I would like to address an issue that I believe to be fairly important;
lack of a clean city. It is especially apparent at this moment given
all of the trash, sand, mud etc. that has been uncovered with the spring
thaw, but it is not a new issue.
Clean and tidy living quarters have always been a sticking point for me,
being rather "anal retentive", and I do not feel that the City of
Minneapolis or its citizens as a whole have done a very good job at
keeping it as such. I think that when we are surrounded by clean and
well kept surroundings that we tend to keep them that way and generally
act better. The reverse is also true in that when our surroundings are
shabby, dirty and run down that people tend not to care as much and thus
do not bother showing pride in their surroundings which many times leads
to less-than-desireable effects.
This isn't to say that all of Minneapolis looks like a rat-hole, but I
believe that we can all think of many places around Minneapolis that
have trash on the streets and boulevards and unkempt yards and
businesses. This trash issue is both a cause and a symptom of larger
issues such as lack of civic and public pride, crime, hopelessness, a
movement away from personal and community responsibility and a lack of
personal and public leadership.
Unfortunately, we are all guilty of this to a certain extent. It would
be easy to point fingers at certain groups or officials and say that
"they" are the ones responsible, but the reality is that we all play an
important role in the communities we live in and how we form and
maintain our communities.
I would like to see a real effort both by city officials and the
Minneapolis public to clean up our city and keep it that way. It may
seem difficult at times but if each of us would pick up around our homes
and neighborhoods and the city would make an on-going and concerted
effort to clean the streets, enforce our city trash ordinances and
provide a good example for its citizens, I believe we could have a very
positive effect on our wonderful city in a very short time. So let's
give it a real effort and I am sure we could reduce certain crime and
livability issues to a noticeable extent.
And finally, the best part about cleaning up the city is that we can all
take part in and pride and responsibility for its success. It's a
win-win situation for everyone. No one is excluded and everyone
benefits.
I am interested to see what others think and feel about this.
Respectfully,
Matthew Dufresne
Central Neighborhood
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