The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
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Friday, November 18, 2016 — 3A
2-News
ALEXIS RANKIN/Daily
Business junior Christopher McClendon sings as part of the Love Movement on the Diag Thursday.
this one that bring together
different groups dedicated to
sustainability.
“You get a bigger bang for your
buck; everything kind of reinforces
everything else,” she added.
“What we’re doing reinforces
what
Recycle
Ann
Arbor’s
doing, which reinforces energy
management, all of those kinds
of things,” she said. “It’s a
bigger message when we all
come together to reach a bigger
audience.”
However,
LSA
senior
Liz
Bedrick, a board member for the
Student Sustainability Initative,
voiced disappointment regarding
the lack of a Q&A session, which
was a part of the town hall in
previous years. Bedrick also said
she felt the event’s scope was
narrower than she expected and
focused on the efforts of only a
few departments.
“I thought it could have been
a little more comprehensive,”
Bedrick said. “A lot of stakeholders
weren’t accounted for here. They
only had four people talk from
three different offices, so I think
they could have had a wider array
of people.”
Nonetheless, she said she felt
the representatives from these
departments
demonstrated
a
positive
trajectory
for
sustainability on campus.
“But I think in terms of their
goals they all seem to be on track,
and I think a lot of the initiatives
going on are really great,” she said.
Engineering
senior
Natalie
Salton said she appreciated the
format of the town hall event
because it provided opportunities
for the community to actively
engage
with
the
topic
and
interact with others involved in
sustainability programs.
“If the University only put out
reports, I think you’ll have a lot
lower participation and awareness
of what’s going on,” she said. “...
You can still talk to people, see
what things are available around
campus by having interpersonal
relationships. It’s a lot more
effective at communicating stuff
than throwing reports and fliers
at people.”
SUSTAINABILITY
From Page 1A
move to California, she said she
promptly began working with
city officials to create a plan for
filling her soon-to-be vacant
spot, minimizing the amount of
disruption that would ensue.
“In other situations in the
past, people have moved and
resigned but because I have full
warning and I’m the kind of
person I am, when I understood
that my son was successful in
purchasing the house and I had
a basic idea of when I would
move, I worked with the mayor
and the city administrator and
the city attorney to create a
reasonable process proposal,
and council then looked at that
process proposal and improved
it,” Briere said.
People interested in filling
the vacancy have until 2 p.m.
on Nov. 23 to complete an
online application. On Nov. 28,
the council will interview all
applicants individually.
Briere said the administration
committee, which is a subgroup
of the council, is currently
deciding on a series of interview
questions to ask applicants,
which will be made public by
Nov. 23.
At the Dec. 5 council meeting,
Briere will offer a resolution
declaring
her
resignation,
creating a vacancy and stepping
away from the table to allow
council members to discuss who
should fill the seat.
Ward
1
resident
Jeffrey
Hayner, who ran for the City
Council seat in 2013, said he is
currently deciding if he will
apply for the vacancy, but hopes
the position will be filled by
someone who represents the
community voice.
“Sabra has done so much
to
promote
community
involvement and participation,
so I really want to make sure
that seat goes to whoever it
is that can keep some of that
going,”
Hayner
said.
“It’s
important.”
Hayner
also
said
he
is
concerned that this position
will be appointed rather than
taken to a public vote, especially
following
the
city’s
recent
vote to move to four-year term
lengths.
“I haven’t read what the clerk
has to say yet, but I followed some
of it when they were discussing
it,” Hayner said. “I don’t love it
because appointments always
lend themselves to abuse of the
majority.”
Briere said she hopes the
opportunity to apply for this
position will attract a different
pool of candidates than those
who would run in an election
against an incumbent.
“It is my hope that a number
of people will apply who are
supremely qualified, but whose
names have never appeared on
a ballot.”
CITY COUNCIL
From Page 1A
violated
or
experiencing
violence or incarceration for
whatever reason,” Ridley said.
While noting it is important
to acknowledge the harsh
realities
of
living
as
a
transgender person, Ridley
said it is equally important
to
remind
others
why
transgender women risk so
much to express their gender
identity in the first place.
“I really just want to find
and look for and dig for those
stories, not that they haven’t
experienced marginalization,
but
this
ever
present
human story of overcoming
these
obstacles
and
being
triumphant and finding love
and finding joy with other
people and with themselves,”
Ridley said.
Panelist
Mari
Brighe,
Spectrum
Center
graduate
communications coordinator,
agreed that more positive
stories
of
transgender
experience
should
be
shared.
Brighe,
whose
articles discussing life as a
transgender woman have been
featured in publications like
Vice, Mic and Bustle, said she
shares her stories publicly
despite receiving daily threats
because she feels obligated
to readers who relate to her
experiences.
“Honestly, every time I get
an email or a tweet or a message
from someone who tells me
that my work is important
to them, is important to
them for being safe or being
included or feeling welcomed
or feeling like their ideas and
experiences were validated,
that means everything in the
world to me and outweighs a
million threats,” Brighe said.
Mark Chung Kwan Fan,
assistant
director
of
the
Spectrum
Center,
echoed
Ridley’s sentiments and said
he hoped the panel discussion
helped
individuals
in
the
University and transgender
community hear more positive
stories
about
overcoming
marginalization
to
find
happiness.
“It’s really to share their
experiences
of
not
just
marginalization
but
also
success,” Chung Kwan Fan
said. “Because even though you
identify within an oppressed
community so to speak, you
do have opportunities to be
successful as well.”
STORYTELLING
From Page 1A
adults staying in a shelter live
with a serious mental illness,”
Blake said. “Part of why this
number is so high is because
folks
with
mental
illness,
especially
severe
persistent
mental illness, even if they
are able to get into housing,
they usually require or would
like some additional support,
and there’s not a whole lot of
permanent support in housing
out there.”
Avalon Housing currently
owns and operates 21 properties
in Ann Arbor that serve both
single adults as well as families.
According to Blake, housing
units
on
these
properties
currently house more than 400
individuals. She emphasized
that the nonprofit operates
more as a support service rather
than a landlord.
“There are a lot of public
housing
agencies
nationally
that are either starting to
move themselves in offering
permanent supportive housing
or are partnering with groups
like Avalon who are already
doing it,” she said. “What all
the research and studies show
is that permanent supportive
housing is what’s most effective
in terms of keeping people
safely housed.”
Blake
also
highlighted
efforts individuals can make
to
become
more
informed
about homelessness, attending
City
Council
meetings
to
hear council and community
members
present
their
positions on the issue. She noted
public hearings in the past
have highlight mixed attitudes
of citizens about proposals
and developments related to
affordable housing.
“What we see is sort of a mix of
folks coming out,” she said. “We
will see some folks who show
up and say, ‘I’m so in support of
there being affordable housing
in Ann Arbor.’ Then we get folks
coming out saying, ‘Not in my
backyard. I don’t want folks who
need affordable housing living
by me; I don’t want folks with
mental illness living near me.’ ”
In an interview with the
Daily after the event, Blake
elaborated,
saying
residents
who oppose affordable housing
project developments in their
neighborhoods often support
the idea in general.
She noted that, historically,
City Council has been highly
supportive
of
Avalon’s
and
similar organizations’ work.
LSA junior Carly Noah, a
member of the CASC Student
Board who organized the talk,
said coming from a small, rural
town, her first experiences
with homelessness during her
freshman year exposed her to
issues of wealth disparities that
are more prevalent in urban
environments.
“It was during the winter, and
I saw people wearing Canada
Goose coats, and I thought
there are so many people who
are homeless, so I was really
bothered by the discrepancy
between the two,” she said.
In her remarks, Blake also
highlighted the gaps in wealth
that exist in Ann Arbor and
Washtenaw County, noting that
while the county is relatively
wealthy, there are a number of
individuals who are of lower
socioeconomic status.
“We have a lot of privilege
in this county, we have a lot of
privilege associated with the
‘U,’ and I don’t think a lot of
people realize just how much
inequality there is in Ann Arbor
currently,” she said.
LSA
freshman
Paul
Chamberlain said after the
event that at the start, he didn’t
understand the full scope of the
issue and the work of advocacy
organizations like Avalon.
“I felt like I wasn’t really
aware of the extent of the
problem, and I was encouraged
by what people are doing to
meet the problem,” he said.
HOMELESSNESS
From Page 1A
the FDA’s new tobacco rule.
Under this rule, the FDA
regulates all tobacco products,
including
hookah
and
e-cigarettes, among others.
The
ACA-sponsored
day,
called the Great American
Smokeout,
began
in
the
1970s and takes place every
year on the third Thursday
of
November.
Smokers
are
encouraged to either make a
plan to quit smoking or use the
day to kick off their plan.
According
to
the
ACA’s
website, 40 million Americans
smoke cigarettes, and tobacco
is the largest preventable cause
of health complications and
death.
TCS
Program
Manager
Alison Nix said “Quit For A
Day” opens a window for TCS
to promote its resources to
people who may be interested
in quitting smoking or who
would simply like to experience
what it would be like to quit for
a day.
“We feel like we have a role
to share information on this
day not only from an education
perspective
around
what’s
going on in the field, but also
to provide information and
support to individuals,” she
said.
Scheduling
the
various
events to culminate on the
same day as the Great American
Smokeout, she added, helps
TCS take part in a national
conversation at a community
level.
“It’s an opportunity for us
to share information on a day
that people are really keyed in
to because it’s a historical event
that’s been happening for many
years,” she said. “By having it on
the Great American Smokeout,
it’s a day that we can focus in
on and highlight the resources
that we have available to help
people do that.”
Public Health Prof. Cliff
Douglas, who teaches classes
in tobacco policy and serves as
the vice president for tobacco
control at the American Cancer
Society, noted in an interview
that
about
90
percent
of
smokers start smoking by the
age of 18, and 99 percent start
by the age of 26.
As a result, Douglas said,
efforts like “Quit for a Day”
in a university setting can be
very influential. He added that
knowledge and awareness are
critical in a college environment
and among students.
“One
critical
focus,
of
course, is students,” he said.
“You’ve got a fairly significant
percentage of smokers who
start during the college years,
so it’s a key transition time
when a college student who
smokes will either decide to
quit or will continue smoking
for many years to come and
suffer the consequences. Or,
in some cases, it determines
whether a student starts to
smoke.”
TCS efforts are slated to
continue throughout the month
— through the end of November,
a wall in UMHS’s Towsley
Center will continue to feature
stories from people who used
TCS to help them quit smoking
as well as information about
other methods to help quit.
SMOKING
From Page 1A
now can all work to ensure that
tomorrow is better than today
and two days from now are
better than tomorrow.”
She told the crowd that the
shock of increasingly angry
and
discriminatory
rhetoric
on campus following Trump’s
election inspired the creation of
an all-inclusive movement.
“We
believe
that
people
have a right to be angry and
they have a right to be scared,”
Jawad
continued.
“But
we
want to counteract all of that
because if we come together as a
community it can rise us up. It’s
been a really frustrating week.
My Uber driver cussed at me
when I dropped a food crumb in
his car. I told him, ‘Thank you
and have a nice day,’ and that’s
the model of our movement.”
McClendon
reminded
the
group that love and peace can
prevail as long as they allow it
to.
“I don’t care what weapon
may fall against me,” McClendon
said. “I will prosper because
I believe in peace. I love that
hijab Nadine wears. I love the
timbs on my feet and my nappy
hair. I love all of you, whether
you’re black or white or blue or
green or yellow or anything in
between.”
SPEAKOUT
From Page 2A
The University of Michigan
Bicentennial Office hosted a
Diag Day Thursday afternoon
to
spread
information
about
the
activities
and
events planned for the 2017
bicentennial
year.
Two
organizers — the Michigan
Bicentennial
Archive
and
the
Bicentennial
Student
Advisory Committee — set
up two booths in the center
of the Diag with the goal
of increasing interest and
student involvement in the
University’s
bicentennial
year.
M-BARC
focused
on
disseminating
information
about a time capsule they are
developing for the occasion.
Designed
by
University
engineers, it will be launched
into space this summer to
orbit for 100 years and will
include information stored in
the form of interviews, audio
and video files and DNA.
On
Thursday,
LSA
senior
Paul
Stefanski,
a
representative from M-BARC,
signed up interested students
to be interviewed for the
project.
M-BARC
plans
to conduct 1,000 of these
interviews in total, which
won’t be heard until the
capsule is brought down from
space by the class of 2117.
“No one has ever sent
something into space for 100
years before or even designed
anything with that intention,
especially since some of the
information is being stored in
DNA,” Stefanski said. “It will
be an interesting experiment
for scientific purposes as
well. Our mission is to make
a time capsule unlike any that
has been made before.”
Nursing
freshman
Mary
Kostesich was one of many
students who signed up for an
interview for the time capsule,
and said she was excited to be
involved in such a project.
“I’m really excited for the
space
capsule,”
Kostesich
said. “I think it’s so cool that
this will be the first of its
kind and is being created by
University engineers.”
Members
of
the
Bicentennial
Student
Advisory
Committee
also
spoke to students in the next
booth about the other 2017
bicentennial events and how
they can get involved. The
University will be offering
classes, open to students and
the public, for both the winter
and fall 2017 semesters about
the history, effect and future
of the institution.
Public
Health
student
Peter DeJonge, a member
of the Bicentennial Student
Advisory
Committee,
said the committee is also
encouraging
other
student
organizations to get involved
in the celebration.
“There are a lot of ways
for your student club to get
involved,” DeJonge said. “If
they want to incorporate a
bicentennial theme they can
talk to us or they can talk to
the bicentennial committee,
and they can integrate that
into their own activities.
The
bicentennial
year
will also see campus visits
from several notable alumni,
seasonal festivals and other
University-sponsored events.
‘U’ Bicentennial Office holds
Diag event to raise awareness
Organizers set up booths aiming to increase student interest
ALEXIS RANKIN
For the Daily
“Sabra has done so
much to promote
community involvement
and participation”
Join the news section. Help tell the stories of fellow students.
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