Sara Beer doesn’t just show up at the East Lansing Farmers’ Market on Sunday mornings with homemade granola and a great smile. A tremendous amount of work goes into every week of selling Spoonful of Granola at the Market, and for Beer, that work is a labor of love.

“My favorite thing,” she says,” is to see people love what I do. I like the fact that I’m making something homemade that’s not full of sugar, and is pretty much a super food – it covers all the food groups if you add dairy.”

When large development projects come before East Lansing's Planning Commission for possible approval, citizens are normally alerted by a public hearing notice. Because the proposed ten-story downtown building being reviewed this Wednesday at 7 pm at Planning Commission has been previously discussed, no such notice is required to be issued and many citizens appear unaware that a major decision may be made this Wednesday on this project. In public discussions around the plan, some citizens strongly favor any possible progress at the long-blighted site, at the corner of Abbot Road and Grand River Avenue. Others have serious reservations about the proposed plan, including in terms of: the size of the proposed building; the ability of the area to manage the associated increase of car traffic; and the developer, PDIG, a company with a principal owner who has caused concern for the failed last go-around at the site, as well as for problems with projects in other cities.

Mackerel Sky has functioned as a kind of “anchor store” to East Lansing’s downtown shopping district from the time it was founded in 1990. Since 1969, husband-and-wife team Tom and Linda Dufelmeier, Mackerel Sky’s owners, have worked almost continuously within a one-block radius. This means they have witnessed four decades of change in East Lansing’s downtown. While they are troubled by the current state of downtown (as noted below), what has not changed is their affection for the regular customers of their business.

In a recent meeting with a group of concerned citizens, City Manager George Lahanas revealed he is planning on September 23 to ask City Council to close the daycare center at Bailey Community Center. Bailey residents fear that the ultimate endpoint of this process may be closure of the Bailey Community Center as well as possible sale of the Bailey school building. The motivation for the closing is primarily budgetary.

In a memo to City Council today, City Attorney Thomas M. Yeadon has advised that the City Manager may use taxpayer-funded City publications to try to sway voters on ballot measures and even elections. According to Yeadon during a discussion at City Council this evening, the City Manager may even use his "Manager's Message" column in the City newsletter Dialog to endorse a candidate for governor if he so wishes.

Last night, the East Lansing Transportation Commission voted with only one dissenting vote to move forward the Park District Investment Group (PDIG) plan for major redevelopment of the “big bank building” at the corner of Abbot Road and Grand River Avenue.