NEWS BRIEFS
CORRECTION TO THIS ARTICLE: In a previous version, "Cambridge citizen files complaint" mistakenly attributed a proposed response to Assistant Attorney General Amy Nable. The response to the complaint from Charles Teague was actually signed by the city clerk, Donna P. Lopez, and addressed to Nable. A modified version of that response to Teague’s complaint was approved by the city countil at their Nov. 4 meeting.
Grad student housing group “still deliberating”
The Graduate Student Housing Working Group was formed to “focus on how we might best house our graduate students” according to the May/June faculty newsletter. In August, the group’s chairman Professor Phillip L. Clay wrote in an email to The Tech that the group planned to “issue a report in October.” However, Dean for Graduate Education Christine Ortiz, a member of the group, wrote that the group is “still deliberating” and offered no updates in an Oct. 28 email to The Tech.
Community forums to discuss future of East Campus development
According to an email to the MIT community from Acting Provost Martin A. Schmidt and Executive Vice President and Treasurer Israel Ruiz, MIT has recently gained the right to develop “over a million square feet of new development, which will be a combination of housing, retail, commercial, and open space.”
The email announced that the urban design team commissioned to perform a “design study [and to] envision the future of our east campus” will hold several MIT community forums to “solicit [community] input and share the study progress.”
Cambridge citizen files complaint
Charles D. Teague of Cambridge filed an Open Meeting Law Complaint against the City of Cambridge, disputing a vote on the Net Zero Emissions Amendment (NZEA), according to a proposed response signed by the city clerk, Donna P. Lopez, and addressed to Assistant Attorney General Amy Nable. Had it taken effect, the NZEA would have prevented MIT developing Kendall Square in any way that was not carbon neutral.
According to the document, Teague believes that, in April, the Mayor Henrietta Davis violated the rules by changing her vote in favor the proposed amendment to a “present” vote after she learned that the amendment would likely cause MIT to be unable to honor a commitment letter that MIT wrote to the council “describing obligations that MIT would perform for the public benefit if the [MIT-proposed] zoning amendment were adopted.”
Decision in Swartz documents suit
The District of Columbia District Court judge has issued an order in the suit for release of the Secret Service’s file on Aaron Swartz, deceased Internet activist. Kevin Poulsen, a news editor at Wired.com, had filed suit against the Department of Homeland Security in April for the release of this file, which is thousands of pages long. MIT and JSTOR had moved for intervention as third parties, seeking the redaction of the names of their employees in the documents.
United States District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly’s Joint Stipulation for Redaction and Release of Documents specifies that in addition to redactions made by the Department of Homeland Security before their release, MIT and JSTOR will be allowed to propose additional redactions. They will then be released to Poulsen, the plaintiff as further redactions are declined or accepted or rejected based on the Freedom of Information Act.