Last month, our two 20-something-year-old sons announced they would be moving out of their apartments in Minneapolis’s Uptown neighborhood to relocate to western states. They were leaving for separate reasons: one, to be closer to the outdoor sports of rock-climbing and downhill skiing that he loves; the other, to return to the headquarters of a company he has been working for remotely. The sentimentalist in me was saddened by this news; the pragmatist, comforted.
As one who has shopped in and lived near Uptown for more than 30 years, I recognize that it is obligatory to say that Uptown is not what it once was. Seemingly, anyone who has been a part of the neighborhood for more than five years will make that point to newcomers. But, following two years of the pandemic and the rioting following George Floyd’s murder, the statement has never been more true. While I am confident that, given years of construction and development, the district can’t help but bounce back, it remains, at best, an unsettled neighborhood, at worst, a dangerous one. To add to the area’s woes, the mayor and city council are putting yet another nail in its coffin by removing all street parking on Uptown’s primary artery, Hennepin Avenue, between Lake Street and Franklin Avenue.
Our older son often reports hearing gunshots from his apartment near 22nd and Garfield. Earlier this year, there was a murder on the street around the corner from our younger son’s apartment near Hennepin and Summit. I try to reassure myself by saying these did not occur on their own blocks, ignoring the fact that stray bullets can travel more than an unimpeded mile.
Last Saturday night, I was lying in bed in our home near Cedar Lake when I became aware of circling helicopters. I grabbed my phone to check on the locations of our sons; both, fortunately, were in their own apartments. I texted them to ask if they, too, were hearing the helicopters. No, they responded and, darkly, one joked, “Sounds like the action is in your neighborhood tonight.” And then, he followed it up with, “Must be bringing you back to your time in L.A.”
He was right. The sounds reminded me of the late ’80s when nightly skies hummed with circling helicopters, a policing tactic used by then L.A. police chief Daryl Gates to fight the city’s rising crime rates. The strategy did little more than put an entire, sleep deprived city on edge. In my list of pros and, mostly, cons, the oppressive sound of nocturnal helicopters ranked high on my rationale for leaving that city in my 20s.
I recognize that Minneapolis is not alone in the increased level of violence. Murders have risen dramatically across the nation during the pandemic, with several urban communities setting records. But the pandemic does not receive sole credit for the surge, since the numbers have been rising every year since 2014 (though still markedly lower than the high-water mark of the 1990s).
And so, we turn to our elected officials for guidance, leadership, and solutions. Though Minneapolis voters may have attempted to take the matter into their own hands by approving a referendum calling for a strong-mayor system (read: procedural), it doesn’t necessarily guarantee the city a strong mayor (read: effective, competent). And, while our current mayor is capable of forming declarative statements, express a desire to speak “perfectly clear,” and display shock and horror at the actions of a police department he has overseen for years, he is yet to display a consistent relationship with the truth. His defense of the November announcement of no-knock warrants is an exercise in Orwellian linguistic gymnastics. Last fall, I weakly supported my intention to vote for the incumbent mayor to both of my sons by saying, “He has to be better in his second term than he was in his first term, right? Nobody can go through 2020 without having learned something profound.” Following the police killing of Amir Locke, I apologized to both boys for being wrong. It would be nice to, someday soon, have a candidate come forward who is good at more than ribbon cuttings and appearances in glossy national magazines.
And so, our boys begin to pack. Sad as I may be, I feel their decisions to depart are wise.
