at the ANN ARBOR SCHOOL OF YOGA Director Laurie Blakeney, Certified Advanced Iyengar Yoga Instructor 420 W Huron St, across from the Y - www.annarborschoolofyoga 1 FREE Class Email Laurie at aasylaurie@gmail.com for reservation • Fresh Local Produce • Variety of Craft Beers • Delicious Meals To-Go WE ARE YOUR FULL SERVICE DOWNTOWN GROCERY STORE • Health & Beauty • Household Essentials • Get us Delivered NATURAL FOODS MARKET & DELI 216 N. FOURTH AVE. ANN ARBOR, MI• PH. (734) 994 - 9174 Must present coupon at the time of purchase. No other discounts apply. Gift cards, case purchases, Co-op cash card, beer or wine cannot be used with purchase. Limit one offer per customer, one coupon per transaction. OFFER EXPIRES 9/26/2021 Cashiers write transaction total: _________________________ COUPON IS GOOD FOR IN-STORE VISIT ONLY WITH YOUR NEXT PURCHASE OF $25 OR MORE $5 OFF Visit our website www.peoplesfood.coop Town or gown: the two sides of Ann Arbor LANE KIZZIAH Statement Correspondent Painting the rock at the cor- ner of Hill Street and Washt- enaw Avenue is much more than just a longstanding campus tradition. In 1953, Michigan students and their Michigan State counterparts began vandal- izing each other’s campuses with paint the week before a rivalry football game, a tradi- tion that escalated to student arrests and suspensions. While the vandalism subsid- ed on campus, the Spartans tried to get the final word, painting “M.S.U.” on the side of a limestone boulder in an Ann Arbor park sometime in the late 1950s. The tradi- tion of “Painting the Rock” persists at both schools to- day. Almost every time I drive down Washtenaw, the Rock looks different after a new student group or sports team has covered it with ev- erything from “Go Blue”s to students’ names to political slogans. But the Rock had a life long before the 1950s. If you were to scrape off the hundreds — maybe thousands — of layers of paint, you’d find a copper plaque depicting the stone’s original purpose: “To George Washington this me- morial erected in celebration of the two hundredth an- niversary of his birth, 1932.” For years after the painting began, there was a push to preserve the monument’s integrity with a sign erected as recently as the 1970s beg- ging people not to paint the memorial, but the tradition was too cemented in campus culture to be shut down. For at least some residents in the area, the Rock represents a lot more harm than good. Despite its co-optation by the University community, the Rock sits in George Wash- ington Park, on city property. For Lauren (whose name has been changed due to her fear of retribution to her business by University clients), a born and raised Ann Arbor resi- dent, the rock is the perfect depiction of the University’s relationship to the broader community. Lauren expressed her frus- tration to me in a recent phone call. She’s one of sev- eral local residents who have complained about the litter- ing of paint buckets or con- cerns of toxins getting into the gutter. In 2016, Nehama Glogower, another resident, wrote an article for the Ann Arbor Observer about her experience slipping in wet paint on the surrounding sidewalk. According to the women in both cases, they were unable to get their concerns heard. “(Residents) resent (the University’s) entitlement,” Lauren said. “Where (the students are) a transient population, they don’t have a sense of placemaking be- cause this isn’t their perma- nent home. And the Univer- sity sort of allows that for their brand, and they don’t have a sense of collabora- tion.” Colin Smith, Parks and Rec- reation Services Manager for the City of Ann Arbor, gets occasional complaints about the park, mostly when paint gets on the sidewalk or be- yond. He said his department has to maintain the park at least twice a year, which he estimates costs about $500- $750 per visit when account- ing for the materials needed to repaint the sidewalk and the labor. However, Michael Rein, U-M director of com- munity relations, said he has never heard complaints about the Rock. What is remarkable about the history of tension be- tween the University and the town is how seldom it is addressed. Ann Arbor is con- stantly ranked among the top college towns in the country and is considered one of the University’s biggest assets. The school is so intertwined with the surrounding area — geographically, cultur- ally and economically — that town and gown problems can seem nonexistent. Ann Arbor was founded in 1824 by John Allen and Elisha W. Rumsey. The two men headed west from De- troit in January of that year and reached what is now present-day Ann Arbor by early February. The pair purchased a collective 2.6 square kilometers of land for $800 (what would be about $22,000 today) and opened up the Washtenaw Coffee House, the town’s first struc- ture. Ann Arbor — named in honor of Rumsey and Allen’s wives, both named Ann — started to expand as an agri- cultural trading center. The University of Michigan, which had been founded in Detroit in 1817, relocated to Ann Arbor in 1839 while both school and town were in their infancy. Less than 20 years after its founding, the city had a population of 2,000, a courthouse, a jail, a bank, four churches and two mills. The University was even smaller. During its first year in the new town, the University had just seven students and two professors. Now, the city’s population stands at over 120,000, and the school’s total enrollment is over 44,700. Michigan and Ann Arbor have grown, si- multaneously, but not neces- sarily together. While most state constitu- tions give state legislatures power to provide for higher education, Michigan is one of the few that mentions specif- ic institutions and enumer- ates specific forms of gover- nance and autonomy. Most states’ public higher educa- tion systems are controlled by a governing board, while Michigan’s 15 universities are independent schools. Each has their own school board that generally super- vises the university’s actions and controls its finances. The governing bodies of Michigan’s three flagship in- stitutions — the University of Michigan, Michigan State and Wayne State — are given almost complete autonomy over the universities’ opera- tions. This has a number of implications, one being that the University isn’t bound by the Ann Arbor local govern- ment in nearly any form — it doesn’t pay taxes or follow the same zoning regulations — which, naturally, can cause some town and gown prob- lems. “The University doesn’t need to follow any of our rules,” Ann Arbor Mayor Christo- pher Taylor said. “They don’t follow our zoning; they don’t follow our planning. And, of course, they have the re- sources to do what they want when they want to do it.” The perfect example of this dynamic is the 27-foot-tall, 48-foot-wide billboard be- tween Michigan Stadium and the Crisler Center. The huge electronic sign was put up in 2013 much to the dis- may of permanent residents. At the time, then-City Coun- cilmember Taylor urged the University to take it down, arguing that it was a dis- traction to drivers. Former University President Mary Sue Coleman responded by saying that it is the responsi- bility of the driver to not be distracted. 18 — Thursday, August 5, 2021 Statement The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com