#People'sDuluthDownload 25.2

The People's perspective on the ongoings of Duluth City Council Meetings, 02/10/2025

Before diving right into recent municipal governing coverage I wanted to offer a sincere thank you for being here and reading my substack! Since this is a newer publication with lots of room for improvement, restructuring, and potential growth with collaborative content I’d like to request your feedback via comments and engagement on this post. How am I doing? What sorts of editing mistakes or factual errors have I made? What sorts of information do you want me to dig deeper and elaborate upon? Do you have a better name suggestion for the publication? I’m open to all sorts of critiques and view this publication as a collaborative effort toward building a greater Duluth and a more accountable and participatory local governance structure. Thanks again for being here :)

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Most of the items on the Duluth City Council’s public meeting agendas are procedural and often lumped together for approval via a ‘consent agenda item’ that is worked through and debated over at the Council’s Agenda Setting Meeting which happens every Thursday at 5:15pm before the biweekly Monday General Meetings (which now start at 6pm). Other items on Council agendas typically include items being read in for the first or second time, after which a vote is recorded. I had the opportunity to attend this past week’s Agenda Setting Meeting which I highly recommend for those interested in how our municipal governing body operates, both on an interpersonal and logistical level.

When reviewing the Council’s Agenda (found here) I was struck with deep concern over Public Safety Item 18 which is a resolution authorizing an agreement between US Marshal Services and the Duluth Police Department for a ‘short-term’ joint operation and ‘overtime pay authorization’ to aid in their targeting of Federal fugitives. My concern, along with many Duluthians who have reached out to Councilors, was whether or not this was related to Mr. Trump’s federal takeover and bolstering of agencies such as ICE and Border Patrol. Metros and large border cities have been raided by immigration officers since Mr. Trump took the helm and there has been some collaborative “Vichy” leadership such as New York City’s corrupt, and now pardoned, Mayor Eric Adams who has ordered his top officials not to criticize the President nor interfere with federal immigration officers. Duluthians are right to stand with immigrants and to be incredibly concerned (sound the alarm) when they see items like #18 on the Councilor’s agendas, especially right now with the ‘shock therapy’ of the utterly tumultuous, fascist, and destructive regime of Mr. Trump (Elon?) being implemented.

The US Marshal Service is often deputized by federal agencies (namely the FBI though certainly ICE as well) to assume custody of individuals arrested on federal charges. Councilor Awal (At Large) was first to question Police Chief Ceynowa about the Item as she answered community fears regarding federal crackdowns on immigration reaching Duluth. The gist of their correspondence, as well as an additional question from Councilor Durrwatcher (District 1) is posted below:

Awal, “Specify the relations to ICE”

Ceynowa, “This is not an immigration action. We do this annually and only for overtime reimbursement … we don’t work on immigration issues”

Awal, “If federal fugitives/individuals are undocumented, what are you going to do?”

Ceynowa, “We don’t contact US border patrol or ICE when we arrest someone … we follow procedures dependent on their status as per our civil service code/law”

Durrwatcher, “Why do we need to authorize overtime pay for this?”

Ceynowa, “Intelligence gathering takes time … we may get up to this $10k amount of overtime pay or we may not.”

Awal, “Where can individuals access DPD policy on immigration apprehension?”

Ceynowa, “Public policy manual item 412 (pg. 375) on our website.”

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More often than not the Council will hear certain commission reports and meetings 20-30 minutes before the General Meeting starts. Prior to Monday’s meeting there was a presentation from the Spirit Mountain Task Force which is made up of members of the ski hill’s board of directors, upper management, and city officials. The Task Force was created in 2020 under Mayor Larson’s administration to offer recommendations intended to help the publicly owned recreation area achieve financial stability and a sustainable plan to pay for the repair and replacement of deteriorated infrastructure. The Task Force’s presentation was focused primarily on seeking $3.4 million from the city to replace two 50 year old lifts with a new four-person lift. The budget for that replacement was approved later in the General Meeting. Below are some ‘sparknotes’ on the presentation led by Ann Glumak, the Executive Director at Spirit Mountain:

“Spirit needs to engage more with the local community like the DCC ski club, COGGS, etc. We are one of two resorts that allows ‘skinning the hill’ (climbing up the hill with mole skins on skis then skiing down) … Increasing revenue generation is a huge goal of ours, we need to have better net operating profit, make guest experience more friendly, and improve food services … We seek to enhance and expand programing offered into more diverse interests such as the outdoor skating rink we recently added and we have snowshoe rentals … we want to increase variety of lessons offered in winter and summer and we want to lower financial barriers to skiing.

There is a consulting group helping us to make recommendations for spirit mountain task force leadership … Since 2021 we have replaced all our lights with more efficient LEDs, made IT infrastructure improvements, replaced all rental gear, acquired a new groomer, added more snowmobiles, upgraded signage, have better snow making, upgrades to timber flyer, added new nordic and snowmobile trails (all these investments amount to about $5 million).

We have a $26 million budget available to better achieve our goals … significant renovation to the skyline chalet and a new lift to replace two 50 year old ones … External review from the consulting group shows that we have too much lift capacity, yet we have to maintain 4 lifts.”

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Following the presentation the General Meeting began and there were no reports from Administration or other committees so it was right into the “Opportunity for citizens to be heard”. There were only two public comments at this meeting, of which I was one.

The first speaker was Chance Wells who is a fellow organizer in Duluth representing OutFront Minnesota which is Minnesota’s largest 2SLGBTQIA+ advocacy group. They spoke at council to reach out to Councilors to work with them and OutFront to discuss how the group can work together to address 2SLGBTQIA+ issues and fears that arise in Duluth. If you (the reader and my comrade) have any interest in connecting with Chance or the OutFront MN organization please message or inquire below and I will get you their contact.

Before getting into my public comment I should preface it with why it felt relevant to this meeting despite so much despair going on in our locality and the world that is worthy of comment. One of the items on Councilor’s agenda Monday night that isn’t commonly brought forward was an amendment to the Duluth City Council ‘Standing Council Rules’. The amendment pertained to a change in the start time for council meetings from 7pm to 6pm. This rule change was voted in unanimously and has gone into effect for biweekly public council meetings going forward so if you hope or plan to attend on Monday February 24th do come earlier as meetings now start promptly at 6pm. The amendment to the ‘standing rules’ provided the opportunity to advocate for another amendment focused on the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance at city council meetings. As a frequent attendee at Duluth City Council meetings it is insufferable to listen to, a barrier to a more participatory and inclusive council chamber, and not representative of Duluth nor reflective of our region’s unique history. Schools don’t even recite this relic anymore; it’s time for Duluth City Council to move on and remove it from our space as well. If you agree with me that the Pledge has no place in modern municipal governance and our shared spaces then please consider e-mailing Council (council@duluthmn.gov) about your concerns. Here is an abbreviated text of my comment:

"The Pledge was written by Francis Bellamy in 1892 for a children’s magazine called, Youth’s Companion, which advocated for indoctrinating a sense of Nationalism and patriotism in public schoolhouses at a time when the United States was just realizing its imperialist ambitions abroad and still systematically stealing Native peoples land. It was also written to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Columbus discovering America, which when you consider the falsity of that narrative and what it celebrates (manifest destiny, white savior complex) and what it omits (native sovereignty, patriarchy, and genocide) then you have a clear and effective argument for retiring the pledge as a relic of history while providing ourselves the opportunity to make this chamber more inviting to all our municipalities constituents. Imagine in place of a blind Pledge of Allegiance we could all sing along to Woody Gutherie’s This land is your land or recite an Ojibwe hymn or we could even raise the flag of the Nation of Fun Du Lac to stand as tall as old glory in an acknowledgement of our history and the native sovereignty and stewardship of the land we all call home along the western most point of the Glitch Gumme. Another easy argument to make against the pledge is that Bellamy, along with his colleagues accompanied the Pledge and their schoolhouse flag movement with a salute known as the Bellamy Salute, recently brought back into the public attention as it was something Elon Musk recently demonstrated on Inauguration Day. One more argument is this constitutional value of separation of church and state. The “Under God” phrase wasn’t part of Bellamy’s original pledge even though he was a Christian nationalist and a bishop because he understood that we are a nation of immigrants not founded in the values of a church…it was only added during the Red Scare in the 50’s.

It’s clear that we are in an era where we can’t necessarily rely on a stable and well functioning governance at the federal level and we increasingly rely on and see ourselves more in local and state governance … so why pledge our blind allegiance to a flag of a nation-state when it is truly much more patriotic to critique power and strive to better it? I make this suggestion to amend procedure as someone who has proudly served their country in the armed forces and an unquestionable devotion to freedoms and our country…however, the pledge is a relic of another time and I look forward rather than backward toward building a more egalitarian and participatory democratic structure that is inclusive, participatory, and inviting for all while also acknowledging and atoning for the violence of this country’s founding and our region’s part in it. We can take strides toward that vision by removing the Pledge from the standing rules of council procedure."

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Upon closure of the meeting Councilor Forsman (At Large) claimed that the “Skywalk issue is coming next session”. Some information trickled down to me that the announcement or focus on this issue of the Skywalk is just basically announcing a committee, consisting of local businesses and stakeholders, to make suggestions for bettering the Skywalk facilities. Part of making the Skywalk function better (in my opinion) is simply populating and re-densify-ing downtown as it has been hollowed out by urban policies that promoted sprawl. The anonymous (maybe not so) reddit user u/Dorkamundo in Duluth’s subreddit provided some insights on the Skywalk following a post about the Council’s initiative for the skywalk:

“We can solve the lack of use of the Skywalk [by] incentiviz[ing] small businesses to move downtown, provide funding for the conversion of unused office space to residential space, improve access to downtown in GENERAL. We need to think outside the box to improve it, kinda like how we've seen the Miller Hill Mall sell the defunct Younkers and Sears to Essentia. The new apartment building going in next to Essentia can be a catalyst for this. 210 units isn't a huge amount given all that space in downtown, but it will create a centralized population that has direct access to the Skywalk and will help make the space more viable from a retail perspective. Too bad there's no link between that building and the rest of the Skywalk [yet].”

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Finally, candidates for the upcoming Council election cycle are starting to throw their hats in the ring. The four seats up for grabs this cycle include District 4 which is currently occupied by the not-so-closeted right-winger, Tara Swenson, as well as District 2 (Mike Mayou) and two At-Large seats (Azrin Awal and Terese Tomanek). Keep your eyes peeled for candidate announcements, coverage of the races, and endorsements.

The main reason I’ve started this publication (blog) is to highlight much of what isn’t covered by the severely lacking coverage offered by our local news outlets which often don’t highlight citizen’s public comments and concerns. I also want to encourage transparency in our local governance and to encourage you, my comrades, to get more involved in building direct and participatory governance structures locally. Together we can build a better city that works for all of us and fight against the monied capital interests (landlords, corporate developers, MNPower, privatized city services) that influence a narrow vision for municipal governing “like a business” rather than as an “essential social and public service to their constituency”.