BY CHRISTOPHER HARRISON ELDRIDGE
“These are heavy times.”
With this observation City Council Vice President Elizabeth Glidden opened her address to the gathered Minneapolitans, seated and serried in a third floor auditorium in Lake Street’s Plaza Verde complex. The high ceilings, crossed by sheer cloth, combine with the worn hardwood and stacked folding chairs to imply a space more suited to awkward youth groups than political activism, but as the eclectic crowd filed in Tuesday night the room took on a distinctly somber tone.
These citizens had answered the call of Alondra Cano, Elizabeth Glidden and Cam Gordon—the progressive members of the Minneapolis City Council—to express their thoughts and feelings on, and collaboratively develop policy responses to, the recent string of police-related killings that have sparked a national discourse on the wider issues of police use of force, income inequality, and the future of America’s urban communities. The Council Members did not want for responses on any count.
They ranged from insightful calls for reform—the appointment of a state ombudsman, a Human Rights Amendment in the state constitution—to heartfelt personal accounts of the human cost of the system as it stands. One man spoke of the psychological toll of worrying about whether or not his mother would be shot when she left for work each day. “I can’t function that way,” he said. Another shared that every time he starts his car he pauses to wonder if he will be the next black man killed during a traffic stop. The night’s speakers were a mix of veteran activists and first-time contributors—indicative of the long simmering movement that has gained new energy from otherwise apolitical citizens that increasingly find the status quo unacceptable. People wanted genuine policy solutions, not legislative platitudes, and though no one would dispute the need for change, there was often a lack of faith in the government’s ability to enact it. As expressed in so many words by so many speakers, “There will be another meeting next month, and we’ll be here again next year.” At one point the microphone was passed to a young African-American woman who had been protesting at the governor’s mansion. She cast aspersions on the assembly, on those seeking solutions through a system she saw as “built to destroy us.”
Whether talking about systemic profiling and intimidation of nonwhite citizens or looking on helplessly as they see children joining a culture of criminality and violence simply for lack of any other option, one theme ran through all of the speeches that evening: Hope, and, implicitly, a lack thereof.
But that activist’s pessimism had no adherents in the assembly. These people were motivated not by rage, but by resolve. These were people who, though jaded by experience, still believe that, if loud enough, their voices will be heard, and their representatives will listen and take action. The scene that night supported their belief. As Council Member Cam Gordon put it, “We’re not there yet, there are no easy solutions … but we’re not alone,” and he was right. In front of me sat State Representative Karen Clark, and various city and state officials were scattered around the room. They were listening.
Vice President Glidden presciently acknowledged the driving force in her opening statement, “people are looking for hope,” for reason to believe that these problems are getting better rather than worse. She argued that they did not search in vain, calling the current situation the “biggest moment for change in my generation.” And based on the scene in that auditorium it would be hard to argue with her.
Council Member Cano announced that the City Council would be voting on Aug. 5 whether or not to call referenda on raising the minimum wage and requiring professional insurance for police officers. State Representative Clark showed real interest in the suggestion of a state ombudsman modeled on New York’s successful public advocate—an office appointed to find and prosecute bad governance. But the real source of hope is the meeting in and of itself. The indefinable critical mass necessary for public dissatisfaction to translate into political change—the tipping point in the long struggle against these injustices—seems to have arrived. Elected officials and members of the community—importantly those not directly affected by these problems—have taken notice of these issues and unanimously agree on the need for immediate and substantive action because, as the event’s description bluntly stated, “the status quo is untenable.”
