On Saturday afternoons in the fall, when the roars of football fans can be heard miles from the stadium, East Lansing mayor Nathan Triplett fondly recalls his time at MSU and his love for the city. Being both an MSU alumnus himself and East Lansing’s youngest mayor have given Triplett a unique perspective on the issues facing both East Lansing and MSU.
“I’m past the point where I can walk around campus and feel like I blend in anymore,” he said. “But my story is the same as a lot of people who came to East Lansing to attend Michigan State — fell in love with the community and never left.”
In Triplett’s personal history, however, lies his most ambitious goal as mayor.
The large student population has focused the economy of downtown East Lansing to be in large part tailored to serving students. When students are encouraged to stay and be part of the immediate East Lansing community, the downtown area will be able to see a more eclectic blend of restaurants, shops and available housing, Triplett said.
Even in the eight years Triplett has served on City Council, East Lansing has changed significantly as a community. There has been a particular influx of international students and the look of downtown East Lansing has changed dramatically.
Triplett said he recognizes that at its core, East Lansing will always be a college town and a conflict of lifestyle is inevitable. With young people coming and going as their careers change, one of the incumbent mayor’s goals, he said, is to encourage more people to stay in the area as lifelong residents.
Accommodating the experiences of college students living on their own for the first time and people working typical business jobs is something Triplett finds valuable about the city. However, balancing the needs of both tends to be problematic.
“There was a period of time where we saw a lot of pressure to convert single family homes close to campus into student rental properties,” Triplett said. “But when we look at the kind of housing we have available now, we see lots of housing for undergraduates and options for well-established families, but nothing for people who fall in the middle of that spectrum.”
Triplett believes East Lansing has these two options for future development of the city: to sprawl outward or build up. He’s in favor of more centralized development along Grand River Avenue.
The high price of housing within walking distance of campus encourages many students to move farther from MSU and even spilling over into nearby areas such as Okemos. Development of affordable, high-quality housing for students still poses a challenge when it comes to keeping students close to the central area of East Lansing.
Recent multi-story developments — such as St. Anne Lofts or the currently under construction apartment building at 903 E. Grand River Ave. — exhibited the kind of development Triplett is looking for, but high rent prices at each are out of reach for many students.
“In the past, policies made it difficult to get quality student housing close to campus,” Triplett said. “We have come around to the appropriate position that it is better for everyone to have these options close to campus.”
No one can say for sure how the city will change moving forward, but Triplett is confident residents will continue to see East Lansing building upward.
“With higher population densities in appropriate central locations we find development is less costly, more environmentally sustainable and supports more people living there,” Triplett said.
The first part of The State News' interview with East Lansing Mayor Nathan Triplett can be read here.
