Star Tribune
Golden Valley mayor-elect aims for dialogue after police racism report
Golden Valley’s first Black mayor hopes her background in restorative justice will help her dial down acrimony over policing in the city when she takes office in January — a year after an explosive investigation found a culture of casual racism in the department.
But Mayor-elect Roslyn Harmon said she sees significant progress since the police investigation was released, and hopes to continue moving the city forward by creating opportunities for everyone to talk about the city’s issues.
“We want to get to a place where everyone feels like they have a voice, like they matter,” Harmon said.
During her campaign, Harmon said, her race was a non-issue for the white voters she met in the city, which is 85% white.
“As I was talking with residents of the white community, it’s like, ‘It’s not about color. We believe you’re qualified,’ ” Harmon recalled.
The response from Black Golden Valley residents and other people of color was enthusiastic, Harmon said.
“For people of color, it’s like, ‘This is huge.'”
Harmon’s historic election came almost a year after the release of a report detailing racist attitudes in the police department.
The investigation ended with an officer’s firing for a slew of racist remarks and other department policy violations. A dozen other officers resigned over the course of the investigation, which also found officers resistant to training on issues like structural racism.
In the year since the report, Harmon said she sees major change in the department, which is rebuilding after a resignation wave winnowed the staff to about a third of its budgeted size in 2022 and early 2023.
The department has seen a thin but steady flow of applications to become police officers, and more applicants for the entry-level community service officer positions that Chief Virgil Green gave more responsibility at the department’s staffing nadir.
Now, just over 30% of the Golden Valley Police Department is made up of women, including the second-in-command, Assistant Chief Alice White. The department has never been more diverse in terms of race and ethnicity, Harmon said, with the chief and both assistant chiefs all people of color.
“We’re breaking all these barriers,” Harmon said.
Harmon said she was confident the police would have enough officers to end a contract for policing services with the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office in 2024.
As vice chair of the city’s Police Employment, Accountability and Community Engagement Commission, Harmon has been part of police candidate interviews and Green’s work to change the department’s culture. She said she is happy with the progress.
“We didn’t go too fast, and we haven’t been going too slow,” she said.
A different approach
Harmon said she hopes to continue the work her predecessors started in Golden Valley. But she brings a different style, with a professional background in restorative justice and ministry.
She believes in the power of open discussion, she said, and wants to create more venues for Golden Valley residents to get together and talk about big issues.
For example, the police commission is planning a community listening session next month, which Harmon hopes will bring in more voices.
With her campaign, Harmon has already created common ground for two Golden Valley politicians who have spent years butting heads: current Mayor Shep Harris and former Council Member Joanie Clausen.
The two have clashed over policing and public safety as the city’s force dwindled, and after the investigation was released last year and an officer was fired for allegedly violating state data privacy laws. But both supported Harmon’s campaign for mayor.
Harmon has straddled a divide on the policing issue in Golden Valley, acknowledging both the harm of racism, and the jolt some longtime residents felt when police officers they knew left the city.
Clausen said she supported Harmon because of her willingness to acknowledge that the city has problems, and she believes in Harmon’s ability to bring people together to address those issues.
Harris said Harmon “brings people together. … The issues, the priorities, the themes of her campaign were attractive to a spectrum of residents.”
Two people from Minnetonka were killed late Friday afternoon when their GMC Suburban ran a stop sign and was struck by a GMC Yukon headed north on Hwy. 169 west of Palisade, Minn.
According to the State Patrol, Marlo Dean Baldwin, 92, and Elizabeth Jane Baldwin, 61, were dead at the scene. The driver of the Suburban, a 61-year-old Minnetonka man, was taken to a hospital with life-threatening injuries.
The Suburban, pulling a trailer, was headed east on Grove Street/County Rd. 3 at about 5:15 p.m. when it failed to stop at Hwy. 169 and was struck by the northbound Yukon. The Yukon then struck two westbound vehicles stopped at the intersection.
Four people from Zimmerman, Minn., in the Yukon, including the driver, were taken to HCMC with life-threatening injuries, while two passengers were treated for non-life-threatening injuries. Three girls in the Yukon ranged in age from 11 to 15.
The drivers of the two vehicles struck by the Yukon were not injured, the State Patrol said. Road conditions were dry at the time of the accident, and alcohol was not believed to have been a factor. All involved in the accident were wearing a seat belt except for Elizabeth Baldwin.
Hill City police and the Aitkin County Sheriff’s Office assisted at the scene.
Amid the cacophony and chaos of the pregame preparation before a recent Minnetonka High School football game, an exceptional group of six girls is gathered together among the school’s deep and talented cheerleading and dance teams.
The cheerleaders, a national championship-winning program of 40 girls, dot the track around the football field. As the clock ticks down to kickoff and their night of choreographed routines begins, the six girls, proudly wearing Minnetonka blue T-shirts emblazoned with “Skippers Nation” and shaking shiny pom-poms, swirl around the track, bristling with excited energy.
Their circumstances are no different from any of the other cheerleaders with one notable exception: The girls on this team have special needs.
They’re members of the Minnetonka Sparklers, a squad of cheerleaders made up solely of girls with special needs.
A football game at Minnetonka High School is an elaborate production. The Skippers’ recent homecoming victory over Shakopee brought an announced crowd of 8,145. And that is just paying attendees; it doesn’t include school staffers, coaches, dance team, marching band, concession workers, media members and others going about their business attached to the game.
The Sparklers program, now in its 12th season, was the brainchild of Marcy Adams, a former Minnetonka cheerleader who initiated the program in her senior year of high school. Adams has been coach of the team since its inception, staying on through her tenure as a cheerleader at the University of Minnesota.
She started the program after experiencing the Unified Sports program at Minnetonka. The unified sports movement at high schools brings together student-athletes with cognitive or physical disabilities and athletes with no disabilities to foster relationships, understanding and compassion through athletics. Many Minnesota schools offer unified sports.
“I grew up in a household that valued students with special needs and valued inclusion,” Adams said. “I saw a need to give to those students. At Minnetonka, we have a strong Unified program, and this was a great opportunity to build relationships and offer mentorship opportunities.”
Elite runners are in a league of their own.
To get a sense of how far ahead elite runners are compared to the rest of us, the Minnesota Star Tribune took a look at how their times compare to the average marathon participant.
The 2022 Twin Cities Marathon men’s winner was Japanese competitor Yuya Yoshida, who ran the marathon in a time of 2 hours, 11 minutes and 28 seconds, for an average speed of 11.96 mph. He averaged 5 minutes and 2 seconds per mile.
That’s more than twice the speed of the average competitor across both the men’s and women’s categories, of 5.89 mph, according to race results site Mtec. The average participant finished in 4 hours, 26 minutes and 56 seconds. That comes out to an average time of 10 minutes and 11 seconds per mile.
And taking it to the most extreme, the fastest-ever marathon runner, Kelvin Kiptum of Kenya, finished the 2023 Chicago Marathon in 2 hours and 35 seconds, for an average pace of about 13 mph. Kiptum averaged 4 minutes and 36 seconds per mile.
Here is a graphic showing these differences in average marathon speed.
