Council trims neighborhood, engagement initiatives

Mayor Betsy Hodges' plans to expand a minority leadership program, analyze neighborhood funding and spend previously restricted tax money in new ways were halted by the City Council this week.

In a series of votes Monday, the City Council made dramatic changes to the mayor's plans for the city's Neighborhood and Community Relations department. Funding for the city's 71 neighborhood groups themselves -- slated to rise by 3 percent -- remained untouched, however.

Among the largest cuts was $180,000 from the mayor's proposal for the One Minneapolis Fund, which doles out small grants to non-profit organizations to encourage leadership among minority communities.

Created in 2013, the fund has paid for groups like Pillsbury United Communities and Lao Assistance Center to recruit Latino and Southeast Asian residents to serve on neighborhood and city boards.

Grantees in 2014 included the Lake Street Council, Appetite for Change, the Council on American Islamic Relations, Asian Media Access, Youth Care, Twin Cities Media Alliance and the Organizing Apprenticeship Project. See their proposed projects here.

Hodges had proposed $212,000 for the program, which received $62,000 in 2014. The cuts left funding at $32,000.

The council also cut $70,000 that was set aside for a study of neighborhood funding, three years after the city took more direct control over neighborhood organization finances. An additional $80,000 for another city staffer to work directly with the neighborhoods was also cut.

Neighborhoods had previously criticized the mayor for using excess money derived from booming special taxing districts -- traditionally earmarked for neighborhoods and Target Center debt -- to help close the city's port and hire new communications staffers. It would have been the first time those funds had been spent outside the neighborhood department and Target Center.

Those tax increment financing districts are expected to produce even more excess funds in future years. Some groups felt spending it outside the neighborhood department set a poor precedent.

The City Council voted to instead fund those activities with general fund dollars, swapping the special tax money back into the neighborhood department.

The budget changes are subject to change, however. They must still formally pass the full council and be signed by the mayor later this month.