Jordan S. Kushner wrote: > [after] Jim Graham's letter to the editor claiming that "Kallenbach worked with the >City Council to create thousands of affordable housing units in Minneapolis, without >the > cost of new infrastructure," people have raised the question on and off this > list, what was Graham talking about? An obvious reaction was that Graham > was making it up becuase there have not been thousands of affordable housing > units created in Minneapolis within the past decade. > > After speaking with a few reliable sources, however, i think i have the > answer: Kallenbach has supported, or Graham has good reason to expect that > Kallenbach will support Graham's carriage house proposal.
Gregory Luce: This will likely be my last post on this particular "carriage house" issue, and I'll chalk it up to relative indifference to the issue as well as a perceived fear among folks in the neighborhood of getting on the wrong side of Ventura Village (or the DFL leadership for that matter). Or, perhaps my bark is weak or I'm just barking up the wrong tree with my concerns. But, here goes: The carriage house concept has been kicking around this part of Phillips for about three years, but it received renewed energy in late 1999 after residents had formed Ventura Village and put together a small team of folks to come up with a Master Plan for the north Phillips region. On that team was Jan and Jim Graham--Jan as the chair of Ventura Village and Jim as a board member. In late 1999 or early 2000, Ventura Village--through the City of Minneapolis-- received a $150,000 Livable Communities Demonstration Act grant through which Graham was paid $50,000.00 as a "project manager." This meant that he was in charge, not only of sheparding any zoning changes needed for the carriage houses, but also coming up with the conceptual plans as well as potential marketing, land planning, NRP funding, hiring other consultants to bring the carriage house grant proposal into fruition.. The details of the actual job of "project manager" have to this day remained sketchy, and others' (not mine) requests for documentation of the LCDA grant have apparently been rebuffed by the Office of Grants and Special Projects. [Aside: During the year 2000, Kenneth Brunsvold was the Supervisor of the City of Minneapolis Office of Grants and Special Projects and was apparently leaving that office. To extend his employment as the grants supervisor, the City contracted with Mr. Brunsvold for up to $50,000 pursuant to a 4-6 month contract beginning, I believe, in May. That contract was extended in November for an additional $25,000, to last until December 31, 2000. In September 2000, the City Council approved another LCDA grant proposal for Ventura Village in the requested amount of $2.1 million. Jim Graham and Kenneth Brunsvold, according to the local publication Finance and Commerce, are now the driving force behind National Housing Authority Corp., a corporation set up in January 2001 to build carriage houses.] By mid-2000, it was believed by some in the neighborhood that Jim Graham had plans, through his own company, of building carriage houses for himself and for others through Ventura Village's carriage house grant program, by then on its way to being an NRP funded program. In the year 2000, Graham continued as well to draw a $50,000 consulting fee or "salary" as the Ventura Village project manager. Despite rumors of Mr. Graham's interest in manufacturing carriage houses, he did not disclose such plans to Ventura Village members at any meetings concerning his company, other than perhaps friends who were also members. At many meetings, Mr. Graham made it a point that Ventura Village needed to build as many carriage houses as possible and as soon as possible. Mr. Graham often spoke of the need for economies of scale in order to build 300 to 1000 such units in North Phillips. By late 2000, the carriage house program subcommittee was formed, consisting of Jim and Jan Graham and three or four others from the VV executive committee or board. I pressed to be part of that committee and was allowed to attend meetings and participate to some extent, though mine was a lone voice on the subcommittee. In December 2000, Ventura Village preliminarily approved the carriage house grant program, through which successful applicants will receive a $10,000 per unit grant (up to $20,000), to be paid directly to the contractor that built the carriage house. Additional changes proposed by Mr. Graham and others continued to be made to the program through January and February 2001. Earlier this year, the zoning and planning commission and the city council heard the neighborhood's application for a special zoning district, "The North Phillips Overlay District," to allow the construction of a second residential structure on a lot that already had one residential structure (i.e., to allow the construction of carriage houses). Council member Niland had earlier introduced the amendment to the zoning ordinance on January 19, 2001. During this time, Jim Graham was a candidate for the sixth ward, along with Dean Kallenbach and at least four others. Jim Graham subsequently withdrew from the DFL nominating convention in late March/early April, and pledged strong support for Kallenbach. It is widely believed (though not confirmed) that Graham agreed to withdraw from the race, in return for which Council President Cherryhomes would provide support and/or lobbying for the needed zoning overlay. Kallenbach received the DFL endorsement, and the overlay passed both the commission and the city council the following month. Graham has ardently been campaigning for Kallenbach since and has been seen in the ward door-knocking with Kallenbach and, obviously, writing strong letters of support. I can only surmise, as Jordan Kushner does, that the "thousands of affordable housing units" are in reality the "hundreds" of carriage houses that Jim Graham proposes to build (and profit from) in North Phillips. I do not know of any program that has created "thousands of affordable housing units" in the city, particularly one that does not involve changes to infrastructure. I can only further surmise that Graham has simply (and likely knowingly through the Kallenbach campaign) given Kallenbach "credit" for working with the City Council to allegedly "create" these affordable housing units (though, as an aside, there is nothing in the current program that requires affordable rents). I respectfully asked the sixth ward candidates some time ago about their knowledge of the carriage house program, its perceived conflicts with respect to profiting the Grahams (again, Jan Graham is the chair of Ventura Village) and the appropriateness of neighborhood leaders/volunteers receiving an "inside" financial advantage in NRP programs that the neighborhood is developing (I think most anyone could agree that Jim Graham has a significant advantage in procuring carriage house contracts). To her credit, Barb Lickness was the only candidate who disclosed her knowledge of the situation. Kallenbach obviously did not respond to those earlier questions. Now, however, Jim Graham is apparently championing the achievements of Dean Kallenbach in not only "creating" these units but apparently working an inside angle at City Council to create these units (if Graham meant some other 1000+ units other than carriage houses, we have yet to hear that). I was, to say the least, extremely surprised to see such magnanimous credit given to Kallenbach, who had nothing to do with the carriage house program (which, for the record, has not created thousands of affordable housing units--none have been built and I'm aware of only 29 grants being awarded earlier this year). Such magnanimous credit raises a clear specific question: what politically will Graham receive in return for his support if Kallenbach is elected? Indeed, the Kallenbach campaign itself suffers from a perception that he is an "anointed" candidate for others, rather than a candidate for himself and the people of the ward. With knowledge now out in the open that Kallenbach allegedly "created" the "thousands" of units that Graham will likely profit from, my general question is also this: what other political debts for Kallenbach are out there and how much will they cost the sixth ward? That question may seem unfairly rhetorical, but it is a serious question that exists on account of a rather lightweight candidate who is receiving a lot of heavyweight support. Gregory Luce N. Phillips > _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
