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Thursday, May 9, 2019
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
OPINION

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 ERIN WHITE
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Anu Roy-Chaudhury

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Timothy Spurlin
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Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily’s Editorial Board. 
All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.

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Editor in Chief

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

ANNE ELSE | COLUMN

Community voices inspire action
S

ustainability has become 
an important topic on 
every level. There are 
large-scale patterns of pollution 
and damage to the Earth that will 
have lasting effects on genera-
tions to come unless adjustments 
are made. With these looming 
causes of climate change that are 
often created by powerful corpo-
rations or governmental policies, 
the sentiment that individuals 
have little power in what is hap-
pening to our planet can arise. 
I have heard people state that 
there first needs to be big sys-
tematic alterations to help the 
issue before they need to worry 
about their own carbon foot-
print. While it is definitely true 
that systematic dynamics need 
to be changed at wide-reaching 
levels, it is also important to 
include the individual’s journey 
towards being eco-friendly and 
conscious about what we put 
into the world.
Increased awareness of and 
education 
about 
sustainabile 
options in daily life can hopeful-
ly expand the demographics of 
eco-conscious people. At a local 
level, students at the University 
of Michigan have a wide array 
of resources for environmental 
education and action. Through 
Planet Blue, students can become 
ambassadors through a simple 
process of watching informa-
tive videos about distinguished 
categories such as energy, food, 
water and community.
If 
students 
utilized 
this 
opportunity, the amount of envi-
ronmentally aware people would 
rise substantially. As described 
in 
Planet 
Blue’s 
community 
training portion, it is benefi-
cial to raise the enthusiasm and 
accessibility of sustainable prac-
tices and events in order to get 
people involved. Many people, 
whether they be students or not, 
struggle with consistent engage-
ment in eco-friendly actions 
in the community due to busy 
schedules 
or 
inaccessibility. 
With the University, we must 
work to make it easier for the 
community to join eco-friendly 
programs and educate others on 
how to care for the environment.
These types of programs and 
access to education will allow 
for open conversations about 
sustainability in personal and 
academic life. Through raising 
our own voices to the leaders 

of our school, we can hopefully 
enact some change in the way 
the University deals with envi-
ronmental policies and deci-
sions. On March 15, our campus 
participated in the Global Cli-
mate Strike. A multitude of ages 
and voices came to support the 
cause. Open protests such as 
this are a way for any individ-
ual to express their support for 
what they believe is right for the 
future of our planet. Without 
sharing personal viewpoints, the 
passion for action will never be 
heard by mega-corporations or 
elected officials.
After the strike, several pro-
testers turned this passion into 
a legitimate call for change 
and went to strike at the Flem-
ing Administration Building on 
campus. They tried to create an 
open dialogue with President 
Mark Schlissel and expose the 
University’s stance on climate 
change policies and carbon neu-
trality. Currently, the University 
has not established clear efforts 
in the way of environmental pro-
cedures. Other Big Ten schools 
are surpassing our less than suc-
cessful commitment to cleaner 
energy and awareness.
Engineering 
junior 
Dhruv 
Tatke explained the necessary 
action the University must take 
in the face of clear environmen-
tal changes and dangers. “We 
need the University to com-
mit to a true and just transition 
to carbon neutrality by 2030, 
including immediate divestment 
from fossil fuels. This goal, that 
has been chosen by a group of 
students who have been help-
ing to coordinate the Climate 
Action Movement on and off 
campus, keeps with the IPCC 
Report which requires that the 
world needs to cut its emissions 
by 40 percent by 2030 if we are 
to keep the planet from warm-
ing 2 degrees Celsius above pre-
industrial temperatures. As a 
center of wealth and privilege, it 
is imperative that the University 
is a leader in this effort.”
This protest resulted in stu-
dent sit-ins, which Tatke helped 
organize, to make these ideas 
reality. 

Anne Else can be reached at 

aelse@umich.edu.

T

oday, a number of places 
suffer from a lack of housing 
being built. My home, the 
Bay Area, and my adopted home, 
Ann Arbor, have seen increases in 
the demand for affordable housing 
without a corresponding increase in 
the supply. What has happened as a 
result is unsustainable. MLive reports 
that from 2015 to July 2018, “Ann 
Arbor has added 50 new affordable 
housing units. The goal was to have 
420 new units by the end of the 
year.” The lack of housing in Ann 
Arbor also has another effect, which 
is that Ypsilanti ends up being the 
de facto housing bank. This will not 
work in the long-term, as Ypsilanti 
will eventually run out of housing as 
well, and then what? Policy that could 
be utilized to address this issue is 
building more housing while radically 
“up-zoning” much of Washtenaw 
County.
Most students have enrolled in 
some kind of introductory economics 
course and/or understand that the 
downward sloping demand line will 
meet the upward sloping supply line 
at a certain point, what we in the 
biz call “equilibrium.” This specific 
case of disequilibrium represents an 
excess demand, and the easiest way to 
rectify this would be to simply build 
more housing — especially affordable 
housing. However, there is a bit of a 
catch-22.
While this would be an easy way 
to address the problem in theory, in 
practice it gets much harder. Building 
housing does not tend to be terrifically 
popular with those who already 
own property in the area, because 

they assume that more housing 
would drop their property values. A 
fundamental issue is that everyone 
feels they must have a backyard and 
picket fence, and this only happens 
via exclusionary zoning that favors 
single-family homes. 

When cities had less people, that 
idea worked because fewer people 
needed housing; today, that is not 
the case. Ann Arbor’s choice to 
downzone 
neighborhoods 
while 
suffering from a lack of affordable 
housing represents a rare policy that 
both looks bad now and will age 
poorly — truly a parable for our times. 
In fact, the exact opposite of this 
should and needs to be done. People 
cannot all live in single-family homes. 
However, there is nothing wrong with 
much more liberalized regulations on 
housing. Japan did it and ended up 
with incredibly affordable cities. As a 
result, Tokyo is a great place to live.
Japan’s policies also offer a bit of a 
cautionary tale about how much local 
government can really do. According 
to Market Urbanism, there are three 
main reasons that Japan was able to 

create the housing market they have 
today. First, housing was less of an 
investment in Japan. Second, public 
services are not administered at the 
local level in Japan. And third, the 
review process to build housing in 
the U.S. is different than it is in Japan, 
as deference is given to local special 
interests. All of these explanations 
point in one direction, and it is not 
a positive one for fans of incredibly 
localized government. It demonstrates 
that cities will not be able to act alone 
to address this crisis and there needs 
to be federal policies put into place 
to ease the pressure of housing. In 
the U.S., a house is the biggest asset 
many people own. From this point of 
view, it makes sense they would fight 
attempts to lower that value, but that 
does not mean it is sound policy. In 
addition to this, where students live 
determines what school they can go 
to from kindergarten through 12th 
grade, and this is usually funded by 
property taxes. By building more 
housing, it is likely that there would be 
more students, something that should 
generate more support than it has.
This illustrates that there is a limit 
to local control. If there is continued 
demonstration of an inability to solve 
this problem by slashing more zoning 
regulations or using tax credits, then 
there is no choice but for higher levels 
of government to step in and take a 
more active role. This should not be 
a first choice, but at a certain point 
if the local government is unable 
to address the problem, something 

ANIK JOSHI | COLUMN

Anik Joshi can be reached at 

anikj@umich.edu.

Addressing the housing crisis

There needs to be 
federal policies 
put into place to 
ease the pressure 
of housing.

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