Two of Minnesota's top higher-education legislators have endorsed a request that the Legislative Auditor look into the process that led to the botched firing of Minnesota State Mankato football coach Todd Hoffner.

On Wednesday, MSM President Richard Davenport and Minnesota State Colleges and Universities System Chancellor Steven Rosenstone asked the Legislative Auditor's office to conduct an independent review of the process that led to Hoffner's firing for images of his children on his university-issued phone. Child pornography charges were filed, then dropped.

An arbitrator then ruled that Hoffner was wrongly fired and the coach has returned to his job. Mankato players initially refused to practice upon his return, but that kerfluffle was soon resolved.

Thursday, the Legislature's two Higher Education Chairs — Sen. Terri Bonoff and Rep. Gene Pelowski — added their voices to the request to have  the Legislative Auditor Jim Nobles look into what happened.

Said Bonoff in a statement:

"Given the problematic outcome of these decisions, a thorough analysis and review is appropriate. What happened? Was our process appropriate? What changes are needed? These questions are best answered by the independent Legislative Auditor."

And Pelowski said:

"The Legislative Auditor will provide us with the information we need to ensure this never happens again."

There appears to be a serious crack in the clerical fraternity … . Madeleine Baran of MPR reports, “[A] longtime official for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis disputed Archbishop John Nienstedt's sworn testimony on the clergy abuse scandal. Nienstedthad testified April 2 that the Rev. Kevin McDonough told him not to write down sensitive information about abusive priests because the information could become public in a lawsuit. Nienstedt also said McDonough provided vague information on past cases and led him to believe that the archdiocese was safe for children. … ‘He and I would have never been in a position for much casual conversation,’ McDonough said. ‘Archbishop Nienstedt managed largely by memo.’"

Oh, look what I have in this pocket … . The AP says,“Gov. Mark Dayton says he's willing to devote another $100 million of a budget surplus to ... broadband infrastructure expansion, additional prison staffing and court-ordered psychological examinations of sex offenders.”

Just a little beyond deterence … . The latest from the Byron Smith trial, from Pam Louwagie of the Strib: “Photos showed six gunshot wounds to Haile Kifer’s body — the most immediately fatal went into her head from under her left ear, according to testimony from Kelly Mills of the Ramsey County Medical Examiner's office. Nick Brady’s body contained three gunshot wounds, all of which would have been fatal, Mills testified.”

Advancing … the bill banning on-line lottery action. Says Doug Belden of the PiPress, “A bill that would ban online lottery ticket sales advanced in the House Thursday. The bill got the OK from the House Commerce committee and heads now to Rules. … In addition to banning online lottery ticket sales, the Senate version would eliminate ‘Play at the Pump’ gas-station sales as well as ATM sales.” MinnPost's Doug Grow saw this coming a couple of weeks ago.

Did you see this couldn’t-be-scripted-better moment from last night’s Twins game?Via FoxSports’ Tyler Mason: “With Minnesota Twins designated hitter Chris Colabello up to bat, FOX Sports North's Marney Gellner was interviewing Colabello's parents in the stands. During the live interview, Colabello launched a two-run home run to center field to tie the game at 2.”

Note to those headed that way … .The Strib’s traffic guy, Tim Harlow, reminds readers, “Commuting is about to get more difficult in the southwest metro as a section of Hwy. 169 closes Sunday evening and will be shut down until July. MnDOT will close the southbound lanes of Hwy. 169 between Crosstown Hwy. 62 and Valley View Road in Edina to resurface the road, improve drainage systems, install guard rails and put a new deck on the overpass spanning the Crosstown. Southbound Hwy. 169 traffic will be diverted onto westbound Hwy. 212 to I-494 during the nine-week closure.”

International sex abuse … . The AP reports,“A British private school said Thursday that images of between 50 and 60 of its students were found on the computer drive of an American suspected child predator who killed himself last month. The FBI has asked for international help to find victims of William Vahey, who worked at 10 international schools around the world over four decades. … Vahey, 64, committed suicide March 21 in Luverne, Minnesota, two days after U.S. agents filed for a warrant to search his computer thumb drive.”

Strib business columnistLee Schafer pooh-poohs the General Mills “immunity” flap: “... now that General Mills has said never mind, we’ve changed the terms back, it’s difficult to see what all the fuss was about. Arbitration clauses in consumer agreements have become more or less business as usual. ... It’s certainly true that anyone who thinks district court is efficient or particularly fair to small-claims plaintiffs has probably never seen the inside of a courtroom.” On Twitter, MPR's Bob Collins took Schafer to the virtual woodshed.

Classic fodder for Angry (and generally Old) White Males … . Jon Collins of MPR reports, “ … the celebration of Columbus Day still rankles Bill Means. ‘We had been edited out of existence in the public school system,’ Means said. ‘To say Columbus discovered America is one of the first lies we're told in public education.’ That particular struggle may be coming to an end, at least in Minneapolis. On Friday, the City Council will consider a resolution that would re-designate Columbus Day as Indigenous People's Day.” Then can we move on to Lake … Calhoun?

MinnPost photo by Karen Boros

Mayor Betsy Hodges

Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges focused on economic equity during her first State of the City address at the American Indian Center.

“While we are one great city, we are not a great city for everyone,” said Hodges citing a Metropolitan Council study that equal opportunity in her city and St. Paul would lift 274,000 people out of poverty, add 124,000 jobs, and increase personal income by $31.8 billion. 

“Growth that includes all of us will propel us further than doing what we have always done,” Hodges said. “Doing what we have always done will get us what we’ve always gotten. What we’ve gotten is growth that is thwarted by the biggest disparities in the country between white people and people of color.”

Hodges explained that she measures every issue she and her staff studied by asking three questions. Each initiative must make the city run well, move the city ahead on equality and make growth possible.

She renewed her call to increase the city population by almost 30 percent adding 107,000 new residents to the current population of 390,000, even though forecasters say it will likely fall tens of thousand short of that.

Hodges also singled out agencies and personnel for praise.

“Our Police Department, with Janee Harteau at the helm, continues its strong work,” said Hodges, noting that violent crime is currently at the lowest level in the last three decades.

“To enhance that work, residents need to see police officers who reflect them and their communities,” said Hodges, adding that this year the Police Department is slated to hire nearly 100 new officers.

She also hit on one of her campaign themes, more attention to children from birth to kindergarten. She announced that Peggy Flanagan, Executive Director of the Children’s Defense Fund, and Carolyn Smallwood, Executive Director of Way to Grow, will co-chair the “Cradle-to-K Cabinet.”

Hodges also endorsed transit systems as a tool for creating jobs and economic growth, noting that the Central Corridor line connecting downtown St. Paul and Minneapolis has already generated an estimated $2 billion in new development.

She did not mention the Southwest Light Rail Line, which the city is currently studying. Minneapolis officials have so far withheld municipal consent over co-location of light and freight rail, and a disputed Chain of Lakes tunneling system.

The State of the City address is the mayor’s major policy statement for the year ahead.

“It certainly sent out a blueprint for our staff to be working on and our staff to be taking action on,” Council Member John Quincy said following the speech. “The Mayor’s role is to set the tone, set the message and direct our staff to work on those issues.”

The next major address by the Mayor is scheduled for August when she will present the proposed 2015 budget. 

Osmo Vänskä will return as music director of the Minnesota Orchestra on May 1.

On one hand, the word today that the Minnesota Orchestral Association’s board of directors and Vänskä have reached agreement on a two-year deal ends the long labor saga that started Oct. 1, 2012, when the board locked out musicians.

It ends with musicians receiving half the pay cut that was being demanded by the board. It ends with chief executive Michael Henson out the door (at the end of the summer). It ends with Vänskä back.

A new series of challenges

But it’s far too early to determine winners and losers. All parties face a whole new series of challenges.

Clearly, the fan base supported Vänskä and will be cheered by his return. But will those fans, who waved Finnish flags when he was the “guest conductor" for a concert in late March, buy tickets into the future?

Even more important, the board  has been split over the lightning rod of this whole labor dispute, Henson. Several members of the board left when Henson was forced out on March 20 by a majority of the board. Board members are the big revenue producers for the orchestra. Presumably, the departure of several board members  means the loss of big dollars.

Hard work ahead

Can new donors be found? Will other donors, who supported the hard line once so enthusiastically espoused by Henson, stop writing big checks?

Finally, it will be hard for the orchestra to return to its position of excellence. Key musicians have left. The new contract calls for a smaller body. With Vänskä back, expectations may prove absurdly high.

Still, the return of Vänskä offers hope that an institution that was pulled apart might have a chance at being put back together. 

WASHINGTON — Sen. Al  Franken said Thursday that proposed federal rules loosening the Internet’s “net neutrality” regulations are “deeply disappointing and very troubling” and “would fundamentally change the open nature of the Internet.”

Federal Communications Commissioner Tom Wheeler is reportedly proposing a new rule that would allow companies to pay Internet service providers for access to quicker means of delivering their content to consumers online. The rule change, if it’s approved, would damage the concept of “net neutrality” — the idea that all content delivered online should be treated equally by Internet providers. Net neutrality holds that a company like Comcast, for example, shouldn’t be able to charge Netflix to stream video to consumers faster.

The rule change comes two months after a federal court ruled in January against a previous set of proposed government rules meant to stop such transactions and uphold net neutrality. Wheeler is now reportedly considering taking those rules off the books entirely.

Franken, who is one of Congress’s most vocal proponents of net neutrality, said the plan was “misguided.”

“The notion that the FCC might create a fast lane for deep-pocketed companies is deeply disappointing and very troubling,” he said in a statement. “Chairman Wheeler’s proposal would fundamentally change the open nature of the Internet, and I strongly urge him to reconsider this misguided approach.”

Congress would face lobbying blitz if it stepped in

The FCC had proposed restricting these “pay-for-play” schemes in a package of rules as early as 2010, but Internet providers quickly challenged the rules in court.

In January, a federal court struck the regulations down, saying that since federal law doesn’t consider the Internet a public utility, like electricity, it can’t be regulated as such.

“When the FCC rules for net neutrality were struck down earlier this year, I urged Chairman Tom Wheeler to act swiftly to maintain the open nature of the Internet,” Franken’s statement said. “But it appears that the Chairman is proposing to move in the opposite direction.”

University of Minnesota law professor Bill McGeveran said Congress could defuse the court’s ruling by stepping in and writing the regulations itself, or giving the FCC more guidance on what those rules should look like. There’s very little political will to do so, though, and if lawmakers moved in that direction, McGeveran predicted Internet companies would launch a lobbying blitz against it.

“You’d have lobbying in every direction,” he said, “and that’s not usually a recipe for quick action.”

Even though pay-for-play deals would be allowed under the reported rules, McGeveran said it appears Wheeler may try preserving as much of the FCC’s 2010 principles as he can, such as preventing Internet companies from blocking websites or lowering delivery speeds for content providers who don’t pay a fee.

“I think the FCC is trying to write a rule that will focus its energy on who would be the worst offenders of net neutrality,” he said.

The Netflix-Comcast deal, he said, is a example of what could come if the rule sticks: companies will likely look to pay to use the fast line rather than stick to the slower options that remain.

Higher prices for consumers

Of course, if companies are asked to pay a fee for quicker content delivery, that could eventually mean higher prices for consumers.

“Consumers are putting their head in the sand if they don’t think expenses are going to get passed along,” said Tom Salonek, the founder and CEO of Eagan-based Intertech.

Salonek wrote a Star Tribune op-ed about net neutrality on April 13 for the sake of raising public awareness about the issue, he said. If he has to, Salonek said his company, which makes software and provides software training, would pay a fee to access faster Internet delivery services.

But he said a pay-for-play system could hurt innovation if profitable companies are able to afford quicker Internet access that small start-ups can’t, even if they’re delivering an inferior product.

He said paying for better access wouldn’t threaten “groups that have been around and have cash-flow and money in the bank … It’s the guy working out of the back of his house trying to start something new, that’s the guy it’s going to have an impact on.”

The proposed rules are due to be publicly released next month, and could be approved later this year.

Devin Henry can be reached at dhenry@minnpost.com. Follow him on Twitter: @dhenry

My beloved mother, the late state Sen. Nancy Brataas, IR-Rochester, died last week at age 86. She was a woman for whom the most meaningful unit of existence was, perhaps, the campaign. Living a life of campaigns, both political and personal, Mom was the first woman in Minnesota to seek the office of senator of her own accord — as opposed to filling the seat of a deceased husband — and to win, serving from 1975 to 1992.

Her campaign-centric worldview was forged over decades of hard-fought and hard-won sparrings. Yes, there was always blood on the floor, but at least there was enough to go around; no one went hungry. That seemed to me, as a young child living in a politically evolving household, the most curious part: that the most stalwart combatants stuck together, whatever the outcome. The goriest battles engendered the deepest, strongest friendships. 

My mom died peacefully in wonderful, embracing hospice care, after 15 years of humoring chronic lung disease. She was grateful for every minute of what she regarded as a windfall of fluttering, fresh days. In a jolly medical check up April 7, she laughed and impishly implored her Mayo Clinic physician: "Why haven't I died yet?" Then she asked to view her lung X-rays taken over the years. She watched in wonder, as if they were family vacations of her lungs' carefree, bright childhood days — except they grew smaller, not bigger. At times like this, I wondered if death would work for Mom. Was it possible that she might actually kill death? Death didn't seem up to her — not enough imagination.

Tools and a truck

Death did finally make it, but only after she was hugely energized for one day by the prospect of remodeling her hospice room, noting archly in a fit of hyper-lucidity: "I feel like I'm in a Motel 6." In truth, the room had a perfectly lovely, Scandinavian-spare, clean and bright aesthetic. But Mom is a quatorze person — as in Louis XIV.

I was trying to find a way to gently explain that this was a transitional space, a conduit from the decorated Hither to the Neutral Yon, but she advanced the plot on me. She asked me to call a friend who had a truck and directed us to drive to her apartment, dismantle her personal hospital bed, haul it to hospice, and reassemble it in her room. We were to accessorize it, too, by bringing back the headboard, the bedclothes, the electrical squid of controlling cables, boxes, dials and cords. Oh, and the artwork on the wall — get it. 

In the family dialect of my childhood, this type of request was known as “A Classic Mom.” This is how I introduced it when I called Dennis, who has been Mom's friend-with-tools-and-a-truck for 45 years. Dennis was expecting the call to announce her death. Instead, he heard me say:

"We have A Classic Mom to do."

"OK."

 "We are going to go to her apartment and bring her hospital bed to the hospice, after we disassemble it. Then we will reassemble it in her room."

"OK."

"I should tell you that I would prefer a starter model — non-electric, for one thing — to debut my bed-assembly skills. Something like an Ikea snap-together job that you put together with an Allen wrench while walking the dog. Vastly prefer it."

"OK. Talk to you tomorrow."

Dennis and I expected to end the day by vivifying the room with a resplendent blaze of Louis and building a better bed. Perhaps that was all Mom needed in death, as in life: to know that we were willing. We would work with her. Her vision would and could come to be.

No pain, no gain

She never recovered the energy needed to pursue the makeover. Instead, she rested the following day, April 16, whispering her last word as a question: “Unconventional?” 

Yes, I assured her — and thanked her over and over. You were unconventional, and blessedly so, Mom. It prepared me for a life of exhilarating possibility. I wouldn't wish it any other way. Nothing is too difficult, all things are possible, wonder abounds. Whatever ridiculous thing has just been proposed — with a spritzing of imagination, soupçon of resourcefulness, a few friends with tools, trucks, talents and good hearts — will work. We'll get it done right and well, on time. That's my mother. My mother's unconventionality is the reason I still so much value the advice given me years ago in graduate school by my sage advisor: "Say yes to everything as long as it doesn't hurt you or other people." That attitude opens a lot of options.

Courtesy of the Rochester Post-Bulletin

Brataas is congratulated after her 1975 election to the state Senate.

Many of those who knew Mom felt — and appreciated — her unconventionality.

They understood her sense that life requires strenuous engagement with the world — be it with friend, foe, idea, problem, colleague, deadline, institution, pantyhose or U.S. Post Office trying to close before mailing something way past deadline.

As a child, this was presented to me as axiomatic. It led me at times to understand my mother as a form of exercise. If I didn't break a sweat in my exertions with my mother, I wasn't trying. No pain no gain. Her tenacity always called for another round of discussion, another piece of data to consider. Strenuous engagement was the default mode of interaction; it is the price of an original mind. Expect resistance to the thing never before thought or proposed; practice push back. Gracefully — or not. Deep, authentic, engagement is the thing. 

The whole package

"Your mother was an amazing woman and a true friend: Difficult, brilliant, talented, organized. So detailed! I'll miss her dearly."

I laugh at this frequent comment, knowing I am among true kindreds when they recall my mother as both difficult and dear in the same breath — and still they mourn the loss of the whole fractious package. It's the word order that contains the wisdom of a lifetime. It acknowledges that difficulty is indeed a part of the process of achievement and finding one's purpose. In this age of facile affirmations, awash in thumbs-up over-connected friending and fanning, we lose sight of the gifts of grit — particularly in women and girls. Mom was a big believer in therapeutic grit: that which prompts growth, deepens and infuses life with meaning. So yes, difficult fits. Dear, too.

If she had Central Teachings on Help — yourself and others — they might read like this:

Seek opportunity. My mother's career in politics started with the smallest opportunity when she was a young housewife with two toddlers. It was a casual request to help register voters, something that could be done an hour or two at a time. She said yes — and continued to say yes and show up. When opportunity knocked, Mom high-fived it back.

Rise to occasions. From her unsuccessful bid for lieutenant governor to contemplating a bid for U.S. Congress, to attending her grandson's 4th birthday party just shortly after her lung cancer surgery, Mom not only gamely showed up and rose to every occasion, she committed 100 percent to a project. In the case of the birthday party, despite the suffocating July heat that makes breathing difficult under normal circumstances — she went on a birthday party field trip to Como Park, picked her horse, threw a leg over and rode the carousel.

Live imaginatively, believe ferociously. Beyond politics, Mom was known for her love of gardens — and her unconventional practices there, too. Often she obtained riotous and thriving results of things that weren't supposed to grow where she put them. She especially loved our misplaced bog dweller, the tamarack tree, in our back woods. Mom could mobilize. Like the thousands of people she engaged in campaigns, the tamarack came to believe in Mom. It persisted because she believed it could, soil pH be damned.

Educate yourself first, then others. Mom was intensely and studiously interested in nearly every subject. She relaxed by listening to professional recordings by university professors, or watching didactically inclined movies and channels. Though art and history were staple subjects, in her later years she developed an intense interest in technology. She lamented that she did not have more time to master the iPad, her iPhone or be more adept on her computers — yes, plural.

Teach youth. Mom believed we all have in our souls the teaching impulse — "unrequited teach," I've heard it called. It's not a formal call to be a licensed career teacher or professor, of course. It's a call to present important information in a careful, purposeful and structured way; to practice it so that it transforms into knowledge, insight and a powerful understanding — because understanding gives people choices in the world. Her grandchildren remember her earliest teaching efforts as her offering "Grandma Grammar Awards." She encouraged them to attain verbal mastery of say, the subjunctive case, with incentives of award points redeemed for Lego sets.

Her last teaching adventure with her family was The Family History Project. It was an immersion into digitizing 60 bankers' boxes of files and images, as well as recording and videotaping with her grandsons many of the stories these files hold. This ongoing project can be seen, in part, at her web site. A digital book for iPad is still in production.

Mentor. Mom truly did believe in the Gospel of Help. She believed she was here to help — and so are you, and that we all can. 

Appreciate. One of my mother's most frequent requests of me in her later years was to help her send thank-you notes, by hand or email, because she believed in the power of appreciation. It was one of her most conspicuous, and longest-running campaigns: to make appreciation the way of the world — appreciating everything: beauty, curiosity, civic life and responsibility, winning, losing, trying. What may be her last thank-you note was hand-written on a notepad on her dining room table, thanking a friend for introducing her to a "new friend." The note says: "I'm so excited to learn more about my new friend Siri and this amazing technology. I think she'll be a wonderful friend for me because typing is so hard. Thank you, Siri!"

Unconventional? Absolutely, and blessed be.

Events

Services: Saturday May 10 (visitation at 10 a.m., memorial at 11 a.m.), Ranfranz & Vine Funeral Homes, 5421 Royal Place NW, Rochester, MN 55901.

A celebration of Nancy Brataas’ life and times in Minnesota politics: Sunday May 18, 5:30-8:30 p.m., University Club of St. Paul, 420 Summit Av., St. Paul, MN 55102

Anne Brataas is CEO and founder of The Story Laboratory LLC, St. Paul, an international science-writing consultancy. 

WANT TO ADD YOUR VOICE?

If you're interested in joining the discussion, add your voice to the Comment section below — or consider writing a letter or a longer-form Community Voices commentary. (For more information about Community Voices, email Susan Albright at salbright@minnpost.com.)

Be careful about how you explain this legal position in public … . Abby Simons of the Strib says, “Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson supported an initiative to clarify a long-standing provision that gives lawmakers immunity from arrest during the legislative session, but a key Senate lawmaker countered that education, not legislation, is key to clearing up misconceptions about the law. The so-called ‘Get Out of Jail Free Card’ has been the source of debate and controversy at the Capitol because some believe it could extend to drunken driving. ... Swanson said the law, as it applies to modern cases, would not get legislators out of an arrest for DWI or any other crime.”

... But doesn't the Minnesota Constitution say, “in all cases except treason, felony and breach of the peace, [legislators] shall be privileged from arrest” during a session? In a Strib commentary, Sens. Ron Latz and Scott Newman write,“If there is confusion about whether legislators are subject to arrest for drunken driving, perhaps it is time to consider eliminating the ‘privilege from arrest’ language from lawmakers’ wallet-sized identity cards, or at least clarify its meaning. However, legislation is not called for.”

Following Strib scoopster Graydon Royce and our Doug Grow, Michael Cooper of the New York Times writes, “In a move that some are calling a victory for art over commerce, the board of the beleaguered Minnesota Orchestra — which recently started playing again after a labor dispute caused a 16-month lockout — voted on Thursday to rehire Osmo Vanska as music director. … Mr. Vanska, who agreed to take the same pay cut as the musicians, said in a statement that he was pleased to have the chance to ‘rebuild’ his partnership with them, adding, ‘I look forward to getting back to music-making with the players and together re-establishing our worldwide reputation for artistic excellence.’”

What next? Pay for interns?Alex Friedrich of MPR reports, “Adjunct faculty at Macalester College and Hamline University will soon be voting on whether to organize. ... They said adjunct professors — generally part-time instructors without tenure — are a major part of the campus teaching force, and want a voice at work. Several described working long hours at multiple campuses with no job security, low pay and often no benefits.” If I didn’t know better I’d think the adjuncts want to be treated like real professors who had to kiss butt, connive and backstab for their tenure.

As for the bill banning online gambling, Doug Belden of the PiPress writes, “Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk, DFL-Cook, has said he thinks the bill will pass in the Senate. … Minnesota Lottery executive director Ed Van Petten warned of ‘unknown ramifications’ if the online service is terminated. About 8,500 people have subscription accounts for which they pay in advance and submit the numbers they want to play, he said. What legal liability would the state face if those contracts were canceled?”

PO’d anglers … . Says Dennis Anderson in the Strib, “Saying the Department of Natural Resources couldn’t have designed a better plan to wipe out Lake Mille Lacs walleyes than the one it has implemented since 1998, a group of Mille Lacs sport anglers and a resort operator sued the agency Thursday. … Particularly irksome, said Minneapolis lawyer Erick Kaardal, is the DNR’s recent edict prohibiting fishing on Mille Lacs between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. from May 12 to Dec. 1, which Kaardal said was administered without consideration of the lake’s walleye fishing heritage.’ Predictably, Indian fishing rights — netting — is a bone of contention.

I’m pretty sure “bragging” isn’t allowed in the The Great Minnesota Codebook of Social Comportment. But Curtis Gilbert at MPR writes, “Minneapolis has a problem, Mayor Betsy Hodges says: The city and its citizens are too modest. ‘We could discover cures for 17 kinds of cancer, and we would say nothing. And if someone else noticed, we would say, 'Yeah, well thanks. Anybody could have done it,' Hodges said Thursday in her first State of the City speech. ‘And then we would change the subject to the weather.’" So Hodges announced ... "The Best Week of Bragging about Minneapolis Ever.” Who are we bragging too, exactly? Our cousin in San Luis Obispo?

Meanwhile, St. Paul is bragging after the hometown Wild even up their playoff series with the higher-seeded Colorado Avalanche. The PiPress's Tom Powers, perhaps the only local daily columnist who approaches puck with a fan's preoccupation, celebrates the 2-1 win as "God's way of paying back Minnesota for all those years of substandard Wild teams." Two of the final three games are in Denver, however.

Brooklyn Park … boomtown. In the Strib, Don Jacobson says, “With the city of Brooklyn Park considering the approval of another in a series of new commercial building projects along the Hwy. 610 corridor, the development momentum in the northwestern suburb shows no signs of slowing down. If anything, a rare combination of available vacant land relatively close to the urban core, ongoing infrastructure improvements, the driving force of Target Corp. and an improving economy is likely to accelerate the building boom despite the city’s recent rejection of some projects … .” An artisanal charcuterie can’t be far behind.

Things you never put in writing … .  Erin Trester of the Forum News Service writes, “The Ellsworth head boys basketball coach faces stalking and assault charges after allegedly sending a school board member threatening text messages when the board voted against renewing his contract. John D. Roberts, who is also a physical education and health teacher in the southwestern Minnesota district, has been charged with stalking with the intent to injure, a gross misdemeanor, and fifth-degree assault, a misdemeanor. … school board member Michael Werner, told officials that Roberts left the meeting after hearing the news about the termination of his contract. When the meeting concluded, Werner said, he received a text message from Roberts stating, ‘I'm coming after you.’" Next time just cc the Sheriff and save everyone a lot of time. 

Obama administration officials, seeking to justify a new plan to regulate tobacco-less electronic cigarettes under a federal law governing tobacco products, on Thursday enumerated unanswered questions about e-cigarettes' possible health consequences and noted their rising popularity among teenagers and young adults.

I filed for the Hennepin County 3^rd District Commissioner special election to organize DEMAND from We the People for alternatives to the disastrous Southwest Light Rail plan.

I’d like to think that all elected public servants are temp workers … but this special election is the ultimate “elected temp job” — it ends in January 2015. Beyond the transit issue, let me just say: I’ll “do my homework” as needed regarding County Board issues, and will try not to do anything stupid.

Last Monday, a Republican Convention of Hennepin County 3^rd District Delegates endorsed me. I am the only convention-endorsed major party candidate on Tuesday’s primary ballot. 

Unfortunately, while MinnPost has profiled four unendorsed DFLers, my candidacy has been mostly brushed off and disregarded. I inquired as to why I wasn’t being profiled — here’s News Editor David Brauer’s e-mail reply:

“Our policy is to report on candidates who have some reasonable chance to influence the outcome of an election. In general, we do not report on frequent filers whose track record has been to capture minimal votes.”

“You are more than welcome to submit a Community Voices for consideration ..."

So… ok… here it is. By the way… it’s true I don’t “capture” votes – but I did receive about 17,000 votes in the 2012 Republican U.S. Senate primary – spending under $1,000. Free people vote too! Many Republicans have been listening… and agreeing. But I’ve also recently presented my plans one-on-one to MNDOT Commissioner Charlie Zelle, [state] House Ways and Means Chair Lyndon Carlson, Senate Transportation Chair Scott Dibble, Mayor Betsy Hodges, and to three Minneapolis Council members, including Cam Gordon. 

My Southwest Light Rail Alternative plan is laid out in a Star Tribune counterpoint— it’s on my website, with lots of additional detail, at www.bobagain.com.

Here’s the guts: let’s use Metro Mobility-size buses, and lots of them, to provide far more robust service for the corridor, with Five-Minute Service frequency. Use existing infrastructure whenever possible — specifically use Shady Oak Road to serve the Golden Triangle area, instead of bulldozing a light-rail line through it. Grade, pave and share with bikes the right of way from Shady Oak to Calhoun, then share the Greenway — to Uptown Transit Station, Lyndale, and a new Nicollet/35W/Lake/Greenway Transit Station. From there, the smaller buses will use inner ramps to go up to existing MnPASS lanes, then back and forth to downtown.

MinnPost file photo by Bill Kelley

Robert "Again" Carney

Result: a dedicated, congestion-free right of way from Shady Oak to Downtown. A trip from Uptown Transit Station to the downtown I-35W ramp will take about 6 minutes— the route then loops through the heart of downtown.

There’s more — my plan includes Five-Minute Service along the entire Greenway — from Uptown to Hiawatha, with elevators linking to all existing north/south bus routes. There will also be Five-Minute Service frequency on Broadway, linking to all north and northeast bus routes, with another shuttle linking to Uptown. The operating cost for my plan is comparable to the light rail plan.

That’s “Plan A”; my website also has “Plan B”: re-route light rail to the Uptown Transit Station, then tunnel under Hennepin — surfacing near Dunwoody. 

Of course, because my “Plan A” and “Plan B” routes go thru Uptown, we can and will leave Kenilworth alone… as it is… with no freight re-routing.

To see just how disastrously flawed the Metropolitan Council process has been, recall that during the “Locally Preferred Alternative” process, we were told Uptown options were unrealistically expensive because they would require tunneling. The Eden Prairie re-route added about $300 million to the cost. Now we’re talking tunnels under a bike path. That’s crazy! If the current plan had been presented initially, it would never have been accepted as a “Locally Preferred Alternative.” 

My “Transit Revolution” approach is designed to produce a fast and radical improvement in Transit options for the Twin Cities. With lots of small buses, and Five-Minute Service frequency, we can and should make transit an alternative that large numbers of people will freely choose. That’s my freedom-loving, congestion-ending vision. 

I have an MBA from Carlson (top 10 percent) and a core in Physics from Macalester. Last year, I wrote a 150 page e-book laying out my Minneapolis Transit Revolution plan — download it at www.bobagain.com. I am confident that over time you’ll hear more reporting on this at MinnPost, and through the mainstream media.

If you’re in my district, I’m asking for your vote for County Commissioner. We the People can and should DEMAND a fresh look at all our options for the Southwest Transit corridor. Automated driving is coming — when it’s here, a fine mesh of small vehicles and frequent service will be easier and better to convert than rail.

Questions … concerns … ideas? Call or text me, my cell phone is: 612-812-4867.

Robert "Again" Carney is a candidate for Hennepin County Commissioner, 3rd district, which covers downtown and southwest Minneapolis and St. Louis Park. The primary election is Tuesday, April 29.

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Fueled in part by the NSA surveillance scandal, Minnesota lawmakers are poised to crack down on how police and government employees access private data. But just how tough a crackdown is being decided now — in legislative negotiations with agencies that are being targeted. 

Bipartisan legislation would require cell phone tracking warrants, citizen notifications if cell phones are tracked, license plate data-storage restrictions, and logging and identifying government workers who access license information.

The moves address growing concerns that citizens’ private information might not be so private, but affected agencies argue a few proposals simply keep them from doing their job.

Underscoring the uncertainty of the end game, Gov. Mark Dayton is reserving judgment on several data-related bills. Dayton "has asked the several state agency heads with concerns about either bill to work with the authors and conference committee members to try to resolve those concerns before final floor action," spokesman Matt Swenson said. 

Watered-down cell phone warrants

GOP Sen. Branden Petersen, a freshman senator from Andover, says he’s working on a comprehensive, nation-leading regulatory framework around how government manages people’s personal data.

“I think the encouraging thing is it’s an issue that resonates on both sides of the aisle,” he said. “There are a lot of questions that need to be answered. In the 21st-century, what does the Fourth Amendment look like?”

State Sen. Branden Petersen

But Petersen is already running into the political realities of trying to tighten data privacy rules.

While the full Senate passed his proposal Tuesday requiring law enforcement agencies in Minnesota to obtain a “tracking warrant” in order to use cell phone tracking devices, Petersen says it wasn’t as strong as his original bill. 

The devices — commonly referred to by model names Kingfish and Stingray — work by impersonating a cell-phone tower and tricking a phone to connect to it using its own antenna. But while law enforcement is tracking the location of possible criminals in real time — an invaluable tool in missing persons and other cases, they say — they are also tracking the whereabouts of potentially thousands of innocent individuals.

The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) and the Hennepin County Sheriff’s office are the only agencies that currently use these devices, and they simply need a court order to do so.

Cell tracking warrants

Get the latest on the bill to
require warrants for cell-phone
tracking with MinnPost's 2014
Legislative Bill Tracker.

Petersen originally wanted to pass a bill that required law enforcement to obtain a search warrant to employ cell-phone tracking, which has more specific use requirements than a tracking warrant. In a last-minute move, Petersen accepted the tracking warrant amendment as part of a compromise with law enforcement.

“I still prefer my original bill, my original position. Unfortunately most of the Democrat votes were going to be lost at the behest of law enforcement,” Petersen said. “We had to accept the amendment to keep the bill moving forward.”

He’s happy his bill still would require people to be notified if their cell-phone was tracked.

The Senate bill is now similar to its House counterpart, authored by DFL Rep. Joe Atkins, which requires probable cause and a court order to access the information from the devices.

Vehicle-tracking clash

Another law enforcement tool that allows police to track vehicles — known as License Plate Readers (LPR) — is headed for negotiations between the House and the Senate. The arguments are similar: police say the tool is invaluable in solving crimes, but legislators say information is being stored on innocent people’s whereabouts.

State Rep. John Lesch

The House bill keeps law enforcement from keeping LPR information in a database — which could be used to reconstruct individual movements of people over a long period of time — but the Senate bill has a 90-day retention period for LPR scans or even longer, if the information is part of a criminal investigation.

“If you are innocent, the police department has no business tracking you without some level of probable cause,” House bill author John Lesch (DFL-St. Paul), said. “The Senate bill lowers that to a reasonable suspicion. That’s not high enough for me, and I think we are probably going to have a discussion about that.”

Public employee snooping 

Law enforcement isn’t the only part of state government keeping massive data sets on individuals. A proposal currently in House-Senate negotiations would crack down on the misuse of state government databases. 

Both bills would require identifying government employees from state or local agencies who access private data, even when it’s being used for work purposes. Government officials would also have to notify the person whose data was improperly viewed and allow that person to request a copy of the resulting investigative report.

Former state employee John Hunt was charged earlier this month for breaching thousands of driver’s license files — of mostly high-profile women — while he worked for the Department of Natural Resources.

His wasn’t the first case of state employees snooping on private data, and GOP Rep. Mary Liz Holberg, the author of the House provision, says it wont be the last. A lobbyist working on the medical marijuana issue at the Capitol this year was notified that there have been “dozens” of breaches of their personal data by government agencies around the state, sometimes at 3 a.m., Holberg said. 

State Sen. Scott Dibble

Sen. Scott Dibble, DFL-Minneapolis, the Senate bill author, said the provision to name the person snooping on data was added after Hennepin County Sheriff Rich Stanek found out his information had been viewed at other law enforcement agencies all over the state, but could not find out who was peeping. 

The Senate also wants the ability to publicly naming the guilty person on a government website.

But government agencies are concerned about having to track and obtain information on anyone who looked at your information — even if it was part of their job. In some cases, small-town local governments won’t have the technology or capital to extensively track their databases, they say. 

Beau Berenston, Association of Minnesota Counties policy analyst, said county workers to who, for instance, help calculate child services, could be the target of client “threats and other retribution” if the bill passes. “We are extremely concerned about the unintended consequences of this provision,” he said.

Legislators are still negotiating the proposal’s final details, but Holberg said they’re keeping government agencies’ concerns in mind. “We don’t want a situation where we put in language where it will have a chilling effect on people who are just doing their job,” she said.

Future-protecting privacy

One proposal aims to create a commission— based on the state’s pension commission — that would foster data-privacy experts within Legislative ranks for years to come. 

“Technology is changing — we are constantly playing catch up,” said Lesch, DFL-St. Paul, who chairs the House Civil Law Committee. “We don’t need to just be vigilant on the back end when this stuff gets out, we need to be vigilant on the front end too, because no matter what there’s going to be leaks and mistakes.”

ragamala.net

Ranee Ramaswamy

The warm spotlight of the Doris Duke Performing Artist Awards shone brightly on Minnesota earlier this week, when four artists with connections to the state were named winners of the prestigious and generous award. Emily Johnson, founder and artistic director of Catalyst Dance, Ragamala Dance founder and co-artistic director Ranee Ramaswamy, and jazz pianist Craig Taborn, who now lives in New York but grew up in Golden Valley, each received the 2014 Doris Duke Artist Award, a largely unrestricted grant of up to $275,000. Open Eye Figure Theatre co-founder and puppet-maker Michael Sommers received the Doris Duke Impact Award, worth up to $80,000. This is the first time since the awards began in 2012 that Minnesotans have been among the winners.

The Doris Dukes are unique among awards given to artists. They are not lifetime achievement awards or “genius” grants, but investments in the potential of individual artists, with an emphasis on saving for the future. Their focus is on contemporary dance, jazz and theatre. Read more about the awards and the winners here. In May at the Walker, we’ll see two Doris Duke winners on the Walker’s stage at the same time when Ragamala Dance debuts its new work, “Song of the Jasmine,” a collaboration with jazz musician and 2013 Artist Award winner Rudresh Mahanthappa.

Big news for a whole lot of music fans: The Replacements will play Midway Stadium in St. Paul on Saturday, Sept. 13. That’s 23 years after their last hometown gig (in 1991) and shortly before Midway comes tumbling down. (The St. Paul Saints are getting a new stadium in Lowertown.) The Current’s Andrea Swensson has written a blog post with everything you need to know about this event, which will be talked about nonstop before and after. Tickets ($50) go on sale at 10 a.m. Saturday, May 3 at eTix, the Midway box office, and the Depot Tavern at First Avenue.

And, speaking of big music news: Starting May 1, Osmo Vänskä will return as music director of the Minnesota Orchestra. See Doug Grow's Thursday story here and my article on reactions to the news here.

Gov. Mark Dayton has proclaimed next Saturday, May 3, “Pete Seeger Day.” That would have been Seeger’s 95th birthday; the great folksinger and activist died in January. Minnesota will celebrate with “For Pete’s Sake,” a festive event at the Fitz. Structured like “a folk opera in two acts,” it will include live music and readings of Seeger’s written works. Among the parade of performers scheduled to appear are Robert Robinson, Prudence Johnson, Estaire Godinez, John Gorka, Chastity Brown, Peter Ostroushko, Tonia Hughes, Aimee Bryant, Tony Glover, Mitch Walking Elk, Dale Connelly, Louis Alemayehu, Sharon Sayles Belton, Rhiana Yazzie, Ann Bancroft, Scarlett Lopez Cruz and Hector Lopez. 7:30 p.m. FMI and tickets ($30). Proceeds benefit the Park Avenue Children’s Defense Fund Freedom School in south Minneapolis.

Mark Moran

What’s that old painting, quilt, vase, toy, clock, chair or weathervane really worth? Have an antique professionally appraised for free by Mark Moran, guest expert on “Antiques Roadshow.” He’ll be at two St. Paul public libraries in May, and if you want your time with him, pre-registration is required. (Walk-ins may be allowed, but don’t count on it.) Thursday, May 8, 4-8 p.m. at West 7th Library; Sunday, May 18, 1-5 p.m. at Hayden Heights Library. FMI.

For artists: Here’s your chance to fill a street-facing vacant window in downtown Minneapolis with your creative work. Led by Hennepin Theatre Trust, “Made Here” is making the Minneapolis Cultural District – stretching from the Walker and the Sculpture Garden to the Mississippi riverfront – more colorful, lively and inviting. “Made Here” has issued an open call to artists, with applications due Monday, May 13. Here are the deets.

Not to nag, but: (1) This Saturday (April 26), thousands of people in 11 American metro areas including Minneapolis-St. Paul will grab their smartphones and video cameras and head out to film “One Day in the Twin Cities,” part of a nationwide media event. Participation is free, and your video could end up on TV. FMI here and here. (2) If you have an idea for the arts in St. Paul, you have 10 more days to apply for the Knight Arts Challenge and some of the $4.5 million the Knight Foundation has committed to this program. Applications (just 150 words) are due by 11 p.m. Monday, May 5. One thing we learned from a Q&A session we attended earlier this month: Most applications come in at the last minute. Sending yours sooner might improve your chances. FMI here and here.

On sale now: Love “The Voice” on TV? See top finalists and past stars at Mystic Lake on July 17. Confirmed so far: Tessane Chin, Jaquie Lee, Will Champlin, Dia Frampton and this season’s winner, runner-up and third-placer. 8 p.m. Tickets here ($59-$69). Coming to Mystic Lake Aug. 9, not yet on sale: American Idol Live 2014… Due at the Dakota: Diane Schuur on June 24 ($30, $40), Nels Cline and Julian Lage on July 1 ($25, $35).

Our picks for the weekend

There’s so much going on this weekend that we hardly know where to begin. To cram in more choices, we’ll try to keep the descriptions short, which runs counter to our nature but there it is. Follow the links FMI.

All day today (Friday, April 25) and into the night at the University of St. Thomas O’Shaughnessy-Frey Library: Emily Dickinson 1,789-Poem Marathon. At 8 a.m. this morning, someone started reading Emily Dickinson’s poem No. 1. Sometime between 9 and 10 tonight, someone will read No. 1,789. Anyone who shows up can join the circle of readers. 2115 Summit Ave., St. Paul. Free and open to the public. FMI.

Tonight: MinnRoast. MinnPost’s annual whoop-de-do and fundraiser features headliner Lizz Winstead (co-creator of “The Daily Show”) and willing participants Gov. Mark Dayton, Sen. Al Franken, Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges, U of M President Eric Kaler, vocalist Erin Schwab, Tesfa Wondemagegnehu and VocalEssence, K-TWIN’s B.T., former state Sen. Amy Koch, and more. At Rock Bottom Brewery and the State Theatre. Pre-show reception at 5:30, show at 7:30.

Tonight through Sunday: Spring 2014 Saint Paul Art Crawl. Over 300 artists will display and sell their original artwork at 28 building locations throughout the city, mostly in Lowertown. Some 25,000 people are expected to attend. Now in its 23rd year, the Crawl isn’t only about buying and selling; it’s also about music (more than 50 acts), dance, poetry, parades, eating, drinking, and participation. New this year: five busking stations, free to all performers on a first-come, first-served basis. A beer-themed art exhibit. Art on baseballs (at Union Depot). An “Art in Architecture” tour of the Rossmor Building. Free pedicab and Metro Transit bus rides. And passports that earn prizes. 6-10 p.m. Friday, 12-8 p.m. Saturday, 12-5 p.m. Sunday. Free.

Saturday in Uptown: The new Walker Library opens with a celebration starting at 9 a.m. Spacious, sunny, and (thankfully) above ground, the $12 million, 15,000-square-foot library on the northwest corner of Hennepin and Lagoon was developed with help from a community advisory committee. Remarks and ribbon-cutting will be followed by music and activities. 2880 Hennepin Ave. S.

Photo by Jimmy Katz

Miguel Zénon will appear with the JazzMN Orchestra on Saturday.

Saturday at Hopkins High School: Miguel Zénon and the JazzMN Orchestra. The prodigiously talented young Puerto Rican jazz musician, a multiple Grammy nominee and MacArthur “genius” grant winner, has mined the music of his native land to make some of the most beautiful albums released in the past several years. JazzMN founder and director Doug Snapp says, “The music … is nothing like you’ve ever heard performed by a jazz orchestra before … Zénon’s playing just sings over the top of the band.” He’ll join JazzMN for the second part of the final concert of its 14th season. The first part will feature standards and vocalist Debbie Duncan. 7:30 p.m. FMI and tickets ($18-$30, more at the door).

Saturday and Sunday: Minneapolis & Saint Paul Home Tour. The popular annual Home Tour invites you into people’s homes to see their additions, renovations and remodeled rooms. This year’s 53 homes include old, new, large and small in various neighborhoods. The owners (and contractors, architects, and tradespeople) are around to answer questions. You can pick up a printed guide at local libraries. Saturday 10 a.m. – 5 p.m., Sunday 1-5 p.m. Free.

Saturday and Sunday at the Capri: “Where Is the Love? A Salute to Donny Hathaway and Roberta Flack.” Music writer and Hathaway fan Michael Anthony sent these words our way: “Donny Hathaway’s premature death in 1979, ruled a suicide, brought an untimely silence to one of the most distinctive and sensual voices in American popular music. But Hathaway’s many recordings, including those with Roberta Flack like the Grammy-winning hit single ‘Where Is the Love?’ remain a welcome part of the soundtrack of our lives. Two excellent singers, Aimee K. Bryant and Julius Collins III, backed by the multi-talented Sanford Moore, will pay tribute to Hathaway and Flack in two concerts at the Capri Theater (2027 W. Broadway) this weekend: 7 p.m. Saturday, 3 p.m. Sunday.”FMI and tickets ($25).

Sunday at Bethel’s Benson Great Hall:“Tchaikovsky for Voices.”VocalEssence ends its 45th season with a big, romantic bang. Three hundred voices – VocalEssence, the Bethel Choir, the Gustavus Choir, Luther College Nordic Choir, and the University of St. Thomas Chamber Singers – will join in singing Tchaikovsky’s “The Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom.” Plus each college choir will sing a solo set. And MPR’s Steve Staruch will host a pre-concert conversation. 3 p.m. FMI and tickets ($20-$40).

Sunday at Macalester’s Weyerhaeuser Chapel: A celebration of poetry hosted by Garrison Keillor, and the announcement of the winners of “Love Letters,” the second annual Common Good Books Poetry Concert. Someone will win $1,000 – for a poem! Imagine that! 1:30 p.m. Free and open to the public.

Monday at Christ Church Lutheran: Accordo. Minnesota’s chamber supergroup turns five and ends its fourth season with a program of music by Schumann, Shostakovich and Dvorák. With Ruggero Allifranchini & Kyu-Young Kim, violins; Rebecca Albers, viola; Anthony Ross, cello; and Mihae Lee, piano. Stay after for a birthday-style party with sweet treats. 7:30 p.m. FMI and tickets ($12-$25).

Monday at the Dakota: Joe Lovano Us Five. Grammy winner, educator, composer and innovator, saxophonist Joe Lovano is a genial giant of modern jazz. When he plays the Dakota on Monday, there should be a line out the door and around the block. This is 2014, so there won’t be, but if you have the slightest interest in jazz, don’t miss this. Us Five features two drummers, which is pretty darned exciting. 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. FMI and tickets ($40 and $25). 

Andrew Wallmeyer

I’m proud to announce that MinnPost has named its first publisher, Andrew Wallmeyer, a journalist who got an MBA and now is a senior associate at the strategic consulting firm McKinsey & Co. 

Andy will oversee the business side of MinnPost, reporting to me. 

Andy emerged from an extensive search that produced a strong pool of applicants. Laurie and I and members of the MinnPost board involved in the search were impressed by his strategic thinking, communication skills, and dedication to figuring out how to make high-quality, nonprofit regional journalism sustainable.

“As someone who loves both great reporting and my Minnesota home, I could not be more excited to join MinnPost and help the organization prosper and continue to blaze new trails in nonprofit journalism,” he said earlier this week. “This is my dream job.”

Andy is a 2002 graduate of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he was editor in chief of The Daily Cardinal, leading a staff of 200, and president of the Wisconsin Union, managing 300 students and a $20 million budget.

Andy then worked as a reporter for seven years, starting at Dow Jones Newswires in New York and ending at his hometown paper, the Stillwater Gazette. 

He earned his MBA at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management in 2011, spending the summer between the two school years working on strategic planning for the Associated Press in New York. Following graduation, he joined the Minneapolis office of McKinsey & Co., where he has since served on teams advising Fortune 500 firms, governments and nonprofits on business issues.

Outside of work, Andy was a founding board member of the White Pine Festival and its communications director from 2005-2009. His wife, Katrina, is the director of development and communications for VocalEssence.

Andy’s first day of work will be May 1. But he and his wife plan to attend MinnRoast tonight. You can reach him at awallmeyer@minnpost.com.

When the Tennessee General Assembly voted last week to criminally prosecute women who use illegal narcotics during pregnancy, it ignored, among other things, the major medical community’s longstanding warnings about the negative and counterproductive effects of such punitive measures.

The bill, sent to Gov. Bill Haslam for consideration April 16, allows for felony assault charges against a woman “if her child is born addicted to or harmed by the narcotic drug, and the addiction or harm is a result of her illegal use of a narcotic drug taken while pregnant.” (A conviction can get you 15 years in prison.)

A woman may be protected from prosecution, the bill says, if she “actively enrolled in an addiction recovery program before the child is born, remained in the program after delivery, and successfully completed the program, regardless of whether the child was born addicted to or harmed by the narcotic drug.”

But the threat of prosecution is the very thing that prevents women with substance use disorders from seeking help, medical professionals say — and not all women will have equal access to care and treatment options.

Here’s a sampling of their many cautionary statements over the years:

The American Society of Addiction Medicine: “Incarceration of pregnant women as a means of preventing fetal exposure to alcohol or other drug use may compromise both maternal and fetal health and inhibit the pregnant woman’s opportunity to receive effective treatments to address her long-term recovery from her substance-related disorder.”

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists: “Seeking obstetric–gynecologic care should not expose a woman to criminal or civil penalties, such as incarceration, involuntary commitment, loss of custody of her children, or loss of housing. These approaches treat addiction as a moral failing. Addiction is a chronic, relapsing biological and behavioral disorder with genetic components. The disease of substance addiction is subject to medical and behavioral management in the same fashion as hypertension and diabetes.”

The American Psychiatric Association: “APA urges that societal resources be directed not to punitive actions but to adequate preventive and treatment services for these women and children. APA strongly advocates the development and funding of the necessary inpatient, outpatient, and residential programs for mothers with their children. Services should address and foster the parental functions, as well as the care of individual mother and child.”

Bratcher Goodwin

Michele Bratcher Goodwin, Everett Fraser Professor in Law at the University of Minnesota Law School, has made a close study of such policing efforts, especially their impact on drug-addicted poor women of color.

Tennessee’s proposed law, she said in an interview this week, “is like throwing a lit match in a very dry and hot place, and the kerosene is already there.” Here’s a summary of her many issues with this and other such laws.

They criminalize drug dependency, which is an illness:

Taking away women’s liberties for something that we know is a medical condition, such as drug dependency, is criminalizing drug dependency. The U.S. Supreme Court said decades ago that criminalizing drug dependency is like criminalizing someone for having the flu.

They target women of color:

For decades, across the United States, we have been criminalizing poor women of color for drug use during pregnancy. And there are significant disparities. For example, we know that physicians are 10 times more likely to report an African American woman for her illicit drug use during pregnancy than a white woman.

And ... because they’re poor, they usually don’t have access to good criminal defense attorneys. And even the criminal defense attorneys who are sympathetic are often not well-versed in cases such as this.

So those who end up in situations where they are prosecuted under laws for posing some sort of harm to their fetuses usually end up accepting some plea bargain. Their cases rarely end up fully adjudicated in front of a jury because they’re coerced and pressed into taking a plea deal.

Anyone can see what kind of leverage a prosecutor can use. For example, a woman who happens to be less educated and poor is told, “Oh look, we’ve got this evidence that your drug use killed your baby." Or "Your drug use affected your baby in this way.” They don’t have the resources to mount a good defense that would include bringing in witnesses who testify, and say, “That’s not true.”

They apply different standards based on class:

Let’s face it: Any woman who happens to be well-to-do who suffers psychological challenges during her pregnancy can seek medical treatment through her doctor and receive prescription medication. And many women do. In fact the empirical evidence suggests that the wealthier a woman is, the more educated [and white] she is ... chances are that during her pregnancy, she’s taking a prescription medication — often cocktails of prescription medications.

The truth of it is ... there’s a different level of moral scrutiny applied based on the type of drug that a woman takes during pregnancy. If it’s prescription medication, we treat that as a morally neutral thing or morally appropriate that the woman receive what we consider to be that type of care — to help and assist her during her pregnancy. And yet a woman who is poor, who lacks access to a physician, and who takes essentially the same kind of drug, except that it’s provided by a dealer on the corner, loses any of that of compassion, any of that moral authority to treat the challenges that she has during her pregnancy, which are no different from the challenges that a woman who happens to be wealthier and more educated has during her pregnancy.

So there is a very different lens that is applied simply based on class.

They reinforce stereotypes and misinformation:

For example, the “crack-baby” scare was incredibly successful during the 1980s, 1990s, and the beginning of the 2000s — based on very faulty information that was spread in the media. In fact, last year the New York Times ... acknowledged that they and other media outlets got it wrong, that they relied on faulty information and published stories that could not be verified and that we know today happen to be simply untrue in terms of crack causing conditions that would lead to the babies being malformed, with smaller brains, with distended genitalia — all sorts of crazy things that were written about in the 1980s that now we know are absolutely just not true. So one of the problems with this, too, is that it helps to reify certain types of stereotypes that are quite problematic.

They corrupt the doctor-patient relationship:

Part of what happens is that states seek to use doctors as gatekeepers, as law enforcement. And this is bad because the public understands their relationship with their doctors to be based on something that involves a fiduciary relationship, which suggests that it’s a very special kind of relationship, where the doctor owes his or her loyalty to his or her patient. The doctor must place all other interests to the side because the primary interest has to be serving the needs of the patient. This also includes preserving the confidentiality of the communications between the doctor and the patient.

Now when law enforcement gets involved in that, it completely distorts this relationship that we come to — expecting care, expecting trust, and expecting that we are the primary beneficiaries of the doctor’s work. That goes out the window in these cases where the state expects the doctors to become their enforcers, to become their snitches. It reprioritizes the medical relationship. So the doctor might otherwise say, "What I need you to do is to get into this rehab program. So here’s a course of action that I recommend for you."

Instead, when law enforcement places this kind of onus and burden on doctors, then law enforcement ... expects for doctors to just call the prosecutor’s office and call police. That completely shortchanges the doctor’s attempt to try to get appropriate medical services to the patient.

And one final thing that I think is really problematic in terms of the physician-patient relationship is that our criminal justice system requires that when a person is being sought by the state for breaching the law in some way, the state has to inform that person that what that person says, what that person does, may in fact incriminate that person. They have to inform the person that this is a criminal matter and that the person has the right not to respond and that the person also has the right to engage an attorney.

Doctors do not provide that information, but this is the gateway to prosecution. Women are being arrested right after seeing their physicians and disclosing information that they believe will be held in confidence. It’s a complete a breach of our constitutional norms in the criminal justice system.

They break up families, and funnel the children of prisoners into the criminal justice system:

Many of these women are already moms, they’re primary caregivers ... [and] children end up in the criminal justice system pipeline because they end up in foster care, and foster care is a criminal justice pipeline. There are very provocative studies being done at the University of Chicago and the University of Wisconsin that detail these horrific outcomes for children who are in foster care who age out [turn 18] and ... have parents who are in prison. They have higher incidence of dropping out and higher incidence of being involved in the criminal justice system. For the girls, over 70 percent end up pregnant themselves by the time they age out.

They allow the state to try to achieve a public good in an unconstitutional manner:

No one wants to see a woman using drugs during pregnancy, and ideally we want all babies to be born healthy. But we cannot discriminate between classes of pregnant women, and target only poor pregnant women. Nor is it permissible for the state to try to achieve a good goal in an unconstitutional way. Hundreds of years of constitutional law tells us that even when the state thinks that it’s going to be something good, it can’t break the law to do it. It can’t violate someone’s constitutional right in order to try to achieve a good, including a public-health good with fetuses.

If you’re celebrating the 450^th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s birth this week, then you may enjoy the April 19^th edition of New Scientist magazine. It includes several articles about the bard’s influence on science and medicine.

The article I found most interesting focuses on how Shakespeare’s keen observations of the workings of the troubled mind — whether in the young Hamlet, the middle-aged MacBeth or the elderly King Lear — impresses many clinicians who diagnose and treat people with neurological disorders.

“Epilepsy, psychiatric breakdown, sleep disorders. ... For all the crudity of 16th-century healthcare, there's a surprising amount of modern medical detail in Shakespeare's plays,” writes Rowan Hooper, an online news editor for New Scientist. "The behaviours of some of his characters often bear a striking resemblance to how today's doctors describe a range of neurological disorders, and his observations continue to inspire centuries after his death.”

Just how striking is that resemblance? Well, Hooper offers “case notes” on some of Shakespeare’s most iconic characters. Here are a couple of them (with British spellings and punctuation):

Name: Sir John Falstaff

Description: Alcoholic, overweight old man

Supporting quote: "If sack and sugar be a fault, God help the wicked."

He may be sweet and kind, but Falstaff is also plump, addicted to sack (sherry) and suffers nightly from a treatable sleep disorder. The evidence comes from a report of Peto, a companion of Falstaff, who was asked to fetch him. "Falstaff!" he scoffed, "Fast asleep behind the arras, and snorting like a horse." Prince Hal replied, "Hark, how hard he fetches breath."

In people who are overweight, there may be constriction on the airways, and this narrowing can lead to sleep apnoea, the commonest form of sleep-disorder breathing. Falstaff may be a comic character, but sleep apnoea is not a trivial condition: those with it may be at risk of brain damage that can contribute to memory loss.

Adolf Schrödter

Falstaff und sein Page, oil on wood

Name: Hamlet

Description: Danish prince, aimless graduate

Supporting quote: "Man delights not me — no, nor woman neither."

Recently bereaved Hamlet, a graduate around 30 years old, thinks life isn't worth living, saying "I do not set my life at a pin's fee". He is melancholic and impulsive, accidentally killing his girlfriend's father. Most of all he swings between moods superbly high and desperately low. He can be tender to his girlfriend, Ophelia, but then cruel ("Get thee to a nunnery: why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners?") and almost violent. His wit and insight is second to none but can manifest in extreme talkativeness and an inability to assess danger. He is also indecisive.

Under the latest edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Hamlet's symptoms suggest bipolar disorder— an assessment that makes sense to Farah Karim-Cooper, a scholar at Shakespeare's Globe theatre in London. "You can see evidence of his mood swings and rage in his chamber with his mother, and in his exchanges with Ophelia," she says.

For those following the long, agonizing story of the Minnesota Orchestra, Thursday’s news was a thunderbolt: Osmo Vänskä had his old job back. The Minnesota Orchestral Association board, or enough of the board, had voted to reinstate him as music director.

Doug Wright, the Minnesota Orchestra’s principal trombone and a member of the musicians’ negotiating committee, was as surprised as the rest of us. “I did not know this was coming,” he told MinnPost later that day. “I knew the vote was coming, and I was hopeful, but I really didn’t know where it was heading.

“The last two years have been a hell of a roller-coaster ride,” Wright said, “with lots of ups and downs. Over the past couple of months, that has intensified to some degree. But I was always hopeful this day was going to come.”

Under the terms of a new two-year agreement, Vänskä will begin May 1. He will lead at least 10 weeks of concerts during each of the next two seasons, 2014-15 and 2015-16, which are now in the planning stages. He'll accept the same 15 percent reduction in compensation the musicians agreed to.

Musicians 'truly excited,' MOA 'delighted'

The musicians issued their statement shortly before the MOA did: “The musicians are truly excited by the board’s decision to bring back Osmo as Music Director. This is a major step in rebuilding the trust and collaborative spirit within our organization as well as with our community. We very much look forward to further collaboration with Osmo, our Board, and our community to continue to build upon the Minnesota Orchestra’s 110-year legacy of artistic excellence.”

Speaking through the MOA’s official statement, board chair Gordon Sprenger said, “Osmo Vänskä led the Minnesota Orchestra to great heights during his previous tenure as music director, and we are happy to be able to reunite Osmo and the Orchestra to deliver outstanding musical performances for our community and to extend their celebrated musical partnership. We are delighted he is back.”

Vänskä said, “I am very pleased to have this chance to rebuild the Vänskä/Minnesota Orchestra partnership, and I look forward to getting back to music-making with the players and together re-establishing our worldwide reputation for artistic excellence.”

Wright and Vänskä texted back-and-forth on Thursday. “I believe he’s thrilled,” Wright said of Vänskä. “I think he’s really excited and ready to get to work immediately.”

Photo by John Whiting

Minnesota Orchestra principal trombonist Douglas Wright: “The last two years have been a hell of a roller-coaster ride. But I was always hopeful this day was going to come.”

It’s a bit early for reflection, but we asked Wright what he thought had made this outcome possible. There were many times – during the 16-month lockout and after, as board members battled, several resigned, and the Symphony Ball was canceled – when it seemed that matters could only get worse.

“I’m guessing that the board ultimately saw this as the best, if not the only, avenue toward success,” Wright mused. “Osmo is our artistic leader. He is clearly sought after by the community. The entire music world has been clamoring for this day. He’s our biggest ticket seller and one of our greatest fundraisers. All of these things add up to – this is what we’ve got to do.”

SOSMN calls for community contributions

The citizens’ group Save Our Symphony Minnesota (SOSMN), a steadfast, articulate supporter of the orchestra and originator of the “Finnish It!” campaign that brought Finnish flag-waving audiences to Orchestra Hall in recent weeks, also issued a statement Thursday afternoon:

We believe that the return of Maestro Vänskä as Music Director will foster healing of the organization’s relationship with its constituencies, will increase ticket sales and donations, and will help restore the orchestra’s international reputation. SOSMN looks forward to working with MOA on this restoration and calls upon the audience, donors and community to support the Minnesota Orchestra through the challenges ahead.

MinnPost spoke with SOSMN’s Mariellen Jacobson. “Restoring Osmo to his position as music director was essential,” she said. “We’re very happy that has taken place, and we’re expressing our thanks to the board for approving this move today. We are also calling upon our constituents – audience and donors – to make their appreciation known by making a contribution right away.”

By 5:30 Thursday afternoon, this status was posted on SOSMN’s Facebook page:

Remember how we flooded the MOA’s ticketing system back in January when the lockout was ended? Let’s flood their ‘giving’ system now to express our thanks to the Board for rehiring Osmo Vanska! If all 11,765 of us gave only $10 the impact would be mighty. But some of us can give $50 or $100 or $500 or more. Join the groundswell already started by SOSMN Leaders this afternoon! And be sure to add a personal message of thanks on the ‘checkout’ page at the end of your transaction.

Two years is a very short time to repair an orchestra that has been badly damaged. So SOSMN isn’t shutting down anytime soon.

More to be done

“We’re continuing," Jacobson said, “and we want to help fix things that need to be fixed. Governance changes still need to be made. Rebuilding the audience, rebuilding the donor base, getting tickets sold – all of those things are important. We’re here to help out in any way we can. We can’t be in the same financial crisis two years from now, or it has all been in vain.”

Donations, ticket sales, listeners in seats. That’s what the orchestra needs from the community, starting now. For Vänskä, who clearly considers the Minnesota Orchestra his own — anyone who attended his farewell concerts in October 2013 saw the pain on his face and heard it in his voice, when he asked the audience for silence — reinstatement must feel like victory tempered by sorrow. Like returning home after a hurricane, or a terrible fire. Your house needs major repairs, but it’s solid and standing. The neighborhood is mostly still there. You’re relieved and a bit giddy. Then you roll up your sleeves and, as the Maestro would say, get to verk. 

Saddam Hussein was a monster. But, as portrayed in a breathtaking achievement of reporting, the new post-American Iraq, the one the United States created under the slogan of "Operation Iraqi Freedom," is a thugocracy and kleptocracy in a state of perpetual sectarian conflict and violence.

This cruel joke against the benefits of democracy is led by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who was elevated and installed by the United States.

Dexter Filkins covered the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for the New York Times, shared a Pulitzer, and now writes for the New Yorker, which sent him back to Iraq to describe (and this is the title of the piece) "What We Left Behind."

Maliki has held office eight years now, although his re-election was blemished by the fact that another candidate got more votes. As a member of the Shiitte majority that was oppressed horribly by Saddam, Maliki had a hard early life, much of it lived in exile in Iran. As portrayed by Filkins, Maliki has led his country into the Iranian orbit, which seems kinda ungrateful of him, since he owes his job to the United States. But Maliki is no grateful American stooge. As Filkins writes:

By the time Maliki returned to Baghdad, in April, 2003, he had come to regard the United States with profound animosity, friends and associates say. Over the years, the U.S. government had supported nearly all of his enemies — most notably Saddam — and opposed his friends, especially the revolutionary regime in Iran. "Maliki was known as an anti-American," Dia al-Shakarchi, a Dawa activist in the eighties, said. "Even after 2003, his stance was very aggressive toward Americans."

One thing about being an American is that we get used to the idea of our special role as the one superpower in a one-superpower world and lose sight of the obvious fact that we are constantly doing things to other countries that we could never imagine any other country doing in ours. Like overthrowing their governments and putting in governments we like better.

As Filkins tells it, in early 2006, with Iraq still in the midst of a bloody civil war, a new election had been held and a coalition of Shiite parties, led by the incumbent Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, had won the most votes. But "Jaafari had infuriated {President George W.] Bush with his indecisiveness, amiably presiding over the sectarian bloodbath that had followed the recent bombing of a major Shiite shrine."

The U.S. ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, was "summoned to a videoconference with ... Bush and [British] Prime Minister Tony Blair. ... During the videoconference, Bush asked Khalilzad, 'Can you get rid of Jaafari?''Yes,' Khalilzad replied, 'but it will be difficult.'''

Filkins got this straight from Khalilzad. Khalilzad got Jaafari to withdraw on condition that the Americans allow someone from his party to take over. The best candidate who fit that description had to be vetoed because his father was an Iranian.

Frustrated, Khalilzad turned to the C.I.A. analyst assigned to his office, a fluent Arabic speaker whose job was to know Iraq’s leaders. "Can it be that, in this country of thirty million people, the choice of Prime Minister is either Jaafari, who is incompetent, or Ali Adeeb, who is Iranian? Isn’t there anyone else?"

“I have a name for you,” the C.I.A. officer said. "Maliki."

... Khalilzad emphasized that he did not choose Maliki; he had merely exerted American leverage to maximum effect. "We were trying to bring Iraqis together," he said. Maliki has said repeatedly, and often angrily, that he did not need American support to get what he wanted from Iraqis. For him, the Americans were just one more overweening foreign power.

You gotta love the modesty. He didn't choose Maliki, he said; he exerted American leverage to maximum effect.

Most of the story is not about how Maliki came to power but about what he has done with it. It isn't pretty. It's a long, sad, authoritative piece, but once I started it, I couldn't stop and I urge you to read it.

In a twist on the "outsource jobs overseas" theme, Minnesota officials are celebrating the opening of a clinical testing facility in Dilworth, Minnesota, owned by Axis Clinicals of India.

The plant will employ 100 workers at a former Wal-Mart site in Dilworth, which is just east of Moorhead. Clinical trials will conducted there for pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device companies.

State Department of Employment and Economic Development Commissioner Katie Clark Sieben was in Dilworth today touring the facility, along with the Axis CEO Dr. Yati Chugh.

If the company meets its hiring goals, it will get $780,000 for the expansion from the state's Job Creation Fund, which provides up to $1 million to businesses after they meet certain criteria, including minimum requirements for job creation and private investments. Businesses must create at least 10 full-time jobs and invest at least $500,000 to be eligible for financial assistance.

Axis Clinicals, headquartered in Hyderabad, India, has 350 employees at research and analysis facilities in the United States, India, Mexico and Thailand.

In a statement, Gov. Mark Dayton said:

“Axis Clinicals’ expansion is great news for Dilworth and great news for Minnesota. It is the best news for the 100 Minnesotans who will go to work in new, good-paying jobs."

Maybe not so crazy when you know the facts. At MPR, Laura Yuen says, “A broad coalition is trying to revive a long-shuttered swimming pool in south Minneapolis, calling it nothing less than a civil-rights struggle. Owned by the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board, the pool in the Phillips Community Center has been closed since 2008. Minneapolis has just three public indoor pools, all located in schools in more affluent corners of the city.”

Meanwhile, in another water-related civil rights issue, the Minneapolis City Council has dumped a day honoring noted sailor Christopher Columbus in favor of Indigenous People's Day, the Strib's Eric Roper reports. There was a time when you wouldn't have messed with Minneapolis Catholics and their legendary hero, but times have changed. MinnPost's Karen Boros offers her take here.

Medical marijuana on the march: In a bipartisan advance, a bill legalizing marijuana passed a state Senate committee 7-3, the PiPress's Christopher Snowbeck reports. Sponsor Scott Dibble reined in patient access and tightened dispensary rules, earning support from Ham Lake Republican Sen. Michelle Benson. DFL Sen. Chris Eaton voted no. The Strib's Pat Condon has more play-by-play.

No legislature jokes, please. WCCO-TV reports, “An officer in the city of Chaska ... recently took pictures of turkeys who were strutting their stuff in the middle of the a major road. The two male turkeys weren't allowing vehicles to pass and were also coming up right to them. The turkeys forced several drivers to turn around. Police say the male turkeys can be aggressive this time of year as they try to establish their dominance during the mating season.”

In that same vein … . KMSP-TV’s Bill Keller reports, “The land of 10,000 lakes is teeming with wild animals, but a fully grown lion is a rare sight — especially when it's just lounging around in the back yard of a metro suburb. A photo of an animal control officer posing by the giant cat got a lot of people talking, especially since Eden Prairie residents are prohibited from keeping exotic animals -- but apparently, it's OK as long as it's just visiting. ‘When we walked into the back yard, it was just like, 'Woah! There's a lion sitting right here in the back yard!’ Pastor Jordan Fleig said." I think we know what Sunday's sermon will be about.

Not exactly in step with the party line … . Randy Furst of the Strib writes, “Former Vice President Walter Mondale testified in U.S. District Court in St. Paul Thursday, defending his decision to pay a woman $30,000 less than a man at the Norwegian Consulate in Minnesota, when he was honorary consul general. In a civil trial that entered its fourth day, Mondale insisted the jobs were not comparable and the wage discrepancy was not due to gender, even though he later co-wrote a strongly worded letter to the Norwegian ambassador in an unsuccessful effort to get the woman’s wages raised.”

$8 million is real money … . James Walsh of the Strib reports, “Snaring the 2014 Major League Baseball All-Star Game was quite the coup for the Minnesota Twins and the Twin Cities. But who knew that it would be such a hit for Minnesota charities as well? On Friday, the Twins and Major League Baseball announced that the team, the Twins Community Fund, the Pohlad Family Foundation and the MLB Charities will contribute more than $8 million to local organizations and community projects connected to the celebration of the 2014 game.”

Interesting crime story by Mara Gottfried of the PiPress… . “Heidi Firkus has been gone for four years, and her family yearns to know the facts surrounding her death. The 25-year-old was fatally shot in St. Paul on April 25, 2010. Her husband, Nicholas Firkus, told police there had been an intruder in the couple's Hamline-Midway home and he had armed himself with his shotgun. He said he and the man struggled, the gun went off, and Heidi Firkus was shot in the back. The only time police talked to Nicholas Firkus was the day his wife was killed.”

In the mood for some Old School traditional-conservative thinking on taxes? In a Forbes column, Travis Brown looks at several recent taxation moves and says, “Minnesota is neither open for business nor willing to let one leave or visit freely. With $4.24 billion in annual adjusted gross income leaving Minnesota between 1992 and 2011 ... it is no surprise that lawmakers are seeking to keep more working wealth from leaving the state by any means possible. The fact that the DOR used a man’s visits to his grandchildren and doctors against him to claim more revenue for the state is enough evidence of this claim. Rather than using higher tax rates and the courts to balance these losses, Minnesota should go the way of Wisconsin and Michigan and cut taxes –states that are experiencing surpluses in the hundreds of millions of dollars for the first time in years, as well as overall economic growth – rather than California.” Would you buy a book by a money guru who wasn’t aware of the surplus here?

A few days old, but same vein … here’s conservative blogger Mitch Berg reacting to news of Glen Taylor buying the Strib and his talk with our Britt Robson. “So what does the Strib really need? ... an Editorial Staff that actually puts accuracy and completeness ahead of politics.  Today — when they’ll sit on video of Mark Dayton giving an embarassing speech, but race to press with even the most foetid allegations about Republicans — they do not.  This editorial staff needs to crack the whip on, if not “objectivity” (which I believe has always been a myth in the major media) at least detachment, balance and development of sources outside the current crop’s clubby Rolodex full of left-leaning contacts.”

Want to keep reveling in the Wild's stirring 2-1 series-evener over the Colorado Avalanche? The Strib's Howard Sinker posts the last, frenetic 2 minutes of the 2-1 win.

Indigenous People's Day — celebrating the heritage and contributions of Native Americans in Minneapolis — won unanimous support of the City Council at a meeting that overflowed the council chambers.

Beginning this fall, the holiday will be celebrated on October's second Monday, the day the state and federal governments designate as Columbus Day.

“We are sending a signal across the nation and to the global community that we make these changes in the spirit of truth-telling,” Council Member Alondra Cano told a gathering before the Council meeting.  

“This is not about Columbus; he is not the center of our existence,” added Cano, who led the drive to establish a new name for the holiday. “This is about the power of the American Indian and people in indigenous communities all over the world.”

The resolution establishing the new holiday explains, “Indigenous People's Day shall be used to reflect upon the ongoing struggles of Indigenous people on this land, and to celebrate the thriving culture and value that Dakota, Ojibwa and other indigenous nations add to our city.”

Said U.S. Congressman Keith Ellison, “Now that we have established Indigenous People's Day, every child — whether that child is native or whether that child is not — will learn the truth about where America really comes from.

“This is so important because it’s difficult to imagine, if you are from the mainstream experience, how it feels to sit in a classroom and be told there was darkness and then Columbus came and then there was light,” Ellison said before the Council vote.

Indigenous People's Day was first proposed 37 years ago by a Native Nations delegation to the United Nations. It was suggested again 13 years later by representatives of 120 indigenous nations gathered for a conference about 500 years of Indian Resistance.

Last year, the City Council approved “The Year of the Dakota:  Remembering, Honoring and Truth Telling" to promote the Native American contributions to the city.

“I have a heavy heart knowing that so many did not live to see this day,” said Dianne Standing Cloud, “but my heart is also happy knowing my children and my grandchildren will grow up in a city that celebrates their indigenous heritage and culture.”

Said Bill Means, “Remember, we discovered Columbus. It's kind of refreshing to be invited to this chamber, because usually we have the drums outside and people are marching. This marks a great change in our relationship.”

Following the vote supporters of the new holiday gathered in the rotunda of City Hall for a rally.

This action does not eliminate Columbus Day in Minneapolis.  It remains, for now, in city ordinances and in city union contracts as a holiday and on parking meters as a day to park free. It is possible for those references to be changed.