I think Ron is onto something. The partisan nature of our Minneapolis
"non-partisan" elections has delivered our governance into the hands of
a small number of people who have the time, interest and motivation to
participate in the (mind-boggling) number of fund-raisings, screenings,
endorsements, and machinations (making sure convention rules and
officers favor our person) that are involved--EIGHT MONTH OUT!!!
The average citizen who comes out to vote on Nov 6 is participating in a
charade. Most of the seats are signed, sealed and delivered by then.
The money, the aura of "serious candidate", the laundry list of
prestigious and necessary endorsements have already been parcelled out
to the people for whom this activity is part of their careers (public
employment, non-profits getting grants, consultants and lobbyists?),
know how to play the game behind the game, and who have rallied the
support of the 400 (or 800 or whatever small number), and made the
commitments to the various special interests. (And the interests ain't
just big money developers!)
Ron's right that the civic ideal is public minded, objective citizens
sitting down to discern what is in the public interest and charting the
appropriate path for our city into the future. It doesn't have to be
about Republican or Democrat or Green or Progressive Minnesota or
Libertarian. We each have a piece of the vision and should be working
together as fellow citizens to figure out what is best for all of
us--including the overwhelming majority of Minneapolitians who don't or
won't or can't spend the time and money and emotion to participate as
early and as often as all the players on this reflector can.
But we live in an ideological age, state and city, and activist people
are more interested in your ideological box and your litmus test
commitments--even if they have at most secondary or teriary impact on
our city. This weekend I heard an activist say that maybe this was a
one party town, and having a few Republicans on some of our governing
bodies might be helpful--BUT, he said, I COULD NEVER VOTE FOR ONE.
Wonder how they (or we Independence's, or Greens who run as Greens, will
ever get our perspectives into the halls of power with that sort of
one-dimensional prejudice and closed-mindedness? (This is why I ran in
1998 supporting proportional representation and instant runoff voting.
To encourage an procedural reform that would open the system up so all
perspectives are represented.)
Memo to everyone--if you want change, vote for change.
I'm convinced that this city is in serious financial straits. Evidence
good DFLer's Wally Swan's warning letter about the impact of the library
referendum on the city's credit rating. I know Wally and know that
things have to be serious for him to say what he did. Evidence the close
7-6 vote on the Mayor's budget. The SW Journal enumerated the concerns
(1/15)--infrastructure gap (we were talking about that in 1997, and now
John Moir is gone and the mayor may want the Public Works Director--who
with Moir wrote the alarm bell report--gone too); internal services fund
deficit; and additional commitments such as the Kondirator legal
settlement.
Guess many of you got your new property valuations yesterday. The
powers that be don't have to raise taxes to raise taxes.
I know progressives want more money for people. Some of us mossbacks
(many of whom are former Democrats) want to help people too. We just
don't think money around here is being spent efficiently or
effectively.
Ron is looking for a pragmatic approach to running government. Focusing
on the real CITY problems(not foreign affairs and ideology), finding
good, fair minded people, and identifying reasonable solutions that can
be win-win. I'd love to see a slate across the city that committed to a
platform of responsibility, reform and concern--without reference to a
national political party.
BTW, a good start would be to not allow candidates in the future to put
a party or ideological affiliation on the ballot as we do now.
Alan Shilepsky
Downtown
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