ann arbor is overrated. » Blog Archive

Forward March

So, there’s this Blog It Forward thing, where you’re supposed to say something nice about a blogger you link to, and then they have to say something nice about someone else, and then there’s so much niceness that you almost forget your car is stranded on campus and the city’s after you for snow violations. Goodspeed said some very sweet things about this site, which he referred to as “the Cadillac of Ann Arbor blogs.” (It’s slow and driven by an elderly grad student.)

Now the task falls on us to keep this thing going, which isn’t easy, since there are so many wonderful blogs in Ann Arbor/Ypsi, many of which are linked to here. But the whole point of this blog is to whine about how much better everything is in Boston. So we’re going to pass on the honor to Shmuel, a onetime Ann Arbor transient who actually made it back out East.

Shmuel’s Soapbox, in both its “blog” and “journal” forms, traces the life of a creative writing student who struggles with his Orthodox Jewish identity and his morality. Sometimes it takes the form of philosophical or political thoughts. Of an early code name for the Iraq war, he writes, “‘infinite justice’ is a complete contradiction in terms. Justice is the force that enforces boundaries and restores balance. By definition, it’s carefully measured to correspond exactly with the actions it repays– that is, after all, the meaning of ‘meted out.’” But more often, it’s personal, and it can be both very funny and very poignant. In response to a tossed-off “Sex:not yet” on the site’s about page, a reader warned Shmuel, “I must say though, since you are a frum yid, you should change the “Sex” on your stats page to say ‘Male’. It is better to lose one joke than to make a Chillul Hashem (as defined in Mesilas Yesharim).” After explaining what “frum”, “Chillul Hashem” and “Mesilas Yesharim” are, he observes, “even joking about sex to the extent that I do on my public home page is kinda radical, and I knew it.” This is an earlier entry - as the journal progresses, Shmuel rebels more and more against this culture.

And he has this advice: “If you go to the toaster oven and slide out the rack using a potholder (or, if you are an Orthodox Jewish male who routinely uses his yarmulke for that purpose, then using a yarmulke as a potholder), do be sure that contact with the very hot rack is, in fact, made only through the potholder, and that your thumb is not extending past the potholder onto the rack itself.”

56 Responses to “Forward March”

Isn’t it hard? I never want to be nice again.
posted by Steven B. Cherry on January 14th, 2004 at 10:54 pm
Yeah, I know. It took a lot out of me.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on January 14th, 2004 at 11:57 pm
Let’s sketch possible scenarios that will lead to Ann Arbor being cool again, since we are being all sunshiney. The major factor in making a place uncool is high rents. The rents are high because people who are neither students nor hipsters keep moving to Ann Arbor. What makes them move there? What do these bobos do for a living? I am assuming that the dotcom bust has helped things up there, but apparently not enough.
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 15th, 2004 at 10:14 am
I hate to say this, but I think a proportion of the bobos are townies who aren’t young and free-spirited anymore. Certainly no UM faculty member or student would have time to grind their own flour for use in baking graham crackers.
posted by Anna on January 15th, 2004 at 10:40 am
I wouldn’t say that high rents are THE factor in making a place uncool - Boston and San Francisco do just fine, and rents in both places can be atrocious. The cost of living thing is a problem insofar as it prices out people who do socially valuable but not lucrative things - artists and musicians, for example. But if a place has a solid patronage for things like arts and culture, then artists can get by living there. The problem with AA is that it’s hard to build a patronage for local culture when so much of the population is short-termers. I tend to think that the big issue with making AA (or any place) cool involves job creation and economic development. For better or worse, most people will move to wherever the good jobs are - and one of AA’s problems is that so many of the interesting people here have to leave Michigan to pursue the career they desire. Obviously economic development has its negatives - suburbanization and gentrification, etc. But I really believe that a cool place is made by cool people, and not just the number of independent businesses. If you can keep cool people here and/or give them a good reason to move here, things will probably work out.
posted by Nick on January 15th, 2004 at 12:24 pm
That is the point I was trying to make. What do they do? If we could pinpoint their economic base of support, we could envision a scenario that might allow us to imagine them going away. For example, the high tech downturn has made Seattle more livable. I loved living in New York in the first half of the nineties because rents kept falling, and there was still room in New York for deadbeat weirdos.
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 15th, 2004 at 12:25 pm
I don’t think economic development is necessarily the key to keeping (or making) Ann Arbor weird. My impression was that Ann Arbor lost its cool because of the longtermers who move to college towns and call the police when college students drink beer. (Have street musicians been outlawed in Ann Arbor yet? That is what the California bobos did when they took over Boulder.) Rents have already forced many, many artists and musicians out of San Francisco and NYC.
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 15th, 2004 at 12:32 pm
Well, we might be looking at this in different ways. You seem to be saying that the problem is all the non-Ann-Arborites moving here - I would say that the problem is that there aren’t enough of them staying here. I do think that the disinclination many locals feel toward involving students in the community here is a big part of the problem. Part of having a cool town is encouraging divergent perspectives and tastes to flourish and proliferate - which you don’t get when everyone has the same background and the same perspective on everything. What you end up with is a place where one half of the population doesn’t care about the town because they’re leaving in 4 years, and the other half wants to freeze Ann Arbor in time and not have it become anything other than an image of 1950s small-town utopia.
posted by Nick on January 15th, 2004 at 12:53 pm
I think we may be saying the same thing. Here’s the acid test - is it possible for a recent graduate (or drop-out) to finda cheap room somehwere, tned bar, and wokr seriously at painting, or at writer for a year or so.
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 15th, 2004 at 1:09 pm
Lucky, for the answer to that question, we can defer to Mucho’s experiences in flop houses and broken-down vans.
posted by Anna on January 15th, 2004 at 1:26 pm
Lucky-

You are describing my entire staff. So I would say, yes, an artist can live here pretty comfortably.

Some live downtown, some live in Ypsi, some live a few miles away.
posted by todd on January 15th, 2004 at 1:29 pm
I lived in AA for a long time on very little. I wouldn’t call it “comfortable” but I guess I would characterize it as “doable”. If you don’t have a car, that helps a lot. If you’re willing to live in a big group situation, it’s not too hard. When I lived in the co-ops it was $325/month including food, ultiitles, everything. I’m sure it’s a lot more now, but still in reach of your average artist/bartender (students can join without question, non-students have to be voted in. But you can be voted in pretty easily in most houses)
posted by Anna on January 15th, 2004 at 1:50 pm
I guess the point I was trying to make earlier was that people make short-term and long-term decisions about where they locate. I think this area needs more and better jobs for people to make decisions to live here long-term, and that AA won’t become a genuinely cool city without a sizable economically, socially, and culturally diverse element in the permanent population (bad verbage, I know, I’m in a hurry). Doing your thing while tending bar or working for a contractor or something is OK for a year, but it would get very old 10-20 years later. I’m friends with lots of musicians in LA and Wash., DC who all have full-time, career-oriented jobs, and who view playing shows and recording on weekends as both a joy and a nice source of spending money. But they need those full-time jobs. I don’t think we’ll get much critical mass for cool things in AA if the people doing them only stay a year and then decide to leave and get their lives together.
posted by NIck on January 15th, 2004 at 5:32 pm
Nick, For the record, I totally agree with you. If I hadn’t been looking at a lifetime of waiting tables at Seva and living in a studio apt. had I stayed, I might not have thought it was so over-rated.
posted by Anna on January 15th, 2004 at 6:05 pm
Now, for the important question: Where the hell is Boris?
posted by Anna on January 15th, 2004 at 6:26 pm
Yeah Anna, it’s really a conundrum for people who move here for grad school (which is a pretty damn large number) or for many of the undergrad programs as well. On one hand, you spend a some years making friends and building good professional relationships - I tend to think that making roots in some fashion is an inevitable part of living anywhere, no matter how much you dislike it. But on the other hand, a degree from an institution as good as UM opens up opportunities that you just can’t take advantage of if you stay here. The NC Research Triangle (where I lived briefly) seems to have had the enlightening moment that this area needs - that is, a few decades ago, the area was sort of a backwater that realized that having 3 major research universities in close proximity (as well as a friendly tax climate) could bring a lot of tech/research employers there - thus came Research Triangle Park, and then the 90s economy, and the rest was history.
posted by Nick on January 15th, 2004 at 9:23 pm
In the debate about whether or not ann arbor is cool anymore we have to take something into consideration. Ann Arbor is a beautiful little city located in southeast Michigan. It is not a large city like Boston, San Fransisco, or Chicago. Therefore it could never get sufficient respect as a liberal town. Only these large urban environments are the thrones of liberal america. Smaller suburban environments like ann arbor are the haven of conservative middle america. This is the case whether we want to admit it or not. The only city in Michigan that is cool or authentic in this sense is the city of Detroit. The rest be they Royal Oak, Lansing, Traverse City etc. will always be seen as nice but not cool(liberal). But who gives a shit whether or not ann arbor is cool anymore as long as it has good schools, is a nice place, and its safe people will continue to move here. That is the way it is.
posted by lexdog on January 16th, 2004 at 1:04 am
I dunno… “beautiful” and “city” might be overstating. I degree that it is in SE Michigan, though.
posted by Anna on January 16th, 2004 at 9:48 am
er - agree
posted by Anna on January 16th, 2004 at 9:48 am
The British definition is that a city is a place with a cathedral. But those of y’all who have a more stringent definition for the word should realize that Ann Arbor, Ypsilanti, and even little Saline, are all cities incorporated under Michigan law. Michigan does not have “towns”, only cities, villages, and townships.

As to the original text: I’m not Orthodox, but I do wear a yarmulke in the synagogue and sometimes elsewhere. It would never occur to me to use it as a potholder. No, it’s not a sacred object, but why get it greasy and dirty?
posted by Larry Kestenbaum on January 16th, 2004 at 9:58 am
This thread has made me realize why “Ann Arbo Sucks.” It sucks because it is the location of the University of Michigan. If U-M had stayed in Detroit, it might have formed a sort of a synergy with the area — graduates might have stayed nad made it more like, say, Houston or Atlanta than Buffalo. If U-M had located itslef in Lansing, it might ahve formed a sort of a synergy with the state capital, and made Lansing more like Madison or Austin or even Columbus, rather than. say, Chillicothe, Ohio. As it is, U-M graduates really don’t have the opportunity to stay that they would have otherwise. Does this make sense to anyone?
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 16th, 2004 at 10:07 am
lexdog makes a cogent argument why A2 is a good small city with many amenities that are lacking in cities of similar sizes. Yeah, it’s media hype when A2 makes all those silly lists, but there is always a grain of truth in the hype.

Most of the” A2 sucks” crowd don’t live here are are just a teensy bit jealous. When I lived in Ypsi, I thought A2 was just a bunch of rich snobs. My gang made fun of it too! It’s easy to make fun of something you know little or nothing about and it’s sport to rip on those who are (perceived) as different or seemingly better off these days. And that’s mostly what the whiners and crybabies spew about Ann Arbor.

Well, I DO live here and have my own reasons why A2 is overrated, but none of them has to do with Tree Town not being a cool, hip or fun place to live, work and play.

The reasons I believe A2 is overrated are the alleged liberal and hypocritical politics, the overrated UM and their spoiled students, and the whiny gen x’ers who are pissed because they missed the cool, hip and past glories of Ann Arbor.

Sure, Tree Town has changed for me too, but I see it as evolutionary and the city is enduring a decade or more of growing pains from a city dominated by the UM to one that is becoming more economically and politically diverse. Yeah, I miss all the interesting and fun local content that was A2 before the corporatization of Starbucks and Jimmy Johns. Yet, there is an essence that remains and that’s why everyone still talks about A2 and some are still jealous of the city as well.

Heaven is where you find it, and it’s located at the Fleetwood Diner
posted by mucho gusto on January 16th, 2004 at 1:00 pm
Yes, that’s it. Jelously. You mean I too can drive a Subaru and live in the Old Fourh Ward? Where do I sign up? Mucho, you’ve got your head up your ass yet again.
posted by Steven B. Cherry on January 16th, 2004 at 2:41 pm
Mucho, You have your reasons for thinking AA is a nice place to live. That’s great. I don’t see why you need to put down UM, though. One could turn your Ypsi-dwellers-are-jealous argument and argue also that the people who really dislike the UM are just jealous.

There wouldn’t be an AA as it stands without the UM. Yes, I know you will argue with me, and since I know that, I will just argue with you in this comment instead of waiting and posting one after that. You are simply wrong. AA as it is now would never have developed into a “city”. It would be Dexter. Not that there is anything wrong with Dexter, but it would not be AA.
posted by Anna on January 16th, 2004 at 2:51 pm
To talk about Ann Arbor as if the University of Michigan were not an integral part of it is a nose/spite/face argument.
posted by Larry Kestenbaum on January 16th, 2004 at 5:33 pm
Anna, If I dislike the UM, I only dislike it… I made no mention of being jealous of an institution. I could be jealous (or envious) of you or my neighbor or the president of the UM, but how could anyone be jealous of an institution??? What does the UM have that I covet or desire? It’s an entity, an institution not a person or thing that has something that I want or need.

SOME people in Ypsi have always been jealous of the big sister to the west. Others don’t give a rip, they’re perfectly happy where they are. Yet in all the rants that knock A2, the one thread that come through every time is that Ypsi in not perceived (and not my perception, mind you) to be as cool as Ann Arbor. It’s not as hip or fun. Maybe Ypsi is more envious than jealous. Nonetheless, Ypsilanti has had an inferiority complex whenever Ann Arbor is mentioned in the same breath.

Your argument is the same one used by everyone who thinks the sun rises and sets on the UM and that A2 would be nothing without it. How can you make such an uninformed statement? Ann Arbor was a city before the UM and it would continue to exist if the institution leaves… and of course it would be different. But how can you, or anyone for that matter peer into a crystal ball and say what Ann Arbor would be like without the UM? It is entirely possible that Ann Arbor could have been bigger and more influential without the UM being here, isn’t it? But we all know that the UM will never leave, so your premise is moot and a little silly. In fact it’s the same straw man argument spouted by most UM defenders. The UM could not exist in a vacuum and would have the same effect on any municipality that hosted its presence. Was Ypsi different after EMU was located there? Of course it was. Would it be different without EMU, most certainly. So what’s your point about how things might be different if things had not turned out this way?

I’m so glad you can predict the future based on the past. All those arguments about “what if” are silly.

Steve, Jealousy? Just look at your statement. If you work hard enough you can buy that Subey and move into the Old Fourth Ward. Just by your thinking that your life would be better with a cool car and living in Ann Arbor tells me that it’s jealousy (or envy… or both).

I remember Dale Bumpers comments regarding Clintons’ impeachment for getting a blow job. Let me rephrase it and put it into context for this thread. If they say it’s not about jealousy (or envy)… it’s about jealousy (And maybe envy too).

Better my head up my ass that your foot in your mouth. Steverino
posted by mucho gusto on January 16th, 2004 at 5:53 pm
Larry is right again. The UM is an integral part of A2, but not as well integrated as it could be. The University has little regard for the rest of the city or the residents who live here and pay taxes to support not only a state institution, but the UM police department that does not respond to local calls. Ann Arborites have two police departments, but only one that serves the taxpayers. And Ann Arborites pay Michigan taxes the last time I looked.

The UM takes land off the tax rolls and gives little back in return. Are any of you aware that the UM bought Wolverine Towers (cross from 777 S State) years back and removed almost 4 million dollars from the local tax rolls?

Anna, if you’re all so enamored with the Big U and all the good it does the city of A2, why not contemplate what Ypsi might look like if it were located there? And don’t turn around and tell me that you would welcome the 800 pound gorilla into your living room.

Yeah, I like living here, even for all it’s overratedness and despite the presence of the UM. But, paying the bills gives me the right to bitch.
posted by mucho ranting gusto on January 16th, 2004 at 6:09 pm
First, thanks for the link! I’m working on my own blog-it-forward entry now… on the other hand, I’m also working on a travel report and my journal’s fifth anniversary entry, so it may take me a bit.

As for Larry’s question: if you wear a yarmulke 24/7, its getting greasy and dirty is a foregone conclusion, although black velvet isn’t bad at hiding the effects. Pulling out the occasional oven rack is nothing by comparison. The real question is whether you want it getting anywhere near your food…

(You might find it reassuring to know that one of my readers sent me a potholder as a birthday present as a result of that entry. Good timing, too, as it arrived just as I stopped wearing my yarmulke in general.)
posted by Shmuel on January 17th, 2004 at 3:04 am
Mucho, We have a very easy, natural experiment if we want to know what AA would be like in the absence of UM. All we need to do is look to a town with about the same geography and the same agricultural past and we know approximately what it would look like. There are actually a couple of options. Ypsi, or the Dexter area. Ypsi if the area had gone industrial, Dexter if not.

The things that you thought were cool about the sixties were largely student-initiated. They weren’t AA German-immigrant-initiated, as Larry has pointed out before. For example, it was called SDS — students for a democratic society — not AALYDS — Ann Arbor Local Youth for a Democratic Society.

Your arguments about tax dollars are tired. see some of the earlier entries about how much money is infused into the economy by students and other UM people.
posted by Anna on January 17th, 2004 at 8:53 am
Anna,

Actually, Mucho’s argument about tax dollars are a good one in the sense that it tells you why AA is having so much fiscal trouble (and it also tells you why AA should be bending over backwards to bring in new businesses and housing into the city)…and your argument that UMich infuses money into the local economy is the other piece of the puzzle.

Since there is such a large chunk of land in AA that isn’t taxed, and a large “seasonal” population in this town that, AA should function, fiscally at least, like a resort. The taxes should be shifted to retail sales, particularly on luxury items.

If this happened, prices for everything that students purchase (including beer, sigh) would go up, and the city would capture the infused money that you refer to to a much greater extent. Transients would foot the bill, so to speak, more than permanent residents would. Students should be happy that the city council hasn’t figured this out yet.
posted by todd on January 17th, 2004 at 9:28 am
apologies for the lack of verb agreement and typos in the above post….need more coffee.
posted by todd on January 17th, 2004 at 11:21 am
Anna, your ability to predict the future based on the past continues to confound me. There are far too many variables to make the kind of assumptions you claim to be true. You only remember what the past was like and recollections are only snapshots of time. Indeed your memory is limited to your experience and what you have learned from others. It’s still impossible to predict the future not matter how “natural” your completely non-scientific and impossible to prove premise may seem to be.

As far as students determining the culture of Ann Arbor in the 60’s you are only partially correct. Your premise assumes that the rest of the city was a vacuum, that the only forces at work were influenced by the UM. Indeed, some of those people who influenced the culture of the 60’s in Ann Arbor were students and graduates of the UM, but those folks and others who were not connected to the UM had as much influence as students.In fact, most students never ventured past State and Liberty or South U. Most never cmae to Main St or points west.In the 60’s some folks who graduated from the UM stayed in town and mixed with the local hippie/youth/runaway community not affiliated with the UM. For instance, John Sinclair/White Panther/Rainbow, Human Rights Party, townie bar scene (Floods, Del Rio, Flame, the Checkmate etc, had their share of students, but they were not necessarily student driven. There was also an active group of local high schoolers and their liberal parents who were part of the local youth culture heritage of A2. The SDS and other political groups had student members and used some campus facilities but they were more influenced by outside sources and folks who were not students or UM affiliated.The SDS sought out students and youth culture, not the other way around.
posted by mucho gusto on January 17th, 2004 at 11:50 am
If one believes that the UM “infuses” more money into the local economy than it sucks out, then I’ve got some submerged property along the Huron to sell.

Sure, the presence of the UM brings money into town, but the questions that beg answers are… How much of it actually stays here? How much of the money that stays is used to reduce the costs associated with being the host city for an instution that occupies almost 40% of the taxable property within the city, yet pays paltry little in support?
posted by mucho gusto on January 17th, 2004 at 12:02 pm
As a total outsider and occasional visitor, my first impression of AA was that it was a quaint, charming town. Its older homes and university feel were appealing to me. However, after the first 24 hours I found myself wondering if there was anything left to do. The restaurants were either overpriced, ok quality food, or crap. I am sorry, but my final impression is that it needs more “somethings” to keep me interested after 24 hours.
posted by sammy on January 17th, 2004 at 12:16 pm
“If one believes that the UM “infuses” more money into the local economy than it sucks out, then I’ve got some submerged property along the Huron to sell.”

First of all, I couldn’t disagree more with your assertion.

Secondly, if this really the case, then it is the fault of the City of Ann Arbor for not setting up its tax structure properly. How is this the University’s fault?

Personally I believe that UMich pulls its own weight fiscally, and then some. I believe that the City is not running a tight ship, and that it squanders the money that UMich does bring in to the City coffers. It is inexcusable for a town that has a cash cow like the University to run at a deficit. Anyone with a working calculator will agree.

The city should have replaced the Wolverine Towers five times over by now—and plopped them right smack dab in the middle of downtown. You have made this same assertion yourself, Mucho.
posted by todd on January 17th, 2004 at 1:32 pm
The UM pays no property taxes. It owns about 30% of the land within the city. That includes private homes, businesses and undeveloped land. I have no idea how much money that property would generate, but somehow I suspect it’s not inconsequential. Taxpayers foot the bill for the lost revenue required to serve those properties with infrastructure (sewer, water, roads, police, fire) and lost revenue from non tax payment. A2 pays twice… for the lost revenue and costs associated with being the host city.

The UM refuses to provide an adequate level of housing for its constituents. This places an added burden on housing and land costs and the resulting tax revenue. These conditions increase the costs of development, thus the inablity of “the city” to replace Wolverine Towers, downtown or anywhere else.

How is the UM a cash cow to be tapped by the city? They are not legally beholden, by statute, financially or otherwise to the community. todd makes reference to $$ the UM brings into the city coffers. Please explain what those $$ are and where they come from? I don’t know how much money the UM spends in development or local wages, but certainly not all of that relieves the local tax base of the burden. I suspect much of it is not spent within the city.

The UM does make a small payment to A2 of about $1 million, mainly for police and fire… even with their own PD, financed by taxpayers statewide. This payment is a drop in the bucket.

Why is it the city’s responsibity to replace Wolverine Towers? The city does not have the legal abliity or the political will to make the UM pay their fair share of the costs of hosting the institution, even if it could.

Your assumption of the UM as a cash cow is barnyard mythology.
posted by much gusto on January 17th, 2004 at 2:22 pm
Mucho, every event, every department and every one of the x# students and employees brings money to Ann Arbor every day. Some of these people actually pay taxes here. Every student that lives off campus pays property taxes (as part of their rent) on overpriced housing that is taxed on it’s inflated value. The city gets their cut from the second tier. The arguement that UofM’s exemption from property taxes is ultimately a huge burden is short sighted and tired.

To everyone that makes the arguement that, “Ann Arbor was a here before UofM and it will be here after,”: You’re attempting to extrapolate around the past 150 years. I don’t think that’s very sound. It would still be here, but there would be a massive exodous. Like it or not, many companies choose Ann Arbor because of the people and partnerships with UofM (and the other universities here). It does make for a nice bumper sticker though.

That’s a lot of text for no edit feature so I hope I didn’t miss anything.
posted by Ryan on January 17th, 2004 at 2:50 pm
Todd’s point about the AA tax structure is a good one. Generally speaking the U.S. is experiencing an epidemic of irresponsible leadership in which elected officials refuse to acknowledge a relationship between expected public services and programs and the tax revenues that pay for them - AA is no different, tho its position is a fairly unique one in the sense that its one major employer is a nonprofit institution that can avoid certain forms of taxation. If it makes you feel any better, Pittsburgh is currently debating new taxes directed at Carnegie Mellon and Pitt as a way of staving off municipal bankruptcy.

I do feel compelled to comment on all this ridiculous bullshit about the UM and the student community being peripheral to the culture and history of AA. If not for the UM, AA would be farmland, period. Sorry if that pisses townies off, but without the U there would be no professors and researchers adding to the tax base, few construction contracts, no employers like Pfizer or Borders, no opportunity to overcharge students to live in slums, etc. Like it or not, the UM has been AA’s major employer for all but 13 years of its history - arguing that the town’s character has emerged independently of the school is ludicrous.

In my opinion, it’s attitudes like these that make AA a terrible place to live. Part of what makes many other areas great is their receptiveness to the contributions of people different from themselves. The Twin Cities, for example, are a very white-bread middle-class area where the locals nevertheless adore things like avant-garde arts shows and the NBA (they’re also very proud that Prince is from there). The Research Triangle, as another example, was a distinctly southern region that experienced rapid gentrification and a huge influx of white-collar workers from the northeast in the 90s - yet besides being shrewd enough to see the economic benefits those people brought with them, they reacted with enthusiasm and curiosity to the ways that outsiders changed the culture of the area - now you have tobacco farmers from outlying counties going to punk shows in Chapel Hill and trying Provence cuisine for the hell of it. AA, however, is completely the opposite. The locals here instead prefer a sterile, self-congratulatory groupthink in which the town is a precious possession that’s ruined by the presence of anyone who thinks or behaves differently than they do. I know some people on this site bemoan the students’ lack of real-world smarts, but in my opinion many of the locals are much further away from understanding reality.

Sorry for the angst, the weather really does this to me.
posted by Nick on January 17th, 2004 at 3:15 pm
Real Ann Arborites like the cold and snow.
posted by mucho a2 gusto on January 17th, 2004 at 3:28 pm
Mucho,

“How is the UM a cash cow to be tapped by the city? They are not legally beholden, by statute, financially or otherwise to the community. todd makes reference to $$ the UM brings into the city coffers. Please explain what those $$ are and where they come from?”

I can’t believe that I have to explain this to you, but I will. I am hoping that you are merely splitting hairs here and assuming that I am talking about direct taxes from the U.

Where do all of the students, faculty, ancillary staff, visitors (for conferences, seminars), etc. etc. eat, sleep, drink, shop, fix their cars, etc. etc. etc.? Please don’t make me go to the trouble of pulling out all the numbers for this. All of these people buy stuff in this town.

To answer two of your queries:

1. Yes, you are correct that the U of M owns a ton of untaxed property. Pretend that you are in charge of AA’s coffers and have an IQ above room temperature. Would you keep raising the property taxes for all of your full-time residents to make up for the “lost revenue” from the U that was never really potential revenue to begin with? Or would you try and address what I mentioned above, and tax the UMich students, faculty, blah, blah, blah, by increasing the city SALES tax so that when 110,000 people blow into town for a football game and buy gas/food/beer, you stand a snowball’s chance in hell of making your money back?

Counting on property tax money from the University is sheer stupidity. It’s not coming. It never was coming. It is not the Universities fault that this money isn’t coming. It is the cities fault for not figuring this out, and it’s not like UMich popped up and demanded tax-exempt status in 1998. This is not rocket science.

2. As to your question about Wolverine Towers, it is specifically the responsibility of the city to come up with the tax dough that they lost. The city must work hard to attract new projects, and locate them in city center. Do you think that this is the last building that the U will buy? Does it come as a shock that the University is actually expanding? Come on Mucho, you’re playing dumb here.

It is the City’s fault for betting on the wrong horse: property taxes.

What I mean by cash cow is that the U isn’t shrinking—its always growing, no matter how crappy the economy is, it’s always bringing in more students, more programs, and more ancillary businesses with it—and more money. These people all have money, and they all need things. You tax them when they buy things. It takes all the burden away from property….and this is coming from someone who would take it in the wallet if sales tax went up.

AA is recession-proof because of the U. Just ask any real estate agent in town who’s been here for a few decades. The city isn’t capitalizing on this fact, and it’s nobody’s fault but ours.
posted by todd on January 17th, 2004 at 3:33 pm
Guess I’m not a real Ann Arborite after all - a shame, really, given how hard I’ve worked at it.

And Todd, a wise bartender once told me that you can’t win an argument with an idiot. We won’t think the worse of you if you stop debating Mucho on tax policy.
posted by Nick on January 17th, 2004 at 4:52 pm
It is one thing for townies in a resort community to rip off tourists — after all, tourists are usually much richer than the residents in northern Michigan. It is another thing for rich bobos to rip off students, most of whom have incomes below poverty level. I still like my idea of the flagship univesity for Michigan being located in Detroit or Lansing.
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 18th, 2004 at 10:20 am
It is one thing for townies in a resort community to rip off tourists — after all, tourists are usually much richer than the residents in northern Michigan. It is another thing for rich bobos to rip off students, most of whom have incomes below poverty level. I still like my idea of the flagship univesity for Michigan being located in Detroit or Lansing.
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 18th, 2004 at 10:20 am
It is one thing for townies in a resort community to rip off tourists — after all, tourists are usually much richer than the residents in northern Michigan. It is another thing for rich bobos to rip off students, most of whom have incomes below poverty level. I still like my idea of the flagship univesity for Michigan being located in Detroit or Lansing.
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 18th, 2004 at 10:20 am
I didn’t suggest that we rip anyone off. Currently, the sales tax level in AA is….drum roll, please….a big donut! That’s right, zero.

When I worked at a resort in Colorado way the hell back in the 80’s, the city sales tax was 14%. There is a middle ground to be sure.

A sales tax shifts the burden away from neccessities over to luxuries…something that I would hop all of you would see as a much better situation. The cost of living frugally would drop (i.e. don’t tax groceries and property), and the cost of *fun* would go up, but not by much. This type of taxation would be a help to poor students, not a hindrance.

I am wondering if there is something in the town charter, or some weird Michigan law that keeps the city from doing this. The current tax structure does not make sense no matter how you slice it.
posted by todd on January 18th, 2004 at 11:07 am
No, no, Michigan’s sales tax rate is limited in the state constitution. No local variation in sales taxes is allowed.

All this business about what Ann Arbor would be like without UM misses the point. If UM were somewhere else, Ann Arbor as we know it would be there, too, and the argument would be exactly the same, even if shifted in geography. Both the “bash-UM” and “defend-UM” points of view are inherent in where UM is, not inherent in the landscape of this particular valley.

If UM were a private, property tax paying industry, like Ford Motor Company, it would pour a tremendous amount of money into the city’s treasury every year, and local property taxes would be very low. Look at Dearborn, say. From that standpoint, UM is nothing like the cash cow a comparably sized auto plant or training center would be.

The absence of property tax revenue from AA’s “mill” (local industry) is reflected in very high local tax rates on everything else in Ann Arbor, and it’s hard to imagine how any of this could be otherwise.

Look around Michigan: cities dominated by state universities, including Ypsilanti, East Lansing, Mt. Pleasant, Big Rapids, Marquette, Houghton, etc., have high tax rates, not because they have weirdly high demands for services, but because they have a small tax base compared to the number of people using the streets, generating garbage, etc. Complain if you want, but a high tax rate is pretty much part of the deal of having a state university in your town.

Those high local taxes have an economic effect. If you open a sandwich shop across the street from an auto plant, your costs will be lower than if you open a sandwich shop across the street from a state university. Of course that is reflected in higher prices and more pressure on profit margins. The high taxes (cost of doing business) in state university towns probably tends to drive out economic activity not dependent on the university.

All that being said, the university draws a population which is generally more affluent and hence more able to pay the high taxes and prices. But it doesn’t always work that way. Ypsilanti also has a state university and has not attracted as affluent a population as Ann Arbor. No surprise that Ypsilanti’s property tax rate is about the highest in the entire state.

Okay, so Ypsi gets a much rawer deal from EMU than Ann Arbor gets from UM. But that’s not EMU’s fault any more than Ann Arbor’s budget situation is UM’s fault. State fiscal and tax policies are determined in Lansing, not in university admin suites.
posted by Larry Kestenbaum on January 18th, 2004 at 5:21 pm
“No, no, Michigan’s sales tax rate is limited in the state constitution. No local variation in sales taxes is allowed.”

Well, there you have it. If you want to know why Ann Arbor is so expensive to live in, look no further.
posted by todd on January 18th, 2004 at 5:38 pm
So, if the people in Ann Arbor don’t like high property taxes, THEY SHOULD MOVE!!!!
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 19th, 2004 at 9:30 am
Other citiesd have other options- East Lansing, for example, could allow itself to be annexed to Lansing.
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 19th, 2004 at 9:33 am
Maybe A2 could be annexed to Saline?

Why isn’t there a high tech triangle between A2, Ypsi and Saline? (loud guffaws around)

I’m curious… how much property tax does Lucky Jackson pay to the city of Ann Arbor? Does Lucky even live here? Does Lucky set foot in A2 and partake in the culture the city offers? Ever leave 20% tips for local servers? (more loud guffaws)

I know almost everyone here thnks differently than me, but one of the things that makes A2 unique is it’s decision (consciously or not) not to “partner” with other communities in the area and in the process not dilute its unique flavor. I also think it’s an asset that local folks whine and complain and WORK to preseve some of the local color and content, and try to slow the corporatization of A2.
posted by mucho gusto on January 19th, 2004 at 11:11 am
What surprises me is that there haven’t been any research studies done to specifically find the fiscal impact of a state university in a local economy. Or that if there have been, that no one is citing them.
I’d also like to point out that there are quite a few people who work at the U who don’t live in town. My girlfriend is the only one out of 20 people in her office that lives in Ann Arbor except her ultimate boss, who’s able to afford a very nice place for himself (thankyaverymuch). While the grad students who work in her department also live in town, none of the admin staff or salaried researchers do. As for the admin staff, the shortest commute for them is 40 minutes. I realize this is anecdotal evidence, and that the low incidence of residence is probably a statistical outlier, but still.
And part of why they want to live outside of AA is that they can buy houses out there, instead of living in aparments here. So they drive in and out, and the only local businesses that really benefit are gas stations.
js
posted by js on January 19th, 2004 at 12:00 pm
I know there are lots of studies about the fiscal and economic impact of new sports stadia, because local governments are being asked to site and support such projects. The state universities, on the other hand, are already sited and difficult to move, so there is no urgent need to examine the pros and cons of a university’s presence in a given community.

To live in the city of Ann Arbor is a choice which entails certain costs. People who work here have the same choice; certainly high housing costs (including taxes) in the city might lead them to choose to live outside the city.

But housing costs are not the only factor. I suspect most EMU employees do not live in the city of Ypsilanti, and most Wayne State University employees don’t live in the city of Detroit. Probably most of those people could save money and reduce commuting time by moving into the city where their jobs are located, but they choose to live elsewhere for noneconomic reasons.
posted by Larry Kestenbaum on January 19th, 2004 at 12:32 pm
Most of the EMU profs I know are young, and do live in the city of Ypsilanti. But that’s just my skewed sampling of people like Linette Lao and Jennifer Albaum. Though, to be fair, a good deal of the profs at U-M live in town, but the admins don’t. I don’t know about EMU’s admins, but I’d bet that they’re mostly commuters as well, just given the demographic of the EMU students and that most of the lower admin staff are students.
js
posted by js on January 19th, 2004 at 12:38 pm
(Oh, and the specific reason that many of the cited was being able to own a house. It’s easy to rent a house here, it’s hard to own one on an admin’s salary).
js
posted by js on January 19th, 2004 at 12:39 pm
No, I live in and pay property taxes to the city of Columbus. I have also lived in East Lansing and in Boulder, so I am something of an expert in cornfield college towns. I am probably one of the older posters here (late thrties) but I have NEVER understood people who live in college towns and bitch about college students. (In much the same way that I couldn’t understand a racist moving to Detroit.)
posted by Lucky Jackson on January 19th, 2004 at 2:01 pm
Err… I was away for a few days giving a talk in Tennessee, where, to my surprise, it was Robert E. Lee, Something Jackson (not Andrew) and Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

AA is overrated, but some parts of the south REALLY suck.

Thanks for holding down the fort , Todd. You are the voice of reason.
posted by Anna on January 21st, 2004 at 11:19 am