Duluth mayor posts cheeky reply after Kathy Cargill rips up plans for Park Point

DULUTH — Duluth Mayor Roger Reinert, described as peeing “in his Cheerios” by Kathy Cargill in a story that ran this weekend in the Wall Street Journal, took to social media with a clarification.

“For the record ... I’m more of a pancake guy #IYKYK,” he posted to X, formerly Twitter, alongside a photo of a lone cake with a pat of butter and a strip of bacon.

Cargill, who has bought more than a dozen properties in Duluth’s Park Point neighborhood broke her public silence on plans for the land in a Wall Street Journal story that went online Saturday. She was going to beautify and modernize this stretch of land that separates Lake Superior from the Duluth-Superior Harbor, she told the publication. She was going to build homes for her relatives, a coffee shop and a sports complex.

A lot of Duluthians have kept an eye on her purchases and wondered aloud about her intentions.

Reinert, who started his term as mayor in January, was among those questioning Cargill’s plans for his former neighborhood. He sent her a letter asking to meet, he told Duluth’s City Council recently. When he didn’t immediately hear back, he said he would ask councilors to also sign off on a letter.

Cargill, a member of the billionaire family, turned to cereal to describe the mayor’s response.

“I think an expression that we all know — don’t pee in your Cheerios — well, he kind of peed in his Cheerios right there, and definitely I’m not going to do anything to benefit that community,” Cargill said of Reinert in the interview with the Wall Street Journal.

Reinert’s post on X didn’t directly address Cargill’s statement, but his hashtag — meaning “if you know you know” — was a strong hint. It was part of a longer note about how he would be riding with local snowplow drivers during the snowstorm.

Meanwhile in Duluth, “Cheerios” has become a buzzword. An anonymous group of residents has issued a challenge to locals (or anyone else) to donate a box or more of Cheerios (or, say, cornflakes) at Duluth Labor Temple or North East Area Labor Council Office between March 27-29. The boxes will be donated to Duluth food shelves participating in Minnesota FoodShare campaign.

The Facebook group, Duluth Cheerio Challenge, is behind the push. It had more than 100 members by Monday evening and describes itself as “community response from a ‘small-minded community that peed in its Cheerios.’”