Letters to the Editor August 2020

Musings by Anita White, Longfellow artist

City charter vote only way to long-lasting change

Dear Editor:

In “Community partnership provides repair vouchers instead of tickets," Margie O’Loughlin presents the Lights On program as a chance for “improving police-community relations” and “healing” after the police killing of Philando Castile four years ago after he was stopped for a broken tail light. The claim is absurd. Philando Castile was killed because he was Black, not because his car needed repairs. If Philando Castile’s death is to be not entirely in vain, we need more than a program; we need a vote on the Minneapolis city charter.

I agree that handing out repair vouchers instead of fines is one easy way to help keep streets safer for everybody. But are armed police officers the best fit for the job when other alternatives are possible? Programs like Lights On might be an improvement but they are not enough when routine traffic stops for Black and Brown motorists too often turn deadly at the hands of police. In Minneapolis, we now have a chance to amend the city charter and remove the roadblocks that keep us from collaboratively and creatively re-imagining community safety. Let us vote and we can maybe finally turn tragedy into something positive and long-lasting.

Craig F. Simenson

Longfellow

Thanks for informative, courageous issues

Dear Editor:

Just read the Messenger which was delivered to my door.

Thanks for your article on LBS and the details of what we have been through. Having worked closely with Kim Jakus to draw various businesses the destruction hit close to home along with the way LoLa was supported by these businesses for so many years.

I remember sitting in LV’s Barbershop and drawing Lamberto as he worked. I later gave him the drawing. How innocent those times seem now.

Thanks for this informative courageous issue of the Messenger for these times

Anita White

Longfellow

Dear Editor:

Thank you so much for keeping the paper going. We loved the warbler article last month. I've lived in Longfellow three years and had never heard of 7 Oaks Oval until reading that article. Since then my family has visited three or four times and told several other friends about it. What a great find within walking distance of us. And we enjoyed the article this month about the game designer in Standish. It's so nice to have local news and discover all these neat things going on right here in the neighborhood. And the Lights On article (about police giving out vouchers rather than tickets) was encouraging to read this week, in the midst of all the pain and sorrow surrounding George Floyd's death.

Thank you for providing this newspaper to our neighborhood each month.

Take care,

Hannah Sheu

Longfellow

What do you think? Email letter to Tesha@LongfellowNokomisMessenger.com