We have 7 attenders in person and 5 by Zoom. Call to order at 6:37
Speaking to the 8/13 Northeaster, Aileen Johnson stated, “. . .[T]he groups are a true grassroots effort to reduce crime with a friendly presence on city streets.” These clubs exist right now in 24 neighborhoods across Minneapolis. We are self-funded volunteers who have lots of different interests, opinions, and views, but we agree on one thing: It is neighbors, business, and law enforcement, all working together in a spirit of friendship, that makes for a safer community.
We welcome everyone who has that belief. We believe that one person can make a difference and that everyone should try. We’re committed to the same objectives:
- to improve safety,
- to build friendships, and
- to increase our civic and municipal acumen.
We started in the North Loop in April, 2021. There was an encampment with two drug markets serving them. My friend called me and said, “What can we do?” I called a friend, Mike Rainville and asked him. Mike said, “Try to get out there and walk”. It made a difference.
After the 4th of July fireworks and violence in the Mill District, they contacted us and we were walking 3 weeks later.
Next someone asked for help with drugs and guns in Loring Park. Today, Loring Park, which once had the highest park-crime rate in the city, isn’t even in the list of 10 top crime incident parks.
EQ comment: the video shows slides of the people she is talking about. Pictured and discussed are
- Windom (which still concludes their walks with tea and cookies),
- East Isles focuses on picking up needles with MFD donated gear,
- Kenwood spends 90 minutes to cover the entire neighborhood,
- Thomas Beach was supposed to cover all of Linden Hills, but a neighbor objected to MPD, so we focused on Thomas Beach, which had a calm July 4.
- Nicollet Island East Bank was the first safety club in the 2nd Pct. That club is actually sponsoring Pumpkinpalooza on the 5th of October for Halloween.
- Sheridan is our newest club in the 2nd. They’re walking and rolling Wednesday nights.
- Three groups: Loring Park, Stevens Square, and Loring Heights are helping each other, adding walkers when one or another group wants to swell the group.
- East Harriet is based in an assisted living complex which is where they start and stop their walks.
- Ward 13 has six Neighborhood Safety Clubs. They rotate walking the neighborhoods — that way they cover the entire 13th ward.
- Kingfield, St. Anthony West and St. Anthony East have launched.
This summer, the Uptown Business District wanted to hire us. We don’t work for pay, but we’ll bring groups in to do a special walk for them.
We are doers. We know we can’t solve large problems, but we know that picking up trash improves an area. If you see blue painters’ tape on a street light, that’s a sign we did a project to get the lights turned back on.
Access Denial: In Loring Park, a guy was selling drugs from his apt. We set up our bright tent across from his building to create “access denial”. We’ve done that other places, sometimes with Mad Dads.
The most fun thing we’ve ever done, was to be in the alley outside of SexWorld, at closing time. Nothing makes a young man run faster than seeing women of a certain age handing out safety literature. We had a ball and it worked. They’re closed in Mpls.
Service Work:
The squad car memorial for Officer Jamal Mitchell was staffed 24 hours/day for 13 days with our help.
We’re sending 40 volunteers to help with the Battle of the Badges dinner.
In the North Loop by the Rabbit Hole, we assisted people out of their Uber Lyfts, and got them to use the crosswalk.
In the 1st Precinct, we passed out info at Inspector Peterson’s and Chief O’Hara’s requests.
We do open houses at Precincts and have done potlucks and BBQs.
We’ve done a Personal Safety workshop here in the 2nd Pct.
We do cookies at the MPD graduations and ceremonies.
QQ: How often do people try to walk through the neighborhoods?
Johnson: It depends weekly, twice weekly or once a month Even a once-monthly walk exposes the neighbors to each other. You are seen out there, in your orange shirts, walking together. Then you learn about the other events that are open to safety clubs.
Our only requirement is that you believe that neighbors and business and law enforcement together stand for a safer community. If you have a quarrel with any of that, we will still urge you to walk in your neighborhood, but believe our network is not a good fit for you.
Comment: it sounds like you start the group, but they have a lot to organize.
Johnson: They do. I do the overall things like getting people the t-shirts, getting them invited to all the events. Then the neighborhood itself needs to schedule the walks and communicate at that level.
QQ: Do you have safety concerns?
Johnson: We do training with the precincts, quarterly. We’ve had enough training so we would never go into a scenario alone and try to do something. We call 911 if we need to. We’ve seen that if we’re standing around in our orange shirts and watching, it shoos people away.
The Loring Park Lt. gave us a lot of coaching when we were across from a drug house. He said if they come out and start yelling at you, evacuate. When people were scaring Lotus patrons, we told the Lt. that we can’t do this on our own, and asked him to have Mad Dads there. Mad Dads came the next week and it was a whole different world. So we don’t worry too much about it. We do what we can. We feel fairly confident but not in a foolhardy way.
The 2nd Pct is a different ballgame. It’s mostly prevention. Presenting a strong community presence can be very discouraging to people who are trying to do harm. You operate on the idea if you are paying attention to your neighborhood you’re safer. Sheridan started because they wanted to get in front of it. That’s been a really good model.
Some people will think if they don’t have 25 people it’s not worthwhile but that’s that’s not true. We don’t believe we can solve large problems. But we think that we make a difference solving smaller problems.
An abandoned building was set afire many times; squatters were going in, constantly. We did what we could there. It’s up to the city to solve the squatting problem, but we can help with the building. We walked around the building, picked up litter, kept our eyes on it. We kept the pressure on Lisa Goodman until the city(?) secured the building. We kept up the trash pickup, because there were still people living outside.They would leave every day and we kept up the trash pickup.
QQ: .How many hours do people walk?
Johnson: Some groups like to go longer, but 90 minutes tends to be a really nice time.
Q: is there a common time?
Johnson: No. We started the North Loop at 5 a.m. on weekends. Mill District is afternoons. North Loop is early evening. It just depends on what the group wants. Kingfield’s walking at 6 a.m. on Monday mornings.
The thing is: almost every group picks up litter. We’re not vigilantes and we make that clear. We’re trying to grow strong friendships and report street lights that are out.
QQ How do you start?
Johnson: People ask me and I and tell them what it’s all about. Then they find like 4 or 5 five friends. Next we get coaching and I walk with them a couple of times. Then I pull back.
Summary: It’s easy to start. We don’t allow people who want to carry guns. We are kind to each other. If we have a problem person, we remove that person.
QQ: Do you go to neighborhood meetings?
Johnson: Only if they ask us.We really like word of mouth. We’re walking in 24 neighborhoods right now. We grow organically and we prefer that. We don’t force any growth. But, if you invite me, I go. Then if people want to join, I’ll get an email or something a few days later.
QQ Do you have any church related groups?
Johnson: We can do a group for a church itself if they just want their own members and they don’t want to be part of the neighborhood.
Comment: Dinkytown is part of the University District where Emilie and I live. It’s largely students and a few early career professionals — very few seniors. Looking at photos of your groups — these are folks who’ve been around for a while and who care about their neighborhood. What are your suggestions for neighborhoods like the University District where there just aren’t many people who look like us?
Johnson: We had hoped the parents of the students who asked us to form this would dedicate this time and that their children would walk with them. We weren’t surprised when the children weren’t showing up, But we were surprised when the parents weren’t.
We might make it if we go through the Greek system to get them community service credit for that work.
Our most committed people generally have lived in the neighborhood for quite a long time. It’s antithetical because our clubs are actually needed out there in Dinkytown at 10PM or later. We haven’t got the answer to that one.
Comment: About Dinkytown: for a short time, some of the Somali elders from Cedar-Riverside were walking Dinkytown. Is that still happening?
Response: I think they’re mostly at Stone Arch now but they do go into Dinkytown as well. We were told in March that the U of M and MPD were working on a contract with them for this summer, but the contract wasn’t signed until last week. I believe the funding was taken over by the Office of Community Safety. The Somali mothers are going to be at the Stone Arch Bridge and in Dinkytown. Then the Park Board has another group of culturally specific outreach workers they contract with. That group has been at the Stone Arch and Father Hennepin Park area.
See STATE OF THE PRECINCT, part 2 of 9/25 meeting.
2nd Precinct Advisory Council 