Minneapolis City Council moves 2040 plan for final vote

The Minneapolis City Council on Wednesday voted to move the 2040 Comprehensive Plan forward for likely approval later this week, after debate over the guiding document for the city's growth captured neighborhood interest for most of the year.

Council members had a brief discussion about the plan during a committee meeting before unanimously voting to move it forward. Council Member Abdi Warsame was absent during the vote. They made some final adjustments, approving small changes to maps that outline future development across the city.

Council President Lisa Bender thanked city staff for their work and council members for their collaboration on the plan, which she called a "really massive undertaking."

"I think the draft that we're forwarding for approval … is something to be really proud of," she said. "The details really matter and people have dug in, and this is a product that will evolve over time over many years."

The Minneapolis 2040 Comprehensive Plan was first unveiled in March. Since then, thousands of online comments, hours of neighborhood meetings and public hearings and scores of amendments shaped the plan.

Council Member Linea Palmisano, who has expressed concern with goals for citywide upzoning, clarified that Wednesday's vote did not submit the plan to the Metropolitan Council. The council will hold that vote on Friday.

In an e-mail blast earlier this week, Palmisano wrote she did not hear from anyone in her ward who supported scaling back the plan to allow triplexes rather than fourplexes on single-family lots. It was one of the most significant changes to the plan earlier this year.

At Wednesday's meeting, there was no mention of a last-minute lawsuit filed by an opposition group that alleged the plan will damage the environment and asked the courts to stop the council's upcoming vote.

A hearing on the case is scheduled for Thursday morning in Hennepin County District Court.

Miguel Otárola • 612-673-4753