Jay Clark made a comment on The List in 2001; I offered a comment I had written elsewhere and a year earlier, to The List, in response. The matter of Landlord duty and vilification is rolling back in to The List, and that is OK. But it is not a new topic here. Opinionated pundits should look to The List Archive to see what ground has been covered already; I did.
Keith Reitman NearNorth In a message dated 11/12/01 12:00:23 AM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: << So at least in Jordan, don't blame Cramer, Cherryhomes, Yanisch, or anybody else from downtown. Boarded houses came down because that was what the neighbors wanted. Jay Clark Cooper >> Downward spiral: drug house/boarded house/vacant lot/repeat", topic by KEITH REITMAN/not the best or the worst landlord, October 04, 2000 10:11 pm CST "Why must we allow narrow minded MPLS. policy to munch our residential/commercial building stock in North Mpls and South Core neighborhoods? And for what benefit. After I sat in on a large public meeting in Joe Biernat's Northside Ward and listened to Hillary Freeman extoll the wonders of this city's Nuisance Ordinance I was left with a very hollow feeling. This lady spoke of Criminal buildings as if they were alive and had legs and needed to be punished for their evil behaviors. The only mention of criminal sanctions for human beings was to be against landlords (property owners). That seemed to comfort many of the sincere homesteaders in this desperate, frustrated, and shell-shocked audience of survivors but I know the shooters have just moved over. We have huge problems to solve but we must define them properly before we can start to solve them. EQUAL PROTECTION UNDER THE LAW means to me that each of us is entitled to a clean, quiet, safe street to live, work, walk, or do commerce. Why does the city offer our tough neighborhood mainly one big, fat simple solution when we report that people our doing criminal behavior at a particular residence or store front? Namely, "give us the address (as if they don't know it) and we'll knock it down". Sadly, I know what its like to live next to a drug house and I know what its like to live in a 4-plex where one criminal occupant or more is a drug addict, cause I been there. It's dangerous and disruptive and totally unacceptable but boarding buildings won't stop criminals unless you nail the building shut with the criminal inside, then knock it down. Folks, I quickly remind you that we can't do that remedy mentioned above cause its not humane and it would be murder, but when 11 year olds are killed by stray bullets at crap games...well...Lets explore real solutions and please, lets keep all stakeholders in the circle. Yes, even landlords and criminals." ---PS---It is a fact that NRP money was generously used to demo private property. Enough per property to have, perhaps, sponsored the preservation of same. I agree with Jay Clark that neighbors cheered demolition, like peasants caught up in the French Revolution as heads rolled. I respond in, rebuttal of Jay Clark, I "...blame Cramer, Cherryhomes, Yanisch..." and.."...anybody else from downtown..." that was in the ruling Regime! Cause neighborhoods had to choose among the crude options contrived Downtown. When there was no bread in Jordan, our DT Marie Antoinettes bulldozed our cake. REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:mpls@mnforum.org Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls