Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.
Goodbye, Uptown Art Fair. Hello, 'SoMi Art Fair.'
Recent redesigns have made Hennepin Avenue in Minneapolis's Uptown neighborhood more pedestrian-friendly, and as a result… the very walkable Uptown Art Fair will be relocating permanently? That’s apparently the word from the fair’s programming director, Jill Osiecki, who told WCCO the new SoMi Art Fair will take place at Bachman’s in south Minneapolis this year.
Yes, Osiecki is actually blaming the new medians on Hennepin for the decision to move. “We're unable to have things like an emergency vehicle get down the street anymore, with having booths on both sides," she says. Far be it from me to question someone who calls south Minneapolis “SoMi,” but it sounds like the organizers, having relocated to the area around the Lyndale Avenue Bachman’s during heavy construction in Uptown last year, decided that they prefer a site with a huge parking lot and easy access to freeways to holding an actual urban art fair.
The event will still be sponsored by the Uptown Association, for some reason.
We Know Exactly How Sports Betting Will Make People's Lives Worse
More bankruptcy, more poverty, more domestic violence. That would be the result of legalizing sports betting in Minnesota, according to researchers who presented their findings at a state Senate committee hearing Wednesday. Senate Finance Chair John Marty (DFL-Roseville), who opposes legalization, chaired the conference, which you can watch here.
A UCLA professor cited a negative effect on “credit scores, debt consolidation and collections data, bankruptcies, car loan delinquencies” in states that have legalized sports betting, the Minnesota Reformer reports. Researchers from the University of Oregon stated that intimate partner violence has increased by 9% in such states.
Axios quotes Sen. Matt Klein (DFL-Mendota Heights), who will once more author a legalization bill, as saying that his not yet proposed legislation would offer "most rigorous protections against problem gambling and underage gambling in the nation." (Thirty-eight states and Washington, D.C. have already legalized sports betting.)
Basically the argument here is: Do you think Minnesota should be a worse place to live or not? On the con side, lives will almost certainly be ruined. On the pro side… uh, “freedom,” or something. Seems like a lot of debates these days break down along those lines, especially when there’s a buck or two to be made.
As for the odds of legalization passing through a closely divided legislature this year? Let’s just say we wouldn’t bet on it.
Build the Fence!
Nothing says “welcome to downtown Minneapolis” like a fenced-in seating area, but that’s what you’ll find outside the Minneapolis Public Library. Today in the Strib, Greta Kaul looks at the increased use of metal fencing around town to exclude the unhoused or prevent criminal activity. Of course, such fencing keeps everyone else out as well, employing that powerful “destroy the village in order to save it” logic we’ve come to expect from city government.
The fencing at the Theater in the Round seating area was intended to discourage “disruptive, anti-social, unsafe behavior,” which had migrated outdoors after being driven from the library, says Ben Shardlow, the chief of staff for the Minneapolis Downtown Improvement District. No word on where that behavior is now taking place instead.
As a response to homelessness, these new barriers are simply not a response. This is just a policy decision to shift unhoused people from one site to another. Which, as far as we can tell, has been the mayor’s plan all along. Once again, the boosters who want us to echo their cry that downtown Minneapolis is back will have to decide whether they want to create a place people want to gather, or one where they’re encouraged not to.
So, What’s up With the Minnesota Senate District 60 Race?
Elections—they never stop happening! The DFL held a caucus yesterday to decide the party nominee for Senate District 60, the seat vacated by the death of former Senate Majority Leader Kari Dziedzic. It wasn’t much of a contest: Doron Clark, a two-year chair of the district DFL, received the official party nomination on the first ballot. There will be a primary on the 14th (that’s next Tuesday) and the general election is on the 28th.
SD60 covers parts of northeast and southeast Minneapolis, so the race will go to a DFL candidate. But still, the race hasn't gone without incident. Today candidate Monica Meyer boasted that she had the endorsements of both Rep. Ilhan Omar and Mayor Jacob Frey, and you've got to wonder if that doubles her chances or halves them. And candidate Mohamed Jama has dropped out over residency concerns. Yes, let's please NOT run an ineligible guy for the legislature again!
