Star Tribune
Edmund Boulevard renaming effort seeks to erase namesake’s racist legacy
Edmund Boulevard in south Minneapolis is a stretch of just 14 blocks, its gentle curves lined with picturesque houses with views of the parkland along the Mississippi River. But for all of Edmund Boulevard’s attractiveness, the story of its namesake reveals Minneapolis’ ugly racist past with racial covenants.
The street is named after Edmund Walton, a real estate developer in the late 19th and early 20th centuries who introduced and popularized racial covenants in Minnesota. That language written into deeds banned anyone but white people from owning or living at the properties.
And upon learning about the boulevard’s history, Mark Brandt and his friend Joe Larsen decided its name needed to go.
“When people are driving along the parkway and they turn into the neighborhood, one of the first things they’re going to see is the word Edmund,” Brandt said. “If people find out he’s this racist guy, we knew about him, but we decided not to change the signs anyway, that says something horrible about us.”
Walton’s racially discriminatory housing practices would become the blueprint for similar covenants across Minnesota, which only ended after the Minnesota legislature banned them in 1953, according to the University of Minnesota’s Mapping Prejudice project.
The effort to rename Edmund Boulevard comes after several successful campaigns to change the names of other local landmarks, including lakes, schools and streets, with controversial pasts. Lake Calhoun was renamed Bde Maka Ska because its namesake was a strong supporter of slavery. Ramsey Middle School changed to Justice Page Middle School in 2017 over its namesake’s call for the extermination of the Dakota people.
Brandt and Larsen don’t live on Edmund itself, but live nearby and pass it often. They held two informational meetings with residents in October and December so people who live on the street could ask questions or voice their opinions. The pair also created an informational website about the name change effort.
At the neighborhood meetings, residents discussed renaming the street, rededicating it to someone else named Edmund, or doing nothing. At the December meeting, four residents voted to do nothing, 10 voted for a name change and 20 voted to rededicate the street to a different Edmund.
Steven Belton, a Black man and former CEO of Urban League Twin Cities, has lived on Edmund Boulevard for 30 years and said he has never met another Black family who lives on the street. He attributes the legacy of Walton’s racist covenants and wants the street name changed.
“This is the best redress for the result of Edmund’s racist, discriminatory and exclusionary policies,” Belton said.
Belton said the effort to keep the name but rededicate it to another Edmund was upsetting as it ignores the history associated with the name simply so residents can avoid changing their address on their mailing lists.
“I want people to do what’s right,” Belton said. “I want this neighborhood to get behind it and I want the political establishment to get behind it.”
How to rename a street
In Minneapolis, residents can ask the city for a street name change if they provide a petition with the signatures of two-thirds of households on the street, plus a $300 application fee and an agreement to cover the costs to replace the signs. (There are at least 12 signs for Edmund Boulevard.)
City officials can also change a name if a council member, the mayor or the public works director asks for it.
In 2021, former Council Member Andrew Johnson helped with an effort to rename Dight Avenue, which was named after a man who championed eugenics and Adolf Hitler. It’s now called Cheatham Avenue.
While Brandt and Larsen initially wanted to collect signatures to change Edmund Boulevard, difficulties reaching residents and the costs associated with a local petition prompted them to change tactics.
The two have talked with Council Member Aurin Chowdhury, whose ward includes the area, to ask her to push for a name change.
“I am supportive of the name change. It’s an important action that we can take to signal to the city of Minneapolis and our community that we want our city to be welcoming to all people, especially Black and brown, Indigenous communities, immigrant communities,” Chowdhury said. “Edmund Walton, the person the street is named after, does not uphold those values.”
Chowdhury said more time interacting with the community is needed before she takes action to change the name.
If the effort to remove Edmund is successful, Brandt hopes the new name would honor the Black or Indigenous history in Minneapolis.
There are plans to host another meeting, but no date has been set, Larsen said.
A former Medtronic consultant received an 18-month prison sentence this week for his role in a scheme linked to the $1.6 billion acquisition of an Israeli medical device company in 2018.
A federal jury in February convicted Doron “Ron” Tavlin, 69, of Minneapolis, of one count of conspiracy to engage in insider trading and 10 additional counts related to securities fraud. That same jury found David Jay Gantman, 58, of Mendota Heights, not guilty of all charges against him. A third defendant — Afshin “Alex” Farahan, 57, of Los Angeles — pleaded guilty in 2022 and has yet to be sentenced.
“His crime was cynical and brazen. It was also reckless,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Ebert wrote in a memo calling for a 3-year prison term. “Tavlin’s conduct had the potential to blow up a deal that a team of executives and financial advisers had been diligently negotiating for months.”
Tavlin is now scheduled to self-surrender Jan. 5 to begin his prison term, which will be followed by 320 hours of community service.
According to the evidence presented at trial, Tavlin learned about a secret, pending acquisition by Medtronic of Mazor Robotics, where he worked as vice president of business development, in 2018. Tavlin also previously worked as a consultant to the Ireland-based Medtronic, which also has a headquarters in Fridley.
Tavlin illegally tipped off Farahan, his friend, about news of the imminent acquisition and told him to keep the news secret. Farahan knew the deal would likely result in a boost to Mazor’s stock price and quickly bought more than $1 million of the company’s stock throughout August and September 2018. Medtronic announced plans to acquire Mazor, which specialized in robotics for spinal procedures, in September 2018 and the deal closed three months later.
Prosecutors said Farahan netted more than $245,000, and Gantman made $255,000 in profit by selling the securities quickly after the deal was publicized. Farahan paid Tavlin for the secret information about the pending deal — including a $25,000 kickback about a year later —according to prosecutors.
U.S. District Judge Donovan Frank, who sentenced Tavlin Monday, also ordered Tavlin to pay a special assessment fee of $1,100 – or $100 per each count. Frank did not impose a fine.
Star Tribune
Charges detail assault in Minneapolis that led to shooting rampage, killing one in Kandiyohi County
Another friend of the ex-girlfriend arrived to help. He pulled up in a car as the group exited the apartment and Matariyeh immediately pointed a gun at him before pounding on the windshield with the gun. Everyone fled as Matariyeh ran back inside the apartment.
The two men met in a parking lot before attempting to return to the apartment. That’s when they looked up and saw Matariyeh on the balcony. Matariyeh immediately began firing multiple shots at them as they took cover behind parked cars.
It was around this time that Minneapolis police officers arrived and made contact with Matariyeh’s ex-girlfriend. She believed he was still inside the apartment, but officers later learned that he had fled. They reached him on the phone. He told officers he was going to kill innocent people if he couldn’t speak with his ex-girlfriend or see his daughter, who was at daycare at the time. He later told police negotiators that “he wanted to go out by ‘suicide by cop.’”
All the while, Matariyeh was speeding westbound.
Police officers pursued him near Cosmos in Meeker County after being alerted that Matariyeh might have stolen another vehicle at gunpoint in Carver County.
Around 2 p.m. he pulled into the rural driveway of Peter Mayerchak in Lake Lillian. Mayerchak, who was in his yard placing hay over his septic mound, went and greeted Matariyeh, who shot him in the chest.
Mixing progressive dreams with dire warnings, a group of DFL leaders riled up a group of volunteers in St. Paul on Thursday morning, urging them to push on through the day’s freezing rain and fatigue in the remaining days before the election.
Several elected officials including Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan and U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar told the group of about 150 campaign staffers, volunteers and union members about how meaningful their work is to keeping DFL control of the Legislature, as the electeds start a statewide bus tour to turn out votes.
“We are here to keep our trifecta here in Minnesota,” U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar told volunteers on Thursday. “We’ve got five days, people!”
On the Republican side, House Minority Leader Lisa Demuth, R-Cold Spring, said earlier this month that the House Republican Campaign Committee had raised a record $2.7 million ahead of the election and she said Republicans have also set records in volunteering and door-knocking as they work to break DFL control.
Minnesota Democrats hold a rally before starting a bus tour around the state to get voters excited, including Rep Ilhan Omar, Sen Amy Klobuchar, Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, House Speaker Melissa Hortman, Senate Majority Leader Erin Murphy, Rep Betty McCollum and Sen Tina Smith on Thursday. (Glen Stubbe/The Minnesota Star Tribune)
“Republicans have the momentum and resources heading into the final stretch to win the majority and restore balance to Minnesota,” Demuth said in a statement. “Minnesotans are ready to move on from the expensive two years of Democrat one-party rule.”
House Speaker Melissa Hortman, DFL-Brooklyn Park, said she thought voters preferred action to the gridlock of divided government. “They’re looking for people who can get things done,” she said.
These last-minute get-out-the-vote efforts come as Democrats around the country push to keep control of state legislative chambers and try to flip a few statehouses that Republicans hold by just a few seats.
The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, the arm of the national Democratic party that works on statehouse races across the country, has spent $500,000 on Minnesota races this year, including House races and the state Senate contest.
