Corruption and the City… of Minneapolis.
UPDATED - MAYOR’S OFFICE RESPONSE IN COMMENTS SECTION. AND PLEASE READ MY LATEST POST, A CONVERSATION WITH DICK COPELAND HERE.
Mayor Rybak and the Minneapolis City Council want to oust the “Mother Teresa” of the Midwest.
The story hit the news wires last week; the City of Minneapolis is citing Mary Jo Copeland’s Caring and Sharing Hands organization, which feeds and houses countless of Minneapolis’ burgeoning poor population, for what the city describes as the facility’s lack of a security plan.
This grassroots organization began many years ago in the heart of Downtown Minneapolis, operating out of a little store front. Back then the city wanted her out because they didn’t want visitors to the new Target Center to see the poor and homeless lined up to receive food, clothing, shelter, and love, from the north-suburban Minneapolis housewife - who, together with her husband, sacrificed their personal lives, and spent their own money to care for the poor - one on one. At the time, it seemed Murderapolis had little concern for the fact our tawdry city had the national reputation of more murders per capita than NYC - oh, and that murder rate is growing once again BTW.
I wonder who pads the politcian’s back pockets in these matters?
It is all about sports arenas and big salaries and the like - but only for a few. The city claims to be working on a security plan for the outreach center. That said, what I believe they are really working on is quite simply a plan to get rid of Sharing and Caring Hands again - get the Catholic lady away from the sports stadium. What an eyesore, huh? To have a center for poor people across from a prosperous, commercial ball park; a scandal the affluent suburbanites coming to town might see. Today I received the following email from a friend who spoke on the phone with the Mayor’s representative:
The city is maintaining that because of the lack of a security plan, she is out of compliance with her business license. They maintain that it has nothing to do with the location near the new Twins ballpark. I find that last item hard to believe. The location has been controversial since day one because of its nearness to downtown and particularly because of its nearness to the incinerator.
I noted that probably every business in Minneapolis is probably out of compliance with one or more items required by their business license. Erica agreed with that.
She was concerned about mothers with small children being exposed to drug deals. I would imagine that those mothers with small children are exposed to a lot more than that.” - email.
“All of the sudden the city’s concerned we’re not doing this right.” - Mary Jo’s husband, Dick commenting on how all the problems came to light last year: “He said that city pressure stepped up in spring 2007, just before ballpark construction began.” - Source.
The city contends concern that mothers and small children are being exposed to drug deals at the center? That’s a farce. Downtown Minneapolis crawls with drug traffickers, while most of the first tier neighborhoods around downtown are just as infested - if not more so. South and north Minneapolis are drug and crime infested neighborhoods - yet the city is focusing upon an emergency care facility which happens to be across from the new baseball stadium - which few wanted in the first place. It is a travesty.
Mary Jo Copeland’s work has even been recognized by the President of the United States, as well as the Vatican. I urge all of my readers - everywhere - to protest this action by the greedy elite who govern the City of Minneapolis. Ray from Stella Borealis published the contacts in the following post I reprinted below for your convenience:
Sharing & Caring Hands needs your support.
The City of Minneapolis has threatened to remove Mary Jo Copeland’s restaurant license and in turn her ability to serve meals to thousands of the poor and hungry. This move has been raised because of alleged security concerns, and comes on the heels of the new baseball park being built across the street from the facility.
Those who would suffer from this are the poor, the disabled, the elderly, families with children, and people suffering from mental illness who come for a warm meal.
There is a City Council meeting on April 25th and we need thousands of people to call the Mayor’s office and tell lhim you support Mary Jo’s work and you oppose any move to remove Mary Jo’s restaurant license. Please call today or before April 25th.
Contacts:
Contact Mayor R.T. Rybak’s (”R” is for Raymond, I just learned) policy aide, Erica Prosser at 612-673-2133 or email her at erica.prosser@ci.minneapolis.mn.us
A march is being coordinated by the community to protest this move. Tentative time for the march is Thursday, April 17, at 12:30 p.m. Call 612-338-4640 to confirm the time.
[Photo: Mary Jo (center) at her facility. The facility is modern, state of the art, thanks to private and corporate donations. The campus surrounding the contemporary buildings of her ministry are clean and well maintained by volunteers. It is by no means an eyesore to the city.]
Links:
April 16th, 2008 at 9:09 am
Going after the down and out through eliminating Caring and Sharing Hands is so incredibly wrong. The rich and self righteous need to find their consciences to help others instead of impeding them.
April 16th, 2008 at 11:09 am
[...] Abbey-Roads2 wrote an interesting post today on Corruption and the City… of Minneapolis.Here’s a quick excerpt … rom the new baseball stadium - which few wanted in the first place. It is a travesty….This move has been raised because of alleged security concerns, and comes on the heels of the new baseball park being built across the street from the facility…. [...]
April 17th, 2008 at 2:43 pm
Mayor Rybak very much values and appreciates the important work of Sharing and Caring Hands – the services they provide to Minneapolis and those in need are admirable and the last thing we want is to stand in the way of that service. That being said, when you operate a business in the City of Minneapolis, no matter what type of business, you must comply with City ordinances that relate to the management of that business, including a plan to ensure adequate security to prevent criminal activity. And the City has an obligation to ensure that licensed businesses are in compliance with these ordinances. There are a number of other facilities that serve the homeless and those with great housing needs in this area of Minneapolis. None of them have these safety issues because we are in partnership with them, and we simply want the same with Sharing and Caring Hands. We don’t want to relocate them. We want to work with them to address these issues so that the people who go there for care and support can be safe. We have been trying to work with them to protect the very needy people who come there, but we need Mary Jo’s partnership to do that. We have clear standards for public safety in Minneapolis that we expect everyone – even Sharing and Caring Hands – to meet.
Those who are served by Sharing and Caring Hands are unique in that many users may be homeless and vulnerable because of these criminal behaviors such as drug abuse. The City can not look the other away, we have a responsibility to ensure the safety of everyone at Sharing and Caring Hands is considered, from the chronic crack cocaine user to the young single mother and her new born child.
The security issues surrounding Mary’s place have a long history as do the City’s attempts to work in partnership with Mary Jo to address these issues. Sharing and Caring Hands has had little progress in addressing these concerns and so, once again, we have asked Mary Jo to come to the table so we can help her put together a comprehensive and achievable security plan. We are extremely hopeful that Mary Jo, with the needs of those she serves in mind, will work cooperatively with us so that we have a result that will make us all happy, the license renewal of Sharing and Caring Hands and safe place of refuge for those in need.
Minneapolis has underway one of the most comprehensive and aggressive efforts to end homelessness in the nation, and ending homelessness will continue to be a priority for the Mayor and the city. This is why we have helped place affordable housing in downtown as well as throughout the city and will continue our efforts to end homelessness by helping people get into safe, affordable and stable housing. This year we are spending $10 million on an Affordable Housing Trust Fund. We are funding street outreach workers to help connect homeless residents to permanent services and move them into a more stable life. We are about to have our next Project Homeless Connect, in which we invite the homeless people in the community to the Convention Center to connect them to services. This is part of Heading Home Hennepin, a city and county partnership to solve long term homelessness. The city has worked very hard to address the needs of the homeless, and those who have housing challenges, and we will continue to do so – hopefully with the partnership of Sharing and Caring Hands.
April 17th, 2008 at 8:26 pm
I’ll respond tomorrow.
I’ve been responding to 1/3 of the MPR article on Abp Nienstedt’s accession.
A very uninformed article.
April 19th, 2008 at 7:16 pm
I like the canned political response. Do you think I can get one just like it?
Terry, I just got home from 12 hours of class and plagiarized your last paragraph from your other blog.
Please don’t sue me. I can’t afford it…I’m afraid I’ll have nowhwere to go since that shelter will be gone.