I live in Ward 12, so although I have some opinions about other wards, they tend to be vague and uninformed. Here's who's running:

Brent Perry (Socialist Action)
Rick L. Nyhlen (Independent)
Charley Underwood (DFL)
Sandy Colvin Roy (DFL) (incumbent)

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I am pretty sure that is IT for my ballot. Hurray! All Minneapolis voters can use the Precinct Finder on the city website to (a) figure out where they'll go to vote and (b) see a sample ballot so they can find out now which offices they'll be voting for. My primary tools here were the list of Candidate Filings plus Google. If you're not registered, don't forget Minnesota has same-day voter registration.

I've done roundups of local candidates in previous years, but I think I did it right before Election Day. This year, I started these posts way further in advance. As a result, I've gotten all sorts of responses from the candidates themselves, which has been interesting but then makes me feel obligated to do follow-up posts.

On with the follow up:

1. Jason Stone responded here, basically just to add a little more information.

2. Dave Wahlstedt complained that I dismissed him too quickly, and said that he was misquoted in the SouthWest article I linked to. On looking at his website and some other information, I'm convinced that he's right I was too offhand with him based on that article. However, I am not going to vote for him because I feel a profound nervousness about putting the parks into the hands of someone who describes himself as a "Liberty Candidate" in any forum -- quite often, that's code for "Libertarian in all but name." Moreover, he talks about how the parks should be offering a "return on investment." And -- to some extent he's right; one of the things that impresses me so much about Erwin is his desire to look for outside funding sources. And in his TV interview (local access cable), Wahlstedt gives the example of Sea Salt as an example of how the parks could raise money; it's a private business that pays rent, but it's also a totally AWESOME asset to the park. I guess what it boils down to is that I have a lot of trouble trusting Republicans. This hasn't always been the case; I have, in the past, voted for Republican candidates on a couple of occasions. (Not many! But some.) But the more damage they do to the state I live in, the less inclined I am to trust anything any of them say.

3. Speaking of Republicans, that Republican party site with links to interviews has some links to Michael Martens, the BAT candidate. I was disturbed to see that one of them is from a Ron Paul/Michele Bachmann forum. I have some inherent prejudices against Republicans running for office, but I do not usually assume they're all as batshit crazy as Michele, or support her batshit craziness. Unless they go to rallies for her, in which case... he didn't SAY anything crazy in that interview but it definitely raised my wariness of him. (Michele, if your google alert turns this post up, please feel free to drop by and tell me how totally crazy you aren't, oh you woman who hid in the bushes to spy on a gay rally, which I think may have been the very first time I read your name and thought, "wow, she is NUTS.")

4. John Charles Wilson, who wants a sovereign communist nation for the Lauraist movement, stopped by to complain that I characterized him (and others) as joke candidates and loonies. For the record: I consider pretty much all current secessionist movements in the U.S. to be made up of nuts and/or complete lunatics. When in addition to being a separatist movement a group bases itself on a religious ideology AND demands as its territory a circular piece of land defined by a 240-mile radius surrounding Minneapolis (which for the record appears to include most but not all of the state of Minnesota, a huge chunk of Wisconsin, a good sized piece of Iowa, and small bits of North Dakota, South Dakota, and Illinois) I really don't feel an obligation to take it seriously.

That said, I think Wilson is less of a lunatic (and certainly less of an embarrassment to the state, not to mention doing far less damage) than Michele Bachmann.

If I get around to it (and my Internet connection speeds up) I will do Ward 12 City Council. I don't think that one should take long.

Carol Kummer wrote back to me two days after I e-mailed her, which is a respectably prompt response, I think. I asked her about her endorsements, first off, and here's who she listed:

AFSCME Council 5
Mpls Fire Fighters #82
Police Officers Federation of Mpls
Stonewall DFL "A" rating
WomenWinning

FWIW, I tend to view a Police Officers Federation endorsement as a substantial minus. Our PD has a lot of problems -- really ugly, awful problems. (A news story about that arrest, if you'd prefer not to watch the video footage.) I don't have a lot of faith in the Minneapolis Police Department, though to be fair, my personal interactions with them have all been neutral or positive. (But I am a middle-aged white woman. Very few of the people who get the crap beaten out of them by the police in Minneapolis are in my particular demographic.)

(And if you're wondering why I said I wanted a well-trained police department in my previous post -- I would like our police officers to be trained not to use the minimum force, rather than kicking the shit out of a guy who's down and subdued.)

Back to Carol Kummer.

She's also supported or endorsed by Sen. Linda Berglin, Rep. Jeff Hayden, County Commissioner Peter McLaughlin, City Council Member Sandy Colvin Roy, andformer State Senator Wes Skoglund.  She says she only seeks endorsement of elected officials who live in the district. So, fair enough.

I asked her what she considered to be the biggest difference between her and Jason Stone. She didn't really answer that question, but instead listed her experience and some of the projects the board has accomplished during her tenure. (Which includes some really great stuff.) (Come to think of it, this may be why it's usually so hard to dislodge Park Board incumbents: practically anyone on the park board can type of a list of accomplishments and it's guaranteed to be full of things that will fill people with warm, positive feelings. The restoration of the WPA walls along the creek! The gorgeous new Wabun picnic area near the falls, with its fabulous wading pool! The restored walking/biking trails on the river! There's nothing there not to like.)

I asked her if there was any local politician that she particularly admired or aspired to be like. She responded with a list of attributes she thought were shared by effective public servants:

- Most decide to run because of a desire to serve people and/or to correct an injustice;
- Once elected, their focus is to learn and do the best possible job for their constituents;
- Deep roots in their communities and a sense of commonality, ability to relate and to communicate and 'play nice' with their colleagues;
- Stick-to-ativeness and ability to work with others to accomplish goals.

I tend to agree with her on these.

Here's the big issue with Carol, honestly. In the various infighting over money and the Park Board in the city this year, there was a group that wanted to give the Park Board independent authority to levy taxes; I thought this sounded like a really bad idea, but it didn't wind up on the ballot anyway so I didn't do a ton of research on it. Anyway, Carol Kummer favored the idea; the whole incumbent board favored it, according to a friend, though he may have been speaking a little hyperbolically. At any rate, after spending the entire damn afternoon reading arguments about how finances are done in Minneapolis, I actually think the way we do them NOW is pretty reasonable: we have a couple of finance wonks, plus three council members and a park board rep who set property taxes and allocate the money. It seems like this is a situation that provides for some balance.

So, I'm probably going to vote for Stone.

So, in addition to two City Councillors, the Mayor, and a Park Board commissioner, there are two at-large members of the BET.

Here's who's running:

Carol Becker
DeWayne Townsend
Phil Wilkie
David Wheeler
James Elliot Swartwood
R. Michael Martens

So, who's battling for the money and glory of a seat on the BET? Analysis below the cut.

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Incidentally, if you're curious what my ballot will look like, a sample is available here as a PDF.

Minnesota's ballots usually switch up the order, to minimize the advantage of having your name at the top, so my guess is that not everyone will get RT at the top. However, if state law doesn't require it, it's possible they will not be changing the order this time, because everything has to be counted by hand, and uniform ballots are easier to count. (In our paper today, they noted that the results, especially of the three-seat races, are not guaranteed to be in until December 21st.) Apparently no one has yet written software that works with both our machines and our procedure, so hand-counting it is.

There are two elections this year related to the BET: one is the election for candidates to serve on it, and the other is the referendum on whether to abolish it entirely and have the City Council take over its job.

There are two at-large seats on the BET. (Also on it: the Mayor, the City Council President, the City Councillor who is Chair of the Ways and Means Committee, and a representative from the Park Board.) The BET is in charge of three things:

* They set property tax rates.
* They decide when and whether to borrow money.
* They oversee an internal auditor to ensure clean government.

I initially thought the pay for BET members was $35/year, which made me bug out my eyes and say, "why even bother?" On looking at web pages, I think I may have been wrong and it's $35/meeting. They appear to meet once or twice a month, depending on the month, so maybe a whole $630 to $840 a year, which at least is enough to pay for parking during the meetings, and coffee to keep them awake. Still, as government bodies go, this is a pretty cheap one, and no one running is doing it for money. Or fame and glory, for that matter, since many regular voters never even cast a vote in that election since they don't pay enough attention to it to know what the BET does, let alone who to vote for.

Analysis of the charter proposal follows below the cut. I'll be back later with candidates.

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Oh, and I got a reply from Carol Kummer, Park Board district 5, but I haven't had time to post about it.

I sent e-mail to John Erwin (who's running for an at-large seat) and to Jason Stone and Carol Kummer (district 5) to ask them some questions. I heard back from John Erwin at the crack of dawn (his e-mail was waiting when I got up -- apparently he dashed it off while getting ready for work) and from Jason Stone at 9 a.m. No response yet from Carol Kummer.

John Erwin's response was particularly useful; more ( below the cut )

I'm in District 5, plus there are three at-large seats.

The District 5 candidates:

Steve Barland
Dan W. Peterson
McClain Looney
Jason Stone
Carol Kummer (incumbent) (and I just typed that as "indumbent," which is one of the funniest typos I think I've ever made by accident)

At-Large:

Nancy Bernard
Tom Nordyke
John Erwin
Annie Young
Mary Merrill Anderson
John Butler
David Wahlstedt
Bob Fine

We'll find out if any of these fine people is a Laurist ( below the cut... )

I'll be back some other day with Ward 12 City Council.

We have city elections this year in November. We're voting for:

1. Mayor
2. City Council
3. Park Board (both my district, and three "at-large" seats)
4. Board of Estimate and Taxation (two at-large members)

Plus the following charter amendment: Should the City of Minneapolis adopt a change in its charter to the composition of the Board of Estimate and Taxation so that the Board's membership consists of the members of the City Council, with the actions of the Board subject to the powers and duties of the Mayor?

Also: Minneapolis is implementing ranked-choice voting (which is to say, instant runoff). We get to pick our three favorites for mayor. The process for counting votes for things like the three at-large park board seats is ... uh ... I think the polite term is "convoluted." It's explained here. The process for routing the votes from one candidate to the next isn't too absurd when you're picking people for a single seat; when you're choosing three people, it involves re-distributing excess percentages and....well, fortunately, I don't have to count the votes, nor will it be my job to scrutinize ballots if GOD FORBID we ever have to recount any ranked-choice races. I just have to figure out who I want to vote for.

Which is harder this year, because with no primary to weed out the obvious joke candidates, I have a much longer list to winnow through. Anyway, I thought I would go ahead and share my research for any fellow Minneapolitans reading this. Although the non-Minneapolitans might want to read on at least as far as the guy who worships Laura Ingalls Wilder and wants the metro area to become a sovereign nation and communist homeland for the Laurist movement. Because I have a link to his website.

Mayoral candidates below the LJ cut.

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Park Board candidates in the next post. Unless I get distracted and forget to finish this project.

I took the girls to visit my grandmother today. Grammie lives in Edina; if you're familiar with Edinborough Park, her balcony overlooks the indoor playground. If you're not familiar with the area, let me describe it just a little: you take 494, which is an enormous highway, and then you exit onto France Avenue, which at this point is a six-lane-wide suburban through-street. As you get off the highway, to your left is a big box plaza and to your right is a tall office building and a Fuddrucker's hamburger place.

As I turned onto France Avenue, I saw what looked like a dog, and slowed down, not wanting to hit it.

It was a fox. Trotting across France Ave. I didn't get a picture -- I was too busy yelling "Molly! Kiera! LOOK AT THAT!!!" to bother digging out my cell phone.

It came within a few feet of the car, and then headed off into the parking lot of the office building.

I had never seen a fox in the wild before. Edina? At the intersection of France and 494? Not where I would have expected to spot one.

I'm thinking about my next novel. I think it's going to be another one in which someone travels back and forth between another world and ours; however, it'll be YA, the other world will be pretty dystopic, and while she's in our world, the character is going to be a teenager in the foster care system.

To get some basic real-world details for this character's life, I would really like to find a social worker, or someone who has worked with teenagers in foster care, who is willing to talk to me. (Or someone who was a teenager in the system -- but it would have to be relatively recently, I think, since things change over time.) The absolute ideal would be someone who has worked in Hennepin or Ramsey County, since the story is set in the Twin Cities, but I'll take what I can find. Are any of my readers social workers? Or do any of you know anyone? I'm looking for someone willing to answer a few questions at the outset, and possibly a few more as I get further in.