Alondra Cano: More neighborhood investment

Alondra Cano's south Minneapolis ward is one of the most diverse in the city, spanning areas surrounding central Lake Street. Cano, the council's first Hispanic member, has been a vocal advocate for undocumented immigrants.

Redevelopment of the site could be a key opportunity to attract more people to spend dollars in the ward. Plans have envisioned demolishing a Minneapolis public schools building on that property and starting fresh with a new mixed-use development.

She would like to explore city subsidies that might temporarily help smaller businesses on that site — as well as similar ones elsewhere in the city — get started, while also connecting them with neighborhood and business associations, the arts, green industry, and education and training opportunities.

Her constituents have experienced discrimination and slower response times. She wants to examine the Police Department's supervisory structure for crime prevention specialists and she highlighted the move to have police wear body cameras: "I just don't want to look … and say that we weren't able to move much on that dial."

"If there's special programs or initiatives that we need to promote or create, I'm more than willing to do that."

Still feeling like an organizer and seeing herself as the scrappy underdog, such as during recent talks about the next council president. "I'm finding myself in 13 council offices where I feel like I'm still the minority. And I'm like, really? I thought we kind of all ran on a progressive thing here."