Lisa Ruth Goodman (born 1966) is an American politician who served as a member of the Minneapolis City Council from the 7th ward. First elected in 1997 and continuously re-elected for 26 years,she was the longest-serving member in council history. The 7th ward holds some of Minnesota's wealthiest neighborhoods,including Bryn Mawr,Cedar-Isles-Dean,Downtown West,East Isles,Elliot Park,Kenwood,Loring Park,Lowry Hill,and Stevens Square.
Goodman was born in Chicago and earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She served as executive director of the Minnesota chapter of NARAL.
Goodman is a native of Chicago,Illinois. She received a Bachelor of Arts in political science and labor relations from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. [1] She interned at the Dane County AFL–CIO. [2]
In 1989,Goodman moved to Minneapolis from Madison,Wisconsin where she had spent a year fundraising for Mayor Paul Soglin. She joined the 1990 United States Senate campaign of Paul Wellstone,serving as chief fundraiser. [3] She then worked for a year as development director of a college service-learning nonprofit before being hired as the executive director of the Minnesota chapter of NARAL in 1992. [3] Goodman formerly taught a course in community and economic development at the University of Minnesota's Humphrey School of Public Affairs. [1]
Goodman was elected to the Minneapolis City Council in 1997,with 54% of the vote. [3] [4] She was the longest-serving member of the Minneapolis City Council. [5] While city council seats are officially nonpartisan,Goodman is affiliated with the Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party. [3] During her career,Goodman has voted for the preservation of historic buildings. [6] She is considered to be pro-development [7] and has consistently called for expansion of the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD). [8] Goodman chairs the Business,Inspections,Housing,and Zoning committee and the Minneapolis Community Development Agency. [1]
A 2007 article about Goodman in the City Pages detailed her close relationships with developers. She sat on the Community Development Committee that approved condo developments. After convincing developers to build the Grant Park luxury condos in a blighted area,she then purchased one of the units,later selling it in 2005 for $315,000. [3] Goodman's relationship with former Minneapolis DFL chair Michael Krause and former Empowerment Zone head Kim Havey came under scrutiny when their company,Kandiyohi Development Partners,began bidding for a wood-burning power plant. [9] Goodman had invested in the company in 2006. [3] She wrote a letter on campaign stationery urging the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency to give Kandiyohi a permit,initially failing to disclose her status as an investor. [9] [3]
In 2012,Goodman was among six council members who voted against funding the new Vikings stadium through redirected sales taxes. [10] In 2015,Goodman was the only member of the city council to vote against a study examining the impact of raising the minimum wage. [11] Later in 2017 she voted in support of the $15 minimum wage. [12]
Prior to a candidate's forum in 2017,Goodman asked challenger Teqen Zéa-Aida if he would hold her chewing gum. She then took the gum out of her mouth and placed it in his hand. [13] [14] [15] She later apologized,saying that it was an attempt at humor. [16]
Goodman has worked to fund the Cedar Lake Trail extension to the river. She has said "I don't believe that we should be using bike lanes as a way to get people out of their cars." [16] Goodman voted against municipal consent for the Southwest LRT. [17] In 2018,Goodman voted in favor of the 2040 comprehensive plan. [18] When announcing the city's planned renovation of Peavey Plaza,Goodwin commented of the downtown Minneapolis park,"like all 45-year-old women,sometimes you just need a face-lift." [19] Following concerns over her comments,she said she was sorry if anyone was offended. [20] Goodman also supported banning new drive-throughs for fast food restaurants and banks in 2019. [21] Governor Tim Walz appointed her to the Minnesota Racing Commission in 2019. [22]
Following a proposal from Mayor Jacob Frey to add 14 police officers including eight neighborhood officers in 2019,Goodman said it was a "drop in the bucket compared to what is needed at this point in time." She joined downtown business interests asking for more police officers [23] and went on to say that she could find budget items to cut that would fund the hiring of at least 24 neighborhood officers. [24]
After the murder of George Floyd and resulting protests in 2020,Goodman was one of three council members who refused to sign a pledge to work towards defunding the police department. [25] [26] Later in the year,Goodman voted against a measure to shift management of police media from the MPD to city officials [27] [28] and against a proposed amendment to the city charter that would have transferred some of the mayoral authority over the MPD to the council. [29] In August 2020,a downtown riot occurred following rumors that the MPD killed a black man. Goodman said she was "disgusted" by the rioters [30] and decried damage to the Lotus Restaurant,saying "none of this did anything to advance racial justice in our city." [31] In November 2020,Goodman voted in favor of a proposal to spend nearly $500,000 to hire police officers from outside the MPD to deal with shortages. [32]
Goodman,when asked about her few city council members' efforts to try to change the Kahn rule before the 2021 election,said it "seems a little bit self-serving." [33]
Goodman left office in 2023 as the longest serving Minneapolis city council member. [34] She was named the city's Director of Strategic Initiatives in September 2024. [35]
Goodman owns a hobby farm in Kandiyohi County that she initially purchased with Michael Krause and Kim Havey. [3]
Goodman lived in a condo in the Bellevue building in downtown Minneapolis before moving to the Bryn Mawr neighborhood. In 2012,Goodman married Ben Horn,who owns FinnStyle,a Finnish-design home store. The architectural style of their glass-walled home,situated on a wooded lot bordering the Theodore Wirth Parkway,was not to Goodman's taste,she added a green roof and has "slowly warmed" to the aesthetic. [36] They divorced in 2016.
In October 2017,Goodman purchased a house in the Bryn Mawr neighborhood for $480,000. Following an assessment of her property at over $500,000,she filed a petition with the Minnesota Tax Court and succeeded in securing a $40,000 reduction in its assessed value. [5]
The Minneapolis City Council is the legislative branch of the city of Minneapolis in Minnesota,United States. Comprising 13 members,the council holds the authority to create and modify laws,policies,and ordinances that govern the city. Each member represents one of the 13 wards in Minneapolis,elected for a four-year term. The current council structure has been in place since the 1950s.
Cameron A. Gordon is an American politician who was a Green Party member of the Minneapolis City Council from 2006 to 2022. He was a co-founder of the Green Party of Minnesota and was called "the most prominent Green elected official in the US."
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Andrea Jenkins is an American politician,writer,performance artist,poet,and transgender activist. She is known for being the first Black openly transgender woman elected to public office in the United States,since January 2018 on the Minneapolis City Council and as the council's president from January 2022 to January 2024.
Jacob Lawrence Frey is an American politician and attorney who has served as the mayor of Minneapolis,Minnesota since 2018. A member of the Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party,he served on the Minneapolis City Council from 2014 to 2018.
Elizabeth Peterson "Lisa" Bender is an American politician,city planner,and a former member of the Minneapolis City Council from the 10th Ward. In 2018,she was unanimously elected president of the Minneapolis City Council.
On July 15,2017,Justine Damond,a 40-year-old Australian-American woman,was fatally shot by Minneapolis Police Department officer Mohamed Noor after she had called 9-1-1 to report the possible assault of a woman in an alley behind her house. Occurring weeks after a high-profile manslaughter trial acquittal in the 2016 police killing of Philando Castile,also in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area,the shooting exacerbated existing tensions and attracted national and international press.
The 2017 Minneapolis City Council election was held on November 7,2017,to elect the members of the Minneapolis City Council. The political composition remained unchanged,with the Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party (DFL) retaining 12 seats and the Green Party of Minnesota one seat. Three DFL incumbents were defeated by intraparty opponents. The new City Council convened on January 8,2018.
The Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board (MPRB) is an independent park district that owns,maintains,and programs activities in public parks in Minneapolis,Minnesota,United States. It has 500 full-time and 1,300 part-time employees and an $111 million operating and capital budget.
On May 25,2020,George Floyd,a 46-year-old black American man,was murdered in Minneapolis by Derek Chauvin,a 44-year-old white police officer. Floyd had been arrested after a store clerk reported that he made a purchase using a counterfeit $20 bill. Chauvin knelt on Floyd's neck for over nine minutes while Floyd was handcuffed and lying face-down in a street. Two other police officers,J. Alexander Kueng and Thomas Lane,assisted Chauvin in restraining Floyd. Lane had also pointed a gun at Floyd's head before Floyd was handcuffed. A fourth police officer,Tou Thao,prevented bystanders from intervening.
Derek Michael Chauvin is an American former police officer who murdered George Floyd,a 46-year-old African American man,in Minneapolis,Minnesota. On May 25,2020,Chauvin knelt on Floyd's neck for about nine minutes while Floyd was handcuffed and lying face down on the street,calling out "I can't breathe," during an arrest made with three other officers. Chauvin was dismissed by the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) on May 26 and arrested on May 29. The murder set off a series of protests in Minneapolis–Saint Paul,across the United States and around the world.
Robert J. Kroll is an American former police officer and member of the Minneapolis Police Department. He was the president of the Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis,the police union for the police department,from 2015 to 2021. Over the course of his career,Kroll was involved in three officer-involved shootings,had 20 internal affairs complaints,and was the subject of several lawsuits. Kroll has been a longtime opponent to reforms of the police department,including calls to address racial bias within the force and reduce the number of people killed by police. Kroll has generated controversy on a number of occasions. In particular,his comments following the murder of George Floyd in May 2020 resulted in calls for his resignation,including from a number of unions,several former mayors of Minneapolis,and a former police chief. Kroll's comments were "Now is not the time rush to judgement and immediately condemn our officers. An in-depth investigation is underway. Our officers are fully cooperating. We must review all video. We must wait for the medical examiner’s report."
The following is a timeline of race relations and policing in Minneapolis–Saint Paul,providing details with a history of policing in the Twin Cities in the U.S. state of Minnesota from the nineteenth century to the present day. The Hennepin County Sheriff's Office,with its headquarters in downtown Minneapolis,is one of the "largest law enforcement agencies in Minnesota" with division and unit facilities throughout Hennepin County. Twin cities,Saint Paul and Minneapolis,have their own police departments,the Minneapolis Police Department,which was established in 1867 and the Saint Paul Police Department. A union for rank and file officers in Minneapolis—the Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis —was established in 1917.
Local protests over the murder of George Floyd,sometimes called the Minneapolis riots or the Minneapolis uprising,began on May 26,2020,and within a few days had inspired a global protest movement against police brutality and racial inequality. The initial events were a reaction to a video filmed the day before and circulated widely in the media of police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on Floyd's neck for several minutes while Floyd struggled to breathe,begged for help,lost consciousness,and died. Public outrage over the content of the video gave way to widespread civil disorder in Minneapolis,Saint Paul,and other cities in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area over the five-day period of May 26 to 30 after Floyd's murder.
False rumors of a police shooting resulted in rioting,arson,and looting in the U.S. city of Minneapolis from August 26–28,2020. The events began as a reaction to the suicide of Eddie Sole Jr.,a 38-year old black man who was being pursued by Minneapolis police officers for his alleged involvement in a homicide. At approximately 2 p.m. on August 26,Sole died after he shot himself in the head as officers approached to arrest him. False rumors quickly spread on social media that Minneapolis police officers had fatally shot Sole. To quell unrest,Minneapolis police released closed-circuit television surveillance footage that captured Sole's suicide,which was later confirmed by a Hennepin County Medical Examiner's autopsy report.
Dolal Idd was a 23-year-old Somali-American man who was killed in an exchange of gunfire with Minneapolis police officers at approximately 6:15 p.m. CST on December 30,2020,after he shot at them from inside the car he was driving. The fatal encounter happened in the U.S. state of Minnesota during a police sting operation.
The police abolition movement gained momentum in the U.S. city of Minneapolis during protests of the murder of George Floyd in 2020 and culminated in the failed Question 2 ballot measure in 2021 to replace the city's police department with a public safety department. The measure would have removed minimum staffing levels for sworn officers,renamed the Minneapolis Police Department as the Minneapolis Department of Public Safety,and shifted oversight of the new agency from the mayor's office to the city council. It required the support of 51 percent of voters in order to pass. In the Minneapolis municipal election held on November 2,2021,the measure failed with 43.8 percent voting for it and 56.2 percent voting against it.
Protests and civil disorder occurred in reaction to the killing of Daunte Wright on April 11,2021. Wright,a 20-year-old Black man,was fatally shot by police officer Kimberly Potter during a traffic stop in Brooklyn Center,Minnesota,United States. Protests that first began in Brooklyn Center spread to other locations in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area and then to other cities in the United States. Several nights of civil disorder in Brooklyn Center and adjacent cities resulted in sporadic looting and damage to a few hundred properties,including four businesses that were set on fire.
The aftermath of the George Floyd protests in Minneapolis–Saint Paul describes the result of civil disorder between May 26 and June 7,2020,in the Twin Cities metropolitan area of the U.S. state of Minnesota. Protests began as a response to the murder of George Floyd,a 46-year-old African-American man on May 25,after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd's neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds as three other officers assisted during an arrest. The incident was captured on a bystander's video and it drew public outrage as video quickly circulated in the news media by the following day.
In the early 2020s,the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area in U.S. state of Minnesota experienced a wave of civil unrest,comprising peaceful demonstrations and riots,against systemic racism toward black Americans,notably in the form of police violence. A number of events occurred,beginning soon after the murder of George Floyd,an unarmed black man,by a white Minneapolis police officer on May 25,2020. National Public Radio characterized the events as cultural reckoning on topics of racial injustice.