Cedar-Riverside welcomes new Somali beat cops

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For years, Minneapolis police have struggled to gain the trust of the Somali community in Cedar-Riverside. The first precinct assigned two Somali beat officers to the neighborhood in the hopes that trust between police and the community can be built.Abdiwahab Ali , who was transferred from the fifth precinct per his request, and Mohamed Abdullahi , who has been working for three years as a patrol officer in the first precinct, officially started working together Sunday as night beat officers. Both are fairly new to the Minneapolis Police Department, and both wanted to work together in Cedar-Riverside.”When you have officers who want to work together on a beat, it makes it so much better for the community and for us,” said Kristine Arneson, first precinct inspector who recently transferred from the fifth precinct. “The community will love them and think of them as theirs, and the cops will think of the area as their own, so they’ll take care of it.”She said beat officers are unique because they don’t respond to 911 calls; they only handle radio calls in their sector.”Beat work is more boots-on-the-ground work,” Arneson said. “[The officers] are our direct communication between people who live and work in the community.”Arneson said each day Cedar-Riverside had two different beat cops, so no relationship was built. “I don’t think the community even knew there were beat cops,” she said.Community organizer Hani Mohamed said the community is excited for the new officers, especially because they are Somali.”This will help because people will feel comfortable,” Mohamed said. Continue Reading

Historic designation process frustrates Prospect Park residents

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Be careful what you wish for. That’s what Prospect Park residents learned after they began the arduous process of becoming a designated national historic site almost 10 years ago. 
When it became apparent that the designation process was time consuming and national designation wouldn’t fully protect the houses of the history-laden neighborhood, residents decided in 2008 that interim protection was needed. The interim protection would protect historic buildings from being demolished and the neighborhood’s character from being altered for at least a year, or until the city reached a decision on local designation. But what residents didn’t expect was how strict the protection would be. Recently, some residents have complained that the city is preventing them from making modifications to their houses. Continue Reading

Immigrants get computer training

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Abdiaziz Mohamed is a Somali refugee who is unemployed, can’t speak fluent English and doesn’t have the basic computer skills most people take for granted. Despite this, the Cedar-Riverside resident has used the Brian Coyle Community Center computer lab almost every day for six months looking for jobs online, hoping his search will land him a job and make him more engaged with technology. Mohamed isn’t the only member of his community grappling with basic technology skills. The number of Cedar-Riverside residents trying to acquire basic typing and Internet skills has increased since an AmeriCorps program called the Community Technology Empowerment Program was introduced to the neighborhood in September. At least 80 percent of the program’s participants are East African immigrants. Continue Reading

Another November 26 holiday: The Hajj pilgrimage and Eid Al-Adha

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Being appreciative of what we take for granted, spending time with family and friends, and sharing huge meals. That’s how Thanksgiving is usually celebrated by Americans every year. But what made this year’s Thanksgiving Day different for American Muslims, is that November 26th was the Day of Arafah – the ninth day of the Islamic month Dhul-Hijjah (Month of Hajj) and one of the best days of the year in Islam. Because the Islamic calendar is lunar, the day began 10 days earlier than last year. On this day, two to three million Muslims from around the world stood in worship on Mount Arafah as part of the five-day Hajj pilgrimage to Islam’s holiest city, Makkah, and nearby holy sites. Continue Reading

EPA takes on arsenic contamination in south Minneapolis

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Megan Koester , a Seward resident on 24th Avenue South, looked outside her window to see a group of people wearing white suits, orange hats, and boots removing soil from the house across the street. The University of Minnesota theater junior said she didn’t know who they were or what they were doing, until her roommate asked them. Koester later discovered they were a group of Environmental Protection Agency workers who have been removing arsenic-contaminated soil in the Seward neighborhood since September. “I didn’t know what the implications of this were,” Koester said. “No one’s told me anything but I assume I don’t have to worry.”
The source of the arsenic is a plant site on the intersection of Hiawatha Avenue and 28th Street that used to produce pesticides containing arsenic from 1938 to 1968. Continue Reading

MINNESOTA VOICES | Dr. Ghafar Lakanwal

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Dr. Ghafar Lakanwal is a native of Afghanistan, an ex-political asylee, a Muslim immigrant, a U.S. citizen, a victim of racism, and someone who fights against racism. Each facet of Lakanwal’s identity has impacted his life in a unique way, some facets more than others. “Why am I telling my story? To show that everybody has their story, whether they are people of color who were here a long time ago and were brought by force as slaves, original inhabitants of this country like the Native Americans, European Americans, or the new immigrants that are coming here now from everywhere,” says Dr. Lakanwal. Dr. Lakanwal is the founder and executive director of the MultiCultural Development Center (MCDC), a non-profit organization established in 1991 that aims to bridge cultural and racial gaps in the Twin Cities. Continue Reading

THEATER | Walking play “The Buddha Prince” comes to Minneapolis

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“Look deep, you’ll see we’re all the same,” was the closing line of The Buddha Prince, a vibrant outdoor play based on the life and teachings of the 14th Dalai Lama and performed for free at Powderhorn Park Thursday night.The “walking play” is literally that – a play whose cast of actors, singers and instrumentalists walk from scene to scene while vividly enacting different periods of the Dalai Lama’s life.The play drew in a crowd of about 180 audience members. Viewers witnessed a detailed rendition of the Dalai Lama’s incarnation of his predecessor (the 13th Dalai Lama), journeyed to the invasion of Tibet during his adolescence, and were finally taken to his emotional escape to India.The Dalai Lama currently lives in India and has led the exiled Tibetan government there since 1959.Each of the six outdoor scenes allowed audience members to immerse themselves into the story’s organic set even though lighting and microphones were not used.”I was pleasantly surprised. I thought the ‘walking play’ was an interesting concept,” said audience member Sol Ortiz.Angela Giddings, another audience member, thought the play was “amazing. Walking just made you feel like you were part of it, more vested in it.”The play’s script includes excerpts from the Dalai Lama’s teachings and autobiographies, and has been endorsed by the Office of Tibet in New York.Play director Markell Kiefer said she was inspired to write the play because of the Dalai Lama’s message of basic human values like peace, compassion and dialogue as opposed to war.”We all have different traditions and cultures, but at the very basic level, if we look deep, we all look the same. And that’s what everyone was left with,” she said.The play has run in several cities across the country since 2001. Continue Reading

Former U student killed in Somalia Friday

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Mohamoud Hassan was a University of Minnesota junior with a bright future that came to an abrupt and uncertain end in his war-torn homeland. The civil engineering major was one of at least 20 Twin Cities Somali men who left friends and family in America to join the Somali rebel group Al-Shabab and defend his homeland against invading Ethiopian troops. The U.S. government labeled Al-Shabab a foreign terrorist group in 2008. The 23-year-old was killed in Mogadishu Friday evening, but details of how he died have not been confirmed. Those who expected Hassan to achieve his education and career goals were disappointed when he left Minneapolis in the fall of his junior year to fight in the war in Somalia. Continue Reading

Taser Policy Forum in Minneapolis

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A public forum about the Minneapolis Police Department’s (MPD) taser policy was held July 15 at City Hall in Minneapolis. The Minneapolis Civilian Police Review Authority (CRA) sponsored the public meeting. Thirty members of the public were present to ask questions and hear what progress the CRA has made in assessing MPD taser use and policy. Those present were critical of the MPD’s arguments supporting the use of tasers. For more information, see REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK | Tasers in Minneapolis
The CRA board member panelists were Pamela Franklin, Austen Zuege, chair Donald Bellfield, manager Lee Reid, and CRA manager and head of the policy committee David Bicking. Continue Reading

New Mississippi Market Co-op store goes green, but uncertified

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Fresh and locally imported fruits, vegetables, and other organic products are surrounded by pumpkin orange walls painted with low-VOC paint. A sealed concrete floor is so shiny that it is hard to believe the floor hasn’t been waxed and will never need wax. Eleven skylights in the ceiling warmly embrace and openly invite the sun’s natural light into the building. The pure organic and “green” feel of the new Mississippi Market Co-op which opened July 16 on West 7th Street in Saint Paul, is almost tangible. Mississippi Market Co-op is open daily 8:00 a.m. to 9:30 p.m.
The address and contact information of both stores is:
1500 West 7th Street, St Paul MN 55102. Continue Reading