Speed Gibson

I'm here at home, waiting for a furnace repairman to replace my blower motor that is giving up the ghost. So, I have some time to continue my series on the Minneapolis City Charter.

I think it's important because Minneapolis is clearly in deep financial trouble, and right or wrong, that will affect us all in Minnesota. Even if the Legislature stepped in to pay off its debts and pension fund shortages, the best of city leaders could make no meaningful promise to avoid a repeat. There is simply no overall accountability to either the voters or the Legislature.

Celebrated gatekeeper (Deputy Editor) Jim Boyd contributed an interesting history of how the current Minneapolis City Charter came to be. The Legislature via a Constitutional amendment granted cities the right to enact their own charters in 1896. Six times between 1898 and 1913, a proposed charter was defeated. Meanwhile, the Legislature which seemed to enjoy governing Minneapolis created still more independent agencies such as the Civil Service Commission and Board of Estimate and Taxation. The Park and Library boards had been created in the 1880's.

"Then in 1920, the charter commission decided to take another crack at the problem. This group must have been dominated by thoroughly pragmatic people, for what it did was gather up all the existing state statutes governing Minneapolis, passed in 28 legislative sessions, squish them together and call it a City Charter. Voters approved, and Minneapolis finally had itself a charter, the 62nd in the state, and far and away the largest."

Editorial writer Steve Berg provided more background on the financial crisis, largely one of debt. External debt service already takes 15 percent of the 2005 proposed budget, and it be the major reason for ongoing spending increases. A sweetheart pension deal for Minneapolis's unions has run aground, much like the Minneapolis Teachers pension has. Shortfalls are being papered over by issuing still more debt.

"Internal fund debt takes a bigger bite. In the 1990's, the city habitually borrowed money from itself to buy new police equipment and information technology, while pushing repayment obligations into the future. The future has now arrived with a thud. One result is crumbling infrastructure, streets and sewers that would have been maintained had the internal borrowing not occurred."

Minnetonka City Manager and frequent OpEx contributor Jim Gunyou provided a great example of how Minneapolis works.

"[In Minneapolis,] a faceless group called the Board of Estimate and Taxation [sets property tax levies.] Its seven members include the mayor, two City Council members, one Park Board member, one Library Board member, and two citizens elected at large. In 2001, the mayor negotiated a handshake agreement with the other members for their respective shares of the total levy pie. Then the back-door dealing started."

"The Park Board decided it wanted more, so it cut a separate deal with the Library Board and some of the others so they could all get a bigger cut. Sounds a little like "Survivor," doesn't it? When all the deals were totaled, the result was a preliminary levy increase of somewhere between 15 and 20 percent. Only the mayor and one citizen rep voted against that largesse at the public meeting no one ever attends."

As several have noted, it's amazing that this process has worked at all.