Internet, relationships form perfect union
WEDNESDAY
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January 26, 2011 | Volume 206 | Number 86 | 40 cents | An independent student newspaper serving Iowa State since 1890. ™
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State of
the Union
Joey Norris, junior in aerospace engineering, and Kristen Morrow, sophomore in global resource systems, talk before President Obama delivers his State of the Union address Tuesday in the Gold Room of the Memorial Union. Photo: Yue Wu/Iowa State Daily
Obama: Collaborate to innovate
By Kaleb.Warnock iowastatedaily.com
President Obama delivered his annual State of the Union address with optimism for America’s future. He called on American taxpayers to work alongside the federal government, to transcend party politics and take the initiative to innovate in order to compete in the global economy. “With their votes, the American people determined that governing will now be a shared responsibility between parties,” Obama said. “New laws will only pass with support from Democrats and Republicans. We will move forward together, or not at all — for the challenges we
face are bigger than party, and bigger than politics.” Obama said America still needs to compete in the global economy and will do so by continuing to be the best place to do business, take responsibility for the deficit, and reform the government and renewable energy. “Our success in this new and changing world will require reform, responsibility and innovation,” Obama said. “It will also require us to approach that world with a new level of engagement in our foreign affairs.” He has ambitious plans to reform and revitalize current policies regarding the use of green energy, education, immigration, infrastructure and the tax code, to
name a few. He hopes to freeze annual domestic spending for the next five years in order to fight the federal deficit. “At stake is whether new jobs and industries take root in this country, or somewhere else. It’s whether the hard work and industry of our people is rewarded,” Obama said. “Two years after the worst recession most of us have ever known, the stock market has come roaring back. Corporate profits are up. The economy is growing again.” Obama specifically announced plans to give $4 billion to fund clean energy, rather than oil companies, and to increase
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Campustown | Renovations
Q&A
By Kayla.Schantz iowastatedaily.com Q&A Trip Ross, senior associate for LANE4 Q: What is your role in the Campustown redevelopment project? My role is during the development process, so before we start construction, I’m handling all the assemblage of the land and the properties. So I’m working with property owners in Campustown to acquire their buildings and land to be used in the redevelopment. And then I’m also handling what we would call “brokerage.” I’m basically finding the tenants that will help support the project, so that’s either tenants that are already in Campustown or in Ames that would be relocating or opening new stores in the redevelopment, or tenants that would be new to Ames that would be opening within the project. Q: What has been the reaction of the business owners that you’ve talked to so far? That’s a tough question, because we’ve talked to business owners in all different kinds of contacts. The first round of conversations were part of a series of focus groups we did for this project. And this is a
type of project that we’ve done before, but we’re by no means a local expert; we wouldn’t Ross claim to u n d e r stand the need in Ames or in Campustown. So we hosted a series of focus groups, some of which were invite-only so we could get specific groups of people. I guess to address your question, one of those groups was merchants that were just in Campustown, another group was local business owners, and then we had students, and government officials, and safety people — like fire, police, that kind of stuff. And then we had a few public sections, and basically we used those sessions and those conversations with local folks [merchants, citizens, students, etc.] to kind of gauge what the need is, what this project should look like, feel like, what would attract attention from a local customer. But what this ultimately comes down to is, we need to deliver a project that people want to go to, that they want to support. So we’re trying to figure out the best way to achieve
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Mollie Tiernan senior in biochemistry
“Our president proposed a lot of progressive ideas in his address. I will be interested to see how much of it Congress will allow through its chambers.”
“I’m really pleased with the emphasis Obama put on innovation, research and education. Focusing our energy in these areas is vital to our nation’s future success.”
City of Ames
LANE 4 representatives respond to concerns, update project status
Trip Ross: LANE4 to use experience, work with business for project goals
Nathan Davis freshman in food science
Hunter Harris: Local groups helped determine project boundaries By Kayla.Schantz iowastatedaily.com Hunter Harris, director of development for LANE4 Q: I last talked to you in early December. What are the updates on the project? Where are we now in the process? Well, long story short is that we are moving along — I wouldn’t say slowly, but I wouldn’t say at light speed — in discussions with some really exciting potential tenants to occupy this space. [We] have been talking with several national grocery and pharmacy users to occupy space when the project is completed. We had anticipated coming back for real thorough and cursory reviews to the City Council at the end of this month but needed to expand that date. We hope to be back in Ames in February or March, whereby we’ll have a big presentation where we kind of outlay all of our efforts and also have an opportunity for students and community members to give further input on our progress so that we can [go] back to the drawing board. Q: What exactly will be in the presentation that
you will give to City Council? Will there be blueprints yet or just a genHarris eral outlay? You know, I think every time that we come back here you’re going to start to see a little bit more and more detail emerge as we’re able to drill down on some of the big issues. We hope to present a final project process plan that will be a little further along than where we were last time that shows the general uses and the properties that will be affected or impacted by the project. We’d also probably have some very preliminary renderings for the project that we hope to get feedback on at that time. And we’ll have a better confirmation on where we’ll be from a plan ... standpoint and also some of the potential tenants that were [contacted] through this process. Q: When you say “feedback,” does that mean there will be more user groups? How will you communicate with the different groups and hear their views on the
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Council hires brand consultant By Kayla.Schantz iowastatedaily.com From Main Street to campus, Ames is comprised of diverse people and places, creating an unique character soon to be made into a city brand. This brand will be promoted to unite its residents and create a reputation for visitors. Tuesday night the Ames City Council approved the decision to hire Brand Endeavor, a company from Marina del Rey, Calif., that specializes in the research, strategy, architecture and execution of brands. “Cities have brands already, whether that’s what they want or not,” said Susan Gwiasda, public relations officer for
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GSB
VEISHEA asks for extra funds By Whitney.Sager iowastatedaily.com After a busy meeting last week, the Government of the Student Body has a light agenda this week. Topping the agenda is a funding request from the VEISHEA committee. The committee is asking for money to provide a larger venue for the comedian for this year’s VEISHEA celebrations. The GSB may also seat an engineering senator, said Halley Stille, speaker of the Senate and senior in French. “Next week may be a good week,” Stille said. “CyRide is coming to talk to us about some new technology they’re hoping to invest in.” This week’s meeting will take place at 7 p.m. in the Campanile Room of the Memorial Union.