Star Tribune
New program helps BIPOC families buy homes in north Minneapolis
As a renter over the past decade, Sean Tanna grew familiar with the stores and restaurants in north Minneapolis — which is why he decided to plant his family’s roots there, he said.
In December, his family officially closed on a three-bedroom house with the help of a $20,000 grant from a program that aims to help Black and Indigenous first-time homebuyers purchase a house in north Minneapolis. Tanna is one of the first recipients of the Homeownership Access Fund, led by the north Minneapolis-based housing nonprofit Urban Homeworks.
Through years of divestment in north Minneapolis and discriminatory housing practices, families of color have been shut out from securing wealth to pass onto future generations, said Urban Homeworks Executive Director AsaleSol Young.
Young hopes the program will help former north Minneapolis residents return to their old neighborhoods, and encourage current residents to stay and invest in the community as homeowners.
“Making the decision to invest in a community like North, by purchasing a home in North, is a long-term commitment,” Young said, adding that homeowners typically have a greater interest and stake to get involved in the community, including local politics and schools, because of their investment in a house.
Grant recipients receive pre-purchase training and a coach to help them navigate financial challenges, such as a low credit score. They can also attend seminars after they purchase a house, and they can continue working with a coach on long-term goals such as paying for maintenance and weatherization.
“If we’re going to help a family get in a position to build wealth, there is no wealth-building if they lose their home,” said David McGee, executive director of Build Wealth, a nonprofit that works to help families navigate the home-buying process.
Tanna has been trying, on and off, to buy a home since 2020. He knew he wanted to leave behind rent increases and his landlord’s apathetic responses to repair requests, but he hesitated. “I was comfortable where I was at,” he said.
His loan officer kept calling to encourage him to buy a house, and he began to focus more seriously on his home search last year. Tanna said he wanted to provide his sons, partner and aging father with a stable place to call home.
“You gotta do it for yourself, but you make sure they’re good as well, by making payments on time and putting food in the refrigerator and just steady working,” he said.
Only two recipients have been awarded the $20,000 down payment grant, including Tanna. The grant is a check that the buyer brings with them to the closing of their house. The plan is to issue eight more grants to recipients this year, according to Katie Herrick, Urban Homeworks communications manager.
With the support of donors and foundations, a future goal is to expand the funding opportunity to south Minneapolis, Young said.
Home buyers who are interested in applying for a grant are encouraged to talk with their loan officer about learning more through Urban Homeworks’ website.
A few months after moving into the house, Tanna’s two sons are making “more noise than anything.” His partner is thinking of painting the exterior of the house from baby blue to white.
“Don’t wait at all,” said Tanna, offering advice to other first-time home buyers. “Don’t pay no one else’s mortgage. You gotta own your own stuff.”
The University of Minnesota has postponed a scheduled Tuesday night lecture from infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci after pro-Palestinian protests that included some protesters barricading Morrill Hall the day before.
On Monday night, several hundred pro-Palestinian protesters gathered at the building, which houses the Minneapolis campus’ administrative offices, as Students for a Democratic Society used tied-up patio furniture to form giant barricades blocking the building’s large front windows and its entrances. The protesters demanded the U divest from companies with ties to Israel. At least 11 of the protesters were arrested.
The university decided to postpone Fauci’s lecture set for Tuesday night because of “unexpected and complicated incidents” over the past day, university spokesman Jake Rickersaid in an email.
“Given the importance of this lecture and the unexpected and complicated incidents that occurred on campus in the past 24 hours, University officials determined it best to reschedule to ensure a great experience for attendees and our University community,” Ricker said.
All tickets for the lecture will be voided and information about the rescheduled date will be posted later, the university said in an online post about the postponement. Pre-paid parking will be automatically refunded, the university added.
Additional pro-Palestinian protests took place Tuesday afternoon at the university in front of Coffman Memorial Union. The protests prompted university officials to temporarily close down at least a dozen buildings in a Tuesday alert. Those included: Coffman Union, Weisman Museum, Hasselmo Hall, Ford Hall, Vincent Murphy Hall, Tate Lab, Morrill Hall, Northrop Auditorium, Johnston Hall, Walter Library, Smith Hall, and Kolthoff Hall. All other East Bank campus buildings were switched to keycard access only, according to the alert.
An anti-Fauci rally had also been planned by conservative group Action 4 Liberty to coincide with the lecture at the university, but that was moved after the lecture was canceled.
Star Tribune
Aunt IDs 3-year-old who was fatally shot in Minneapolis home, speaks about what happened
A close relative on Tuesday identified the 3-year-old boy who was fatally shot this week in his family’s northeast Minneapolis apartment a day earlier.
Woods said police have told the family that Jajuan got ahold of the gun and it went off.
“Someone left a loaded gun [in the home,” said Woods, who has started an online fundraiser for her sister, Charlotte Williams. “He got ahold of it thinking it was a toy.”
Woods said her nephew, who went by Junior, “loved trucks and dinosaurs. He was just so silly and goofy. He was a momma’s boy.”
Jajuan suffered a gunshot wound to the top of the head, a source with knowledge of the incident told the Star Tribune. Paramedics rushed the toddler to HCMC, where he died a short time later.
Woods said she did not know who owned the gun.
Police spokesman Trevor Folke said Tuesday evening there have been no arrests and had no update to share in the “active and ongoing investigation.”
Bergman is championing efforts to boost literacy and invest in early childhood programming, and getting there, she said, requires financial sustainability, and that may mean closings and mergers. She attended last week’s finance committee meeting — as she’s done on a regular basis — and described the mention of “opportunity” as another rosy way of avoiding hard truths.
The district is spread too thin, she said. Some schools could take more students. Yet in others, class sizes are huge and caseloads so large that educators can’t build relationships with students and families, she said.
“I just fundamentally believe, and it’s been one of the objectives of my campaign, to be someone out in the community talking about this moment, listening to reactions, and listening for the places where families could get on board with the possibility of their beloved school having to close,” she said.
A way to get there, Bergman said, is by consolidating buildings, and in turn, expanding programming — perhaps not far from the school left behind.
Callahan argues that the mere mention of closings is causing families to leave the district: “This is not something that should be talked about so flippantly,” she said.
She said she would entertain the idea only if there also are plans to stabilize and recruit students, plus answers to three questions: How much money is being saved by closing a building? How many students will be retained if the school closes? And how many new students have to enroll to keep it open?
