Roseville House district candidate’s residency is questioned

The DFL candidate for a Roseville seat in the Minnesota House is pushing back on allegations from his Republican opponent that he doesn’t live in the district he hopes to represent.

Curtis Johnson is currently a member of the Roseville Area Schools board. He has owned a home in Little Canada since 2017, according to Ramsey County property records.

In May he filed to run for the open seat in House District 40B, saying he lived in an apartment complex less than 3 miles from his Little Canada home. The district includes parts of Roseville and Shoreview and has been represented by DFLer Jamie Becker-Finn, who isn’t seeking re-election, since 2017.

In a statement, Johnson said he and his wife decided to move to Roseville last year, but they’ve struggled to find the right house. In the meantime, he’s been renting “a Roseville apartment as my primary residence while we keep searching for a forever home.”

“My wife and our youngest child still live in the house because we didn’t want to disrupt our child’s life by moving the rest of the family into my apartment and then moving them again after we found a house in Roseville,” Johnson’s statement said.

State law requires House candidates to live in the district they want to represent for six months before the election. Johnson’s Republican opponent, Paul Wikstrom, says he has evidence that Johnson is still living at his Little Canada home.

Wikstrom released an ad Oct. 15 that accused Johnson of lying about his residency, but he has not committed to making a legal challenge. A residency challenge would be decided by the Minnesota Supreme Court.

“My confidence level is high that we have a solid case he is not a resident of the district,” Wikstrom said in an interview. He noted that Johnson’s vehicle is often at the Little Canada home and a portable storage container appeared out front days after his political ad went online.

Shoreview resident David Gottfried, who lost the DFL endorsement for the seat to Johnson, said he was aware of the residency allegations but didn’t bring them up in the endorsement contest because he felt they were untrue.

“I don’t put a lot of merit in anecdotal evidence,” Gottfried said. “To the best of my knowledge, the claim that Curtis doesn’t live in the district is false.”

Questions about candidates’ residency come up nearly every election cycle.

In Winona, DFL House candidate Sarah Kruger said a conservative group’s ad accusing her of not living in the district was false.

GOP Sen. Torrey Westrom faced a residency challenge in 2022 after redistricting prompted him to move from Elbow Lake to Alexandria. The Minnesota Supreme Court denied a petition to remove Westrom from the ballot.

Republican state Sen. Jason Rarick and Rep. Marion Rarick, formerly O’Neill, faced residency questions when they married in 2023. At the time, the Senate GOP said the couple would “keep and maintain residences in their respective districts and will continue to serve their constituents as they have throughout the six years of their relationship.”

Minnesota’s residency rules for the state Legislature are different from the rules for Congress, which don’t require candidates to live in the district they want to represent.