Jeez, I knew about the western end of Lansing Township and the areas near Eastwood, but I didn't know that there were sections south of Michigan and on the other side of 127.
I think the fact that the township basically ignores those little neighborhoods on the east side has to do with race and class, they have nice side walks over in Waverly they just repaved W Michigan Ave. I often go to the the Village Party Store and the Eastside Fish Market, and drive down those streets. Lots of people live in those little houses, and I think they deserve to be part of the city. The contrast between Mifflin and say Hayford is remarkable. They did recently knock down [maybe it fell down] one of the saddest looking houses next to the asphalt company. There was a family living there until last spring.
They are starting to apply to exterior treatments on the building. On the north east corner charcoal colored rectangle panels. I am hoping for the best, it will be hard to overlook this building if it is less than the best.
I heard an interesting comment about the Sky Vue, in that they received tax incentives from Lansing with the understanding they would provide hundreds of construction jobs, and then did not hire any local contractors. It looks like the only local people who are making any money over there are the hired pickets. I believe they after the fact, changed their target market to all students from mixed. This seems at the least ingenues to except tax breaks from the people of the city of Lansing and build a building built by outsiders for temporary student residents, whom I would say the majority would be Chinese students who will go back home after college. It is great that students come here from all over the world, but I am not sure we should be subsidizing a company to build and profit from a building no one from Lansing will live in.
I don't think it is fair to say that the majority of students living in Skyvue will be Chinese. Chinese students make up just over 10% of MSU's undergraduate population (East Asian influx slowly changes East Lansing), so if you project that percentage on to the residents of the building I wouldn't expect them to occupy more than just over 10% of the building.
There are definitely in-state families that can afford to spend a lot for their children to live in nice housing (think Metro Detroit and Grand Rapids metro area), as well as out-of-state students who are already paying more than double the tuition to attend MSU. Students are also taking on far more loans than they did in previous generations and will be using the money from those loans towards paying for higher-end apartments (I definitely think this is a terrible idea for students to make, but there is a significant number that *are* deciding to do so).
Purely anecdotal, but I'm around to the various student apartments fairly often and there is definitely a disproportionate amount of Chinese students living in the newer/higher-end complexes. They are the ones driving the Lamborghini's, Mclaren's, Maserati's, etc... I've heard many mentions about the importance of "prestige" in Chinese culture, appearances are important to them so they put their kids in expensive cars, clothes and high end housing. It's come to a point where I really wonder what will happen if MSU begins losing out on these Chinese students, I'd bet they're having a sizable impact on the local economy, especially the student housing market.
I was pointing out that many students who are also from China would be living at the Sky Vue building. They changed their target tenets from mixed to all student, renting by the bed. I was noting that Lansing tax payer subsidies are being used to help build a building that will bring economic benefit to Lansing, but know one from Lansing will live there unless they are a student. I was thinking that our tax breaks should be going to developments that benefit the people of Lansing in terms of an economic benefit, employment, and new modern residences. I only have the evidence of my own observations, I have noted that the new buildings are advertised in Chinese. There are places where there seem to be a lot of Asian students living. While is seems like many Asian people have moved here, I was pointing out that most foreign [and domestic] students go home, or do not end up living in Lansing. We benefit from their presents while they are here of course but should the tax payers of Lansing be helping to build what basically fancy dorm rooms. By the way I love that there are so many Asian folks living here,and seeing those fancy cars makes me smile. You never get to see cars like that often around here. I often find my car totally surrounded by Impalas!
While we may see more than 10% living there, maybe closer to 20% due to a selection bias in prices, it is our unconscious bias that makes us disproportionately notice people that are different than ourselves. For every "Chinese" student that we notice, there could be nine students that we don't remember or notice because they didn't stand out. It is also worth noting that many students of Asian heritage attend MSU and aren't international students who come from rich families.
I agree that we shouldn't be using subsidies to build housing for temporary residents and I was disappointed to see the marketing shift of the building, though once it is built it will stay for the long run. As more buildings get built closer to campus, we may see demographic shifts in these buildings. Some students may stay in the buildings after they graduate as they take jobs in the Lansing area.
Please just let me say that my observations are mostly anecdotal, I have not lived here for 35 years so upon my return I have noted a large increase in the number of Asian people, which in 1980 was almost zero. I happened to be related to a Chinese American family, my niece is half Chinese decent, my new Great niece is one quarter Chinese decent. I happen to know more than just a bit about Chinese culture, and many Chinese Americans. I have nothing negative to say about the students who come here from all over the world. I know the racial make up of MSU, which if one looked only at the student section of football games you might think it is 98% white. When I went to MSU it was Iranians[not all of them] who drove the fancy cars.
Maybe I was a pessimist, but I always assumed that Skyview was going to be student housing, I never remember hearing any indication that it would be targeted at anyone else. I do not have a problem offering incentives on student housing, my criteria for incentives on apartment buildings is based on where the building is, it's design and it's quality of construction/materials; I don't much care who the intended residents are. While I'd prefer a less student-centric project, I still think Skyview will have enough of a positive effect on the City to justify the cost of its incentives. If there was one thing I would've wished for with this project it would be higher quality materials on the facade; redesigning the building to look like a collection of buildings rather than a single monolithic structure would also have been nice. Lansing is still quite a ways from being able to be truly picky about who we offer incentives to, we're still pretty much in the "Please come build something" phase. If this current wave of development is sustained for a couple more years and everything proposed gets built we should find ourselves in a much better position moving forward.
Comments
Gross.
There are definitely in-state families that can afford to spend a lot for their children to live in nice housing (think Metro Detroit and Grand Rapids metro area), as well as out-of-state students who are already paying more than double the tuition to attend MSU. Students are also taking on far more loans than they did in previous generations and will be using the money from those loans towards paying for higher-end apartments (I definitely think this is a terrible idea for students to make, but there is a significant number that *are* deciding to do so).
I agree that we shouldn't be using subsidies to build housing for temporary residents and I was disappointed to see the marketing shift of the building, though once it is built it will stay for the long run. As more buildings get built closer to campus, we may see demographic shifts in these buildings. Some students may stay in the buildings after they graduate as they take jobs in the Lansing area.