BRIEFS July 7, 2022

County Converting Aqua Motel
to Affordable Housing
The Hennepin County Board has approved purchasing and rehabilitating the Aqua Motel at 5719 Lyndale Avenue South to provide permanent single room occupancy (or rooming house) housing using federal COVID relief funds. After necessary repairs are completed, the county will contract another agency to lease, operate and manage the property as low-income housing. The former motel will provide 36 units of housing, most likely for single adults. This is part of the largest investment in affordable housing the county has likely ever made. On June 2, the board approved spending more than $27 million help preserve or build 1,900 affordable housing units.

Aug. 9 Primary Election
On Aug. 9, there will be a primary election in Minnesota. At the city level both the Republican and Democratic Farmer Labor (DFL) parties will have primaries in the 5th congressional district race. There will also be primary elections in the nonpartisan Hennepin County Attorney and Sheriff races that will determine which two candidates will be on the ballot in the November general elections, as well as for the Minneapolis School Board Member at-large and District 5 races. Because more than one candidate has filed with the DFL for Senate Districts 62 and 63 as well as for House District 62A, there will be DFL primary elections held for those southside races as well. On Aug. 9, State Senator Omar Fateh is being challenged by union organizer Shaun Laden in 62. State Representative Aisha Gomez is being challenged in the primary by Osman Ahmed, who also ran unsuccessfully for the same seat in the primary in 2018. State Senator Zaynab Mohamed is being challenged by Todd C. Scott. You can vote early June 24-Aug. 8. Find more information at www.sos.state.mn.us/elections-voting/

City Updating Climate Action Plan
The city of Minneapolis, through its Sustainability Office, launched a community engagement process to inform an update to its Climate Action Plan that was approved in 2013. That plan set goals and identified strategies to eliminate carbon emissions, reduce pollution and improve the environment. The update will likely include significant changes for a renamed plan, that is currently being called the Climate Equity Plan. Engagement will include tabling at events this summer, convening listening sessions, and establishing a steering committee and work groups. You can learn more and take a survey by visiting https://www2.minneapolismn.gov/government/programs-initiatives/climate-equity/

Human Rights Investigation Subcommittee
The city council has established a new Pattern & Practice Investigations Subcommittee to review and engage in the Minnesota Department of Human Rights investigation into the city. On June 14, they met for this first time and received a presentation from the Minnesota Department of Human Rights and their investigation that found that the city of Minneapolis and Minneapolis Police Department has engaged in a pattern and practices of race discrimination in violation of the Minnesota Human Rights Act. The presentation said, “Without fundamental organizational cultural change, reforming MPD’s policies, procedures, and trainings will be meaningless.” It called for a consent decree that lays out specific changes the city and MPD will be required to make, is issued by a judge, is a legally binding agreement that the parties are required by law to follow with timelines for prioritization and accountability, uses an independent oversight team to hold the parties accountable, and lives on regardless of election cycles.