Minneapolis

Minneapolis Teachers And Support Professionals Strike Enters Week Two

March 15, 2022 Fight Back News. Resist! Labor Unions, Minneapolis, Strike, Teachers

Minneapolis MN - Teachers and education support professionals at Minneapolis Public Schools began a strike on March 8, shutting down the Minneapolis school system. Today, March 14, the strike continues as the schools remain closed for a second week. Over the weekend a series of events were held by the striking educators; there we also several actions called by community and labor supporters in the area. On Saturday, March 12, a car caravan called by the Minnesota Immigrants’ Rights Committee (MIRAC) wound its way through Minneapolis streets to end at the Davis Center where the Minneapolis Public Schools office is located. The car caravan began on Lake Street in a predominantly Latino working-class neighborhood of South Minneapolis.

Strike Day Four: Teachers And Education Assistants Holding Strong

March 12, 2022 Fight Back News. Resist! Education, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Protests, Worker Rights and Jobs

Minneapolis, MN – The Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT) strike entered its fourth day on Thursday March 11 as Minneapolis Public Schools remained closed. Picket lines continued to have large crowds with many schools reporting 100% turnout to their picket lines every day of the strike, and the others reporting nearly all educators on their lines. Each day of the strike so far has featured morning pickets at schools starting at 7:30 a.m. and a large unity action happening mid-day or early afternoon. On Tuesday at noon a large rally of around 7000 educators and supporters was held at the Davis Center where the Minneapolis Public Schools office is housed. On Wednesday the unity rally was at the Minnesota State Capitol and again several thousand showed up to hear speeches shouted from the stage to large chants from the giant crowd.

Minneapolis Teachers’ Strike Is A Struggle For Black Lives

March 12, 2022 Adnan Ahmed, Left Voice. Resist! Black America, Education, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Strike, Worker Rights and Jobs

The Minneapolis teachers’ strike kicked off this week with a huge turnout. Over 4,000 teachers and Educational Support Professionals (ESPs) are on strike for the first time in 50 years. The teachers are demanding smaller class sizes, increased wages (especially for ESPs who are mostly people of color), increased mental health support for students, and retention of educators of color. Students, parents, and community members have joined these educators in this strike. The Teachers’ Demands Are Anti-Racist With the George Floyd uprising, Minneapolis saw the rebirth of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. The police violently repressed community members and people burned down the 3rd precinct. A few months later, on November 4, 2020, over 600 community members and BLM activists were arrested during a protest on the 1-94 freeway, the largest mass arrest in Minnesota’s history.

Massive Turnout On Day One Of Minneapolis Teachers’ Strike

March 9, 2022 Adnan Ahmed, Left Voice. Resist! Education, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Strike, Worker Rights and Jobs

For the first time in 50 years, Minneapolis public school teachers and educational support professionals (ESPs) went on strike yesterday to demand better wages, smaller class sizes, mental health support for students, and retention of educators of color. The last time Minneapolis teachers went on strike was in 1970 when it was illegal for public employees to strike. The strike began at seven o’clock in the morning on Tuesday. Teachers, students, parents, and their supporters picketed outside their schools and made speeches. Supporters brought coffee, snacks, and hand warmers. Many of the picketers carried signs calling out Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) superintendent Ed Graff for dismissing the demands of students or teachers.

Twin Cities Takes To The Streets For International Women’s Day

March 8, 2022 Siobhan Moore , Fight Back News. Resist! Labor Unions, Minneapolis, Women's Day, Women's Rights

Minneapolis, MN - Around 60 people gathered in Mayday Plaza on Sunday, March 6, for an International Women’s Day protest organized by the Twin Cities district of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization. Demands for reproductive rights and healthcare for all, justice for missing and murdered indigenous women and two-spirit people, an end to gender-based violence, queer and trans liberation, and justice for all stolen lives were raised. The demonstrators also stood in solidarity with Twin Cities educators preparing to strike, signs reading “Victory to the educators!” dotted the crowd gathered in the square, and similar phrases frequented the speeches given. As the demonstration began, chants demanding an end to the oppression of women and attacks on reproductive rights and trans rights echoed around the neighborhood.

Educators In St. Paul And Minneapolis May Go On Strike Soon – Here’s Why

March 6, 2022 Cirien Saadeh, Prism Reports. Resist! Education, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Strike, Worker Rights and Jobs

In a Feb. 24 announcement, teachers with the Saint Paul Federation of Educators (SPFE) and the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT), which includes both teachers and Education Support Professionals, announced an intent to strike. Filed with the state of Minnesota’s Bureau of Mediation, the intent to strike was authorized by the board in a vote counted Feb. 17 and provides a legally-mandated, 10-day warning to the school districts about a possible strike. The demands from both unions to their districts have been similar. They are asking for limits on class sizes, wage increases, and better mental health support for students. According to reporting from Minnesota Public Radio, the districts have said that the teachers’ demands are not feasible due to budget shortfalls.

Students Protest Fatal Police Shooting Of Amir Locke

February 10, 2022 Eder Campuzano, Star Tribune. Resist! Amir Locke, Minneapolis, Police, Student Activism

Hundreds of Twin Cities-area students walked out of class Tuesday to protest the fatal shooting of 22-year-old Amir Locke, a Black man who was killed by Minneapolis police serving a no-knock warrant at a downtown apartment. Locke was not the subject of the warrant. The demonstration, organized by the student organization MN Teen Activists, began at St. Paul Central High School at noon. Students from across the Twin Cities gathered for the rally and march, including pupils from Lakeville, Hopkins, St. Louis Park and Minnehaha Academy in Minneapolis. The activists said they are demanding the resignations of Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, interim Police Chief Amelia Huffman and Hennepin County Judge Peter Cahill, as well as the demilitarization of Minneapolis police.

SWAT Officers Involved In Locke Killing Have Violent, Checkered Past

February 6, 2022 Niko Georgiades, Unicorn Riot. Resist! Minneapolis, Police, Police abuse, Violence

Amir Locke was a 22-year-old registered gun owner with no criminal record. He was killed before 7 a.m. on February 2, 2020, when SWAT officers with the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) executed a no-knock search warrant for the St. Paul Police who were doing a homicide investigation. Body camera footage showing the killing was released the next day. It showed a SWAT unit of police enter a downtown Minneapolis apartment with a key, shout “police search warrant,” kick a couch that Locke was sleeping in a blanket on, and kill him within two seconds. Locke had a handgun next to him as he was sleeping and rolled over to grab it after being startled awake. Locke never fully raised the gun and his finger never reached the trigger.

Minneapolis Voters Could Change How The City Approaches Public Safety

November 2, 2021 Anoa Changa, NewsOne. Create! Minneapolis, Police, Public safety, Voting

Last year after George Floyd’s murder, community organizers spurred a national conversation on the role of policing and public safety. The collective outrage and sustained protests led to democracy in action. In Tuesday’s election, Minneapolis voters have a chance to change the way the city handles public safety. Organizers like Miski Noor want voters to embrace the opportunity to change how the city deals with public safety and vote in favor of the public safety amendment known as Question 2. Noor, an organizer with Black Visions, spoke with NewsOne over the weekend in between get out the vote events. Reflecting on the energy of early voters in line to cast their ballots Saturday, Noor says Minneapolis has been waiting for this change.

Minneapolis Is About To Vote On Whether To Dismantle The Police

October 7, 2021 Logan Carroll, In These Times. Create! Defund the police, Direct Democracy, Minneapolis, Police

It was a cool Friday in Minneapolis, made cooler by the shadows of the skyscrapers towering over People’s Plaza. In the brick-lined courtyard between the Hennepin County Government Center and Minneapolis City Hall on September 17, the Yes 4 Minneapolis campaign and its allies held a rally whose purpose had come undone the day before. Yes 4 Minneapolis is working to amend the Minneapolis City Charter by removing a mandate for a mayor-controlled police department with a certain number of officers per resident (0.0017, to be exact). In its place, the amendment establishes a Department of Public Safety under the joint control of the mayor and the 13-member Minneapolis City Council. The radical restructuring would allow for future revisions.

High Rise Window Cleaners Enter Second Week Of Strike

August 26, 2021 Hamilton Nolan, In These Times. Resist! Minneapolis, Strike, Unions, Window Cleaners, Worker Rights and Jobs

In Minnesota, a strike by unionized high rise window cleaners at two companies has entered its second week — an example of the tensions growing across the country as workers seek to collect on promises that employers made to them before the pandemic. Around 40 cleaners are on strike, representing about half of the city’s entire work force in the specialized industry. They are members of SEIU Local 26, a vocal and politically active union with 8,000 members in the Twin Cities. Though the window cleaners are few in number, they have been able to generate outsized attention locally thanks to the union’s well-honed ability to pull off visible strikes in and around Minneapolis. Since the beginning of last week, the workers have rallied and held picket lines at major buildings in downtown Minneapolis and at the city’s airport, where some of them have worked cleaning handrails, walkways and glass.

Driver Plows Into Protesters In Uptown Minneapolis

June 15, 2021 Matt Sepic, Tim Nelson, and Jon Collins , MPR News. Educate! Criminal Justice and Prisons, Minneapolis, Violence

One person was killed and three injured Sunday night after the driver of an SUV drove into a crowd of protesters in the Uptown area of Minneapolis, near the site where Winston Smith was shot by sheriff's deputies earlier this month. A witness said the eastbound SUV was moving at a high rate of speed as it approached just before midnight, and that the driver appeared to accelerate as they got closer to demonstrators who had blocked off Lake Street near Girard Avenue. The driver struck a vehicle parked across one of the traffic lanes on Lake Street, apparently positioned to protect the crowd. That second vehicle then hit people.

Aerial Surveillance In Twin Cities Frustrates, Alarms Residents

May 5, 2021 Sam Richards, Unicorn Riot. Educate! Minneapolis, Police, Rebellion2020, Surveillance

When protests broke out several weeks ago in a Minneapolis, Minnesota suburb over the police killing of Daunte Wright, tensions were already high thanks to the trial of Derek Chauvin, the police officer found guilty of murdering George Floyd. State and local authorities were ready for the unrest — and so were their federal partners. Armored vehicles and soldiers from the Minnesota National Guard became a symbol of the militarized crackdown. Other less visible federal forces were also at work. Thousands of feet overhead, Department of Homeland Security surveillance planes and helicopters circled Brooklyn Center, Minneapolis and surrounding areas, according to Air Traffic Control records and flight data.

‘Justice Looks Like Abolition’

April 23, 2021 Alice Herman, In These Times. Educate! Abolish Police, George Floyd, Legal System, Minneapolis

On Tuesday, April 20, jurors in Minnesota found former police officer Derek Chauvin guilty of all charges brought forward for the death of George Floyd: second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. Chauvin’s bail was also immediately revoked and he was taken into custody after the verdict was read. The guilty verdicts represent a strong departure from the legal norm: between 2005 and 2019, only four police officers had been found guilty of murder in the United States, while an estimated 1,000 people have been shot and killed by cops every year since 2015. A breakdown of that five year study by the Washington Post shows that Black Americans were killed by police at more than double the rate of white people.

When Will Minneapolis Start Listening To The Whole Community?

April 20, 2021 Eric Ortiz, Medium. Create! Art, Community, George Floyd, Minneapolis

Minneapolis didn’t get here alone. The actions and decisions of many people created the challenges facing the city. Solving them will require the work of many people, too. But before anything changes, people need to start listening to each other. Imagine if Derek Chauvin had listened to George Floyd and let him breathe. A 46-year-old man and father of five would not have died. Minneapolis would not have burned. The city would not have had over $1 billion in damage. And communities would not have had to deal with the fallout of the most expensive civil disorder in U.S. history. After Floyd died in police custody on Memorial Day at 38th Street and Chicago Avenue in Minneapolis, the site of his death turned into a memorial to honor Floyd’s life.

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