BY ED FELIEN Last month in this space we published a notice we found on the Nokomis East Neighborhood Association (NENA) website about a new program they were planning: Nokomis East Neighbor-to-Neighbor Communication Project. We felt this could be a very useful community resource. Who could disagree with their organizing…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Oh, great. Not only is it winter, but it’s in the peak of a terrible pandemic. And you want to talk about wellness? Is that some kind of sick joke? When the conditions are most stacked against your goal, that’s not when you give up, it’s…
BY ED FELIEN In ancient China, the state apparatus was 3,000 years old when the student revolts on May 4, 1919, began the Nationalist revolution that eventually overthrew the emperor. The bureaucracy was so far removed from the people that they spoke a different language. They had contempt for the…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE “You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone,” Joni Mitchell famously sang. I have been thinking about the many local delights that are gone, or may be soon. In 2016 I was still working for Heart of the Beast Theatre. We put on “La Natividad”…
“We are in pain, don’t choke us.” —Ira Azhakh BY KAY SCHROVEN Despite ambitious efforts by the city and a Neighborhood Action Plan to reimagine Lake Street, Ira is not hopeful. After 40 years in the car business in the 4500 block of East Lake Street, he has closed. Before…
BY TONY BOUZA On Nov. 28, 2020, The New York Times reported the discovery of a 12-foot steel monolith in the desert called Red Rock Country, Utah. It described it as evocative of Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 film “2001: A Space Odyssey.” In that film primates howl around an unexplained monolith.…
BY KATHRYN KELLY Results of the latest Minneapolis Park Board survey on the Hiawatha Golf Course Master Plan have, again, shown that a HUGE majority of respondents do not support a plan that has, so far, cost over $870,000. The responses have been compiled and quantified in a best effort…
Dear Tony Bouza, I enjoy your columns and respect your expertise and vision as both a police chief and a commentator. I have several suggestions to make for reform of the Minneapolis Police Department. First, I would like to see the City of Minneapolis require police officers to live in…
We all want a safe Minneapolis. But I’m not certain that more of the same will bring that to us. I sent the following comments to the Budget Committee: Attention Mayor Frey and Members of the City Council: I support the actions of the six brave City Council Members who…
BY ELINA KOLSTAD On the night of Nov. 4, 2020, a demonstration took place at Cedar-Riverside in Minneapolis. It was organized by a coalition of groups including Twin Cities Coalition for Justice 4 Jamar and other local peace and justice organizations. The demonstration was held in part as a reminder…
BY TIGER WORKU (FROM THE SEWARD NEIGHBORHOOD FORUM) Hello, Neighbors, I want to shed some light on what happened on the highway and in our neighborhood late into the night on Wednesday, Nov. 4, and early into the morning on Thursday, Nov. 5. Pro-democracy protests took place all across the…
The choice between peace and mutually assured destruction There it was—the article reminding us of the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and who better to write it than Helen Caldicott, pediatrician, founder of the Physicians for Social Responsibility and Nobel Peace Prize winner. It’s been 75 years since the…
Medicare Advantage Plans are another way to get your Medicare Part A and Part B coverage. Medicare Advantage Plans, sometimes called “Part C” or “MA Plans,” are offered by Medicare-approved private companies that must follow rules set by Medicare. Most Medicare Advantage Plans include drug coverage (Part D). In many…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE First, let us consider the staggering array of online workouts available these days, especially those geared toward seniors who might have mobility issues. Chair workouts and zero-impact aerobics (ZIP) dominate the list. There are stand-alone companies like GrowYoung Fitness (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQn6LXA4_2c), along with the Ys, private health…
DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE I just finished reading “The Plague” (in translation) by Albert Camus. I didn’t consciously do it as a preparation for writing this, but it had that salutary effect. I say salutary because it’s not an easy or pleasurable read, whether you happen to be in a pandemic…
