In the news: A round-up of stories from what we’re reading this week

Detroit Has Its Own Thanksgiving Parade. The City Gets Bigheaded About It.

The march down Woodward Avenue, which endured through the city’s hardest years, features papier-mâché caricatures that are uniquely Detroit.

Detroit’s Thanksgiving parade is not Macy’s, nor does it try to be. It is also not the most famous event on Detroit’s holiday calendar, a title that belongs to the Lions football game, a Turkey Day mainstay since 1934. But the parade, which predates the football game by a decade, might be the purest encapsulation of Thanksgiving in a city that leans harder into this holiday than most anywhere else. “We’re homespun, but national-worthy,” said Tony Michaels, the president and chief executive of the nonprofit organization that stages the event. Read the full story here. — by Mitch Smith, New York Times, with Photographs and Video by Nick Hagen | Reporting from Detroit

Data centers eyed in at least 10 Michigan towns. How they might change state.

Developers are publicly pursuing projects in at least 10 Michigan communities — all in the Lower Peninsula — while others are in confidential negotiations to buy power from the state’s major electricity utilities. The data center industry is expected to nearly triple by 2030, fueled by the growth of artificial intelligence and cloud computing. Tech companies are racing to build facilities as soon as possible, often facing stiff resistance from local communities and worries about environmental impact. The state has 57 smaller data centers — none of the massive hyperscale data centers owned by the likes of Google, Microsoft and Meta, according to the online database Data Center Map. But  Oracle, OpenAI and Related Digital have cleared key land use hurdles needed to build a $7 billion data center campus in Saline Township, south of Ann Arbor. They expect to open the facility in 2027. Read the full story here. — by Kelly House, The Bridge

Years of neglect catch up to Detroit’s Leland House as residents forced out

Less than a month before the holidays, the historic Leland House in Detroit told residents they must leave because DTE Energy plans to cut electricity on Wednesday due to a hefty outstanding debt.  Management for the 20-story tower, which now operates as an apartment building, notified tenants on Black Friday that DTE intends to disconnect power, giving residents of roughly 40 occupied units just a few days to move out. The building’s owner, Leland House Limited Partnership Company, owes the delinquent bills and is also behind on a rising water bill. The company asked the utility for a one-week extension to pay a $43,000 deposit, but DTE declined. It remains unclear how quickly residents will be placed in new housing, but city officials said they are doing everything they can to help residents relocate. Read the full story here. — by Steve Neavling, Detroit Metro Times

Solar training academy aims to make Detroiters ‘energy leaders’

Detroit may have no bigger solar energy evangelist than Todd Winters. A self-proclaimed “cheerleader” for the renewable energy source, the 52-year-old said his interest and awareness came as early as childhood, when he used calculators powered by solar cells. This summer he was accepted into the Solar Intelligence Training Academy, SITA, a workforce development program, designed to equip Detroit residents with skills in solar technology, environmental justice, and sustainable energy. Launched in June by the Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network, the pilot program offers four weeks of classroom and lab training, and enrolled 15 students out of roughly 70 applicants for its initial cohort. SITA is among a handful of solar installation training programs that have popped up in Detroit, from Green Door Initiative in Midtown to We Want Green Too, Communities Power, and Feed Your Neighborhood on the city’s east side. The training programs come at a time when low-income communities look to renewable energy as a means of offsetting utility costs, reducing fossil fuel emissions, and creating alternative power sources in a time of climate-related disasters. “Solar energy isn’t just about panels and wires — it’s about economic independence, environmental justice, and community resilience,” Gi’Anna Cheairs, co-executive director of DBCFSN, says in a statement. Read the full story here. — by Ethan Bakuli, Planet Detroit