Frey launches task forces to address Minneapolis police-community relations, affordable housing

A month before officially taking office, Minneapolis Mayor-elect Jacob Frey announced Tuesday the creation of several new task forces to help implement his policy agenda.

The new committees will address community-police relations, affordable housing and economic inclusion. There will also be an "all-encompassing" policy committee that will take ideas from the public, co-chaired by outgoing City Council Member Elizabeth Glidden and Abou Amara, who previously worked as policy director for the state House of Representatives.

All committees will begin work this month and continue into the first half of 2018, according to Frey's office.

The announcement offers some of the first insights into Frey's priorities since his election.

The community-police task force will begin work as Minneapolis braces for a decision on whether prosecutors will charge a police officer in the fatal July shooting of Justine Ruszczyk Damond, an unarmed woman in south Minneapolis.

That killing comes in the aftermath of several other high-profile police shootings in the Twin Cities that led to mass protests.

To head this effort, Frey has recruited lobbyist Sarah Walker, who helped start the Minnesota Second Chance Coalition — which helps former prisoners reintegrate into society — along with Minneapolis Foundation Vice President Chanda Smith Baker and City Council Member Linea Palmisano, whose ward includes the neighborhood in which Damond was killed.

Minneapolis Police Chief Medaria Arradondo will also "play a key role" in the task force, according to the mayor's office.

The affordable housing committee will be co-chaired by Anne Mavity, executive director of the Minnesota Housing Partnership, former Minneapolis housing director Tom Streitz and Hennepin County Commissioner Peter McLaughlin.

Shauen V.T. Pearce-Lassiter, of Greater MSP, will chair the economic task force, with others to be named.

Andy Mannix • 612-673-4036