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On Saturday, May 1, International Worker's Day, over 2,000 people marched from South Minneapolis downtown to the Minneapolis Convention Center where the Minnesota Republican Party had just endorsed a platform and a candidate for governor that supports the Arizona law that requires police to racially profile Latinos. The law is unquestionably unconstitutional and an insult to people of color.
EL PUEBLO UNIDO JAMAS SERA VENCIDO
THE PEOPLE UNITED WILL NEVER BE DEFEATED |
7-way partnership tackles
Diamond Lake wetland pollution
BY DICK SAUNDERS
A unique citizen-driven plan has blossomed into a pioneering public-private-homeowner partnership to enhance water quality in Diamond Lake, a 41-acre South Minneapolis shallow wetland that has suffered deteriorating wildlife conditions since 1990.
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MSP phases out DC-9s
BY BOB FRISKNEY
& DICK SAUNDERS
 Of interest to noise-harassed MSP neighbors, South Metro Airport Action Council (SMAAC) has learned that Delta will phase out all 24 of its aged Douglas DC9-30 and -40s in October, keeping 34 advanced DC9-50s in service. The 1960-70 vintage jets have been among the noisiest aircraft operating regularly at MSP since Northwest’s 1987 acquisition of Republic Airlines. Subsequently, Northwest
grew its DC-9 fleet to more than 165 in the mid-1990s, purchasing a batch from a European carrier.
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Unintended consequences
BY TONY BOUZA
Unintended consequences: a harsh law of public life that visits well-intentioned officials out to fix serious problems.
Unlike the simple answers of demagogues out to gather cash, power or sex—and we have a plethora of those—those acting in good faith rarely expect the negative results that pop up in unexpected places.
These heroes see a problem—homelessness, addiction, crime, poverty, disease, unemployment, whatever—and apply a solution. Education would be a beacon to the benighted. Policing would be the answer to crime.
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The Vikings stadium game
BY ED FELIEN
 It looks like the Legislature is not going to be able to get it together to fund a Vikings Stadium this year.
That’s what House Speaker Margaret Kelliher said earlier in the Session, “Not this year.”
It’s way too hot an issue in an election year, and Kelliher is already hoping the folks in Hennepin County will forget that she engineered the billion dollar sales tax increase for them to pay for the Twins’ Stadium as she runs across this loaded mine field in her quest to be Governor. Some out-state legislators wanted to try and stick it to Minneapolis again by using that portion of the Minneapolis Sales Tax that was used to pay for the Convention Center (and will expire this year) to pay for the Vikings.
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Re: “Understanding Gaza, Sderot and Najd”
A REBUTTAL BY CHERYL FIELDS
Southside Pride (March 2010) recently examined the history of the Israeli town of Sderot, a target of many Palestinian rocket attacks. Quoting Wikipedia, the article stated that in 1948, the Arab village of “Najd was occupied by Jewish soldiers” and “the inhabitants were expelled and fled to
Gaza. The village was then completely destroyed and leveled to the ground. In 1951, the town of Sderot was built over the village lands.”
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Buying America-with our dollars
BY JIM HIGHTOWER
Who owns America? Wall Street, you say? The corporate powers? Well, yes. But who owns them? The carefully contrived myth is that they are owned by you and me—the millions of mom & pop investors, pension-fund retirees, and people with savings in mutual funds. This Norman Rockwell portrait of widespread financial democracy is heartwarming, but a lie. Controlling ownership is securely in the hands of financial elites.
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World-class students and schools
BY DR. WILLIAM D. GREEN
I would like to personally congratulate the high school staff of Roosevelt who have worked extremely hard to become one of our new fully authorized International Baccalaureate schools.
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Remembering 34th Avenue
BY ED FELIEN
34th Avenue will always be clouded for me in a romantic haze. For those of us in the Roosevelt High School class of 1956, it was where hopes and dreams came alive or were dashed to dust.
If you had a car, after school, at night or on the weekends you’d head over to Charley’s A & W Root Beer Stand at 43rd and Hiawatha (where 34th Avenue used to connect to Hiawatha). We’d meet in the parking lot, drink nickel or dime root beers (8 ounces or16) or a black cow (root beer in a 16-ounce mug with a scoop of vanilla ice cream) and munch on a shrimp or heeseburger basket and talk about where the parties were for the weekend.
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The origins of Islam: the Kaaba and the Hajj
BY BARNABY DEVITT
Most of the time we think of Islam as the last of the three largest Western religions, following Judaism and Christianity. All three tell many of the same stories, and all three are said to come from Abraham. But even before Abraham there was a religious culture in the Middle East. There was a Kaaba and there was a Hajj. There was the month of Ramadan. There are important parts of Islam that predate Christianity and Judaism.
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Steve Seltz honored
BY ELAINE KLAASSEN
 South Minneapolis resident Steve Seltz was honored on April 24 at a Minnesota Literacy Council luncheon celebrating people whose volunteer work supports literacy in the Twin Cities. Seltz was nominated by the volunteer coordinator at SHAPE (South Hennepin Adult Programs in Education) where he has put in a thousand hours.
For much of his adult life, Steve Seltz took care of the elderly. From the time he graduated from high school, in the late ’70s, he worked as a nursing assistant at a number of nursing homes. One of the places disbanded and he continued to take care of two of its clients on a personal basis until they passed away. Then he passed his civil service exam and worked at the state nursing home, then the veterans home. He said, “I saw myself as a caregiver and friend.
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May 2010 
