Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Elections - City Councils and Commissions - Policies
mamundsen
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby mamundsen » June 27th, 2017, 1:35 pm

Former legislator Kate Knuth hired as Minneapolis' chief resilience officer

http://www.startribune.com/former-state ... 429460473/

I've known Kate almost my entire life. She's great and I was sad that she decided to quit politics so quickly. I am happy that she continues to be involved locally and this seems like a HUGE role. When it says the job description is:
a new position that coordinate the city's work on urban challenges from housing affordability to climate change.
Any one else pick up on this? thoughts?

SurlyLHT
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby SurlyLHT » January 2nd, 2018, 3:47 pm

My wife and I have lived in a Stephen Frenz property for 15 months or so. It was 'purchased" by Rickey Misco who was extremely friendly and told us the properties were his 401k and started replacing broken stoves and refrigerators and removing pests in the month or so he before he realized he may not get a license. He was doing such a great job before the license issues my wife and I decided to stay in our unit.

Now, with Frenz having no license, Rickey having no license and the administrator Lighthouse having no keys, records or funds relating the property we're entering our 3rd month with confusion. There has been no notice on the current state of the property from the law firm, the city, administrator, nor Frenz or Misco. My wife and I have discovered everything in the Star Tribune.

Now Frey has jumped in and said he's coming up with a plan for the Frenz and Kahn properties and generally the whole affordable housing issue.

Personally, it feels like the City of Minneapolis seriously bungled in letting this this issue develop given that there are now dozens of properties under the control of an administrator. (Likely the largest Landlord in the city.) I think and hope the final outcome will be good for the tenants and the city. But seriously I look at my neighbors and their children who have befriended my wife and I...and I can't help but feel as if they've been somewhat forgotten even though the outcome may be good. (My wife and I make over the median household income so we're not that vulnerable much of this.)

Forum thoughts this? What happens to these properties will affect the character and built environment of the city for years.

(A side-note: I doubt our units will stay affordable given that we're right next to a LRT station and when looking at the property it's easy to see how a renovation could easily lead to more rent income.)

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FISHMANPET
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby FISHMANPET » January 2nd, 2018, 7:43 pm

Hey you probably live on my street.

Blaisdell Greenway
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby Blaisdell Greenway » January 7th, 2018, 10:11 am

Keep making noise... squeaky wheel, etc. It's very important the city gets this right, and it can set the tone for the mayor's "affordable housing or bust" agenda. Tell your friends and neighbors to stay in contact with the council member, etc.

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FISHMANPET
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby FISHMANPET » January 8th, 2018, 11:47 am

Lisa Bender is Council President, Andrea Jenkins is Vice President, Andrew Johnson is Majority Leader, and Cam Gordon is Minority Leader (lol).

LakeCharles
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby LakeCharles » January 8th, 2018, 1:17 pm

Anyone more knowledgeable than me care to shed light on the importance of these roles? President makes sense to me, but what do the VP and Majority/Minority Leaders do?

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FISHMANPET
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby FISHMANPET » January 8th, 2018, 1:28 pm

VP chairs committee of the Whole, Majority & Minority leaders are members of the Executive Committee along with President and VP (I think)

MNdible
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby MNdible » January 8th, 2018, 2:13 pm

Committee chairs:


More details in the thread.

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FISHMANPET
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby FISHMANPET » January 8th, 2018, 2:55 pm

Wait that's not right, Cano has public Safety, not Fletcher.
E: He corrects himself later in the thread.

All the deets straight from the source here: https://lims.minneapolismn.gov/Download ... 39084].pdf

twincitizen
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby twincitizen » January 9th, 2018, 1:43 pm

1. Bender as Council Prez and then assigning Public Safety to Cano... what am I missing here? I thought that relationship was pretty frayed.

The wishful cynic in me says it looks like Cano is being set up to fail (by sticking her foot in her mouth so hard she'd be forced out), but I doubt that's the case, because she'd make the city look really bad by association and no one wants to see that.

2. How did Steve Fletcher wind up not chairing a committee AND get left off Zoning & Planning, given the prominence of W3 in citywide affairs and pace of downtown development? He is on a bunch of other committees, but this result was unexpected.
Former legislator Kate Knuth hired as Minneapolis' chief resilience officer

http://www.startribune.com/former-state ... 429460473/

I've known Kate almost my entire life. She's great and I was sad that she decided to quit politics so quickly. I am happy that she continues to be involved locally and this seems like a HUGE role. When it says the job description is:
a new position that coordinate the city's work on urban challenges from housing affordability to climate change.
Any one else pick up on this? thoughts?
Knuth out after 7 months. Negotiated exit following the election, as the Frey administration has different ideas for what this position should be working on: http://www.startribune.com/minneapolis- ... 473945953/

Anondson
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Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby Anondson » January 27th, 2019, 11:11 pm

Should Minneapolis require neighborhood orgs be representative of the demographics of their neighborhood?

http://www.startribune.com/minneapolis- ... 504949652/

How should the city require the nonprofit orgs accomplish this?

mplsjaromir
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby mplsjaromir » January 28th, 2019, 5:02 am

Quotas.

Anondson
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby Anondson » January 28th, 2019, 8:12 am

Oh damn. I read the comments.

QuietBlue
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby QuietBlue » January 28th, 2019, 9:01 am

If the city is funding them, the city can set conditions. Though I think implementing such a change will be difficult.

On a related note, I wonder if some neighborhoods will choose to form true HOAs in the wake of things like this, the rezoning, etc.

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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby Anondson » January 28th, 2019, 11:08 am

In the age of social media, how much of neighborhood org’s original purpose for forming and continued existence is just a process-burdensome anachronism?

I can see there may be some value in keeping neighborhood orgs as a minor league feeder system for political parties, but the opacity and openness to participation of some of them needs to be lifted more.

EOst
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby EOst » January 28th, 2019, 12:44 pm

I don't know for Minneapolis, but at least in Saint Paul the neighborhood organizations are useful for channeling neighborhood volunteerism. There are a lot of festivals and community gardens and the like that only exist because neighborhood orgs are organized around them.

I think the Minneapolis 2020 goals are going to be difficult or impossible to meet if they want to keep the 70(!) existing organizations. Assuming an average board size of 11 (probably low-balling; Harrison has 15 people, Standish-Ericcson 14), that means almost 800 people are needed to keep those boards running. It's a real challenge to find that many people willing to do thankless volunteer work even without any quotas for age/gender/ethnicity/etc.

twincitizen
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby twincitizen » January 29th, 2019, 9:57 am

Minneapolis' 70-something orgs should really consolidate to something resembling St. Paul's 17 district councils, with a goal of 30 or fewer organizations. The consolidated ones like Longfellow and East Nokomis are "right-sized", while having separate 501c3 organizations for tiny Bryant neighborhood (population < 2,000) is ridiculous. The "right size" for these organizations is probably a range of 1-2 square miles in the densely populated areas (Whittier is fine as-is, for example), and 3-5 square miles in the less populated outskirts (see Longfellow, East Nokomis).

For many of these orgs, growing is the only way they'll have a shot a finding enough renters, POC, etc. These organizations cannot continue to be run by the same 5-10 people since the 1990s, regardless of their race/gender/owner-renter status.

Or, as Nick has said previously, maybe the Council Ward is a small enough "lowest level" of government, and we don't actually need anything smaller. As the City's population grows, I'd be ok with adding 2 more councilmembers if it meant we could stop funding these neighborhood groups. 450k people / 15 wards = 30,000 ppw. That's roughly how many people lived in each ward at the last redistricting after the 2010 Census.

MNdible
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby MNdible » January 29th, 2019, 11:46 am

I know that these neighborhood boards are everybody's favorite punching bags, but in my experience they're providing great value in organizing grassroots volunteer efforts and improving quality of life. And while I'm not sure we need the same number we currently have, I certainly wouldn't reduce it to the number that St. Paul has.

Put another way, for the honestly very modest funding that the City puts into these groups (in the post NRP world), they're getting a lot of bang for their buck.

mattaudio
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby mattaudio » January 29th, 2019, 2:38 pm

I'd rather see us move towards a model where...
1. The city has a robust engagement mechanism that can be deployed for various needs (like they did for Mpls2040).
2. There's a city-wide grant fund for individuals and entities to invest in their communities.

Neighborhood Orgs as separate 501c3's would be free to continue operating under that model, but they wouldn't be the only show in town. These orgs are, on the whole, very inefficient and opaque - they simply do not operate at a scale that allows them to be better. Let's use the city to fill those needs with more efficiency, and let's let anyone have access to resources if they can prove to use those for a community benefit.

kellonathan
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Re: Minneapolis City Politics General Discussion

Postby kellonathan » March 19th, 2019, 12:02 pm

I'm probably not the first one who had this question, but, does anyone know why Mpls does not have a separate "department of transportation", and instead lumps it under the department of pubic works?
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