BY ED FELIEN Two tormented 21-year-olds unleashed a storm of death and sorrow last month in Atlanta and Boulder. Why? There are no easy answers. They were both victims of bullying. Robert Aaron Long was bullied by his evangelical church to hate and fear his natural need for sexual expression.…
BY ED FELIEN There was a lovely piece in the Pioneer Press in February about Bryan Ring bringing help and hope to the homeless camped out near Sheridan Park in North Minneapolis: “Stillwater man is godsend to people living in Minneapolis homeless camps.” “He brings sleeping bags, food, hand warmers,…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE You probably did not guess when you read my “Saving the Earth like we mean it” piece a year ago (https://southsidepride.com/2020/04/13/saving-the-earth-like-we-mean-it/) that it was only Part I of an ongoing exhortation. Even worse, this is the agitprop equivalent of a good-cop-bad-cop routine, and last year was…
BY TONY BOUZA The awful, awful thing about bureaucracy is its cold indifference. Many of my colleagues sought comfort, salaries and pensions while wallowing in self-pity and whining like gold medalists. Humanity was the great missing thing. Shortly before I left policing—for the first time voluntarily—we had an awful murder—Cindy…
BY ADRIANA CERRILLO DIRECTOR, BOARD OF EDUCATION, MINNEAPOLIS PUBLIC SCHOOLS From the insurrection at the Capitol in Washington, D.C., to the barbed wire lining the streets of downtown Minneapolis, 2021 has been a grim reminder of the divisions in our communities. Unless we make a strong effort to bridge our…
BY ED FELIEN Charles Rodgers is running for Park Board. That’s good news for people in South Minneapolis who want a park system that works for all of us. He says, “Growing up in Memphis, the only child of a single mom employed long hours as a domestic to a…
BY ELAINE KLAASSEN If you go to 38th and Chicago, the corner where George Perry Floyd Jr. was killed by a Minneapolis police officer kneeling on his neck, you will see that the people have claimed the intersection as a free state, an autonomous zone of nonviolence and anti-racism. They…
BY ELINA KOLSTAD On the morning of Jan. 6, I woke up to the news of the Democratic candidates winning the runoff election for the Senate seats in Georgia. I knew that this gave the Democrats too slim a majority to accomplish much and I knew that the Democrats…
BY KATHRYN KELLY Park Board Commissioner Musich sits on her elevated hill over Lake Nokomis and surveys her dominion of Lake Nokomis. On her campaign website she says that her family loves “looking out over the park from our living room and seeing so many people enjoying OUR FRONT YARD.”…
BY PETER MCLAUGHLIN • Your job is to create a park system for all of Minneapolis. Your plan will destroy a vital, viable historic resource that has served the community for almost a hundred years. You may not like golf, but there are people who do, people who get great…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE A big subject in local educational news has been the struggle between teachers’ unions and school districts over when and how it is safe to return to in-person classes. As we explained in the October 2020 Education Section, it’s a complex issue. For some teachers, in-person…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE The state of the COVID-19 pandemic is still pretty uncertain for summer 2021. Therefore, not surprisingly, there are more virtual options than ever before available. But there are still some in-person day camps and even residential traditional camps. There is actually a huge variety of choices,…
BY KAY SCHROVEN Oh a storm is threatening My very life today If I don’t get some shelter Oh yeah, I’m gonna fade away — “Gimme Shelter,” The Rolling Stones In the 1980s when many mental health facilities were closing, 14 local churches became involved in addressing homelessness and providing…
BY ED FELIEN I feel like Oscar in Sesame Street: “I like trash.” What’s there to do during the pandemic and forced incarceration but watch trashy action flicks on Netflix? And, after you’ve watched all the James Bond movies and “Ocean’s Eleven,” you’re left with the dregs at the bottom…
BY DAVID TILSEN This year the entire Minneapolis city government is on the ballot—the mayor, all 13 council members, the Board of Estimate and Taxation and the Park Board. All of these elected officials have been through a lot as the city has been traumatized by the pandemic, the George…
