This is a great list dicussion to be having on Independence Day!
George Garnett, a former NRP Policy Board member and an old hand in
these matters posts elsewhere:
"RE: Is a Referendum the Best Alternative?
It seems to me that a few points need to be made. First, the City
Council has the power to implement a levy without a referendum. Second,
it is very possible that a referendum could lose at the polls in
November. I think there are a lot more people who would rather have
lower property taxes, and the NRP and/or affordable housing does not
enjoy the same base of support as for instance schools do. An
unsuccessful referendum effort could do tremendous damage to any other
effort to fund neighborhood work in Minneapolis by demonstrating
weakness. Has anyone considered a more direct lobbying campaign focused
at getting seven votes on the council and the mayor to support a levy
NOW while the city is working on its budget?
"I would also point out that St. Paul funds much of its community
development activity through a half cent sales tax which was approved by
the legislature. The legislature and the governor might be more
comfortable with a sales tax which would sunset in 10 years versus the
TIF system where it seemed that TIF districts never died, they just got
extended."
And I reply:
"Getting seven councilmember votes plus the support of the mayor as an
alternative to the referendum levy seems less cumbersome, but one must
remember the intense lobbying effort that went into the episode
surrounding the report of the Affordable Housing Task Force.
"A full year's work by that body was sharply compromised by the
intervention of Mayor Sharon Sayles Belton and a last-minute
substitution of language supported by Council President Cherryhomes and
Council members Biernat, Campbell, Colvin Roy, Johnson, Minn (now Lane),
and Thurber that moved the definition of affordable housing from the 30%
of Metro Median Income (MMI) standard to a 50% standard that now permits
the claim of "affordability" to be used when in fact many thousands,
perhaps many tens of thousands of Minneapolis' households fall far short
of that revised and conveniently optimistic standard. We will have firm
numbers when the 2000 Census reports income later this year. My point is
that this mayor and this seven-member majority contributed knowingly and
I believe callously to the gravity of our housing crisis despite the
advice of a committed and knowledgeable body of stakeholders and senior
agency staff. To those who would entrust the entire NRP program to the
good will of the incumbent leadership, I say "caveat emptor".
"This leadership's track record was soiled by disingenuous and
irresponsible manipulation of the good faith effort of the affordable
housing task force and I am convinced that subsequent preferences shown
to corporate interests signal a likely future mission drift away from
"bottom-up" development unless the body politic is very firm indeed
about preferred legislative intent."
List member Ann Berget, herself a candidate for city council in the
Tenth Ward, warns about the possibility of unintended consequences. May
I suggest that referenced intended consequences may reliably ensue if
the incumbent mayor is sent packing and one additional new face beyond
that of Gary Schiff appears in the list above. A successful NRP
referendum vote will both buoy the hopes of such a replacement
leadership aspirant majority and send a coherent and significant message
back to the Legislature. There may be some "unintended consequences" for
some of those worthies who voted to denigrate our widely acclaimed
development model as municipal age and population shift in the suburban
rings tread inevitably down the paths forged by our older and larger and
hopefully wiser jurisdiction.
Or a conservative mayor can sweep into office on the "tax cut ueber
alles" ticket that has so mesmerized state and federal entities and we
can have this discussion later with much more unmanageable municipal
challenges set in corporate cement.
Fred Markus Horn Terrace Ward Ten
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