Today’s weather forecast is predicting showers early and then steady rain later in the day with a high of 53 degrees and a low of 41 degrees. For the rest of the weekend, it looks like it’s mixed with rain and mostly cloudy skies with temps in the upper 30s and low 40s.

Former MSU board chair Vassar: ‘I’m not going away’ despite ‘disturbing’ board vote

Former Michigan State University board chair Rema Vassar called the board’s historic vote to censure her and fellow trustee Dennis Denno, strip them of their duties and refer them to the governor to consider their removal a “disturbing overreaction to my actions.”

The decision came Sunday evening, hours after Vassar announced her resignation from her position as board chair and days after the release of a 63-page investigation into allegations of board impropriety.

But Vassar says the investigation was incomplete and not conducted properly.

Investigators noted that many MSU administrators and personnel had a “fear of retaliation” from Vassar and Denno and as a result, kept the identities of those interviewed confidential.

Vassar also said the investigation ignored additional allegations regarding other trustees and “fail(ed) to question the basic unreliability of the accusations against me.”

She said that decision “was reached in the best interest of the University, to allow for the Board to move beyond its long history of dysfunction and personal recriminations, to get down to business and serve our constituents.”

Vassar also said she’s “deeply touched” the Black Students’ Alliance and MSU’s chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People came to her defense and promised she’d continue to support student engagement.

Local artist brightens Lansing with murals

From giant fruit on the wall of Capital City Market to license plates driven throughout the state, local artist Brian Whitfield has made a lasting mark on the Lansing area. His artistic journey is far from over, he says.

Whitfield has been an artist for as long as he can remember. As a child, he used to shape pieces of food into animals. Today, he creates 30-foot murals, 3D collage pieces and a variety of graphic art.

He said his current style has taken his entire career to create. One of his biggest inspirations was Picasso’s later abstract work.

Music is another place Whitfield gets much of his inspiration, primarily jazz and gospel.

Although he has covered a variety of walls throughout the Lansing area, painting murals was something Whitfield never expected to be doing.

Whitfield’s first solo mural covers the underside of the US-127 and Michigan Avenue overpass located between Homer and Howard Streets. Since then, he has expanded to take on several other larger-scale projects throughout the Greater Lansing area.

Currently, he is working on the second half of a mural near Lansing Community College. When creating a mural, Whitfield starts with a pencil sketch to lay out the composition and decide what elements he will include.

Whitfield said that he is still uncomfortable with painting murals, and that’s part of the reason he continues pushing himself to do it.

In the future, Whitfield said he hopes to start returning to smaller work. He said he would like to create more pieces that make people think.

Although he has opened up and experimented with his art much more than when he began, Whitfield said he hopes that the future will bring more comfortability and more progress.

Based on original reporting by Theo Scheer and Vivian Barrett.

Here is the MSU home Athletic line-up for the weekend…

Tomorrow

• Women’s Tennis will take on Ball State at 10 A.M. and Oakland at 2 P.M. both at the outdoor tennis courts.
• Gymnastics will host the MSU Quad Meet against Greenville, Central Michigan, and Fisk at 2 P.M. at Jenison Field House.

Sunday

• Men’s Tennis will go up against Cornell at 12 P.M. at the indoor tennis center.