2019-10-22 by The Michigan Daily

ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-NINE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM

Tuesday, October 22, 2019

Ann Arbor, Michigan

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Students talk DEI progress in Business

Individuals cite personal experiences with discrimination within school PARNIA MAZHAR Daily Staff Reporter

DESIGN BY ROSEANNE CHAO

‘U’ has spent $1.6 million on sexual assault case litigation

University defends against lawsuit alleging policies violate due process rights CLAIRE HAO

Daily Staff Reporter

As of Sept. 27, the University of Michigan has spent $1.6 million defending against a lawsuit alleging its policies violate the due process rights of those accused of sexual misconduct, MLive reported at the beginning of October. When asked by The Daily, University spokesperson Rick Fitzgerald clarified costs incurred by the Doe v. University of Michigan lawsuit are not drawn from tuition money and state appropriations. Instead, Fitzgerald explained, the

University’s legal fees are covered by its insurer, Veritas Insurance Corporation, which the University owns. A report in 2017 found higher education institutions around the nation spend an average of $350,000 on sexual misconduct lawsuits. To explain the significantly higher cost of the Doe v. University of Michigan lawsuit, Fitzgerald pointed to the amount of legal work required in the “3-year-old, heavily litigated case involving complicated legal issues.” “The plaintiff filed an initial complaint, an amended complaint,

and second amended complaint, the latter of which is 40 pages long and contains more than 200 paragraphs of allegations,” Fitzgerald wrote in an email. “There has been a total of 64 briefs in the trial court, with 38 filed by the plaintiff, resulting in a record that exceeds 5,000 pages. There have been five lengthy hearings and four status conferences in the trial court, as well as full briefing and oral arguments in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.” However, Deborah Gordon, the attorney representing the anonymous plaintiff, pushed

back against the University’s explanation. According to Gordon, $1.6 million is an “incredible” sum of money to spend on a case not involving discovery of evidence. Instead, she blamed the cost on the University’s legal briefings. “I’m a four-person law firm, I do contingency fee work mostly,” Gordon told The Daily. “At one point they had 12 different attorneys working for them from three different law firms, two of them outof-state … I’m a very small firm and they’re saying it’s me that caused this? That’s laughable.” See CASE, Page 3

Every time Business senior Mia Heard walks into class, she is the only Black person in the room. “When I walk in a room, I don’t get the luxury of being like, ‘Oh, I’m just a person walking to class,’” Heard said. “It’s like, I’m the Black girl walking into this class, and I can just feel the pressure of just being that Black girl; the black dot that always has to be there or they know I’m gone.” According to the Office of the Registrar, for the winter semester of 2019, 2 percent of students in the Stephen M. Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan were Black, 6 percent were hispanic and 57 percent were white. In addition, 62 percent of students were male and 38 percent were female. These demographics are not unnoticed by the entirety of the Business School. To improve diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, students and faculty developed the DEI Task Force during the winter of 2018. Part of the Bachelor of Business Administration Council, the Business School’s student government, the taskforce

Council Search Advisory Commitee hosts considers first townhall for VP of Student Life regulation Community members express areas of interest, expectations for Harper replacement for rentals

ANN ARBOR

VARSHA VEDAPUDI For The Daily

Officials talk impact of Airbnb, VRBO on local housing crisis in city of Ann Arbor ANGELINA BREDE Daily Staff Reporter

Ann Arbor’s frequent sporting, academic and cultural events draw in large numbers of tourists, creating an expansive market for short-term rentals through platforms like Airbnb and VRBO. But, in light of Ann Arbor’s lack of affordable housing crisis and the threat to the hospitality industry, city officials are considering regulating short-term rental companies. There are currently 978 Airbnb listings in Ann Arbor, and over 300 of these are for an entire home — whether it is a house or one bedroom apartment. This means there are 300+ less homes available for people who want to live in Ann Arbor. Ann Arbor City Councilmember Elizabeth Nelson told The Daily she is concerned about how short-term rentals are affecting Ann Arbor’s housing market. “If people are going to advocate strongly to city council that we need to build new housing, those same people should be every bit as concerned about the housing that we are losing to short term rental,” Nelson said.

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hosts events and initiatives to develop an inclusive environment for students. Though parts of the Business School have been working to improve DEI efforts, some say the lack of a race and ethnicity course requirement in the Business School, paired with the lack of communication between administration and students, has impeded the growth of diversity in the Business school. Opposing views from students on the Identity and Diversity in Organizations workshops in the school has also been an obstacle, according to some students. “I literally felt like a slave in that instance, because I felt like I was begging people to buy me” In one of her group projects for class, Business senior Elsa Ramesh, head of the Inclusive Classroom Committee for the DEI taskforce, said a student made transphobic and racist comments while other students laughed along. She said the students present, including herself, did not speak up about the incident to avoid upsetting their peers. They worried it could impact their grades, Ramesh said. See DEI, Page 3

GOVERNMENT

Ruling on redrawing districts reversed

U.S. Supreme Court overturns case, cites unfair advantages for one politcal party BARBARA COLLINS Daily Staff Reporter

The U.S. Supreme Court overturned a ruling Monday morning that would have caused almost three dozen Michigan congressional and legislative districts to be redrawn on account of the districts unfairly helping one political party. The 34 Michigan districts under examination by the Court included 15 state house, 10 state senate and nine congressional districts. Multiple Democratic plaintiffs along with the League of Women Voters first brought the case to attention, and a panel including three federal judges in April, saying the districts were unconstitutionally gerrymandered. The group gave the state a deadline of Aug. 1 to redraw the district lines in time for the 2020 election or the court would do it for them. The panel then released a 146-page opinion which said the boundaries enacted by Republicans following the 2010 census either filled districts with Democratic voters or spread out their own voters in other districts in a way in which was unconstitutional.

RYAN LITTLE/Daily Town Hall members discuss the search for the new Vice President for Student Life at the Trotter Multicultural Center Monday afternoon.

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INDEX

NEWS.........................2 OPINION.....................4 CLASSIFIEDS................6