What do citizens want at the Third Precinct site? * updated

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What do citizens want at the Third Precinct site?
The Longfellow Community Council will hold four meetings in April to ask community members if they want the police building to be in the current location at Lake and Minnehaha or a different predetermined location chosen by the city.

After two and a half years, Longfellow residents have the opportunity to tell the city what they want at the Third Precinct site (Minnehaha and E. Lake St.). However, the city is only giving the Longfellow Community Council four weeks to organize and publicize meetings, and another four weeks to gather input. The report is due to the mayor in mid-May.
Phase I will ask community members if they want the police building for the Third Precinct to be in the current location at Lake and Minnehaha or a different predetermined location within the borders of the Third Precinct. That location has been predetermined by the city, but has not yet been shared. The city is planning to go live with a website dedicated to this process on March 27 with an online survey. Phase II will focus on recommendations for a Community Benefits Agreement regarding the Lake and Minnehaha location. There is still much to be worked out for Phase II. After another series of community conversations about developing a CBA, a working group will be formed to continue the work. The final CBA will be then shared back with everyone who participated in the process for review and comment.
"Longfellow Community Council is thankful and energized to be a part of the community engagement efforts around the future site of the police building in the Third Precinct as it is vital to bring residents, businesses and community organizations into the conversation and that we start the work taking down the barbed wire and bringing the site at Lake and Minnehaha back to community use," said LCC Executive Director Rachel Boeke.
"After 2.5 years of inaction with the promise of intentional and thoughtful outreach, the accelerated timeline from the city with this process, now that it's in motion, is opposed to the concept of real engagement. The Third Precinct is made of roughly 139,000 residents, not including business owners, employees, etc. The amount of outreach and work required to communicate with a large, representative constituent of this precinct is considerable. The sudden urgency of the city to have a response from residents has reduced our timeline to four weeks for organizing locations, informing the community about each event, and gathering residents into conversation.
"Our goal with these conversations is to involve as many community members as possible so the results are undeniable and cannot be pushed aside. We believe that any decision around the future of the Third Precinct site needs to be made by the people."

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