Star Tribune
How should Minneapolis public safety reform be done? Report offers a roadmap
More than three years after a Minneapolis police officer murdered George Floyd, sparking an international outcry, Minneapolis has a plan.
On Tuesday, the city released a report from a Harvard-based team that seeks to chart a long-term vision not only for law enforcement, but for the root causes of crime and how to heal from the trauma it brings.
What it lacks in specifics — there are no estimates for costs or personnel, or a concrete timeline — the report, titled “Minneapolis Safe and Thriving Communities,” makes up for in ambition.
Chief author Antonio Oftelie called the 143-page outline “the most ambitious plan around public safety, community safety in the nation” and offered benchmarks to get it started over the next year, although he emphasized the vision could take decades to be fully realized.
While many of the ideas aren’t new to those following police reform efforts — such as emphasizing alternatives to policing where officers with guns aren’t needed — city leaders welcomed the report as a blueprint to overlay the various initiatives in scattered stages of funding or debate.
A host of city officials including Mayor Jacob Frey, City Council President Andrea Jenkins and Community Safety Commissioner Cedric Alexander hailed the report at a news conference Tuesday. All suggested they would adopt the bulk of its nonbinding recommendations made by a third party paid with nontaxpayer funds.
On Wednesday, the document will be formally presented to the City Council’s Public Health and Safety Committee, where it will face vetting from council members not generally aligned with Frey and Jenkins and who have accused them of moving too slowly on reform.
The recommendations come as the city finds itself subject to a growing number of roadmaps and guidelines for public safety — some with the force of law behind them — after outside investigations issued scathing findings directed at the Police Department.
In March, the city reached an agreement with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights over how police investigate crimes, use force and hold problem officers accountable. Last month, the Department of Justice concluded that the Police Department engaged in a pattern of racist and abusive behavior, a finding that is expected to lead to a yearslong consent decree overseen by a federal court.
Three years in the making
Oftelie’s recommendations have been in the works since 2020.
A Minneapolis native, he serves as executive director of Harvard University’s Leadership for a Networked World and is the federal monitor of an 11-year-old consent decree between Seattle and the Department of Justice.
Growing up, he said, his family benefited from Minneapolis police — but he was also aware of problems between officers and the communities they serve, especially in predominantly nonwhite neighborhoods.
He said that after watching the video of Floyd’s murder from his home in Massachusetts, he felt compelled to get involved.
“The light was shining on Minneapolis and we wanted to do something,” he said Tuesday. Conversations with city officials started soon after.
In the spring of 2021, the city announced it was working with Oftelie’s team, which is being funded by about $400,000 in donations from the Pohlad Family Foundation, McKnight Foundation, Minneapolis Foundation and Joyce Foundation.
The timeline for when — or if — Oftelie’s recommendations would be adopted has shifted as the city has shuffled its bureaucracy following a voter-approved charter amendment and efforts to reorganize its public safety responses. In 2021, the city suggested the results of Oftelie’s work would be delivered around the end of that year.
In July 2022, Oftelie gave one of two updates to the council and said he would provide the city’s incoming and inaugural public safety commissioner “a seamless flow of work” as soon as he stepped into the role.
However, nearly a year after Alexander started the job, it remained unclear what the overarching plan was.
The report outlines a “robust continuum of services” that the city should provide residents, broken down into three categories: violence prevention, response to community safety incidents and restorative justice. Within a year, the report recommends that the city:
- Establish an executive leadership team and community advisory board
- Develop a multiyear implementation and financial plan
- Design a governance and operations plan
- Initiate policy and practice committees and work groups
- Implement a community communications plan and progress dashboard
Frey estimated the plan would cost “millions” of dollars — on top of costs to comply with the state and federal agreements — but offered no further specifics.
Read the report:
Northern State 35, Concordia (St. Paul) 34: Wyatt Block’s 2-yard TD run and the PAT with 10 seconds remaining lifted the Wolves past the host Golden Bears. Block’s touchdown capped an 11-play, 72-yard drive by the Wolves, who trailed 24-7 in the second quarter. Jeff Isotalo-McGuire’s 34-yard field goal with three minutes, 32 seconds remaining gave the Golden Bears a 34-28 lead.
Winona State 31, Bemidji State 28: Cade Stenstrom rushed for two TDs and passed for 150 yards and a TD to help the host Warriors outlast the Beavers. Stenstrom’s 1-yard TD run and the PAT with two minutes, 10 seconds remaining gave the Warriors a 31-21 lead. The Beavers responded with an 11-play, 93-yard drive to pull within 31-28 with 18 seconds remaining but the Warriors recovered the ensuing kickoff.
Div. I-AA
North Dakota State 59, Murray State 6: The top-ranked Bison built a 42-3 lead in the first half and went on to defeat the host Racers in Murray, Ken. CharMar Brown ran for 97 yards and three TDs for the Bison.
South Dakota State 20, South Dakota 17 (OT): Amar Johnson’s 3-yard TD run in overtime lifted the host Jackrabbits to the victory. The Coyotes opened the OT with a 40-yard field goal.
Youngstown State 41, North Dakota 40 (OT): The host Penguins went first in OT and scored and then stopped North Dakota’s two-point conversion to hold on for the victory. The Penguins sent the game into OT on a 35-yard field goal with 12 seconds remaining.
Div. III
Augsburg 35, St. Olaf 34 (OT): The host Auggies stopped a two-point conversion in overtime to outlast the Oles. The Auggies went first in the overtime and scored on a 25-yard pass from Ryan Harvey to Tyrone Wilson. It was Harvey’s fifth TD pass — the fourth to Wilson. After the Auggies’ PAT, the Oles scored on a 25-yard TD pass from Theo Doran to Braden Menz. But the Oles’ pass attempt for the conversion failed.
After splitting their two-game West Coast trip to begin the season, the Wolves improved to 2-1 with a 112-101 win over Toronto in their home opener. It was a wire-to-wire win that featured some strong bursts of play from the Wolves and other times when their decision-making was suspect. But those moments when they were on, specifically the start of the game and most of the third quarter, were enough to carry them against a shorthanded Raptors team that was without RJ Barrett, Bruce Brown and Immanuel Quickley.
Julius Randle had 24 points while Anthony Edwards had 24 on 21 shot attempts. Donte DiVincenzo had 16 off the bench. Nickeil Alexander-Walker left the game in the fourth quarter and did not return, though he was in the bench area for the final minutes after going to the locker room briefly.
The Wolves’ starting lineup had its best stretch of basketball on the season after that unit started off sluggish in the first two games. Mike Conley, who was 3-for-16 to open the year, hit two early threes to set the tone, though Conley would finish 2-for-8.
Donte DiVincenzo replaced him at point guard halfway through the quarter and continued the hot shooting from the point guard slot with three threes of his own. The Wolves forced five Toronto turnovers and had a 32-18 lead after one.
Coach Chris Finch toyed with some different lineup combinations in the first half as he had Conley and DiVincenzo begin the quarter together while having Joe Ingles run the point later in the quarter. It led to an uneven second, and the Wolves led 56-44 at halftime.
But the Wolves played inspired coming out of the break. Jaden McDaniels, who didn’t take a shot in the first half, had nine points in the opening minutes of the third. Edwards hit a pair of threes as they pushed their lead to 22. The Wolves weren’t sharp closing the night, and the Raptors had the game within right inside of two minutes, but the Wolves had built enough of a cushion.
Rudy Gobert. Gobert had 15 points and 13 rebounds and was the beneficiary of some lobs from his teammates like Edwards, Conley, Nickeil Alexander-Walker and Joe Ingles. Gobert also finished with four blocks.
Gobert had two blocks on one possession in the fourth quarter that got the crowd off its feet and Gobert pounding his chest. Gobert blocked D.J. Carton and Jamison Battle.
Star Tribune
Trump denigrates Detroit while appealing for votes in a suburb of Michigan’s largest city
NOVI, Mich. — Donald Trump further denigrated Detroit while appealing for votes Saturday in a suburb of the largest city in swing state Michigan.
”I think Detroit and some of our areas makes us a developing nation,” the former president told supporters in Novi. He said people want him to say Detroit is ”great,” but he thinks it ”needs help.”
The Republican nominee for the White House had told an economic group in Detroit earlier this month that the ”whole country will end up being like Detroit” if Democrat Kamala Harris wins the presidency. That comment drew harsh criticism from Democrats who praised the city for its recent drop in crime and growing population.
Trump’s stop in Novi, after an event Friday night in Traverse City, is a sign of Michigan’s importance in the tight race. Harris is scheduled for a rally in Kalamazoo later Saturday with former first lady Michelle Obama on the first day that early in-person voting becomes available across Michigan. More than 1.4 million ballots have already been submitted, representing 20% of registered voters. Trump won the state in 2016, but Democrat Joe Biden carried it four years later.
Michigan is home to major car companies and the nation’s largest concentration of members of the United Auto Workers. It also has a significant Arab American population, and many have been frustrated by the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s offensive in Gaza after the attack by Hamas against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
During his rally, Trump spotlighted local Muslim and Arab American leaders who joined him on stage. These voters ”could turn the election one way or the other,” Trump said, adding that he was banking on ”overwhelming support” from those voters in Michigan.
“When President Trump was president, it was peace,” said one of those leaders, Mayor Bill Bazzi of Dearborn Heights. ”We didn’t have any issues. There was no wars.”
While Trump is trying to capitalize on the community’s frustration with the Democratic administration, he has a history of policies hostile to this group, including a travel ban targeting Muslim countries while in office and a pledge to expand it to include refugees from Gaza if he wins on Nov. 5.
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