The Michigan Daily - Friday, September 7, 1984 - Pae 7
city neighbors fight downtown commercialization
1
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By ERIC MATTSON
Although developer Peter Allen
hided against his plan to- convert
Braun Court into a domed shopping
fnall with second-story bridges connec-
ting the houses, the conflict between
d&wntown commercial development
daid downtown housing continues, split
sharply along partisan lines.
Democrats and neighbors are
pphing low- and moderate-income
housing downtown, while Republicans
4rd developers are pushing for more of-
i&eand retail space.
BRAUN COURT is a seven-house
developient off Fourth Avenue which
d!&;eloper Peter Allen and Jan Mak will
convert to retail space. Residents of the
74-year-old development formed the
Downtown Neighbors' Association and
dradght the change, saying that the
1rrytown and Farmers' Market shop-
ing areas depend on the residential
halure of the neighborhood to attract
customers..
But the owners of the property say
the Kerrytown area needs more retail
tspice, and they opposed a plan that
would rezone the neighborhood for
strictly residential use. The area is
zoned for office, retail, or residential
'use.
' Roger Kerson, one of the Downtown
Nighbors' Association leaders, said
tou have to put some limitations on
private property," something
tepublican City Council members have
been reluctant to do.
q ALLEN AND Mak abandoned plans
to turn Braun Court into a domed shop-
ping mall with walkways connecting
the second floors of the buildings. Allen
said the plan was "just too bloody ex-
pensive and too much of a change too
soon."
But Kerson said the developers want
to stay out of the public eye and avoid
the necessary City Council approval of
the zoning variances for the plan.
Kerson acknowledged that it will be
difficult to rezone the area with a
Republican majority on the Council,
but said he will continue to fight down-
town commercial expansion unless it is
tied to low- or moderate-income
housing in the same area.
COUNCILMAN Lowell Peterson (D-
First Ward) is studying the possibility
of requiring developers to include
housing in any new construction, a
proposal that faces opposition from
Republicans and developers.
Ann Arbor presently is facing its
largest flurry of development in many
years. Although Tally Hall, a com-
bination retail space/parking struc-
ture, is the only visible construction
site, there are several others in the
works.
The Downtown Club, located at 110 N.
Fourth Ave., will soon be renovated into
high-rent office space. Several. mem-'
bers of Council formed an adhock com-
mittee to save the former rooming
house for single-room occupancies, but
they eventually conceded that the
building had been neglected for so long
that restoring it to its former state
would be economically impossible..
'There's a lot of rhetoric about housing
downtown, but not much is done about it.'
- Doris Preston
Fifth Ward Councilwoman
AN INTERESTING twist to the con-
flict was the fact that Mayor Louis
Belcher was part-owner of the proper-
ty, and Peterson and Councilman Larry
Hunter (D-First Ward) hinted that
Belcher may have had a conflict of in-
terest when he approved a site plan for
the building 18 months before he pur-
chased it.
Belcher responded by saying he
hadn't known that he would be pur-
chasing the property when he approved
the site plan, and City Attorney R.
Bruce Laidlaw sided with Belcher.
Peterson and Hunter wanted to trip
up Belcher's plans to turn the building
into office space because they wanted
to see the building converted to low-
income housing, but they recently gave
up that struggle.
ANOTHER controversy was over a
house at 415 N. Fourth Ave., owned by
developer Carl Braver. The city had
planned to lease the house for use-as ,a
homeless shelter a few months ago, but
the deal fell through when a church
near the site objected to the plan.
When the homeless shelter plan
failed, Brauer announced plans to turn
the back yard of the house into a
parking. lot to make the house more
suitable for commercial use. But the
move was opposed by the same group
which objected to the Braun Court con-
version, the Downtown Neighbors'
Association.
The group supported a proposal by
Peterson to rezone the entire block as
strickly residential - a plan which was
narrowly defeated five to five along
party lines this summer, with six
votes needed for approval.
COUNCILWOMAN Doris Preston(D-
Fifth Ward) supports the push for low-
income housing downtown, but she
acknowledged that developers who
bought property expecting to use it
commercially may sue the city to
collect damages if the zoning is
changed.
"You cannot just pull zoning out from
under (developers)," said city planning
commissioner Martin Overhiser.
Brauer said he supports the need for
housing downtown, but said "you could
not justify renting this at residential
rates."
NEARLY ALL interested parties say
that housing is vital to the downtown
because it makes the area safer and
supports business at night. The con-
trbversy arises over what type of
housing should be supported and what
role the city should plan in downtown
development.
The issue is split largely across par-
tisan lines. Republicans traditionally
support more of a laissez-faire program
than the Democrats, and Preston, the
only Democrat on the planning com-
mission, said "they essentially don't
believe in zoning."
"There's a lot of rhetoric about
housing downtown, but not much is
done about it," Preston said.
Preston said that the Downtown
Development Authority, an advisory
commission for Council, should
"develop the low-cost housing in those
transitional areas."
JOHN SWISHER, chairman of the
DDA, said "I think there's a demand for
all kinds of housing: The question is
money." He said he sympathizes with
Braun Court's residents, but "maybe
Braun Court has outlived its use as a
residence.. . it's not very attractive."
Several other buildings are also being
contemplated, partly due to the present
low interest rates. Swisher said the
projects that are being talked about are
not new projects,,they simply are star-
ting now because the economy is
recovering.
MAYOR BELCHER and her partners
are planning to tear down the Sun
Bakery at Fifth and Liberty to put up a
new office building. Another developer
is planning an office building near City
Hall. A third is pushing for a convention
center on the corner of Fifth and Huron.
These projects represent the first
significant developments in about fif-
teen years.
In essence, the controversy is a
philosophical one. Most Republicans
feel that government should set the tone
for development but should basically
let the market determine what sort of
development is needed. Most
Democrats feel that the city should be
far more involved in planning than it
currently is.
For example, some Democrats point
out that there is a glut of office space
downtown, but there are still plans to
build more office buildings.
But Republicans say that the market
will determine when there is too much
office space, and Council should not in-
terfere.
The controversy is not likely < to be
resolved soon. As Councilman Gerald
Jernigan (R-Fourth Ward) said, "I
think the problem has been there for
along time, it's just coming to fruition
right now."
This story originally appeared in
the Daily's summer edition.
F
Iarbour s
By INGRID KOCK
Although today Levi Barbour's name
s most often connected with the Betsy
arbour dormitory that bears his
nother's name, the scholarship
rogram he established 70 years ago
as provided nearly 500 oriental women
ith a University education.
The Barbour scholarships make the
Ptilversity of Michigan a focus for out-
tanding oriental women graduate
tdents," said Prof. Ann Larimore,
iii has served on the selection and
* cutive committees for the scholar-
ip program. Nine or ten oriental
{ omen in Rackham receive the
olarship money each year.
WHEN HE BEGAN the program in
,1914, Barbour explained its purpose in a
geter to University President Ruthven
Hptchins. "The idea of an oriental
gs ,scholarship," he wrote, "is to
jbig girls from the Orient, give them
iat Occidental education and let them
k back whatever they find good and
wassimilate the blessings."
According to a 1942 article by Univer-
sity historian W. Carl Rufus, Barbour
decided to set up the scholarship after a
itrip to China and Japan. He had met
,three Oriental women there who had
graduated from the University and
freturned to their home country and
became prominent leaders in medicine.
jBarbour wanted other Oriental women
to have the opportunity for similar suc-
cesses.
Barbour entered the University as an
undergraduate in 1863 and went on to
graduate from the Law School. From
1892 to 1908 he served as a University
regent.
THE DIFFERENCES between the
mo*nen Barbour saw in the Orient and
those who benefit from the scholarships
'tday reflect 70 years of dramatic
changes in the Orient. Rufus said the
early Barbour scholars brought their
,now-archaic customs with them to Ann
Aibor.
"The first two women who arrived,
,K4'meyo Sade Kata and Mutsu Kikuchi,
tame from wealthy families, Rufus
wrote.
),The two "thought housework beneath
Ithelr dignity" and had to be taught how
cholarships aid oriental women
to make their own beds, he said..
OTHERS CAME WITH their feet
bound as a part of a Chinese tradition,
and some women from Muslim and
Hindu countries had been raised under
the purdah, the tradition requiring that
women be kept from men's sight by a
curtain or veil.'
Recently, however, Larimore said
the Barbour scholars have shown the
effects of the cultural revolution. One
student had been forced to spend eight
years in an electrical workshop before
attending college.
Larimore said the purpose of the
program is not to convert Oriental
women to Western ways, but rather to
provide "scholarly and scholastic
training that is not available in their
home countries." She said participants
agree to return to their home countries
after their stay at the University and
that most do return home.
ETHEL THOMS, a Rackham staff
member who works with the program,
said the almost 500 women who have
received the scholarships have come
from India, Korea, the Phillipines,
Vietnam, Burma and Indonesia in ad-
dition to China and Japan. They study a
wide range of disciplines and enter
professions ranging from bacteriology,
psychology and medicine to business
administration and library science.
Many students emphasize medicine,
Thoms said, "because a lot of their
countries don't have the medical
training that we do."
Barbour scholar Che Wei Zoe Tan,
from Taiwan, said the scholarship
freed her from having to work as a
teaching assistant while at the Univer-
sity. She said she appreciated the
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scholarship and wanted to know more
about its origin. "I think Barbour
scholars schould be oriented a bit more
towards who Barbour is,'' she said. "I
would like to know this and also why he
began the scholarship."
Asked about returning to her home
country after graduating from the
University, she said, "It will not be
easy with the job market in Taiwan not
open to my field of communications."
She said she would like to teach com-
munications courses at a Taiwan
university and "begin building up a
program there."
This story originally appeared in
the Daily's summer edition.
Bentley grants provide
two with scholarships
-By THOMAS HRACH
Two University freshpersons have
received 'an unexpected gift: Their
tuition, fees, room, and board will be
provided by a private foundation.
For the second year, The Bentley
Foundation of Owosso, Michigan, has
awarded full four-year scholarships to
academically promising freshpersons.
The recipients are Mia Schmiedeskamp
of Ann Arbor and Debra Van Putten of
Grand Rapids.
"THE AWARD is unique because it
rewards talented students to do what
they do best, said Jerry Desjardins, a
trustee of The Bentley Foundation.
"That is to become complete students
in every area at the university.
"The award also helps the University
compete for some of the top notch
students in the state - something
which every school needs to do at the
present time," he said.
The foundation's board of trustees
chooses its two recipients each year
from a pool of newly accepted students
submitted by the University's ad-
missions office.
The trustees then review the potential
recipients' records and conduct per-
sonal interviews to choose the winners.
"The Bentley Foundation has funded
smaller grants-in previous years," said
Susan Lipschutz, an assistant to
University President Harold Shapiro.
"Yet now they want to pick some
really super people and follow them
through their four years at the Univer-
sity. "
"The board tries to award merit
while stressing character and leader-
ship along with academic and ex-
tracurricular prowess," she said.
Unlike many other types of aid
available through the University, the
recipients are not obligated to play
athletics or work for their generous
gift. The winners merely must report
back to the trustees periodically on
their academic progress.
Though financial need is taken into
consideration it plays only a secondary
role in the selection of the award win-
ners.
This story originally appeared in
the Daily's summer edition.
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711 N. University
(near State St.)
Ann Arbor
Classes in ballet,
modern, jazz, tap
and ballroom
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