Tuesday, Nov. 5, is Election Day. Voters in Falcon Heights and Lauderdale will cast their ballots on a levy referendum for Roseville Area Schools and will choose between four candidates to fill three seats on the Roseville School Board. Falcon Heights voters will also be asked to choose between three candidates vying for two at-large seats on the Falcon Heights City Council. St. Paul voters have four candidates to choose from for the mayor’s seat and five candidates running to fill three seats on the St. Paul Public Schools Board of Education. Meet the candidates here.
Tuesday, Nov. 5, is Election Day. Voters in Falcon Heights and Lauderdale will cast their ballots on a levy referendum for Roseville Area Schools and will choose between four candidates to fill three seats on the Roseville School Board. Falcon Heights voters will also be asked to choose between three candidates vying for two at-large seats on the Falcon Heights City Council. St. Paul voters have four candidates to choose from for the mayor’s seat and five candidates running to fill three seats on the St. Paul Public Schools Board of Education. Meet the candidates here.
The District 10 Como Community Council will vote on bylaw changes that will reflect an adjustment in service boundaries between St. Paul Districts 6 and 10 and increase the size of the council at its Nov. 19 meeting, which will be held at the Historic Streetcar Station, 1224 N. Lexington Parkway, at 7 p.m.Since April 2013, a group of volunteers from District 10 and the South Como neighborhood have been working to revise the district’s bylaws to allow the move of more than 3,500 South Como residents from District 6 into District 10.The change will take effect on Jan. 1, 2014.The committee presented its final recommendations for changes to the District 10 bylaws at a community meeting on Sept. 25 and to the District 10 Community Council on Oct. Continue Reading
Kathy Zieman was caught off guard when she got news last week that the St. Paul City Council would be voting on a resolution this week that would initiate a request for proposals (RFP) process to find a private vendor to take over the management of the Como and Phalen golf courses by next spring.Zieman, president of the golf course’s Como Women’s Club and a member of the Como Regional Task Force, said the news “came out of the blue.”When Parks and Rec director Mike Hahm spoke at District 10’s District Plan Ad Hoc committee meeting on Sept. 9, he assured attendees that the Como Golf Course was not closing, Zieman said. “I guess he was right. They were looking at something totally opposite. Continue Reading
When the Minnesota State Fair opens in August 2014, traffic congestion should improve on both Como and Larpenteur avenues, if the fair’s new transit hub and gate on the northwest side of the fairgrounds works as planned, says Jerry Hammer, the fair’s general manager.
Beer will be flowing on Fridays and Saturdays at Bang Brewing Co. in south St. Anthony Park starting this weekend.The doors to Bang Brewing, 2320 Capp Road, will be open from 5 to 10 p.m. Fridays and noon to 5 p.m. Saturdays. First up on the beer list is Bang’s launch beer, Neat, a “very pale ale.” Bang will serve pints at the brewery and have growlers available for take away, according to proprietor Sandy Boss Febbo.The beer is brewed with all organic ingredients, and Boss Febbo says she and her husband, Jay, are looking forward to opening their doors to the neighborhood.The 1,300-square-foot brew house, which looks like a grain bin, is nestled to the south of the BNSF railroad tracks, just east of Raymond Avenue.Right: Sandy and Jay Boss Febbo (Park Bugle photo by Lori Hamilton) Continue Reading
Rock Star Supply Co. has set up shop at the southwest corner of Raymond and University and is looking for artists, writers, volunteer tutors and students who can use the help of a few creative people to improve their study skills.Rock Star has been working with students at Como Park Senior High School and schools in Minneapolis for several years. The group moved from its office in Minneapolis to University Avenue this summer with the help of Starling, a group that has been working to fill vacant space on University Avenue.The prototype for Rock Star Supply is Pirate Supply Co. started by author Dave Eggers in San Francisco. Pirate Supply blends a fun retail shop (yes, it sells pirate gear) with artists and writers who are willing to tutor.Rock Star has applied to join Eggers’ 826 National, a nonprofit that gives leadership training, administration and other resources to eight writing and tutoring centers across the country that are patterned after Pirate Supply.Starting this fall, Rock Star will provide free weekend project-based workshops and after-school tutoring to low-income students in elementary through high school. Continue Reading
You have until Monday, Sept. 2, to vote on one of three $1 million projects that could make St. Paul better.If you haven’t heard about the Forever St. Paul Challenge, listen up: The St. Paul Foundation launched a contest back in February that will award $1 million to a winning idea to “make St. Continue Reading
Frogtown isn’t the only St. Paul neighborhood that would be hit hard by Mayor Chris Coleman’s new funding strategy for the city’s 17 neighborhood-based district councils.The District 10 Como Community Council’s funding is set to remain stagnant over the next three years—at $51,873—but the city didn’t take into account that in January 2014 the district will increase by nearly 4,000 residents when South Como residents leave District 6 and become part of District 10.District 10’s population will grow by one-third, from nearly 11,900 to nearly 15,800.“The magnitude of the population shift caused by this change is unprecedented and results in an inequitable funding outcome where Como Park residents will experience a 25 percent decrease in per-resident funding,” said District 10 board chair John Knox.“We want the transition with the additional citizens being added to our district in 2014 to go as smoothly as possible,” he said. But the lack of increase in funding to account for the population shift “seems to be a pretty big road block.”Shortly after the mayor’s budget was released in July, Knox sent a letter to Coleman, Ward 4 council member Russ Stark and Ward 5 member Amy Brendmoen, asking the mayor to adjust the district’s funding over three years.At press time the mayor’s office was trying to schedule a meeting with Knox.According to Knox’s letter, the mayor’s budget will reduce District 10 per-resident funding by 25 percent, from $4.35 to $3.29 “in one fell swoop.” That decrease will force the district to make significant cuts to its programs, Knox said.The mayor’s proposal phases in funding cuts for district councils facing a population loss over a three-year period. Knox is asking that the mayor place District 10 in a similar category by adjusting funding over three years to maintain equity among district councils. This would allow District 10 to seek alternative funding sources and adjust to the new funding, the letter said.Knox’s letter asks the mayor to fund the district at $3.90 per resident ($61,429) in 2014. Continue Reading
To celebrate the award-winning red maple at the corner of Nebraska Avenue and Victoria Street, Kate Lehmann invited neighbors to her front lawn for a Poet-Tree party on July 17.Left: Kate Lehmann sits in front of her award-winning red maple.Despite the 90-odd-degree weather, nearly 20 people showed up with tree-related poems in hand and one with bagpipes.The event kicked off with 10-year-old Simon Harrison-Michaels reading what Lehmann calls “the tree poem of all tree poems”: “Trees” by Joyce Kilmer (“I think that I shall never see a poem as lovely as a tree.”)Neighbors read work by poets such as Mary Oliver and e. e. cummings; the bagpiper, Anne Kaplan, played a tune about a rowan tree; and they shared watermelon, lemonade and other snacks under the shade of the red maple.The party was inspired by the maple’s District 10 Como Tree Appreciation Award and the Sidewalk Poem stamped into Lehmann’s walk. “A Gentleman’s Invitation,” written by St. Paul poet laureate Carol Connolly, was placed on Lehmann’s sidewalk several years ago as part of Public Art St. Paul’s Sidewalk Poetry program.But Lehmann says a garage sale she held earlier this summer was the real motivator for the party: “I enjoyed meeting neighbors who came by” and she wanted to have another opportunity to gather with them.Simon Harrison-Michaels reads Joyce Kilmer’s “Trees” Continue Reading
