This district is currently represented by Billy Menz, who dropped out after not getting endorsed at the DFL City Convention.

On the ballot there are two Dans:

Dan Engelhart (DFL-endorsed)
Dan Miller

Over on the post about the At-Large race I provided a whole lot of backstory on the last four years of the Park Board, and I don’t want to just C&P that whole thing over because there’s a lot. For the people who don’t want to click over, here’s a minimalist “why I’m super annoyed with the current Park Board, and why I want candidates who will do different things” summary:

• Current Park Board turned down a free park in favor of keeping parking and pretended this was about fire safety.
• Current Park Board oversaw a strike and most of the board failed to intervene.

Dan Engelhart got endorsed at the DFL City Convention, Billy Menz dropped out, and Dan Miller joined the race. On September 29th an e-mail went out advocating for an “apolitical Park Board” and signed by some of the most aggressively centrist, absolutely political people in town. They’re supporting Miller.

Dan Engelhart (DFL-endorsed)

Engelhart’s website emphasizes his background as a union organizer and employee (he’s the business agent for MAPE). I e-mailed to ask for more information on his work with the parks, and he got back to me promptly to talk about his involvement with AFCAC (the Above the Falls Community Advisory Committee). Honestly I felt like I got the best sense of who he is, what he stands for, and what he wants to do on the Park Board from watching his WedgeLive interview. You can also listen to WedgeLive interviews as a podcast but this is a good one to watch on YouTube, as there’s a lot of discussion of the areas they bike through and it’s useful to be able to see some of what they’re talking about. He struck me as committed, knowledgeable, and thoughtful.

Dan Miller

Calling Dan Miller a “bike guy” doesn’t really do him justice. He teaches biking to kids through a program in the local schools; he’s chaired multiple groups working on planning bikeway expansions; he’s worked on master plan advisory committees; he’s served for years on the Bicycle Advisory Committee. From his website: “Thanks in part to his advocacy, $5.5 million in public funding was secured to begin construction of the Grand Rounds Missing Link between Stinson Boulevard and the Franklin Avenue Bridge. […] Dan Miller has spent a decade championing a safer Central Ave. His persistent advocacy helped shape MnDOT’s corridor plan. […] His firsthand experience [with kid biking safety] informed his role in the Edison High School Safe Routes to School study, where he led site tours and helped identify high-risk areas.” Various people I know have worked with him and say he’s good to work with.

I like this, and he sounds terrific in a number of ways (his website also expresses commitment to playgrounds, dog parks, ice rinks, etc., lest you think he is just a bike guy). I guess my main concern about him is the fact that the Super Apolitical (very political) people endorsed him. I e-mailed him and asked, among other things, whether he had considered screening for Labor endorsement.

He replied, among other things: “My reason for filing was after Billy Menz suspended his campaign. I felt strongly that there be at least two candidates on the ballot for Parks Commissioner District 1.  I do not have an agenda.  I am running because it is my civic duty to offer voters a choice of parks over politics.  I have years of volunteering on parks, city and neighborhood committees as well as a career managing people and projects.  There’s alot happening at MPRB which I think is going in the right direction. I don’t wish to upend Parks for All, the Above the Falls and Grand Rounds Missing Link efforts.  I’m a collaborator and will not be a ‘my way or the highway’ commissioner.” (I’m not sure if he’s referring to Billy Menz there but “my way or the highway” is a phrase that has come up A LOT when people have talked about Billy Menz.) So given his line about “parks over politics” I do have concerns that he’s weaker on labor issues, especially given that Engelhart has in fact done a bunch of civic work in the parks (less than Miller, but this is actually an extremely high bar.)

ETA: I watched the Parks & Power forum and my concerns that Miller is weaker on labor issues were reinforced by Miller’s answers on the questions about the strike. This first came up about 15 minutes in. A constituent asked how people would ensure a strike didn’t happen again. Miller’s reply went on for a while but included:

Miller: It was a bad mark — it was a bad mark on everybody. Park board and union. Particularly the union leadership. The park board is more than just a union contract. […] If you take a look at the park boards’ 200 page budget from last year, and to be able to see the challenges that are out there, you’ll see a dollar amount that is not increasing, it’s got to stay the same, costs are going up, something’s got to [inaudible] and that will be… [shrugs].

Audience member: the workers’ backs.

Miller: Could be workers’ backs, could be a reduction in labor.

The strike came up again 45 minutes in (they got asked about lessons learned). Miller again opted to blame union leadership:

I don’t fully understand — I can only tell you what I’ve read in the newspaper, which reflects worse on LiUNA’s leadership than on the Park Board. […] To have national leaders come down and try to beat up on the Park Board … those folks were stuck. They were trying. I think leadership led them down a crack that a lot of people in LiUNA didn’t want to go.

So yeah, I would vote for Engelhart. The people who have worked with Miller have good things to say about him, but it’s clear he didn’t miss out on union endorsement just because he got in late.

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I do not have a Patreon or Ko-Fi but instead encourage people who want to reward all my hard work to donate to fundraisers. This year I’m fundraising for YouthLink. YouthLink is a Minneapolis nonprofit that helps youth (ages 16-24) who are homeless or at risk of homelessness. (Here’s their website.) I have seen some of the work they do and been really impressed. (An early donor to the fundraiser added a comment: “YouthLink was incredible instrumental in my assistance of a friend to escape a bad family situation in Florida with little more than a computer and a state ID. Thanks to YouthLink and their knowledge of resources my friend was able to get a mailing address (which was essential in getting a debit card and formal identification documents), healthcare, hot meals, an internship at a local company, and even furniture for their new apartment.” — That is exactly the sort of thing I’m talking about!)