Google now has an app that will match your face to fine art. I have determined you can point your phone’s camera at a computer screen to match Minneapolis politicians to faces in old paintings. Disclaimer: much like DNA testing services provided by sites like ancestry.com, these results are not 100% genetically accurate.
Kevin Reich, Ward 1.
Cam Gordon, Ward 2.
Steve Fletcher, Ward 3.
Phillipe Cunningham, Ward 4.
Jeremiah Ellison, Ward 5.
Abdi Warsame, Ward 6.
Lisa Goodman, Ward 7.
Andrea Jenkins, Ward 8.
Alondra Cano, Ward 9.
Council President Lisa Bender, Ward 10.
Jeremy Schroeder, Ward 11.
Andrew Johnson, Ward 12.
Linea Palmisano, Ward 13.
Mayor Jacob Frey.
The ubiquitous unflattering Star Tribune photo of former Mayor Betsy Hodges shows a 50% genetic match to a boy playing the bagpipes.
Former City Council President Barb Johnson.
Former mayoral candidate Tom Hoch.
I tried to run the eerily human face of Andrew Johnson’s dog through the Google fine art machine, but it couldn’t find a match. However, Wedge LIVE computers calculate that Andrew Johnson’s dog is a 99% genetic match to a painting of an Ewok.
It’s very likely Lisa Bender will become Council President. The other candidate is Andrea Jenkins.
The public vote for president is traditionally unanimous once it becomes clear which candidate has majority support. Privately Bender has had seven of 13 votes secured for a while: incumbents Cam Gordon and Andrew Johnson, joined by new members Steve Fletcher, Phillipe Cunningham, Jeremiah Ellison, and Jeremy Schroeder.
Andrea Jenkins had the support of Alondra Cano plus the four remaining incumbents who were part of President Barb Johnson’s coalition during the last term: Kevin Reich, Abdi Warsame, Lisa Goodman, and Linea Palmisano.
The council will also elect a Vice President, a Majority Leader, and a Minority Leader.
Who will lead new committees?
It’s important to note the obvious: large turnover on the council means large turnover on many committees, both in terms of membership and who chairs those committees.
Here are some committees to watch for changes (previous committee chairperson in parentheses):
Community Development & Regulatory Services (Goodman)
Transportation & Public Works (Reich)
Public Safety, Civil Rights & Emergency Management (Yang)
Zoning & Planning (Bender)
Ways & Means (Quincy)
Assuming Bender is elected president, she will not be back as chair of Zoning & Planning. Because Yang and Quincy were not reelected, they will definitely not be back as chairs of their respective committees. Lisa Goodman wields a ton of money and power from her position as chair of CDRS. Does she hold on to it?
Watch for the creation of new committees. An example from the beginning of last term: Community Development was combined with Regulatory Services as a gift from Barb Johnson to Lisa Goodman.
Can I purchase a shirt to commemorate this momentous quadrennial event?
Acme Comedy’s remaining parking lot was half-filled during a Friday show last June
In 2016, Acme Comedy Co was the subject of the most high-profile movement to save a parking lot in recent Minneapolis history. If the owner of an adjacent parking lot was allowed to turn it into apartments, Acme’s owner predicted he would be forced to move his business out of Minneapolis to a parking-rich suburb. Nationally-known comedians rallied to Acme’s defense. Nearly 6,000 people signed an online petition to save a parking lot — in order to save a beloved comedy institution.
This dynamic plays out on a smaller scale every week in neighborhoods across Minneapolis. Parking concerns are pervasive in a changing city. But people don’t usually pay attention long enough to check predictions against reality. We get headlines that say Neighborhood Threatened by Change. We never get the follow-up headline years later: Oops, Things Are Actually Just Fine.
So it’s important we honor bearded soothsayers like Peter Bajurny, who was right all along. There’s one less parking lot in Minneapolis but the comedy business is booming in the North Loop. Go have your obnoxious “I told you so” moment, Peter — you deserve it.
A duplex at 4257 Vincent Ave South was demolished recently. The land is zoned for single family, just like a lot of the Linden Hills neighborhood that surrounds it, so the duplex will be replaced with a single family home (I suspect this explains why nobody vigiled or tried to give the house a pedigree by researching a famous former resident). Many of the exclusive single-family neighborhoods that we know today, the kind dotted with small apartment buildings and grandfathered triplexes, have become that way because of some long-forgotten downzoning that made new multi-family housing illegal.
The house on Vincent Ave was grandfathered in as a legally non-conforming property, but now that the duplex is gone, it’s gone for good. Exclusionary single-family zoning means that conversions like this can only go in one direction, towards fewer units. If you think of housing like a game of musical chairs, wealthy Ward 13 just lost another chair. And our zoning code makes it really hard to build new chairs in the places where people most want to sit.
Stories of conversions from multi-unit to single-family homes were surprisingly common, and celebrated, when I documented the last 45 years of housing politics in the Wedge neighborhood. It’s not the story that usually comes to mind when people think of gentrification or displacement. It’s not the kind of big change people notice and complain about; it’s not six stories of apartments on a parking lot. It’s the slow, silent, unrelenting gentrification of a neighborhood — and we use the zoning code to encourage it.
Don’t let the apparent building boom in Minneapolis fool you — there has been a citywide, decades-long drift towards more restrictive zoning. Yes, we make room for big developers who build mega-buildings downtown. Yes, we build six-story buildings on certain major corridors, places lucky enough to survive the craze for downzoning over the last 45 years. This means we build the kind of housing (big buildings on pricey lots with dozens of units or more) that costs the most to build, and is therefore the most expensive to live in. This means we are largely a city that is off limits to affordable housing in our most desirable neighborhoods. This means many of our neighborhoods are unaffordable by design, and will remain so for decades into the future.
In the Wedge neighborhood (my neighborhood), this trend has meant multiple successful rounds of downzoning. At times when downzoning failed, activists pushed for historic districts (while openly admitting that historic districts were a backdoor attempt to accomplish the goals of exclusionary zoning). But it’s important to recognize this point: to the degree the Wedge has any racial or income diversity, it’s largely because of the people living in apartment buildings constructed between 1950 and 1975. These two-and-a-half story walkups were so despised by certain noisy neighbors that the city gave in to activists and made it illegal to build them.
The city downzoned large swaths of south Minneapolis in 1975. Today we celebrate those old apartment buildings as Naturally Occurring Affordable Housing; we allocate precious public dollars to preserve them. We hope that, in the face of a housing shortage, with rental vacancy rates hovering near two percent, we can keep these affordable apartments out of the hands of investors who would renovate and upscale them. It’s a reminder that Minneapolis has failed to reckon with the ways our zoning practices work against our affordable housing policies.
That’s not to say there haven’t been small moves to reverse the trend. City Council Member Lisa Bender has legalized accessory dwelling units (or backyard/garage apartments) and eased minimum parking requirements. She also fixed a quirk in the zoning code that had effectively outlawed two-family dwellings in areas zoned in a two-family category (tale of backdoor downzoning: over the previous decades, minimum lot-size requirements had been increased to the point that you couldn’t build a duplex on a typical lot zoned for duplexes). None of this stuff would have happened without Lisa Bender as a champion; Minneapolis has led the way on land-use reforms over the last few years because of one person (which is impressive, but also scary when you imagine a world without her).
The politics of appeasing single-family voters can be compelling. Though I believe Lisa Bender is one of the most exceptional and principled elected officials in the country, both downzoning and historic districts have still come to my backyard in Ward 10 over the last four years (albeit in more limited forms than desired by some). It’s not because these are great ideas, but because energetic people got noisy to demand it.
The noise extends beyond my own backyard. A group of residents in downtown Minneapolis (who, in fairness, would tell you, “we don’t live in downtown!”), organized under the name Neighbors for East Bank Livability, sued to stop a 40-story condo tower. The punchline is that many of them live in 20 to 30 story condo towers. A judge ordered the group to post a $100,000 bond to offset developer costs in the event NEBL loses their legal fight (they will definitely lose their legal fight and all of this money). This money is in addition to legal fees they will incur. They had a surprisingly easy time raising (and flushing) all that money.
A group of residents in St Paul is fighting for low density zoning under the name Livable St Paul. Their cause involves the former site of an automobile manufacturing facility. Like their “Livable” counterparts in Minneapolis, they are well-funded and highly motivated. They disagree with the St. Paul City Council’s recent decision to allow medium- and high-density zoning at the Ford Site, including 20 percent affordable housing. They have reportedly collected enough petition signatures to put the Ford Site rezoning on next year’s ballot in St. Paul.
And then there are the smaller scale skirmishes. A few of my favorite examples, in case you missed them:
The unremarkable house in the Wedge that became the subject of a years-long battle, at city hall and in the courts, to stop a 4-story apartment building. Story includes cameo appearance by since-disgraced HGTV personality Nicole Curtis and a vigil 🕯️ in honor of a house.
Cases of outrageous NIMBYism are wacky (and fun, I admit), but by no means typical. As much as I’d like to report that needed zoning reforms are opposed exclusively by an army of fancy clowns, it’s just not the case. Many people are capable of writing reasonable-sounding anti-apartment emails to their city council member — emails that often do not imply renters are subhuman and sometimes do not compare city planners to Hitler. Chances are pretty good that when an elected official reads that low-key complaint about parking, they already agree with a lot of it. And even for more enlightened politicians, bad policy can feel essential to political survival when it’s backed up by a stream of highly charged resistance to even the smallest neighborhood change.
So it’s time to get noisy. Talk to your friends about zoning. Start the conversation with your city council member — let them know you exist and that you are engaged. The Minneapolis city council will adopt a new Comprehensive Plan in 2018. This is a key document that will guide future zoning reforms in Minneapolis. Ask your council member how they plan to lead in the fight against exclusionary zoning.
As reported by Nick Magrino, this neat-o tool lets you offer feedback on the Minneapolis Comprehensive Plan:
extremely neat-o: new comp plan feedback tool lets you identify specific areas where you’d like to expand housing and commercial choices, and opportunities to improve access for walking, biking, and transit @Mpls2040https://t.co/fjMDActkyjpic.twitter.com/NHJvT3yQe8
After being defeated in 2013, Council Member Tuthill transitioned directly from working as an elected official into an administrative position with the city’s Community Planning and Economic Development (CPED) department. This allowed her to keep her old City Council email address, and become Meg Tuthill: Shadow Council Member.
One thing you learn when you request Meg Tuthill’s government emails is that she’s close with former colleague and current City Council Member Lisa Goodman (gives you a leg up when you’re looking for a job at CPED).
Here’s a conversation from January 2016, when Goodman wanted Tuthill to help her use the Healy Project to stop new multifamily housing in Goodman’s ward. Goodman wanted to “keep this out of the email” (a thing she said in an email) in order to avoid “litigation.”
Email related to multifamily housing proposal for 1900 Colfax.
The reason Goodman is seeking help from Tuthill’s friends at the Healy Project is because it’s the same tactic Tuthill used to fight apartments at 2320 Colfax during the latter part of her term on the council. There’s a reason Goodman is afraid of getting sued for organizing neighborhood opposition to a project she might have to vote on — she was sued for doing that very thing 10 years ago:
That pushed Hoyt over the edge. He filed his lawsuit on March 27, 2007.
Goodman hounded the Loring Park neighborhood group staff and board members to provide the group’s email list, so that she could send them the complaint. When they refused, she even threatened to cut off the group’s funding.
The court battle dragged on for two and a half years. Skolnick, Hoyt’s attorney, pursued a three-pronged legal strategy, essentially arguing that Goodman—and the city of Minneapolis—had deprived his client of fair and equal treatment.
The key question was whether Goodman had made up her mind before she voted on Parc Centrale. Unfortunately for Goodman, a flurry of email evidence showed she had taken a position, lobbied other council members, and even helped neighbors organize their opposition. She did all this weeks before she cast an official vote.
In another message, Tuthill consulted with Lisa Goodman via their government email accounts about Goodman’s rumored 2017 opponent, Will Bornstein. Bornstein is a former president of the Lowry Hill East Neighborhood Association, a group Tuthill has been involved with for five decades after helping found the organization in the early 1970s. (As it turns out, Will Bornstein did not run against Lisa Goodman in 2017.)
The Healy Project features prominently in Tuthill’s work life. In May 2015, Tuthill asks another city employee to help her edit a Healy Project tour invitation: “Would you please proof and make changes for me?”
Another thing you notice in these emails is that former Council Member Tuthill’s grudge against the current council member is keeping Tuthill from performing her job at the city. When Tuthill was asked in March 2016 to set up meetings with a number of city council members, Tuthill refuses to communicate with Lisa Bender’s office by responding: “Happy to do this. All but Bender. I’m sorry.” In another email Tuthill says, “Left messages for all the other [council members] except Bender.”
Other emails show a continued concern with Lisa Bender. In October 2015, Tuthill sent a message to the President and CEO of the Minneapolis Chamber of Commerce, praising his performance in a radio debate with Lisa Bender.
The subject of the MPR discussion was Mayor Hodges’ proposed Working Families Agenda. Tuthill writes, “I want to thank you for your calm, reasonable approach to this disastrous idea from Glidden, Bender and Hodges.”
Referring to paid sick time, Tuthill tells him, “I find this frightening. Acting as a union for the private sector is not the job of government.”
One last thing to note: Meg Tuthill lives up to my stereotype of extremely concerned residents, wielding her influence at CPED to demand access to the Star Tribune comment section.
This has been your update on the once and future leader of the Ward 10 government-in-exile. The post-election period could be a wild ride (just like four years ago) as the Wedge neighborhood’s Tuthill faction grapples with the idea of another four years in the wilderness. Just keep in mind that our bike lane battles aren’t always about bike lanes.
A meeting of the Whittier Alliance neighborhood organization was overrun on Monday by a group of Wedge residents eager to voice concerns over a proposed bikeway on 24th Street.
Staff from the city’s Public Works Department found it hard to even begin their presentation, as former Council Member Meg Tuthill — notorious “Nazi Lane” protester, accompanied by about a dozen energized loyalists from the Wedge — interrupted the introduction by snapping “first of all, who are you?”
Tuthill at left, participating in “Nazi Lane” protest.
Tuthill, who was defeated by Lisa Bender 64 percent to 30 percent in 2013, tag-teamed the meeting with another former Minneapolis elected official, Audrey Johnson. Johnson, a former school board member, is known for hurling insults (“Bendrification”) at Lisa Bender while giving public testimony at the City Planning Commission.
The Wedge contingent interrupted, sidetracked, and generally monopolized the discussion, in a way that reminded me of every poorly conducted Wedge neighborhood (LHENA) meeting I’ve been to over the years. Also in attendance was the Tuthill-endorsed city council candidate who lost to Lisa Bender 64 percent to 20 percent in last week’s city election. Yes, the meeting felt like an extension of election season.
Prior to the start of the Public Works presentation, State Rep Karen Clark conducted a (non-bike) Q&A that went on longer than expected. Audrey Johnson, seeming like she couldn’t wait to lay the hammer down on Lisa Bender, peppered Clark with questions about the city’s rental vacancy rate. Johnson told Clark, “we’re being lied to” by the city council, in order to justify the construction of more housing.
The primary concern expressed about a potential bikeway was parking. One person said the parking study was not valid because it happened in July when people are out of town. Another said the study wasn’t done at the right times of day. Another wanted the bikeway on 25th Street (an option that would remove more parking). Other attendees said they were unhappy that this would be the only public meeting (in reality, there was a meeting two months ago, and more meetings will happen next month).
Other concerns included, but nobody bikes, and sure, we all bike, but what about winter?
The Q&A, which turned into an unproductive bike-gripe session, was cut off so that the meeting could move to the next agenda item. As Public Works staff exited the room, they were pursued and pinned down for more questions in the lobby by Tuthill and company.
Meg and co have cornered public works staff in the lobby as they were leaving, as Whittier Alliance meeting continues in the other room. pic.twitter.com/7eENQORhU8
Left unheard were many other bike lane supporters and skeptics in the room, both groups deprived of a meaningful opportunity for feedback or understanding of the project.
It should be mentioned that the 24th Street bikeway has been a part of the city’s Bicycle Master Plan since 2011. Meg Tuthill served on the city council that adopted the bike plan seven years ago, and according to meeting minutes it was passed on a voice vote without her objection.
We’ve come to the end of a long, weird, grueling election season. I’ve had some days off. The team is newly invigorated.
We’re pleased that Tom Hoch wasted an unprecedented amount of his own money not becoming the next mayor of Minneapolis. My pumpkin, Mayor Betsy Hodges, is off to the compost bin. And the actual Betsy Hodges is probably planning a Hawaiian vacation. No more Barb, no more Blong — a striking change in leadership for north Minneapolis. John Quincy lost his seat in Ward 11, and on the bright side, I imagine he probably never had strong feelings either way about that.
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Finally, a sincere thanks to all our existing subscribers! You’re amazing. Anyone who says people won’t support hyperlocal news with real dollars is a liar. (And if Carol Becker is reading this, I want to make it clear that not a dollar of subscriber money was spent on my vanity write-in campaign for Board of Estimate and Taxation. Call off the lawyers, Carol.)
Minneapolis City Council c/o 2017 with Mayor-elect Frey (in crown)
Our municipal elections are over and the biggest story nobody can see happening is the race to become president of the Minneapolis City Council in 2018. Newly elected members won’t be sworn in for two months, but the behind the scenes discussions, jockeying and waffling is happening right now. Four years ago, in 2013/2014, we didn’t get the full story until late January, weeks after it was officially settled.
The process for electing the new council president is by majority vote of the 13 members of the new city council in January following an election. Once elected, the president has the authority to assign council members to the various committees, and appoint committee chairs. This fact alone makes it an extremely powerful position.
It’s the first big way our new council, with five new members, could change how City Hall operates over the next four years. In conversations with City Hall observers and insiders, two committees are often mentioned as particularly important centers of money and power: Community Development & Regulatory Services, chaired currently by Lisa Goodman; and Transportation and Public Works, chaired currently by Kevin Reich.
Another thing to watch for in January: committees can be newly created, combined, or split apart. A combining of committees happened at the beginning of the last council term in 2014.
Council Member Lisa Goodman won more power under the new structure. Goodman’s community development committee, which oversees the use of housing funds and steers economic development initiatives, now includes regulatory services.
To give a hypothetical example of the kind of thing that could happen in January, “Community Development” could again be split apart from “Regulatory Services” with new chairs for one or both committees.
For the sake of discussing how this could all end up, let’s begin by characterizing the existing council factions as “Team Barb” and “Team Not Barb” (both teams receiving their names courtesy of soon-to-be-former Council President Barb Johnson). Team Barb is the more conservative side of the council, with Team Not Barb on the more progressive side.
Team Barb (8)
Kevin Reich
Jacob Frey (Mayor-elect)
Barb Johnson (President, defeated)
Blong Yang (defeated)
Abdi Warsame
Lisa Goodman
John Quincy (defeated)
Linea Palmisano
Team Not Barb (5)
Cam Gordon
Elizabeth Glidden (retired)
Alondra Cano
Lisa Bender
Andrew Johnson
After last week’s election, the council’s more progressive “Team Not Barb” will become newly empowered in 2018, adding the five new members listed below (which makes for a nine member majority on the council of 13):
Steve Fletcher
Phillipe Cunningham
Jeremiah Ellison
Andrea Jenkins
Jeremy Schroeder
There’s no guarantee that this group holds together as a bloc exactly as listed above, but it’s likely that the new council president will emerge from among the incumbents in the new progressive majority. Of course there’s always the possibility for unconventional alliances, as when Alondra Cano disappointed many of her most ardent supporters by backing Jacob Frey for mayor.
Conventional wisdom says incumbent John Quincy is a goner in Ward 11. The Star Tribune would not have endorsed against him if they thought he had a chance of surviving this election. Which means Ward 11 will likely have a new city council member come 2018.
I’ve been observing Quincy’s challengers all year long, and I believe both would immediately become excellent council members, and clear upgrades over the incumbent.
What separates Erica Mauter from most other candidates is her willingness to say true things that are hard for people to hear. That’s a big reason why Ward 11 voters should make Mauter their number one choice on November 7.
Mauter has been the most bluntly honest about the need for reforms that chip away at the exclusionary zoning practices that keep small and midscale multi-family housing out of single-family neighborhoods (her support for triplexes and easing parking minimums earned her the rebuke of the Star Tribune editorial board). You also see this political courage when Mauter very directly makes the case for equity to the largely white residents of Ward 11.
One thing that all the council candidates I’m endorsing this year have in common: they are courageous and impressively wonky. Erica Mauter checks both boxes. I’ve seen it myself and I hear it from others. People I respect who work side by side with Mauter on policy issues tell me she knows her stuff and works hard, standing out from her colleagues. She has lived up to this praise when I’ve seen her in person at candidate forums.
Jeremy Schroeder is the other challenger in Ward 11. You should rank Schroeder second on your ballot. He is an excellent candidate and has run an impressive campaign.
This one goes without saying. I’ve been a Janne supporter from the beginning. But it’s important to make it clear one last time before election day: Ward 7 would be very lucky to have Janne Flisrand working for them.
You should go read Janne’s website for her policy positions. I won’t bother telling you how I’m on board for all of it. I’d rather focus on Janne’s personal qualities and her tremendous capacity to make those positions a reality: whether it’s on affordable housing; police reform; protecting the environment; and creating a transportation system that works for people, not just cars.
I know Janne pretty well. She’s someone I rely on to help me understand the way our city works, and all the ways it could work better. I’ve watched her campaign up close for the last year. I believed in Janne last November when she started; after watching her campaign for all this time, I am in awe of what she’s built and the people she surrounds herself with. She works freakishly hard every day; she lifts people up, supporting and inspiring them to do big things; and there’s no issue she can’t figure out or help you understand better.
Janne has no special affinity for politics for the sake of politics. She doesn’t want to be council member, she wants very much to do the job of council member.
As I say, Janne works incredibly hard. She pays attention to details. She’s prepared for everything. She has a stubborn, persistent refusal to leave anything to chance. This has a downside: the Janne campaign team is exhausted right now (though exhilarated). The upside: Janne is ready to get some stuff done as a council member. And she’s proven herself uniquely qualified to build the coalitions that make progress happen. Ward 7 shouldn’t pass up the chance to vote Janne as their first choice for city council.
