>In fact, Minneapolis has nothing tangible to offer me. I only go inside the Minneapolis city limits a few times per year and I easily could do without that. Brutal >statements I know, but this is true for the vaste majority of Minnesota residents outside of Minneapolis.You may not like to hear this, but the world for most >citizens of this state does not revolve around Minneapolis. They do not go to Minneapolis, they go to "The Cities".
Minneapolis is not important simply because I live here. It is important because without it, "The Cities" would not exist. Period. Why do you think the suburbs exist? Why is 394 heading into downtown a parking lot every morning? Why is 94 westbound into downtown a parking lot every morning? Why is 35W southbound heading into downtown a parking lot every morning? Why is 35W northbound heading into downtown a parking lot every morning? The world revolves around Minneapolis for people more than they perhaps realize. All those people who live in the 'burbs and are doing "just fine" are heading into Minneapolis for their jobs. They should be just as concerned about what happens in this city as anybody else. All those people heading into downtown Minneapolis on any given weekday are only part of what is going on there. Who is cleaning the IDS Center? Who is answering phones at Wells Fargo? Who is manning the counters at all the restaurants downtown? These people don't drive into downtown from their suburban and exurban houses. They take the bus. These are the workers that do the jobs that need to be done, there are a lot of them, and they rely on the bus. If they can't work, that's a problem. Employers aren't going to stick around if they can't find workers to do the work that needs to be done, the work that doesn't pay very well, the work that won't be taken by suburbanites. >It is time for you, the citizens of Minneapolis, to figure out how to pay for that mass transportation system you so dearly want. I sincerely wish you the best of luck. Too many people seem to think like this: that the only things that concern them happen in the suburban donut in Minnesota. Nothing that happens in the urban core matters; nothing that happens in rural Minnesota matters. It is exactly what the Taxpayers League believes in: if it doesn't directly impact ME, it doesn't matter. If I don't ride the bus, it isn't important and I don't want to pay for it. If my kid speaks English fine, ESL classes are unimportant and I don't want to pay for it. Et cetera. But we are not so separated from others that this is the truth. If people who are on the lower and middle end of the scale don't have transit options, they will lose their jobs. They will lost their health insurance. They will lose their educational opportunities. We will be paying for unemployment, for their health care when they use the Emergency Room as preventative care, for jails when they turn to crime. We will be paying for lost productivity because they can't better themselves. We pay either now or later, it's your choice. The only difference is that we will pay far more in terms of opportunity cost if we wait. There is no way to keep what happens in Minneapolis from affecting the entire state, no matter how much people want to think. Frankly, I don't understand the short-sightedness that is so prevalent today. It seems pretty obvious to me: the economy is a pyramid, with the few at the top on top of larger base of less-skilled labor at the bottom. Erase that base, and the whole thing will come crashing down. Not right away, but eventually. Businesses can't survive if they can't hire anybody to take out the trash. It's expensive to provide parking for every single employee. It's a waste of resources. For some reason, though, a lot of people are forgetting this. They think that the unseen machinery that powers this region will continue to run flawlessly even when you start dismantling it. A wheel bearing in a car may not be nearly as complicated or valuable as the V8 engine under the hood, but take away those cheap bearings and see how far you go. If we don't start acting as a community to lift everybody up, we are going to lose our status as a top metropolitan area and we will become mediocre. It's too bad so many people in Minnesota these days want this to happen, because they no longer want to pay for what used to make our state better. ________________________________________________ Do you Gonzo?! http://www.angelfire.com/mn/freakpower === Nathan Hunstad CARAG Minneapolis, MN (651) 489-9107 -- Home PGP DH/DSS public key -- http://www.angelfire.com/mn/freakpower/nhpubkey.txt 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
