Minneapolis: Sheridan’s small area planning

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For more than a decade, Sheridan Neighborhood Organization (SNO) volunteers have entertained development proposals for properties near the Mississippi, Marshall Street, along 13th Avenue and at its various nodes. Many have been built or are underway.“The impetus” for their current work on a Sheridan Small Area Plan, says consultant Breanne Rothstein, “is development pressure. There’s lots of city owned land,” and opportunities to partner, do proactive work before the developments. It’s also a city goal for every activity center (13th Avenue is one) to have a plan, so the City’s Department of Neighborhood and Community Relations funded it with $30,000.The money pays for Rothstein’s firm, WSB & Associates, Inc. with the help of Community Design Group and the Flood Plain Collective, to conduct meetings and produce a pretty and organized document narrating current conditions and making future recommendations. About a dozen neighbors reviewed a draft at an open house July 29, and a last step is to work on a suggested land use map that the city requires be included.WSB, by the way, is also handling the small area planning process for Nicollet Island East Bank Neighborhood.What’s in the Small Area PlanHousing: The Steering Committee working on the plan asked that new development be focused on the city-owned parcels at 13th Avenue and Marshall Street NE providing “opportunities for mixed use housing, with sidewalk-oriented commercial on the first floor.” That intersection is already slated for a housing development by Everwood, which will preserve the former Grain Belt office building at 1215 Marshall and the archaeological remains of the Orth Brewery. Continue Reading

Many Northside Minneapolis park and rec changes underway

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A million here, a million there, $3 million and so on, pretty soon we’re talking real money and real change in North Minneapolis parks.There’s been major digging at North Commons, Farview’s field is about to go under the knife, and the biggest of them all, Theodore Wirth Park, is close to having a completed master plan, waiting on some internal review steps, according to the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board (MPRB) planner in charge, Andrea Weber.“That means it’s stuck on my desk” said assistant superintendent for planning, Bruce Chamberlain. “It’s a big park, and a massive document,” he said of the months and years that have gone into the process so far.Theodore Wirth ParkThis spring, the park board inked an agreement with the City of Lakes Loppet Foundation that allows the foundation to raise $3 million to donate to MPRB in exchange for the rights to lease and operate a new welcome center near a new “silent sports” facility on Theodore Wirth Parkway. The terms of that lease are not spelled out, and if the project cost exceeds $3 million it will have to be re-worked and re-bid.The agreement is also contingent on the parks making plans for reworking the 17th and 18th holes on their main golf course to accommodate an open field as a starting area for mountain biking.They are on a deadline coming up (in September), and Chamberlain said they are working on it. John Munger of the Foundation was on vacation this past week and could not be reached for comment.Park users will, however, see many not-insignificant changes throughout Wirth’s many amenities. Looking at minneapolispark.org and talking with Weber, we find:Crews have continued seeding and other storm damage recovery steps at the south end of the lake. Continue Reading

Minneapolis Youth congress: Real ideas, dialog

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Though Minneapolis Youth Congress (MYC) members say they can see results from their involvement, their biggest frustration remains adults who ask for their opinion but then don’t follow through, four representatives told a Hawthorne Huddle meeting in July.

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Partial closures scheduled on University Avenue in Northeast Minneapolis

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After many months of get-ready work by utility companies on buried lines, contractors for the Minnesota Department of Transportation are on schedule with the mill-and-overlay of University Avenue Northeast, State Highway 47, between Third Avenue and 27th Avenue Northeast. On Monday, Aug. 19 they completed the west side of the road, including several feet into the adjoining streets at the intersections. On Aug. 20, pictured, they were working on the east side of University.Unlike many mill-overlay operations where the street handles traffic overnight in its milled state, these workers swept up the excess old asphalt and almost immediately put down binder and the new coat of asphalt. The Monday work has already been striped with traffic lane markings.Work will continue with partial closures (one lane of traffic each way) on Aug. Continue Reading

Planning $5.6 million makeover for Northeast Park in Minneapolis

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What do you get when you let community people and architects loose with a kit of paper parts, maps, and an hour or so to put them together? Twelve ideas for a new Northeast Park, and a lot of discussion about how these ideas and parts might work with what’s already there between Polk and Johnson from 16th to 13th avenues NE.Add two more days intense work by the architects, and five different approaches emerge, incorporating the best ideas, brought back for more critique. While three of those seemed to rise to the top, at the Saturday, Aug. 3 meeting on the subject only about half of the Community Advisory Committee (CAC) members were present, so they didn’t vote.They hope to have at it again next in September or early October, with a final meeting in November at the latest, with Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board (MPRB) consideration also in November. CAC chair Doron Clark emphasized that at every meeting, there would be opportunity for public input. Continue Reading

Minneapolis: Sept. 5 deadline for Central streetcar comments

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A $60 million legislative maneuver by Northeast’s State Sen. Kari Dziedzic has pushed Minneapolis streetcars closer to reality. Residents and business people affected have until Sept. 5 to read up and write their comments, and then the matter will go to the Minneapolis City Council.The first phase of the Nicollet Avenue- Central Avenue or “10-18” streetcar route, named for the current bus routes, would go from Kmart to Kramarczuk’s, as one consultant put it in conversation, the infamous Lake Street-blocking Kmart on Nicollet Avenue, to somewhere between 5th and 8th Avenue in the Old St. Anthony area Northeast.Charlene Zimmer of ZAN Associates, a consultant acting as project manager for the City of Minneapolis, presented most of the information. She said this area, about one-third of the ideal 9.2 miles, would serve two-thirds of the transit-dependent (non-auto-owning) population, two-thirds of those considered in poverty, and two thirds of the non-whites along the 9.2 miles. Continue Reading

Going with the FLOW Northside in Minneapolis

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Like all art crawls offering way more than anyone can can see in the allotted time, FLOW is an individual experience. The West-Broadway-centered phenomenon, organized by West Broadway Coalition and listing 17 sponsors, expanded to three days, July 26, 27 and 28. Here’s my trip:Wenso Ashby and Jame warmed up at CCaldwell Fine Arts Gallery and Studio, 125 W. Broadway.Charles Caldwell painted the mural on the side of 4th Street Saloon. The latest addition, which will eventually read “Welcome to North Minneapolis”is coming along. Dinner on the Farm used ingredients from the West Broadway Farmers Market for the exclusive gourmet Underground Dinner in the Kindred Kitchen Courtyard, 1200 West Broadway; there was space for 40 people Friday night; apparently they dressed appropriately for the cold weather. At 1108 Broadway upstairs Friday, the artists and businesses in the Moja Studio and Artist Coop had their studios open for a meet and greet. Christopher Harrison talked with a friend about his latest work which involves a lot of sand. For the first time in eight years, instead of July heat, FLOW met the challenge of rain and chill, with some events on Saturday starting a half hour late.  Old Skool Hip Hop Dancers warmed up the crowd and Big Daddy Kane got the audience moving Saturday evening.  Indoors, on both Friday and Saturday, Wing Young Huie and Ashley Hanson demonstrated the various methods they’ve been trying to engage people around planning for Penn Avenue improvements. One game involves writing a question on a ping pong ball and then discussing the question while playing ping pong. Another challenge was to “tell your Penn Avenue story in 6 words.” Continue Reading

Progress possible on sex offender concentration after North Minneapolis residents meet with Hennepin County officials

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A month after public officials met community members in a heated exchange over Level 3 sex offenders, Hennepin County Commissioner Linda Higgins told NorthNews, “our county folks have finally realized they have someone that will” do the right thing. “There’s a law to pay attention to.”At the meeting, a Hennepin County Department of Corrections representative had said, “we need the support of our elected officials to say ‘no, it’s a concentration.” Minnesota Statutes 2012 244.052 Subd. 4a, Level III offenders; location of residents, states: “When an offender assigned to risk level III is released from confinement or a residential facility to reside in the community or changes residence while on supervised or conditional release, the agency responsible for the offender’s supervision shall take into consideration the proximity of the offender’s residence to that of other level III offenders and proximity to schools and, to the greatest extent feasible, shall mitigate the concentration of level III offenders and concentration of level III offenders near schools.”Information distributed by Jordan Area Community Council (JACC) staff before the meeting, held June 25 at North Regional Library, states that zip codes 55411 and 55412 (North Minneapolis) house 51 individuals, 39.5 percent of the total 129 Level 3 sex offenders in Minneapolis. Level 3’s are those determined to be most likely to re-offend.Officials at the meeting claimed that the recidivism rate is actually just 1-2 percent because of the intense supervision, check-in, and community awareness that comes with their placement. Later in the meeting, Nelima Sitati of Harrison neighborhood, where one count says 14 offenders live, reminded everyone that her zip code, 55405, is part of North Minneapolis too.Dave Haddy, a JACC board member, quoted contextual statistics, concluding that sex offenders are being deliberately concentrated into an area where people are most likely to be below the poverty line and where there are many children under age 18. Continue Reading

Biggers Seed Project funded, planning underway for new North Minneapolis mural

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Out of the impermanence of a painted freeway sound wall may come a permanent asset for the arts community, as well as, 13 years after demolition of the original North Minneapolis mural, an opportunity to learn history and art across generations.The City of Minneapolis learned July 17 the National Endowment for the Arts Our Town grant will fund the John Biggers Seed Project. This $150,000 grant matches funding from the City’s Art in Public Places program.Mary Altman, the city’s public art staff person, said about two-thirds of the needed funding is in place and there are other grant applications out. There is also work to be done to develop the process of selecting artists to work on the project; it’s anticipated that recruiting will take place in fall.Seitu Jones and Ta-coumba Aiken were involved in 1996 when John Biggers, the acclaimed African American muralist, and 17 emerging artists created the Celebration of Life mural on 160 feet of concrete freeway wall near Lyndale Avenue. The “Celebration of Life” mural used African folk symbols set against a serene blue background, and was intended to convey a message of creation and spiritual balance. When Heritage Park was built, the wall was torn down amid much angst and protest.Several works by Seitu Jones, developed with community members, have been incorporated into the infrastructure of Heritage Park in one effort to mitigate the loss of the iconic art.In the new project, Jones and Aiken will again play key roles, as will two associates of Biggers, Willis Bing Davis of Ohio and Jon Onye Lockard of Michigan, who were selected through an invitation call. Continue Reading