Some company allowed for long-term care residents. The Star Tribune’s Chris Serres reports: “For the first time in four months, families will be allowed to visit their loved ones inside senior care homes, as Minnesota health authorities cautiously lift lockdown restrictions meant to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus among vulnerable older adults. … The Minnesota Department of Health is recommending that nursing homes and assisted-living facilities allow certain family members and outside caregivers inside these facilities to help monitor residents’ care and alleviate the harmful effects of prolonged isolation and loneliness.”
After the protests. KMSP’s Tom Lyden reports: “At least 150 Minneapolis Police Officers have begun the process of seeking ‘duty disability’ for post-traumatic stress under the Minnesota Public Employees Retirement Association (PERA), said an attorney representing the officers. … The attorney, Ron Meuser, who handles most disability claims for the Minneapolis Police Federation, told the FOX 9 Investigators 75 of those officers are under doctors’ orders not to return to work as they undergo treatment for symptoms consistent with PTSD.”
Former Minneapolis mayor Betsy Hodges has an op-ed for the New York Times, explaining how white liberals block change. She writes: “Democrats have largely led big and midsize cities for much of the past half-century. Yet the gaps in socioeconomic outcomes between white people and people of color are by several measures at their worst in the richest, bluest cities of the United States. … How could this be? Because high-profile cultural conservatives ask this question so disingenuously, white liberals have generally brushed aside this reality rather than grappled with its urgency. There’s now a danger that this sidestepping will continue, even after a national evaluation of racism since the brutal police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. … As the mayor of Minneapolis from 2014 to 2018, as a Minneapolis City Council member from 2006 until 2014 and as a white Democrat, I can say this: White liberals, despite believing we are saying and doing the right things, have resisted the systemic changes our cities have needed for decades.”
Taking safety into their own hands. WCCO reports: “Some people feeling unsafe in the Phillips neighborhood of Minneapolis street have put up barricades at both ends of their street to block traffic from getting through. … In less than two weeks, neighbors say their community near Lake and Cedar has transformed. … ‘We were terrified to be just walking,’ Maria Perez said. “We were like no, we prefer to be inside.” … Neighbors say that’s all changed now thanks to the blockades.”
In other news…
Update from Powderhorn: “Hundreds now living in Powderhorn Park as neighbors fret and leaders wrestle over next steps” [Star Tribune]
This is really bad: “KSTP-TV reporter asks Muslim woman: What’s the difference between a hijab and white supremacist gang regalia?” [Sahan Journal]
Regarding the U’s Native American Medicine Garden: “University under fire for treatment of sacred Indigenous garden, caretaker” [Minnesota Daily]
Well, these things move in cycles: “Sales boom, factory shutdowns leave bikes in short supply amid pandemic” [MPR]
SWLRT update: “Cedar Lake Parkway closed; freight lines shifting” [Southwest Journal]
Aww: “Minnesota Wild adopt new rescue dog, Hobey” [KARE]
Looks nice: “New St. Croix River Crossing Loop Trail has Stillwater going round and round” [Star Tribune]
Your very own castle: “Hot property alert: South Minneapolis’s historic White Castle is available to rent” [City Pages]
Hodges is right on many accounts; although it is ironic, she herself is from Wayzata, lived in Linden Hills and her years in office tended to at times blame others. How many kids in Linden Hills, Deephaven, Wayzata get bused to other school districts or how many of those same families have low income housing in their neighborhoods? It is usually pushed off to the low income and middle income to bear the brunt. And let’s be brutally honest, many of us, even some who are people of color have mixed feelings about sending our kids to underperforming schools, or having high density next door. When we do it is usually because that is what we can afford, it is not the luxury of a political statement. And yet some of us would argue that it bring benefits of its own–relationships and experiences we might never have had. So how do we expand each others’ worlds and opportunities and recognize people may want different living styles(low density, high density, etc) but allow people of all backgrounds more opportunities.
“it is ironic”. Yes, Hodges op-ed brings to mind the saying “Physician heal thyself”. She seems a trifle bitter and cannot comprehend (accept?) that she, too, had her career of public service destroyed by deadly force policing. There seems quite a heavy reliance upon unstated intuition being the “real” driving force behind policing decisions. Yet she was the one in the driver’s seat.
Interesting to see the latest gambit being pulled by Boss Kroll and his boys–abuse of PERA with dubious “disability” claims, all apparently being handled by the same attorney. One has to wonder if the same doctor ordered PTSD treatment for the 75 (150?) coppers. Is this an orchestrated slow down?
Curious that a wave of post-riot PTSD symptoms only occurs when actual reform of an abusive force might become a reality. But one might as well make the system pay big one final time, eh, Boss Kroll?
As for the Phillips blockades, one has to acknowledge that that is the future for the city. Indeed, I assume this is what “neighbors policing neighbors” is supposed to look like. The next logical step is armed checkpoints.