ann arbor is overrated.

City Council wants to amend the living wage ordinance to include a loophole that will end up exempting the mostly younger workers that clean out trash cans at Summer Fest, but why stop there? How about adding some explicitly discriminatory language to make extra sure that employers of some high school and college students don’t have to pay them as much as other workers? Here’s an amendment to the amendment proposed by Council member Stephen Kunselman (seconded by Sabra Briere):

5) This Chapter shall not be applicable to the establishment and/or continuation of the following if developed specifically for YOUTH, high school and/or college students: (a) A bona fide training program; (b) A NONPROFIT SUMMER PROGRAM; (c) A NONPROFIT YOUTH EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM; (d) A work-study, volunteer/public service, or internship program.

On a voice vote, the Mayor declared the motion carried.

Internships are some of the biggest scams around. In fields like journalism and publishing, they are not only unpaid but often restricted to college students only, effectively closing them to all but students from the most affluent backgrounds. Inside Higher Ed reports on “the internship racket,” concluding that “American colleges do a fairly good job providing access to students of varying economic means; they should stress the superior value of achievements within school, instead of lending respectability and support to an internship racket that reliably, and inaccurately, presents the well-off as more enterprising.” (Here’s a good blog on the topic.) It’s unclear why the Ann Arbor City Council wants to enshrine the low pay of internships in law.

Okay, it’s totally clear.

The News once again misleadingly ignores the contributions of graduate students to the university’s research output in their story on the GEO work stoppage: “Graduate student instructors teach part time while working on their advanced degrees … The typical instructor teaches 16.5 to 20 hours a week during the eight-month academic year in return for a salary of $15,199, benefits and a full tuition waiver.” Most people are probably not aware that “working on…advanced degrees” often requires the production of research that benefits the university.

By the way, our server has been slow because of spammers. We’re probably going to move servers soon; posting may be light while we work on this.

Murph has a great post about the future of the single-family detached house monoculture in light of recent economic problems. “Quality of life” and “diverse neighborhoods” (in the A2 sense of “low density” and “low density” respectively) have been the norm only for a few decades and may start to disappear as, he writes, “People will be quietly moving in with each other not only for help paying the mortgage, but for help paying the heating bills. Houses everywhere will be ‘over-occupied’, with individuals or families doubling up for the sake of finances.”

It can’t really be said to be a positive thing when people who would rather own and live in single-family detached houses are forced by economic circumstances to rent or live with larger groups. But at least it may bring on the reform of zoning laws and anti-dense development attitudes that penalize renters, students and people in nontraditional living situations.

Observer writer Vivienne Armentrout has announced her candidacy for the 5th Ward, running on a “quality of life” platform. Now, “quality of life,” as it’s used in A2, is what all the hip blogging kids would call a “dogwhistle.” It signals to a certain constituency that you’re willing to speak their language, while appearing innocuous to outsiders. (Paradoxically, local dog park advocates don’t really have any dogwhistles.) The constituency is, of course, the anti-density crowd.

(We should probably add that since “quality of life” has been a political rallying cry for so long in Ann Arbor, its use at this point is probably somewhat reflexive to anyone promoting an anti-density agenda, rather than a dogwhistle in the strict sense of a carefully engineered attempt to hide such an agenda.)

Could this be unintentional? Maybe, but don’t forget that Armentrout was a major Mike Anglin supporter, serving as his official representative on this Arbor Update thread. Anglin’s campaign, if you recall, was pretty much one long human-audible anti-density whistle.

So what constitutes quality of life? “[G]reen spaces and historic buildings … the small local businesses, the active volunteers in every part of community life, the devotion to social equity as well as to the environment and the arts, and the diverse neighborhoods,” Armentrout says. “Diverse neighborhoods,” of course, is usually code for “keeping out development,” as we’ve seen in pretty much every zoning controversy of late.

And these diverse neighborhoods, she says, need to “remain…affordable to young families, people aging in place, and everyone in between.” The neighborhoods are affordable; the only problem is that they need to “remain” that way, at least for young families and older people and everyone in between, which we guess would have to be medium-aged families. Students and singles, apparently, can fend for themselves.

Geoff Larcom is thrilled at Ann Arbor’s ranking on Prevention’s “best walking cities” list. Why is A2 such a great place to walk? Larcom illustrates:

A recent Friday night is an example. I got out of work around 10:30 p.m. after an evening shift. I took a favorite route, from The Ann Arbor News through Central Campus to The Village Corner store on South University Avenue and back.

On the way, I passed a vintage downtown theater, a world-class concert venue, a landmark brick arch, several quirky stores and a law school with classic Gothic architecture.

It was snowing big, fluffy flakes, and U-M students were still on break.

So I had the streets to myself. It was one of those cozy, bright nights when it feels as if you own downtown.

Many of you know that sensation, yet another reason Ann Arbor ranks as a top place to take a walk.

So that’s why A2 is such an amazing place for pedestrians — because you can stroll to a convenience store on a freezing night and pass some closed stores and a law school, without anyone else walking around to spoil your solitude.

“The problem with Israel,” wrote Aimee Smith in the MIT student paper, “is that it is a racist, colonial, settler state built on ethnically cleansed lands.” Some would merely call it a “Western Cultural Imperialis[t]” state, but that’s just (matzo-)mealy-mouthed Israel-pandering, she argued.

We remember Smith’s, um, activism from our days out East. So after years of complaining about how much we miss Cambridge, we probably deserve it: she seems to have suddenly (well, as in a year or so ago) appeared in A2.

We would ask why it couldn’t have been Toscanini’s ice cream that followed us out here instead, but now they’re begging for money on the Internet after being busted for tax evasion.

Ann Arborites are pretty savvy about marketing. They don’t consider a jar of President’s Choice salsa to be the height of cuisine just because it’s labeled “gourmet,” and they’re well aware that “light” doesn’t mean healthy. Even “organic,” which has a specific legal meaning, is often criticized for not being a stringent enough label, and it’s a safe bet that many A2 residents are up on all the nuances. They’re far too skeptical to be taken in by glib advertising-speak. Except when it involves housing.

Marketers of apartments do not generally advertise “pretty okay” or “more or less adequate” housing units. They like to tout their product as “luxury.” And where University Village is concerned, A2 has completely fallen for it. Today’s Daily plays right into the hands of the anti-”Manhattanism” crowd with an editorial blasting the proposed housing development for its alleged lavishness. “Ann Arbor doesn’t need its own Trump Tower … housing blatantly targeted at wealthy students creates class segregation.” With student advocates like these, who needs neighborhood associations?

In a cartoon in the latest Observer, a professor is depicted addressing a crowded lecture hall: “Each year students ask, and the answer is, ‘No, U of M students do not have immunity from city and state laws.’” Interesting timing — we can’t help thinking that this lecture might have been better directed toward Judy McGovern, Peter Schork and the rest of the Summer Fest board, who seem to be under this very misapprehension.

Last night’s public meeting about the proposed University Village development was a kind of preliminary attempt at the kind of neighborhood input sessions that would be required under Sabra Briere’s recent proposal. Without this kind of back-and-forth with the neighbors, she said, an “immediate hostility to change” is often the result.

So what does it look like when residents are asked for their opinions early in the process to defuse this hostility? “This isn’t Chicago!…This is becoming the Manhattanism of the city,” one participant was said to have “yelled.” Another complained, “It’s too much building and too many students.”

The meeting’s location near State and Eisenhower, nowhere near the site of the proposed development and difficult to reach without a car, certainly didn’t make it easy for the demographic that might actually live at University Village to attend. “If you were to ask them, I think most students would be very positive about this development,” said one alum who is working on the project. Doing our best Thora Birch in “Ghost World”: Yeah. That’ll definitely happen.

Ann Arbor ranks third on Prevention magazine’s latest list of Best Walking Cities. Wow, A2 must be a really great place to get around by walking.

Okay, those of you who are familiar with these best-cities lists know that it probably means no such thing. The criteria? “How many residents walk to work or as part of a fitness program, along with the number of parks per square mile.” Commuting to your job on foot, power-walking around your suburban subdivision with those little hand weights — what’s the difference? They’re both walking, right?

The survey also looked at “low crime rates, mild year-round temperatures, the number of cultural attractions, participation in recreational sports and pet ownership.” Of these, the first two make some kind of sense, although crime rates might be especially low in places where no one would even think of walking around at night, as is the case in some cities and just about all quiet suburbs. As for the last three: huh?

The only way this ranking could have been worse is if they had given a bonus for lower-density neighborhoods — because then there’s a longer distance to walk to get to the next house. It’s totally walking-friendly!