- [Narrator] Just ahead on One Detroit.

The process of burning coal to make electricity is causing some environmental concerns.

We'll preview a Great Lakes Now special examining the issues associated with coal ash, plus a candid conversation on the future of the teaching profession here in Michigan, and renowned pianist and composer, Chucho Valdes talks about performing at this year's Detroit Jazz Festival.

It's all coming up next on One Detroit.

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(upbeat music) - [Narrator] Just ahead on this week's One Detroit.

How does Michigan compare to other states when it comes to educating our children?

We'll take a closer look at the teaching profession here in the state, both the challenges and successes, in a future of work report.

Also coming up, he's the artist in-residence for this year's Detroit Jazz Festival, award-winning Cuban pianist, band leader, and composer, Chucho Valdes sits down for a wide ranging conversation with WRCJ radio host, Linda Yohn.

But first up, a legacy of our industrial age is threatening some drinking water supplies in Michigan and around the country.

Coal ash has become an issue and the next Great Lakes Now special here on Detroit Public Television looks at what's being done to prevent it from contaminating the environment.

The Energy News Network and a group of journalism students at Chicago's Northwestern University collaborated on the program.

Great Lakes Now host Ward Detwiler spoke with the students' professor, journalist Kari Lydersen.

(upbeat music) - Kari, to start out what is coal ash exactly, and why is it something we should know about?

- Yeah.

What is coal ash?

It's a toxic byproduct of burning coal to make electricity, and even as coal plants around the country, including in Michigan, have closed in high numbers.

This coal ash is left over and there's nearly a billion tons of it.

And it's toxic and coal plants by nature are near water, near rivers and lakes.

So the coal ash is usually stored on site in big pits or ponds, right near these rivers and lakes, and the great majority nationwide, including in Michigan, of these pits and ponds are also unlined.

So there's really nothing much separating the toxic coal ash from the groundwater.

It has the potential to contaminate groundwater, and if you're relying on a well for water that could be your household water.

And it could also get into municipal water supplies or just into lakes and rivers where people are fishing and recreating.

So it is a really big ecological and environmental threat that a lot of people actually don't even know about.

- So how is this issue playing out in Michigan and specifically in Southeast Michigan?

- In Michigan, there are about 80 coal ash pits and ponds where this toxic material is being stored on the site of coal plants that are either still operating or closed.

And in Southeast Michigan, there's coal ash at the River Rouge site, at several DTE electric sites, and consumers energy sites.

The, the, the Michigan sites tend to be on the west coast along Lake Michigan, and then also in the Detroit area.

And actually at the great majority of the sites, it is proven to be contaminating groundwater.

That's true in Michigan and around the country as well.

- So if the, these coal plants are closing, does the problem just go away?

- Not at all.

The coal ash is still there for good, unless it's removed.

So it's something that even as all these coal plants have closed, we get rid of the air pollution from the coal plants but we still have to deal with the coal ash.

One interesting thing in Michigan, there's more plans in Michigan than in other states to actually remove the coal ash, which is generally a good thing, but that can raise some questions too.

They'll take it to landfills.

How will they do that?

Transportation?

You're talking like hundreds of trucks a day for a long time in a lot of cases when they're bringing it to a landfill.

And then also, how quickly will they do it?

You know, that's the plans, but will in fact it still just sit in place for a long time?

- So what are some of the options for cleaning this up and keeping it out of the drinking water?

- We don't really know when and where it's getting into drinking water.

There's some sites nationwide where contamination from coal ash in water supplies has been documented, but one of the bigger problems is we just don't know what's going on with it, which is all the more reason to remove the coal ash or make sure it's stored safely.

So yeah, the main options are leaving it in place, which is usually not a good option, but the option that a lot of companies are planning to take, or removing it, like the company... a lot of companies in Detroit are looking to do.

And then what a lot of people see as the best option is what they call beneficial reuse, which is basically recycling it.

Coal ash is actually used safely as a major ingredient in concrete and other building materials and also to sort of build up lands.

So there's unsafe ways to do that in terms of the building up land, but there's also really safe ways to recycle coal ash.

And then you're... then it's not contaminating groundwater.

- What regulation is there for coal ash?

Is it the state's responsibility or is the federal government taking the lead?

- There is a federal rule from 2015 that says the companies need to test the groundwater and make those records publicly available and come up with plans to close these coal ash sites in a way that they are not contaminating the water.

So that rule, the companies did do a lot of testing and put a lot of data online.

But in terms of the requirements to safely close the sites, they were largely being ignored.

And the government really wasn't taking much action.

And then during the Trump administration, the rules were actually loosened and really no enforcement was carried out, but just this year, starting in January, the EPA has really basically said it's gonna take these rules seriously.

And it started issuing some requirements and some decisions and some denials of extensions on closing these sites.

And some states, they actually have laws that are specific to coal ash, and then they have other environmental rules that could be used to crack down on coal ash.

But in most cases, the states have been fairly lax in doing anything regulatory about coal ash, either.

- What do we know about the health risks for people if they drink water that's been contaminated with coal ash?

- Well, we know these heavy metals are bad.

Some of them are neurotoxins that affect brain development and health.

Some of them are linked to higher rates of cancer and heart disease and other diseases.

So these heavy metals, arsenic, cobalt, lithium, boron, these are definitely things you want to avoid drinking or having too much contact with.

We don't really know to what extent they are in drinking water and putting people at risk, but there's definitely pathways for them to get into drinking water, especially private wells and even municipal water supplies.

The health risks it causes play out over time.

So you'll never know, you know, exactly what might have contributed to you developing cancer or a disease like that.

So, you know, that exposure to these metals in coal ash, that's the kind of risk that this raises.

- If you had a crystal ball, what do you see as some of the future options for regulations or laws or even private industry taking responsibility for coal ash?

- Well, the rules that we have in place on the federal level from 2015 actually do a lot to protect us or to start cleaning up the coal ash.

So I can't predict what's gonna happen in the next presidential election, but if we have a switch, it's safe to say that that progress might stop or even be rolled back on the federal cleanups.

I think we could see some stepped up action from state governments.

And then industry, a crazy thing is doing a good cleanup doesn't necessarily even cost industry anything because they bill it to the rate payers in most states.

So we have high energy prices right now which might make it less likely that companies will want to get their customers mad by raising their energy prices even more.

But at the same time, if a company can do the right thing and they actually get to make a profit on that spending in some states.

So, you know, maybe that will become actually more common.

- [Narrator] You can learn more about coal ash concerns in the next Great Lakes Now special, airing Wednesday, August 31st at 7:30 PM on Detroit Public Television.

Plus, find all of their stories about coal ash and more at GreatLakesNow.org.

One Detroit examined the state of teaching in Michigan during a recent virtual town hall in our Future of Work series.

Panelists debated whether there's a teacher shortage in the state and explored ways to make the profession more attractive to future educators.

I spoke with three education experts.

Ypsilanti Community Schools superintendent, Alena Zachery Ross, Chalkbeat Detroit and Bridge Michigan education reporter, Tracie Mauriello, and Craig Thiel, research director at the Citizens Research Council of Michigan.

(upbeat music) - What, what are some of the bigger issues that we're facing today?

- Right now we're really... Michigan has been struggling for a long time.

It's been in the bottom half of states as far as performance of schools and Michigan students were really starting to gain some ground before the pandemic.

They were catching up to other states and then the pandemic just blew everything out of the water for everyone.

So one of the biggest issues that we have in Michigan and elsewhere around the country is to help these kids catch up.

They had two years of disrupted, disjointed learning.

Some kids were bounced back and forth between virtual and in-person learning a number of times.

At the same time, we have...

Districts are having a very hard time finding teachers.

- If there is an actual shortage, what are some of the ripple effects we might see downstream when it comes to what might be a dwindling teaching core?

- A number of things are happening because there aren't enough teachers in some areas, class... the under-staffing, it has been a real problem.

It's resulted in less qualified teachers at the same time.

It's really motivated teacher prep programs to get on the ball and really try to attract candidates from different segments.

A lot of second career teachers are coming into teacher prep programs now.

School districts are making efforts to, they're calling it, Grow Your Own.

They're trying to get their paraprofessionals, bus drivers, any kind of support staff that's already in the schools.

They're finding ways to help train them to become certified teachers.

But if this doesn't get done, we're really facing some trouble down the road.

We're going to have an under prepared workforce.

So this is really something crucial.

It's urgent.

- I'd like to bring in the research director for the Citizens Research Council of Michigan, Craig Thiel and Ypsilanti Schools superintendent, Dr. Elena Zachery Ross.

Thank you both for joining us today.

- Hi, thanks for having us.

- Yes.

Thank you for having us.

Well, I really appreciate the opportunity.

- Absolutely.

So Craig, let's start with you with exactly what we're talking about.

Is it a shortage or not?

Because some of the work that you guys have done indicate that it's not as clear cut as simply being a shortage of teachers.

So could you just explain that a little bit for us?

- Just in, in summary, what we, what we know is that certain schools, certain schools in certain locations and certain classrooms are much more harder to fill with a qualified full-time instructor than other, other other classrooms and districts in schools.

We can talk about the details of that but I think that's an important nuance to understand.

And just if...

It goes without saying but I'm gonna say it anyways, the research literature again suggests that the number one input into the performance of our K12 students throughout their careers is having a highly qualified teacher in front of them, leading instruction, developing curriculum, leading instruction, helping students that may not be on the path to success, and intervening when that's necessary.

So the teacher is the most important component in our whole K through 12 education system.

- Dr. Ross, we've alluded to it a couple times already.

You have real world experience with dealing with this stuff.

Are Ypsilanti Schools feeling a shortage of teachers and you know, how are you navigating that?

What are, what are you seeing?

What do you encounter?

- Definitely.

We see shortages in actually all staff, it's not just the teacher shortage, but that's the one that's the most impactful in our classrooms.

And I definitely agree.

They're in specialty areas, especially in special education, our English language learner classes, as well as our CTE programs.

And then just the highly qualified status needed for our secondary schools.

Those, those are the positions that we're seeing needs in.

We know that in the hunch, again, the rationale of why.

Number one, we've gone into smaller class sizes, so we actually do need more teachers than probably when the research talked about it because we haven't gone into the larger class sizes anymore.

Secondly, teachers used to come in...

I mean, they are dedicated.

They come in, they, when they were sick, they come in when they were stressed, and now teachers have learned during a pandemic, you know, I have to first take care of myself.

Their family situations might have changed.

So although we have teachers who hold certificates in Michigan, we find that there are there earlier retirements.

There are people that are taking leaves.

And so that has required us to need more staff in our buildings.

- Are you coming up against things like teachers requiring higher salaries, better benefits packages or is it the lack of people to even try to court with, with higher salaries and better benefits package?

Is it what schools are able to give or is it the fact that there just aren't enough people for schools to, you know, get through the door and into the classroom?

- Well, school finance is always a huge issue.

We need to...

I will not argue with anyone.

We need to pay our teachers more.

They are required to do more.

They're required to keep their certifications up.

If a person with that same level of education was in another field, they'd be paid much higher.

We understand, they guess other school districts could pay more in districts that have, you know taxable house values that are higher.

And so that then brings the competition and teachers being recruited with the shortage, teachers being recruited to other districts, teachers going to other districts due to that.

- You were talking about competition and that's very real now, especially we have all... every state in the country has gotten massive amounts of federal COVID relief funding that has trickled down to almost every school district in the country.

- Craig, what are you guys going to be paying attention to as all this money pours into the education system?

What are you gonna have your eye on?

- Well, that's a great question.

And there's a lot of money just to, to lay the numbers out, Congress over the three emergency packages for K through 12, allocated 190 billion dollars across the country.

Michigan's take of that is about 6 billion.

If it's just a school board and the school administration deciding how to spend the money, that's not meeting the congressional intent.

And there are some set asides as Dr. Ross mentioned with the federal money.

There's a minimum threshold of 20% has to go to address learning loss, ultimately taking the pulse on how effective, efficacious, the use of those dollars were in terms of getting those kids.

So one, seeing if the monies are being budgeted for those purposes, and then seeing to what extent, you know, those districts that were identified as losing the most in terms of the progress are made... have made it up.

(slow jazz music) - [Narrator] The sounds of jazz will once again, fill the streets of downtown Detroit over the Labor Day weekend.

The 43rd annual Detroit Jazz Festival is returning to live performances after going virtual the past two years due to COVID.

This year's headliner and artist in-residence is award-winning pianist, band leader, and composer, Chucho Valdes.

WRCJ radio host Linda Yohn spoke with a musician who is renowned in the world of Latin in Afro Cuban Jazz.

(upbeat music) (upbeat piano music) - Chucho, welcome back to Detroit.

And please give us your thoughts on the Detroit-Havana connection.

- [Translator] My opinion, it's one of the most important festivals in the world of jazz.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) I've been lucky enough to play before, but this time, as a artist in-residence is really a huge honor for me.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) I will be able to present a lot of projects that I've been working on.

First of all, the one called The Creation.

It's a suite in three parts.

And you describe the influences of the African music in the Caribbean, in the United States, Africa, and everything else.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) The second, second one is Duet (Chucho speaking foreign language) with Diana Ribs, one of my favorite singers.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) And the third one is gonna be With the Super Quarts.

It's my understanding that it's an excellent relation between the festival between Havana and Detroit.

- Tell me what it means to be communicating through music internationally.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) - [Translator] Music is the universal language.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) - [Translator] And all musicians that, in this moment we are talking about jazz, we are a big family.

(upbeat piano music) (Chucho speaking foreign language) Festival is the place to meet.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) It's like our home in this moment.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) And we exchange knowledge and we play together.

It's a wonderful thing for me.

- Tell us about the relationship of the piano in Cuban music to other instruments, especially the drum.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) - [Translator] Piano is a harmonic instrument, but at the same time, very with rhythm.

The drum is an instrument of rhythm.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) When they both play together, the piano just feels resting because the drum is helping the piano.

- You had a great group with drummers and other instruments, including Paquito de Rivera, - Wow.

with Irakere.

Tell us a little bit about the difference that Irakere made for the world.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) - [Translator] Irakere changed everything, all the structures.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) I think it was the brass section, most important.

The one that placed more influences in all the history of Cuba.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) That's the section more incredible that have just gone through the Cuban music.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) And the most respected musician that even today.

We had a lot of elements of the jazz to the Afro Cuban music.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) And we also introduced so many African percussion instruments that were not used before in the Cuban dance music.

- Yeah.

La bata.

- La bata.

- La bata.

Mhm.

- Yeah.

Beautiful.

- You know it.

- Yeah, I do.

I do.

Jazz Bata Dos.

- [Chacho] Mm.

- [Linda] Mm.

Beautiful recording and Mirror Mirror.

- [Chacho] Woo.

You have won Grammy awards for both of these.

And I hope people will re-listen to them.

What should we listen for in Jazz Bata Dos and Mirror Mirror with Chick Corea and Eliane Elias?

(Chucho speaking foreign language) - [Translator] First of all in Jazz Bata, the language is totally different.

The vocabulary is totally different to what he has made before.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) The piano I used to just apart from the harmony as a percussion instrument, I was playing with the drums.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) It's totally different language.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) Mirror Mirror is one of the most beautiful experiences in all my life.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) I adore Eliane Elias.

Brazilian music is incredible, but she also managed just to deal with African music, all the languages.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) Chick Corea, who by the way, is one of my heroes.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) I felt very comfortable in that language among us.

- Give us some of your other dreams and jazz hopes for the world.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) - [Translator] I'm working on it.

(both laugh) (Chucho speaking foreign language) - [Translator] I'm working on the vocabulary and language, (upbeat piano music) Cuban, Afro Cuban jazz.

(upbeat piano music) (Chucho speaking foreign language) But with another way of expression.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) And with a harmonic feeling, totally different to the one that we have done so far.

(Chucho speaking foreign language) I think it could be something different to everything that we have done before.

- Bueno.

(Chucho laughs) (speaking in foreign language) - Muy bueno.

Chucho, gracias, thank you.

(upbeat piano music) - [Narrator] That will do it for this week's One Detroit.

Thanks for watching.

Make sure to come back for One Detroit arts and culture on Mondays at 7:30 PM.

Head to the One Detroit website for all the stories we're working on.

Follow us on social media and sign up for our weekly newsletter.

- [Announcer 1] From Delta Faucets to Behr Paint, Masco Corporation is proud to deliver products that enhance the way consumers all over the world experience and enjoy their living spaces.

Masco, serving Michigan communities since 1929.

Support for this program is provided by the Cynthia and Edsel Ford Fund for Journalism at Detroit Public TV.

The Kresge Foundation.

- [Announcer 2] The DTE Foundation is a proud sponsor of Detroit Public TV.

Among the state's largest foundations, committed to Michigan focused-giving, we support organizations that are doing exceptional work in our state.

Visit DTEFoundation.com to learn more.

- [Announcer 1] Nissan Foundation and viewers like you.

(upbeat music) (slow piano music)