Official Freep Film Fest guide in today’s paper!

About the festival

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ncaafinalfour FREE PRESS INVESTIGATION

GREEN
TEXAS TECH 61, MICHIGAN STATE 51

Texas Tech’s
suffocating
suffocating
Mayor’s
defense too much
support

DAZED
for Michigan State
as Spartans are
defeated in the
raises
national semifinals
MORE IN SPORTS, 1C
questions
Program run by woman with
BUSINESS, 1B
ties to Duggan got grants
New hotels find Joe Guillen and Kat Stafford
USA
USA TODAY
TODAY NETWORK
NETWORK
Detroit
Detroit Free
Free Press
Press

room downtown
in building boom A charitable program run by a woman with
close ties to Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan re-
Only a decade ago, hoteliers ceived $358,000 in city grants and also bene-
struggled to fill their empty fited from a fundraising campaign that a top
rooms. Now, they struggle city official spearheaded at the mayor’s direc-
to keep up with the demand. tion, the Free Press has learned.
An email obtained by a Freedom of Infor-
mation Act request shows that Duggan or-
dered the city’s chief development officer to
raise money for Make Your Date, which is a
nonprofit medical organization according to
state and federal records, where Dr. Sonia
Hassan serves as president and director.
Hassan was seen late last year arriving af-
Make change ter hours at the same suburban residence as
Duggan in an edited surveillance video taken
happen. by a private investigator. She was handpicked
by the mayor to lead Detroit’s efforts to reduce
USA TODAY NETWORK’s A preterm births in Detroit.
Community Thrives initiative
turns community building See PROGRAM, Page 14A
ideas into reality. Find a
project in Michigan and help
make it happen. Your donation
could help a Michigan
nonprofit receive a $100,000
grant. Visit usatoday.com/ Michigan
Michigan State
State fans
fans react
react to
to the
the Spartans’
Spartans’ performance
performance in
in the
the Final
Final Four
Four national
national semifinal
semifinal game
game Pot-infused edibles
against Texas Tech at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis on Saturday.
are ready to flood
flood
JUNFU HAN/DETROIT FREE PRESS
ACommunityThrives. against Texas Tech at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis on Saturday. JUNFU HAN/DETROIT FREE PRESS

Spirited Spartans fans find their way from across the Michigan market
Inside today’s Free Press
❚ House Envy ............................1G globe to Minneapolis to cheer their team in the tourney Kathleen Gray
USA
USA TODAY
Detroit
Detroit Free
TODAY NETWORK
NETWORK
Free Press
Press

❚ Movies.....................................8E
❚ Obituaries .....................24-28A
Tresa Baldas In a growing number of spic-and-span
❚ Puzzles ...............................2-3H Detroit
Detroit Free
Free Press
Press kitchens across Michigan, blueberries and
USA
USA TODAY
TODAY NETWORK
NETWORK espresso beans are being coated in chocolate,
brightly colored gummies are being poured
Weather On the Jumbotron at the Breslin Center, into molds and marshmallows, cherries and
there’s only one thing that excites Spartan crushed cookies are being added to chocolate
High 69° ❚ Low 55°
basketball fans more than a dunk or a 3- bars.
Some rain. Forecast, 2A
pointer: “Dancing Jan,” a retired Michigan But these are not quite the Willy Wonka
State University professor who dazzles the factories of childhood dreams.
crowd with her spunky moves during In addition to the sweet ingredients, oils
Sunday $2.00 timeouts. extracted from the cannabis plant also are be-
When the petite, clapping Spartan ing infused into these products, which are be-
shows up on the big screen in her signa- coming a staple of medical marijuana dispen-
ture Kelly green blazer and black glasses, saries and will be a core sales item when the
Volume
Volume 188
188 || No.
No. 338
338 ©2019
©2019 the crowd roars. adult recreational market starts selling legal
Home
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inside
Subscribe:
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Cover story A Free Press investigation
A banner flies over downtown Detroit on Thursday above crowds partying at Opening Day events. The banner was one of three flown over the city, paid for by Mayor Mike Duggan agitator
Robert Carmack. Carmack said the banners cost $1,500 each. In November, Carmack broadcast surveillance video of Duggan on giant screens outside City Hall. JUNFU HAN/DETROIT FREE PRESS
Continued from Page 1A
The Free Press has not named Hassan in
previous articles about the surveillance
video, which shows Duggan arriving at that
location on three occasions without his per-
sonal protection team. But the city’s financial
support, attempted fundraising campaign
and Duggan’s repeated promotion of Make
Your Date raises ethics questions about
whether the mayor used city resources to
benefit Hassan’s program.
The Free Press has been examining Make
Your Date’s operations and funding for sever-
al months. As part of its investigation, the
newspaper requested documentation of
communications involving Hassan, Duggan
and the mayor’s chief of staff, Alexis Wiley.
City officials had previously downplayed
Duggan’s assistance to Make Your Date as
typical of the mayor’s support for city-backed
philanthropic efforts. But the records ob-
tained in late March revealed a significant
commitment of resources from the develop-
ment office at the mayor’s direction.
Duggan orders fundraising effort
The fundraising campaign Duggan or-
dered began with an email introduction be-
tween the city’s development officer and
Hassan. The email’s subject line was “Make
Your Date Fundraising.”
“I’d like to introduce you to Ryan Frie-
drichs,” Wiley wrote in the August 2017 email
to Hassan. “He is our chief development offi-
cer and the Mayor has tasked him with
launching a large scale fundraising effort to
Make Your Date. He’ll be in touch soon!”
The fundraising effort was eventually
deemed unnecessary, officials stress, but not
before several city staffers collaborated on
the campaign. The effort did not result in any
donations. However, Make Your Date has
raised more than $1.5 million since its incep-
tion.
Duggan has never directly addressed the
allegations of an extramarital affair, insisting
his marriage is a private, personal matter un-
related to city business. Representatives of
both Duggan and Hassan refused this week
to answer direct questions about the nature
of their relationship.
“Dr. Hassan does not comment about per-
sonal matters,” spokesman Bill Nowling said
in a statement.
Wiley referenced a previous statement
from the mayor’s office that declined to char-
acterize Duggan’s relationship with Hassan.
“This was addressed last November and we
made clear then that there would be no fur-
ther comment,” Wiley wrote in an email.
In addition, the mayor’s office vehemently
denied the city ever provided money directly
to the Make Your Date nonprofit. The city
contends Make Your Date is administered as
a Wayne State University program, senti-
Program’s support
raising questions
Dr. Sonia Hassan sits to the left of Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan at the 2015 fundraising
gala at MGM Grand Detroit for Hassan’s Make Your Date program. MAKEYOURDATE.ORG
ments echoed by university officials.
“All funding went solely to the institution
of Wayne State University,” Wiley wrote in an
email.
But contracts that govern the city grants
all name Wayne State and Make Your Date as
recipients. While Make Your Date is not de-
scribed as a nonprofit in the contracts, the or-
ganization is registered as a nonprofit with
the state and the Internal Revenue Service.
Donors at the 2017 annual gala were directed
to make their checks payable to Make Your
Date Detroit, “a 501(c)(3) organization,”
which is the IRS designation for a nonprofit.
Furthermore, Make Your Date’s own web-
site describes its purpose as: “The Wayne
State University School of Medicine is raising
funds to support Make Your Date Detroit, a
free program to help pregnant women ensure
a safe delivery. Mothers-to-be can take ad-
vantage of this powerful and free nonprofit
program, offered through the City of Detroit,
for assistance in delivering healthy full-term
babies on or after their due date.”
Duggan wasn’t just supportive of an effort
to tackle preterm births — he approached
Wayne State about creating a program to ad-
dress it, according to a statement from the
mayor’s office.
City commits resources to raise funds
After Wiley sent that email to Hassan in
2017, Friedrichs wrote to the doctor, sending
an email to her at 10:36 p.m. that committed
“all three of our lead Development Officers to
the discussion” and said the fundraising
campaign would focus on public and philan-
thropic grants and corporate donations.
Friedrichs, who oversees the Office of De-
velopment and Grants, offered to host a
meeting to discuss the effort in the mayor’s
office.
“I look forward to the discussion and to be-
ing an ally for your work however I am able,”
Friedrichs wrote to Hassan.
Ultimately, the city’s fundraising efforts
for Make Your Date did not raise any money.
City workers met with Wayne State’s philan-
thropy staff, made a number of preliminary
inquiries and provided “concept papers” to
the Skillman Foundation and the Children’s
Hospital of Michigan Foundation, Wiley said.
“After those initial meetings, Wayne State
philanthropy staff concluded they already
had strong relationships with the potential
funders and did not need (the city) to solicit
funds for Make Your Date,” Wiley said.
The controversy involving Hassan began
in November when Detroit businessman
Robert Carmack broadcast the surveillance
video of Duggan on giant screens outside
City Hall, creating a public spectacle during
rush hour. Carmack, who is embroiled in vari-
ous disputes with the city, suggested the
video showed the mayor having an affair. Af-
ter the video aired, Duggan and his wife, Lori
Maher, issued a statement defending their
marriage. Speculation about an affair also
was referenced in an open records lawsuit
government agitator Robert Davis filed in De-
cember, against Wayne State and Hassan.
The Free Press has not independently cor-
roborated the allegations suggested in the
video.
On Thursday, three planes towing banners
referencing Duggan and Hassan flew over
downtown, catching the eyes of thousands
partying during Tigers’ Opening Day events.
At least one of the banners, which Carmack
said cost $1,500 each, named Hassan, mis-
spelling her name, and continuing in cheeky
language: “Dr Hussan marry me? Love Mayor
Duggan” followed in red letters by, “Oh I for-
got I’m married”
City fundraising rare
Government ethics experts said it is un-
common for cities to raise money for non-
profit organizations and questioned whether
Detroit’s fundraising effort for Make Your
Date was offered to other nonprofit groups.
“It’s not at all unusual for cities to make
grants or write contracts for nonprofits,
that’s done all the time,” said University of
Southern California professor Terry Cooper,
who authored the book “The Responsible Ad-
ministrator: An Approach to Ethics for the
Administrative Role.” But “to raise money for
a nonprofit, that’s quite unusual. It seems to
me there are several dimensions to this be-
yond a conflict of interest.”
Hui Chen, the former compliance counsel
expert at the U.S. Department of Justice, said
that all local nonprofits aligned with the may-
or’s mission to reduce preterm birth should
have been given the opportunity to benefit
from a city-staffed fundraising campaign.
“Every organization that’s got a mission
that’s aligned with your objective, not just a
single organization,” Chen said. “You don’t
just have a private conversation with one sin-
gle organization, ‘We’re going to help you.’
“My stance is, to really do things in a fair
and transparent way for a public organiza-
tion, if you want to offer this kind of help, of-
fer it to everybody.”
Detroit’s decision to assign city workers
for nonprofit fundraising is not common, said
Elizabeth Boris, a fellow at the Urban Insti-
tute and co-editor of the book, “Nonprofits
and Government: Collaboration and Con-
flict.”
Continued on next page

Cover story A Free Press investigation
Continued from previous page
“I would say that I don’t know of other in-
stances, which is not to say that they don’t
exist, but it seems to me that it’s probably
rare,” said Boris, founding director of the in-
stitute’s Center on Nonprofits and Philan-
thropy and former founding director of the
Aspen Institute’s Nonprofit Sector Research
Fund.
Like Chen, Boris questioned the city’s
process for deciding to raise money for Make
Your Date.
“Did they do campaigns for other organi-
zations?” Boris said. “Or is there some proc-
ess by which they raise money and dole it out
and this one is an aberrant case? I guess
those are the things I look for.”
A state directory of maternal infant health
programs lists about a dozen agencies in De-
troit.
Officials won’t talk; email withheld
The mayor’s office would not make Frie-
drichs available for an interview about the
Make Your Date fundraising campaign. It of-
fered only to respond to written questions for
Friedrichs, who is married to Michigan Sec-
retary of State Jocelyn Benson and has a city
salary of $181,983. The Free Press declined to
submit detailed written questions without an
opportunity to interview Friedrichs.
“We see no reason for Mr. Friedrichs to do
a wide-ranging interview where he would be
responding to various detailed financial
questions only from memory, instead of hav-
ing (office) staff assemble the full and accu-
rate information for your questions,” Wiley
wrote in an email.
Friedrichs’ office of more than 20 employ-
ees is responsible for finding grants and other
sources of revenue to support the city’s prior-
ities. Make Your Date was among 41 priorities
listed in a 2018 annual report summarizing
the work of Friedrichs’ office. The priorities
list is a mix of general city initiatives, such as
recycling, brotherhood, sustainable housing,
and the Motor City Makeover, as well as some
specific groups, such as professional devel-
opment for the Detroit Public Schools Com-
munity District.
The annual report indicates the Office of
Development and Grants completed work on
its Make Your Date efforts on Feb. 6, 2018,
with at least “some level of ODG support.”
The city’s fundraising campaign for Make
Your Date followed a series of grants that the
city directed to the program from 2015 to 2017.
The money came from Detroit’s allocation of
state money for maternal and child health
programs.
Make Your Date, as an integral part of the
city’s plan to reduce preterm birth, is de-
signed to help pregnant women deliver full-
term babies. The organization holds preg-
nancy education classes and says it connects
women to doctors and midwives, and pro-
vides other medical services.
A program representative told the Free
Press that Make Your Date has served more
than 8,000 Detroit women. Although Hassan
would not discuss program services with the
Free Press, Wayne State provided a sample
from 2017 that showed 1,715 women were ser-
viced in three key areas — educational ses-
sions, cervical length screenings and group
prenatal care.
The city did not disclose its fundraising
campaign for Make Your Date when the Free
Press asked for information in December. In
response to written questions about the city’s
and the mayor’s relationship with Make Your
Date — and specifically asked then whether
city staff helped raise money — city spokes-
man John Roach provided the following writ-
ten response:
“The mayor volunteered to serve as hon-
orary chair of Make Your Date’s annual fund-
raiser, as he has done for many philanthropic
events and the city of Detroit has been gener-
ally supportive of Make Your Date’s fundrais-
ing efforts as we have done for a variety of
philanthropic efforts.”
The Free Press obtained the emails be-
tween Wiley and Hassan last month through
a supplemental response to a Freedom of In-
formation Act request for their communica-
tions.
The messages from the city officials to
Hassan were not included in the city’s initial
395-page response, which had been re-
viewed by the law department. Instead, the
initial FOIA response included a single email
between Wiley, Hassan and Friedrichs with a
message body that read, “Attachment is cor-
rupted.” After the Free Press questioned the
“corrupted” notation on the attachment, the
city provided the emails about the fundrais-
ing campaign and explained that “clean
copies” were eventually discovered during a
“manual search.”
“It appears this particular email thread
was corrupted during (the city’s IT depart-
ment) process of transferring the emails
identified as part of its search parameters,”
according to a March 18 letter from the city’s
FOIA coordinator.
The Free Press made several attempts to
reach Hassan for comment but she declined
through Nowling, who specializes in crisis
communication, and through Wayne State
Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan poses with headlining comedian Louie Anderson and Dr. Sonia Hassan, the president and director of Make Your
Date, at the 2015 fundraiser gala. Duggan credited Hassan with carving a new path to reach pregnant mothers in Detroit. MAKEYOURDATE.ORG
University, which also declined requests for
an in-person interview. A university spokes-
man instead offered to answer only written
questions via email.
Nowling, who said Hassan was at a med-
ical conference in Europe, provided a state-
ment Thursday afternoon that asserted there
was nothing wrong with the operation and
described questions about any relationship
as “a personal matter that is and should re-
main private.”
Wayne State Vice President and General
Counsel Louis Lessem characterized the
newspaper’s reporting as a sensationalist at-
tack on a “highly respected scientist.”
“Make Your Date was from the beginning a
program administered appropriately and
ethically by Wayne State University. … The
only beneficiaries of the Make Your Date pro-
gram are the neediest among us,” Lessem
said in a written statement.
Duggan backs Make Your Date early on
Duggan’s professional relationship with
Hassan goes back at least to the beginning of
his administration. Shortly after he was
elected in 2013, Duggan handpicked Hassan
to carry out his mission to reduce Detroit’s
preterm birth rate, which is among the na-
tion’s highest.
By the time Duggan picked her to lead the
effort, Hassan, a lauded doctor, had distin-
guished herself in the field of obstetrics and
gynecology. She “achieved a national and in-
ternational reputation of excellence” thanks
in part to her role as a lead investigator on a
breakthrough medical study to prevent pre-
term birth, according to a favorable recom-
mendation letter in 2014 from Wayne State’s
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
Promotion and Tenure Committee.
Hassan, a professor and associate dean for
maternal, perinatal and child health at the
university’s School of Medicine, earned
about $512,000 in 2015, according to school
documents. She launched the Make Your
Date nonprofit in 2014 with support from the
city and Wayne State. Duggan was a key
speaker at its initial news conference, touting
the organization’s role in his ambitious mis-
sion to fight preterm birth.
“Carrying her baby to full-term is the most
important thing a mother can do for the de-
velopment of her child,” Duggan said in a May
2014 WSU news release about the launch.
“The Make Your Date program is designed to
make sure every baby born in Detroit is given
a chance at a healthy start in life.”
City and university officials contend the
nonprofit was never actually operational,
even though it has been filing state and feder-
al documentation of its charitable mission.
“At an early stage in the program’s develop-
ment, consideration was given as to whether
a 501(c)(3) corporation would be an appropri-
ate structure, a subsequent determination
was made that the financial and administra-
tive services necessary to its functioning
could be more effectively and much more
economically provided by existing university
resources,” according to Lessem.
Yet the program continues to promote it-
self as a nonprofit on its website, in fundrais-
ing materials and required government re-
porting documents. When asked why it con-
tinues to file such paperwork, Lessem re-
sponded: “It is not evident to me that
FREEP.COM ❚ SUNDAY, APRIL 7, 2019 ❚ 15A
City of Detroit fundraising totals
Detroit’s Office of Development and
Grants is tasked with finding public and
private funds to support initiatives that
serve residents.
❚ 2016 ...................................... $231.6 million
❚ 2017 ..................................... $274.7 million
❚ 2018 ..................................... $325.2 million
SOURCE City of Detroit
About the reporting team
❚ Joe Guillen has been covering city
governance and development issues for
the newspaper since 2013. He has
covered Detroit city hall, been a member
of the investigations team and previously
worked at The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer
covering county and state government.
Contact him at 313-222-6678 or
jguillen@freepress.com.
❚ Kat Stafford is the Detroit government
watchdog reporter for the Free Press,
covering city issues and the community.
A Detroit native, Stafford is vice
president of the Detroit chapter of the
Society of Professional Journalists.
Contact her at kstafford@freepress.com
or 313-223-4759.
dissolving the corporation would serve to ad-
vance the Program’s ends or benefit those
who it serves.”
Big donations for Make Your Date
Make Your Date was launched with help
from major health organizations in the area,
including St. John Providence Health Sys-
tem, Henry Ford Health System and the De-
troit Medical Center, which Duggan ran as
CEO until he resigned in 2012 to run for may-
or.
Some of those health groups also gave
Make Your Date significant financial help
early on.
The Detroit Medical Center and the DMC
Foundation donated $100,000 each and Me-
ridian Health gave $33,000 to Make Your
Date in its first year. All three groups would
continue to contribute over the next several
years as Make Your Date expanded its donor
base.
DMC declined to answer specific ques-
tions about its contributions and instead pro-
vided a brief statement saying, “like many or-
ganizations in Detroit, the DMC and its Foun-
dation have provided support to this charita-
ble organization.”
DMC Foundation President Mariam No-
land confirmed its monetary support for the
organization. A spokeswoman for Meridian
said late last year that the health care insur-
ance organization has contributed to Make
Your Date since 2014, but did not respond to
several specific questions about its dona-
tions.
Of the $1.5 million Make Your Date has
raised, the newspaper could identify from
university records about $500,000 in the
form of grants and another $900,000 in do-
nations. Many contributions were made
through its celebration galas, where Duggan
served as honorary chairman for three
straight years, from 2015 to 2017.
Photos from one gala posted on its website
show Hassan and Duggan sitting at a table
together and posing for a photo with come-
dian Louie Anderson, the headlining enter-
tainment act.
While onstage at the 2015 gala at MGM
Grand Detroit, Duggan credited Hassan with
starting Make Your Date and carving a new
path to reach pregnant mothers in Detroit.
“She’s gone the next step and said, ‘It’s
good that I made the breakthrough. I want to
make sure the moms and kids really get treat-
ed,’ and she’s gone to the extent of organizing
this event. And on behalf of everybody in De-
troit, Sonia, thank you,” Duggan said in a
video posted on Make Your Date’s Facebook
page.
Joe Mullany, a former CEO of DMC who
left the health system in January 2017, also
spoke at the gala and noted that he had
worked with Duggan for a few months before
Duggan became mayor. Mullany, whom Dug-
gan hired at DMC, said the mayor personally
reached out to ask him to support his initia-
tive to fight preterm birth.
“When I got the phone call from the mayor,
it was, ‘Joe we gotta collaborate, we gotta
bring everybody into this together.’ You
know? I was like, ‘Really Mike? Ok, whooo,
we can do that,’ ” Mullany said to laughter in
the audience. “This is bigger than any institu-
tion, bigger than any entity. It’s a big issue we
need to attack together. And I’m so proud that
egos got put aside. The institutions were able
to come together and really make a commit-
ment to make this happen.”
In 2015, the City of Detroit began sending
to Make Your Date a portion of its state allo-
cation of money for maternal and child health
programs. The city directed more than
$358,000 in grant money to Make Your Date
between 2015 and September 2017. The state,
Wayne State and the city’s grant administra-
tor — the Southeastern Michigan Health As-
sociation — all approved the city’s grant con-
tributions to Make Your Date.
Make Your Date used the city grants for
many purposes — nurses’ labor costs, office
supplies, computer equipment and advertis-
ing were among the expenses, records show.
There has been no suggestion that Make Your
Date or Hassan have misused any funds.
The city’s third and final grant to Make
Your Date, for $100,000, was finalized in May
2017 and expired on Sept. 30, 2017.
The Detroit city charter — a document that
lays out the rules of city government — pro-
hibits the mayor, other elected officials and
city employees from rendering services that
are in conflict or incompatible with the prop-
er discharge of their official duties. Also, one
of the 2017 contracts governing payments to
the program also contains conflict of interest
guidelines.
Cooper, the USC professor, said the public
deserves to know more about the city’s sup-
port of Make Your Date.
“Are we being fair to other nonprofits in the
city if we give money to a particular nonprof-
it?” Cooper said.
“We’re always concerned about when we
give out public funds. We want the receivers
to be accountable for how they’re used so we
can determine they were used in the most ef-
fective or efficient way.”
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NEW DOCUMENTARY SALUTES DETROIT’S Duggan’s

ROCK SPIRIT, OPENS FREEP FILM FEST
support for
BUSINESS, 9A program to
Jeeps star at
off-road festival be probed
Wild concepts test drivers’
interest at the annual Moab Woman with close ties to
Easter Jeep Safari.
mayor runs prenatal effort
Kat Stafford and Joe Guillen
Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK

An independent probe into a charitable

program run by a woman with close ties to
Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan has been
launched after a Free Press investigation re-
vealed last week that the program received
$358,000 in city grants and
benefited from a fundraising
METRO, 4A
campaign.
Prosecutors say The Office of Inspector
General announced its inves-
Simon lied tigation Monday afternoon in
Former MSU president is a news release that said its
charged with lying to police probe will center on “Mayor Duggan
in Nassar investigation. Mike Duggan and the City of
Detroit’s interactions with the
Make Your Date nonprofit.”
“The OIG is duty-bound, pursuant to the
Charter of the City of Detroit, to initiate and to

CREEM
pursue the investigation,” the release stated.
Creem magazine “In accordance with the Charter, the investi-
founder and publisher gation will focus on whether the Mayor and/
Barry Kramer stares or any City officials potentially abused their
down legendary music authority by providing preferential treatment
writer Lester Bangs in

OF THE
June 1976.

ROCK
See DUGGAN, Page 6A
JOHN COLLIER/DFP

NATION+WORLD, 13A
Actress to plead
guilty in scheme School is
telling kids:
Felicity Huffman and others
face 4 to 10 months in
college admissions scandal.

No vaccines?
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Inside today’s Free Press
❚ Obituaries ............................12A Julie Hinds Detroit Free Press | USA TODAY NETWORK

T
❚ Classified................................8B
❚ Comics ....................................2C
Kristen Jordan Shamus
❚ Puzzles................................4-5C he range of emotions that Creem maga- Freep Film Detroit Free Press
zine evoked comes through in Michael Festival USA TODAY NETWORK

Stipe’s anecdote from the new docu- Wednesday through

Monday morning started like any other at
Weather Sunday
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High 62° ❚ Low 36° About 100 events school officials confirmed a student with the
Partly sunny. Forecast, 2A Stipe recalls his grandmother seeing a photo of Al- measles attended classes on March 29 while
Venues in Detroit and
ice Cooper in the magazine and saying, “He’s going potentially contagious.
suburbs
Buses pulled up along the circle drive, and
Volume 188 | No. 340 ©2019
to burn in hell.” Instantly, the future front man of Lineup, festival passes a stream of cars dropped off students return-
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6A ❚ TUESDAY, APRIL 9, 2019 ❚ DETROIT FREE PRESS
Cover story/Metro
AFSCME takes control of
Mich. state employee union
Paul Egan
Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK
LANSING – Michigan’s oldest state employ-
ee union — the Michigan State Employees As-
sociation — was placed in trusteeship Monday
after years of controversy and internal feuding.
Representatives of the American Federation
of State, County and Municipal Employees
(AFSCME) International, the union’s parent
organization, arrived at the union’s Lansing of-
fices Monday morning, locked officials out of
their computers, and sent its elected officers
home, three union sources told the Free Press.
They later changed the locks on the office
doors, sources said.
The union, founded in 1950, is now under
the control of a trustee.
Union officials said they were working on a
statement but had no immediate comment.
AFSCME officials weren’t immediately say-
ing what prompted the unusual action, but the
Free Press has reported on internal MSEA strife
since 2016, when the National Labor Relations
Board accused President Ken Moore and other
REGION/MICHIGAN
Stolen ambulance recovered
after patient flees in it
An ambulance that was reportedly stolen by
a patient Sunday night in Detroit has been re-
covered, according to authorities.
Detroit Police said the incident started in
the 19000 block of Prevost about 10:15 p.m.,
with EMS responding to what was believed to
be an overdose.
Police said medics found an unresponsive
25-year-old man and placed him in the ambu-
lance.
During transport to the hospital, police said,
the man woke up and was disoriented. The
EMS driver stopped the ambulance and went
to assist his partner, as the man “continued to
be combative.”
When the medics exited the ambulance, po-
lice said, the man got into the driver’s seat of
the vehicle and fled.
A scout car stopped the ambulance at
Woodmont and Plymouth a short time later,
police said, and the man was taken into custo-
dy and brought to a hospital.
Detroit grandpa, 70, fatally shot
during struggle with teen
Police are searching for a teenage suspect
after a 70-year-old grandfather was shot and
killed in Detroit on Monday morning, authori-
ties said.
According to a preliminary report, police say
they believe a 16-year-old boy came over to a
house on the 9000 block of Mansfield to see the
victim’s granddaughter.
Duggan
Continued from Page 1A
to the Make Your Date Non-Profit.”
The city Office of Inspector General is an in-
dependent office that investigates waste,
abuse, fraud, and corruption in city govern-
ment. The office is headed by Ellen Ha, who
was appointed to the post by the Detroit City
Council in 2018 after serving as Detroit’s FOIA
coordinator in the city’s legal department.
The results of the investigation will be
shared, the OIG said, with the mayor’s office,
City Council and the public.
An email obtained by a Freedom of Informa-
tion Act request showed that Duggan ordered
the city’s chief development officer to raise
money for Make Your Date, which is a nonprofit
medical organization according to state and
federal records, where Dr. Sonia Hassan serves
as president and director.
Duggan was seen late last year arriving after
hours at the same suburban residence as Has-
san in an edited surveillance video taken by a
private investigator. She was handpicked by
the mayor to lead Detroit’s efforts to reduce
preterm births in Detroit.
The city’s financial support, an attempted
fundraising campaign and Duggan’s repeated
promotion of Make Your Date, raises ethics
questions about whether the mayor used city
resources to benefit Hassan’s program.
The Free Press examined Make Your Date’s
operations and funding for several months and
as part of its investigation requested commu-
nications involving Hassan, Duggan and the
mayor’s chief of staff, Alexis Wiley.
City officials previously downplayed Dug-
gan’s assistance to Make Your Date as typical
leaders of attempting to break an internal
union formed by union office staff.
The union has been forced to pay hundreds
of thousands of dollars in back pay and pen-
alties after findings that it violated federal la-
bor laws.
Moore won re-election in 2018, despite a
challenge from union member James Zoccoli
of Garden City, who framed much of his cam-
paign around the controversies and the refus-
al of Moore and other board members to dis-
close how much had been spent on legal fees
defending the board’s position.
“I’m looking to hopefully get him out of of-
fice, so we can restore our reputation in orga-
nized labor,” Zoccoli said of Moore and the
MSEA.
Moore could not be reached for comment
Monday. President since 2010, he has main-
tained support from a majority of the
14-member MSEA board.
The union has about 4,600 members, but
only about 65 delegates were eligible to vote
on whether Moore got another three-year
term.
The incident was reported at 4:38 a.m. Po-
lice said an argument took place between the
70-year-old and the teenager, and the two
were reportedly tussling over a gun when the
firearm discharged.
The 70-year-old was shot in the chest and
pronounced dead at the scene when a medic
unit arrived.
Police said the suspect fled the scene with
the gun.
Michigan commission: Trial court
funding is ‘broken’
LANSING – A commission says the way
Michigan trial courts are funded is “broken”
and should be overhauled with a new model
in which the state shares more of the cost.
The Trial Court Funding Commission, cre-
ated under a 2017 law, released its interim re-
port Monday.
The recommendations are designed to ad-
dress how judges depend on money from de-
fendants convicted of crimes to cover court
operating expenses.
Under one recommendation, the state
would establish a fund for receipt of all trial
court assessments and state general funds,
and distribute the revenue to local courts
based on caseloads.
Court employees would become state em-
ployees, and the state would fund technology
needs.
The Michigan Supreme Court is consider-
ing whether court costs ordered by judges are
an illegal tax against offenders.
Compiled from staff and Associated Press
reports.
Dr. Sonia Hassan sits with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan during the 2015 fundraising gala for
Hassan’s Make Your Date program at MGM Grand Detroit. MAKEYOURDATE.ORG
of the mayor’s support for city-backed philan-
thropic efforts. But the records obtained in late
March revealed a significant commitment of
resources from the development office at the
mayor’s direction.
The fundraising campaign Duggan ordered
began with an email introduction between the
city’s development officer and Hassan. The
email’s subject line was “Make Your Date
Fundraising.”
Wiley wrote in the August 2017 email: “I’d
like to introduce you to Ryan Friedrichs. He is
our chief development officer and the Mayor
has tasked him with launching a large scale
fundraising effort to Make Your Date. He’ll be in
Port Huron Police Lt. Brian Kerrigan inspects a handgun during the department’s gun
buy-back program Saturday at the Municipal Office Center. Firearms purchased at the event
were to be sent to the Michigan State Police to be destroyed. BRIAN WELLS/TIMES HERALD
Port Huron citizens cash
in at gun buy-back event
Jackie Smith   Port Huron Times Herald
USA TODAY NETWORK – MICHIGAN
The gun buy-back program organized by
Port Huron’s police department Saturday
didn’t quite go as planned.
“It was successful so fast that we ran out of
money, and then we had to get our own funds
out of the police department,” Port Huron Po-
lice Chief Joe Platzer said about halfway
through the four-hour event.
It was the first time the department hosted
a gun buy-back program, where residents can
bring in unwanted firearms in exchange for
cash, and Platzer said they hadn’t expected
such a high turnout.
The effort was announced in February
with $5,000 in financial support from Ach-
eson Ventures, but within an hour to an hour
and a half Saturday, police at the Municipal
Office Center’s south parking lot quickly
sought other options to sustain the effort into
the afternoon.
Platzer and Capt. Marcy Kuehn said for
some command staff, that included cash
withdrawals from their own bank accounts.
By noon, officials said they’d collected
about 50 firearms, as a steady stream of resi-
dents continued to swing by.
“These are the type of guns that we want to
get off the street — rifles, shotguns, hand
guns,” Platzer said. “We’ve had a lot of citi-
zens talk to us and said they were thankful
that we were doing this program, that they’ve
had these guns sitting in their house. They
didn’t know what to do with them, and that
this is what they were looking for.”
Carol Fletcher and her brother Paul Kortes,
both of Port Huron, each brought in unwant-
ed guns. Fletcher brought a pistol and a rifle
that had belonged to her husband. After he
touch soon!”
The fundraising effort was eventually
deemed unnecessary, officials stress, but not
before several city staffers collaborated on the
campaign. The effort did not result in any do-
nations. However, Make Your Date has raised
more than $1.5 million since its inception.
In a prepared statement after the investiga-
tion was announced, Wiley said the city wel-
comes an “independent review” of the city’s
role in supporting the Make Your Date pro-
gram.
“An unbiased, thorough review of the facts
will demonstrate that the central claims and
unsubstantiated suggestions made by the De-
died five years ago, she said she wasn’t sure
what to do with them.
“Then, I heard about this and said, ‘That is
wonderful,’ ” she said. “See, I have a little one, a
10-year-old, and like I said, they could’ve both
been loaded. I don’t know anything about guns.
It’s just a relief.”
Kortes said his gun had been given to him
two decades ago but spent the time stored in
his garage.
“But I never even used it, never shot it,” he
said. “It was just sitting there. It thought it was
a good opportunity to get rid of it.”
And when the siblings got to the south MOC
lot, they were in for a surprise.
“We thought we were just going to turn them
in,” Kortes said.
His sister chimed in, “We didn’t even know
we’d get money.” Combined, they received
$500.
Although the program had been geared to-
ward city residents, Platzer said they hadn’t
been turning away residents who live in sur-
rounding townships.
In the back of a police truck laid dozens of
firearms, and in a container beside it was a
large swath of unwanted ammunition. Once
the event was over, Platzer said the police de-
partment would go through the haul to ensure
none of the guns were stolen — Saturday’s pro-
gram carried a “no-questions-asked” tag line
— before returning any of those to their owners
and sending the rest to the Michigan State Po-
lice to be destroyed.
Acheson Ventures Donna Niester, too, said
she hadn’t anticipated such a high turnout for
the event and suggested they may continue it
on an annual basis.
“For me, it’s a shock,” she said. “We’re going
to get them an additional grant, so we’ll pay
them back their additional money.”
troit Free Press are completely false,” Wiley
said, adding that “no city funds were ever pro-
vided to a Make Your Date nonprofit and no pri-
vate money was ever raised for it.”
Duggan has never directly addressed the al-
legations of an extramarital affair, insisting his
marriage is a private, personal matter unrelat-
ed to city business. Representatives of both
Duggan and Hassan refused last week to an-
swer direct questions about the nature of their
relationship.
“Dr. Hassan does not comment about per-
sonal matters,” spokesman Bill Nowling said in
a statement.
Wiley last week referenced a previous state-
ment from the mayor’s office that declined to
characterize Duggan’s relationship with Has-
san. “This was addressed last November and
we made clear then that there would be no fur-
ther comment,” Wiley wrote in an email.
In addition, the mayor’s office vehemently
denied the city ever provided money directly to
the Make Your Date nonprofit. The city con-
tends Make Your Date is administered as a
Wayne State University program, sentiments
echoed by university officials. However, the
program continues to promote itself as a non-
profit on its website, in fundraising materials
and required state and federal government re-
porting documents.
Wayne State published on its website Mon-
day a response indicating it also welcomed an
independent review “following the question-
able reporting from the Detroit Free Press.”
“While Wayne State University is not the
target of the article, we feel compelled to de-
fend a program critical to the health of Detroit
mothers and babies, and a dedicated, talented
Wayne State faculty member who was ma-
ligned based on implications and innuendos.”
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THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2019 ❚ FREEP.COM E2 PART OF THE USA TODAY NETWORK

FREE PRESS INVESTIGATION

DETROIT ROCK CITY Duggan

dodges
SPORTS, 1C

Pistons clinch
ON OPENING NIGHT questions
amid probe
playoff berth
Advance with victory over
Knicks in final game of season.

He avoids answering about

doctor who heads program;
Nessel is looking into it
Kat Stafford and Joe Guillen Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK

Days after learning the Detroit Office of In-

spector General is investigating city support of
the program overseen by a Wayne State Uni-
MOTOR CITY, 1E
versity doctor, Mayor Mike Duggan avoided a
Ford Edge ST is barrage of questions Wednes-
day about his relationship with
fast and fun the program’s director.
Mark Phelan reviews the SUV’s A Free Press investigation
performance model. published last week raised
conflict of interest concerns
regarding Duggan and Dr. So-
Duggan nia Hassan, who runs a med-
ical program that received
$358,000 in city grants and also fundraising
efforts in 2017 ordered by the mayor.
Duane Smelser of Ira Township dances before the opening night showing. RYAN GARZA/DETROIT FREE PRESS Duggan was asked several times about the
nature of his relationship with Hassan during
a City Hall news conference Wednesday,
Bill Laitner Detroit Free Press | USA TODAY NETWORK called to discuss developments in the federal
probe of the Detroit demolition program. But
The Fillmore Detroit welcomed a crowd of rock-music insiders, fans and a few celebrities Thurs- the mayor, who previously refused to com-
NATION+WORLD, 6A ment, would say only that he supports the
day night to open this year’s Freep Film Festival. ❚ First up? A documentary tribute to Detroit’s
DeVos defends work to fight preterm birth by Hassan’s Make
literacy cuts rock-music history — and specifically to Creem magazine, which carried the beat nationwide from
See DUGGAN, Page 11A
Education secretary claims the late 1960s through the early 1980s. See FILM FESTIVAL, Page 10A ❚ More in Play and Sports
programs are ineffective.

Inside today’s Free Press

Bob Probert, Goose Feds: Dearborn
❚ Obituaries......................12-14A Loonies and a hat trick man trained by
❚ Movie Guide ..........................7D
of horrific headlines
❚ Comics ..................................13D
❚ Puzzles ................................2-3F
Keith Gave Special to Detroit Free Press
ISIS could face life
USA TODAY NETWORK Tresa Baldas Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK

Weather “Keith Gave was this (expletive) who wrote a

column for the Detroit Free Press. We never got
High 54° ❚ Low 50°
along because he was always one of those re-
Morning shower. Forecast, 2A
porters that was just waiting for something,
so he could report the (expletive), you know?”
— Bob Probert, in his book, “Tough Guy.”
Daily $2.00
Bob Probert deserves some credit in that
line he penned for his book — and repeated
in the film that documents his short but
Volume 188 | No. 342 ©2019
eventful life; he pretty much nailed the job
Home delivery pricing inside
Subscribe: 800-395-3300
description of a newspaper beat writer.
Classified: 586-977-7500;
800-926-8237 See PROBERT, Page 10A
A Dearborn man who was arrested on a
Syrian battlefield and accused of helping ISIS
is facing new charges alleging he was trained
by the terror group, attended an ISIS camp
and fired a machine gun on its behalf —
claims that could send him to prison for life if
he is convicted.
‘Tough Guy: The Bob Probert Story’ The man’s family, however, has long main-
tained that he is innocent of any wrongdoing
❚ 8 p.m. Thursday: Patriot Theater at the War Memorial.
and that he was kidnapped by the terrorist
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DETROIT FREE PRESS ARCHIVES See ISIS CHARGES, Page 11A

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Cover stories

Duggan ing any additional public officials.”

Continued from Page 1A
Your Date program.
“I’m never going to talk about my personal
life, as you well know,” Duggan said.
The Michigan Attorney General’s Office told
the Free Press on Monday that it also was look-
ing into the situation, following publication of
the newspaper’s investigation last week.
“We recently became aware of these con-
cerns and we are looking into them,” according
to Kelly Rossman-McKinney, the Attorney
General’s communications director.
No other details regarding state-level inter-
est in the case were available, however the of-
fice does oversee requirements for organiza-
tions that solicit or receive charitable contribu-
tions in Michigan and provides consumer in-
formation regarding nonprofits.
At the news conference he called Wednes-
day at City Hall, Duggan also expressed confi-
dence that the federal investigation into the
city’s demolition program removed any doubts
about its integrity.
At the news conference, reporters peppered
Duggan with several questions about Make
Your Date and he addressed many of them
while declining to talk about his relationship
with Hassan. But he eventually stopped an-
swering questions and walked away from the
mayor’s briefing room podium as his staff end-
ed the news conference.
The Free Press investigation showed the
city’s chief development officer and members
of his staff undertook a fundraising campaign
for Make Your Date at Duggan’s direction.
The fundraising effort was eventually
deemed unnecessary, but not before several
city staffers collaborated on the campaign. The
effort did not result in any donations. However,
Make Your Date has raised more than $1.5 mil-
lion since its inception.
On Monday, the city Office of Inspector Gen-
eral launched a probe into Make Your Date.
Duggan said he hopes the media thoroughly
reports the probe’s conclusions.
“I am a huge supporter of Wayne State Uni-
versity’s Make Your Date program, and Dr.
Hassan never took a dollar and so I’m going to
let the OIG process play out,” Duggan said. “All I
ask is that you publicize the conclusion of the
investigation as much as you publicize the in-
vestigation itself.”
As he left the news conference, he did not
answer a question about whether he will dis-
cuss the Hassan relationship with the Inspec-
tor General.
Duggan defended the city’s support of Make
Your Date. He said the program was structured
as a part of Wayne State University and not a
nonprofit organization when it received city
Mayor Mike Duggan speaks at a news conference Wednesday. It was called to discuss
developments in the federal probe of the Detroit demolition program. MANDI WRIGHT/DFP
grants and fundraising support. However, con-
tracts for the grants also identified Make Your
Date as getting the money.
Duggan was seen late last year arriving after
hours at the same suburban residence as Has-
san in an edited surveillance video taken by a
private investigator. She was handpicked by
the mayor to lead Detroit’s efforts to reduce
preterm births in Detroit.
The city’s support raises ethics questions
about whether the mayor used city resources
to benefit Hassan’s program.
City officials had previously downplayed
Duggan’s assistance to Make Your Date as typ-
ical of the mayor’s support for city-backed
philanthropic efforts.
But a Freedom of Information Act request
uncovered an email that showed Duggan’s in-
volvement in the high-level fundraising effort.
Duggan had ordered the city fundraising effort
for the program, which was communicated via
email to Hassan by his chief of staff.
The results of the OIG investigation will be
shared with the mayor’s office, City Council
and the public.
Demolition probe
Separately, Duggan addressed Tuesday’s
news that two former employees of a promi-
nent contractor firm in Detroit’s demolition
program pleaded guilty after they were ac-
“I am a huge supporter of Wayne
State University’s Make Your Date
program, and Dr. Hassan never
took a dollar and so I’m going to
let the OIG process play out.”
Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, talking about an
investigation over city support of a program aimed at
fighting preterm births
cused of bid-rigging and accepting bribes to-
taling hundreds of thousands of dollars. The
convictions were the first to result from a
lengthy federal investigation into the program,
which has been fueled by more than $258 mil-
lion in federal funds.
Anthony Daguanno and Aradondo Haskins
said they shared key bid information with a
subcontractor when they were putting togeth-
er demolition proposals for their employer,
Adamo Group.
Daguanno received more than $372,000,
according to the indictment.
Haskins, who also later worked for the city’s
Building Authority, received $26,000, includ-
ing some money after he was hired by Detroit
to oversee certain demolition projects.
In announcing the guilty pleas, federal au-
thorities said in a release that the government,
“as of today’s date, does not anticipate charg-
But it wasn’t immediately clear whether the
statement solely addressed Daguanno’s and
Haskins’ case or the entirety of the wide-
reaching probe, which has splintered off into
different facets within the last several months.
When reached for comment, both the U.S.
Attorney’s Office and the Office of the Special
Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief
Program declined comment, saying they
wouldn’t make a statement “beyond the press
release.”
Duggan on Wednesday said he was pleased
by the announcement that no additional
charges were expected against any additional
public officials.
“I said from the very beginning, if any public
official committed a crime, they should be
charged,” Duggan said. “But in the three-year
investigation, I never saw any evidence that
anyone running the Land Bank or the Building
Authority had broken any laws.”
But when pressed on whether he received
any direct confirmation beyond what was stat-
ed in the news release, Duggan said he was
“acting today off the statement that was in the
release,” before declining to share any private
discussions he may have had with federal au-
thorities.
The convictions come a week after two con-
gressional leaders — U.S. Reps. Rashida Tlaib
and Brenda Lawrence — jointly called for in-
creased oversight of blight remediation efforts
across Michigan, including Detroit’s demoli-
tion program.
The move followed Free Press investiga-
tions this year outlining concerns about the
city’s quality controls within the federally
funded program, which is overseen by the De-
troit Land Bank Authority and Detroit Building
Authority.
Despite several recent high-profile inci-
dents in the demolition program, Duggan de-
fended the city’s quality controls and said it
has responded strongly to companies that
have violated procedures in place.
“I think the oversight is excellent,” he said. “I
think they’re responding to accounts that may
not be factually accurate but I am very confi-
dent of the controls in place.”
Joe Guillen has been covering city govern-
ance and development issues for the newspa-
per since 2013. He has covered Detroit city hall,
been a member of the investigations team and
previously worked at The (Cleveland) Plain
Dealer covering county and state government.
Contact him at 313-222-6678 or jguillen@free-
press.com.
Kat Stafford is the Detroit government
watchdog reporter for the Free Press, covering
city issues and the community. A Detroit na-
tive, Stafford is vice president of the Detroit
chapter of the Society of Professional Journal-
ists. Contact her at kstafford@freepress.com.

ISIS charges
Continued from Page 1A

Ibraheem Izzy Musaibli, 28, a natural-born

U.S. citizen who has been locked up since his
arrest last summer, is believed to be one of only
two American men to be captured on an Islam-
ic State battlefield and charged in the U.S. with
supporting a terrorist group. He was captured
last summer as he tried to escape a valley in
Syria, where American-backed Syrian forces
had been trying to destroy remaining pockets
of Islamic State control. He was transferred
into U.S. custody in July 2018.
The government says this case is about
holding accountable Americans who leave this
country to support terrorist groups.
As Assistant Attorney General John Demers
stated: “The (Dearborn) defendant traveled
overseas, joined ISIS, and received training
from the terrorist organization. He was ulti-
mately detained overseas and turned over to
the FBI. With these charges, he will be held ac-
countable.”
Musaibli’s lawyer was not available for com-
ment. His family has long argued that the gov-
ernment has it wrong, saying Musaibli is not an
extremist and has never associated with any
terrorist group.
His brother, Abe Musaibli, 26, previously
told the Free Press that his older brother trav-
eled to Iraq from Yemen to help refugees and
was later kidnapped by ISIS members and
forced into Syria. He said his brother was jailed
in an ISIS prison, pleaded for help and eventu-
ally escaped to the Syrian Democratic Forces.
The government, however, has painted a
different picture, alleging Musaibli helped ISIS
for three years, using various aliases, including
Abu Shifa Musaibli and Abu ‘Abd Al-Rahman
Al-Yemeni.
According to the superseding — or new —
indictment, from April 2015 through June 2018,
Musaibli knowingly provided and attempted to
provide material support to ISIS, received mil-
itary-type training from ISIS, discharged a ma-
chine gun on the terrorist group’s behalf and
attended an ISIS military camp.
U.S. Attorney Matthew Schneider said the
April 11, 2019
PUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD FOR THE DRAFT 2019
MICHIGAN CONSOLIDATED ANNUAL ACTION PLAN
Prior to submission for further funding from the Housing and Urban Development
(HUD) Office of Community Planning and Development, Michigan is required to
prepare a Consolidated Housing and Community Development Plan (the
Consolidated Plan). The Consolidated Plan proposes an action strategy by which
those needs will be addressed through five program years for the period July 1, 2015
– June 30, 2020. The five annual action plans are funded by five formula programs
covered in the Michigan Consolidated Plan (HOME, Community Development Block
Grant, Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDs, the Emergency Solutions Grant,
and the Housing Trust Fund). The Michigan State Housing Development Authority
(MSHDA) is responsible for preparing the Michigan Consolidated Plan and soliciting
comments from the public regarding the plan on an annual basis.
Ibraheem Izzy Musaibli’s sister, right, and
The comment period will commence on April 11, 2019 and end on May 11, 2019
mother leave the Theodore Levin Federal and will focus on the draft action plan language. Copies of the 2019 Michigan
Courthouse in Detroit in 2018. Consolidated Action Plan may be downloaded free of charge from the MSHDA
CAMERON POLLACK/DETROIT FREE PRESS website at www.michigan.gov/mshda.
All interested parties are invited to attend the public hearing listed below and/or
“By traveling to Syria to train submit written comments for the Michigan Consolidated Action Plan. Information
gathered during the public hearings and the written comments received will be used
and fight as a member of ISIS, to develop the 2019 Michigan Consolidated Action Plan.
Mr. Mousaibli fought against
Please note the following date and locations for the 2019 Public Hearings:
coalition forces, which included
Detroit: Wednesday, April 24, 2019 from 10:30 a.m. – 12:00 noon
members of the U.S. Military.” MSHDA Detroit Office, Cadillac Place, 3028 W. Grand Boulevard,
Suite 4-602
Timothy Slater, Detroit’s FBI chief,
talking about the case
Lansing: Thursday, May 2, 2019 from 1:30 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.
MSHDA Lansing Office, 735 E. Michigan Avenue
The government alleges Masaibli not only
fought against Syrians, but American forces, Individuals and organizations unable to attend the hearing may still submit written
too. comments to Tonya Young, 735 East Michigan Avenue, P.O. Box 30044, Lansing,
MI 48909. Written comments must be received no later than May 8, 2019.
“By traveling to Syria to train and fight as a
Comments can also be submitted to the MSHDA Consolidated Plan Coordinator via
member of ISIS, Mr. Mousaibli fought against e-mail to hidmailbox@michigan.gov.
coalition forces, which included members of
the U.S. Military,” Detroit’s FBI chief Timothy Special Assistance: The meeting locations are accessible to mobility-challenged
Slater stated Wednesday. individuals. Persons with disabilities needing accommodations for effective
Musaibli was initially charged with crimes participation in a meeting should contact Housing Initiatives at 517.335.2524 a week
that could send him to prison for 20 years, if in advance to request mobility, visual, hearing or other assistance.
convicted. The new charges carry a manda-
tory minimum sentence of 40 years, or up to
DF-GMG0016741-01

new indictment in Masaibli’s case adds life.

charges “to more fully capture his conduct” Contact Tresa Baldas: tbaldas@free-
while he was with ISIS for nearly three years. press.com
4A ❚ TUESDAY, APRIL 23, 2019 ❚ DETROIT FREE PRESS
Metro
Mayor Duggan faces recall effort
2 petitions filed
seeking to remove
him from office
Kat Stafford and Joe Guillen
Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK
The investigation into whether Detroit May-
or Mike Duggan gave preferential treatment to
a local medical program has spawned a recall
effort against the mayor.
Government agitator Robert Davis and
Brenda Hill, who called herself a “political ac-
tionist,” have coordinated on recall petitions
REACHING FOR SPRING
Shruthi Siddu, 31, and Atreya Balekai, 2, of Troy have fun on the playground at Boulan Park in Troy on Monday. The
thermometer didn’t quite crack 70, but it was still warm and sunny enough for outdoor springtime fun in metro Detroit.
The high was 68, according to the National Weather Service. Rain will move into the area Tuesday morning but should be
gone by early afternoon. Tuesday’s high is expected to be 68, with a low around 42. KATHLEEN GALLIGAN/DETROIT FREE PRESS
Adoption agency changes $4.7M effort to stop ‘zombie’ deer
LGBT policy after settlement before they’re in Michigan forever
Decision only applies to
group’s Michigan operations
David Eggert
ASSOCIATED PRESS
LANSING – A major faith-based foster care
and adoption contractor for the state of Michi-
gan said Monday it will place children in LGBT
homes, reversing course following a recent le-
gal settlement.
Grand Rapids-based Bethany Christian Ser-
vices is responsible for about 8% of Michigan’s
more than 13,000 foster care and adoption
cases involving children from troubled house-
holds.
“We are disappointed with how this settle-
filed on Monday against Duggan. The petitions
are worded differently but they both seek to
kick Duggan out of office based on an ongoing
investigation by the Detroit Office of Inspector
General into the city’s support of the Make
Your Date organization.
Dr. Sonia Hassan, an associate dean at the
Wayne State University School of Medicine
with close personal ties to Duggan, runs Make
Your Date, which aims to fight preterm birth.
A Free Press investigation earlier this month
showed the city directed more than $358,000
in federal grant money to Make Your Date be-
tween 2015 and 2017. Duggan also ordered the
city’s chief development officer to help raise
money for Make Your Date in 2017.
Duggan was seen late last year arriving after
hours at the same suburban residence as Has-
ment agreement has been im-
plemented by the state govern-
ment. Nonetheless, Bethany
will continue operations in
Michigan, in compliance with
our legal contract require-
Nessel ments,” the nonprofit said in a
statement, confirming a policy
change that was first reported by WGVU-FM.
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, a
Democrat, announced the settlement last
month with same-sex couples who had sued
in 2017. It prevents faith-based agencies from
refusing to place children in LGBT house-
holds for religious reasons if it has accepted
them for referral from the Michigan
See ADOPTION, Page 5A
“He is by far one of the most
corrupt, inept public officials this
city has ever elected.”
Government agitator Robert Davis
san in an edited surveillance video taken by a
private investigator. She was handpicked by
the mayor to lead Detroit’s efforts to reduce
preterm births in Detroit.
Detroit Inspector General Ellen Ha opened
her investigation days after the Free Press de-
tailed the city’s support to Make Your Date.
Both the administration and Wayne State have
repeatedly denied any conflict of interest due
Deer infected with chronic wasting disease
can look emaciated and confused,
wandering aimlessly. ERIC SHARP/DFP
to the personal relationship because the pro-
gram is administered by the university, they
say.
“Mike Duggan has been no friend to the citi-
zens of the city of Detroit,” Davis said. “He is by
far one of the most corrupt, inept public offi-
cials this city has ever elected.”
This is Davis’ second attempt to recall Dug-
gan. His first petition was approved in 2016 but
he said he collected no signatures. This time is
different, he said, because he has $50,000
committed from Detroit businessmen, whom
he would not name.
Duggan’s Chief of Staff Alexis Wiley said in a
brief statement, “As was the case in 2016, a re-
call is still a right provided under the City
See DUGGAN, Page 5A
A Royal Thai Navy ship pulls a seastead
to shore. YONGYOS PRUKSARAK
Seastead
living puts
Michigan
man on run
Thai officials seize floating
home, seek to arrest couple
Frank Witsil Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK
The Royal Thai Navy seized and disman-
tled the floating platform that a Michigan na-
tive and Bitcoin investor had made his home
with his Thai girlfriend.
In a video posted to social media early
Monday, a high-ranking Thai military official,
Witthanat Kochsanei, offered details in Thai
of the fate of the house that has been called a
“seastead,” a word combining sea and home-
stead.
Meanwhile, the Phuket News, a Thailand
news outlet, is reporting that Thai officials
also may drop charges accusing the pair of vi-
olating Thailand’s national sovereignty,
which could result in life imprisonment or
death.
Instead, they may be prosecuted on a less
severe charge.
Still, not much is known about the safety
and whereabouts of the couple — Chad El-
wartowski and Supranee Thepdet — who said
through social media that they have been on
the run from Thai officials for nearly a week
See SEASTEAD, Page 8A
Aleanna Siacon Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK
Michigan is raising the stakes in its battle to
fight chronic wasting disease in deer, a neuro-
logical condition that makes deer look like
“zombies.”
The Michigan Department of Natural Re-
sources is teaming up with Michigan State Uni-
versity to dole out $4.7 million in grants to sup-
port efforts targeting the disease.
Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is related to
mad cow disease. Infected deer often look
emaciated and confused, wandering aimlessly
and unafraid of humans.
Dr. Russ Mason, chief of the DNR Wildlife
Division, told the Free Press portions of the
See ‘ZOMBIE’ DEER, Page 8A

Metro
Dragon trail work may start this summer
Hope is for hiking, biking
path to be national attraction
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BIG PRAIRIE TOWNSHIP – A new trail in
western Michigan that developers believe
could become a national attraction is set to
break ground this year.
Construction on Michigan’s Dragon at Har-
dy Dam trail in Newaygo and Mecosta counties
could begin by this summer, the Muskegon
Chronicle reported.
Mayor Mike Duggan is being investigated over alleged preferential treatment given to a local medical program. Two recall petitions, seeking
his removal from office, were filed Monday. MANDI WRIGHT/DETROIT FREE PRESS
Duggan
Continued from Page 4A
Charter.” There was no other comment from
city officials.
Davis’ petition language references Dug-
gan’s ties to Hassan, the inspector general in-
vestigation and “whether Mayor Duggan and/
or any city officials potentially abused their au-
thority by providing preferential treatment to
the Make Your Date nonprofit organization,
which is run by Dr. Sonia Hassan.”
Hill, who filed the second petition to recall
Duggan on Monday, said she’s been displeased
Adoption
Continued from Page 4A
Department of Health and Human Services.
Lansing-based St. Vincent Catholic Chari-
ties challenged the deal in federal court last
week, alleging violations of the U.S. Constitu-
tion and the federal Religious Freedom Resto-
ration Act.
Of the faith-based agencies known to not
serve LGBT couples or individuals in Michigan,
Bethany does the most work for the state. The
nonprofit was handling 1,159 cases as of Febru-
ary. Catholic Charities had 404 cases, or 3%,
while St. Vincent had 80, or less than 1%.
State human services department spokes-
man Bob Wheaton said the agency was pleased
it will “be able to continue its long-standing
partnership with Bethany in providing ser-
vices to children and families.”
Nessel tweeted over the weekend that hav-
ing more adoption agencies not discriminate
results in “more children adopted into loving,
nurturing ‘forever’ homes. Thank you to Betha-
ny Christian Services.”
On April 11, Bethany’s national board of di-
rectors voted to change the policy. It applies
only in Michigan, not to its operations in other
states. The policy change also does not impact
From an aerial view, the 47-mile hiking and
biking trail encircles a dam-formed pond that
resembles the shape of a dragon. The pond is
part of the Muskegon River that pooled above
the Hardy Dam, which is owned by Jackson-
based utility Consumers Energy.
Visitors will be able to use the trail to walk or
bike along the top of the dam.
“There are other trails that are this long, but
very few are circular, fewer go around a body of
water and none of them that we could find go
around a body of water that’s undeveloped,”
said Ryan Coffey Hoag, a land use educator at
Michigan State University Extension who’s in-
with the mayor since he was first elected. Hill
has long been active in Detroit politics and re-
cently worked on Coleman Young II’s failed bid
against Duggan for mayor in 2017.
“Time after time, we’ve found that he hasn’t
done what’s in the best interest of the majority
of Detroiters,” Hill said. Former mayor “Kwame
(Kilpatrick) didn’t steer grants toward his al-
leged mistress. Duggan’s doing that.”
The Wayne County election commission
will review the petition language in the coming
weeks at a hearing that has yet to be scheduled.
If either petition is approved, Davis would
have to collect valid signatures equal to at least
25% of votes cast for governor in Detroit last
year.
“If St. Vincent is unable to
receive referrals from or
contract with the State, it will
be forced to close its foster care
and adoption programs ...”
St. Vincent Catholic Charities
private adoptions, according to Bethany.
A 2015 Republican-enacted law says child-
placement agencies are not required to pro-
vide any services that conflict with their sin-
cerely held religious beliefs. But Nessel’s set-
tlement says the law does not apply if agen-
cies are under contract with the state.
In its lawsuit, St. Vincent said it fears the
state will not renew its contract in October
because of the local nonprofit’s religious be-
liefs and practices.
“If St. Vincent is unable to receive referrals
from or contract with the State, it will be
forced to close its foster care and adoption
programs, ending a decades-old religious
ministry and reducing the number of agen-
cies available to serve families and children in
need,” the agency said in the complaint.
volved in the project.
The 2-foot-wide trail is planned to pass
through untamed terrain, six campgrounds
and eight boat launches and marinas. The
route will also include 13 scenic overlooks and
20 footbridges.
“It became really obvious really quickly that
this wasn’t a local trail; this was going to be an
attraction that would bring people into the re-
gion,” Hoag said. “This is about economic de-
velopment.”
The trail and its bridges, overlooks, signage
and kiosks are all estimated to cost more than
$3 million combined, he said.
According to Michigan law, recall petition
language must be submitted to the county
clerk in the county where the elected officer
resides before a recall petition may be circu-
lated.
Davis filed recall petitions in September
2015 against Duggan, citing his hiring of two
top administrators who have since left the
city — former Department of Neighborhoods
Director Charlie Beckham and Corporation
Counsel Melvin Butch Hollowell — despite
their brushes with the law.
Wayne County Clerk spokeswoman Lisa
Williams-Jackson said petition sponsors
have 180 days to collect signatures once their
petition is approved.
Man ruled justified in shooting
in attempted home burglary
Kara Berg Lansing State Journal
USA TODAY NETWORK — MICHIGAN
SEBEWA TWP. – A 69-year-old Ionia
County homeowner who fatally shot a Lan-
sing man will not be charged with the man’s
death, prosecutors say.
Justin Eddy, 40, was shot and killed during
a reported attempted home burglary in Sebe-
wa Township, near Portland, in early January.
Ionia County Prosecutor Kyle Butler ruled
Monday that the homeowner acted in self-
defense when he shot Eddy, and chose not to
issue charges.
A man, later identified as Eddy, forced his
way into a home in the 4000 block of East
Musgrove Highway occupied by a married
couple, a 69-year-old man and a 63-year-old
woman, just after 10:30 p.m. Jan 1.
He told the couple he was being chased by
someone who was trying to kill him, accord-
ing to the news release. He had arrived at the
couple’s home in a pickup that had been sto-
len from a home about two miles east, accord-
ing to the news release. He abandoned his
FREEP.COM ❚ TUESDAY, APRIL 23, 2019 ❚ 5A
Newaygo and Mecosta counties each pro-
vided $150,000 for the project, which also re-
ceived $860,000 in grant money and other do-
nations. The counties have applied for two
grants from the Michigan Department of Natu-
ral Resources that could provide an additional
$750,000, Hoag said. The more than $1 million
remaining is expected to be raised through cor-
porate and private donations.
The trail is scheduled for completion in
2022. It’s still pending approval from the Fed-
eral Energy Regulatory Commission, which
regulates the property’s owner, Consumers
Energy.
Chalk up
a win for
people who
park too long
ASSOCIATED PRESS
DETROIT – Marking tires to enforce park-
ing rules is like entering property without a
search warrant, a federal court said Monday
as it declared the practice unconstitutional in
Michigan and three other states.
Alison Taylor had received more than a
dozen $15 tickets for exceeding the two-hour
parking limit in Saginaw. The city marks tires
with chalk to keep track of how long a vehicle
is parked. Her lawyer argued that a parking
patrol officer violated the Fourth Amendment
right against unreasonable searches.
A three-judge panel of the appeals court
agreed.
The purpose of marking tires was to “raise
revenue,” not to protect the public against a
safety risk, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Ap-
peals said.
“The city does not demonstrate, in law or
logic, that the need to deter drivers from ex-
ceeding the time permitted for parking – be-
fore they have even done so – is sufficient to
justify a warrantless search under the com-
munity caretaker rationale,” the court said.
The decision sets a new standard for Mich-
igan, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee, the
states covered by the 6th Circuit. The court
overturned an opinion by U.S. District Judge
Thomas Ludington, who had called the legal
theory “unorthodox” and dismissed the case
in favor of Saginaw.
Saginaw’s city manager didn’t immediate-
ly reply to a message seeking comment.
Taylor’s attorney, Philip Ellison, began re-
searching the issue when another lawyer
complained that his tire was marked while he
sat in his car. It’s apparently a common prac-
tice in downtown Saginaw, where there are
no meters to enforce time limits.
“A good portion of my practice is repre-
senting the everyday person,” Ellison said.
He argued that marking tires was similar
to police secretly putting a GPS device on a
vehicle without a proper warrant, which was
the subject of a 2012 U.S. Supreme Court rul-
ing.
The case will return to federal court in Bay
City. Ellison wants Ludington to certify the
lawsuit as a class-action, with refunds for
people who got tickets.
own pickup at that location, leaving the engine
running and headlights on.
The man grabbed his gun and went outside
with Eddy, while his wife stayed inside and
called 911. They were not able to find anyone
outside.
The man told Eddy “Don’t come in here,” just
before the 911 call ended, according to the news
release. The police investigation showed Eddy
went back inside the home and smashed the
cell phone and asked for the gun several times.
Eddy struck the man in the face and pushed
him down to the ground and attempted to take
the gun from the man’s waistband before the
man shot and killed Eddy, according to the
news release.
He was pronounced dead at 11:36 p.m. Toxi-
cology reports showed Eddy had a blood alco-
hol content of 0.25 and the presence of fenta-
nyl in his system, supporting his “erratic be-
havior,” according to the release. He had strug-
gled with drug abuse and had recent contacts
with police and the Michigan Department of
Health and Human Services.
 PLAYING THE FIELD
With no clear favorite in the Kentucky Derby,
Maximum Security could get the roses.
SPORTS, 2B
O N G U A R D F O R 1 8 7 Y E A R S

SATURDAY, MAY 4, 2019 ❚ FREEP.COM PART OF THE USA TODAY NETWORK

New Jeep factory a done deal

Land swaps complete; Detroit ments needed for FCA to move ahead building
the new Jeep assembly plant near Mack and St.
More inside
plant expected to open in ’20 Jean. ❚ Ram drives reduced profits for FCA. 9A
Construction should start this year with a ❚ GM talks of possible $1B expansion. 9A
John Gallagher planned opening date of late 2020.
Detroit Free Press FCA plans to invest $2.5 billion in the Jeep
USA TODAY NETWORK
plant and the adjacent Jefferson North Assem- new plant and to demolish or renovate homes
bly Plant, creating an estimated 4,950 jobs. in the area.
Fiat Chrysler’s new Jeep factory on Detroit’s Among the details Duggan announced: ❚ The city turns over about 215 acres of land
east side is now a done deal. ❚ FCA agreed to pay for a $35-million pack- assembled for the project to FCA. The final big
Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan announced at a age of community benefits, including $19 mil- piece of that includes about 80 acres owned by
late Friday afternoon news conference that lion for workforce training and education, with FCA’s Mack Engine Plant II in Detroit will be
agreement has been reached on all the ele- millions more to build a buffer wall around the See JEEP PLANT, Page 7A converted to a new Jeep plant. JUNFU HAN/DFP

Mayor Mike UPGRADES COMING AT DETROIT PARK

As costs for
Duggan’s nuclear
wife files for energy soar,
a divorce its future is
Joe Guillen and Gina Kaufman
Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK
uncertain
JC Reindl
Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, whose per- Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK
sonal life has been the subject of media re-
ports in recent months, is now facing di-
vorce. There was a festive atmosphere in down-
His wife of more than three decades, Ma- town Monroe earlier this week when a group
ry Loretto Maher, filed for divorce Friday in of nearly two dozen environmental activists
Wayne County Circuit Court. held a “funeral” for nuclear energy, complete
The divorce filing comes a month after a An aerial view Thursday of the James Scott Memorial Fountain and construction underway with a small homemade coffin bearing an effi-
Free Press investigation for the Grand Prix on Belle Isle in Detroit. MANDI WRIGHT AND JUNFU HAN/DETROIT FREE PRESS gy of the power industry’s old mascot, Reddy
raised questions about Dug- Kilowatt.

DETROIT’S JEWEL A
gan’s ties to Dr. Sonia Hassan, “You’re not supposed to smile at a funeral,
a Wayne State University phy- but this one we can,” said Keith Gunter, 63, of
sician who heads a maternal Livonia, who has been protesting nuclear
health program the mayor power since the late 1970s.

LITTLE TARNISHED
supported. The activists were in a buoyant mood be-
Duggan Online court records show cause of the nuclear industry’s recent finan-
Maher, who commonly goes cial struggles, which have brought early clo-
by Lori, filed the divorce com- sures to several reactors across the country
plaint Friday. Novi-based at- and prompted others to seek bailouts.
torney Julia Perkins, a partner
in the Varnum law firm, is list-
Rain, construction, Grand Prix setup make Belle Isle a mess Yet they acknowledged that their funeral

ed as having been retained. See NUCLEAR, Page 7A

Perkins could not be immedi- John Gallagher Columnist | Detroit Free Press | USA TODAY NETWORK
ately reached for comment.
Maher Information available Blame it on heavy rains, rising lake lev-
through the court online con-
tains limited information els, the Grand Prix setup, or major con-
about the divorce case. The record shows struction projects but Detroit’s Belle Isle Park is a
the complaint was filed Friday and that a
settlement conference is scheduled for Aug. mess right now. ❚ The good news is that most of the
2.
problems should clear up in time for another sea-
Neither Duggan’s spokesman, John
Roach, nor his chief of staff Alexis Wiley, son of picnics, family reunions, biking, jogging,
could be reached for comment by the Free
Press. The couple released a statement to and sunset watching. And the long-term outlook is
several media outlets confirming they had for a more ecologically friendly environment for
made the painful decision to divorce. Nu- High waters from heavy rains Anti-nuclear activists Mark Farris, left, and
merous attempts to obtain the statement wildlife, plant life and human visitors alike. flood picnic areas at the Blue Keith Gunter took part in a “funeral” for
Heron Lagoon on Belle Isle. nuclear power on Tuesday in downtown
See DUGGAN, Page 6A See GALLAGHER, Page 6A MANDI WRIGHT/DETROIT FREE PRESS Monroe. JC REINDL/DETROIT FREE PRESS

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6A ❚ SATURDAY, MAY 4, 2019 ❚ DETROIT FREE PRESS
Cover stories
Workers assemble grandstand seating Thursday in advance of the May 31 Grand Prix at Belle Isle. Many residents complain the setup and teardown ruins the island. JUNFU HAN/DFP
Gallagher
Continued from Page 1A
But there are plenty of short-term issues on
Belle Isle just now:
1. Flooding
Heavy rains have left standing water on
grassy areas throughout the island. Much of
the park will be unusable until things dry out in
coming days or weeks.
“Basically we have a lot of pumps on the is-
land,” said Karis Floyd, the park supervisor
with the Michigan Department of Natural Re-
sources. “We open those up to try to pump the
water down. But as you know, not only the De-
troit River but several lakes around the state of
Michigan are flooding over due to the addition-
al rain. Hopefully, we’ll get a few additional
days with no rain. We can continue to pump it
down and just wait for it to dry out.”
2. It’s Grand Prix time
The annual Detroit Grand Prix is setting up
for the three-day event beginning May 31. As
many fans of the island have complained over
the years, the Grand Prix setup and teardown
restricts traffic in various ways until the barri-
ers and obstacles are finally removed in the
weeks following the race.
3. Electric cable project
DTE Energy is taking over the electrical ser-
vice to the island from the city’s public lighting
department. To do that, DTE is laying new ca-
bles on the island. That has chewed up grassy
areas along the central road through the island
but should be finished soon.
4. Perimeter road; fish habitat plan
In a major construction project, crews are
building a new road bridge along the perimeter
road known as The Strand on the east end of
the island facing Canada.
There, crews opened up the shoreline to
connect the island’s Lake Okonoka to the De-
troit River as part of fish habitat restoration
work. Building the bridge over the opening
should be done by mid-August, said Amanda
Treadwell of the state’s Department of Natural
Resources. Until then, the perimeter road will
be closed through that stretch, but visitors
should be able to use a shortcut that runs be-
tween the forest on the island and the perim-
Duggan
Continued from Page 1A
from city officials were unsuccessful.
Six months ago, Duggan and Maher de-
fended their marriage after Detroit business-
A flooded picnic area on Belle Isle. Recent heavy rains have caused problems. JUNFU HAN/DFP
The northernmost point on the outer perimeter road is under construction.
MANDI WRIGHT/DETROIT FREE PRESS
eter road farther along.
5. Road resurfacing
In July, the Michigan Department of Trans-
man Robert Carmack aired surveillance video
showing Duggan and Hassan arriving at the
same suburban residence last year.
“We decided to write this statement to-
gether because we are proud of the marriage
we’ve built over 32 years, proud that our bond
today remains strong, and proud of our goal to
spend the rest of our lives together,” the state-
portation is scheduled to resurface part of the
central roadway through the woods. That
stretch has been notorious for big, deep pot-
holes. The resurfacing should take about two
weeks and close that central roadway through
ment read.
Duggan and Hassan both have repeatedly
refused to address the nature of their rela-
tionship in recent months.
The City of Detroit and Duggan supported
Hassan’s organization, Make Your Date, with
$358,000 in federal grants from 2015 to 2017
and a fundraising effort in 2017. The Detroit
the woods for that time.
A work in progress
Belle Isle has always been a work in pro-
gress. When French settlers first reached the
island in the early 1700s, it measured only
about three-fourths its current size of 982
acres — the largest city-owned island park in
the United States. Landfill expanded the island
to its current configuration around 1940.
Over the decades, the island evolved from
mostly forest and marsh to a venue with mul-
tiple recreational and cultural offerings. But as
the City of Detroit’s financial abilities deterio-
rated in the years leading up to the municipal
bankruptcy in 2013, maintenance lagged at
Belle Isle and other cities parks.
During that period of financial difficulty, the
historic Aquarium on Belle Isle had closed,
restrooms were padlocked, the canoe rental
had long shuttered, and there were multiple
other problems.
Restoring the glory
Taken all together, the various repair work
and upgrades now underway are part of a plan
to restore the once-dilapidated park to glory
following the takeover by DNR on a 30-year
lease from the city that began in 2013.
Since then, DNR, the Friends of the Detroit
River, the Belle Isle Conservancy, the Army
Corps of Engineers and other players have
worked on multiple renovation projects.
The island’s Blue Heron Lagoon on the east-
ern end of the island, formerly a closed body of
water, has been opened to the Detroit River as
part of a fish habitat improvement project. Blue
Heron Lagoon has, in turn, been connected to
Lake Okonoka, which has also been opened to
the river.
Thanks to donations and volunteers, the
Aquarium has reopened and continues to ex-
pand its exhibits. The historic Conservancy,
which, like the Aquarium, was designed by
famed architect Albert Kahn, is also undergo-
ing restoration work today.
DNR has also welcomed recreational offer-
ings, including kayak rentals, to the island.
And there are many more projects in planning
to further restore the island.
So perhaps some short-term inconvenience
is worth it for some long-term gain. At any rate,
fans of Belle Isle are not likely to let a little rain
dampen their enjoyment of a Detroit jewel.
Contact John Gallagher: 313-222-5173 or
gallagher@freepress.com.Follow him on Twit-
ter @jgallagherfreep.
inspector general has opened an investiga-
tion into the city’s support of Make Your Date.
“I’m never going to talk about my personal
life, as you well know,” Duggan said at a news
conference last month.
Staff writer Kathleen Gray contributed to
this report.
 HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!
Still time to make mom happy Windsor: She’s been here all along
Procrastinators have not run entirely out of time and can Columnist looks within to find pieces he’d sought for
still make mom’s day with any of these last-minute gifts. years since mother’s death; ready to let go, lovingly.
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PAUL WHELAN’S EMPLOYER HAD RUSSIAN TIES FREE PRESS INVESTIGATION

Spying case grows Nessel:

curiouser and curiouser More info
SPORTS, 1C
Greene a lesson needed on
nonprofit
in adaptability
Tigers reliever has coped
with surgeries, doubt, numb
fingers, and succeeded.
Attorney general looking into
program linked to Duggan
Joe Guillen and Kat Stafford Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK

While Wayne State University officials in-

sist that the Make Your Date nonprofit — un-
der scrutiny for its ties to Detroit Mayor Mike
Duggan — is dormant and inactive, the Michi-
gan attorney general is questioning the or-
ganization’s nonprofit status and had been
METRO, 4A
unable to get any answers for nearly three
Rochelle Riley months.
Inquiries from the attorney general’s office
says goodbye went ignored until Wednesday, when Make
Columnist leaving Free Press Your Date provided information to the state
but she will still be fighting about its operations — hours after the Free
for Detroit’s success. Press published an article about its lack of re-
sponse.
The attorney general’s office is looking into
Make Your Date’s fundraising practices, in-
cluding why it is not registered with the state
to solicit charitable donations and where the
donations ended up.
Kristen Jordan Shamus and Deirdre Shesgreen Detroit Free Press | USA TODAY NETWORK The newspaper’s review of Make Your
Date’s finances, organizational records and
Paul Whelan, the Michigan businessman accused of spying in Russia, entered fundraising activities shows that Make Your
Date used its nonprofit status in some in-
the country on a business travel visa supported by BorgWarner Inc., he told his
stances, including obtaining a federally is-
lawyers in Moscow. ❚ Whelan, 49, of Novi was the director of global security sued logo used prominently in its charitable
solicitations.
METRO, 3A for the Auburn Hills-based auto supplier when he traveled to Russia on Dec. 22
Several experts say Make Your Date’s setup
Who is your for the wedding of a friend. He was arrested six days later by the Russian Feder- is confusing. After reviewing financial docu-
ments obtained by the Free Press, they said it
Shining Light? al Security Service (FSB) and charged with espionage. ❚ He remains in a pris-
is difficult to reconcile claims of a dormant, in-
Honor those exceptional on cell at Moscow’s czarist-era Lefortovo Detention Facility, held without active nonprofit with annual fundraisers
leaders who are making a Make Your Date has held and also its routinely
much more information about the accusations against him than he knew on
positive impact. updated registrations with state and federal
the day when he was initially detained. See WHELAN, Page 15A agencies that suggest nonprofit activities.
The debate over the nonprofit status of
USA TODAY NETWORK ILLUSTRATION, PHOTO BY DMITRY SEREBRYAKOV/AP
Inside today’s Free Press See NONPROFIT, Page 16A
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Keith Matheny Detroit Free Press PFOS, one of 3M’s chief PFAS products, “is
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tion letter, referring to a compound used in
3M’s ScotchGard stain-protection product
line, among other uses.
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PFAS, the emerging contaminant causing a po- is more toxic to wildlife,” he stated, adding that
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16A ❚ SUNDAY, MAY 12, 2019 ❚ DETROIT FREE PRESS

Cover story A Free Press investigation

Nonprofit under scrutiny from Nessel

Continued from Page 1A saying then, if they have established them-
selves with the IRS.”
Make Your Date comes while the Detroit Office Wayne State officials have given the Free
of Inspector General investigates whether Press varying answers about how Make Your
Make Your Date received preferential treat- Date’s money is handled. They said last De-
ment from Duggan and the city. The probe was cember that Wayne State is Make Your Date’s
launched last month after a Free Press investi- fiduciary and identified other nonprofits for
gation showed the city directed $358,000 in which the university serves in that role. They
federal grants to Make Your Date and Duggan have said Make Your Date is entirely a Wayne
ordered a city-led fundraising effort for the State program. But then in April, a spokesman
program, which aims to prevent preterm birth for Hassan told the Free Press for the first time
in Detroit. that the Wayne State University Foundation
The Duggan administration and Wayne handles some of the organization’s donations.
State officials have been vehement in their po- Duggan, in defending the city’s support for
sitions that Make Your Date is entirely a uni- the organization, has joined Wayne State offi-
versity program and that the nonprofit — cials in characterizing Make Your Date as a
which happens to have a similar name — is dormant nonprofit. He predicted the city’s in-
dormant. City officials maintain the money spector general will also find the nonprofit
went to Wayne State and not the nonprofit. was inactive when the city directed federal
Days after the first Free Press report, Michi- grants to Make Your Date between 2015 and
gan Attorney General Dana Nessel’s office 2017.
confirmed that it, too, was reviewing issues “I am 100% confident when the OIG does
raised by newspaper. this they will find a dormant nonprofit that
The office’s queries into Make Your Date never spent any money, never took any mon-
began with a Feb. 13 letter seeking clarification ey, that never ever opened a bank account and
on its registration with the state. The letter re- Dr. Sonia Hassan, in red, sits with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan during the 2015 fundraising that the City of Detroit in no way did anything
quested a reply within 30 days but went unan- gala for Hassan’s Make Your Date program at MGM Grand Detroit. MAKEYOURDATE.ORG to support that,” Duggan said at a news con-
swered. The office sent a follow-up letter on ference last month. “Everything was in direct
April 22 reminding the nonprofit to respond partnership with the university.”
and advising that it is against Michigan law to troit’s efforts to reduce preterm birth after he partment of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs. Detroit Inspector General Ellen Ha has not
raise money without proper registration. was elected in 2013. The Make Your Date non- The logo is featured in fundraising materials, said when her report on Make Your Date will
In its response to the attorney general’s of- profit launched in 2014, but it was never oper- along with descriptions of Make Your Date as be released. Some have questioned whether
fice on Wednesday, Make Your Date included ational because the university took over the a nonprofit organization. Ha, who previously worked in the law depart-
its bylaws and requested an exemption from program, Wayne State officials have said. Several experts familiar with nonprofit reg- ment under Duggan, can be impartial.
requirements in state laws for charitable or- Make Your Date has raised more than $1.5 mil- ulations whom the Free Press interviewed ex- Wayne State and Make Your Date officials
ganizations. lion since its inception, according to Wayne pressed confusion about how the organization earlier this month refused to answer the Free
The Free Press began examining Make Your State. is set up because it has used its nonprofit sta- Press’ questions seeking clarification on how
Date’s operations and funding several months Make Your Date is designed to help preg- tus in various ways. Make Your Date solicits donations, where the
ago, after possible conflict of interest issues nant women deliver full-term babies. The or- Paul Streckfus, a former IRS tax official money goes and how its donations are report-
arose because of revelations about the may- ganization holds pregnancy education classes who runs an online publication devoted to ex- ed to the IRS. On Wednesday, Wayne State re-
or’s close ties to its director, Sonia Hassan, a and says it connects women to doctors and empt organizations, said Wayne State’s affili- iterated in a statement its stance that Make
noted Wayne State physician. Duggan and midwives, and provides other medical ser- ation with Make Your Date is irrelevant be- Your Date is a university program and not a
Hassan were seen on surveillance footage last vices. cause donors are writing checks in Make Your nonprofit organization.
year arriving at the same suburban residence. The Make Your Date nonprofit filed paper- Date’s name and the nonprofit entity has Despite Wayne State’s hesitance to discuss
The video prompted the mayor and his wife to work with the Internal Revenue Service last maintained its tax-exempt status with the the inner workings of Make Your Date, an at-
defend their marriage when the video became year to maintain its tax-exempt status and it IRS. torney for Hassan on April 23 threatened the
public in November. filed an annual report with the state. Hassan “The issue is that they are recognized by Free Press with a libel suit, demanding the
Duggan’s wife, Lori Maher, filed for divorce also registered a logo with the federal trade- the IRS as a tax-exempt entity,” said Streck- newspaper retract its characterization of
May 3. mark office last year, using the name of the fus, editor of the EO Tax Journal. “It doesn’t
Duggan handpicked Hassan to lead De- nonprofit as registered with the Michigan De- matter what Wayne State and the others are Continued on next page

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Cover story A Free Press investigation
Continued from previous page
Make Your Date as a nonprofit in previous cov-
erage.
“My client is not a public figure and has
never had her reputation attacked before. At
no point does the Free Press story cite a single
case where the nonprofit started by Dr. Has-
san got any money, any support, or any bene-
fit,” Thomas Cranmer, an attorney with the
Miller Canfield firm, wrote April 23 to the gen-
eral counsel for the Free Press’ parent compa-
ny, Gannett. The city has hired Miller Canfield
in the past for representation, notably in its
municipal bankruptcy case and the federal
demolition investigation.
“Dr. Hassan has been libeled, it was done
with malice, and it was done with full knowl-
edge the story was false,” Cranmer wrote. “If
you fail to move quickly to print a full retrac-
tion of the false allegations and apologize in
order to offset some of the damage to Dr. Has-
san’s reputation, we will take the necessary
legal action to clear her name.”
Through its attorney, the Free Press has re-
futed defamation and libel claims in its re-
sponse to Cranmer.
Nonprofit experts said it is difficult to un-
derstand officials’ explanation that Make Your
Date is entirely a Wayne State program with
no active nonprofit.
They point to the fact that Make Your Date
has maintained its tax-exempt status with the
IRS and the State of Michigan. And they point
to a logo obtained last year from the U.S. Pat-
ent and Trademark Office, which has been
used for fundraisers, the program’s website
and promotional items.
The fundraising brochure for Make Your
Date’s 2017 gala instructs donors to make their
checks out to the Make Your Date Detroit
501(c)(3), one of the IRS’s designations for a
nonprofit organization.
George W. Smith, a certified public accoun-
tant in Southfield who works with nonprofits,
reviewed Make Your Date’s regulatory filings
and fundraising documents and said the or-
ganization’s structure is unclear at best.
“They’ve done an outstanding job of blur-
ring everything to the point (of) how do I tell
you what’s right and what’s wrong?” Smith
said. “If it’s deliberate, they’ve done a hell of a
job and they should print a book on it.”
There has been no suggestion that Make
Your Date or Hassan have misused any funds.
Make Your Date created a brochure in 2017
for its annual gala downtown that sought do-
nations of up to $25,000.
Duggan, as the gala’s honorary chairman,
was featured on the brochure along with co-
median Louie Anderson, who was the head-
lining act. Individual tickets cost $250 and
event sponsorships ran between $2,500 and
$25,000.
Insignias for Wayne State, the City of De-
troit and the Detroit Medical Center were in-
cluded in the brochure as the event’s present-
ing sponsors. But nothing on the package in-
dicated Make Your Date is a program run by
Wayne State.
“Make Your Date Detroit is a nonprofit or-
ganization leading the way to ensure every
pregnant woman in every neighborhood in
Detroit knows that our great city is stepping
up to ensure she delivers a full-term healthy,
happy baby,” the sponsorship package said.
Legal experts said the brochure is an exam-
ple of how confusing Make Your Date’s struc-
ture is. If Wayne State runs the Make Your
Date program, then it should be clear to do-
nors that they are giving their money to
Wayne State.
“So, to me, that’s the question — who’s real-
ly soliciting? Is Wayne State soliciting or is
Make Your Date? If Make Your Date is not reg-
istered to do charitable solicitation, then they
shouldn’t be soliciting. Wayne State should be
soliciting,” said Sally Wagenmaker, a Chicago
lawyer who represents nonprofits.
Even references to Make Your Date on
Wayne State’s website are confusing. Despite
the university’s insistence that Make Your
Date is only a program of the university, its
Wayne State website for accepting donations
describes Make Your Date as a “powerful and
free nonprofit program, offered through the
City of Detroit.”
In the financial documents provided by the
university, there is a copy of a $5,000 dona-
tion from the Community Foundation of
Greater Flint in 2017 that includes the Make
Your Date nonprofit’s federal tax identifica-
tion number.
On its Facebook page, Make Your Date is
classified as a nonprofit organization. Infor-
mation about its ties to Wayne State is mini-
mal — visitors to its Facebook page only are
provided boilerplate information about Make
Your Date’s backers.
On the 2017 gala brochure, Make Your Date
is very specifically referred to as a 501(c)(3)
nonprofit. In other public-facing documents it
calls itself a “not-for-profit organization” a
designation that also conveys a charitable
purpose but has different requirements from a
nonprofit.
“With the support of the Mayor’s office,
major medical institutions, universities, foun-
dations, and insurance companies, we’ve
built a caring and supportive team dedicated
to turning the tide against dangerous preterm
births,” reads the “Our Story” section of Make
Mayor Mike Duggan said, “I am 100% confident when the OIG does this they will find a dormant nonprofit that never spent any money, never
took any money, that never ever opened a bank account and that the City of Detroit in no way did anything to support that.” MANDI WRIGHT/DFP
Your Date’s Facebook page.
Make Your Date’s 2017 gala brought in tens
of thousands of dollars, but the nonprofit did
not report the income to the IRS in its 2017 tax
return.
Make Your Date collected at least $59,000
from health care organizations and other
groups who sponsored the gala or bought
tickets to the event.
The donations included a $25,000 spon-
sorship by DMC and $20,000 from Henry Ford
Health System. Make Your Date financial rec-
ords obtained from Wayne State via the Free-
dom of Information Act do not indicate exact-
ly how many tickets Make Your Date sold for
the gala.
Make Your Date raised a total of $224,105 in
its 2017 fiscal year.
But when Make Your Date filed its 2017 tax
return, it reported that its income was less
than $50,000.
Hassan spokesman Bill Nowling previously
told the Free Press the Make Your Date non-
profit never opened a bank account or spent “a
single cent.”
“The nonprofit never received any funds
from any funder, the city or otherwise,” Now-
ling wrote in an email. “Make Your Date is a
program run by Wayne State University. WSU
manages all the organization’s finances, in-
cluding the receiving of outside funding, the
approving of expenses, and maintaining an-
nual budgets.”
Bruce R. Hopkins, author of “The Law of
Tax-Exempt Organizations” and a professor at
the University of Kansas School of Law, said
Make Your Date should be marketed either as
a university program or a stand-alone non-
profit.
“I don’t know quite what’s going on here,”
Hopkins said. “It’s either a program of the uni-
versity or it’s a separate nonprofit. I haven’t
the faintest idea which way it’s structured.”
A contract between Make Your Date and
the Detroit Medical Center in 2017 is also un-
clear about whether Make Your Date was op-
erating as a university program.
The contract spelled out DMC’s $25,000
donation to sponsor Make Your Date’s third
annual gala in 2017. DMC received 20 tickets to
the event, which included cocktails, dinner
and entertainment, according to the contract,
obtained by the Free Press via the Freedom of
Information Act.
As the recipient of the donation, Make Your
Date was listed on the contract as “Make Your
Date c/o Wayne State University, a nonprofit
organization.” Hassan signed the contract as
director of Make Your Date.
Experts in nonprofit regulations said the
contract language makes it difficult to tell
whether Make Your Date was a nonprofit enti-
ty or a Wayne State program when the con-
tract was signed.
“The way this is written it’s a bit ambigu-
ous,” said William Fournier, of Caplin & Drys-
dale, a Washington, D.C., law firm. “Including
it as ‘care of Wayne State’ suggests that they’re
trying to treat it as a program, but the recipient
signing the contract — signing as director of
Make Your Date — which suggests they’ve got
kind of legal authority to sign as a separate en-
tity,” said Fournier, who specializes in non-
profit tax requirements.
Smith said the contract language is vague,
and that he was unable to tell whether it is de-
liberate.
“Are they lazy, ignorant, (or) they just don’t
know what they’re doing,” he said. “I can’t tell
you enough with any of this to say which way
it is,” he said.
E2
“Are they lazy, ignorant, (or)
they just don’t know what
they’re doing. I can’t tell you
enough with any of this to say
which way it is.”
George W. Smith, a certified public accountant in
Southfield who works with nonprofits, talking about the
Make Your Date nonprofit
Another sign that Make Your Date’s non-
profit is up and running is the program’s use of
a trademarked logo.
The Make Your Date nonprofit corporation
received a trademark certificate in 2018 from
the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
The certificate was sent to “Make Your
Date, Inc.,” which is the nonprofit corporation
registered with the State of Michigan that city
and Wayne State officials claim has been in-
active since 2014.
Make Your Date’s trademark certificate de-
scribed its logo — a baby’s footprints inside
pink and blue hearts, which is prominently
displayed on the organization’s Facebook
page, website and promotional material.
The Make Your Date nonprofit has a seven-
member board currently headed by Hassan’s
sister, Susan Hassan. New members have
come and gone since the nonprofit was incor-
porated in 2014, according to regulatory fil-
ings.
The current board also includes Conrad
Mallett, CEO of DMC Sinai-Grace Hospital,
and David Cotton, who was CEO and founder
of Meridian Health Plan until it sold last year
to WellCare Health Plans for $2.5 billion. Nei-
ther Mallett nor Cotton could be reached for
comment.
A spokesman for Wayne State downplayed
the board’s role.
The board was set up when Make Your Date
launched and was applying for tax-exempt
status as a nonprofit organization. Make Your
Date opted to be run as a Wayne State program
instead of an independent nonprofit, spokes-
man Matt Lockwood wrote in an email last
month.
“Wayne State has never used a board to
govern the Make Your Date program. We have,
from time to time, consulted with voluntary
advisors on the development of the Wayne
State program, but those meetings were infor-
mal and did not have minutes or formal re-
ports,” Lockwood wrote.
Fundraising materials for Make Your Date
offer donors who give $100,000 or more a spot
on an “advisory board” and the “operating
committee” for the organization. But the ma-
terials aren’t clear on whether those are seats
on the board of directors.
Despite Lockwood’s characterization of the
board as idle, emails Sonia Hassan sent in
2017 suggest the board influenced Make Your
Date’s operations. The Free Press obtained the
emails through an open records request.
Hassan weighed the board’s input when
considering whether Make Your Date would
participate in the creation of a directory for
young expectant mothers.
“We would very much like to partner with
you,” Hassan wrote on Feb. 1, 2017, to a repre-
sentative of the National Council of Jewish
Women. “However, at this point would have to
present the plan of your project and some of
the logistics to our team overall. It’s also likely
our Board members would want to know a bit
more about this project before moving for-
ward as it could potentially impact some of
FREEP.COM ❚ SUNDAY, MAY 12, 2019 ❚ 17A
our partners — including the one we intend to
work with soon.”
Later that year, in August 2017, Sonia Has-
san anticipated the board’s reaction to an up-
coming public announcement involving Make
Your Date and SisterFriends, a city initiative.
In emails with Duggan Chief of Staff Alexis
Wiley and Joneigh Khaldun, the city’s then-
health director, Hassan debated contents of a
news release to announce the partnership.
Hassan wanted to modify the health direc-
tor’s quote in the release because it didn’t “op-
timally capture the spirit of the collaboration
…
“As written it implies that the current pro-
gram ignores the other issues a woman faces
— transportation, social issues, home visiting,
and more — which is not the case. Our pro-
gram, supporters, funders and board will be
surprised at the messaging — especially in
light of the success of the program thus far.
Perhaps we could focus on the message as dis-
cussed previously.”
Whether Make Your Date is a Wayne State
program or an independent nonprofit, a board
of directors for an organization its size would
be expected to keep meeting minutes, said
Smith, the Southfield accountant. If the IRS
were to audit Make Your Date, meeting min-
utes would be among the first things it re-
quests, Smith said.
“If you don’t have minutes, they’re going to
say you’re not even functioning like a nonprof-
it,” he said. “It’s not a requirement; it’s an ex-
pectation standard. Particularly in something
like this with nonprofits, they would expect to
see minutes.”
Ultimately, the setup for Make Your Date is
irrelevant when examining whether the or-
ganization received preferential treatment
from the city, said Leslie Lenkowsky, a profes-
sor at the Indiana University Lilly Family
School of Philanthropy.
“The organizational form doesn’t matter at
all,” Lenkowsky said.
The issue is whether the city’s conflict-of-
interest policies were followed in its support
of Make Your Date, he said.
Viki Harrison, director of state operations
for the nonpartisan grassroots organization
Common Cause, said the debate about wheth-
er Make Your Date is a nonprofit or solely a
university program doesn’t get at the heart of
the issue, which she said is the appearance of
a conflict of interest.
Common Cause is a national organization
that advocates for open and clean govern-
ment.
“Whether it goes to a nonprofit or a school,
that’s a bunch of background noise,” Harrison
said. “That doesn’t matter. She’s working with
the program over at Wayne State, too. ... He
has just put her in a bad situation.”
Harrison, whose expertise includes ethics
and accountability, said elected officials such
as Duggan should always be mindful that the
decisions they make could raise ethical and
morality concerns among their constituents.
“I think that our elected officials in this
country have to go above and beyond the law
to make sure there are no conflicts of interest
when you are talking about money,” Harrison
said.
Contact Joe Guillen at 313-222-6678 or
jguillen@freepress.com. Contact Kat Stafford
at kstafford@freepress.com or 313-223-4759.
❚ Coming Monday: Charity with close ties to
Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan flip-flops on
who handles its money.
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MONDAY, MAY 13, 2019 ❚ FREEP.COM PART OF THE USA TODAY NETWORK

2 YEARS INTO 5-YEAR PLAN

Handling
SUPERINTENDENT: of Make
METRO, 4A
Toys on display
WE’RE ON TRACK Your Date
as protest
The installation is critical of
immigration policy that
Vitti touts donations
progress
refuted
separates families.

in Detroit
schools
President: Foundation has
nothing to do with nonprofit
Joe Guillen and Kat Stafford
Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK

NATION+WORLD, 9A The nonprofit prenatal program under

Campus security
still debated
A Colorado school guard is a
hero, but experts remain
split how to secure schools.
Superintendent of Detroit Public Schools Community District Nikolai Vitti talks to students about their
concerns at the Student Leadership Development meeting on Friday. KIMBERLY P. MITCHELL/DETROIT FREE PRESS
John Wisely
Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY NETWORK
Two years after taking the helm of Detroit public
LIFE+MONEY, 1C schools, Superintendent Nikolai Vitti says a reform
plan is on track and the district is returning to “nor-
Secure your malcy” after a decade of emergency management.
The elected school board meets regularly, the bud-
debt-free future get is balanced and new systems are being put in
People who have climbed place to make the business side of the operation work
out of debt offer tips for again.
others to escape. “We’ve tackled a lot in two years spanning from
teacher pay to procurement to our budget, the strate-
gic plan to new curriculum,” he told the Free Press. “I
mean, all those things for most organizations and ad-
Inside today’s Free Press ministrations would take five years to do. We’ve done
❚ Obituaries ............................12A it in two in a district that had no systems or processes
❚ Comics ....................................2C to begin with.”
❚ Puzzles................................4-5C Hiring Vitti was the first major decision of the
❚ Movies ....................................6C newly elected school board, which took office in 2017.
“... overall attendance is up. Our vacancies have
improved from 275 when we started to 120 right
now, those are all proof points.”
Superintendent Nikolai Vitti
So far, the board is satisfied with his work, board Presi-
dent Iris Taylor said.
“I think we’ve done very well,” Taylor said. “When
you consider where we were and where we are now,
the district is focused and has a strong strategic
brand.”
Teachers withhold grade
Teachers are more skeptical and some parents are
taking a wait-and-see approach.
“We’ll hold our grade until we see the outcome of the
See SCHOOL REFORM, Page 7A
scrutiny because of connections between its
director and Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan has
defended itself by claiming its
donations were handled by
the Wayne State University
Foundation.
But it isn’t true.
Despite previous state-
ments from representatives of
Dr. Sonia Hassan that dona- Hassan
tions to the program were han-
dled by the foundation, its
president told the Free Press it actually has
nothing to do with Make Your Date.
Wayne State University Foundation Presi-
dent Susan Burns said claims the foundation
raised money for Make Your Date were incor-
rect. The foundation is a legally separate en-
tity from the university and handles its en-
dowment, but it is not legally registered to
seek charitable donations in the state of
Michigan.
“I think they’re confused. I think they mis-
spoke,” Burns told the Free Press last week.
Info filed with attorney general
The shifting explanation for how charita-
ble donations to Make Your Date are handled
comes as the organization is under scrutiny
by the Detroit Inspector General’s Office for
its ties to Duggan and by Michigan Attorney
See MAKE YOUR DATE, Page 6A

Weather
High 53° ❚ Low 40°
Rain. Forecast, 2A
Despite recalls and deaths, air bags help save lives
Jamie L. LaReau little time to react at 60 mph.
Detroit Free Press “The whole dashboard was on my legs,” said
USA TODAY NETWORK
Vaccher. “I saw this bright light and I truly thought

WEAHII-11000v In January 1997, Terri Vaccher saw a bright flash as

she slammed head-on into the trailer of a semi-truck.
She feared the flash of light was her life ending, but
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it was the exact opposite.
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Vaccher, who was 30 and eight months pregnant,
Classified: 586-977-7500; was in her Ford Explorer SUV on a freeway in Irvine,
800-926-8237 California, that day when a tractor-trailer in front of
her jackknifed and spun out across all lanes. She had
that I was going to die, but that light was actually the
air bag coming out.”
The impact of the air bag burned her arms and
slammed her into the seat, where her seat belt
cinched up hard to hold her in place.
She broke her left leg and knee and her right ankle. An air bag saved Terri Vaccher, who was 8
Rescuers spent an hour using the jaws of life to months pregnant when the Ford Explorer SUV
slammed into the trailer of a semi-truck in
See AIR BAGS, Page 6A Irvine, Calif. TERRI VACCHER

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6A ❚ MONDAY, MAY 13, 2019 ❚ DETROIT FREE PRESS
Cover stories
Make Your Date
Continued from Page 1A
General Dana Nessel for its fundraising
practices.
On May 8, Make Your Date submitted a re-
quest to the attorney general’s office for ex-
emption from requirements in state laws for
charitable organizations. The request was
submitted hours after the Free Press reported
that day that Make Your Date had ignored the
office’s prior inquires about its operations.
The Free Press began examining Make Your
Date’s operations and funding several months
ago, after possible conflict of interest issues
arose because of revelations about the may-
or’s close ties to its director, Hassan, a noted
Wayne State physician.
Duggan handpicked Hassan to lead De-
troit’s efforts to reduce preterm birth after he
was elected in 2013. As a result, Make Your
Date was launched in 2014. It is designed to
help pregnant women deliver full-term babies.
The organization holds pregnancy education
classes and says it connects women to doctors
and midwives, and provides other medical
services.
Burns’ admission that the foundation is not
involved in Make Your Date contradicts previ-
ous statements made by others to the Free
Air bags
Continued from Page 1A
extricate her, but “nothing from my belly up”
was injured. Two days later she gave birth to a
premature, but healthy, boy she named Do-
minic.
“I’m just very, very grateful,” said Vaccher. “I
absolutely believe, had I not had an air bag and
my seat belt on, I never would have survived
that.”
Vaccher’s experience illustrates what data
show: Working air bags save lives.
Which isn’t to say air bags are without trou-
bles. A typical air bag deploys at 200 mph, said
Becky Mueller, senior research engineer with
the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.
People have been hurt by them. In recent years,
millions of vehicles have been recalled for de-
fective air bags that killed at least 24 people.
Still, properly functioning air bags greatly
increase the odds of surviving a severe crash,
especially if the driver follows other basic safe-
ty rules.
The recalls
If people get a recall notice for a defective air
bag, safety experts say it is critical to go to a
dealership and get it repaired, which is free, as
soon as possible.
“The horror of this type of defect is that you
don’t need it until you need it,
and when you do need it, it’s
now going to be hurting you,”
said Jason Levine, executive di-
rector of the Center for Auto
Safety in Washington, D.C. “A
defective safety product is just
Mueller as terrible as defective brakes or
a steering wheel that prevents
steering.”
The most publicized air bag defect has been
the Takata recall. In fact, the National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration has dubbed it
“the largest and most complex safety recall in
U.S. history.”
It involves vehicles made by 19 different
automakers and more than 41.6 million vehi-
cles in the United States. Those
cars were recalled to replace
frontal air bags, made by parts
supplier Takata. The air bags
were mostly installed in 2002-15
model year cars. Some of those
air bags could deploy explosive-
Levine ly, injuring or even killing occu-
pants. At the end of March,
NHTSA reports that, worldwide,
300 have been hurt by the air bags in addition
to the 24 deaths.
In addition:
❚ Last month, U.S. auto safety regulators
said they were investigating about 12.3 million
air bags made by auto supplier ZF-TRW and in-
stalled in vehicles from Fiat Chrysler, Honda,
Hyundai, Kia, Mitsubishi and Toyota. These air
bags may have failed to deploy in crashes in-
volving at least eight deaths. The air bags are
used in model-year vehicles 2010-19, said a
government document.
❚ On May 6, NHTSA said that two owners of
the Mazda CX-9 large SUV complained that the
side curtain air bags can inflate for no reason.
Four people were hurt in one of those cases.
Regulators are investigating the complaint and
said the probe covers CX-9s from the 2010-13
model years. Investigators will determine the
possibility of a recall.
Lives saved
Frontal air bags have been standard equip-
Press during its months-long investigation
concerning possible conflict of interest be-
cause of to ties between Hassan, its director,
and Duggan.
Foundation role repeated claim
The involvement of the Wayne State Foun-
dation in Make Your Date’s fundraising was
central to claims from Hassan’s representa-
tives that Make Your Date was not operating
as a nonprofit program when it received
$358,000 in federal grants from the city and
other donations that totaled more than $1.5
million since 2014.
The Free Press reported last week that the
Michigan attorney general is questioning the
organization’s nonprofit status and had been
unable to get any answers for nearly three
months. Several experts interviewed by the
newspaper said Make Your Date’s setup is
confusing and that it is difficult to reconcile
claims of a dormant, inactive nonprofit with
annual fundraisers Make Your Date has held.
Officials have said that money was not re-
ported to the Internal Revenue Service be-
cause Make Your Date is a Wayne State pro-
gram and not a nonprofit organization.
But in its investigation into Make Your Date
and the organization’s nonprofit status, the
Free Press obtained a 2017 fundraising bro-
chure that referred to Make Your Date as a
“I’m just very, very grateful,” said Terri Vaccher. “I absolutely believe, had I not had an air bag and my seat belt on, I never would have survived
that.” Vaccher gave birth to her son two days after this crash in 1997.
ment in all cars since model year 1998 and in all
SUVs, pickups and vans since model year 1999.
Air bags reduce the chance of an upper body
or head injury during a crash. According to
NHTSA data:
❚ In frontal crashes, frontal air bags reduce
driver fatalities by 29 percent and fatalities of
front-seat passengers age 13 and older by 32
percent.
❚ NHTSA estimates that the combination of
an air bag plus a seat belt reduces the risk of
death in frontal crashes by 61 percent.
❚ From 1987-2015, frontal air bags saved
44,869 lives.
❚ In 2016, air bags are esti-
mated to have saved 2,756 peo-
ple.
One of those lives was Lynne
McChristian. Early one morning
in September 1999, McChristian
was driving to work in Tampa.
McChristian As she turned left, an oncom-
ing car plowed into the passen-
ger side of her new Toyota Cam-
ry. The air bag in the steering wheel exploded in
her face and her seat belt constricted with such
force it broke her collarbone, she said. The car
was totaled, but she was alive. She credits her
life mostly to the air bag.
“The seat belt alone might not have been
enough to prevent further damage to me,” said
McChristian, a spokeswoman for the Insur-
ance Information Institute, a trade group fo-
cused on insurance education. “I could have hit
that steering wheel with the force of that im-
pact. That could have meant severe head trau-
ma and facial damage.”
Sometimes, the force required to quickly in-
flate air bags can injure people if they are seat-
ed too close to the air bag before it deploys,
IIHS’s Mueller said. The first generations of
frontal air bags did injure a lot of people, ex-
perts say, because they deployed with greater
force than those on later model cars.
NHTSA estimates that more than 290
deaths were the result of frontal air bag infla-
501(c)(3), one of the IRS’s designations for a
nonprofit organization.
Although the brochure instructed donors to
make their checks out to the Make Your Date
Detroit 501(c)(3), Hassan spokesman Bill
Nowling claimed last month that the Wayne
State University Foundation collected the
money.
“The 501(c)(3) referred to is the WSU Foun-
dation,” Nowling wrote in an April 3 email to
the Free Press. “Make Your Date Detroit is the
name the WSU Foundation used to solicit for
the WSU-run program.”
Mistakes were made
When told of the foundation president’s de-
nial, Nowling said last week that his previous
claim about the foundation’s fundraising role
was taken from a Wayne State website that in-
dicated online donations to Make Your Date
would be processed by the foundation.
“Do I verify every fact that Wayne State
puts out there? No,” Nowling said, emphasiz-
ing that Hassan is his client and not Wayne
State. “I assume they’re correct.”
The website Nowling was referring to has
been edited to remove the reference to the
foundation. Nowling said he did not know
anything about the edits to Wayne State’s
website for its fundraising platform, Warrior-
Funder.
Terri Vaccher, 52, poses with her son, Dominic
Vaccher, 22. Terri was 8 months pregnant
with Dominic when an air bag saved them in
an crash with a semi-truck’s trailer.
PHOTOS BY TERRI VACCHER
tion in low-speed crashes from 1990-2008.
Most of those deaths were in vehicles made be-
fore 1998, and more than 80 percent of people
killed were not wearing a seat belt.
But in recent years, advanced government
requirements have made serious injuries from
properly functioning air bags rare. Technology
has helped too. Sensors enable air bags to
know if a 100-pound person is sitting close to
the air bag or a 200-pound person is reclined in
a seat, and “they can adjust to how soon, fast
and how stiff that air bag deploys by those sen-
A Wayne State spokesman said Wednesday
that references to the foundation were a mis-
take that was noticed the week prior and were
removed. He did not indicate exactly when the
changes were made.
Claims about the Wayne State Foundation’s
role in handling Make Your Date’s donations
also came from Hassan’s attorney, Thomas
Cranmer of the Miller Canfield firm.
In an April 23 letter to the Free Press threat-
ening a libel suit, Cranmer wrote that all of the
organization’s fundraising had been done
solely through the university foundation.
“All charitable donations made to the Make
Your Date program from its inception have
gone exclusively to the Wayne State Univer-
sity Foundation,” Cranmer wrote. “... The WSU
Foundation runs fundraising campaigns for all
aspects of the university.”
Cranmer had a different assessment of the
foundation involvement last week when told
of Burns’ comments that it is not tied to Make
Your Date.
“Wayne State University handles the finan-
cial transactions for Make Your Date through
its infrastructure. Wayne State University is
itself a 501(c)(3) and raised all of the money for
Make Your Date. WSU processed the gifts to
Make Your Date and WSU issued the donor re-
ceipts,” Cranmer wrote in the email.
Free Press staff writer Gina Kaufman con-
tributed to this report.
sors,” said Mueller.
Air bag injuries today are typically minor
and far less life threatening than the situation
the person would have faced without an air
bag, Mueller said.
“But we understand it could be a dangerous
thing in the wrong context,” said Mueller.
“That’s why if you’re in a fender bender at 5
mph, your air bag doesn’t deploy because
there’s some risk in that” deployment.
Sensing a crash
Here are some safety tips drivers and pas-
sengers should follow when driving in a car
with air bags:
❚ Wear the seat belt. It helps save lives and
minimize injury.
❚ Shorter people should maintain 10 inches
between the steering wheel and their chest.
The first 2 inches of an air bag deploying have
the most force.
❚ Never put your feet on the dashboard.
❚ Hold the steering wheel at the 3-and-9 or
4-and-7 positions and do not have your hands
on the center part marked “air bag.”
❚ Pay attention to the road to avoid a colli-
sion in the first place.
Finally, safety experts say government tests
air bags regularly to ensure they are as protec-
tive as possible, because if a person is in a high-
speed crash, that person is better protected
with a functioning air bag than without one.
“They are a highly tuned feature on your car
that is far more intelligent than you can imag-
ine,” said Mueller. “They can sense a crash
within milliseconds of hitting another vehicle
or object. Air bags can deploy between 10 to 40
milliseconds of having a crash — that’s a blink
of an eye.”
Contact Jamie L. LaReau: 313-222-2149 or
jlareau@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter
@jlareauan. Read more on General Motors and
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