Tickets Now Available For First Lady's Visit

Tickets now available for first lady's visit

By AMANDA JONAS

NCWS STAFF REPORTER

The general public finally gets its chance today at tickets to Tuesday’s speech by first lady Hillary Clinton at the University of Michigan. But fewer than 200 seats remain after university students, faculty and staff got first dibs earlier this week.

Clinton speaks Tuesday at Hill Auditorium at 2 p.m.

The auditorium seats 4,100 people, but some seats were reserved for special groups and White House security staff. Tickets were free but had to be picked up in advance.

University students were allotted about 2,000 tickets and could reserve them Wednesday and Thursday, with U-M faculty and staff given the chance at 300 tickets on Friday.

The U-M box office said the tickets were gone each day within half an hour.

“Every morning we’ve had a line past the bookstore,” said Kara Baron, who works at the ticket office.

Baron expects long lines and difficulty in getting through phone lines today when the general public can reserve tickets.

“I think there are people talking about coming when the building opens (at 6),” Baron said.

The box office will be open from 9 a.m. until noon today to receive ticket requests.

The general public can either go to the Michigan Union Box Office at 530 S. State St. or call 763-8587 for tickets.

No more than four tickets can be reserved per person.

Tickets reserved over the phone can be picked up at the will-call desk at Hill Auditorium on Tuesday before the speech.

The speech will be broadcast on 91.7 WUOM Radio; UMTV, channel 26 on the U-M campus; and Ann Arbor Community Television Network, channel 8. Some tickets may be available at Hill Auditorium on Tuesday before the speech because of cancellations.

Clinton’s visit is part of the Year of Humanities and the Arts (YoHA) celebration at U-M. For information, call 764-1185, or visit the YoHA Web site at www.yoha.umich.edu