Students making their way to last Saturday’s football game may have detected something different about their usual route to the stadium. The houses in the 900 block of South State Street, usually the epitome of pre-game celebrations on campus, were noticeably less festive in the wake of "cease and desist" letters sent by the Ann Arbor City Attorney’s Office last week.

LSA senior Alex Girard, a resident of 933 S. State St. — better known as the BOX House — said although residents of the house started partying at 5:30 a.m. like any regular football Saturday, the tailgate was not “business as usual.”

“It was pretty much killed,” he said. “(The Police) showed up and gave everyone on the street public nuisance tickets.”

Kristen Larcom, senior assistant city attorney, sent a letter to the houses of the 900 block of South State Street last Tuesday threatening lawsuits from the city if the houses continued to engage in “illegal and dangerous conduct.”

While BOX House was one of the few in the block that did not receive a noise violation this weekend because it heeded a warning from a police officer to turn its music down, Girard admits that the continuation of their pre-game rituals is “not looking good.”

Larcom said the city has yet to file a lawsuit against the houses, adding that she wasn’t aware of an increase in tickets given out on Saturday.

“It needs to be understood that the letter did not say that they could not host pre-game parties,” she said.

Girard added that he is looking for a way to continue with the festivities while avoiding action from the city. He is even considering petitioning the University to recognize the house's tailgates as an official part of Football Saturday.

“The only way we can actually beat it is if we get (University President) Mary Sue (Coleman) to acknowledge the State Street tailgates as part of the festivities,” Girard said.

To that end, Engineering junior Joe Juanico, who does not live in any of the affected houses, is planning a protest that will start in front of The President's House and continue on to City Hall, where he hopes, “the right person will hear their claim.”

The protest is planned for Oct. 16, the Friday before the next home football game against Delaware State University.

Juanico has created a Facebook event, which already has more than 700 confirmed guests, and he’s looking into permits for setting up the protest.

“It’s a battle between students and the city, and I figured (President Coleman) was kind of like the leader of the school,” he said.

He added that he noticed a difference in the atmosphere of the South State Street tailgates last weekend.

“One thing led to another, and I saw a bunch of angry people and figured I’d start a protest,” he said.

Larcom said that because the houses are located near the busy South State Street and Hoover Street intersection, their tailgating activities cause many traffic problems.

“The houses in the 900 block of South State Street are at this point the only ones causing problems that we know of,” she said. “It has a lot to do with the circumstance and location.”

Larcom’s original letter sent last week discussed the problems the pregames cause, and also the laws they potentially break.

“We appreciate your willingness to pass on to your tenants that there is ‘zero tolerance’ for illegal activities, such as possession of open intoxicants in public, minors in possession, littering, excessive noise and other disorderly conduct,” the letter stated.