Star Tribune
Minneapolis small businesses caught in the middle of road construction
Through the orange cones, through the construction dust, through the honking gridlock, Minneapolis businesses are open for business.
Massive road projects tied some of the city’s liveliest neighborhoods in knots this summer. Work crews moved in, ripped up, blocked off and rerouted great swaths of Uptown, Midtown, Dinkytown, Northeast Minneapolis and probably your neighborhood, too.
Lanes closed, roads closed, sidewalks closed. Neighborhood shops and restaurants opened anyway. Their customers needed them; they needed their customers.
To reach Moth Oddities — their wonderful, welcoming vintage shop, filled with handpicked finds the couple sourced across Italy and the U.S. — customers must first run the Northeast construction gantlet: orange cones, blocked lanes, rumbling construction equipment where parking spots used to be, barricaded sidewalks that force pedestrians to dart from one side of the street and back like a high-stakes game of Frogger. Keep going. Shops like these are worth it.
“It’s been disheartening and exhausting trying to do business amidst all the construction the last six months,” Pietras wrote to the Minnesota Star Tribune. She and O’Neill met at the University of Minnesota College of Design and bonded over a shared love of vintage in a world of fast fashion. Moth Oddities started in 2014 as an online shop and a single rack of clothes in their tiny studio apartment. In 2021, they opened their first storefront. Last year, they opened a studio space next door to their shop at 13 5th St. NE, hosting everything from workshops to classes to gallery shows.
And then came the first “Road Work Ahead” signs. Customers slipped away. Debts mounted. Neighborhood businesses hoped the city might treat the disruption like the disaster it felt like and step in with aid for struggling businesses.
“Shops like ours — and the neighboring locally owned restaurants, cafes, bars, boutiques, ice cream shops, artist studios, wellness studios, fitness clubs, salons, etc. — are what make the city of Minneapolis special. I wish the city could recognize this and provide better support during such disruptive times,” Pietras wrote.
As well-wishers flocked Officer Ikran Mohamed, 4-year-old Amira Shafii raised her little arm in a proud salute — her auntie’s new police cap perched lopsided on her head. The ‘junior officer’ cracked a smile.
Mohamed, dressed in a black hijab, adjusted her newly pinned badge with henna-laced hands. She’d just become the first Somali woman to ever join the Minneapolis Police Department.
“I want to be a role model for girls who look like me, so they can say ‘I can do it, too,” Mohamed, 23, told reporters Thursday night following a graduation ceremony honoring 11 new recruits and 12 lateral hires from other Minnesota law enforcement agencies.
“I’m just very excited to be here and represent my people and my community.”
Amira Shafii, 4, goes around saluting friends and relatives for photos wearing the police uniform cap of her aunt, officer Ikran Mohamed, who became the first Somali woman to become an officer with Minneapolis Police Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024 at the American Indian Center in Minneapolis, Minn.. ] AARON LAVINSKY • Aaron.lavinsky@startribune.com (Aaron Lavinsky/The Minnesota Star Tribune)
Mohamed immigrated to the United States from Kenya when she was 10 years old. She previously worked as a corrections officer in Steele County.
Beside her, 27-year-old Officer Lesly Vera also had the power of representation on the mind. Vera became the first non-citizen to serve on the police force Thursday, marking a significant victory for immigration advocates.
Although thousands of lawful permanent residents and DACA recipients already serve in the United States military, many states maintain citizenship requirements for those seeking to become a licensed police officer. But in recent years, as law enforcement agencies across the nation have struggled to replenish their ranks with qualified candidates, a growing number have eliminated that requirement.
In 2023, at the recommendation of the Peace Officers’ Training Board, the Minnesota Legislature changed state law allowing for applicants who are either citizens or “eligible to work in the United States under federal requirements.”
“The Republican Party would be far better off with him losing this round and having a Democrat in for two years,” Scheffler said.
The 6B district include the cities of Baxter, Breezy Point, Jenkins, Nisswa, Pequot Lakes and all but one precinct in Brainerd. That one precinct is included in District 6A, which is represented by Davis’ brother, Rep. Ben Davis, R-Merrifield, who is seeking a second term this election.
Davis said he doesn’t like being caught in the middle of a political dispute. His intention in signing the petition in June wasn’t about endorsing any candidate, he said.
“People are tired of the two-party system,” Davis said. “Why not give a third option?”
An elderly Minnesotan died earlier this year after a bat exposure at home in the western part of the state resulted in a case of rabies.
The Minnesota Department of Health announced the death Friday, following confirmatory testing on Sept. 20 of the rare infectious disease by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The case is the ninth on record in Minnesota since 1917, and the fourth since 2000. Seven of the infections were fatal.
State health officials said the death does not indicate a heightened risk to the public, but urged people as always to avoid contact with bats, which are responsible for 70% of U.S. rabies cases. State Public Health Veterinarian Dr. Stacy Holzbauer also reminded people to seek rabies vaccinations for household pets and livestock.
Rabies is treatable with an immune globulin injection plus four doses of rabies vaccine to boost the immune system, but only if treatment is started before symptoms emerge. Otherwise, the disease is almost always fatal.
The state said the victim is older than 65 and was exposed to a bat in July. The investigation into the infection is ongoing, but family members reported that a bat had been in the house and that the victim had killed a bat. The individual did not receive rabies treatment before symptoms emerged.
Public health workers were following up to determine whether close relatives or health care workers who treated the victim had been exposed to the virus.
The state encouraged people to contact health care providers or the health department after any physical contact with bats, because their bites can sometimes leave only small or unnoticeable marks. Bats can be tested for rabies if captured to determine whether people need to initiate treatment.
