Okay, waitaminute, first the Smoking Ban is tantamount to Slavery and ethnic cleansing of Native Americans, and now Peter McLaughlin is an unsung hero? C'mon Jim, let's be real here. Heck, if that's the case, the Empowerment Zone also put significant funding into Many Rivers (both phases) and other projects down in the Phillips Community, does that make every Boardmember an unsung hero or just RT Rybak because he's co-chair and running for Mayor like Peter. I like Peter, when I lived in Stevens Square he was my commissioner, and he was always a great commissioner and came to our events, but he's hardly unsung. If he is, then I guess RT is unsung for picking and garnering the support for confirmation of probably the greatest Police Chief this City has ever seen, Bill McManus, and for such other greats leaders in the city as Jayne Khalifa, head of the Civil Rights Department and Bonnie Bleskachek, the new Fire Chief. If he's unsung then I guess RT and our Northside Council Members (Barb Johnson, Natalie Johnson-Lee and Don Samuels) are unsung for the resources and development they're bringing to North Minneapolis through the Northside Partnership like the $40M Northside Home Fund and the Probation House in Jordan. These people aren't unsung, they're doing their job. And when they go over and above the call of duty, then they're doing their job exceptionally well, but it's their job to find resources, build partnerships, to "change the course of mighty rivers". How well they do their job should be the deciding factor for whether they keep their job or get promoted, but pushing hard for projects and finding resources is what they're supposed to do. The question is how well they do it. If you want to put a plug in for your candidate, then do that, but don't couch it in this "unsung hero" category when it's their job. You want to know who's unsung Jim? It's people like you, whom a lot of people don't know how much you did to get Ventura Village to come to fruition. It's people like Booker Hodges, whom I often don't agree with, but who has the courage to speak his mind and bring awareness to issues. It's the staff of the neighborhood organizations like Julie Filapek, Suzi Kim Scott and Roberta Englund who put in countless hours for the needs of the neighborhoods. Did you know that Roberta, with a little help from Jordan, got a congressional appropriation, thanks to Martin Sabo, in the amount of $975K which is being leveraged to greater amounts and will do programming for youth across the Northside next year? That's unsung. All the people who do incredible work and never get any real thanks or acknowledgement for it, that's unsung. Let's honor that and give them the much needed credit, we can leave the campaigning for the "Who's the best candidate" posts. Let's talk about the often unnoticed people who make sure that our neighborhoods work, that the City works, and help their community but don't get the praise for it. Jonathan Palmer Victory In a message dated 12/31/2004 9:07:57 AM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Let us get off tobacco and get back to the "unsung heroes" for the MPLS year.
A year ago American Indian Community Development Corporation (AICDC) received exclusive development rights to several lots in the Ventura Village Neighborhood of Minneapolis. The purpose of this assignment of rights was to develop affordable homeownership opportunities for poor American Indian families. Unfortunately, one area that AICDC thought it had rights to did not belong to Minneapolis, but had been tax forfeited to Hennepin County and never transferred to Minneapolis. This property was to be auctioned unbeknown to either AICDC or apparently Minneapolis CPED. With only two days notice Peter McLaughlin was able to get the support of Commissioners Gail Dorfman and others to pull the land from the auction and transfer the property (at auction price) through Minneapolis to AICDC for construction of those affordable homes. That project is part of bringing approximately 3 million dollars of funding from the Mille Lacs Band to create affordable home ownership in Minneapolis and the Ventura Village Neighborhood. The homeownership project also led to Mille Lacs bringing several additional millions of dollars of investment for Franklin Avenue. It is amazing the media coverage and "singing" that takes place around much smaller efforts of non-private dollars, isn't it? But Peter McLaughlin deserves to be a little less "unsung" about his efforts on behalf of Minneapolis, so here is little singing of his praise. This is not too different from the "unsung" part that Peter McLaughlin played in the first major development built as part of the Franklin Avenue resurrection. Peter coaxed MCDA to give the bonding that allowed Many Rivers East to be built, and to stop other "less than supportive efforts" by others to stop additional funding. I remember well the 10:30 at night call I received from Peter saying he had worked it out and the bonding would be forthcoming. I did not fully believe him at the time, thinking he was like many politicians who tell you of their efforts but do little in reality. I was mistaken, Peter McLaughlin's commitments had real substance, they were not fluff. I was glad to "yell" down thanks to Peter at the State Democratic Convention when word came that the bonding had come through. That was probably the only "singing" Peter ever received on that effort of his. Others helped of course, and rightfully took credit when the building was finally built, but without his direct "unsung" effort it would not have happened. The same is true of the Detox and many other things that have occured in our City. Hard work behind the scenes to just "get it done". We need the dreams and to weave the bright pretty picture to lead people, but we also need a little hard work and action to get us to those dreams. In the next year I am sure Peter will not be "unsung" for long, but it was those "unsung" things in the past years that might have made him a "hero" for much of South Minneapolis. Just quietly, and effectively, working to improve the lives of Minneapolis residents. I am sure in the next year there will be a great deal of fluff thrown around by candidates for Council and Mayor, but we should remember that for one at least there was a foundation of substance that was built on hard "unsung" work, and not just empty promised fluff. Lets hear from other posters about their "unsung heroes" and "promise keepers". Jim Graham, Ventura Village Neighborhood, Phillips Community, Sixth Ward of Minneapolis 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
