Robbinsdale grapples with renaming park tainted with racist legacy

After an evening full of passionate statements from community members, Robbinsdale city leaders this week failed to agree on a new name for Sanborn Park, which is named after a family that tarnished local properties with racial covenants.

A push from activists to rename the park after Philando Castile was narrowly defeated by the city council, but appears to remain a possibility as the city decides what to do next. Castile — a Black man killed by police during a traffic stop in Falcon Heights in 2016 — was once a resident of Robbinsdale.

Valerie Castile, Castile’s mother, who said she formerly lived in Robbinsdale, spoke first at a public hearing Tuesday.

“I’m not here to negotiate or debate the name change,” Castile said. “I am here simply to say thank you for even the consideration for the nomination.”

Several members of the Robbinsdale Human Rights Commission who helped draft the city’s renaming policy and cosigned the application for “Castile Park” spoke about Castile’s legacy of helping school children get access to meals. Many said it is important to right the wrongs of the Sanborn Holding Company.

The Sanborn family, which owned much of the land throughout Robbinsdale in the early 1900s, placed racial covenants on their real estate, prohibiting “any person or persons of Chinese, Japanese, Moorish, Turkish, Negro, Mongolian or African blood or descent” from leasing or mortgaging their properties, according to Mapping Prejudice, a University of Minnesota database of racial covenants in the Twin Cities metro.

Racial covenants were used to segregate the metro during the early- to mid-1900s, and the effects are still visible. In 1948, the U.S. Supreme Court declared racial covenants unconstitutional, and Minnesota outlawed them in 1953. Thus, the covenants hold no legal power but remain on deeds to properties scattered around the Twin Cities.

There appears to be broad support on the city council to remove the Sanborn name from the park. But it’s less clear what the new name should be.

Scott Schneider, a Robbinsdale resident of 35 years, said he supports the name “Shoreline Park,” the other name proposed.

“Previous speakers have spoken of a terribly racist Robbinsdale … the neighborhood has evolved,” Schneider said. “I think we need to back off of this racist rhetoric that has been painted.”

Others said they are uncomfortable naming the park after a person who could be deemed as controversial, apparently referring to how Castile’s killing and the acquittal of the officer who killed him became a flashpoint for racial tensions.

Robbinsdale Mayor Bill Blonigan and Council Member Regan Murphy both signed the proposal for Shoreline Park.

“I thought I was doing a good thing to try to get this park unnamed,” Blonigan said, emphasizing that he proposed Shoreline Park before the Castile Park proposal and that he had been unaware of Castile’s ties to Robbinsdale. “And now because somebody else came in after us, it looks like we are against this particular individual, who is a great individual.”

Council Member Aaron Wagner made a motion to instate the name Castile Park, and Council Member Mia Parisian supported the idea. Mayor Blonigan and the other two council members, Murphy and Jason Greenberg, voted no, striking down the motion.

Instead of offering a vote for Shoreline Park, Blonigan offered the name Harriet Tubman Park, after the woman who helped free enslaved people, but that motion failed to garner a second.

Ultimately, council members concluded more community discussion is needed.

“That just shows we are moving forward, and this is part of that process,” Greenberg said.

Grace Henrie is a University of Minnesota student on assignment with the Star Tribune.