[Mpls] A Forum at the Kaplan's
For anyone who feels strongly- either postivie or negative-- about my posts on the forum or other acitivites you have the opportunity to meet with me. Yes! Taking a page from Mayor Rybak's open forums, I too am having an open forum. I will be available starting at 6p.m. on New Year's Eve outside of 510 River Place. That is Sam and Sylvia Kaplan's place. Wanting to be responsive to feedback from critics--- I have been told that camp outs are passe (the exact words I believe were getting old). So, I have decided to practice the politician's art and transform my Camp'n Out at the Kaplans to A Forum at the Kaplans. I do not expect this year's forum to be well attended. The temperature being a deterrent and all. Plus, I am well aware that I am not all that important. Just one citizen voicing her opinion. And, since I am not a person charged with making policy or creating solutions for the City of Mpls, it probably would be more appropriate for people to contact our elected officials to give them a piece of your mind and demands solutions from them. There is no charge for attending my forumbut please bring coffee. Margaret Hastings-Mpls-Kingfield 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
Re: [Mpls] (no subject)
Thank you, Wizard, Barb and Andy for the holiday messages. And I'd like to extend my holiday greetings and best wishes to all on this list as well, especially to my sparring partners (you all know who you are), I've learned a lot from you and have the deepest respect for your convictions.---Peter Schmitz (CARAG) 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
[Mpls] What other Mayors are saying about homelessness
From Real Change newspaper: Issue dated from 12/24/03 to Jan.7, 2004 San Francisco Mayor-elect Gavin Newsom intends to make homelessness his administration's number-one priority, and his first moves will include creating a 10-year plan for ending chronic homelessness and going after tens of millions of new dollars in federal funding. Newsom told the San Francisco Chronicle that he plans to create within six months about 550 units of new supportive housing for troubled homeless people, and to make city agencies collect numbers on exactly how many homeless are getting which services, so he can better determine what the most pressing needs are. The centerpiece of any plan, he said, will be creating more housing with counseling services. The target population will be the chronically homeless - the 3,000 to 5,000 people who sleep outside most of the time. They are the worst off of the city's homeless population, estimated to be between 8,600 and 15,000. Although Boston's official 2003 census of 6,113 homeless adults and children is about the same as it was last year, city officials and homeless advocates warned last week that the cities hidden homeless'' pushes the actual tally well above 7,000 marking the largest increase in recent years. These numbers are a dramatic undercount of the true number of homeless in our city,'I Mayor Thomas M. Menino said at a news conference where he announced a cabinet-level homelessness council to coordinate shelter and housing. The numbers are lower because there are fewer places for homeless to go. Cuts have forced families to shelter on friends' couches, in cars, on the street and other places where we may not be able to count them 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
[Mpls] Fwd: forgot to sign post
---BeginMessage--- the what mayors are saying post was submitted by Margaret Hastings-Mpls-Kingfield ---End Message---
[Mpls] A Mill City Christmas, 1958...
December 24, 1958: This new typewriter is great! It's a portible so I can take it with me to school and everywhere. I just set it out on the old table here at granma's. open up the case put paper in and start typing! Oops. that lever sure is easy to bump by accident. Moms kinda sick so dad took her to the hospital so Gramma Gertrude is taking care of my baby brother. I hope mommie is OK, she's having another baby soon and she had a hard time with the two of us when we came. That leaves me with just uncle Woody and uncle Ricky to play with. Uncle Woody is good at making stuff and he can sorta fix anything, but uncle Ricky is more fun. There, finally got that lever set right. My baby brother and then grandma fall asleep, so Uncle Ricki suggests we go downtown and see the lights. Uncle Woody's car is broken down again, so we walk past the old brickyard to the bus barn and hop on one headed for downtown. Just about every bus is headed for downtown, so we just get on the one at the front of the line and in a few minutes we head south down Washingon Avenue. I liked the old streetcars better though- the buses stink and never seem to warm up. We get off at Hennipen and 4th Street and Ricky leads us down an alley and into a back door, down a narrow hallway, and into a room. Ricky flicks on a light and I see that the room is full of mirrors, gowns, and all kinds of strange stuff. I am only 8 but I read pretty good, and my eyes caught a stack of booklets titled it's been a pleasure, the Jewel Box Revue. Ricky hands me one and says to keep it hidden from my mom. I open it up and read it, it's the program for some type of female impersonator show. Then I look up and see that Ricky has become... a beautiful woman! I've seen men dress up like women on TV before, but they didn't really look like women and Ricky did. Ricky ordered me not to tell mom about this either, and signed some pretty pictures of her (oops) Ricki Raymond and gave them to me too. While we were talking uncle Woody had gone further up the hall to what I think is a bar, and a bunch of tall ladies and a short man came in. They talk about getting something to eat, but for some reason they don't wanna go outside. Finally they collect up about $10 and send me up to Great Northern Market for food. They're still open, and I barely manage the two huge bags for the two blocks back. The kitchen and the main room with it's tiny stage was empty so Ricki, the other tall women, and the short guy set to work preparing dinner and setting out a table with the best dishes in the place. They told me that they were in the cast of the Jewel Box Revue and the show was off for Christmas eve and Christmas day. They'd played here for weeks though, and though the show's mailing address was in New York City they spent so much time in Minneapolis it was like home to them. They told me the show started in Miami but moved out a few years later when the politicians started harrassing them and what they called the green and yellow clubs. Dottie and Storme, who were pretty darked skinned told me they felt safer in Minneapolis since the city had outlawed discrimination in 1948, but apparently the law didn't apply to the way they dressed up, which they called drag. These tall ladies cooked way better than my mom or grandmas and we ate food I'd never heard of before. Then I fell asleep in a booth while they exchanged presents and carried on. When I woke up they had left a bunch of little gifts for me in my typewriter case, stuff like signed pretty pictures of them performing and jewelry. They were getting restless, by now it looked like the whole cast was there and they wanted to go out. They decided to visit a bar down Nicollet just south of Downtown. We headed out the front of the small side bar that was open and grabbed my uncle Woody and a few hangers on as we walked up to Nicollet and overwhelmed the first bus going south. Fortunately they were still running weekday schedules and the bus was empty except for the driver. We got off a few blocks past Grant Street and I was instructed to stay between a couple large women in big skirts as we entered the bar. While the streets were empty the tiny bar was packed and I couldn't see over anyone anyway. The party continued past one in the morning, and then the police broke down the door... from a block over from Hawthorne Primary School, D. Sluyter
Re: [Mpls] McManus; Doing the right thing
Michael Atherton I think that it maybe impossible to find exactly the right candidate. How many bisexual, female, Black, Hispanic, Asian, and politically liberal police officers are there in the United States? To clarify a point I made in an earlier post. I argued that hiring a woman as a police chief would be something different because women approach the world from a different viewpoint then men. I didn't say that it was superior - just different. I have literally sat with this mayor at a table where he talked repeatedly about needing to think about thinking outside the box. My point was simply that by hiring someone that was different from all the people that were hired in the past, we might get different results. There are a lot of ways that people can be different - race and gender are two ways but surely not the only two ways. I do believe that if the debate about the police chief should be about a whole host of issues beyond these labels. Having said that, we do need to look at the cumulative effects of decisions. One of the values that this community values is diversity. It seems like a simple dream that someday, half of the important jobs in the city are held by women, given that women half of the people in this city. But remember that women have been an oppressed class for a long time in this country (we just got the vote in 1920) and we still see the effects of attitudes that women are second class citizens (women's pay is still on average 80% of men) And diversity doesn't happen just by itself. It has to be a conscious choice. Because on a micro level, decisions get made for a lot of factors beyond things like gender but taken together, they have a cumulative effect. We have a Mayor who hired the first female Public Works Director, which is quite amazing when you see the long line of pictures of previous Public Works Directors and know the number of women in public engineering. But he also hired a male City Coordinator, MCDA/Planning head, Health Department director (I think this position is still interim...correct me if I am wrong), and Chief Information Officer. Factors like race and gender should not be determining factors but neither should we be blind to the cumulative effects of decisions if we want a bureaucracy that is representative of our city. Carol Becker Longfellow 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
RE: [Mpls] What other Mayors are saying about homelessness
Unfortunately the Bush Administration has been less than friendly to programs that support homeless individuals. For example, the federal government assigned NO MONEY to the state of Minnesota this year for programs that provide basic drop-in centers for homeless and runaway youth. The result of which was that none of the seven basic drop in center programs for runaway and homeless youth across the state of Minnesota received renewal funding this year. Project OffStreets, the largest basic needs drop-in center program for youth in Minnesota, lost nearly half a million dollars in federal funding. The fun part of this is that the federal government (specifically the Administration for Childrn and Families, which stewards the Basic Needs Drop In Center Grant Program) did not inform the applicant agencies that no money was assigned to Minnesota this year. There is some hope that this will change as the ACF has announced that there will be a slight increase (about $4 million) in the Basic Center fund beginning next year. The only organization that received basic needs money in Minnesota this year was the Greater Twin Cities Council of Churches (I believe that is the name...). The reason for that is there was specific money for basic needs centers set aside in a fund only for faith based organization. My my my I guess that just goes to prove that there are very real consequences for social service agencies from overt federal policies that favor faith-based programs over secular agencies with long, proven track records of serving vulnerable populations. Anyone else outraged? I know I am, and I'm Christian. Have a very Merry Christmas with the knowledge that those of us with homes and families are indeed blessed. Yours, Brandon Lacy Campos Powderhorn Park _ Expand your wine savvy and get some great new recipes at MSN Wine. http://wine.msn.com 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
[Mpls] Kola Project/Help the first Americans
Editorial: Kola Project/Help the first Americans Published December 25, 2003 The lights have gone out at the Kola Project off of East Franklin Avenue -- and not just because it's Christmas. These days, the drop-in center for American Indian alcoholics is dark much of the time. Volunteers still stop by to open the doors for a few hours a day, and the doctor who caters to hard-up clients still comes by to treat the sickest of the sick. But the program is a shadow of what it used to be -- for a reason you can guess. Several years back, a few generous souls started wandering Franklin Avenue looking for the Native American alcoholics who dwell there -- bringing them food and clothing and medical care. They named their endeavor Kola -- after a Lakota word meaning friend -- and ultimately opened a drop-in center to serve Indian chronic inebriates. Their goal wasn't to get these longtime alcoholics to straighten up completely: For people who've lived the roughest of lives, that's probably aiming too high. Alcoholism among Native Americans, after all, is largely distinct from chemical dependency among non-natives: Ample research suggests that many Indians carry a genetic variation that dramatically increases their sensitivity to alcohol, increases their risk for lifelong addiction and makes sobriety harder to sustain. http://www.startribune.com/stories/1519/4286258.html Posted by Shawn Lewis, Field Neighborhood -- ___ Sign-up for Ads Free at Mail.com http://promo.mail.com/adsfreejump.htm 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
Re: [Mpls] (no subject)
Happy Hanachrismanza all!!! Hope you Pagans had a great solstice! Om to our new neighbors from the East. And a large Bah-Humbug to anyone writing about politics today. Jon Gorder Loring Park
[Mpls] Forwarding a post from Lydia Howell re: homelessness
Hi, Lydia Howell requested I reformat and send her post which she could not get on the forum due to the formating issue. Margaret Hastings-Mpls See her post below: Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2003 11:34:46 -0600 From: Lydia Howell [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Much Homelessness CREATED by Public Policies I lived in Minneapolis 15 years, have been covering housing/homelessness issues for over 4 years and persoanlly KNOW a number of people (most of them EMPLOYED) who've been homeless. If our elected representatives--like the Mayor--are supposed to serve the public, why is it that so many of their positions and policies ONLY serve the most economic PRIVILEDGED members of the public? This is not just a legitamate question. but, in an alleged democracy a CRUCIAL one. What I've witnessed first hand is this: 1. Older truly AFFORDABLE housing stock has been SYSTEMATICALLY DESTROYED since the mid-1980s as cost of housing RISES. 2.The vacant lots created are then given to big developers who build housing at $200.000 to as much as almost $1million(depending on developemnt). Homeless people sure can't besides much of the working class NOT afford this housing! Look at the signs in front of such developments and you see how many PUBLIC(tax payers' money) go into these developments, in effect SUBSIDIZING housing for those WITH MONEY--and leaving those WITHOUT money (often literally) in the cold. 3.Demonizing poor and homeless people has worked very very well as DISTRACTION from the UPward/REVERSERobin Hood of giveaways to the wealthy corporations since Reagan years. It's classic scapegoating that ought to be seen through by now. 4.Here's a reality-check on homeless folks:40+% are EMPLOYED--they just can't FIND houding threy can afford.Reality-check:a ONE-room efficiency averages $450 a month--IF you can FIND it;a 1-bd rm is $625 a month. Imagaine being a $5.50-6.00 an hour worker trying to pay for such hosuing! Do the people who serve you at McDonald's, ring you up at Rainbow or Target, take care of your kids or elderly parent DESERVE A PLACE TO LIVE? In wartime, we're told to support the troops: as many as HALF the homeless men are vets. What about the folks who are mentally itll? Reagan promised community-based programs when closig most stae mental hospitals--but, those alternatives never happened! Many of the women w/children who are homeless are escapoing deomstic violence--shelters for battered women have NEVER had enough beds to meet the need they have ALL been CUT in Pawlenty's budget. HALF the runaway girls are escaping sexual abuse at hands of fathers, step-fathers, mother's boyfriend--but, for the 800 (that we know of) homeless youth in TC, there are LESS THAN 100 beds--that's family values for you! When we're UNwilling to deal w/these other issues(menatl health, domnestic violence, child abuse), that also creates homelessness. 5.WHY are middle-class folks OUTRAGED by putting supportive housing or shelters or public low-income housing in their neighborhoods--yet NOT outraged by the HUGE giveaways of their taxes to Target($60-100 million for their new corp hq/store downtown) or for by the river housing for the rich($300,300-900,00EACH condo!). Land, infrastructure, loans are given to Big Corporations who almost always do NOT KEEP THEIR END OF THE BARGAIUN(remember Northwest Airlines getting $350,000 million the good-paying jobs they were going to create? They canceld airplane maintenance ctr--relocated to CHINA-- instead creating less than 1$8 or $9 an hour reservation jobs!)Never paid back loan either. WHY aren't folks FURIOUS at the continued stadium debate? How can it be justified to spend PUBLIC money for this when Carl Pohlad has more $$$than he could spend in many lifetimes--meanwhile, schools are cut, healthcare cut, parks cut, arts cut--anything for the MAJORITY is cut, while the wealthy keep picking the pockets of the rest of us! and instead of demanding more common good policies, too many folks turn their anger on the poor and homeless. The work that Margaret Hastings continues to do is not only morally RIGHT, it's the BEST of what REAL democracy looks like. The most basic decency (in even middle class folks) OUGHT to mean supporting the solutions that exist to end homelessness. As Hastings observes:even in the boom times, Sayles-Belton RTEFUSED toaddress the issue in fact, did the policies I've already pointed out that CREATED MORE HOMELESSNESS. Lydia Howell, Seward 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]
Re: [Mpls] Forwarding a post from Lydia Howell re: homelessness
Lydia Howell wrote, amongst other things: 4.Here's a reality-check on homeless folks:40+% are EMPLOYED--they just can't FIND houding threy can afford.Reality-check:a ONE-room efficiency averages $450 a month--IF you can FIND it;a 1-bd rm is $625 a month. Imagaine being a $5.50-6.00 an hour worker trying to pay for such hosuing! Mark Anderson replies: I think the obvious answer to this is to again allow rooming/boarding houses in Mpls. The rule against having a certain number of unrelated persons in one house is one of those laws written for a town with no lower class. Allowing a bunch of unrelated folks to share a house would result in most of that 40% being able to afford to pay their own way, which would free up a bunch of the shelters. Problem solved, with no public money spent! And at the same time it gives back pride to poor people because they can survive on their own. Admittedly, it would probably take a few years after the law was repealed for enough of the shared houses to reach the market. But we should be trying to solve long term problems as well as short term ones. Mark V Anderson Bancroft 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
