West Michigan Wakeup October 29, 2025

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The news you need to start your days. It's the
West Michigan Wake Up, powered by Minards on Star one
oh five point seven. We start in West Michigan, where
the Grand Rapids Teachers' Union has signed four tentative agreements
teacher placement, payroll dues, deduction, sick Bank, and the Professional
Development Committee, where the agreements signed last night, However, all

(00:23):
tentative according to the Grand Rapids Education Association. The twenty
twenty five twenty six calendar has also been agreed upon,
according to the Union. We've got the latest at West
Michigan Star dot Com taking a look. Hurricane Melissa still powerful,
making landfall earlier this morning in Cuba as an extremely
dangerous Category three hurricane after devastating Jamaica. This is one

(00:47):
of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes in history. We're looking at
severe flooding, reports of extensive damages to homes, hospitals, and schools.
Melissa already responsible for seven deaths. The Democratic officials in
twenty five different states are now suing the Trump administration
in an attempt to block a food assistance program from

(01:09):
drying up due to the ongoing government shutdown. The USDA,
as you heard, indicated that SNAP benefits, which provide for
more than forty million low income Americans, will be suspended
starting November one, that's Saturday. These states are now contending
the administration is legally required to first spend the SNAP

(01:30):
Contingency Fund. Experts say it currently has between five and
six billion dollars. It would not be enough to fully
cover November benefits, which would be about eight billion, but
the states stress it could cover at least a significant portion,
and the Trump administration should be legally required to show
up for those Americans. This was shocking news to me

(01:51):
as someone whose shops here all the time for my kids. Carter's,
the George based clothing retailer tailored towards babies and kids,
closing dozens of stores throughout the next three years. The
company confirming the news yesterday, they say, while we are
studying our business in twenty twenty five, there is still
meaningful work to do for Carters to unlock its full

(02:12):
potential in both consumer and shareholder expectations. Fancy speak for
the fact that they will be closing one hundred and
fifty stores across the country and cutting roughly three hundred jobs,
which accounts for about fifteen percent of their staff all right,
taking a look at sports. Unfortunately a loss for our

(02:32):
Michigan State Spartans. They tried a late comeback but not
enough in pre season exhibition play last night, losing to
number four Yukon in a seventy six to sixty nine loss.
But our Griffins what a show, securing his first goal
of the season, Nate Danielson steering our Griffins to a

(02:52):
four to three shootout victory over the Iowa Wild, once
again setting a franchise record with a our Griffins on
a perfect six and zero start. It was a great
night for our Red Wings as well, winning over Saint
Louis five to two. And you will catch our Detroit
Pistons in action tonight taking on Orlando. You can hear
that on Talk twelve thirty WTKG for the latest news,

(03:16):
weather and traffic. Make sure news Radio what thirteen hundred
and one O sixty nine F them is a preset
on our free iHeartRadio app.