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The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News

University 
researchers collect 
norovirus samples

Researchers at the Medical 

School began collecting samples 
from the recent outbreak of 
norovirus that swept campus 
earlier this month, the University 
announced on Wednesday. 

More than 100 students were 

infected by a strain of the virus 
causing diarrhea and vomiting. The 
University confirmed last week that 
the initial infections were traced to 
dining halls, though the outbreak 
may have spread beyond residence 
halls. 

Though the virus is fairly 

common, it is difficult to grow in 
laboratory settings. Dr. Christiane 
Wobus, a microbiologist at the 
Medical School, has studied the 
disease in mice for the past 10 
years and is now investigating 
stool samples from members of the 
campus community who recently 
experienced symptoms. 

No approved vaccines or 

treatments currently exist for the 
virus. Wobus and other researchers 
will compare the human samples 
to the infected mice and attempt 
to determine the way the virus 
interacts with human cells. 
Detroit mayor finds 
$50 million in 
unused city bonds

Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan 

revealed $50 million dollars in 
unspent bond funds as a part of his 
new budget plan, The Detroit News 
reported on Thursday. 

The unspent funds date back to 

1987, and will be allocated toward 
improvements to public safety 
and parks. Duggan’s proposal 
allocates $11.7 million to city parks, 
$7.5 million to the Detroit Police 
Department’s Real Time Crime 
Center and $7 million toward 
updating the police department’s 
8th precinct in northwest Detroit. 

John Hill, the city’s chief 

financial officer, presented the four-
year balanced budget plan, which 
calls for conservative spending by 
the city for the foreseeable future. 

Discussion of the plan centered 

around shortages in pension 
funds. The city’s bankruptcy plan, 
organized by the former state-
funded emergency management 
team, promised full funding 
of pension obligations to city 
employees. Duggan announced 
in his remarks, however, that the 
forecast was inaccurate. He hopes to 
put together an organized approach 
before the city must begin making 
payments in 2024. 

 

Odeh’s verdict 
vacated by federal 
appeals court

A federal appeals court approved 

an appeal on Thursday in the case 
of Rasmea Odeh, a former Jackson 
resident originally found guilty for 
lying on immigration forms, the 
Detroit Free Press reported.

Odeh, originally from Palestine, 

was prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney 
for the Eastern District of Michigan 
for not revealing her role in a 1969 
civilian bombing in Israel when 
entering the United States. Her case 
quickly became a rallying point for 
Palestinian rights groups around the 
country.

A panel of appeals judges called 

into question the exclusion of 
evidence related to Odeh’s post 
traumatic stress disorder. Though 
the appeals court vacated the U.S. 
District Court’s decision, it did not 
explicitly call for a new trial.
Workplace shooting 
in Kansas plant

Four to seven people have 

been killed and 20 injured in a 
workplace shooting in Hesston, 
Kan. on Thursday, NPR reported. 
The suspected shooter, identified by 
employees as coworker Cedric Ford, 
opened fire at Excel Industries, 
a local manufacturing plant. 
According to a local sheriff, Ford 
was fatally shot by authorities.

Nearby Hesston College put the 

campus on lockdown in response 
to the shooting. About 375 students, 
plus staff members, remained on 
school grounds for several hours.

-RIYAH BASHA

NEWS BRIEFS

allows us to explore what is pos-
sible in the future of transporta-
tion, as well as apply learnings 
to today’s road safety opportu-
nities, including driving apps, 
on-demand services and com-
mercial fleets,” Zendrive CEO 
Jonathan Matus said in the 
release.

Representatives 
from 

Zendrive were also unavailable 
for comment Thursday evening.

To help create Mcity, the Uni-

versity partnered with many of 
the world’s leading auto com-
panies such as Honda, Ford and 

General Motors. In addition 
to Mcity, the state of Michi-
gan is home to 375 automotive 
research centers and hosts the 
highest concentration of indus-
trial and mechanical engineers 
in the country.

The 32-acre testing site simu-

lates urban and suburban envi-
ronments using traffic signs, 
sidewalks, construction obsta-
cles and even potholes. Ford 
became the first auto industry 
to use Mcity to test its driverless 
car technology by testing how 
its LiDAR sensors — sensors that 
use laser beams to gauge the sur-
rounding environment — would 
operate in the winter.

MCITY
From Page 1

and you can see what ward they’re 
in,” said Jacqueline Beaudry, Ann 
Arbor city clerk, in an interview. 
“Students can choose to register 
to vote in Ann Arbor and some 
do.”

To have their name on the bal-

lot for primary elections, which 
will take place in August, partisan 
candidates must submit a peti-
tion containing 100 signatures by 
April 19.

To verify a signature is viable, 

Beaudry said the city cross-ref-
erences the petition with a data-
base of registered voters, which 
is linked to the Secretary of State. 
According to Michigan law, voter 
registration and drivers operat-
ing licenses must have the same 
address.

Beaudry said only one candi-

date — Diane Giannola, a Demo-
crat seeking the Ward 4 seat 
currently held by Krapohl — has 
filed a completed petition as of 
Thursday, though petitions for 
others have already begun to cir-

culate. Giannola is a former mem-
ber of the Ann Arbor Planning 
Commission, and works as in the 
University of Michigan’s Tech 
Transfer lab as a Venture Accel-
erator Manager. She is a Univer-
sity alum.

Ann Arbor resident Will Leaf 

has also pulled petitions to repre-
sent the First Ward. He is attempt-
ing to run again after challenging 
current 
councilmember 
Sabra 

Briere (D–Ward 1) last year. Leaf 
intends to run as a Democrat, hop-
ing to fill the seat currently held 
by Sumi Kailasapathy (D–Ward 
1). Kailasapathy has not yet pulled 
a petition for re-election.

There are aso independent 

candidates, such as Ann Arbor 
resident Kevin Leeser in Ward 5, 
running. Independant candidates 
must file a petition comparable 
to those for partisan candidates 
by July 21 to be on the November 
general election ballot.

Leeser has pulled petitions to 

run as an independent candidate 
for a seat representing the 5th 
Ward. He lost in last year’s elec-
tions to Chip Smith (D–Ward 5), 
when he ran as a write-in candi-

date. Lesser is a U-M Health Sys-
tem nurse and University alum.

This year he is vying to fill the 

seat on Council currently held by 
Warpehoski. In last year’s cam-
paign, Leeser focused primarily 
on bicycle and pedestrian safety. 
He has also expressed opposition 
to the ongoing Ann Arbor deer 
cull, of which Warpehoski is in 
favor.

For both mayoral and Council 

seats, each term lasts two years, 
with half of Council eligible for 
reelection each year. This year 
is also a mayoral election year 
— Taylor, currently running for 
mayor without opposition, pulled 
his petitions last month.

Candidates running for mayor 

must collect 50 signatures from 
residents in each ward of the city, 
requiring them to collect a total of 
250 signatures.

“Even if he had, say, 100 but 

they were all from the Fifth Ward, 
he’d still need to get the 50 from 
each of the other wards,” Beaudry 
said.

Daily Staff Reporter Marlee 

Breakstone contributed reporting 
to this article.

COUNCIL
From Page 1

versity officials discussed sev-
eral benefits of the proposed 
facility.

For students, the new center 

will mean the opportunity for 
increased seating on each bus, 
Hank Baier, associate vice presi-
dent for facilities and opera-
tions, said.

“We currently cannot service 

articulated buses at our cur-
rent facility,” Baier said. “We 
can transport more passengers 

between North Campus and 
Central Campus, which is our 
biggest student demand.”

The center’s future North 

Campus location will also mean 
buses will no longer need to 
drive from the current facilities’ 
South Campus location to North 
Campus each morning to begin 
their routes, meaning less fuel 
will be used, Baier added.

“The more people we put per 

trip, the better our emissions 
characteristics, so it also helps 
us 
with 
our 
environmental 

goal,” he said.

CENTER
From Page 1

sity — and, in turn, students 
— money. According to a newly 
released report analyzing pub-
lic transit alternatives in Ann 
Arbor, a light rail is the most 
cost-effective 
option. 
That 

being said, the entire project is 
estimated to cost between 500 
and 700 million dollars and 
add an additional 8-percent 
increase in annual operating 
costs to both the University 
and the city of Ann Arbor. 
Subsequently, in the immedi-
ate future, students could see 
a tuition hike. It should be 
noted, however, that similar 

projects in the past have been 
paid for with a combination of 
federal, state and University 
funding, along with public and 
private partnerships. The Uni-
versity would not be taking on 
this project alone.

Though the project would 

be expensive in the immediate 
future, it would likely save the 
University and students money 
in the long run. A light rail 
would provide an easy, acces-
sible, convenient, ultimately 
less expensive and more envi-
ronmentally friendly way to 
bridge the gulf between our 
campuses and greatly improve 
the quality of student and city 
life.

OPINION
From Page 1

he felt at home at the University 
of Michigan, and emphasized the 
positive effects finding that the 
community had on him. Solidar-
ity, he noted, was key to many 
communities on campus.

“I want to get to the topic of 

building solidarity, which is why 
we are all here today — margin-
alised students here at UMich,” 
Reed said. “There’s Black stu-
dents, there’s Latino students, 
there’s Native American students, 
and there’s not a lot of us here. We 
can’t afford not to come together 
in solidarity.”

He stressed the importance of 

MSA and BSU students attending 

each other’s events for the educa-
tional experience.

“If we can erase that petty 

mindset that comes with Uni-
versity students who are so cen-
tered upon making sure that 
their individual organization or 
their resume, or these superficial 
things, are so padded with junk, 
then we can really make change,” 
Reed said.

University 
alum 
Donavan 

McKinney, 
another 
panelists, 

took a different approach to 
the idea of solidarity. Though 
he echoed Reed’s sentiments 
about coming together as a cam-
pus community, McKinney said 
he advocated for the Muslim 
and Black communities coming 
together economically, by mak-
ing contributions to one another’s 

organizations and events.

LSA senior Lehman Robinson, 

who attended the event, said he 
has personally struggled with the 
intersectionality of his Black and 
Muslim identities. 

“Being a Black Muslim it is 

important to combine our com-
munities and I found it hard to be 
Black and be Muslim at the same 
time,” Robinson said. “I find it 
harder to go into the BSU being 
Muslim.”

This is the third and final MSA 

event for Black Heritage Month. 
MSA also hosted a discussion of 
the African and African-Ameri-
can history of Islam, and a talk on 
mass incarceration from the lens 
of a Muslim narrative leading up 
to Thursday’s panel.

PANEL
From Page 1

order, and over 70 percent of all 
students screened were some-
what dissatisfied with their 
bodies.

Ayub emphasized the need 

for more resources to help com-

bat the prevalence of such disor-
ders on campus.

“We saw a need that there 

wasn’t 
enough 
conversation 

of how to turn awareness into 
activism,” Ayub said.

Read more online at michigan-

daily.com

DIET
From Page 2

time that they can’t spend on other 
things.”

Councilmember Chip Smith 

(D–Ward 5) echoed many of Bri-
ere’s points, adding that he is dis-
appointed in DEQ’s continued 
failure to update its 1,4-dioxane 
standards, and that there is a lack 
of trust in the community of DEQ.

“Frankly, DEQ’s got a little 

bridge building to do on Monday 
night,” Smith said. “We’ve been 
very patiently waiting for (the new 
standards) as this plume creeps 
closer and closer to the river and 
impacts more and more private 
wells.”

“Their failure to deliver on this 

is a pretty big failure, in light of 
the DEQ’s failures in other areas 
— namely Flint — I think there is 
rightfully an awful lot of concern 
in our community,” Smith added.

CITY
From Page 2

MAZIE HYAMS/Daily

LSA feshman Brett Boehman looks at works honoring the late Art Prof. Jon 
Onye Lockard on display in the Fine Arts Library on Tuesday. Lockard’s art, 
focussing on the spirit of civil rights and Black pride, was instrumental in the 
development of Black arts and culture in Michigan.

LOCK ARD’S ART

MATT VAILLIENCOURT/Daily

Rackham student Maryam Aziz speaks at a panel on Muslim solidarity at Rackham Auditorium on Thursday.

Ann Arbor woman killed in collision
Incident involving 

truck caused 
closure of all 

eastbound traffic

By CAITLIN REEDY

Daily Staff Reporter

A car crash on I-94 resulted 

in the death of a 21-year-old Ann 
Arbor woman Wednesday night. 
Another woman was in critical 
condition after the incident.

The collision of a semi-truck 

and a car occurred just after 6 

p.m. on I-94 East, near Pittsfield 
Township. A 30-year-old woman 
was driving in the far left lane 
when, according to the Michi-
gan State Police, she lost con-
trol and swerved in front of the 
semi-truck, killing the 21-year-
old passenger. The crash is still 
under investigation.

The incident resulted in the 

closure of eastbound I-94 for 
six hours Wednesday night. It 
happened amid a heavy and 
wet snowfall, which began that 
afternoon and accumulated sev-
eral inches of slush and snow. 
The National Weather Service 

released a winter storm advi-
sory in the days leading up to 
the snowfall, predicting upward 
of 10 inches in some areas. The 
peak of the snowfall happened 
Wednesday 
afternoon 
into 

nighttime, covering the time that 
the I-94 accident took place.

Other 
car 
accidents 
also 

occurred due to the severe 
weather Wednesday. The sys-
tem, formally named Winter 
Storm Petros, hit much of the 
southeastern parts of the state. 
The Washtenaw County Dis-
patch reported multiple minor 
crashes during the time of the 

3 — Friday, February 26, 2016

KRISTINA PERKINS /Daily

Mayor Christopher Taylor expresses his support for new water cleanup standards at the Ann Arbor City Council meeting 
in the City Council Chambers on Feb. 1, 2016. 

