I faded out after the vote to sustain the ruling of the chair not to permit
Annie Young to address the convention and before the announcement of the
first secret ballot tally of the day. My compliments to Rick Stafford for
his support for Annie's proposed valedictory speech and my regrets for not
having the stamina to sit through what would have been 12 session hours had
I stayed the course. Passage of the municipal-year caucus proposal will help
invigorate the convention system but I must say there was a lot on the plate
yesterday. It's a big logistics challenge to process speeches and multiple
ballots for each of several elected boards in such a large delegate body
independent of the time-consuming moments of deep controversy and
preliminary to the predictably lengthy series of "survival of the fittest"
votes in the mayor's race.
The convention's dismissal of Commissioner Young's "ave atque vale" was
troubling to me and reminiscent of the partisan management of the Sixth Ward
convention that culminated in oppressive shouting and other displays of
political muscle that - in my opinion - had an intimidating effect on that
small body of delegates.
The note of group incivility common to both of these events really disturbs
me. We have large responsibilities these days and excessively partisan
behavior seems more appropriate to a high-school football rally than to the
proceedings of a deliberative body whose decisions have such significant
impact on the public weal. It would be helpful to turn the political volume
down a bit and look more closely at the costs and benefits of fusion
politics - aggravating divisions between the DFL and the Greens hands an
advantage to other political interests who will clearly benefit from this
"divide and conquer" opportunity.
For better or worse, we now embark on a primary season that has some pretty
important blank boxes on the DFL sample ballot - an opportunity for Mark
Stenglein, perhaps, but also a lesson about the limits of personality
politics and DFL insider business as usual.
As many list members know, I consider the lack of affordable housing for
households at 30% or less of metro median income - households making less
than $20,000 per year - the walrus in the municipal living room.
Retributionary cuts in federal money are increasingly likely, exacerbating a
housing supply shortfall for which no timely federal solution will be
forthcoming. The "dividing the spoils" mentality we see in the Minnesota
House of Representatives and the Governor's office further highlights the
need to have a municipal debate this year that moves past internecine
bickering to a reasoned search for local solutions to our local situation.
This is hardscrabble politics and I'm glad to see party puffery forced to
yield pride of place to a many-sided look at intractable economic and social
issues.
_______________________________________________
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