Critics Respond to George Floyd Square Proposal with Skepticism, Annoyance, Outrage

Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.

This Is So Not Gonna Happen

We’re not much in the business of predicting the future here at Racket, but we’re gonna give it a shot this once: The city of Minneapolis’s new proposal to overhaul The People’s Way at George Floyd Square just ain’t happening.

Yesterday the city announced its recommendation to sell the dilapidated Speedway on 38th & Chicago to violence prevention group Minnesota Agape Movement for a project that would cost an estimated $20–$35 million. Agape would oversee the development of a six-story building that would house a “museum of Civil Resilience,” an “affordable business incubator,” an “entertainment and media hub,” and an “art gallery, rooftop memorial garden, and community event space,” in addition to a theater for young people and a restaurant/bar. 

Critics quickly responded to the proposal with skepticism and annoyance, offering multiple reasons why Agape, an organization built by former south Minneapolis gang members, was not right for the job. First, Agape already has a volatile relationship with the custodians of George Floyd Square, as J.D. Duggan wrote about in Racket almost five years ago. Second, Mayor Jacob Frey has a history of providing unallocated funds to the group by, uh, creative means. And finally, as Susan Du writes in her thorough piece on the matter in the Star Tribune, Agape's "financial status is unclear.”

George Floyd Square sits in Ward 8, and Council Member Soren Stevenson, who represents the ward, says he heard nothing about the plan until immediately before its announcement. That's not the work of a mayor who wants a council buy-in. A cynic—or just someone who's watched Frey in action before—might even suspect that the mayor's goal is for City Council to shoot his plan down so he can blame them for the city’s lack of progress on George Floyd Square.

Coming Soon to the Upptoown Theater: Thennein Theaneie

AI has gotten scary good these days—it can be hard to tell the difference between a video filmed by humans featuring actual people and one made by a computer featuring people who don't exist.

On the other hand, there's still plenty of six-fingered slop out there. For example, the video posted back in March by a group calling itself Hello Uptown, unearthed Friday by Man About Uptown Mike Norton:

Excuse me, that's Hello Upptoown.

Weirdly, most of the videos on Hello Uptown's TikTok account—like this one from early May featuring the CC Club, or this one from April starring Iconos Gastro Cantina—feature the actual businesses (though if you want to argue about the borders of Uptown, you can of course feel free).

But there's definitely more AI-generated junk to be found when you sift through the photos and text on the Hello Uptown website, unless "Lake Street Goods" and "Boutique MPLS," and, my personal favorite, "Retail Store MPLS" have opened since the last time I was in Uptown.

Hey, we love Uptown, and we know it needs help. But there's gotta be a less depressing, more effective way to do it than with pictures and paragraphs puked up by a computer.

Wanna Buy a Giant Ninja Turtle?

Or maybe a Rainforest Cafe frog, a Snoopy atop his doghouse, or a banana split bench? All these and more can be yours, as Mendota Heights-based fiberglass sculpture company TivoliToo is clearing out about 1,500 pieces and selling ‘em online. Artworks span from small bookshelf-friendly items to full-on lawn statements—mostly priced under $200.

“This collection represents four and a half decades of craftsmanship from a studio whose work millions of people have enjoyed without ever knowing who made it,” states a press release from GrafeAuction.

And it’s true; you probably know some of TT’s projects, which include the SpongeBob that greets you at Nickelodeon Universe at Mall of America, the giant book signage atop Heritage News at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, and those Snoopy character sculptures that showed up all over town during the aughts.

Items up for auction include “bronze” sculptures of Joe Mauer, Peppermint Patty, and Mickey Mouse (not all together, of course); a few different takes on Target’s former mascot, Bullseye; and, for some very logical reason we’re sure, this take on Linus as a BLT, complete with a bread hat, a jar of mayo at his feet, and a slab of bacon as his beloved blanket. 

WOLVES BACK: Fancy Essay Edition

Well, your Minnesota Timberwolves have their backs against the wall when the San Antonio Spurs visit Target Center Friday night with a 3-2 lead in the best-of-seven Western Conference semifinals playoff series. Fret not! The Wolves yard sign guy (and we're guessing the contractually bound Wolves graphic design guy) haven't lost the faith.

Historically, T-Wolves fans have had their faith tested, the great poet/essayist/Wolves superfan Hanif Abdurraqib writes this week in the New Yorker. With a hardscrabble sense of inevitability fellow Midwesterners should relate to, the Columbus, Ohio-based Abdurraqib remembers the years 2005 through 2022, back when following the Timberwolves "was mostly just misery—a team that wasn’t good and that wasn’t close to being good." Our current boom time for Minnesota basketball? He approaches it with a zen-like steadfastness earned through decades of punishment.

I don’t understand people who come to sports to feel rage, or agony, or panic. At least, I don’t understand those people anymore (I once was one). I have consumed the new golden era of Timberwolves basketball the past few seasons with a sense of calm that I think alarms the rest of my Wolves-fan pals. I think that rooting for a hopeless and hapless team for so long gave me a new perspective on the simplicity of sports: It is the clearest example of zero-sum. There is only one championship, and only one team can win it.

You can read the whole essay here—hurry, things don't look great! Such is life as a Wolves fan, even in this new golden era. And that's OK.