The Ann Arbor City Council will 

vote on the proposed city budget 
for fiscal year 2022 at the council 
meeting on Monday night. A meeting 
was held on May 3 for residents to 
express thoughts and concerns about 
the roughly $470 million proposed 
budget. Covering issues ranging from 
policing to deer population control, 
the proposed budget contains many 
hotly contested items. 

Police 
The budget includes $155,000 

for the Ann Arbor Independent 
Community 
Police 
Oversight 

Commission (ICPOC), which serves 
as a bridge between residents and the 
Police Department.

The ICPOC was established in 2019, 

partly in response to the fatal shooting 
of Aura Rosser, a Black woman with 
mental illness, by Ann Arbor police.

At the May 3 meeting, Ward 5 

resident Ralph McKee urged the 
council to follow recommendations 
from the ICPOC as well as Dr. Lisa 
Jackson, chair of the ICPOC, who also 
spoke at the beginning of the council 
meeting. 

“I would really urge you to really 

engage (Dr. Jackson) in depth on 
(police funding),” McKee said. “She 
has really studied that. Many of the 
rest of us are what I would call part-
timers on that issue. We’re interested 
in it, but we really haven’t studied it to 
the level she and other activists have.”

Many Ann Arbor residents want 

to see mental health professionals, 
not police, respond to emergency 
calls when appropriate. City Council 
passed a resolution in April asking the 
City Administrator to create plans for 

an unarmed first responder program 
for mental health crises in Ann Arbor.

At the meeting, Ward 2 resident 

Jeremiah Simon said he wants to see 
police funding redirected to mental 
health professionals.

“The current budget proposal 

increases the police budget from 
$30.7 million to $31.4 million from 
2021 to 2022,” Simon said. “The city 
should shift responsibility for mental 
health and substance use crisis 
response away from the police, and 
therefore should shift money to a new, 
autonomous, unarmed crisis response 
program.”

City 
Councilmember 
Kathy 

Griswold, D-Ward 2, told The 
Michigan Daily she supports having 
unarmed mental health professionals 
with proper oversight and training 
respond to appropriate emergency 
calls.

“The county is responsible for the 

911 Dispatch… (if we) say we want 
to be treated differently you have to 
have the dispatcher know when to 
send out a police officer and when to 
send out an unarmed mental health 
professional,” Griswold said. “That’s 
going to be difficult, but it’s going to 
be possible. We have to have a lot of 
training and a very clearly defined 
implementation plan.”

Ann Arbor resident Michelle 

Hughes called in to the Council 
meeting to show her support of 
increasing the amount of money 
for unarmed responders which is 
currently at $234,000.

“We should have more money spent 

on unarmed responders this year, 
shifting the enforcement of traffic 
things away from the police,” Hughes 
said. “The amount that we have on our 
budget for the new unarmed response 
program is not zero, and I very much 

2

Thursday, May 20, 2021
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
NEWS

A preview of the 2022 Ann 

Arbor City Budget

Leaders 
of 
the 
University 

of 
Michigan 
Central 
Student 

Government (CSG), including its 
president and vice president, issued a 
statement via the CSG Instagram page 
on Monday condemning Israel’s recent 
actions in the ongoing Palestine-Israel 
conflict.

The statement was released after 

reports of the deaths of over 30 
Palestinians, including ten children, 
due to Israeli airstrikes in Gaza 
City. The attack came after rockets 
launched from the Gaza Strip reached 
the Israeli city of Tel Aviv. 

The statement was signed by 

CSG President Nithya Arun, CSG 
Vice President Carla Voigt, CSG DEI 
Coordinator Zaynab Elkolaly, CSG 
Cabinet Member Eman Naga, LSA 
Student Government Vice President 
Zackariah Farah, SAFE, the Arab 
Student Association (ASA) and the 
Muslim Student Association (MSA). It 
was not approved as a resolution by the 
CSG Assembly.

In the statement, the CSG leaders 

said Israel is responsible for the death 
and destruction of the Palestinian 
people and property since the state of 
Israel was established by the United 
Nations in 1948. 

“For the past 73 years, this 

violence 
has 
displaced, 
harmed, 

and killed indigenous Palestinians,” 
the statement reads. “This is not a 
‘conflict,’ but emblematic of Israeli 
settler colonialism, ethnic cleansing, 
and apartheid.” 

The CSG leaders went on to 

claim that anti-Palestinian and pro-
Israel sentiments were rampant 
in our campus community. The 
statement acknowledges that CSG has 

participated in pro-Israel events, such 
as funding yearly trips to Israel for 
Jewish students. 

“We also must recognize CSG’s 

prior complicity with Israel’s violence 
through participation in events such 
as yearly trips to Israel that supported 
the settler-state in its apartheid and 
occupation,” the statement reads.

The CSG leaders ended their 

statement by calling on the University 
to divest from Israeli companies and 
by vowing to use their platform to 
uplift and represent Palestinian voices 
and work with Palestinian student 
groups, such as Students Allied For 
Freedom and Equality (SAFE). 

“The 
University 
of 
Michigan 

remains complicit by choosing not 
to divest from Israeli companies 
profiting 
off 
the 
settler 
state’s 

occupation,” the statement reads. “As 
such, CSG is determined to correct 
these wrongs by working with SAFE 
and other organizations advocating 
for Palestinian liberation to curate 
actionable steps that will be released at 
a later date.” 

The statement comes less than 

five years after CSG voted against 
calling on the University to divest their 
investments from Israeli companies 
in 2016. CSG passed a resolution in 
2017 calling on the University to form 
a committee to look into divesting 
from said Israeli companies, but that 
resolution was ultimately rejected by 
the Board of Regents. 

Student reactions
The 
statement 
drew 
mixed 

reactions 
from 
the 
campus 

community, with some believing that 
the statement was biased and one-
sided, and others believing that CSG 
did what was necessary to support 

CSG response to the Israel-Palestine 
conflict draws mixed reactions from 

U-M community

 JUSTIN O’BEIRNE

Daily Staff Reporter

GEORGE WEYKAMP

Summer News Editor

420 Maynard St.

Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1327

www.michigandaily.com

CALDER LEWIS

Editor in Chief

eic@michigandaily.com

KATIE LYNGKLIP

Business Manager

business@michigandaily.com

EDITORIAL STAFF

Madison Gagne 

Managing Editor 

mbgagne@umich.edu

Allison Engkvist 

Digital Managing Editor 

engkvist@umich.edu 

Christian Juliano and Shannon Stocking

Managing News Editors 

news@michigandaily.com

Josh Taubman and Max Wadley 

Managing Sports Editors

sports@michigandaily.com

Rosa Sofia Kaminski and Julian Wray 

Managing Arts Editors 

arts@michigandaily.com

Becca Mahon and Dominick Sokotoff 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Managing Photo Editors 

photo@michigandaily.com

Sarah Chung and Allison Yih

Managing Design Editors 

design@michigandaily.com

Ethan Patrick and Caroline Atkinson

Managing Copy Editors

copydesk@michigandaily.com

Eliya Imtiaz and Lola Yang

Managing Michigan in Color Editors

michiganincolor@michigandaily.com

Amelia Duffy and Zoe Storer

Managing Social Media Editors

socialmedia@michigandaily.com

Mary Rolfes

Editorial Page Editor

opinion@michigandaily.com

Margaret Rudnick 

Managing Video Editor

video@michigandaily.com

Samantha Cole 

Managing Statement Editor

statement@michigandaily.com

CONTACT INFORMATION 

News Tips tipline@michigandaily.com

Corrections 
 corrections@michigandaily.com

Letters to the Editor tothedaily@michigandaily.com 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

News section news@michigandaily.com

Photo Department photo@michigandaily.com
Arts Section arts@michigandaily.com

Editorial Page opinion@michigandaily.com
Sports Section sports@michigandaily.com
Advertising wmg-contact@umich.edu

The 
Michigan 
Daily 
(ISSN 
0745-967) 
is 
published 
Monday 
through 
Friday 

during 
the 
fall 
and 
winter 
terms 
by 
students 
at 
the 
University 
of 
Michigan. 
One 

copy 
is 
available 
free 
of 
charge 
to 
all 
readers. 
Additional 
copies 
may 
be 
picked 

up 
at 
the 
Daily’s 
office 
for 
$2 
per 
issue. 
Subscriptions 
for 
September 
- 
April 
are 

$250, 
and 
year-long 
subscriptions 
are 
$275. 
University 
affiliates 
are 
subject 
to 
a 

reduced subscription rate. Subscriptions must be prepaid. 

Read more at michigandaily.com

DOMINICK SOKOTOFF/Daily

The Ann Arbor City Council is set to vote on a proposed $470 million budget Monday 
night.

applaud that, (but it) is much closer to 
zero than I would like it to be.” 

Pedestrian Safety
Ann 
Arbor’s 
Healthy 
Streets 

program which aims to provide safe 
options for pedestrians and bikers in 
the city was of particular concern to 
residents.

The program, which was designed 

to allow for proper social distancing 
during the COVID-19 pandemic, 
was first passed by City Council 
in July of 2020. The city employed 
several methods to increase outdoor 
recreational space for pedestrians, 
including street closures, sidewalk 
space expansion, new bike lanes and 

reducing vehicle lanes. 

At the Council meeting, Ann 

Arbor resident Shannon Hautamaki 
said paying for the Healthy Streets 
initiative is vital for the wellbeing of 
children in Ann Arbor.

“For 
families 
with 
young 

children, I don’t see a return to 
normalcy happening that quickly. 
Vaccines for young children are still 
several months, if not a year away,” 
Houtamaki said. “Children will have 
to do most of their socializing outside 
where transmission of COVID is 

Read more at michigandaily.com

