U-M, Ann Arbor express support, sympathy for MSU: The show of statewide unity came after a campus rampage ended with three students dead and five injured on Monday. Students held a candlelight vigil on the Diag on Wednesday and Wolverine athletes will don a MSU-supportive decal on their uniforms for upcoming games. U-M president Santa Ono and AAPS superintendent Jeanice Swift issued statements, and U-M regent Jordan Acker tweeted a thread explaining just how symbiotic the U-M-MSU relationship is. “It’s mostly love off the field and court,” Acker wrote.
Plan outlined for demolition, replacement of Sears at Briarwood: Fifty years after it opened, the owners of the vacant department store want to tear it down and replace it with a grocery store, a two-level retail building and apartments, MLive reports. City councilmember Jen Eyer, whose ward includes the mall, is an enthusiastic supporter of the redevelopment. The announcement begins to bring to fruition ideas first floated two years ago.
City reviewing affordable housing incentives: The rules passed in 2019 to encourage more affordable housing in downtown high-rises haven’t worked, consultants told the city council this week. Developers haven’t embraced the incentives because they can’t finance and manage the number of subsidized units required, MLive reports (paywall). Trilby MacDonald and John Hilton reported on the conflict for the Observer in April 2021.
Main and Liberty road closures coming Monday, may last till May: The intersection at Main and Liberty as well as the block of Main between Liberty and William will close at 7 a.m. for an $8 million rebuild that’s expected to take more than two months, according to the city. Businesses will remain open, with pedestrian access throughout the project. The work includes repaving S. Main, replacing a water main, and sidewalk accessibility improvements.
Two guilty in sexual assault of six-year-old: A jury convicted Patricia Myia McDaniel and Richard Anthony Allen-Bass of forcing a child in McDaniel’s care into sex acts, MLive reports. The victim testified she was living with McDaniel in Ypsilanti when the assaults occurred. McDaniel also faces the same charges alongside another man, Robert Wibert Whitsett; the two are expected to be tried in late May. She and Allen-Bass already face minimum sentences of twenty-five years to life in prison.
Earthen Jar may close after sixth break-in in three months: Intruders broke a front window at the vegetarian Indian restaurant on S. Fifth, MLive reports (paywall). Nothing was taken this time, but “I don’t think we will stay here if this kept happening,” manager Sim Sethi said. The building also suffered $20,000 in damage from a Dec. 13 fire.
Two anti-military activists arrested in U-M job fair attack: U-M police say the pair poured a red substance on the recruiting tables for the U.S. Navy and the National Security Agency at the Michigan Union, MLive reports. After the arrests, demonstrators took to the Union’s front steps with banners opposing a planned expansion of the National Guard’s Camp Grayling, according to What’s Left Ypsi.
U-M to add a week to 2023-24 winter break: Regents are expected tonight to shift the return to class from January 3 to January 10 next year “to better support the mental well-being of University of Michigan students and faculty, university leaders,” according to the Record. This change would push the end of the semester out a week and move commencement to the first weekend of May.
Campus meets two sustainability goals three years early: U-M gave itself until 2025, but now reports it has reduced greenhouse gas emissions in Ann Arbor by 25 percent from its 2006 benchmark and exceeded its goal of applying 40 percent less chemicals to campus landscapes, according to the University Record. The remaining 2025 goals pertain to fuel efficiency, waste reduction, sustainable food purchases, and broader awareness and engagement around sustainability topics. As Madeline Stone-Wheatley reported for the Observer in January 2022, the school now has even more ambitious green goals.
Tickets available for U-M president’s inauguration: The official installation of Santa Ono as the school’s 15th president is set for March 7 at 3 p.m. at Hill Auditorium, according to a press release. Tickets are free at the Union Ticket Office while supplies last. In addition to the ceremony, the day will feature a parade across the campus and a reception starting at 4 p.m. at Ingalls Mall.
Twenty-five U-M students, faculty win Fulbrights: The grants are funding research during the 2022-23 academic year in Rwanda, Chile, Lithuania and many other countries on topics as varied as public health care supply chains to emotion and behavior dynamics in offspring of parents with bipolar disorder, according to the University Record.
Ex-Wolverine star wins Super Bowl, announces retirement: Chad Henne, who played for Michigan from 2004-2007, spent the past five years as a back-up quarterback for the Kansas City Chiefs. After the Chiefs won their second Super Bowl in four years, Henne, 37, announced on Instagram that he was “calling it a career” and “capping it off with a Bud Light and another ring,” Yahoo Sports reports. Back in the day, Henne and three teammates appeared in a production of Archibald MacLeish’s “J.B.” as part of an independent study. “They were well-mannered and humble and came to work and came to play,” U-M theater prof Philip Kerr told the Observer in 2008.
U-M football assistant coaches share $2.5M in bonuses: To the victors belong the spoils, and the near-perfect 2022-23 season meant a lot of spoils for Jim Harbaugh’s staff, reports MLive, which got ahold of documents outlining who got what. Between the Big Ten championship, the bowl berth, and the spot in the College Football Playoff, offensive coordinators Matt Weiss and Sherrone Moore picked up $525,000 in bonus payouts. (Weiss was fired last month over computer-access violations.)
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