Minnesota

2023, A Year Of Progress: Expanding Voting Rights Across The Country

December 31, 2023 Morgan McLeod, The Sentencing Project. Organize! Elections, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, New Years Eve, Pennsylvania, Prisoner rights, Texas, Virginia, Voting, Voting Rights

This year, thanks to the tireless efforts of dedicated advocates and organizations, we’re witnessing a remarkable shift in the political landscape when it comes to expanding and protecting the right to vote for justice-impacted people. Advocacy Based on Lived Experience (ABLE) – an organization dedicated to working to engage people in the democratic process – held several community events across Kentucky, allowing attendees and lawmakers to hold discussions on pertinent issues in their communities, regardless of their political affiliation. Participants frequently discussed state legislation that would restore the right to vote to over 160,000 Kentuckians who are disenfranchised due to their history with the criminal legal system.

Anti-War Committee Launches Billboard Campaign For Divestment

December 20, 2023 Ashley Taylor, Fight Back News!. Resist! Anti-War, Billboard, Divestment, Israel, Minnesota, Palestine, US Imperialism

Minneapolis, MN – On December 18, the Minnesota Anti-War Committee held a press conference to proudly announce the installation of four billboards in Minneapolis and Saint Paul. These billboards will serve as a visual call to action, reinforcing the committee's demands: “Divest Minnesota from Israel” and “End U.S. aid to Israel.” Strategically placed, these billboards will be a powerful tool to amplify the Anti-War Committee's demands that Minnesota divest from Israel and for the U.S. to end all support for Israel's apartheid regime. Billboards will be Minneapolis at 515 Washington Avenue S; 815 Washington Avenue SE, and at 328 S 3rd Street. The Saint Paul billboard is at 2040 Marshall Avenue.

A Beacon Of Hope To The Unhoused Faces Eviction

December 17, 2023 Ellie Zimmerman, Unicorn Riot. Organize! Eviction, Homelessness, Indigenous Activism, Minnesota

Minneapolis, MN — Camp Nenookaasi is throwing the subject of Minneapolis’ encampment policies into the spotlight again as it faces eviction on December 19. The camp’s supporters are waging the latest skirmish in a longer fight between the city’s prohibition of encampments and those who claim that allowing encampments to remain intact is the most humane approach to the issue, as well as a crucial first step toward getting people into stable housing and recovery programs. On Dec. 8, a group of activists arrived at Mayor Jacob Frey’s office to deliver an eviction notice to his door, symbolically evicting him from the city in an attempt to draw his attention to the issue and sway his decision to further displace the unhoused.

‘Subsidizing Abuse’ Investigates Affordable Housing Industry’s Record

November 29, 2023 Isabela Escalona, The Real News Network. Educate! Affordable Housing, Housing, Minnesota, Report, Worker Rights and Jobs

At least $84 Million in Minnesota state and municipal funds earmarked for affordable housing projects have gone towards contractors with records or accusations of worker exploitation, from wage theft to misclassification to labor trafficking to sexual abuse, according to a new report. Subsidizing Abuse: How Public Financing Fuels Exploitation in Affordable Housing Construction was published on November 14 by North Star Policy Action, which calls itself “an independent research and communications institute.” It was authored by Jake Schwitzer from North Star Policy Action and Lucas Franco from Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA).

Minneapolis City Councilors Reject Recruitment Deal With Cops

November 26, 2023 Marjaan Sirdar, Unicorn Riot. Resist! Accountability, City Council, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Police

On Friday, Nov. 17, Mayor Frey called a special council meeting where they voted down a tentative deal struck by the mayor and police to attempt to increase staffing of the MPD with cash bonus incentives after “critically low staffing levels” have plagued the department, bogging down 911 response times. One week before the council voted down the proposal, Mayor Frey and the police union signed the agreement to pay $18,000 in bonuses to current officers over a two and a half year period, and $15,000 to new recruits over a three year period. The money for the agreement was to be taken from a $19 million fund that was allocated by the Democratic-controlled state legislature for the City of Minneapolis, following the murder of Floyd by MPD, but still needed city council approval.

Zoning Reform Is Entering A New, Grown-Up Era

November 25, 2023 Zak Yudhishthu, Next City. Create! Housing, Minnesota, St. Paul, Urban Design, zoning

Blink, and you might’ve missed it: St. Paul, Minnesota just ended zoning that restricts neighborhoods only to single-family housing. On Wednesday, October 18, the St. Paul City Council voted to change the city’s zoning code to increase neighborhood-scale density across the city. Areas that today only allow for single-family homes will soon allow for at least four units of housing per lot. At first glance, these changes might recall those passed by Minneapolis in 2019, when the city’s 2040 Comprehensive Plan legalized triplexes city-wide. Minneapolis received extensive attention for the changes, as it was a national leader in eliminating city zoning that excluded every housing type except for single-family homes.

Minnesota Nurses Win Big, Then Walk Back Winning Model

November 1, 2023 Sarah Hughes, Labor Notes. Strategize! Minnesota, Nurses, Strikes, Unions, Victory, Worker Rights and Jobs

Last fall, 15,000 nurses were part of a creative coordinated bargaining effort to reshape health care in Minnesota. They won new contract language on safe staffing and substantial raises—things they hadn’t thought possible. But a year later, the Minnesota Nurses Association is riven with conflict. Members are being investigated on charges like “acting against the interests of the bargaining unit.” A candidate for vice president was removed from her elected positions and had her membership suspended, making her ineligible to run for office. How did one of the most exciting rank-and-file union efforts in health care take such a turn?

Be Their Voices Presser: ‘No More Jail Deaths!’

October 6, 2023 Niko Georgiades, Unicorn Riot. Resist! Accountavbility, Deaths, Minnesota, Prisoner rights

St. Paul, MN — Five years after losing her son Hardel Sherrell to medical malpractice and improper care while in a Minnesota jail, Del Shea Perry leads another protest against in-custody deaths. At least 15 people have died this year while inside Minnesota jails and at least 65 since 2018, according to Be Their Voices, Perry’s non-profit. A press conference titled No More Jail Deaths! organized by Be Their Voices took place on Oct. 4 at noon central in front of the Minnesota Department of Corrections building in St. Paul. In a media release about the press conference, Perry says: “The Hardel Sherell Act was passed in 2021 to give the MN Department of Corrections greater oversight of county jails, especially over medical care.

Judge Dismisses Charges Against Water Protectors In The Interests Of Justice

September 18, 2023 Climate Defense Project. Resistance Report Criminal Justice and Prisons, Indigenous Rights, Line 3 Pipeline, Minnesota, Pipelines, Victory, Water Protectors

As three Native women Water Protectors prepared for trial next week in Aitkin County, Judge Leslie Metzen dismissed all remaining criminal charges against Winona LaDuke, Tania Aubid and Dawn Goodwin late Thursday afternoon, September 14, 2023. The nearly three-year-old charges stemmed from a peaceful and prayerful gathering on the banks of the Mississippi River on ceded Anishinaabe land as Enbridge began construction of its Line 3 tar sands pipeline. Joined by several dozen other Water Protectors, the three women wore ceremonial jingle dresses, and sang, danced, and prayed for the water as heavy construction equipment tore into the earth.

Prisoners Strike At Oak Park Heights Canteen

September 17, 2023 Dan Feidt, Unicorn Riot. Resist! Criminal Justice and Prisons, Minnesota, Prison Labor, Strikes, Wages, Water

Oak Park Heights, MN — Just days after prisoners at the Stillwater prison staged civil disobedience actions by refusing a staff lockdown, incarcerated workers at the nearby ‘level 5’ MCF-Oak Park Heights prison canteen have staged a work strike, according to activists who regularly stay in touch with prisoners. The use of segregation, or sending prisoners to ‘the hole,’ has increased in recent years. Oak Park Heights administrators sent prisoners there 694 times in 2018, according to state Department of Corrections (DOC) data. The Twin Cities branch of the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee (IWOC) sent out a press release on the Oak Park Heights work stoppage.

Helicopter Footage From Mass Arrest Reveals State Trooper Surveillance

August 17, 2023 Niko Georgiades, Unicorn Riot. Educate! Mass Arrests, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Police, police brutality, Surveillance

Minneapolis, MN – High-tech surveillance video and audio communication from a Minnesota State Patrol helicopter, obtained and first published by Unicorn Riot, reveals some of the planning and tactics behind the largest mass arrest in recent Minnesota history. On Nov. 4, 2020, a multi-agency law enforcement operation kettled and arrested at least 646 people during a post-election-day protest calling for then-President Donald Trump to not ‘steal the vote.’ In an exclusive release, viewers are taken inside Minnesota State Patrol’s Bell 407 helicopter, N119SP, to see and hear the operations of authorities as around 700 peaceful protesters marched onto Interstate 94 in Minneapolis.

How Immigrant Warehouse Workers Took On Amazon And Won

August 10, 2023 Maximillian Alvarez, The Real News. Resist! Amazon, Minnesota, State legislature, Worker Rights

"I've never been an organizer,” Khali Jama says, “but I’ve always fought.” As a single mother, a Muslim, and a Somali-American worker living in Minnesota, Jama has always had to fight for the life she, her family, and her fellow workers deserve. And earlier this year, after bringing that fight to the Minnesota state legislature, Khali and her coworkers achieved a major victory. “On May 16,” Lisa Kwon reports in PRISM, “Minnesota lawmakers passed the nation’s strongest Amazon warehouse worker protection legislation with the Warehouse Worker Protection Act, which ensures that workers can take breaks during the workday and have access to relevant quota and performance standards and data on how fast they’re working.

Limited Funds Stunts Minnesota’s Conviction Review Unit

July 7, 2023 Niko Georgiades, Unicorn Riot. Educate! Criminal Justice and Prisons, Legal System, Minnesota

Minnesota’s Conviction Review Unit (CRU) has received nearly 1,000 applications of wrongful incarceration to review but with only a couple paid staff and four grants in two years, impacted families complain about lengthy waits while the CRU say they lack capacity and funding. Created to prevent, identify, and remedy wrongful convictions, the state’s first-ever CRU began accepting applications in August 2021 — after the first quarter of 2023, it had completed only one official investigation. Seeking transparency on the unit as time continues to pass, advocates and families of many wrongfully incarcerated people languishing in Minnesota prisons have publicly confronted the CRU, complaining of inaction.

Creating America’s First Native Public Housing Complex

June 26, 2023 Kasey R. Keeler, Next City. Educate! History, Indigenous Rights, Minnesota, Public Housing

During the second half of the 1960s, on the heels of the civil rights movement and in the midst of a steadily growing urban Indian community, American Indian community members in Minneapolis and Saint Paul began to meet to discuss the many issues urban Indians across the Twin Cities were facing. These community gatherings eventually became the foundation for the politically minded American Indian Movement, widely recognized as AIM. It would not be long before “AIM and its leaders saw the need for a native-oriented housing development to help American Indians transition from the reservation to the city without losing touch with their traditional values” researcher Robert G. Style writes.

Minnesota’s Community Solar Program

June 12, 2023 Maria McCoy, Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Create! Community Solar, Energy, Minnesota, Solar Energy

Minnesota was one of the first states to enable community solar and became an early leader as its program flourished. The original policy, passed in 2013, established a community solar program bound to the state’s largest investor-owned electric utility, Xcel Energy, and was noteworthy for allowing for unlimited development. A 2023 policy (HF 2310) has expanded the program, while also introducing new rules and limitations. Community solar is still only available to customers of Xcel and will be administered by the Minnesota Department of Commerce. Under the new rules, a qualifying community solar garden may have no more than five megawatts of generation capacity, must have at least 25 subscribers per megawatt, and no consumer may subscribe to over 40 percent of a garden’s capacity.

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