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White House blog praises Rybak, dings Pawlenty

By David Brauer | 02/24/09

I'm still getting used to a Net-savvy President, but Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak showed up on the official White House blog Monday night.

In a bit of call-and-response between the mayor and the man he endorsed, whitehouse.gov touts Rybak for staunching Tim Pawlenty's local-government aid cuts with Barack Obama's largesse:

The first dollars from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act are going out in just two days — Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2009 — in the form of federal support for state medicaid payments.

But the impact is already being felt well beyond that. Just today, Minneapolis mayor R.T. Rybak announced that he was prepared to swallow hard and make significant cuts to public works and public safety. Thanks to the ARRA, he won't have to:


"Now let’s turn to Police. If the Governor’s cuts were passed on directly to the Police Department, it would have led to the elimination of 57 sworn police officer positions and 19 non sworn employees. We will not have to do that because of two factors. First, working with Chief Dolan, we are proposing elimination of $1.5 million in non personnel costs, including overtime.

"Second the federal Recovery Act’s one time public safety grants arrived just in time. President Obama said he would help cities keep police officers on the job and he has delivered. Because of this funding I will be proposing no personnel cuts in the Police Department. Next time someone asks you what the Recovery Act will do, start by telling them it will keep 57 police officers working on the streets of Minneapolis."

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Comments (4)

Submitted by Bill Krause on February 24, 2009 - 11:42am.

"If the Governor’s cuts were passed on directly to the Police Department, "

Who said the Governor's cuts should be passed directly to the Police Department? Why would anybody look at public safety as the first place to cut? Rybak is making a bogus straw man argument.

Submitted by Reggie McGurt on February 24, 2009 - 3:02pm.

Actually, Bill Krause, if you had been paying attention, you would know that the police cuts are only one of many cuts Rybak will have to make in Minneapolis to deal with the Governor's cuts to local government aid. Public safety makes up the largest share of the Minneapolis's budget, so they will have to share some of the cuts. The LGA cuts to Minneapolis are too huge to manage without hitting public safety.

The blog post barely touches on one crucial point: this is one-time money. The federal money will only pay for cops in 2009. In 2010, Pass-the-buck Pawlenty's LGA cuts go even deeper. So these cops (and possibly many more) will be out the door in 2010.

Submitted by dan buechler on February 24, 2009 - 3:41pm.

I'm not sure Pawlenty cares about Minneapolis anymore. He grew up in St. Paul area. He gets no political support from Minneapolis. Clinton cops and Obama officers are politically popular but maybe we'll have to rely on the National Guard Homeland Brigade.

Submitted by Bill Krause on February 24, 2009 - 5:34pm.

If Reggie McGurt would have attempted to understand my comment, he would have understood that city governments have basic services that need to be prioritized. Public safety is the highest priority and should be the last place that a mayor would look to cut. Rybak made a bogus point by applying an across the board cut when things should not be prioritized that way.

If public safety needs to get cut, then look for fat in the management before cutting front line officers.

How large is the mayor's staff? How many Deputy Directors of Communications does he have? How many $10,000 water fountains do we need?