Tornadoes may be possible for a second consecutive night across much of lower Michigan on Friday, with parts of metro Detroit likely to experience thunderstorms, according to the National Weather Service.

Subscribe to the Detroit Evening Report on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

The strongest storms are expected to pass through the region between 10 p.m. and 3 a.m., with winds up to 55 mph and up to 1-inch size hail possible.

Several counties in West Michigan, mid-Michigan and metro Detroit are still recovering from the severe storm that passed through the area overnight Friday, bringing high winds and power outages for thousands of residents.

Roughly 9,000 DTE  customers and 185,000 Consumers Energy customers were still without power as of Friday morning, according to outage maps. Officials warn to stay at least 20 feet away from downed power lines and to keep children and pets inside.

Residents can report fallen power lines to DTE Energy by calling 800-477-4747 or to Consumers Energy by calling 800-477-5050.

Other headlines for Friday, May 16, 2025:

• The Detroit Fire Department is continuing its Summer Safety Series every second Wednesday of the month through August, covering seasonal fire safety tips, prevention strategies and more.
• The Coleman A. Young Recreation Center has reopened after a five-year closure and $11 million renovation. The city of Detroit now has 13 recreation centers open to the public.
• Movement Festival is coming to Hart Plaza Memorial Day weekend, May 24-26, featuring more than 115 local and international techno artists across six stages. WDET is an official media partner for the event. Learn how you could win VIP passes to this year’s festival at wdet.org/movement.

Do you have a community story we should tell? Let us know in an email at detroiteveningreport@wdet.org.

Several tornado warnings and watches were issued across southeast Michigan overnight on Friday, as a line of severe storms made its way across the state.

A tornado warning was in effect for Lapeer County, Genesee County, Livingston County and parts of Oakland County, according to the National Weather Service. A tornado watch was in effect for all of southeast Michigan through 5 a.m. Friday. Tornado warnings were issues for several West Michigan counties as well.

The storm left thousands without power in West Michigan, Mid-Michigan and metro Detroit, according to Consumers Energy, Great Lakes Energy, and DTE outage maps.

Friday will be mostly sunny with a high of 84 degrees. Rain is forecasted for Friday evening, with scattered thunderstorms expected to continue through the weekend.

For over 70 years, the Michigan Department of Education has annually selected a teacher of the year. The winner then serves as a representative and advocate for teachers across the state.

Last week, Cory Rosser  — an alternative education teacher at Quest High School in North Branch, Michigan  — was named the 2025-26 Teacher of the Year. Now in his 22nd year of teaching at Quest, Corey teaches social studies and Imagine Learning courses for students in grades 10-12.

Corey joined The Metro on Wednesday to discuss the Teacher of the Year honor and his approach to creating an engaging environment for students in class.

Use the media player above to hear the full conversation.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

More stories from The Metro

Singer-songwriter Ryan Allen has never stopped, literally. The metro Detroit-based multi-instrumentalist has never stopped writing, recording and performing.

Even when his primary band, Extra Arms, is on hiatus, he’s at it again with a new solo album that drops this weekend, capped off by a show at Bowlero Lanes Lounge on Friday. Allen and I go way back; we were both scrappy music journalists in our early 20’s when we first met — albeit even back then it was something more of a side-hustle, but I digress…

You can hear Allen and I not only talk about the broad subject of nostalgia, but also hear us drill down on how it informs and inspires the music we love and the music we write! Allen’s new album, “Livin’ On a Prayer on the Edge,” taps into that singular exhilaration we all felt as teenagers when we were discovering the music that would come to define us, while also ruminating on the way music can sweetly sculpt our memories of those formative days.

I am a nostalgic person,” Allen said, “as much as I wish sometimes that i wasn’t. But I’m not someone who wishes it was like the old days…”

As mentioned during the interview, there’s an underlying theme of enduring, that prevails throughout the album, and what better to endure than timeless music?

“Like Teenage Fanclub and those other ’90s bands like Matthew Sweet records, which all had that kinda jangly, open chord, big sounding poppy rock sound, that was what I really was drawn to as a teenager,” he said. “Just something about that warm blanket of distortion and melody — that is that sweet spot for me musically. And [“Livin’ On a Prayer on the Edge“] definitely is an homage to all of that stuff!”

While Allen was hanging out with me in-studio, he also performed an acoustic version of “When I’m Gone,” off his new album!

Along with Allen’s interview, I also premiered lots of new local music — particularly leaning in to indie-rock vibes with Zastava‘s “Truth,” a lead single from their forthcoming album; and Gloomco, with ‘Wake Up,’ the second single from their forthcoming release, “Nothing Left to Say.”

Another local group with an album out this weekend is the dream-pop/shoegaze ensemble Origami Phase. I premiered a new song from their EP “Ostara,” which has its release party this Friday at Small’s in Hamtramck.

But wait, there’s more! We also heard from Ann Arbor folk/Americana/jazz singer-songwriter Jess Merritt, who has an album release show this Sunday at The Ark.

Another reliable facet of MI Local is that you’ll hear from artists based all around the state of Michigan, including The Charlie Millard Band, who came out of the “northern” part of the “lower” peninsula — they have a new album out soon titled Pilot Boy, and we heard their new single, “Wedding Bells.”

See the playlist below and listen to the episode on-demand for two weeks after it airs using the media player above.

MI Local Playlist for May 13, 2025

• “Wake Up” – Gloomco
• “Fake Lives” – The Messenger Birds
• “Wedding Bells” – Charlie Millard Band
• “Lakeside” – Jess Merritt
• “Complicate Me” – Outrageous Cherry
• “Truth” – Zastava
• “I’m Team Edward” – drive safe!
• “Lilith” – Origami Phase
• “Sober” – sock jock
• “I Should (But I Don’t Really Wanna)” – Ryan Allen
• “When I’m Gone” – Ryan Allen (live in WDET Studios)
• “So What Who Cares” – Ryan Allen

A Michigan judge has granted a permanent injunction against three of the state’s remaining abortion restrictions, declaring they violate the Reproductive Freedom for All constitutional amendment voters passed in 2022.

The court’s ruling affirms the amendment established even broader reproductive rights for Michigan citizens than they had under Roe v. Wade, and eliminates a 24-hour mandatory waiting period, a mandatory informed consent form, and a ban on advanced practice clinicians performing abortions. The court had previously granted a temporary injunction against these three restrictions last year.

Tuesday’s ruling did, however, uphold the legality of one of the laws challenged by the plaintiffs, Northland Family Planning Centers and Medical Students for Choice: a law requiring abortion providers to counsel and screen patients for “coercion to abortion,” and requiring clinics post notices that it’s illegal in Michigan to coerce someone to have an abortion.

Abortion rights supporters argued the restrictions were medically unnecessary and intended to create barriers to abortion.

“It’s about time that these unnecessary and stigmatizing barriers to care are finally thrown out for good,” said Renee Chelian, executive director of Northland Family Planning Centers, said in a press release Tuesday. Northland Family Planning filed the lawsuit last year with Medical Students for Choice, along with the Center for Reproductive Rights.

“Our patients no longer have to worry that they may not be able to get the time-sensitive care they need. These restrictions are an insult to our patients, who know what’s best for themselves,” Chelian said.

But abortion rights opponents, who campaigned against the 2022 ballot proposal, said the ruling was “bad news for women.”

“At the same time, abortion complications have skyrocketed, removing standardized informed consent about abortion procedures, possible complications, and alternatives to abortion is a disservice to women,” Genevieve Marnon of Right to Life of Michigan said via email.

State data shows that in 2023, “total immediate complications” following an abortion occurred at an average rate of 5.1 for every 10,000 abortions performed. Between 2020-2022, before the constitutional amendment, the average rate was 1.6 for for every 10,000 abortions performed. Both are far below the most recent data available for complications following hospital deliveries. The state abolished its mandatory abortion reporting system in 2024.

“The injunction demonstrates how radical and abortion obsessed our state has become,” Marnon said.

What did these abortion restrictions mean? 

On paper, the restrictions being challenged sound pretty straight-forward: only physicians can provide abortions, and patients have to sign an informed consent form and wait 24 hours.

But abortion providers said at least 150 people a month would miss their appointments, because patients would make a mistake with the paperwork process required to meet the state’s 24-hour mandatory waiting period and consent form. That includes patients who’ve increasingly been traveling from out-of-state since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022.

In practice, the waiting period and informed consent requirements have been combined into a single form, accessible only through a state website, that patients had to sign no more than two weeks, but no less than 24 hours, before their appointment, then print the time-stamped form and bring it to their appointment.

Renee Chelian, the founder and executive director of Northland’s clinics, testified about a patient who “came in at 23.6 weeks (the legal cut-off in Michigan) but who had not printed the time-stamped form from the DHHS website,” the Michigan Court of Claims Judge Sima G. Patel wrote in the order issued Tuesday. That patient had to be referred to providers in other states, because Northland “could not legally provide the service the next day.”

Other patients were “denied a medication abortion” (which is an option in the first 11 weeks of pregnancy) and instead were “forced to undergo a more invasive procedure with higher risk because of the 24-hour delay,” the order said.

The judge cited figures provided by Chelian estimating “that approximately 10 patients were turned away each month for failure to provide” the required forms.

The court ruled that the 24-hour mandatory waiting period “burdens and infringes on patients’ rights to reproductive freedom” by “increasing costs, prolonging wait times, increasing the risk that a patient will have to disclose their decision to others, and potentially forcing the patient to forgo a medication about for a more invasive procedure.”

Other materials patients were required to review, which included information about contraception and fetal development, are “coercive and stigmatizing,” the court ruled.

And the limitation on abortion providers, which effectively bans advanced practice clinicians like nurse practitioners from providing abortions “arbitrarily limits abortion providers to physicians only,” according to the ruling. That “exacerbates existing provider shortages, leading to large swathes of Michigan without access to nearby abortion care.”

But the judge disagreed with plaintiffs that state requirements to screen for someone being coerced to get an abortion “burden or infringe” on a patient’s access to the procedure, as “nothing in the statutes requires providers to ask specific or direct questions” and providers can “tailor their questions and interact with patients in an organic way.”

What the ruling means for future abortion battles

Since Michigan voters passed some of the broadest reproductive rights in the nation, numerous other states have followed suit. But Michigan has also illustrated how it’s one thing to have those rights on paper, while in reality, figuring out what they mean in practice requires years of legislative and legal battles.

Democrats have previously tried, and failed, to get several of these restrictions overturned in Lansing. And that was even when their party controlled all three branches of state government. Since then, abortion rights supporters have turned to the courts as the next-best option, in this case as well as others.

But abortion rights opponents say Michigan voters never intended to create rights beyond those protected under Roe, and point to efforts to repeal the state’s ban on Medicaid funding for abortions and parental consent laws as “radical” and out-of-step with the majority.

In this ruling, the court specifically lays out how Michigan’s constitutional amendment provides abortion protections beyond what Roe guaranteed. “Michigan voters dramatically changed the Michigan Constitution by adopting the RFFA,” the judge wrote.

A fetus would count as a dependent for Michigan taxes under a bill getting hearing Tuesday before the state House Finance Committee.

The bill would apply to people who are at least 10 weeks pregnant by the end of the tax year. A doctor would have to verify that pregnancy status.

State Rep. Gina Johnsen (R-Lake Orion) sponsors the bill. In an interview, Johnsen said she hopes it encourages more people to start families.

“Everything costs more to just survive, raise a family, take care of yourself. But, even starting at pregnancy, the costs go up. And this bill is to recognize that that’s when the costs start, not just when a child is born,” Johnsen said.

The personal exemption allowed under Michigan tax law is adjusted each year. For the 2024 tax year, it added up to $5,600 for each person and dependent.

Critics of the bill question whether it would truly provide enough support for new families.

Danielle Atkinson is the founder of the group Mothering Justice. Atkinson said she’s skeptical the bill would provide meaningful help for mothers.

“If this was in good faith, we would definitely be looking at the true cost of care, money that’s lost when you are out of work. And just overall what it takes to raise a child in this society,” Atkinson said.

She estimated it costs upwards of $14,000 each year to raise an infant, when accounting for childcare, food, clothes and other costs. Meanwhile, she raised concerns that the legislation could also have implications for talks around access to abortion.

In 2022, Georgia became the first state that offers such a tax exemption for fetuses after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. That legislation was tied to Georgia’s fetal heartbeat law.

Johnsen said her bill, however, was based on the federal WIC program. That program offers food assistance to low income pregnant people, nursing mothers, and families of young children.

“I just want the moms to have an opportunity to have some assistance here and recognize that this is financially more difficult than not having a baby,” Johnsen said.

But Atkinson said expanding other programs, like Rx Kids, which gives checks to mothers of newborns are better uses of time and money.

“We have to think in the totality of when we’re talking about moms and families and babies, what does the most good and we need to put our attention and our resources behind those initiatives,” Atkinson said.

The bill is inching along in the state legislature at a time when House Republicans are also calling for across-the-board income tax cuts, setting aside more funding for roads, and cutting back budget spending.

Democrats have pushed back, arguing that those policies could put public services and social safety net spending at risk. Senate Democrats, however, have still called for the creation of what they describe as a “working parents tax credit.”

Johnsen defended her push for another cut, saying there are places to cut waste in the budget.

“We say we’re looking out for the most vulnerable. Well, the most vulnerability are the babies and the pregnant moms and the elderly and the veterans. They have to come first. Or we don’t have a thriving and strong society,” Johnsen said.

She said she expects the bill to come to a vote in the Michigan House of Representatives within the coming weeks.

Detroit at Play is a workshop series led by the Taubman Visualization Lab at the University of Michigan. 

Last month, in collaboration with the Boys and Girls Club of Southeastern Michigan, high school students developed software engineering skills and designed video games. 

Devaughn Washington is a 9th grade student who participated in the program. His team developed the game “Junkyard Mayhem,” where players find supplies in a junkyard and use it to fix up homes in a virtual Detroit-inspired world. 

Washington joined The Metro to discuss the collaborative process of creating a game with a team of peers and what he learned. Director of the Taubman Visualization Lab Ishan Pal-Signh also joined the show.

Use the media player above to hear the full conversation.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

More stories from The Metro

In this epsiode of MichMash, host Cheyna Roth and Gongwer News Service’s Alethia Kasben and Zach Gorchow sit down with State Senator Mallory McMorrow to discuss why she’s running for Michigan’s open US Senate seat.

Plus, people have grown accustomed to remote work since the pandemic, but is it here to stay? We discuss how remote work has affected state government employees and whether Gov. Gretchen Whitmer will have them return to in-person work full time.

Subscribe to MichMash on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

In this episode:

• Is remote work here to stay for state government employees?
• Discussing the cost of remote work
• State Senator Mallory McMorrow on her run for Michigan’s open US Senate seat

Democrats nationally have been struggling to form an identity since the recent presidential elections. McMorrow said that while establishment Democrats may not be meeting the moment, newer voices could help give the party a stronger sense of direction. 

“My sense is that the Democratic Party needs a shakeup, but that’s not going to come from the party itself,” she said. “It is going to come again from candidates and people, in every state across the country, running the types of campaigns that are going to reshape what this party is, how it presents itself.”

In addition to McMorrow, former Wayne County Health Director Abdul El-Sayed and 11th Congressional District Representative Haley Stevens are also running for the state’s open senate seat as Democrats. The election will take place Nov. 3, 2026.  

Michigan has now moved to universal blood lead testing for children under six years old through universal testing. 

Lead is a naturally occurring toxin that harms children, impacting their health and development.  

Angela Medina, care coordination section manager at the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS), said children can get assistance if they have elevated blood lead levels.

“Previous to universal testing, Michigan was considered a targeted testing state, meaning all children that are enrolled in Medicaid should be tested for lead at ages one and two, and all other children not enrolled in Medicaid should have a conversation, their parents should have a conversation with health care providers about certain risk factors to determine if they’re at risk for lead exposure, and if they are, then they should be tested,” she said.

However, now with universal testing, the requirement is now that physicians test all children at ages one and two, regardless of their insurance.

Children with elevated blood lead levels, at 3.5 micrograms per deciliter or higher, are eligible for MDHHS services and through other local health departments to lower the blood lead level.

That includes in-home nursing case management to educate families about nutrition and safe cleaning, and connecting with the lead Safe Home Program for an environmental investigation to identify the source of exposure to remove it, she explained.

The new changes expand the coverage for all children under 6 years old to get tested, including those on all insurance plans.

“The only way to know if you have an exposure to lead is to have your blood tested, and the only way to treat is to remove that exposure source. If a child is being exposed to lead, it’s very important that we go through these processes to identify and remove that exposure so they can continue to grow and develop in a healthy way,” she said.

She said children should get tested at 12 months, and then again at 24 months.

“This is typically when exposure levels peak for most children. So both of those testing intervals are very important to make sure the child continues not to be exposed to lead,” she expanded.

Medina says the new expansion of coverage will allow more kids to get tested.  She said this is preventative health service under the federal Affordable Care Act.

“It must be covered without any additional co-payments or co-insurance charges,” she said. “Most private insurance is covered by the Affordable Care Act, and Medicaid also covers blood lead testing, so insurance companies should cover the cost of the blood lead test the children are receiving.”

She said if you have a child who’s never been tested for lead and they are under the age of six, talk to your health care provider about getting tested.  

For more information, visit michigan.gov/mileadsafe. 

City leaders joined with community members and stakeholders on Wednesday to celebrate the grand opening of a new affordable housing complex at the historic St. Matthew School on Detroit’s east side.

Subscribe to the Detroit Evening Report on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Renamed The Residences at St. Matthew, the building had previously been vacant for almost a decade. Now the residence will offer 46 new affordable apartments with 36 one-bedroom, four two-bedroom and six studio units. Twenty-five of the units are reserved for permanent supportive housing for individuals who were unhoused. The rest of the units will serve folks making 30%-60% of the area median income.

The Residences at St. Matthew is part of the national Healthy Housing Initiative launched by Catholic Charities USA. The Catholic Charities of Southeast Michigan, who spearheaded the renovation, will have the residence serve both affordable housing needs and health services delivered through a partnership with Henry Ford St. John Hospital.

“This redevelopment represents the heart of Catholic Charities’ mission — to create hope, foster dignity, and build community,” said Paul Propson, CEO of CCSEM, in a statement. “We are proud to honor the legacy of St. Matthew’s Parish by helping meet a critical need for affordable housing in Detroit.”

Other headlines for Friday, May 9, 2025:

• The My Mental Wellness clinic inside the Islamic Center of Detroit will host a mental health first aid training from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Saturday, May 10.
• Southwest Detroit music venue El Club closed down Saturday due to what the general manager described as “police intimidation,” Detroit Metro Times reports.
• The late Detroit funk and soul ‘ambassador’ Amp Fiddler is being honored on May 16 with his own street — Amp Fiddler Ave. The city of Detroit, in collaboration with the Amp Fiddler Estate, will reveal the street sign on the corner of 7 mile Rd and Revere St.
  All are welcomed to attend.

Do you have a community story we should tell? Let us know in an email at detroiteveningreport@wdet.org.

The Michigan Global Talent Initiative released a report saying Michigan is on track to add 125,000 college-educated immigrants to the state’s job market as part of the state’s Sixty by 30 goal.

The goal aims to have 60% of Michigan’s workforce to obtain a post-secondary degree or professional credential by 2030.

Steve Tobocman, executive director at Global Detroit, says the state has added nearly 55,000 new college educated foreign born individuals, or immigrants, to the job market since 2019.

“We created an ambitious plan with business and state government and local Chambers of Commerce to almost double that and raise the number of high-skilled immigrants joining the Michigan economy to 120,000 to 125,000 by the year 2030,” he said.

Tobocman says Michigan is also the first state to develop a comprehensive immigrant inclusion strategy to help the group reach its goals.

“If we had done nothing, had no strategy around immigrant talent, we probably would have added 65,000 college-educated immigrant workers to the workforce by 2030, which would roughly mean about 12% of the overall goal,” he said,

Tobocman says Michigan has over 38,000 international students who account for 70% of the graduate school students in advanced STEM fields. However, students need support to integrate into jobs and stay in Michigan post-graduation.

“While the nation is having its own debates about border security and the right frame of immigration, this kind of talent initiative is one that has received bipartisan support, that the first appropriations happened under the Republican legislature,” he said.

Still, he says, the initiative is seeking funding to continue these programs.

From May 20-22, Global Detroit and the city of Detroit will co-host “Welcoming Interactive,” gathering leaders to welcome immigrants and provide resources.

Tobocman’s conversation with WDET’s Nargis Rahman was featured on The Metro this week. Take a listen below.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

More stories from The Metro

Enforcement for the Real ID Act starts on May 7. State issued driver’s licenses and IDs that are not Real ID compliant will no longer be accepted at checkpoints at the airport.

A Real ID in Michigan will have either a gold circle with star design or a Michigan silhouette with star.

The Real ID Act was passed in 2005 as an effort to create a national standard for obtaining an identification card.

You can still convert your ID to a REAL ID after the deadline at a Secretary of State.

When do I need a REAL ID?

• When boarding a domestic flight in the U.S.
• When entering a military base or nuclear power plant
• When visiting certain federal buildings

How Is the REAL ID different from my Enhanced ID?

An Enhanced ID allows for border and sea crossings — for example: you can enter Canada by land or sea, but you cannot fly into the country. You cannot use an Enhanced ID in place of a passport. An Enhanced ID is an acceptable form of identification for domestic flights.

What do I need to get a REAL ID?

Visit a Secretary of State office and bring:

• Your current state-issued ID
• A valid, unexpired U.S. passport, birth certificate, or qualifying immigration document such as an I-551 Permanent Resident Card or foreign passport with a U.S. visa. If you have specific questions about documents that qualify, please contact the Department of State Information Center at (888) SOS-MICH (767-6424)
• A certified legal name-change document, if your name is different from what is on your birth certificate

There’s no added charge for converting to REAL ID if you do so at the time of renewing or replacing your license or ID. Otherwise, there is a correction fee ($9 for license; $10 for ID) to convert to REAL ID.

I don’t have a REAL ID. Can I still fly domestically?

Yes, but expect longer wait times and additional screening at checkpoints.

Other forms of acceptable ID for domestic flights include:

• State-issued Enhanced Driver’s License (EDL) or Enhanced ID (EID)
• U.S. passport
• U.S. passport card
• DHS trusted traveler cards (Global Entry, NEXUS, SENTRI, FAST)
• U.S. Department of Defense ID, including IDs issued to dependents
• Permanent resident card
• Border crossing card
• An acceptable photo ID issued by a federally recognized Tribal Nation/Indian Tribe, including Enhanced Tribal Cards (ETCs)
• HSPD-12 PIV card
• Foreign government-issued passport
• Canadian provincial driver’s license or Indian and Northern Affairs Canada card
• Transportation Worker Identification Credential (TWIC)
• U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Employment Authorization Card (I-766)
• U.S. Merchant Mariner Credential
• Veteran Health Identification Card (VHIC)

Do I need a REAL ID to vote?

All state-issued identification cards will be accepted at voting polls. Voters who do not have valid state-issued identification or another accepted identity document may sign an Affidavit of Identity.

Can non-US citizens apply for a REAL ID?

If you are a lawfully present non-U.S. citizen, including permanent and non-permanent residents, you are eligible to apply for a REAL ID driver’s license or ID card or turn your current Michigan driver’s license or state ID into a REAL ID. In either case, you’ll need to schedule an office visit at a Michigan Secretary of State branch office and bring the required legal presence document. It’s important to note that some documents already in the possession of non-US citizens qualify as REAL ID and will be acceptable for flying domestically when the law goes into effect on May 7, 2025. These include:  

• Permanent resident card
• Foreign government-issued passport
• Canadian provincial driver’s license or Indian and Northern Affairs Canada card
• U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Employment Authorization Card (I-766)