On Tuesday night the Ypsilanti Township Board adopted Resolution 2026-26, demanding that the University of Michigan and Los Alamos National Laboratory halt all ground-disturbing activity on the 144 acres until archaeological and cemetery investigations are complete.
It passed on a voice vote with no opposition.1
This one isn’t the Township speculating, and that’s what makes it different from everything that has come before. The substance comes from the Michigan State Historic Preservation Office, in writing, to the University.
What the State told the University
The Cultural Resource Protection Manager at SHPO wrote to a University project manager. As read into the record at Tuesday’s meeting and quoted in the resolution, he said:
That the Huron River corridor is highly archaeologically sensitive, and that a vacant parcel like this one may contain intact archaeological material. That Textile Road itself was a Native American trail, and that these two factors make the property very sensitive.
Then this:
This risk includes burials. I can share that a site boundary with a recorded cemetery overlaps the property.
He strongly recommended the University engage a federally qualified archaeologist to conduct an assessment — a desktop analysis — and said likely recommendations would include an archaeological survey to define the site that overlaps the boundary, so it could be avoided or mitigated during construction.
And if the cemetery is believed to overlap the property, a human remains detection dog survey would be most beneficial to determine where those remains are located.
You absolutely do not want to hit remains during construction.
He also told them to contact the tribal historic preservation offices for the tribes with ancestral ties to this area, noting those offices are the keepers of cultural data that the State office itself does not hold.
I have not seen that correspondence directly. It was read into the record at a public meeting and is quoted at length in the resolution. I’ve asked the Township for copies and will publish them here when I have them.
A title search is not an archaeological survey
On August 28, MLive reported a University spokesperson saying the University had conducted title searches and site surveys of the property, and that those reviews had not identified any such artifacts or remains.
The resolution rejects that in terms I’d call unusually direct for a public document: a title search establishes ownership of real property. It cannot and does not determine whether burials, human remains, burial features, archaeological deposits or funerary objects lie beneath it.2
As the resolution puts it: Ownership history and archaeological history answer fundamentally different questions.
That’s correct, and it isn’t a close call. A chain of title tells you who held the deed. It tells you nothing about what is in the ground.
The federal argument
This is the part I’d pay closest attention to, because if it holds it reaches further than anything else anyone has tried.
The resolution argues that because Los Alamos is a federally owned national laboratory within the Department of Energy system, overseen through the National Nuclear Security Administration and operated by Triad National Security, the collaboration constitutes a federal undertaking.2
If that’s right, Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act and its regulations at 36 CFR Part 800 require the responsible federal agency to take into account the effects of the undertaking on historic properties, and to carry out the consultation process — including with federally recognized tribes — early enough that avoidance and mitigation can still be considered.
Why that matters here: Section 106 attaches to the federal agency, not to local zoning. Every other avenue this community has tried runs into Article VIII of the state constitution. This one doesn’t go near it.
I’m not a lawyer and I’m not going to tell you how this comes out. Whether a particular partnership triggers Section 106, and which agency is responsible, are genuinely contested questions that turn on facts about federal funding, permitting and control. But it is a real legal argument, made by a municipal attorney, in a document now sitting with the NNSA’s laboratory, the Regents, SHPO, the State Archaeologist and tribal governments.
What the resolution actually demands
No ground disturbance until the investigations are done. And the definition is deliberately broad — clearing, grubbing, tree removal, grading, excavation, trenching, drilling, boring, utilities, roads, foundations, stormwater infrastructure, substations and transmission facilities, staging areas, or anything else capable of disturbing graves or remains.2
The investigation it calls for is layered, and the resolution is explicit that no single method substitutes for another:
- Archival and background research — SHPO site records, historic cemetery records, plats, General Land Office records, aerial photographs, deeds, prior investigations, ethnographic and tribal historical information
- A human remains detection canine survey, covering the documented cemetery area, buffers, and any area identified as having elevated burial potential
- Non-invasive geophysics — ground-penetrating radar, magnetometry, electrical resistance — with the caveat that a negative result from one method is not proof burials are absent
- Systematic archaeological field survey across the remainder of the 144 acres
- Supervision by a Principal Investigator meeting the Secretary of the Interior’s Professional Qualification Standards, with osteologists, cemetery specialists and Native American cultural specialists
- A written Unanticipated Discoveries Plan before any ground disturbance — immediate stop-work, protection of the area, notification of the State Archaeologist and tribal representatives, and confidentiality of precise burial locations
Where burials are found, the Township declares preservation in place and avoidance its strongly preferred alternative. And it says the area of potential effects must not be artificially narrowed to the building footprints.
It also asks the University for copies of its archaeological survey reports, SHPO correspondence, cemetery records, geophysical reports, any communications with federal agencies about Section 106, and any tribal consultation documentation that can lawfully be disclosed.
Where it was sent
The Clerk was directed to transmit certified copies to the Board of Regents, the President of the University, Los Alamos, the State Historic Preservation Office, the State Archaeologist, federally recognized tribal governments and Tribal Historic Preservation Officers, the Michigan Public Service Commission, the Department of Natural Resources, and EGLE.2
That distribution is doing work. Several of those bodies regulate this project in ways the zoning exemption does not touch.
Being careful about this one
A few things I want to be straight about, because this is emotive material and it would be easy to get ahead of the evidence.
Nobody has found remains. What exists is a recorded cemetery boundary that overlaps the property according to State records, and a State recommendation to investigate before digging. That is serious and it is not the same as a discovery.
A resolution is a demand, not an injunction. The Township cannot compel the University to stop. This is a formal request with legal arguments attached, transmitted to bodies that may have authority the Township lacks.
And the University may well have done more than it has said. Its spokesperson referenced site surveys alongside title searches. If a professional archaeological assessment exists, publishing it would resolve a great deal of this in an afternoon.
What I keep coming back to is the sequencing, which is the same pattern as the environmental assessments. The State told the University there was a problem. The community found out from the Township, not from the University. And the answer offered publicly — a title search — doesn’t address the question that was asked.
The Township attorney put it plainly on Tuesday: the appropriate time to find unmarked graves is before excavation, not after construction equipment encounters human remains.
That seems hard to argue with.
Sources
- Charter Township of Ypsilanti, Board of Trustees regular meeting, October 6, 2026 — full video · agenda (PDF)
- Resolution 2026-26, in the October 6, 2026 Board of Trustees packet (PDF). The resolution begins at page 1 of the New Business section and runs 18 pages.
- National Historic Preservation Act, Section 106, and implementing regulations at 36 CFR Part 800. Advisory Council on Historic Preservation
The SHPO correspondence quoted above was read into the record at the October 6 meeting and is quoted in Resolution 2026-26. I have requested copies from the Township and will publish them here when I have them. If I have characterized anything unfairly, tell me and I’ll fix it and say that I did.
