Right to Work? No, RTW = Rob the Workers: John Marty

Right to Work? No, RTW = Rob the Workers

by Senator John Marty March 22, 2012
The so-called "Right to Work" (RTW) constitutional amendment pushed by Republicans is anything but a right to work. In 1961, Dr. Martin Luther King described the purpose of "Right to Work" laws as efforts "to destroy labor unions and the freedom of collective bargaining by which unions have improved wages and working conditions of everyone.Wherever these laws have been passed, wages are lower, job opportunities are fewer and there are no civil rights." Dr. King called "Right to Work," a "false slogan" and a "fraud." King recognized that unions play a critical role; they have provided better public health and safety standards and have worked to make the economy work for everyone. In fact, on the day when Dr. King was assassinated in 1968, he was in Memphis supporting a sanitation workers' strike. To him, unions were essential to the rights and dignity of working people. Fifty years later, we are still fighting the same battle, this time with a Republican proposal to amend the Minnesota Constitution with the so-called "Right to Work." Some things haven't changed, and RTW is as fundamentally dishonest today as it was then. Anyone who is struggling to find a job would love to have a right to work. But this constitutional amendment has nothing to do with that. As in the past, this legislation is simply a proposal to allow workers who benefit from collective bargaining, arbitration, and other benefits to refuse to pay for the services they receive from the union. If this were accurately portrayed, the public would overwhelmingly reject such a scheme. That's why they use deceptive language. Their ballot question would ask voters whether to amend the constitution to guarantee people the "freedom to decide to join or not join a labor union, and to pay or not pay dues to a labor union." Workers already have that choice. Under federal and state law, if employees vote to organize a union, individual workers cannot be required to join or pay dues; they can only be required to pay for the representation provided by the union. RTW, by removing the requirement that workers pay for those services, means few unions could survive. This RTW amendment is being pushed for the very reasons that Dr. King identified: to weaken unions and bring down wages and benefits. And the impact is dramatic; the average family income in RTW states is almost $10,000/year lower than in Minnesota. Our economy is already stacked against workers. Many cannot find work, and many of those who are working do not earn enough. More than three in ten Minnesotans are struggling to meet basic needs. Some workers cannot afford housing and go from their jobs to a homeless shelter at night. Passing the RTW proposal would make the situation much worse. Just as importantly, lives of workers are at greater risk under RTW. Unions have long led the fight for worker safety laws and enforcement. During the 2011 legislative session, I remember a hearing where several firefighters sat in full protective gear -- one even in a hazmat suit -- in an already overheated capitol hearing room, to persuade lawmakers to provide sufficient training for firefighters. Unions have also been instrumental in negotiating with employers to provide safety equipment at construction sites; they fight for adequate staffing levels for nurses in hospitals and for protective gear for police and firefighters. This push for worker safety makes a huge difference. Workers in states with RTW laws are over 50% more likely to die in workplace incidents than workers in non-RTW states like Minnesota. Fortunately, the RTW proposal is struggling in the legislature. The Senate Republicans pulled the bill out of the committee it was assigned to, apparently because they didn't have enough votes to pass it there. In the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, one Republican spoke in favor of the proposal but voted against it, and another spoke against the proposal, then voted for it. They are struggling; we can defeat this. Hundreds of workers packed the hallways of the capitol outside of the hearing room to express strong opposition to a bill that would take away their rights. They understand that the proposal has nothing to do with any right to work. To them, RTW means "rob the workers". It's time to move beyond this fraudulent legislation. Let's talk about a trueright to work: Everyone who wants to work should have a right to a job - a job that pays a living wage. There are so many people eager to work, and so many tasks that need doing in our society. Yet our society has failed to connect the workers with the work that needs to be done. We could start by taking unemployed construction workers and hiring them to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure - making schools and all public buildings energy efficient, addressing the enormous backlog of deferred maintenance of public housing and buildings at our colleges and universities. We could hire teachers to expand early childhood programs, which provide great savings over the long run, and employ young adults to intervene with at-risk teens. It is time to stop attacking workers and start attacking unemployment. Defeating RTW would be a great start.

Senate announces Vikings stadium hearings

There may not be a special legislative session for a new Minnesota Vikings stadium, but there will be public hearings.

 

Sen. Julianne Ortman, R-Chanhassen, who heads the influential Senate Taxes Committee, announced Wednesday she would hold two informational hearings on the Vikings stadium on Nov. 29 and Dec. 6.

 

“We are holding these hearings to invite the public and interested parties to come and testify and offer their views. It is an issue that people are very passionate about,” Ortman said.

 

“Based on information provided to these committees, we will determine if there is a consensus for further action,” she added in a statement.

 

Details related to the hearings, according to Ortman, would be released at a later time.

 

Sen. Julie Rosen, R-Fairmont, the lead Senate author of stadium legislation, hailed the announcement.  "Senate Republican leadership has taken a bold and necessary step," she said.  But Rosen added that "it is obvious that this issue will not have a simple solution or an easy consensus."

 

Gov. Mark Dayton also said he welcomed the hearings, calling them a "very positive step forward."  Speaking to reporters after meeting with Arden Hills city officials Wednesday -- the Vikings want to build the stadium in Ramsey County's Arden Hills -- the governor said that "hopefully those hearings will present a clear picture, to at least the senators, as to what the options are and where to go from here."

 

House Republicans -- the party also holds a majority in the House -- have not announced any stadium hearings.

 

The Nov. 29 hearing would be a joint meeting of the Senate Taxes Committee and the Senate Local Government & Elections Committee. The Dec. 6 hearing would be a joint meeting of the Senate Taxes Committee and the Senate State Government Innovation & Veterans Committee.

 

The announcement comes as Dayton, who has pushed to resolve the Vikings stadium issue, acknowledged that a special legislative session to address the topic was now unlikely. The Legislature is scheduled to meet in regular session beginning Jan. 24.

 

The Vikings, who have played in the downtown Minneapolis Metrodome since 1982, want to build a $1.1 billion stadium in Arden Hills. The project would be funded by $407 million from the team, with the remainder coming from undetermined public subsidies.

Latest developments in the Occupy protests: AP

Latest developments in the Occupy protests

By The Associated Press – 17 hours ago 

Some of the latest developments in the Occupy protests:

CALIFORNIA

A day of demonstrations by students and anti-Wall Street activists was disrupted Tuesday when a campus police officer shot a man with a gun about a half-mile from the main protest site at the University of California, Berkeley.
The shooting occurred inside the Haas School of Business as hundreds of demonstrators left an outdoor plaza at the school for a march to demonstrate outside a bank. Officials didn't yet know whether the suspect was part of the Occupy Cal movement, said Ute Frey, a spokeswoman for the university.
ReFund California, a coalition of student groups and university employee unions, called for a campus strike, and protesters marched and rallied to protest banks and budget cuts to higher education.
Earlier in the day, more than 1,000 students, campus employees, faculty and other demonstrators filled an outdoor plaza after many took part in teach-ins. The plaza was covered with banners that read "stop the cuts" and "educate the state."
In Los Angeles, police and Occupy protesters are working on a plan that would close down an encampment that encircles City Hall.
Cmdr. Andrew Smith said Tuesday police don't have a sense of when demonstrators will pack up and go home but discussions are ongoing and both sides hope for a peaceful resolution.
Tensions rose briefly earlier Tuesday when about 100 protesters marched downtown in solidarity with New York counterparts being ousted from their encampment. No arrests were made.

GEORGIA

About 50 protesters gathered on the steps of City Hall in downtown Atlanta on a rainy Tuesday evening, holding banners reading, "Take Back Wall Street" and "Oakland, Wall Street, Atlanta, Chapel Hill: Our Passion for Freedom is Stronger Than Their Prison."
Spokeswoman La'Die Mansfield said the Occupy Atlanta demonstrators joined protests across the country in solidarity with New York protesters who were told to vacate Zuccotti Park.
The Occupy Atlanta protesters were forcibly removed by police from the park they had camped in for weeks after Mayor Kasim Reed decided conditions had become unsafe. The experience has given the Atlanta protesters a kinship with movements in New York and Oakland, where police also clashed with protesters, Mansfield said.

ILLINOIS

Protesters staged a sit-in Tuesday in front of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's office to try to stop health care cuts.
The protesters had the backing of a variety of activist groups, including Occupy Chicago, as they marched to City Hall from a nearby church. About a dozen protesters eventually took up seats on the floor outside Emanuel's office under the watchful eyes of police and journalists. Dozens more protesters assembled in a cordoned-off area in a hallway outside Emanuel's office. The mayor wasn't there.
The protesters oppose his proposed budget, which would close six of the city's 12 mental health clinics and partner the city's neighborhood health clinics with a federal program.
They chanted and offered testimonials about how they had been helped by the clinics.

MAINE

Occupy protesters worked Tuesday to insulate their tents, set up portable heaters and buy extra thermal socks as they vowed to stick it out in a city park for the winter months ahead in Maine.
Close to 60 tents are now set up in Lincoln Park, with many people placing hay bales around their tents and tarps over the top for insulation to ward off the cold to come. Some have brought in portable kerosene and propane heaters to prepare for the weather in Portland, which averages 62 inches of snow a year.

MASSACHUSETTS

Hip-hop mogul and political activist Russell Simmons told protesters at the Occupy Boston encampment Tuesday that it will take dramatic action to rid the American political system of corporate influence.
Simmons arrived in Boston after police dismantled the birthplace of the Occupy movement in New York earlier Tuesday.
"The Occupy movement is under attack," Simmons said, adding that there is no contradiction in a multimillionaire such as himself supporting a movement demanding economic equity. "I benefit off the tax code, but I'm ready to pay more taxes and ... I don't like having my secretary paying more in taxes than me."
Also Tuesday, Occupy Boston demonstrators filed a lawsuit as a pre-emptive strike against any attempt to remove them from their protest site.
The lawsuit said the demonstrators are concerned about attempts in New York and other cities to shut down the protests. The group is seeking a temporary restraining order to prevent the city or police from removing them from Dewey Square in Boston's financial district, where they have had an encampment since Sept. 30.
A hearing on the request is scheduled in Suffolk Superior Court Wednesday.

MICHIGAN

The Detroit City Council has given Occupy Detroit protesters a one-week extension on their right to hold out at a city park.
Organizers of Occupy Detroit told council members Monday that they wanted extra time to clean up the park and move their belongings to new, winter locations.
Council members approved the extension Tuesday. It allows group members to remain at Grand Circus Park until 10 p.m. next Monday.
About 150 people have moved into the park since Oct. 14.
The city last month denied a request for a 45-day permit.

MINNESOTA

Authorities in Minneapolis aren't saying when or if they will begin enforcing a new rule against sleeping overnight on a government plaza after they declined to remove Wall Street protesters the night the rule took effect.
Several dozen protesters spent Monday night on the plaza between the Hennepin County Government Center and Minneapolis City Hall. Since Oct. 7, the roughly half-block area has been the site of protests rooted in a movement that began in New York City.
Carolyn Marinan, a Hennepin County spokeswoman, and Sheriff Rich Stanek have said they're balancing free speech with concerns about the safety of protesters, who have been forbidden to set up tents.
"It's not going to be OK for people to stay overnight when temperatures are dangerous and cold," Marinan said Tuesday. "We don't want someone freezing on our plaza."

MISSOURI

A federal judge refused Tuesday to order Kiener Plaza re-opened for round-the-clock protests by the group Occupy St. Louis, whose tent city was ousted over the weekend after police began enforcing a 10 p.m. curfew in city parks.
U.S. District Judge Carol Jackson said Occupy St. Louis failed to show that the curfew was being selectively enforced in Kiener Plaza or that the enforcement was a reaction to the political nature of the protest, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
Occupy St. Louis maintained its tent city in Kiener Plaza from early October until police arrested 27 members without incident early Saturday.

NEW YORK

Hundreds of police officers in riot gear raided the Occupy Wall Street encampment in New York City in the pre-dawn darkness Tuesday, evicted hundreds of protesters and then demolished the tent city, leaving the future of the demonstration in limbo.
Later in the day, a New York judge upheld the city's crackdown. Supreme Court Justice Michael Stallman said in his ruling that the protesters "have not demonstrated that they have a First Amendment right to remain in Zuccotti Park, along with their tents, structures, generators and other installations to the exclusion of the owner's reasonable rights ... or to the rights to public access of others who might wish to use the space safely."
Protesters were allowed back into Zuccotti Park two by two Tuesday evening. They each could take only a small bag. No sleeping bags or tents were allowed.
City Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez was released without bail Tuesday night after being charged with resisting arrest as police cleared the Occupy Wall Street encampment at Zuccotti Park.
Rodriguez emerged from a courtroom Tuesday night with visible scrapes on his left temple and right forehead. He says an officer assaulted him two blocks from the park as he went to observe the police action. Police had no immediate comment.
Several journalists were arrested, handcuffed and hauled onto police buses along with hundreds of protesters Tuesday.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg defended the NYPD's policy of keeping the media back, saying it was intended to keep them out of harm's way.
City officials said the behavior was troubling, and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said the council would look into "reports of excessive force by the NYPD and reports of infringement of the rights of the press."
According to a poll released Tuesday, most New York voters don't believe the Occupy Wall Street movement has a clear message or represents 99 percent of Americans, but they support the demonstrators' right to stay in public parks around the clock.
The Siena College poll showed 45 percent of voters statewide have a favorable view of the movement. Forty-four percent have an unfavorable view, up six percentage points from a month earlier.
However, 57 percent of those polled said the demonstrators should be able to stay in the parks all day and all night, while 40 percent say they should not.
In upstate New York, a Republican Party official clashed verbally with Occupy Albany protesters Tuesday and urged Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo to appoint a special prosecutor to handle curfew violations by the demonstrators in a public park next to the state Capitol.
Albany County Republican Chairman Don Clarey went to the encampment Tuesday to tell reporters that Cuomo should appoint the special prosecutor.
"The rule of law is at stake here," Clarey said. "We need to enforce the law."
Demonstrators surrounded him Tuesday with signs with slogans like "Got Lies" and "Robin Hood was right" and countered that they have a constitutional right to be there. "The Constitution is the law of the land," some chanted, making him hard to hear.

OHIO

Police in Ohio say they have arrested seven Occupy protesters for refusing to leave a bank.
Columbus police Sgt. Rich Weiner says the group on Tuesday took their protest and chanting into a Fifth Third branch and a U.S. Bank branch, where they were arrested.
He said they were asked to leave by security, and those who refused were arrested on misdemeanor criminal trespassing charges.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson plans to join an Occupy group in Ohio at a rally protesting the recent clearing out of Occupy camps in New York and other cities.
Spokesmen for Occupy Cincinnati and Jackson say he will join the group Tuesday night at a downtown park where the group's members have been meeting and last month camped out. The group says about 20 University of Cincinnati students joined them Tuesday in a meeting on the UC campus where Occupy Cincinnati had urged students to walk out of classes in support of the movement.

OKLAHOMA

A member of the Occupy Tulsa group said Tuesday that demonstrations will continue there around the clock despite recent arrests of protesters in the city and elsewhere.
Occupy Tulsa members have been gathering at a downtown park for several weeks to protest what they say is corporate greed and economic inequality.
Tulsa police officer Jason Willingham estimated 40 to 50 arrests had been made at H.A. Chapman Centennial Green since Nov. 2, the most recent on Sunday.
Occupy Tulsa member Brian Horton said those arrested in Tulsa weren't acting as part of the group when they violated the city's 11 p.m. park curfew.

OREGON

A group of key Occupy Portland demonstrators say they're breaking off ties with the city and police amid allegations by demonstrators that police used excessive force when they broke up a downtown camp that protesters had held for five weeks.
Protester Justin Bridges was hospitalized Sunday after police dragged him away from the camp, and he now claims officers beat and brutalized him. Police said Bridges was simply pulled away from a dangerous situation when he fell to the ground between protesters and riot police.
Six demonstrators who had served as liaisons between Occupy Portland, the city and police published an open letter Tuesday saying they were giving up their positions "in direct response to the deplorable police actions" and what they see as a lack of communication.
Officials told protesters in a state park on the Capitol grounds in Salem their tents and other structures have to be out by the end of the month.
Parks and Recreation Department officials say the camp's food and medical structures at Willson Park are open all night and are attracting unruly people.
The department told the protesters Monday their permit to demonstrate would end at the end of the month. The park is open to pedestrians 24 hours a day, and state officials say the protesters can be there if they don't camp or have structures.

PENNSYLVANIA

Police say a homeless man was arrested early Tuesday for assaulting a homeless woman at the Occupy Philadelphia encampment.
Officer Jillian Russell says the 47-year-old man was arrested after slapping and punching the woman. He is charged with simple assault.
Both the man and the woman told police they were affiliated with the protest. A member of Occupy Philadelphia said he couldn't immediately verify whether that was the case.

TENNESSEE

A flood of support for Wall Street protesters poured in after Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam imposed a curfew that led to the arrests of 55 people in Nashville, according to public records obtained by The Associated Press on Tuesday.
Of nearly 400 emails sent to the Republican governor's office, only 11 supported his actions.
The documents also include cost estimates for cleaning the plaza following the protest. One company on Oct. 31 said it would cost more than $46,000 to clean and refinish the surface, while another estimated it to be about $18,000 to pressure wash and treat the areas.

TEXAS

Police say seven people have been arrested at an Occupy El Paso campsite in a peaceful removal of the protesters.
El Paso police spokesman Darrel Petry says no one was injured during the arrests early Tuesday at San Jacinto Plaza. The seven El Paso residents are accused of misdemeanor unlawful camping in a city park and also being in a public park after hours, he said.
A federal judge has refused to grant an order sought by Occupy Dallas demonstrators to prevent the city from closing their campsite.
Protesters failed to get a temporary restraining order Tuesday. U.S. District Judge Jane Boyle earlier expressed concern that federal courts did not have jurisdiction.
The city last week said protesters had violated an agreement to allow the campsite near Dallas City Hall. The city noted reports of a sexual assault of a child at the site, the removal of a baby over possible endangerment and trespassing arrests.
A Nov. 12 deadline to comply has been extended.
Occupy Dallas officials said protesters are abiding by the deal.

VIRGINIA

Members of Occupy Richmond say they'll take up a newspaper publisher's offer to encamp on his property next door to the mayor's residence.
The protesters said they'll accept the offer from Raymond Boone, editor and founder the Richmond Free Press. They said they'll begin their encampment on Tuesday.
Boone offered his property last week in an editorial.

WASHINGTON

The Occupy movement has reached one of Washington state's most remote towns — the fictional home of the characters in the vampire teen series "Twilight."
The Peninsula Daily News reports that 17 people held an Occupy Forks protest on Saturday, rallying outside a Bank of America branch, the only corporate presence the protesters could find in the town.
It's about a four-hour trip from Seattle, on the western side of the Olympic Peninsula.

AUSTRALIA

Police in Australia have swooped down on the Occupy Melbourne camp, arresting three protesters as they enforced city orders requiring demonstrators to take down tents and tarpaulins.
A Melbourne spokeswoman says campers weren't evicted Wednesday morning but were issued notices giving them an hour to remove the shelters. She said some protesters have lawfully remained at the camp.

SWITZERLAND

Police in the Swiss city of Zurich have cleared a makeshift camp linked to the global Occupy protest movement.
Zurich city police say 31 protesters peacefully resisted the clearance and were briefly detained when officers enforced an evacuation order for the historic Lindenhof square early Tuesday.
Police spokesman Marco Cortesi says some 20 protesters had earlier left the camp voluntarily.
The protesters had pitched their tents in the old town square Oct. 16 as part of an international anti-capitalist movement sparked by efforts to "occupy Wall Street."

Copyright © 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. 

SCSU survey: Jobs remain No. 1 concern for state

More than half of Minnesotans asked during the most recent St. Cloud State University survey think the state is headed in the wrong direction.
Fifty-six percent of the 626 Minnesotans randomly selected for the survey Oct. 17-26 had that opinion. That’s down 1 percent from last year.
And those surveyed identified unemployment and job opportunities as the biggest problem facing the state. Budget and budget deficit was second, followed by the economy.
The survey also asked whether the state constitution should be amended so that only a union of one man and one woman will be valid or recognized as a marriage in Minnesota.
Forty-seven percent said the constitution shouldn’t be amended in that fashion, while 44 percent believed it should be amended.
The gap widened depending on how the person being asked was contacted. Of those who were asked the marriage amendment question on a “landline” phone, 48 percent supported the marriage amendment. Only 39 percent of those contacted on their cellphones supported the marriage amendment.
The survey’s margin of error was plus or minus 5 percent.
Other survey questions asked about the job performances of President Barack Obama and Gov. Mark Dayton. Obama’s performance rating increased, with 41 percent rating his performance as excellent or pretty good. That’s up from 38 percent last year. But 59 percent rated his performance only fair or poor.
As for Dayton, 45 percent rated his performance excellent or pretty good, while 50 percent rated his performance as fair or poor.
When asked who was to blame for last summer’s state government shutdown, 57 percent blamed the Legislature, 19 percent blamed Dayton and 19 percent said that both were to blame.

"ALEC" Draz and Winona area Republicans embrace change

Tired of blaming Dayton for tax hikes, Draz and Winona area Republicans embrace change

Posted by Sally Jo Sorensen 

In Minnesota tax hikes no surprise, the editorial board of the Fargo Forum writes:

Nobody should have been shocked this week to learn that elected officials representing Moorhead and Clay County gave preliminary approval to property tax increases. They did so grudgingly – Moorhead Mayor Mark Voxland cast the decisive vote on a divided City Council – and vowed that they’d keep scrutinizing the budgets to try to soften any tax hikes before final approval.

The city is forced to find ways to replace $827,000 in Local Government Aid and elimination of a homeowner tax credit paid to cities representing another $538,000 in lost revenue. The $1.3 million revenue gap is a direct consequence of the Minnesota Legislature’s refusal to raise statewide taxes – action that merely shifts the burden downstream to local governments. Cutting the city budget absorbs part of the gap, but the preliminary budget calls for an 8.3 percent increase in property tax, translating into $73 more in taxes on a $140,000 home.

Read the whole editorial which, like so many of Greater Minnesota's editorial judgments concerning the property tax shift, is as withering as an mid-September frost.  It leaves the legislative majority just as exposed as limp zucchini, defrosting in the garden:

So, while members of the Minnesota Legislature can crow about their achievement in holding the line on spending, local taxpayers repeatedly have been forced to pay higher property taxes – often cited by voters as the least popular tax. Ultimately, Minnesota voters will have to decide if they want that to continue.

The Mankato Free Press board observed that now Property tax boosts start with the state:

It will also be more difficult now for state legislators to say that property taxes are strictly a local decision and come from the local level. Clearly, the Legislature and the governor changed state law in a way that will likely cause local property taxes to rise, even if locals don’t increase their levies.

Looking to Minnesota's southeastern corner, it's not surprising to find ALEC model lawmaker Steve Drazkowski doing the sort of crowing that the Forum editors derided. For as the editors of the Winona Daily News recently pointed out with regard to local school levies, the corporate bill factory zombie has no shame.

Today's Winona Daily News reports in Lawmakers reconsider cutting property-tax creditthat Draz and his pals have broken with House GOP Tax Czar Greg Davids' gambit of blaming Dayton entirely for the elimination of the homestead credit. Now it's just tough love, perhaps the local government equivalent of torching a daughter's provocative panties.

Draz and other Southeastern Republicans aren't the ones doing the reconsideration mentioned in the headline. They're doing the sort of crowing scorned by the Forum and other editors:

"The credits make it difficult for our cities, counties, and townships to budget when they're not sure how much of a credit they'll receive from the state," said Jeremy Miller, R-Winona. "Everyone seems to agree that in the long run, the homestead exclusion will be better for the budget processes at the state and local level."

Miller must move in very small circles to think that "everyone seems to agree" that the homestead exclusion will be better. Perhaps he's merely riding the rhetoric of the world's smallest bandwagon. Howe has a slightly different cackle:

Sen. John Howe, R-Red Wing, and Rep. Steve Drazkowski, R-Mazeppa, agreed.

"By changing to an exclusion, the state's trying to be up front with counties and municipalities," said Howe. "When we make decisions on the local level, residents get better results."

But for Draz the Destroyer, it's pure anti-revenue template:

"We shouldn't make promises we can't keep with money we don't have, and that's just what reinstating the credits would do," said Drazkowski.

DFLers Ann Lenczewski and Paul Marquart proposed a bill this week to bring back the homestead value market credit.

Image: Chocolate Drazombie bunny, by Tild.

Related posts: "Breathtaking chutzpa": House Tax Czar Greg Davids haz it, DL Online sez

This is not what reform looks like: Faribault paper calls out legislators on end of Homestead Credit

Mr. Accountability: Greg Davids not ready to take hit on homestead credit property tax change

Posted by Sally Jo Sorensen on Sep 16, 2011 at 07:32 AM in Cities, Counties, Governor Mark Dayton,Minnesota legislature, Politics, Postmoronic Politics, State Legislature, Taxes |

Do it now dossier: Lobbying 4 justice!

Season for lobbyists at Legislature begins

After Labor Day for many people means the end of the summer easiness.  Back to the grind of work.  One place for sure where the "grind" starts is at the Minnesota Legislature.

Between now and the end of November when the grind slows down again because of the Holiday season, hundreds of lobbyists, interest groups, and many public and private associations will be visiting your state legislator and other members of the state legislature.

The visitors will be asking Chairpersons of various policy committees to be the Chief Author of their bill.  They may ask your legislator to sponsor a bill that concerns the area in which the elected official and you live in.  The interest group representative may go to a legislator because of the employment and background the elected person may have.  A number of reasons.

This is the time of year is when the legislator starts to think seriously of the bills he/she wants to introduce.  I have heard many times from elected officials when I ask them about legislation--"wait" until after Labor Day because they are back in their districts and rarely come to St Paul until after Labor Day. 

When the special interest representative meets with the legislator who you elected wants to discuss an idea for a bill and get their Chief Authorship, there are basically two ways of how the bill will be directed.  The interested party/lobbyist being the conductor or the Chief Author working and leading in concert with the interested party.  Most times a bill is created the concert way, but once in a while the conductor is the interested party/lobbyist.

Now is the most impelling time for you to meet with your legislators, when you can have an in depth conversation on issues that impact your community, district, and state.  You will be competing with others, but you are their constituent.  Time can and will be made for you

Ask your legislator----What are you thinking of introducing this year for the district?  Are you introducing any bills for any interest groups or associations?  I have an idea for a bill--Can I work with you on it?

A legislator's book fills up very fast with bills of legislation they will introduce.  You want to make sure you and others from the district are heard loud and clear.

To get on your way, the Minnesota Legislature has a great tool to find out who your Representatives and Senators are.

Posted by Rich Neumeister at Thursday, September 08, 2011  

MN Schools Short on Cash

Reported by: Shane Delaney

ALBERT LEA, MN - Minnesota public schools are back in session and already most of them are struggling for money.

Earlier this year state lawmakers agreed to borrow money from Minnesota schools to help resolve the state's government shutdown. When the state borrowed the $2.2 billion they never set an exact date on when to pay it back.

     

That means for this academic year schools will be short money, and districts with already declining enrollments are looking for funding elsewhere. 

“The state is taking out a short term loan on the backs of the school districts,” said Michael Funk, superintendent of Albert Lea Public Schools.

Funk says his district, along with about 90 percent of public districts in the state, are taking out loans to cover the shortage.

“It amounts to about $20,000 in interest we have to pay throughout the year but that's because we have a pretty good fund balance we can dip into when the state isn't paying us money,” said Funk.

Funk says the funding gap comes at a time when a record setting number of districts are asking voters for an increase in operation levees this November.

“That is a direct result I think of not having real solid balanced and not having enough money from the state and this shift just compounds things,” said Funk.

The shift is even hurting districts with increasing enrollment.

“We're looking at probably late spring maybe early summer where we'll run out of cash to pay our bills and we'll have to go out and then borrow,” said David Krenz, superintendent of Austin Public Schools.

Krenz says his district has already secured a line of credit with a local bank. He says while an increasing enrollment means more state money, it also means more expenses.

“In our case we're continuing to grow so that's a good thing and being a larger district those students can fit in a little easier than if you were in a smaller district,” said Krenz.

And even though districts will eventually get the money paid back to them, some administrators say enough is enough.

“Is the education of our kids important or is playing this game of financial gimmickry what we want to do, and I wish we had real leaders at the capitol who would step up and say enough is enough,” said Funk.

When the state does repay they'll give the districts an additional $50 per student to help cover interest charges and other costs.

     

Funk says that should be enough for the Albert Lea district , but many in the state will have to absorb those interest charges

Six laid off in state Attorney General's Office #Minnesota

Six laid off in state Attorney General's Office

By Joe Kimball | Published Fri, Aug 26 2011 2:44 pm 

Five attorneys and a legal assistant have been laid off in the Minnesota Attorney General's office, after the Legislature cut $2.35 million from the agency's two-year budget.

The staff is being reorganized, and more savings will come from attrition through retirement, the office said in a statement.

And:

The general fund of the Attorney General’s Office (“AGO”) has been substantially reduced over the past ten years, from $28,852,000 in 2001 to $21,029,000 in 2011. In adjusted dollars, this represents a budget cut of over 40 percent.

Because 80 percent of the budget is personnel, staff cuts were needed to meet the lower budget numbers.

Ten years ago the office had 525 personnel, and was the largest public law office in the state. Today, the office, with about 300 employees, is substantially smaller in size than several metropolitan county attorney offices, the statement said.

Goodbye to All That: Reflections of a GOP Operative Who Left the Cult Source: Clean Technica

US: The shadow of suspicion falls in the Mall of America

G.W. Schulz, Daniel Zwerdling and Andrew Becker
Salon.com
Wed, 07 Sep 2011 16:10 CDT

© Unknown

Visitors who have done nothing wrong are winding up identified in counterterrorism reports

Bloomington, Minnesota - On May 1, 2008, at 4:59 p.m., Brad Kleinerman entered the spooky world of homeland security.

As he shopped for a children's watch inside the sprawling Mall of America, two security guards approached and began questioning him. Although he was not accused of wrongdoing, the guards filed a confidential report about Kleinerman that was forwarded to local police.

The reason: Guards thought he might pose a threat because he had been looking at them in a suspicious way.

Najam Qureshi, owner of a kiosk that sold items from his native Pakistan, also had his own experience with authorities after his father left a cellphone on a table in the food court.

The consequence: An FBI agent showed up at the family's home, asking if they knew anyone who might want to hurt the United States.

Mall of America officials say their security unit stops and questions on average up to 1,200 people each year. With 4.2 million square feet under one roof, the two-decade-old mall is a monument to suburban shopping and entertainment. Nearly 100,000 people from around the world pass through on a given day. 

The interviews at the mall are part of a counterterrorism initiative that acts as the private eyes and ears of law enforcement authorities but has often ensnared innocent people, according to an investigation by the Center for Investigative Reporting and NPR.

In many cases, the written reports were filed without the knowledge of those interviewed by security. Several people named in the reports learned from journalists that their birth dates, race, names of employers and other personal information were compiled along with surveillance images.

In some cases, the questioning appears to have the hallmarks of profiling -- something that officials at the mall deny. In nearly two-thirds of the cases reviewed, subjects are described as African-American, people of Asian and Arabic descent, and other minorities, according to an analysis of the documents.

Mall spokesman Dan Jasper said the private security guards would not conduct interviews based on racial or ethnic characteristics because "we may miss someone who truly does have harmful intent."

Much of the questioning at the mall has been done in public while shoppers mill around, records show. Two people, a shopper and a mall employee, also described being taken to a basement area for questioning. Officials at the mall would not address individual cases.

"The government is not going to protect us free of charge, so we have to do that ourselves," said Maureen Bausch, executive vice president of business development at the mall. "We're lucky enough to be in the city of Bloomington where they actually have a police substation here [in the mall] ... They're great. But we are responsible for this building."

Reporters at the Center for Investigative Reporting and NPR obtained 125 suspicious activity reports totaling over 1,000 pages dating back to Christmas Eve, 2005. The documents, provided by law enforcement officials in Minnesota, give a glimpse inside the national campaign by authorities to collect and share intelligence about possible threats.

The initiative exemplifies one of the enduring legacies of the terrorist attacks 10 years ago: Organizations and individuals are now encouraged by U.S. leaders to watch one another and report any signs of threats to homeland security authorities.

There is no way for the public to know exactly how many suspicious activity reports from the Mall of America have ended up with local, state and federal authorities. CIR and NPR asked 29 law enforcement agencies under open government laws for reports on suspicious activities. Only the Bloomington Police Department and Minnesota's state fusion center have turned over at least a portion of the paperwork.

In 2008, the mall's security director, Douglas Reynolds, told Congress that the mall was the "number-one source of actionable intelligence" provided to the state's fusion center, an intelligence hub created after 9/11 to pull together reports from an array of law enforcement sources.

Information from the suspicious activity reports generated at the mall has been shared with Bloomington police, the FBI and, in at least four cases, the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.

The push to encourage Americans to report suspicious activity began in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, when government officials and citizens found out there had been hints about the attackers that intelligence analysts had missed.

In the decade since, the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security have launched programs urging citizens to report suspicious activity. The private sector, including the utility industry and other businesses concerned with protecting "critical infrastructure," have their own surveillance and reporting systems. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has made such reporting a priority.

Last year the Department of Homeland Security launched a promotional campaign, "If you see something, say something," encouraging Americans to report anything perceived as threatening.

Among those formally enlisted were parking attendants, Jewish groups, stadium operators, landlords, security guards, fans of professional golf and auto racing and retailers such as the Mall of America. Visitors "may be subject to a security interview," the mall's website says.

The suspicious activity reports from the mall are rich with detail. They contain personal information, sometimes including Social Security numbers and the names of family members and friends. Some of the reports include shoppers' travel plans.

Commander Jim Ryan of the Bloomington Police Department said shoppers are not under arrest when stopped for questioning by private security. He said even he would walk away if the questioning seemed excessive.

"I don't think that I would subject myself to that, personally," he said. Ryan, however, defends security procedures at the mall.

Ryan said such reports are crucial to the nation's safety in the post-9/11 era. He said the suspicious activity reports could be held by his agency for two decades or longer. He acknowledged that the mall's methods, and reports the security guards file, may "infringe on some freedoms, unfortunately."

"We're charged with trying to keep people safe. We're trying to do it the best way we can," he said. "You may be questioned at the Mall of America about suspicious activity. It's something that may happen. It's part of today's society."

Some national security and constitutional law specialists question the propriety and effectiveness of such reports.

Dale Watson, a former top counterterrorism official with the FBI, said the mall's reports suggest that anyone could be targeted for intrusive questioning and surveillance.

"If that had been one of my brothers that was stopped in a mall, I'd be furious about it -- if I thought the police department had a file on him, an information file about his activities in the mall without any reasonable suspicion to investigate," said Watson, who played key roles in the investigations of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and a 1998 attack on U.S. embassies in East Africa.

Shoppers, who for the most part had no idea that a visit to the mall led to their personal information being shared with law enforcement, reacted with anger and dismay when shown their reports.

"For all the 30 years that I have lived in the United States, I've never been a suspect," said Emil Khalil. The California man was confronted at the mall in June 2009 for taking pictures, and he said an FBI agent later questioned him at the airport. "And I've never done anything wrong."

Mike Rozin, chief of a special security unit at the mall since 2005, acknowledged that the vast majority of people who come into contact with his unit "have done nothing wrong, have no malicious intent."

"They just act in a suspicious manner that obligated me to investigate further," Rozin said. "We talked to them for an average of five minutes, and they're able to continue their shopping."

Francis Van Asten's experience with mall security lasted much longer.

On Nov. 9, 2008, the Bloomington resident videotaped a short road trip from his home to the Mall of America. Van Asten, now 66, planned to send it to his fiancée's family in Vietnam so they could see life in the United States.

As he headed down an escalator, camera in hand, mall guards caught sight of him.

"Right away, I noticed he had a video camera and was recording the rotunda area," a security guard wrote in a suspicious activity report.

Van Asten, a one-time missile system repairman for the Army, was questioned for approximately two hours, records show. He was asked about traveling to Vietnam and how he came to know people there. The FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force was alerted. He was given a pat-down search, and the FBI demanded that his memory card be confiscated "for further analysis."

Authorities were concerned about his footage of an airplane landing at Minnesota's nearby international airport. They also worried Van Asten was conducting surveillance of mall property.

Exhausted and rattled, Van Asten had trouble finding his car after the ordeal was over.

"I sat down in my car and I cried, and I was shaking like a leaf," Van Asten said in an interview at his home. "That kind of sensation doesn't leave you real quickly when you've had an experience like that."

Bobbie Allen, a musician who lives in downtown Minneapolis, was stopped for writing in a notebook. As he waited for a lunch date on June 25, 2007, Allen jotted down some words, which caught the attention of security guard.

One guard wrote in Allen's suspicious activity report: "Before the male would write in his notebook, it appeared as though he would look at his watch. Periodically, the male would briefly look up from his notebook, look around, and then continue writing."

Guards asked for his name and for whom he was waiting. Allen, who is black, felt singled out for his race, according to the report. The guard responded that he was "randomly selected" for an interview.

The guards called Bloomington police, after deciding Allen was uncooperative and his note-taking "suspicious." Allen was cleared, but a suspicious activity report was compiled, complete with surveillance photo, age, height, address and more. Much of that information ended up in a Bloomington police report.

Jeffrey Rosen, a law professor at George Washington University, said such actions trample on traditional civil liberties protections and shift unaccountable power into private hands.

Rosen said the risk of abuses is high, particularly if there turns out to be a lack of proven results. "If all they're getting for amassing suspicious activity reports on innocent people in government databases is the arrest of a few low-level turnstile jumpers and shoplifters, that doesn't seem very sensible," Rosen said.

In Allen's case, he responded in a way few others have: He complained to the Minnesota Department of Human Rights and filed a lawsuit. Department investigators concluded that there was probable cause to support Allen's claim of racial discrimination.

Allen declined an interview, citing a settlement agreement reached with the mall.

Not everyone had a negative reaction to being written up. After a report naming him was forwarded to the FBI, Sameer Khalil of Orange County, Calif., said he believed that police and private security have an important job they must do.

"I think [the mall's program] makes America safer," he said.

Businessman Najam Qureshi discovered how the suspicions at the mall can linger.

The FBI arrived on his doorstep shortly after a run-in with mall security. His family moved from Pakistan to the United States when Qureshi was 8. Police once pulled over their car for a minor traffic violation, and Qureshi remembers his father saying, "You don't have to fear the police here. They are here to help."

Qureshi opened a small kiosk at the mall so his aging father, a former aeronautical engineer named Saleem, could keep busy. One day in early 2007, Saleem Qureshi left his cellphone in a mall food court. When he returned for it, security personnel had established a "perimeter" around the phone, along with other unattended items nearby that did not belong to Saleem -- a stroller and two coolers.

The "suspicious" objects eventually were cleared by security, documents show. But mall guards pursued Saleem Qureshi with questions.

"Qureshi moved around a lot when answering questions," security guard Ashly Foster wrote in a report. "At one point, he moved to his kiosk and proceeded to take items off of two shelves just to switch them around. ... He seemed to get agitated at points when I would ask more detailed questions."

Four years after his father ended up in a suspicious activity report, his son was shown the report for the first time.

"Everybody that lives in this country," said Najam Qureshi, "is a person of interest as far as these reports are concerned."

The Center for Investigative Reporting, the nation's oldest independent, nonprofit investigative news center, reported this story along with National Public Radio. You can contact the reporters at gwschulz-at-cironline.org, zwerdling-at-npr.org and abecke-at-cironline.org.

Read the extended version on the Center for Investigative Reporting's project site.

The interviews at the mall are part of a counterterrorism initiative that acts as the private eyes and ears of law enforcement authorities but has often ensnared innocent people, according to an investigation by the Center for Investigative Reporting and NPR. In many cases, the written reports were filed without the knowledge of those interviewed by security. Several people named in the reports learned from journalists that their birth dates, race, names of employers and other personal information were compiled along with surveillance images. In some cases, the questioning appears to have the hallmarks of profiling -- something that officials at the mall deny. In nearly two-thirds of the cases reviewed, subjects are described as African-American, people of Asian and Arabic descent, and other minorities, according to an analysis of the documents. Mall spokesman Dan Jasper said the private security guards would not conduct interviews based on racial or ethnic characteristics because "we may miss someone who truly does have harmful intent." Much of the questioning at the mall has been done in public while shoppers mill around, records show. Two people, a shopper and a mall employee, also described being taken to a basement area for questioning. Officials at the mall would not address individual cases. "The government is not going to protect us free of charge, so we have to do that ourselves," said Maureen Bausch, executive vice president of business development at the mall. "We're lucky enough to be in the city of Bloomington where they actually have a police substation here [in the mall] ... They're great. But we are responsible for this building." Reporters at the Center for Investigative Reporting and NPR obtained 125 suspicious activity reports totaling over 1,000 pages dating back to Christmas Eve, 2005. The documents, provided by law enforcement officials in Minnesota, give a glimpse inside the national campaign by authorities to collect and share intelligence about possible threats. The initiative exemplifies one of the enduring legacies of the terrorist attacks 10 years ago: Organizations and individuals are now encouraged by U.S. leaders to watch one another and report any signs of threats to homeland security authorities. There is no way for the public to know exactly how many suspicious activity reports from the Mall of America have ended up with local, state and federal authorities. CIR and NPR asked 29 law enforcement agencies under open government laws for reports on suspicious activities. Only the Bloomington Police Department and Minnesota's state fusion center have turned over at least a portion of the paperwork. In 2008, the mall's security director, Douglas Reynolds, told Congress that the mall was the "number-one source of actionable intelligence" provided to the state's fusion center, an intelligence hub created after 9/11 to pull together reports from an array of law enforcement sources. Information from the suspicious activity reports generated at the mall has been shared with Bloomington police, the FBI and, in at least four cases, the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. The push to encourage Americans to report suspicious activity began in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, when government officials and citizens found out there had been hints about the attackers that intelligence analysts had missed. In the decade since, the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security have launched programs urging citizens to report suspicious activity. The private sector, including the utility industry and other businesses concerned with protecting "critical infrastructure," have their own surveillance and reporting systems. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has made such reporting a priority. Last year the Department of Homeland Security launched a promotional campaign, "If you see something, say something," encouraging Americans to report anything perceived as threatening. Among those formally enlisted were parking attendants, Jewish groups, stadium operators, landlords, security guards, fans of professional golf and auto racing and retailers such as the Mall of America. Visitors "may be subject to a security interview," the mall's website says. The suspicious activity reports from the mall are rich with detail. They contain personal information, sometimes including Social Security numbers and the names of family members and friends. Some of the reports include shoppers' travel plans. Commander Jim Ryan of the Bloomington Police Department said shoppers are not under arrest when stopped for questioning by private security. He said even he would walk away if the questioning seemed excessive. "I don't think that I would subject myself to that, personally," he said. Ryan, however, defends security procedures at the mall. Ryan said such reports are crucial to the nation's safety in the post-9/11 era. He said the suspicious activity reports could be held by his agency for two decades or longer. He acknowledged that the mall's methods, and reports the security guards file, may "infringe on some freedoms, unfortunately." "We're charged with trying to keep people safe. We're trying to do it the best way we can," he said. "You may be questioned at the Mall of America about suspicious activity. It's something that may happen. It's part of today's society." Some national security and constitutional law specialists question the propriety and effectiveness of such reports. Dale Watson, a former top counterterrorism official with the FBI, said the mall's reports suggest that anyone could be targeted for intrusive questioning and surveillance. "If that had been one of my brothers that was stopped in a mall, I'd be furious about it -- if I thought the police department had a file on him, an information file about his activities in the mall without any reasonable suspicion to investigate," said Watson, who played key roles in the investigations of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and a 1998 attack on U.S. embassies in East Africa. Shoppers, who for the most part had no idea that a visit to the mall led to their personal information being shared with law enforcement, reacted with anger and dismay when shown their reports. "For all the 30 years that I have lived in the United States, I've never been a suspect," said Emil Khalil. The California man was confronted at the mall in June 2009 for taking pictures, and he said an FBI agent later questioned him at the airport. "And I've never done anything wrong." Mike Rozin, chief of a special security unit at the mall since 2005, acknowledged that the vast majority of people who come into contact with his unit "have done nothing wrong, have no malicious intent." "They just act in a suspicious manner that obligated me to investigate further," Rozin said. "We talked to them for an average of five minutes, and they're able to continue their shopping." Francis Van Asten's experience with mall security lasted much longer. On Nov. 9, 2008, the Bloomington resident videotaped a short road trip from his home to the Mall of America. Van Asten, now 66, planned to send it to his fiancée's family in Vietnam so they could see life in the United States. As he headed down an escalator, camera in hand, mall guards caught sight of him. "Right away, I noticed he had a video camera and was recording the rotunda area," a security guard wrote in a suspicious activity report. Van Asten, a one-time missile system repairman for the Army, was questioned for approximately two hours, records show. He was asked about traveling to Vietnam and how he came to know people there. The FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force was alerted. He was given a pat-down search, and the FBI demanded that his memory card be confiscated "for further analysis." Authorities were concerned about his footage of an airplane landing at Minnesota's nearby international airport. They also worried Van Asten was conducting surveillance of mall property. Exhausted and rattled, Van Asten had trouble finding his car after the ordeal was over. "I sat down in my car and I cried, and I was shaking like a leaf," Van Asten said in an interview at his home. "That kind of sensation doesn't leave you real quickly when you've had an experience like that." Bobbie Allen, a musician who lives in downtown Minneapolis, was stopped for writing in a notebook. As he waited for a lunch date on June 25, 2007, Allen jotted down some words, which caught the attention of security guard. One guard wrote in Allen's suspicious activity report: "Before the male would write in his notebook, it appeared as though he would look at his watch. Periodically, the male would briefly look up from his notebook, look around, and then continue writing." Guards asked for his name and for whom he was waiting. Allen, who is black, felt singled out for his race, according to the report. The guard responded that he was "randomly selected" for an interview. The guards called Bloomington police, after deciding Allen was uncooperative and his note-taking "suspicious." Allen was cleared, but a suspicious activity report was compiled, complete with surveillance photo, age, height, address and more. Much of that information ended up in a Bloomington police report. Jeffrey Rosen, a law professor at George Washington University, said such actions trample on traditional civil liberties protections and shift unaccountable power into private hands. Rosen said the risk of abuses is high, particularly if there turns out to be a lack of proven results. "If all they're getting for amassing suspicious activity reports on innocent people in government databases is the arrest of a few low-level turnstile jumpers and shoplifters, that doesn't seem very sensible," Rosen said. In Allen's case, he responded in a way few others have: He complained to the Minnesota Department of Human Rights and filed a lawsuit. Department investigators concluded that there was probable cause to support Allen's claim of racial discrimination. Allen declined an interview, citing a settlement agreement reached with the mall. Not everyone had a negative reaction to being written up. After a report naming him was forwarded to the FBI, Sameer Khalil of Orange County, Calif., said he believed that police and private security have an important job they must do. "I think [the mall's program] makes America safer," he said. Businessman Najam Qureshi discovered how the suspicions at the mall can linger. The FBI arrived on his doorstep shortly after a run-in with mall security. His family moved from Pakistan to the United States when Qureshi was 8. Police once pulled over their car for a minor traffic violation, and Qureshi remembers his father saying, "You don't have to fear the police here. They are here to help." Qureshi opened a small kiosk at the mall so his aging father, a former aeronautical engineer named Saleem, could keep busy. One day in early 2007, Saleem Qureshi left his cellphone in a mall food court. When he returned for it, security personnel had established a "perimeter" around the phone, along with other unattended items nearby that did not belong to Saleem -- a stroller and two coolers. The "suspicious" objects eventually were cleared by security, documents show. But mall guards pursued Saleem Qureshi with questions. "Qureshi moved around a lot when answering questions," security guard Ashly Foster wrote in a report. "At one point, he moved to his kiosk and proceeded to take items off of two shelves just to switch them around. ... He seemed to get agitated at points when I would ask more detailed questions." Four years after his father ended up in a suspicious activity report, his son was shown the report for the first time. "Everybody that lives in this country," said Najam Qureshi, "is a person of interest as far as these reports are concerned." The Center for Investigative Reporting, the nation's oldest independent, nonprofit investigative news center, reported this story along with National Public Radio. You can contact the reporters at gwschulz-at-cironline.org, zwerdling-at-npr.org and abecke-at-cironline.org. Read the extended version on the Center for Investigative Reporting's project site. The interviews at the mall are part of a counterterrorism initiative that acts as the private eyes and ears of law enforcement authorities but has often ensnared innocent people, according to an investigation by the Center for Investigative Reporting and NPR. In many cases, the written reports were filed without the knowledge of those interviewed by security. Several people named in the reports learned from journalists that their birth dates, race, names of employers and other personal information were compiled along with surveillance images. In some cases, the questioning appears to have the hallmarks of profiling -- something that officials at the mall deny. In nearly two-thirds of the cases reviewed, subjects are described as African-American, people of Asian and Arabic descent, and other minorities, according to an analysis of the documents. Mall spokesman Dan Jasper said the private security guards would not conduct interviews based on racial or ethnic characteristics because "we may miss someone who truly does have harmful intent." Much of the questioning at the mall has been done in public while shoppers mill around, records show. Two people, a shopper and a mall employee, also described being taken to a basement area for questioning. Officials at the mall would not address individual cases. "The government is not going to protect us free of charge, so we have to do that ourselves," said Maureen Bausch, executive vice president of business development at the mall. "We're lucky enough to be in the city of Bloomington where they actually have a police substation here [in the mall] ... They're great. But we are responsible for this building." Reporters at the Center for Investigative Reporting and NPR obtained 125 suspicious activity reports totaling over 1,000 pages dating back to Christmas Eve, 2005. The documents, provided by law enforcement officials in Minnesota, give a glimpse inside the national campaign by authorities to collect and share intelligence about possible threats. The initiative exemplifies one of the enduring legacies of the terrorist attacks 10 years ago: Organizations and individuals are now encouraged by U.S. leaders to watch one another and report any signs of threats to homeland security authorities. There is no way for the public to know exactly how many suspicious activity reports from the Mall of America have ended up with local, state and federal authorities. CIR and NPR asked 29 law enforcement agencies under open government laws for reports on suspicious activities. Only the Bloomington Police Department and Minnesota's state fusion center have turned over at least a portion of the paperwork. In 2008, the mall's security director, Douglas Reynolds, told Congress that the mall was the "number-one source of actionable intelligence" provided to the state's fusion center, an intelligence hub created after 9/11 to pull together reports from an array of law enforcement sources. Information from the suspicious activity reports generated at the mall has been shared with Bloomington police, the FBI and, in at least four cases, the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. The push to encourage Americans to report suspicious activity began in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, when government officials and citizens found out there had been hints about the attackers that intelligence analysts had missed. In the decade since, the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security have launched programs urging citizens to report suspicious activity. The private sector, including the utility industry and other businesses concerned with protecting "critical infrastructure," have their own surveillance and reporting systems. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has made such reporting a priority. Last year the Department of Homeland Security launched a promotional campaign, "If you see something, say something," encouraging Americans to report anything perceived as threatening. Among those formally enlisted were parking attendants, Jewish groups, stadium operators, landlords, security guards, fans of professional golf and auto racing and retailers such as the Mall of America. Visitors "may be subject to a security interview," the mall's website says. The suspicious activity reports from the mall are rich with detail. They contain personal information, sometimes including Social Security numbers and the names of family members and friends. Some of the reports include shoppers' travel plans. Commander Jim Ryan of the Bloomington Police Department said shoppers are not under arrest when stopped for questioning by private security. He said even he would walk away if the questioning seemed excessive. "I don't think that I would subject myself to that, personally," he said. Ryan, however, defends security procedures at the mall. Ryan said such reports are crucial to the nation's safety in the post-9/11 era. He said the suspicious activity reports could be held by his agency for two decades or longer. He acknowledged that the mall's methods, and reports the security guards file, may "infringe on some freedoms, unfortunately." "We're charged with trying to keep people safe. We're trying to do it the best way we can," he said. "You may be questioned at the Mall of America about suspicious activity. It's something that may happen. It's part of today's society." Some national security and constitutional law specialists question the propriety and effectiveness of such reports. Dale Watson, a former top counterterrorism official with the FBI, said the mall's reports suggest that anyone could be targeted for intrusive questioning and surveillance. "If that had been one of my brothers that was stopped in a mall, I'd be furious about it -- if I thought the police department had a file on him, an information file about his activities in the mall without any reasonable suspicion to investigate," said Watson, who played key roles in the investigations of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and a 1998 attack on U.S. embassies in East Africa. Shoppers, who for the most part had no idea that a visit to the mall led to their personal information being shared with law enforcement, reacted with anger and dismay when shown their reports. "For all the 30 years that I have lived in the United States, I've never been a suspect," said Emil Khalil. The California man was confronted at the mall in June 2009 for taking pictures, and he said an FBI agent later questioned him at the airport. "And I've never done anything wrong." Mike Rozin, chief of a special security unit at the mall since 2005, acknowledged that the vast majority of people who come into contact with his unit "have done nothing wrong, have no malicious intent." "They just act in a suspicious manner that obligated me to investigate further," Rozin said. "We talked to them for an average of five minutes, and they're able to continue their shopping." Francis Van Asten's experience with mall security lasted much longer. On Nov. 9, 2008, the Bloomington resident videotaped a short road trip from his home to the Mall of America. Van Asten, now 66, planned to send it to his fiancée's family in Vietnam so they could see life in the United States. As he headed down an escalator, camera in hand, mall guards caught sight of him. "Right away, I noticed he had a video camera and was recording the rotunda area," a security guard wrote in a suspicious activity report. Van Asten, a one-time missile system repairman for the Army, was questioned for approximately two hours, records show. He was asked about traveling to Vietnam and how he came to know people there. The FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force was alerted. He was given a pat-down search, and the FBI demanded that his memory card be confiscated "for further analysis." Authorities were concerned about his footage of an airplane landing at Minnesota's nearby international airport. They also worried Van Asten was conducting surveillance of mall property. Exhausted and rattled, Van Asten had trouble finding his car after the ordeal was over. "I sat down in my car and I cried, and I was shaking like a leaf," Van Asten said in an interview at his home. "That kind of sensation doesn't leave you real quickly when you've had an experience like that." Bobbie Allen, a musician who lives in downtown Minneapolis, was stopped for writing in a notebook. As he waited for a lunch date on June 25, 2007, Allen jotted down some words, which caught the attention of security guard. One guard wrote in Allen's suspicious activity report: "Before the male would write in his notebook, it appeared as though he would look at his watch. Periodically, the male would briefly look up from his notebook, look around, and then continue writing." Guards asked for his name and for whom he was waiting. Allen, who is black, felt singled out for his race, according to the report. The guard responded that he was "randomly selected" for an interview. The guards called Bloomington police, after deciding Allen was uncooperative and his note-taking "suspicious." Allen was cleared, but a suspicious activity report was compiled, complete with surveillance photo, age, height, address and more. Much of that information ended up in a Bloomington police report. Jeffrey Rosen, a law professor at George Washington University, said such actions trample on traditional civil liberties protections and shift unaccountable power into private hands. Rosen said the risk of abuses is high, particularly if there turns out to be a lack of proven results. "If all they're getting for amassing suspicious activity reports on innocent people in government databases is the arrest of a few low-level turnstile jumpers and shoplifters, that doesn't seem very sensible," Rosen said. In Allen's case, he responded in a way few others have: He complained to the Minnesota Department of Human Rights and filed a lawsuit. Department investigators concluded that there was probable cause to support Allen's claim of racial discrimination. Allen declined an interview, citing a settlement agreement reached with the mall. Not everyone had a negative reaction to being written up. After a report naming him was forwarded to the FBI, Sameer Khalil of Orange County, Calif., said he believed that police and private security have an important job they must do. "I think [the mall's program] makes America safer," he said. Businessman Najam Qureshi discovered how the suspicions at the mall can linger. The FBI arrived on his doorstep shortly after a run-in with mall security. His family moved from Pakistan to the United States when Qureshi was 8. Police once pulled over their car for a minor traffic violation, and Qureshi remembers his father saying, "You don't have to fear the police here. They are here to help." Qureshi opened a small kiosk at the mall so his aging father, a former aeronautical engineer named Saleem, could keep busy. One day in early 2007, Saleem Qureshi left his cellphone in a mall food court. When he returned for it, security personnel had established a "perimeter" around the phone, along with other unattended items nearby that did not belong to Saleem -- a stroller and two coolers. The "suspicious" objects eventually were cleared by security, documents show. But mall guards pursued Saleem Qureshi with questions. "Qureshi moved around a lot when answering questions," security guard Ashly Foster wrote in a report. "At one point, he moved to his kiosk and proceeded to take items off of two shelves just to switch them around. ... He seemed to get agitated at points when I would ask more detailed questions." Four years after his father ended up in a suspicious activity report, his son was shown the report for the first time. "Everybody that lives in this country," said Najam Qureshi, "is a person of interest as far as these reports are concerned." The Center for Investigative Reporting, the nation's oldest independent, nonprofit investigative news center, reported this story along with National Public Radio. You can contact the reporters at gwschulz-at-cironline.org, zwerdling-at-npr.org and abecke-at-cironline.org. Read the extended version on the Center for Investigative Reporting's project site.

ALEC's Lackeys: King and Keith: the Cucking Stool

ALEC's Lackeys: King and Keith

In an attempt to pivot away from the consequences of the budget cuts they insisted upon, Minnesota Republicans want to change the conversation. Last week, Republican legislative leaders held a press conference to announce "Reform 2.0." Currently lacking details, Reform 2.0 is supposed to gather ideas through citizen input, but it's more likely to be warmed over leftovers from the last session. It's a virtual certainty that the Reform 2.0 agenda will look almost exactly like the American Legislative Exchange Council's (ALEC) agenda for "state government reform." The 2010 Republican "reform agenda" was cribbed from ALEC, and 2011 will feature more of the same. And in today's episode of ALEC's Lackeys, we'll look at two of the most "reform-minded" Republican members of the House - Reps. Keith Downey and King Banaian.

The Minnesota GOP's "reform (1.0 and 2.0) agenda" seems to be drawn directly from ALEC's 2011 "State Budget Reform Toolkit" in both word and spirit. If you go line by line through the list of ALEC's "Index of Recommendations," the parallels are striking. The deep, original reform ideas of Rep. Keith Downey are nothing more than rewarmed ALEC boilerplate. The dazzling budgetary wizardry of Rep. King Banaian is cut and pasted from the ALEC playbook.

ALEC Recommendation: The legislature should require each agency to have a mission statement with goals and objectives linked to the state’s core functions of government.
ALEC Recommendation: States should adopt a Budgeting for Outcomes (BFO) approach to bring sanity and fiscal sustainability to the state budget process.

At the top of all Minnesota Republican talk about the budget is a buzzword - "priority-based budgeting." That was the basis for Rep. Banaian's HF2, one of the core priorities of the House GOP.

ALEC Recommendation: States should create a permanent sunset review commission to recommend ways the state can cut costs, reduce waste, and improve efficiency and service levels.

HF2 also included a "sunset commission" that would force all state agencies to appear in front of a panel to justify their existence or be eliminated. This was rolled into SF1047 (the omnibus state government bill) which was eventually vetoed by Governor Dayton.
When you get to "Section IV: Tools to Control Cost and Improve Government Efficiency" in ALEC's toolkit, the similarities with the legislative agenda of Keith Downey are downright eerie.

ALEC Recommendation: Adopt a state hiring freeze encompassing all departments.
ALEC Recommendation: Policymakers should delay automatic pay increases for state employees until the rising costs of government are brought under control.
ALEC Recommendation: Increase the use of privatization and competitive contracting to execute tasks to lower costs and improve the quality of service provided.
ALEC Recommendation: Develop a program (or programs) for state employees to allow them to be rewarded for savings generated by new innovations or re-engineering of existing business practices.

HF4: Mandates a 15% reduction in state workforce by 2015 by using a combination of hiring freezes, furloughs, and early retirement incentives.
HF192: The "Reinventing Government Employment Act" would freeze salaries, benchmark future salaries based on a review process, implement an employee "gainsharing program" where employees who save money get a share of the savings, force state employee units to bid for contracted services against private contractors, and propose a constitutional amendment to make Minnesota a "right to work (for less)" state.

ALEC Recommendation: States should adopt a constitutional revenue or spending limit. Such a limit would impose much needed discipline on profligate spending patterns.
ALEC Recommendation: Pass a balanced budget requirement, mandating that the expenditures included in the budget for the next fiscal year shall not exceed estimated revenues, and create a protected emergency reserve account.

HF1612: Proposes a constitutional amendment limiting spending to the revenue taken in the previous biennium.
HF67: Limits spending in the 2012-13 biennium to forecasted revenues.
Please do go and read the ALEC playbook, erm, "toolkit," if you haven't already. Reform 2.0 will be more of the same. Book it.
Follow me on Twitter @aaronklemz
 

http://www.twincities.com/ci_18830566?nclick_check=1

Glitter flies at State Fair amid battle over marriage amendment (w/video)

By Andy Greder
agreder@pioneerpress.com

Updated: 09/05/2011 06:10:24 PM CDT

Glitter as a political weapon: The latest skirmish came Sunday when a group calling itself "Glitterati" dumped bags of it on an anti-gay-marriage group's booth at the Minnesota State Fair.

Four people showered the Minnesota for Marriage booth with the shiny stuff as they passed overhead on the Sky Glider ride about 5 p.m., protesting what group organizer Nick Espinosa said was preferential treatment by Fair officials. Espinosa's group said the Fair declined registration attempts by the gay-marriage-rights group Minnesotans United for All Families.

Both sides have descended on the Fair to stake sides on a 2012 constitutional amendment proposal to define marriage as an institution between a man and a woman.

"Where's our booth? Equality for all!" shouted the unidentified people in a video posted on YouTube.

Espinosa, whose group claims previously throwing glitter on presidential candidates Michele Bachmann and Newt Gingrich, said the Fair initially declined registration attempts by both Minnesota for Marriage and Minnesotans United for All Families. That changed just after the Fair opened when Minnesota for Marriage announced that it had a spot.

Espinosa said the release came as a "shock."

"We think that's preferential treatment, and we are pushing, advocating for equality," said Espinosa, of Minneapolis.

event one opened up.

Both groups initially called to get a booth and were told none was available. But apparently only Minnesota for Marriage registered for a booth in the 

On about Aug. 30, Minnesota for Marriage received a recent booth vacancy, said Jim Sinclair, the Fair's deputy general manager.

Minnesotans United for All Families did receive permission to disseminate its information at other political booths, Sinclair said.

In the YouTube video, those staffing the anti-gay-marriage booth appeared not to notice the glitter blitz.