t get in within 20 minutes of a phone call.”
Beaumont’s on-call policy is having a cardiologist at the hospital within 20 minutes,
Haines said. The hospital averages 74 minutes in door-to-balloon time, he said.
“We have been under 90 minutes for three
years,” Haines said.
Beaumont averages about 20 emergency
heart attacks each month in which the cardiac cath lab is activated, Haines said. “Onethird of those cases we are in that 45- to 60minute window,” he said. The hospital
performs about 250 angioplasties each
month.
Beaumont also closely tracks the time it
takes patients who enter the hospital until
they arrive in the cardiac catheterization
laboratory.
“The first component is recognition by
the initial caregiver (emergency medical
Lower electricity sales cited
in energy-reform debate
With action potentially looming on Michigan energy reforms, a coalition calling for more legislative review is pointing to Michigan electricity companies’
second-quarter sales declines as another indication
why neither legislation nor new plants should be
rushed.
DTE Energy Co. and CMS Energy Corp. reported electricity sales down about 4 percent from the same
quarter a year ago, reflecting the
slower economy, the effects of the
American Axle and Manufacturing
Holdings Inc. strike, and other factors in addition to weather.
Dave Waymire, spokesman for
the Customer Choice Coalition, a collection of business groups, consumer interests and alternativeelectricity suppliers, said that
beyond the second-quarter reWaymire
sults, “growth rates have not been
extremely high in Michigan.” He said the state overall, through the most recent data year of 2006, “is using less electricity than we were in 2000, when our
needs were being met adequately.
“There doesn’t seem to be a huge increase in demand going on today, and it’s important for the Legislature to stop, look and analyze these bills and listen to what people other than utilities are saying.”
But energy company officials said analysis and
projections remain valid. Lorie Kessler, DTE director of external relations, said a combination of factors propels the need to build new sources of power
generation, including the replacement of aging generating plants and expected growth in demand.
Jeff Holyfield, CMS director of news and information, said “that there are extremely long lead times
to build new power plants, and the issue is not 2008
or 2009 but the issue is whether Michigan will have
the power it needs in 2015 and beyond.”
He said quarterly results are not a sound basis for
deciding long-term energy policy. Kessler said that
also applies to projecting long-term demand.
— Amy Lane
technician, emergency physician or cardiologist),” Haines said.
The next step is to take an EKG, or heart
test, on the patient, to help diagnose
whether the problem is a heart attack and to
rule out other medical problems, he said.
Haines said Beaumont’s door-to-EKG
time is 6.5 minutes, door-to-activating acute
myocardial infarction (heart attack) team is
14 minutes and door-to-activating the cath
lab is 40 minutes, Haines said.
“We never have an acute patient waiting for
a cardiologist to get to the lab,” Haines said.
Most top hospitals strive to have emergency medical technicians take EKGs and
forward the information electronically to
physicians for evaluations, said Dr. Tom
LaLonde, chief of cardiology at St. John Hospital & Medical Center in Detroit.
LaLonde said St. John’s average door-toballoon time is less than 90 minutes.
“A key to this is our use of a communication system that makes it possible for paramedics to send real-time medical information to the hospital emergency department,”
LaLonde said.
The EKG data can help doctors determine
if a patient is having a heart attack,
LaLonde said.
St. John averages about 1,800 annual angioplasties, but only about 125, or 7 percent,
are considered emergencies in which the 90minute time is crucial, he said.
Cardiologists at the University of Michigan
Hospital and Health Centers in Ann Arbor are required to be at the hospital within 30 minutes,
said Kara Gavin, a media relations specialist.
Jay
Greene:
(313)
446-0325,
[email protected]
PSC investigates
storm response
The Michigan Public Service Commission is investigating the utilities’ response to the June
storms. No early findings or comments were
available last week, but in June PSC Chairman
Orjiakor Isiogu said that “reports of telecommunications breakdowns and prolonged power outages raise serious concerns that must be fully investigated.”
The PSC’s staff is looking at a variety of issues,
including the storms’ effect on the utilities’ distribution systems, the utilities’ response and
whether any changes are needed to reduce future
power outages of similar magnitude.
Commission staff will file a report by Aug. 22,
and the utilities have until Sept. 22 to file responses.
One issue raised by Detroit Edison regarding
the June (and other) storms is the emerald ash
borer. Dow said Edison would like to join with
the PSC to increase public awareness of utility
problems caused by the beetle.
Dow said ash trees weakened and killed by the
borer are becoming a serious problem. Ash trees
50 feet high may be outside the 10-foot range allowed for line clearance, but they can still bring
down lines and cause outages, he said.
“They’re out of range for us to clear, and we
need homeowners to clear them,” Dow said.
“They can improve their service and their neighbors’ service to have these dead trees removed,
before they become a problem.”
Judy Palnau, media and public information specialist at the PSC, said both Edison and Consumers
have in the past brought concerns about the ash
tree problem to the commission’s attention.
She said commission staff last week was not
aware of any Edison request for an educational
program and said the commission does not yet
have an opinion on the matter.
— Amy Lane
8/8/2008
4:29 PM
Page 1
August 11, 2008
Page 33
Suppliers: Rising costs, market spur cuts, lawsuits
■ From Page 3
year ago. Truck sales decreased 19.3 percent to
3.92 million vehicles, down 19.3 percent from
the same period a year ago.
“We have to right-size our North American
business,” Peterson said. “Everything is in a
tumble-down situation. We are just trying to
make sure we don’t end up like our peers — in
the red.”
Novi-based Citation Corp. made a similar
move Aug. 4 when it said it was shaking up its
North American operations.
The supplier of forged and cast metal components said it plans to cut production at its metal
foundry in Lufkin, Texas, and reduce the workforce there by 128 employees.
Those cuts, expected to be completed by September, closely follow the closure of a brakeand suspension-component
plant in Butler, Ind., completed in July, where Citation
had employed 144 workers.
Citation CEO Doug Grimm
said the cutbacks were in response to sharp declines in
North American truck sales
and production, which, coupled with sharp cost increases in raw materials, have creGrimm
ated problems for the
company.
Citation has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy
protection twice since 2004.
Grimm says the first reorganization was
filed because the company did not have a
means to recover steel cost increases from its
customers. The company made another Chapter 11 filing in April 2007 because its first reorganization plan in 2005 did not account for the
20 percent drop in North American pickup and
SUV production and the increase in oil prices
seen in 2006. The company emerged from Chapter 11 shortly thereafter.
Now, it’s a different story.
“We buy steel scrap … and we get recovery
properly from our customers,” Grimm said.
The company also has a stronger balance sheet,
he said, with debt levels much below the more
than $100 million the company owed at its second filing in April 2007. Citation has agreements with all its customers to recover at least
some of its increasing raw-material costs
monthly, Grimm said.
But other companies, typically tier-two and
tier-three suppliers, don’t have such frequent
pass-through agreements with customers.
One example is a lawsuit filed July 30 by
Troy-based Delphi Corp. against Wisconsinbased Kickhaefer Manufacturing Co. L.L.C., a maker of metal stampings used in Delphi-made
wiring harnesses.
Delphi said Kickhaefer threatened to stop
shipping parts to Delphi factories if it was not
given a 20 percent price increase to recover
steel costs. Kickhaefer told Delphi its steel costs
grew as much as 81 percent since January, and
fuel surcharges were up 800 percent since 2004,
according to a note attached to Delphi’s lawsuit
written by Jeff Hubert, Kickhaefer executive
vice president of sales and marketing.
Because Kickhaefer is Delphi’s single source
for the wiring harness stampings, and Delphi
operates on a just-in-time basis, an interruption would force Delphi to shut down its wire
harness operations immediately.
Delphi countered that it was forced to give
Kickhaefer the increase, calling the demands
“unilateral and baseless.”
Delphi is asking a U.S. District Court judge in
Detroit to make Kickhaefer continue to deliver
the parts at the original contract price, without
the 20 percent increase, and pay Delphi’s attorney fees. The case is ongoing.
Crain’s sister publication Automotive News
reported June 30 that Johnson Controls Inc. in
Plymouth sued three of its suppliers in May for
seeking price hikes to recoup rising steel costs.
In other litigation, Royal Oak-based FormTech
Industries L.L.C. was able to avoid a court injunction to compel shipments of its steel forgings to
Canadian supplier Linamar Corp.
FormTech CEO Michael Ryan and Crystal
Roberts, Linamar corporate communications
manager, confirmed last week their companies
will soon enter a consent agreement at U.S. District Court in Detroit in lieu of a hearing on
Linamar’s Aug. 1 request for an injunction to
compel shipments.
“Basically, these are just procedural steps.
We’ve agreed to (resolve) one step in the
process,” Ryan said. “Linamar is a very good
customer to us, and this is all very complicated,
as I’m sure you can appreciate.”
The FormTech litigation, as well as the Delphi and Johnson Controls cases, are directly
linked to steel prices, which in some cases have
nearly doubled since January.
James Mallak, former CFO of Novi-based Tower Automotive Inc. and now a managing director at
Alvarez & Marsal L.L.C. in Detroit, said the just-intime delivery model is essential to spare suppliers a loss from leftover inventories when production stops or a product’s specifications change.
He noted that several of his clients also are
voicing concerns about materials costs.
But he contends the benefits of the just-intime system to the industry as a whole far outweigh any risks, including the recent litigation.
“It (just-in-time) gives the material suppliers
a point of leverage when they have a dispute on
pricing, and it gives labor a leverage when
there’s a contract dispute, because a work stoppage can cause shutdowns for other companies
very quickly,” he said.
“I would call that (the litigation) a risk, but
these are generally (incidental) compared to
the overall benefit of the practice.”
Ryan Beene: (313) 446-0315, [email protected]
Chad
Halcom:
(313)
446-6796,
[email protected]
Roncelli: The last name doesn’t always matter
■ From Page 3
client is working with, going beyond the bricks and mortar.
“I’m thinking first of how to finance the projects and I understand
how to manage the financial side of
the business,” said Wickersham.
However, it was a difficult decision for Roncelli, because the company has always been run by
someone in the family. In addition,
he has two brothers, Scott and
David, who work for the company
as executive vice presidents.
Roncelli had been ruminating
about succession for five years, but
it was during the company’s 40th
anniversary in 2006 that he started
putting things in perspective.
“That was a time to pause and reflect,” he said. “But this has been on
my mind for years. Every week,
every month, projects get more
complicated,
responsibilities
grow.”
It came down to the sophistication needed to run a company with
more than $200 million in revenue.
“Family-owned companies, traditionally, just don’t always make
it beyond the second, third generation. We’re not gonna be one of
those companies, we won’t allow it
to happen,” he said.
Wickersham will run day-to-day
operations. Roncelli, still chairman,
will focus on the company’s real estate holdings and his strong suit
over the years: business development.
Succession issues are never easy,
HISTORY TO THE WEST,
FUTURE TO THE EAST
The 600-square-foot office where
Skip Roncelli started Roncelli
Trenching Co. in 1966 still stands
today as part of Patrico Transit Mix
— which started Skip’s business
— on Metropolitan Parkway in
Sterling Heights.
Immediately to the east is the
1,100-square-foot building that
was Roncelli Inc.’s first home.
In 1987, the company moved
again, roughly 100 feet to the
east. The building started as
5,400 square feet, and a 20,000square-foot addition was added
several years ago.
“In 42 years, we’ve moved 100
yards to the east,” said Chairman
Gary Roncelli.
And to the east of the current
headquarters? Roncelli owns the
land, just in case.
— Daniel Duggan
said John Rakolta Jr., CEO of Detroit-based Walbridge Aldinger Co.,
who inherited his position from his
father, who bought the company.
Rakolta took the post in 1970
when revenue was $22 million. In
2007, revenue hit $1.1 billion.
While Rakolta said he’d love to
see his 27-year-old son, John III,
take over the post, it won’t be something handed down. John III works
for the company and will have the
chance, like others in the company,
to earn the top position.
“This business is so competitive
and the complexity is so broad that
your succession has to be the best
person,” he said. “Not just the person with the right last name.
“It’s a testament to Gary’s leadership to make that decision.
That’s what you have to do.”
Rakolta said the Roncellis have
created a company that puts people
in positions to do quality work.
“They’ve got the right culture
there to get things done,” he said.
Like most companies, Roncelli
Inc. has depended on long-term relationships. Roncelli has built the
company on several key relationships made over the years.
One started with Sam Walton in
Gary Roncelli’s garage.
“The phone rang, and it was
Sam Walton on the other end,” he
said. “It took me about a minute
and a half to figure out if it was really him, since I have a lot of
earthy friends who might like to
pull a prank like that on me.”
Walton’s request: Build a
175,000-square-foot Sam’s Club in 66
days, rather than the five months
normally needed.
“It’s a simple choice when someone makes a request like that,”
Roncelli said. “You can not do the
job and never get any business
from that company again. You can
try to do the job and fail, then never get any business from the company again. Or you can succeed.”
The Southgate store was completed on time, in less than half the
time it would normally take.
Since then, Roncelli has built
eight Wal-Mart stores and one other
Sam’s Club for the company.
Similarly, the company’s relationship with media mogul Sumner
Redstone made Roncelli a niche
player in the construction of cinemas. Redstone is majority owner
and chairman of Dedham, Mass.based National Amusements Inc., parent company of Showcase Cinemas.
Simple gestures are important,
Roncelli said. When a GM executive
visits the offices, all employees who
own GM cars park them in front.
But even bigger gestures come
from the wallet.
Roncelli has become an investor
in jobs the company has built.
Gary Roncelli is a co-owner of Freedom Hill Amphitheatre with restaurant owner Joe Vicari. Roncelli recently took a small equity position
in the Pinnacle Race Course.
“We like to have a little skin in
the game,” Roncelli said. “And
people who hire us like it because
we have skin in the game.”
The future of the company could
involve other Roncellis. Gary’s
sons are ages 19, 17 and 16.
“I’d ideally like to see my children come and run the company,”
he said. “But they’re too far downstream to even think about it.”
Daniel Duggan: (313) 446-0414,
[email protected]
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8/8/2008
5:48 PM
Page 34
Page 1
August 11, 2008
RUMBLINGS
3 file to run
for trustee
slots at OCC
hree candidates were
Trustee Janice Simmons,
running for three
who died while in office.
seats on the oft-contentious Oakland Community
College Board of Trustees as
of Friday — though none so
far are the incumbents.
Add “Republican” and
Filing paperwork last
possibly “university goverweek to run for the two seats
nor” to the list of Danialle Karoffering complete six-year
manos’ latest public avocaterms were Shirley Bryant, retions.
tired director of community
Karmanos, 35, chairrelations for Birmingham Comwoman
of the Museum of Conmunity Schools, and Carlyle
temporary Art Detroit board
Fielding Stewart, pastor of
and founder of nonprofit
Hope United Methodist Church
children’s organization Dain Southfield. Currently
nialle Karmanos Work It Out, reholding those seats are
cently launched a Web site,
Trustees Phillip Abraham and
www.dkforwsu.com, to deSandra Ritter.
clare her interest in the Re“I went to the board’s July
publican nomination to run
meeting and I was appalled,”
for the board of governors of
said Bryant, who also sits on
her alma mater, Wayne State
the OCC Foundation board
of directors and
worked at Birmingham schools for
28 years. “I know
how boards are
supposed to work,
and none of the
others I’ve worked
with are anything
like this.”
The OCC board
was admonished
earlier this year
for contentious
behavior and “ac“Exiderdome” visits Detroit.
tivity that goes beyond the scope” of
University, in November.
its duties by the Higher
Candidates from the two
Learning Commission of the
major
political parties for
North Central Association of
board of governors seats
Colleges and Schools during
have to be nominated at
an accreditation review.
state conventions — the
Filing last week for the
Michigan Republican Party
partial term now held by
hosts its convention Aug. 23
appointed trustee and CFO
and the Michigan Democratic
Dale Cunningham of the OakParty convention is Sept. 6.
land County Sheriff’s Office is
Diane Dunaskiss, wife of
Christopher Maloney, of
former State Sen. Mat
Northville.
Dunaskiss, is currently the
Cunningham has been
only Republican on the
serving since last year as
board. All candidates in Noan interim replacement for
T
Danialle Karmanos seeks
seat on the WSU board
WEEK IN REVIEW
FROM WWW.CRAINSDETROIT.COM, WEEK OF AUG.2-8
vember will run for the
seats held by Jacquelin Washington and Paul Massaron.
Floating technology exhibit
docks in Detroit
Georgia-based Siemens
Energy & Automation Inc.’s
floating, two-story exhibit
and learning laboratory
pulled into Detroit late last
week on the second stop of
its U.S. tour.
Mounted on a Hannah Marine Corp. barge, the 10,000square-foot Exiderdome,
also dubbed the World of
Automation, is designed to
show companies Siemens’
latest technologies.
Siemens kicked off a series of events and seminars
with a Thursday night automotive summit with the design leaders of two U.S. automakers about the
challenges facing the automotive industry and the latest technologies for factory
automation.
During the event, the
company presented Focus:
Hope with a $30,000 check to
fund scholarships for students pursuing math, science and engineering. On
Friday morning, Siemens
hosted a Science Day at the
Exiderdome for
fourth- and
fifth-graders in
Focus: HOPE’s
program.
The Exiderdome, which
launched its
tour in Chicago
last month, will
remain docked
at the Talon/Omni complex
on the Detroit River
through Friday before moving on to Boston, New York,
Charlotte, Orlando, Los Angeles, Denver and Houston.
The exhibit is not open to
the public, but engineers
and manufacturers can
schedule visits or register
to attend any of the seminars and events focused on
the automotive and glass industries by clicking on the
Detroit tab at www.
exiderdome.com/us.
Video and more on ‘Living and Investing in the D’
By now, you’ve probably seen our
“Living and Investing in the D”
special supplement. Deal-makers
of Detroit are still getting it done,
and our stories show the vitality
that’s still here.
We’ve added a new dimension to
our coverage this year. On our Web
site, you’ll find video and exclusive
additional content for “Living and
Investing in the D.” We also have
an interactive map showing the
growth of city neighborhoods.
You can find it all at
www.crainsdetroit.com/livingd.
We know it’s hard to run a small
business by yourself. Crain’s Small
Talk has guest bloggers who are
attorneys, entrepreneurs, and
small-business advisers. They
know what they’re talking about,
and they’re not afraid to share.
Go to
www.crainsdetroit.com/smalltalk
for more.
While you’re there, sign up for our
Small Talk e-mail newsletter, so
WEB WORLD
you can get updates on smallAlan Baker
business news three times a
Web General Manager month.
Tiger Stadium
group gets
more time
ossible preservation
of part of Tiger Stadium got an extension until March 1 on
Wednesday, as the Detroit
Economic Development Corp.
forwarded to City Council a
proposed agreement with
the Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy, with possible help
from the
Ernie Harwell Foundation.
The
latest
tentative
agreement
with the
conserHarwell
vancy
calls for an escrow deposit
of $150,000 by Aug. 8, another $119,000 by Sept. 8 and a
final payment of $100,000 by
Dec. 8. On Friday, City
Council postponed a vote
on the issue until September, the Associated Press
reported.
P
OTHER NEWS
䡲 Detroit has begun to
notify city employee unions
that layoffs are planned after an agreement to raise
$65 million by selling the
city’s half of the DetroitWindsor Tunnel stalled, the
Associated Press reported.
䡲 Bernard Kilpatrick, father of Detroit’s mayor,
won’t have to testify in a
lawsuit Wayne County has
brought against Jon Rutherford, a former homeless
shelter operator and president of Metro Emergency Services Inc., who was indicted
in 2006 by a federal grand
jury on conspiracy, tax evasion and fraud charges, The
Detroit News reported. Kilpatrick’s consulting firm
was on Rutherford’s payroll.
䡲 Lou Pavledes, head of
Cobo Center 1996-2004, on
Thursday pleaded guilty to a
charge related to receiving
nearly $100,000 from a contractor, the Associated Press
reported. The U.S. attorney’s
office also filed a charge
against Karl Kado, who had
contracts at Cobo Center, accusing him of making false
statements on tax returns in
2003 and 2004.
䡲 Dexter-based ReCellular
Inc., a cell phone recycling
company, plans to add 40
employees over the next
three months as it expands
its Michigan operation.
䡲 Greektown Casino L.L.C.
plans to open its expanded
gaming floor on Aug. 29,
weeks ahead of schedule,
TOURNAMENT AN ECONOMIC BOOST
Tiger Woods’ absence notwithstanding, the 90th PGA
Championship last week at Oakland Hills Country Club in
Bloomfield Township played host to golf’s elite and throngs
of spectators.
The 90-year-old south course, nicknamed “The Monster” by
Ben Hogan after his 1951 victory there, saw 156 of the
world’s best professional golfers compete for the $7.5
million purse and the Wanamaker Trophy (and $1.35 million
check) as the winner of the season’s final major tournament.
It was the third PGA Championship for the private country
club and first since 1979.
The tournament was expected to bring from $40 million to
$60 million into the region’s economy. More than $12
million was spent at the tournament on corporate hospitality,
where chalets for the four-day event cost up to $500,000.
For full Crain’s coverage of the event, see
www.crainsdetroit.com/pga.
the Associated Press reported. Its new hotel is
scheduled to open early
next year.
䡲 The Michigan Economic
Development Corp. is spending $300,000 to promote
Michigan as a business destination on WDIV-Channel 4
during the Beijing 2008
Olympic Games.
䡲 Henry Ford Health System in Detroit and Flintbased McLaren Health Care
both had their certificate of
need applications for a proton-beam therapy center
approved by the Michigan
Department of Community
Health.
䡲 Tightening credit markets and auto industry turmoil in North America led
to a 55 percent drop in the
value of supplier mergers
and acquisitions in the first
half of 2008 compared with
the same period last year,
according to a PriceWaterhouseCoopers L.L.P. report
released Wednesday.
There were 121 merger
and acquisition deals worth
$3.1 billion signed in the
first six months of the year,
compared with 149 deals
worth a total of $7.1 billion
during the same period in
2007.
䡲 UFP Technologies Inc.
will close its compression
molding plant in Macomb
Township and consolidate
its Michigan operations in
Grand Rapids, Plastics
News reported. Workers
will be offered transfers.
䡲 Marathon Oil Corp. has
made a $2.4 million grant to
the Detroit Science Center to
fund the “Future Fuels
Gallery,” scheduled to open
in 2010.
䡲 Warren-based MSX International Inc. has acquired
the Japanese training operations of Carter and Carter
Group P.L.C. Terms were not
disclosed
䡲 Passenger traffic for the
first six months of 2008 set a
record at Detroit Metropolitan
Airport with 18,532,811 travelers, up 3.1 percent from
17,973,756 in 2007, according
to the Wayne County Airport
Authority.
䡲 Richard Dugas Jr., president and CEO of Bloomfield
Hillsbased
builder
Pulte
Homes
Inc., said
Monday
his company
would ofDugas
fer a
$7,500 discount on new purchase agreements with
home buyers for Pulte, Del
Webb and DiVosta homes
bought from Aug. 5-Sept. 15.
䡲 The nonprofit Detroit
Youth Foundation is changing its name to YouthVille Detroit effective today.
OBITUARIES
䡲 James O’Connor, former
president and co-owner of
Markline Fuel Oil in Troy,
died from complications of
Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases Aug. 2. He
was 80.
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Page 1
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HEALTH CARE - Crain`s Detroit Business

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