Southside Pride

	Phillips/Powderhorn Nokomis Riverside

July 2010

Nokomis :

Council Member John Quincy cuts the ribbon while Tom Donnelly holds it as they welcome people into the new apartment building at 5746 Sander Drive. Through the cooperation of the City of Minneapolis, The Salvation Army, Tom and Muriel Donnelly of Donnelly Stucco and the Department of Veterans' Affairs this apartment building has been purchased to provide long-term housing for homeless vets. It was a festive ribbon-cutting on Monday, June 21, with free hot dogs, potato salad and pop.

Open Arms opens its doors

BY DICK SAUNDERS

Open Arms of Minnesota, the largest provider of meals for the chronically ill in the Twin Cities, celebrated two milestones in June —the delivery of its two millionth meal and the dedication of its new $8.1-million community kitchen at 2500 Bloomington Ave. S.

Some would say Open Arms’ entire history epitomizes “building pride on the Southside” magnificently, while demonstrating an ability to fulfill big dreams.

Started in 1986 in a small apartment kitchen in Phillips by Bill Rowe, Open Arms took 19 years to deliver its first million weekly meals to peopl living with HIV/AIDS. But it took only five years to deliver the second million as its clientele grew to about 1,200 by including those with breast cancer, multiple sclerosis, ALS and other chronic and progressive diseases.

Longfellow Station is moving forward

BY ED FELIEN

From Purina Mills

The demolition of the Purina Mills site at 38th Street and Hiawatha Avenue should be complete by the end of June, and the Longfellow Station
development should begin construction almost immediately after the site is cleared.

Southside Pride reported two years ago that the Longfellow Community Council and Capital Growth Real Estate had signed a Community Benefits Agreement that insured that the development company would be eligible for some part of
the Metropolitan Council’s $8.8 million Liveable Communities Grants. Dennis Geisinger reported:

SMAAC to hold Issues Forum online

BY DICK SAUNDERS

The South Metro Airport Action Council (SMAAC) is engaging Minnesota gubernatorial candidates in a brisk and ongoing dialog about current plans and problems at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

Cedar Avenue: the gateway to happiness

BY ED FELIEN

Newly arriving immigrants from Scandinavia drifted to the Cedar Riverside area and Snoose Boulevard in the 1880s and ’90s. Cedar Avenue at 5th Street had Dania Hall, a settlement house for Scandinavians where they could

speak their native tongue and find jobs and lodging. Most immigrants came out of rural poverty and were anxious to find work to pay back the friends and relatives that had loaned them money for passage into the new world.

The early part of the nineteenth century had seen the final collapse of feudalism in Scandinavia. Grazing and pasturelands had been held in common. Whole villages used these lands communally. No one got rich, but everyone lived comfortably. Then, with the advent of capitalism and the importance of private property, the common lands got sold, and eventually a few wealthy landowners drove the others out.

It’s not hard to bump up your credit score.
It’s not hard to lower it, either.

BY STEPHANIE FOX

Whether you have a good or a poor credit score, the fact you have one at all is the fault of the Minnesota-based Fair Isaac Corporation (FICO), which, in 1958, created the statistical basis for determining creditworthiness. The practice of using a set number by which prospective borrowers were judged didn’t become widespread until the 1980s. Because the score is derived from algorithms, it is considered impartial.

New general, same disaster

BY ED FELIEN

The first rule about holes is if you find yourself in one and you don’t want to be there, then, stop digging. Why is it so difficult for Obama to stop digging deeper in Afghanistan and just get out? He’s pursuing a doomed strategy. On Monday, July 5, according to the StarTribune, Senator John McCain spoke to the press during his visit to Afghanistan: “The Taliban know that Kandahar is the key to success or failure, so what happens in this operation will have a great effect on the outcome of this conflict. But I am convinced we can succeed and will succeed, and Kandahar is obviously the key area. And if [we] succeed there, we will succeed in the rest of this struggle.”

Anti-war protest at Senator Klobuchar’s office June 17

BY ED FELIEN

On Thursday, June 17, at 4:30 pm about 25 anti-war activists gathered outside Senator Klobuchar’s office on Washington Avenue in South Minneapolis to protest her support for the escalation of war in Afghanistan.

The Anti-War Committee in its press statement said: “Since the deployment of 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan last December, civilian casualties there have increased dramatically. Rhetoric from the Obama administration expresses concern for civilian deaths, but the violence continues.

Last month, Afghanistan’s Interior Ministry reported that civilian casualties jumped by 33 percent in a recent month-long period.

What’s love got to do with it?

BY BARNABY DEVITT

Tina Turner sang:
Oh, what's love got to do, got to do with it
What's love but a second hand emotion
What's love got to do, got to do with it
Who needs a heart
When a heart can be broken

Is it true, as Bobbie Dylan says, that "love makes the world go 'round"? Or, do we live in an indifferent universe, on a planet created by a cosmic force that has no interest in us?

Jim Hightower talks about populism

BY JOE GROSS

Whither populism? Or to put it in other words: What is populism, really, what the heck happened to it and is it still alive?

To hear Jim Hightower talk about it, populism most definitely is alive; it just might not call itself populism. And it has nothing to do with Tea Party activists.

"Populism is not just incoherent outbursts of anger," Hightower says. We're sitting in Dominican Joe. The former Texas agriculture commissioner, and current radio host and author of "The Hightower Lowdown" newsletter is looking exactly like you hoped he would look—cowboy jeans, shirt and hat. "It's a long-term effort by ordinary folks to take economic and political power out of the hands of corporations that are running roughshod over our economy, our energy supply and our government. That's partly why we're doing this event."