Paul Weir said: > I just heard that a Somali businessman who is the spokesperson for > other Somali businessmen at the Village Market in Ventura Village was > forcibly evicted from his store this afternoon. Apparently, many of > these business owners are now demonstrating in the street, and > television crews from two stations are present. Does anybody in south > Minneapolis know anything about this? > > Paul Weir > Phillips
I know something about this. I was at the Village Market suuq this afternoon with Omar Jamal, from the Somali Justice Center, and some Somali elders. I received a call from Jim Graham this afternoon about 1pm. Jim suggested to me that there was, perhaps, an illegal eviction going on. I went there almost immediately. Upon arriving I found the Mpls. Police there and a Hennepin County Sheriff's notice placed on the wall by the door of the business in question and a number of Somali merchants wondering what was going on. The police had in their possession a document from the Sheriff that trespassed the evicted merchant from the building. There was a lot of "he said she said" stuff going on, so it was somewhat hard to sort out. The stories that I heard from the evicted merchant, from the owners of the mall, and from Jim Graham were not all identical and so my observations and conclusions about what happened (or is still happening) may or may not be the full picture. According to the owners of the suuq, the merchant in question has been a tenant in the Suuq only about 3 months. Allegedly he is being evicted for violating his lease by subletting his space to others and for not carrying required insurance. Before you accept that as fact and spread it around, you might want to confirm it with the owners and/or get independent verification. As to whether or not the merchant is a spokesperson for the other merchants; I saw no evidence of that nor did anyone ever suggest that to me, perhaps Jim Graham has some inside information about that. What is clear is that the Sheriff's office is involved in the process of the eviction. There seems to be a difference of opinion about whether or not the merchant was given proper and adequate time to remove his possessions. There also seems to be a difference of opinion about whether or not the merchant was given proper service of the eviction notice. The suuq owners claim to have photographed all of the merchandise before they began to box it up for storage. I have no reason to disbelieve that, although I did not ask for nor did I see the photographs. From the little I know about evictions and Unlawful Detainers, part of the process requires the landlord to put the evicted tenant's possessions into secure storage for sixty days. When I arrived at the suuq, somewhere between 1pm and 2pm, I found the employees of the suuq owner inside the merchant's stall boxing up the merchant's possession. At my suggestion, the suuq owners opened the doors to the space to allow Jim Graham and others from the Ventura Village Neighborhood Organization to photograph the scene and to photograph the people who were actually doing the work of boxing up the merchandise. Omar Jamal, some Somali elders, the police and I spent the next couple of hours speaking with the suuq owners and other merchants about what was going on and about how the eviction process works. When I left, sometime after 4pm, things were calm, there were no TV cameras nor demonstrations going on. Your post is the first that I heard of TV cameras and demonstrations. If there were improprieties or violations of the law going on, that is to be sorted out in court on Tuesday. Right now, this is, as the police said to me, "a civil matter." A friend, John Kolstad, was at my home when Jim Graham first called me. John accompanied me to the Village Market and remained there the whole time I was there and left with me. He may have seen or heard other things that I did not. [some background information: The Village Market is a suuq (marketplace) located at East 24th Street and 10th Ave S. in the Ventura Village Neighborhood of the Phillips Community. The suuq stalls are leased to merchants, of whom about 95% are Somali. The suuq serves as a defector community center for the Somali Community. In addition to various merchants and service providers, the suuq also houses a restaurant and at least one coffee house.] Dean Zimmermann Minneapolis City Council Member/Ward 6 612-673-2206, Office 612-724-3888, Home [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Peace/Shalom/Salaam REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
