Michigan
MSU research touted as essential to maintaining state’s agricultural diversity, identity
While Michigan Rep. Julie Brixie, 73rd District, grew up in Chicago, her family has deep roots in agriculture. As a child, she visited cousins who lived on a 2,000-acre cattle ranch in Nebraska.
A burgeoning interest in agriculture eventually prompted her to pursue a master’s degree from Michigan State University in crop and soil sciences and environmental toxicology.
“Even though I grew up as a city person, my parents thought it was important for my cousins and me to learn from each other’s environments,” Brixie said. “My cousins are farmers, and I ended up marrying someone who grew up on a small dairy farm in northern Wisconsin. That and my education are reasons I’m interested in agriculture, but of course being in Michigan as a state representative, one of the most wonderful things about Michigan is the agricultural diversity of our state.”
The wide range of specialty crops produced is one of Michigan agriculture’s defining characteristics, Brixie noted, something she believes needs to be protected. Specialty crop growers face a multitude of pressures, from insects, pests and diseases to navigating volatile economic and policy environments.
“We have so many specialty crops, and we’re very similar to California in that respect and different from other Midwestern states that grow a lot of corn, beans and wheat,” Brixie said. “One of the interesting things to me as a person in the legislature is how tied our specialty crops are to the sense of place in Michigan communities. It’s more than just the blueberry industry or cherry industry. Being that agriculture is the second-largest economic driver in Michigan, it’s important for economic reasons but also for maintaining our identity as a state.
“With all of the specialty crops we have, the small family farm is still a thing. They need a lot of support because the specialty crop industries can’t fund much research on their own. It’s really important for our agriculture university — MSU — to do research to help those folks in order for us to continue with the success of Michigan agriculture.”
Labor shortages, policy shifts and extreme weather are among the struggles farmers have relayed to Brixie. She said those are recurring themes from her conversations in recent years.
“One of the major things I hear about is the workforce and the availability of people willing to do the seasonal work that is so much a part of Michigan agriculture,” she said. “The ability of farmers to hire those workers with the changes we’ve had in some political administrations has become more difficult.
“Also, tariffs have had an enormous impact and have upended the entire agricultural industry, from the cost of tractors and other equipment to the amount of money farmers are able to receive for their products. Soybeans have taken a huge hit, for example. The global instability that has resulted because of the tariff wars that we’ve seen over the past year has had a terrible effect on our farmers.”
Changing weather patterns and extreme weather events have also led to mounting challenges, including widespread insect, disease and weed pressures. Brixie said that’s where MSU can play a leading role.
“This diversity of agricultural crops in Michigan leads to the need for these very specialized research opportunities,” Brixie said. “Climate change, climate variability, these are huge issues we’re facing. Whether it be the temperature of Lake Michigan or timing of rainfall or dry periods, all of these things impact the ability of crops to thrive. When we have these situations, you can experience new pests that come from other places in the world that can devastate an entire industry — whether that’s an actual bug, a rust, a mold or a mildew that’s growing on a specific crop.”
Alongside her colleagues in the legislature, Brixie has supported several programs through MSU AgBioResearch and MSU Extension that confront obstacles to agricultural production through research and community outreach.
Project GREEEN and the Michigan Alliance for Animal Agriculture, partnerships among MSU, Michigan agriculture industries, and the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, are two state-funded endeavors aimed at short-term plant and animal agriculture challenges.
Brixie praised a project through M-AAA dealing with the outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza as an example of MSU’s ability to respond quickly to needs in the agriculture industry.
“The programs at MSU like M-AAA have been able to respond very rapidly to issues like the bird flu that struck here and in other states,” she said. “At first, it really negatively impacted the poultry industry but troublingly jumped species to the dairy industry. Humans were being exposed as well. Through the existing network MSU has all across the state, they were able to do an amazing job. They really led the nation in assessing the risk and understanding how the pathogen spreads. I feel like we averted what could have been a worse disaster, and the dairy industry ended up in much better shape because of that MSU response.”
Along with Project GREEEN and M-AAA is a newer partnership among MSU, the Michigan Plant Coalition and MDARD called the Agricultural Resiliency Program. Brixie was one of the primary catalysts in its creation in 2024 to explore long-term plant agriculture problems related to extreme weather and water. State funding has allowed MSU to hire researchers and MSU Extension educators to fill gaps in university expertise in these areas.
Additionally, a competitive grants program has funded projects investigating solutions such as artificial intelligence-based forecasting platforms, water quality monitoring and nutrient runoff prevention technologies, and optimizing irrigation and fertilizer applications in tree fruit systems.
AgBioResearch Director George Smith said the discoveries by MSU scientists wouldn’t be possible without legislative support, and rural communities would be strained without them.
“I appreciate Rep. Brixie and her understanding that agriculture and farms of all sizes, including small farms, are the foundation of our rural economies,” Smith said. “That’s so important to the future, and there’s so much at risk if we lose that aspect of agriculture. As we talk about the role of AgBioResearch with support from the state of Michigan, there are so many examples of where our scientists are doing tangible research that can make a difference — generating new data that can inform policy or provide estimates of the impact of policies, or developing new tools and technologies that solve major problems.”
Smith puts the responsibility of continued communication with legislators on the shoulders of MSU and the agricultural community. Sharing stories about the impact of agricultural research is key.
“We’re grateful for Rep. Brixie’s support as well as our other legislators, and we will never take for granted that communication and being in dialog with our partners in the legislature,” he said. “It’s critical to talk about the whole host of issues that AgBioResearch and Extension are here to work on. We’re committed to doing that work, and it’s on us to continue telling that story.”
Brixie said she encourages constant communication, explaining its value to the legislative process.
“The fundamental thing I would like farmers to know is that we in the legislature want to help farmers in our state,” she said. “We understand the importance of farming in Michigan and how tied it is to our economy. It’s such a deep-rooted part of our culture. We’re here to help you, and we need back and forth communication in order to be the most effective at doing that.
“With MSU, please continue doing what you’re doing as a liaison between legislators and farmers. We talk to our own constituents but not necessarily someone from another district. For example, we had a town hall that MSU was gracious to participate in to talk about the impact of SNAP-Ed cuts. For issues like that with policy implications, it’s helpful for us to understand how it’s affecting people on the ground.”
This story originally appeared on the Agbioresearch story.
EAST LANSING, Mich. – Jeremy Fears had 21 points and eight assists and Coen Carr also scored 21, helping No. 8 Michigan State hold off Rutgers 91-87 on Thursday night.
The Spartans (25-5, 15-4 Big Ten) will close the regular season on the road against rival and third-ranked Michigan on Sunday.
Michigan State has won five straight games to secure a top-four seed in next week’s Big Ten Tournament and a double-bye into the quarterfinals.
The Scarlet Knights (12-18, 5-14) have slumped toward the bottom of the 18-team conference.
Rutgers’ Tariq Francis scored 25 points, Lino Mark had 14 and Emmanuel Ogbole added 13.
Michigan State trailed by a point at halftime and took control with an 11-0 run. Carr dunked three times in 1:13 and Jordan Scott followed with a slam 32 seconds later.
The Spartans had a comfortable cushion until the final minute, when their 10-point lead was trimmed to two. Fears sealed the win with two free throws with 2.9 seconds left.
Jaxon Kohler scored 15 points and Carson Cooper added 14 in the final home game for both seniors.
Michigan State celebrated its seniors after the game, including Nick Sanders, son of Hall of Fame running back Barry Sanders of the Detroit Lions.
The school honored a military veteran, as it does every game before the national anthem is played, and the latest was Kohler’s 102-year-old great grandfather, Earl “Chuck” Kohler, who served in the Navy and is one of 12 remaining survivors of the Pearl Harbor attack.
Up next
Rutgers: Host Penn State on Sunday.
Michigan State: At No. 3 Michigan on Sunday.
___
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2025 MI marijuana excise tax revenues drop for local governments
In 2025, local government retail license share dropped $4,211 from Michigan marijuana sales for the tax year. New taxes could cut it more in 2026.
Michigan municipalities and counties that allow recreational marijuana dispensaries are set to receive far less money this year than last in their annual portion of tax revenue collected from cannabis sales.
Sales declined in 2025 for the first time since legal recreational marijuana sales started in December 2019.
A total of 114 cities, 39 villages, 81 townships, 75 counties and four tribes will receive payments from the Marijuana Regulation Fund, according to a March 3 news release from Michigan’s Cannabis Regulatory Agency. They will get about $54,000 per retail store or microbusiness, based on nearly $94 million collected.
Last year, each eligible government entity received a little more than $58,000 per business based on a total of nearly $100 million in marijuana tax revenue.
Detroit, once again, will receive the most money of any municipality. There are 61 active retailer licenses in Detroit, so the city will get nearly $3.3 million in tax revenue.
State law determines how the money is split. The Michigan Transportation Fund gets 35% of the revenue, which is used for the repair and maintenance of roads and bridges, and another 35% goes to the School Aid Fund to be used for K-12 education. The other 30% is split between municipalities, counties and tribes.
The payments come from revenue collected from the 10% recreational marijuana excise tax. This tax is separate from a new 24% wholesale tax that went into effect Jan. 1. The revenue from that tax will go to fixes for local roads.
Sales at recreational marijuana dispensaries declined by 3% last year to $3.17 billion, down from $3.28 billion in 2024, according to figures from Michigan’s Cannabis Regulatory Agency, leading to the smaller payouts. More government entities also split the revenue compared with last year.
Payments to municipalities could get smaller if sales continue to decline. Recreational marijuana sales in Michigan plunged nearly 16% in January compared with December as heavy snow, cold temperatures and fears of higher prices due to the new 24% wholesale cannabis tax kept consumers at home.
While recent trends indicate a cooling period, a February report from Headset, a cannabis market intelligence firm, said the market — one of the largest in the country — has shown resilience over the last two years.
Below are the municipalities that received the most tax revenue:
- Detroit: $3.3 million
- Grand Rapids: $1.5 million
- Lansing: $1.4 million
- Ann Arbor: $1.2 million
- Kalamazoo: $1 million
- Flint: $648,000
- Traverse City, Hazel Park and Adrian all will receive $594,000.
For a full list of municipalities, counties and tribes that will receive marijuana tax revenue, go to www.michigan.gov/treasury.
Contact Adrienne Roberts: amroberts@freepress.com
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Artificial intelligence is rapidly reshaping everything from classroom conversations to social media, and leaders at Grand Valley State University (GVSU) say West Michigan is positioning itself to help determine how the technology is used, responsibly.
The university’s College of Computing is launching the West Michigan Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence (AI) Consortium, aimed at helping businesses, researchers and the community better understand how to use artificial intelligence.
Right in the heart of Grand Rapids, along the Medical Mile, the consortium will meet at the Daniel and Pamella DeVos Center for Interprofessional Health (DCIH) every week, with quarterly meetings open to the general public.
The effort is aimed at helping West Michigan industries adopt AI that fits their specific needs, while problem-solving for security, bias, privacy, and ethical concerns.
Right in the heart of Grand Rapids, along Medical Mile, the consortium will meet at the Daniel and Pamella DeVos Center for Interprofessional Health (DCIH) every week, with quarterly meetings open to the general public. (Abigail Taylor/WWMT)
Marouane Kessentini, Ph.D, Dean of the GVSU College of Computing told News Channel 3 that a wide range of companies in the region are bringing forward questions of where, and how, to ethically integrate artificial intelligence into their practices.
“Here in West Michigan, we have a high concentration of many industries, health, manufacturing, and of course high-tech companies,” said Kessentini. “The first questions are about security, privacy, ethics and bias. It’s not just about deploying tools. It’s about deploying them responsibly.”
Kessentini said the consortium will focus on training, research and community education, with a heavy emphasis on data privacy, cybersecurity and misinformation.
“There are many examples where AI systems were trained on data that wasn’t diverse,” he said. “That can lead to inaccurate results. That’s why testing and training are critical.”
The consortium will bring together faculty researchers, students, and industry leaders, with weekly meetings planned to develop guidance for using AI at scale.
The goal is to help companies validate AI outputs, clean and manage data, and identify bias before systems are put into real-world use, especially in high-risk industries like healthcare and manufacturing.
Some projects will involve software design, others will focus on creating public data sets that are reliably sourced, but anonymized for safe use, and many more are yet to be ideated.
Some projects will involve software design, others will focus on creating public data sets that are reliably sourced, but anonymized for safe use, and many more are yet to be ideated. (Abigail Taylor/WWMT)
The initiative is backed by $1,031,000 in federal support, through the Community Project Funding (CPF) process, resources that U.S. Representative Hillary Scholten (D-MI-03) said she advocated for among members of congress in Washington.
“West Michigan should be leading the way in how artificial intelligence is developed and used, and that starts with investing in people and institutions we trust,” said Rep. Scholten. “This funding will help GVSU bring together educators, industry, and public partners to build AI systems that are ethical, secure, and transparent while preparing students for good-paying jobs and strengthening our region’s economy. I’m proud to support this work and to continue delivering federal investments that ensure West Michigan remains at the forefront of responsible innovation.”
It’s important that AI is useful, but also safe…
GVSU also launched an online certificate portal that is open for community members interested in learning about ethical AI use, for free.
Kessentini said the training is for the general public to learn how to navigate the technology, including the risks and limitations.
“It’s important that AI is useful, but also safe,” said Edgar Cruz, master’s student with a badge in cybersecurity.
Cruz is currently researching how AI systems can be attacked or manipulated with poisoned data, specifically as it relates to vehicle-to-vehicle communication, where AI helps self-driving cars exchange information like speed and position.
“We want to ensure that the system is robust and safe,” he said. “Because obviously people are involved.”
Kessentini said the consortium is designed to be a public resource, not just an academic project.
Quarterly community meetings will be open to the public, and training materials are available online through the College of Computing website.
“This is innovation with purpose,” he said. “We want to start here in Grand Rapids, but we want to make a global impact.”
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