Craig told The Detroit News
after the approval the decision
has been discussed for long
enough and its purpose is to
help the police department
protect the community.
“This is about the victims,”
Craig
said.
“We
took
the
community’s concerns to heart.
I know some have felt we were
not transparent during this
process, but when we purchased
this $1 million software, we
had a conversation with City
Council … so there was nothing
secret about it.”
LSA senior Hannah Agnew,
president
of
the
Student
Executive Committee of the
Prison Creative Arts Project,
said
the
continued
use
of
facial recognition technology
will only increase the divide
between civilians and police.
“With a study the ACLU did,
there were many issues with
misidentifying Black folks and
women,” Agnew said. “And
with the way we already over-
police people of color, adding
more surveillance is not going
to help … People fear it and it
creates distrust in the police
system. We could be investing
that money in services that let
people prosper and that raises
them up instead.”
U.S.
Rep.
Rashida
Tlaib,
D-District 13, told The Detroit
News she believed the software
should be analyzed by only
African Americans to avoid
further
misidentification
of
people of color.
“Analysts need to be African
Americans, not people that are
not,” Tlaib said in a Detroit
News video. “It happens all
the time, it’s true — I think
non-African Americans think
African Americans all look
the same. I’ve seen it even
on the House floor, people
calling Elijah Cummings ‘John
Lewis,’ and John Lewis ‘Elijah
Cummings,’ and they’re totally
different people.”
Craig told the Detroit News
he believes Tlaib’s comments
were
insulting,
adding
all
department officers and civilian
employees receive bias training
and should not be barred from
jobs involving the software.
“That’s
something
we
train for, and it’s valuable
training, but to say people
should be barred from working
somewhere because of their
skin color?” Craig said. “That’s
racist.”
Law
student
Michael
Goodyear,
who
is
editor-
in-chief
of
the
Michigan
Technology
Law
Review,
said though the controversy

surrounding the technology is
valid, focus should be put on
the software itself as opposed
to those analyzing its results.
“I think she (Tlaib) has a valid
point, for sure, that visualization
technology
can
be
helpful,
but it does have shortcomings
that are particularly related to
recognizing people of color,”
Goodyear
said.
“That
said,
it is from a more technical
standpoint, so it should mean
reworking
the
algorithm,
making sure the algorithm
correctly identifies individuals,
which
obviously
can
have
some biases from the coders
themselves. But I think it is a
maybe another separate move
from what Representative Tlaib
had said in those comments. So
it’s not necessarily the person
who’s using the algorithm, but
the algorithm itself.”
Facial recognition technology
is used in everyday life through
Facebook photo tagging, airport
security and even in online
dating applications. Goodyear
pointed out it is also being
used by other governments for
more
surveillance
purposes
but emphasized a need for
regulation similar to Detroit’s
in these situations.
“The Chinese government
has
been
using
facial
recognition
technology
to
track the movements of certain
Uighur groups in western China
… that’s kind of the far, not
great side of this technology,”
Goodyear said. “The Chinese
and Hong Kong governments
have been using it in Hong Kong
to actually track jaywalking in
Hong Kong, which is maybe a
little bit ‘big brother’. So it is
important to — kind of like in
what this ordinance is doing
now — to draw boundaries of
what’s acceptable behavior and
what’s not acceptable.”
If
facial
recognition
technology
were
to
be
implemented in Ann Arbor,
Agnew said it would have
similarly detrimental effects on
the community.
“Anywhere you implement
this it won’t have a good
outcome
because
of
over-
policing and over-surveilling,”
Agnew said. “Ann Arbor likes to
think of itself as a very liberal
city, and this would be a way
to police the already small
numbers of people of color we
have here.”
If the software were to be
implemented in Ann Arbor,
Goodyear said he hoped it
would be with clear regulations
and
limitations
in
part
produced through community
engagement. He pointed out
Ann Arbor’s smaller size and
said the roles of the Ann Arbor
Police Department and the

University police would change
how such technology could be
implemented compared to in
Detroit.
“I think they’d definitely
implement it in a different way,”
Goodyear said. “But hopefully
they’d do it in a similar way to
Detroit, where they have public
forums that allow things to be
discussed publicly and actually
create regulations to limit any
sort of things might be going on
like in China, or Hong Kong for
example.”
Deputy
Chief
of
Police
Melissa
Overton
of
the
University’s Division of Public
Safety & Security said the
department has not discussed
using
facial
recognition
technology yet.
“We are always reviewing
the
latest
technology
that
would assist law enforcement in
solving crime, however, we have
not discussed facial recognition
at this time,” she wrote in an
email to the Daily.
The
Ann
Arbor
Police
Department did not respond to
requests for comment in time
for publication.
With regards to the primary
controversy surrounding the
software, Goodyear believes
the
technology
still
needs
improvement.
However,
he
emphasized
the
facial
recognition technology would
not be able to solely be used to
indict or imprison a suspect.
“They
should
be
going
through
and
making
sure
that it’s absolutely accurate,”
Goodyear said. “But … no
one’s going to be arrested and
thrown in jail, indicted, based
purely on their picture. Facial
recognition technology so far
is one factor. So under standard
evidence, you need to have a
variety of different things that
kind of show that someone
did something. In this case, it
would be good evidence, but in
and of itself, it’s not enough.”
Agnew argued there would
be no positive outcomes from
the
continued
use
of
the
technology for both victims and
those incarcerated.
“With
the
criminal
justice system we tend to
disproportionately
target
people of color,” she said. “And
that often doesn’t happen in a
way that helps victims. They’re
saying, ‘We’re going to use this
system of surveillance to help
victims.’ But how is it going to
help victims? It’s not providing
support or help to victims to
deal
with
what
happened,
it’s just another way to police
people.”

“Understanding
individuals
from
communities
that
you
haven’t
been
exposed
to
is
critical,” Niemer said. “And most
importantly, it’s not just about
understanding them, but about
developing the skills to learn how
to understand them. These skills
are critical for our own individual
successes and also to the successes
of our society.”
One of the featured projects
presented
at
the
event
was
introduced
by
Public
Health
senior Eryka Swank, whose team
has partnered with the Spectrum
Center to create an oral history
project in celebration of the
Spectrum
Center’s
upcoming
50th anniversary. The two-year
project will consist of a collection
of interviews from past and
current LGBTQ faculty and staff
and alumni who will share their
personal stories as members of the
LGBTQ community.
“Our big hope is that we can
highlight stories that are not
typically heard,” Swank said. “We

know that LGBTQ people are
oppressed, and that our stories
and experiences are stigmatized
so being able to give them platform
and allow our stories to be
preserved for generations to come
and for years to come is a really
awesome thing.”
Swank said she hopes the
project will give a voice to those
who are oppressed even within the
LGBTQ community.
“We’re trying to get a kind
of equity of whose stories are
known. I think it’s important
to me because the visibility and
representation on our campus
I think is really important and
a lot of times, even within the
LGBTQ community, there’s still
privilege and oppression,” she said.
“Sometimes the stories of the most
privileged LGBTQ people are the
ones that we know, and so being
able to try to get at all of them and
know all the stories, good and bad,
all the experiences, good and bad,
and somewhere in between, is
really important to me.”
Kim Lijana, director of Center
for Educational Outreach and
part
of
the
Undocumented
Students Knowledge Community,
introduced
another
project.

Her team’s project intends to
create a course to help educators
understand
and
support
undocumented students in their
pursuit of higher education, both
on campus and before they arrive
on campus. The course will consist
of three modules, titled “What does
it mean to be undocumented?”,
“How can we improve college
access
for
undocumented
students?” and “How can we
support undocumented students
to succeed in college?”
“The first module … is really
giving
additional
information
for people to better understand
because it’s very complex, and for
many educators, it’s like this is their
first step into better understanding
that there are even undocumented
students in their school,” Lijana
said. “So, we’re sort of thinking
about this trajectory to make sure
that we’re providing educators
the information that they need to
support student; that we’re really
empowering them to understand
that there is something you can do,
as well as inspiring them to take
action.”

Andrew
Berki,
director
of the Office of Campus
Sustainability and member of
the President’s Commission
on
Carbon
Neutrality,
explained these investments
support
the
existing
infrastructure
for
fueling
vehicles as well powering
and heating facilities. He
said the Ann Arbor campus’s
natural gas plant powers
and heats Central Campus
and the athletic facilities.
The
University
contracts
electricity from DTE Energy
to
power
North
Campus
burns natural gas in boiler
systems
to
heat
North
Campus buildings.
According to Berki, the
Ann Arbor campus emits
approximately
640,000
metric tons of carbon dioxide
into the atmosphere per year.
Ninety-eight percent of Ann
Arbor
campus
emissions
are a result of burning fossil
fuels to heat and provide
electricity
to
buildings,
and two percent of campus
emissions
come
from
the fuel burned to power
transportation.
University
President
Mark Schlissel formed the
President’s
Commission
on
Carbon
Neutrality
to
create recommendations to
achieve
carbon
neutrality
on campus. One of the goals
was to reduce emissions by
2025 to 26 percent below
2006 emissions levels. In
a prior interview with The
Daily,
Schlissel
expressed
his concern regarding the
logistics of carbon neutrality.
“We use steam to heat
the campus, and the only
efficient way so far to make
steam is to burn a fossil fuel
or to have a nuclear power
plant, (and) we don’t have
a
nuclear
power
plant,”
said Schlissel. “So, we want
to
understand
what
the
condition and the cost is if
we were to say we want to

change the way we heat and
cool the campus: would it
cost us $100 million, would it
cost us $1 billion?”
Berki described some of
the efforts the University
has taken in its push toward
reducing
emissions
and
achieving carbon neutrality.
According
to
Berki,
the
University has already signed
a commitment with DTE
Energy to receive 200,000
megawatt-hours
of
wind-
powered energy in the near
future, which will reduce
emissions by about 100,000
metric
tons
of
carbon
dioxide.
The
President’s
Commission
on
Carbon
Neutrality is also the process
of hiring a firm to analyze
the current infrastructure of
how the University heats and
powers Central, North and
the Medical campuses.
“They’re
going
to
be
coming up with strategies
on how to move away from
fossil fuels and possibly fuel
our campus with carbon
neutral options,” said Berki.
“Of course, those strategies
and options will have to
meet the scale and reliability
requirements to meet the
mission of the institution, but
that’s a huge effort that the
PCCN has pushed forward,
and we’re excited about it.”
Jonathan
Morris,
a
Rackham
student
in
the
School
for
Earth
and
Environmental Studies, was
skeptical of the University’s
ability to take meaningful
action on reducing its carbon
footprint.
“I think the President’s
Commission
on
Carbon
Neutrality is a good thing,”
Morris said. “I would be
a lot more excited if the
University
administration
showed evidence that it will
actually make a difference.
While other universities are
taking the climate crisis very
seriously and fundamentally
changing the way they do
business,
the
University
of Michigan seems more
concerned with protecting
its
image
and
arresting

students who are raising
these issues.”
Morris
criticized
how
the
previous
University
president’s
Greenhouse
Gas Reduction Committee
created a 2015 report of
recommendations
that,
according to Morris, was
largely ignored.
“From my perspective, I
don’t see anything different
between that committee and
the new PCCN in terms of
accountability,” Morris said.
“It would be wonderful for
the PCCN to come out with
bold recommendations for
rapidly
achieving
carbon
neutrality,
but
without
any
formal
accountability
measures
in
place,
the
University
administration
could just cherry pick a few
things to improve the image
of the University without
taking
meaningful
steps
toward decarbonization, as it
did before.”
Elkolaly
outlined
what
the University can do for
improvement.
“The
U-M
Carbon
Neutrality
Commission
needs
to
be
establishing
dialogue, first and foremost,”
Elkolaly said. “Students and
staff have been completely
in the dark and have only
been
responded
to
with
unjust legal action. Once
they actually agree to sit
down and communicate with
us about our concerns, we
can take further, actionable
steps.”
Berki
argued
reducing
emissions and reliance on
fossil fuels is a collective
effort.
All
off-campus
housing, he noted, is also
fueled by fossil fuels, so
reducing energy use off-
campus
and
individual
actions remains important to
limiting emissions.
“I think it’s all of our
responsibilities
—
faculty,
students and staff — to
take ownership around the
issue and to do what we can
individually to help attack
this problem that we have,”
Berki said.

Marijuana
micro-businesses
cultivate up to 150 plants and
process, package and sell cannabis
products to adults over 21, retail
dispensaries and consumption
centers.
Councilmember Jeff Hayner,
D-Ward 1, said he voted for
legalization in 2018 because he was
a proponent of decriminalization,
not because he wanted more
facilities opening up in Ann Arbor.

“I didn’t vote for Prop 1 to have
600 distribution and consumption
facilities open in my community,”
Hayner said. “And I have had
people come up to me and say
they have legitimate concerns
about the placement of these, and
legitimate concerns about large
money flowing to the cities that
do allow this use and it driving
out other businesses that serve a
broader portion of the community.”
Current businesses in Ann
Arbor that sell cannabis products
have city permits they must renew
on an annual basis. The new points-
based application system will affect

how
these
already-established
marijuana facilities comply with
the city’s licensing rules as well as
their annual renewals.
According to the Marijuana
Regulatory Agency, failure to
comply with the department’s laws
may result in nonrenewal of the
business’s license.
“A
state
operating
license
shall not be renewed unless the
department has determined that
the individual qualifications of
each person required by the act
and these rules is eligible, qualified,
and suitable as part of the license
renewal in accordance with the
relevant
licensing
standards
set forth in the act and these
rules,” the Michigan Marijuana
Regulatory Agency wrote in the
policy statement.
This
shifting
legal
aspect
of regulations will also impact
businesses looking to enter into the
Ann Arbor marijuana market.
Once the policy is set, if the
state starts to receive more license
applications than the limit of
28, it will mean an increase in
competition between the new
cannabis businesses looking to
set up shop in Ann Arbor. The
decision of selecting applicants is
at the discretion of the city, rather
than the state, and according to
McDonald, whether applicants are
“best suited” to operate in the city
will depend on the compliances
of the Michigan Regulation and
Taxation of Marihuana Act.
Recreational
marijuana
businesses need a city permit
in addition to state licensing to
operate, with the annual city fee
being $5,000. Michigan will start
accepting
license
applications
starting Nov. 1 of this year.

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Wednesday, October 9, 2019 — 3A

“Under
some
circumstances, even probing
for weaknesses may result in
severe penalties, up to and
including
expulsion,
civil
fines, and jail time,” the
description
explains.
“Our
class policy is that you must
respect
legal
and
ethical
boundaries of vulnerability
testing at all times, or else you
will fail the course.”
Voatz,
a
Boston-based
mobile
elections
company,
uses blockchain and current
smartphone
technology
to
make it possible for voters
to
participate
in
various
elections
through
their
phones. The company was
founded in 2015 and has since
processed nearly 80,000 votes
in 30 separate elections.
During the 2018 election
cycle,
it
was
revealed
that
Voatz
experienced
an
unsuccessful
security
breach targeted at votes in

West Virginia. Since 2018,
West Virginia has permitted
members of the military and
those living overseas to vote
through Voatz. At a press
conference on Oct. 1, CNN
reported Mike Stuart, the U.S.
Attorney for the Southern
District of West Virginia, was
told the IP addresses matched
those at the University.
“During the 2018 election
cycle,
Secretary
of
State
Warner referred to my office
what he perceived to be an
attempted intrusion by an
outside party into the West
Virginia
military
mobile
voting system,” Stuart said
at the press conference. “No
legal conclusions whatsoever
have been made regarding
the conduct of the activity or
whether any federal laws were
violated.”
Nimit
Sawhney,
Voatz
CEO and co-founder, wrote
in a statement to The Daily
there
was
no
detectable
security breach, but the FBI’s
intervention is necessary to
avoid any potential hacks in

the future.
“The Voatz system worked
as designed and intended,”
Sawhney wrote. “The attempt
was detected, thwarted at
the gate and reported to the
authorities. We fully support
the West Virginia Secretary
of State’s office and the law
enforcement
agencies
in
their
investigations
under
the purview of the law. Given
that elections infrastructure
is
classified
as
critical
infrastructure
under
the
Department
of
Homeland
Security, we will continue to
report any such attempts in
the future.”
University
spokesman
Rick Fitzgerald declined to
comment further on the issue,
noting the details have not
been uncovered yet.
“It’s not clear what someone
may actually have attempted,”
Fitzgerald wrote in an email
to The Daily.
This
is
a
developing
story. Please check back at
michigandaily.com for more
information.

HACK
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DEI
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