Okay.

Welcome to the regular meeting of the Public Health and Safety Committee for October 29, 2025.

I am Jason Chavez, the chair of this committee.

Before we begin the meeting, I want to offer a friendly reminder to all member staff and the public that these meetings are broadcast live to enable greater public participation.

These broadcasts include a real-time captioning as a further method to increase the accessibility of our proceedings to the community.

Therefore, all speakers need to be mindful of the rate of their speech so that our captioners can fully capture and transcribe all comments for the broadcast.

We ask all speakers to moderate the speed and clarity of their comments.

At this time, I'll ask the clerk to call the roll so we can verify your quorum for this meeting.

Councilmember Payne.

Present.

Rainville.

Present.

Present.

Vice Chair Wandsley.

Present.

Chair Travis.

Present.

Let the record reflect that we have a quorum.

I remind my colleagues that we'll be using speaker management today.

So please make sure you're signed up.

Before we move on to agenda, I'll call on Vice Chair Wandsley, who has a motion, and then Councilmember Rainbow.

Thank you, Chair Chavez.

But I and Councilmember and Chair Chavez are bringing forward a motion to amend the agenda today to include a legislative staff direction titled Charter Compliance and Enforcement, which would ultimately, if it's accepted, put it under as item five on discussion.

And while that is a really concerning trend amongst this administration from blocking the council from receiving information that we're legally entitled to.

So we'll talk more about the directive once we get to it, but with this, I will ask uh for a second in moving this motion forward.

Second.

And before we move forward, I do know that council member rainfall is on queue to uh make sure that we have the canopy roots presentation go first.

Clerks, I don't do I need to make a motion on that, or can I just do that?

As in first, you're just if I Mr.

Chair, if I'm understanding just shifting the items around.

Yep.

So three to yeah, three and four switching them around.

If there's no objection, then I think you can do that.

Yes.

Yep.

So, you know, I guess council member, I'll make a motion to move items number three to number four, and then we can open them for debate.

There's a second.

Uh councilmember Rainville, you are on queue, then vice chairwandsley, and if anybody wants to get on queue, you can get on cue.

Councilman Rainville and then Councilmember Chowdhury.

Uh thank you.

Uh my motion was just to flip the order of those reports.

I I have to leave at three o'clock, so I would enjoy hearing the canopy roots presentation.

That's why I'm making that.

Thank you.

Councilmember uh Chowdry.

I wanted to make the request that we take up the legislative directive before the re receive and files.

Yep, that we will do that.

Okay, we'd said item number five, so that's why I wanted to clarify that.

Thank you.

So what we're gonna do first is uh move approval the consent and then we'll move on to the legislative directive that uh is being brought forward and then we'll go into discussion.

Great.

So without objection, um sorry, Mr.

Chair, would you like a voice vote or a roll call for a voice vote for the motion to amend the agenda by adding the item?

Yep, correct.

All those in favor say aye.

I was opposed to saying nay.

Any objections?

All right, the amend the agenda has been amended.

Uh colleagues, now item number one is accepting a training reimbursement for firefighter training and education and approving the related appropriation resolution.

Item number two is receiving and filing an appointment to the public health advisory committee.

Colleagues, do we have any discussion on the agenda?

Consent agenda.

Great.

Uh seeing no further discussion, um, we'll approval of these items.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say nay.

Any objections?

Great.

Uh next up, I'll just pass it on to uh Vice Chair Wancy.

You did speak on the item, but if you wish to elaborate.

Thank you, uh, Chair Chavez.

So, Chair Chavez and I are bringing forward this walk-on item um in response to Mayor Fry's and MPD's failure to fulfill a request to present in today's committee uh specifically about the MPD's internal investigation into the shooting of Davis Matori.

Now, for the public who may not be aware, uh Davis Mattore is a black resident who repeatedly asked MPD for help because his neighbor was making specific racist threats to harm or kill him.

And then this time uh last year, Mr.

Matory was shot in the neck, and that shooter uh was not apprehended by MPD for another five days.

Now MPD has stated publicly that they did conduct an internal review of this case um several months ago, and Mr.

Mattore himself reached out to full counsel on September 18th, asking us to obtain the internal report that was supposedly done.

Now, in his request, he also highlighted uh that his inquiry was inspired by the reporting of Mariah Samuels, who is a black woman or was a black woman who recently lost her life to a known abuser who she also had repeatedly told MPD was a threat to her life.

In response to Mr.

Matory's request, the council passed a legislative directive on October 9th, requesting that MPD release the results of their internal investigation into the shooting of Davis Matory by his neighbor John Sachak.

On October 15th, that directive was signed by Mayor Fry.

And the director requested that MPD once again present to the public health and safety committee on October 29th, which is today.

And as we can see from the agenda, um, the report is not on there.

And also no one from MPD or the Office of Community Safety showed up to agenda setting for this committee meeting to speak about why they declined to respond to the council's legislative directive.

Um I do want to give gratitude to Chair Chavez, who made many attempts um in getting a response for several days from the Office of Community Safety.

And late yesterday afternoon, uh we finally received communications from Commissioner Bartnett, who sent the email to the entire council.

And I will say that email was deeply concerning and essentially deflected the whole basis of why the request was made in the first place.

Uh Commissioner Barnett stated yesterday in that email that um he believes that releasing MPD's completed internal review would somehow conflict with the city's uh auditor's office ongoing independent after action of the Davis Matory case.

I will say this email is nonsensical for a few reasons.

First, Commissioner Barnett stated that releasing the requested internal report will somehow impede the ongoing independent analysis being done by the city auditor's office.

As of today, the city auditor has never made such claims and only cited that the auditor's office's primary needs from MPD are their cooperation with the after action process.

Commissioner Barnett also claimed, or essentially claims in this uh email are not only suspicious but also are dubious, considering the fact that this body has seen MPD do both before.

For example, last year, the council asked for both an internal report and the independent external analysis of MPD's use of shot spotter technology.

MPD not only released their internal findings, but they also are actively participating in the independent analysis being done externally.

So in this case, once again, OCS could absolutely do both.

They could release their internal findings of what they discovered regarding the Davis Matory shooting while also cooperating with the ongoing after action that's being uh carried out by the city auditor's office.

That was actually due on June 13th and is now delayed out to um early next year for release.

And that brings me to my second point.

The Office of Community Safety or the Minneapolis police department cannot use the ongoing after action process as justification for their non-release of MPD's internal review when they're also the main barrier to said after action being completed.

This past week, the city auditor informed council that the delay on the mature after action is the result of MPDs and the Fry administration's continued refusal to cooperate with the office investigatory process and thus allow the city auditor to complete his charter mandated duties, which includes producing the Davis Matory after action.

Now, in taking these two considerations together, Commissioner Barnett letters justifying MPD's non-compliance to publicly releasing the internal review of Mr.

Mattore's case is not only absurd and unacceptable, but it's also illegal.

However, I want to be extremely clear, neither Commissioner Barnett nor the mayor gets to a struct council's legislative process as reinforced by the city's charter.

While I'm unsure as to why both city leaders feel comfortable violating the charter by withholding information requested by council through our legislative process, their brazenness does not mean we have to accept it as a body.

And this legislative motion that we're bringing forward today explores options in which council could take for enforcement actions, or that the public can take as well when the executive branch is not compliant with the city's charter.

And in closing, I do want to say, Mr.

Maturi, I am sorry that MPD and Mayor Fry continues to fail you.

This meeting was supposed to be an opportunity to have a sober conversation about MPD's action or inactions regarding your case to have honest reflections on where the police department failed and what changes they are making to protect future residents from becoming victims of preventable acts of racist violence.

MPD refused to have that conversation today.

And while I'm disturbed by MPDs and our executive leaders, the lengths that they are going to avoid having to account to the public and to this body about the decisions that they make, I do want to be clear to you, Mr.

Mattore, that I know many of my colleagues and I will continue to pursue justice for you and for all residents who are impacted by our police department's failure in keeping all of our residents safe.

So with that, I stand for questions and we'll move uh this item forward for approval.

Thank you.

Next, so we have Councilmember Palmasano.

Mr.

Chair, I don't have questions, but I do want to explain why I think this is inappropriate.

Um walk-ons are supposed to be in the case of an emergency.

Um, why this could not have waited until the next committee meeting, I don't know.

It feels nothing but political.

Um we've got to stop using victims of crimes this way.

I'm worried it's gonna mess up court cases down the line.

The language in the legislative directive that I agreed to says present an update.

The commissioner sent a letter to council members saying that releasing this internal review would compromise the audit investigation.

So, Commissioner Barnett did provide an update per the legislative directive that Councilmember Wandsley is talking about.

The council cannot both ask for an after-action review on for one situation, the Mooturi incident, and then also demand that some of the after-action review elements be released before the after-action review is over.

The commissioner, who used to be chief judge, is working in good faith with the auditor to ensure all information is shared and contributed to the after-action review.

So the fact that council members don't like that their request for an after action review and a legislative directive are in conflict is not a good reason to interfere with an after action review.

The Office of Community Safety gave the auditor the review, not us, but they are working together on this.

So we have Councilmember Rainbow.

Thank you, Chair.

I just want to um say once again what uh council member Palmason did.

So the public knows Commissioner Barnett was chief judge of Hennepin Colony before he took this job with Minneapolis.

And if his memo says that uh the case would be compromised if that report is released, I take him as his word for that.

Next up, we have Vice Chair Wansley.

Thank you, Chair Chavez.

Um, I just want to point out a few just outright false statements made by my colleagues here.

First, walk on there's nowhere in our policy that says it it requires their emergency.

I think that's interpretive uh to Councilmember Pamosano's understanding of our legislative process.

Um, neither or never the less, um, I want to reiterate, it was actually you, Councilmember Pamasano, when I referenced in the example where we saw MPD fulfill a request, which you brought actually a legislative directive to have an inquiry in the use of shot spotter technology.

And I brought forward with a number of my colleagues also a request for independent and external evaluation of that process.

They fulfilled your legislative directive and are currently working on that same external process.

So, once again, your point, and we've shown it through the president, you said actually on this matter, that MPD can do both.

There's a resistance to do both, and I don't understand that the background of our commissioner of community safety's the relevance of that, the relevance is what's stated in the letter.

The letter says that according to him, not to our city uh auditor, which I want to reiterate.

Our city auditor has not reinforced any of the claims that are referenced in the letter provided by Commissioner Barnett as to why they will not release the internal review that they told to many media outlets that they completed just this past summer.

There is nothing in a policy or anything that says that in order to receive internal findings, you have to go through an after-action process first.

That there's none of that that's founded anywhere.

So this is literally made up on the days.

And it's important, and to also highlight, then if that was the case, why did Mayor Fry sign this legislative directive in early October?

Mayor Fry had the opportunity to veto if that was the basis of it, and yet that did not happen.

We were under the understanding under our charter in force understanding that we were going to receive this information that we're entitled to, so that Mr.

Mattori could understand what actions are being taken to make sure no one is put in his same predicament of almost losing their life after having reached out to the mayor, to the chief of police, to the police themselves multiple times around getting protection, and then that protection was not rendered to them.

So I just want to highlight we've had numerous examples of what we're requesting being fulfilled is not being so in this case, and the rationale that was provided to us by our commissioner of community safety is actually unsound.

The public should have had this report and also the after action is because of the enabling of the Fry administration to continue to resist this body's attempts and getting information that we're legally entitled to, the public's requests for information that they're legally entitled to.

And this is what this directive tends to reconcile.

And that is absolutely appropriate.

That falls exactly under our oversight authorities, and anyone else who doesn't want to seek it or actually figure out how to do your job in an effective and successful manner and not tolerate interference from the executive office, I encourage you to support this motion.

Yeah, I want to read a key part of the legislative directive that the mayor signed and that has now completely shifted.

Present the requested information to be received and filed to the public health and safety committee no later than October 29, 2025.

What that means is that the mayor and his administration were supposed to come to agenda setting, submit an RCA, and get this item on the agenda.

If the mayor was unwilling to do so, he should have not signed this action and he should have vetoed it.

But he did neither.

He signed it.

So I'm not sure where the goal post is shifting now.

I'm not sure what thoughts and opinions have shifted now, but I'm not sure why this item was not submitted when he had signed it.

The math isn't mathing.

This feels really wrong.

I will finish with this part that's really important.

Transparency is not political.

Receiving justice is not political, it's just the right thing to do.

The fact that Mr.

Matory has not received this information as a victim of a crime who was shot, who has been asking for this information, who was victim blamed, is just abhorrent.

How can someone almost nearly get killed, getting shot, asking for this information, has called out the failures of our police department and yet not receive any form of justice, any form of information when this thing had been done for a very long time.

It just does not make sense to me.

Next up, we have Council President Payne.

Speaking in my role as the chair of our audit committee, because I think there's uh I just want to clarify for the record, there are we're having two, actually, there's three conversations happening right now under one topic here.

Uh the actual underlying action that we have here is trying to get an understanding of what kind of consequences there can be for violating the charter.

And I don't think anybody should actually disagree with us as an oversight body, figuring out what do we do in the case of a violation of city charter, whether that's from an elected official including us, or um any other position than leadership or officer within the institution.

So I just if that's all that we're talking about and all that's in front of us for a vote, which in fact it is, uh, that should be a unanimous vote.

So that's that piece.

The thing that I think is also getting conflated here is there was an internal investigation after the shooting of Davis Metrori conducted by MPD.

Separately, there was a request for an after action review from our independent city auditor.

Uh the legislative directive that uh we were anticipating see a response to today was strictly related to the internal review done by MPD.

Uh the after-action review done by the city auditor uh has also been held up and he expressed his concerns with the lack of cooperation from MPD to conduct that after after action review, that independent after action review.

Um we on the city uh on the audit committee, uh, just sent a letter to the mayor requesting that as the audit committee, not as a council, but as the audit committee requesting that they rectify the situation with MPD not cooperating with that after action review.

Uh we have not yet heard a response for that letter, but despite that, whatever that response, it doesn't speak to the underlying motion that is in front of us, which is what do we do as an institution when uh our charter is out of compliance?

And we actually need to have an answer that to that.

Is that updating our ethics code and creating some sort of consequences within that context.

Do we need to amend our city charter to do that?

Because right now, our city charter is very limited on uh what type of interventions there are, particularly for elected officials when they're not complying with the charter.

So this is a very this is good governance.

This is us building out our oversight tools that are woefully lacking under the new government structure.

Uh, and so I'm gonna be supporting this today, and I hope the rest of my colleagues do as well.

Councilmember Palmasano.

Mr.

Chair, as I understand it as I send my staff to these regularly, Mr.

Jeffries and the mayor's office were present at agenda setting um to speak about this.

I don't understand why my comments are categorized as conspiracy by Councilmember Wandsley, but she demands that her responses are authority here on this body.

I don't see her example of shot spotter being similar or even remotely similar.

Um her example about shot spotter and me adding on a directive during the conversation about shot spotter, it has not been reported back.

Did I miss it?

I think it's due in March of next year.

Um this motion, as Council President Payne mentions, is it is fine on its face.

It's an interesting academic exercise, but it presumes already, its intent presumes already, and without speaking it, that there has been a violation of the city charter here, which is ridiculous on its face.

Next up, we have councilmember Rainfill.

Thank you.

I I have a question for our attorney.

Has the charter been violated by this action by Commissioner Barnett?

Uh Mr.

Chair, Councilmember Rainville.

Um I, you know, this is the first I'm personally hearing about much of this, and so I I don't know how to respond.

Understandable, thank you.

Next up, we have Councilmember Chowdery.

Thank you.

I do think that this is a helpful legislative directive in terms of figuring out how we can build out some of the checks and balances we need to get regular business done.

Um there have been instances throughout this term where one of the main tools that we do have as a city council is this legislative directive to get information from the city administration if it's five hours or more of work, and it's important information to get to do a regular business, and we also set a deadline, and oftentimes we work with departments to set that deadline to receive the information.

These deadlines are really, really important because it sets up the stage for us to take action, um, to begin work on legislation and then also have it be in relationship to the budget.

There was a legislative directive that I was an author of that was supposed to um that was supposed to come back and uh have a presentation given to I believe the public health and safety committee, but it ended up being pushed back several several months and still has not been given, right?

And there is a big gray area on what do we do here when we ask for a legislative directive and the deadline's not mass met.

And for my case, I believe the legislative directive was supposed to come back to the council March of 2025, and it's currently almost November of 2025, which is a it's it's a very very big gap in terms of us getting information that's needed for work that we were hoping to complete before this term was done, which may not happen at this point.

So that is something that we need to figure out.

Um I do think it would be helpful uh for council members, the authors to kind of if they if they feel up to kind of clarifying some of the things that were brought up by my colleague, council member Palmasano, it's my understanding that um the mayor's staff and Jared Jeffries um as name was either not present at agenda setting at all or did not even speak to the item, which I think I think it's reasonable to be present, and I think it's also reasonable to speak to the item that you're not going to present on, that is of great public interest and interest to the body.

I think that's a reasonable ask to have.

Yeah, okay.

Thank you, uh, Councilmember Chowdery.

For clarity at agenda setting.

No, uh Well, is it your Council Member Palmano?

It's on Q.

Well, she made a question.

So at agenda setting, the Office of Community Safety did not once submit an RCA for this item, knowing that it was due to this committee for presentation, and no one spoke as to why it was not submitted or why they would not be speaking.

As a result of that, Chair Chavez followed up over email with the Office of Community Safety asking what happened, will they be walking on a RCA and a presentation for today?

And late yesterday is when we all received the email response from Commissioner Barnett saying, again, his justification for why they would not be presenting today.

So that's kind of the timeline of things, and the only correspondence that we've had regarding this directive from the Office of Community Safety.

Next up, we have Councilmember Pomasano.

Mr.

Chair, um, I don't think we should be talking about these kinds of things on the dais.

I think we should go back and figure that out.

I don't think that um you brought it up in agenda setting, Councilmember Chavez.

I think if there was the it in my own just naive sense, I would think that if there was an expectation of a presentation, then it would be here printed on the agenda.

So I will move to forward this without recommendation to full council.

Um we can keep this moving along.

Uh like I mentioned from Council President Payne's um perspective, it is an interesting academic exercise.

I just think that this alleges that there was a violation that already happened when I just don't see any of these examples being um the case.

So I will go ahead and move this forward without recommendation.

I would need a second.

Second.

I am next on queue.

I will say that I did reach out to the administration, and I asked them, uh, and I brought up this item before the agenda was gonna be published.

That way we can make sure that this item would get on the agenda before it was made public.

So I reached out, the administration knew about it before the agenda was even public, which is what's even more concerning.

That yes, the administration didn't come to agenda.

You know, it happens.

People sometimes make mistakes, and I'm not saying the administration didn't come at all.

They come for different topics, but they did not come to speak to this item.

As chair of this committee, I gave them an opportunity before this agenda was made public to everybody here in the city of Minneapolis and this country, quite frankly.

Um, that a pathway to make sure that it would get on the agenda before it was made public because I did not want to have this fight on the day, so I actually I just want this information and Mr.

Matury deserves this information.

Uh the refusal to put it on the agenda even after agenda setting, after I reached out is what is leading to this moment right now.

But they had ample opportunity, and I brought it up over email and have proof.

Honestly, the public media make data requests, because you'll get it, or I'll send it to you myself.

Uh next up, uh, we have council president Payne.

Uh thank you, Chair Chavez.

Uh I I'm not gonna be supporting forwarding this out recommendation.

I'm ready to uh send this forward with approval, and I just don't appreciate characterizing my comments as some sort of academic exercise.

Every single day we are requesting information from the uh administration.

We have an entire policy and uh enacted that says what those procedures need to look like to get that information.

Oftentimes we don't get that information as required by the charter.

We have active violations of the city charter.

Am I gonna sit up here and protest when we have to shift a presentation for a single council cycle?

No, I don't think that is an egregious violation.

But when we don't even hear from the administration that they will or won't present until a memo the day before, uh, that's not academic.

That's actually what we're dealing with right now.

And so I just don't I don't appreciate that characterization.

Uh I'll be voting against foreigning this without recommendation, and I will be uh when that hopefully fails, be moving this for recommendation.

On the motion to move this item without recommendation, I'll ask the clerk to call the role, council president Payne.

Nay.

Councilmember Rainbow.

Chowder.

No.

Almost on up.

Aye.

Vice Chair Wansley.

Nay.

Chair Chavez.

No.

We have two nays.

Excuse me, we have two ayes and four nays.

And that motion does not carry I am on cue to move this forward with approval.

Second.

Clerk.

There was no discussion here.

Council.

President Payne.

Aye.

Councilmember Rainville?

Nay.

Choudrey.

Aye.

Almost on up.

No.

Vice Chair Wansley.

Aye.

Church office.

Aye.

We have four eyes and two nays.

And that motion carries colleagues.

Next up we have the behavioral crisis response presentation.

If folks from BCR can please come, that'll be really helpful.

Welcome up, Chief Tanner.

I'm just gonna introduce you.

Get our presentation lined up.

So thank you.

All right.

Mr.

Chair, members of the committee, uh, we have at us today our partners from Canopy Roots to make their annual presentation on behavioral crisis response.

So uh I'd like to introduce to you uh Sheree Hansen, uh Director of Behavioral Crisis Response for Canopy Roots.

Thanks for being here.

Thank you.

All right, um thank you all for having me.

Um my name is Sheree Hanson.

I am the program manager for the Minneapolis BCR program.

I am also um a resident of Minneapolis, Ward 9.

Um, and I'm here to give you an update about uh the BCR for 2025.

So to take you through what we'll be talking about, um we're gonna go through an overview of canopy roots in the BCR, key program highlights for this year, um, and we'll talk about successes, challenges, and opportunities moving forward.

So, first of all, who is Canopy, right?

We are innovative mental health unarmed first response that operates here in Minneapolis via 911 dispatch.

Um our approach is different, right?

Our approach um focuses on collective knowledge and um supporting people within the context of their community.

We want to identify natural and cultural strengths that are already in existence and tap into those, and we would like to affirm our recipients' dignity above all else.

All right, so our model looks like this.

It's culturally affirming, meaning we're our responders are trained to meet the needs of people from many different backgrounds and identities.

Of course, our responders are unarmed.

Um they are said they're trained to leverage relationship as opposed to leaning into a power differential to get what they need and to move the situation forward in the community, right?

We're going to lean into supporting that person, meeting them where they are, as opposed to exercising power over them or leaning into that power differential.

So our responders are trained and certified.

All of our responders are mental health practitioners per the statutes.

Additionally, some of them also are licensed therapists, L I C SWs, LPCCs, and social workers.

So our services, of course, are embedded into 911.

This is the way that the community is able to access us through 911 dispatch.

Our teams are 24-7 and they are mobile.

Our responders move around in these lovely vans and come to recipients' homes and to scenes of incidents.

So we are independent first responders.

Unlike a co-responder model, BCR responders have a response that's independent from police or other organizations that might be partnering with one-to-one.

Our responders work in pairs, and we independently are brought into situations by dispatch on our own.

This allows us to not have to bill insurance.

It allows our recipients to not have to worry about money and worry about insurance, which oftentimes can be a barrier for people seeking care.

So what does the BCR do when we are out there supporting recipients?

Our purpose is to provide person-centered culturally responsive crisis services to community members of all ages.

So this is as early as a child can understand what we have to say and well into mature age.

This means that we would like to support people and deal with mental health issues in a way that does not involve law enforcement if it's not necessary.

Of course, we like to avoid involuntary hospitalization.

Sometimes hospitalization is necessary for the situation, but oftentimes there are other ways to solve these concerns and address these issues.

And so we like to again work within the context of the recipients' community and provide support that is based in what they need that doesn't allow, doesn't make us have to take them to the hospital when it is not the best option.

So when we respond to a behavioral crisis, we promote safety through the use of emotional de-escalation tactics.

Our responders are trained in de-escalation and seek to humanize people and their struggles, believing that this naturally de-escalates people.

Crisis intervention and support, our responders engage in creative and respectful problem solving with recipients that supports their culture and their experiences, not go against them.

And of course, whatever identity that they have, we seek to have the resources and referrals that are appropriate for them and tailored to them.

So this is our 911 eligibility criteria.

So the central thing is behavioral or mental health crisis, right?

So there needs to be a mental health component to each of our calls for it to be within our scope.

No weapons involved or being actively used.

No physical violence has occurred or is occurring.

Now sometimes there are situations where physical violence has happened, but the situation has been cleared and the scene is safe, and we are brought in to support people who are experiencing emotional distress or mental health distress as a result.

So no medical emergency.

As we know, mental health and physical health are integrated.

So sometimes we get called out, and it appears to be a mental health concern, but we find out that it's medical, and in those situations, we would activate EMS or the proper authorities in that situation.

So drugs and alcohol are not escalating the situation.

However, as long as they don't create a safety risk, our responders help support these recipients as well.

So police may request BCR presence through 911 dispatch, but the incident still must meet this above criteria.

Situations outside of these criteria would result in a response from another agency like EMS or police.

So some of our program highlights.

So we responded to 11,500 plus calls for the service last year.

Okay.

This is slightly more than the number of calls we've responded to from August 2023 to August 2024.

We responded to 8,973 behavioral crisis welfare calls, meaning the BCRWs, that problem nature code, and then the 2,610 are the BCR calls or the priority one mental health calls.

So we completed our second year of 24-7 operations in June.

This means we've been able to provide around the clock support for a couple years now.

And we were able to expand to max five vans in service at any given point in time, and from three.

So we increased two vans available at our high high times.

And starting in November 2024, that was when we were able to get that started.

And we have been working towards that for a while, so we're really proud of that milestone.

So you can see some of these numbers, responses since launch.

Of those calls, 75% again were that BCRW, 25% were the priority one mental health calls.

And these are our call responses by calendar year.

We are now for this year at 8,500.

So this is a breakdown of our response locations.

As you can see, we have responded to calls in every neighborhood, every neighborhood, every ward and every precinct of Minneapolis.

Now that embeddedness, that how we're integrating into 911 is what allows for us to be available in these situations to accomplish this many calls and support the community in this way in this capacity.

So how were incidents resolved by the BCR?

Okay.

So trauma-informed and emotional support, right?

Our responders approach community members recognizing that trauma can impact anyone.

We are aware of common triggers that people have and ways to avoid behaviors that trigger people's trauma.

We also focus on crisis de-escalation, like we talked about earlier, attending to their emotional needs first.

Additionally, we engage in psychoeducation.

This means educating the recipient and the families about any mental health concerns that might be at play and giving them next steps if they are willing to accept that.

Risk assessments and safety planning.

Safety is of the utmost importance to our program and our responders.

Our responders show up to a situation consistently assessments so that we can make sure that the recipient is safe themselves, and that if there's any intervention that needs to happen to get them immediate support, that happens immediately.

Service connection, including voluntary transport and appropriate warm handoffs to hospitals, crisis residences, etc.

Additionally, there can be some light skills training.

Sometimes we engage in mindfulness training with our recipients in the moment, if that is what needs to help uh needs to happen to help them get through the moment, okay.

Um and additional brief interventions, right?

This is short work, this is emergency work, and so we treat it as such.

We are brief in our interventions and try to be as pointed and as effective as we can be in a short amount of time.

All right.

Success is in progress.

At this moment, the BCR has fulfilled the goals and functions originally intended for our services.

This year has been mostly about maintaining, right?

Maintaining the success and deepening our effectiveness.

So one of the ways we've been able to do that is through development of a community advisory board focusing on oversight and accountability.

So in order to deepen the effectiveness of our services, right, that accountability is really important.

We want to be accountable to the community, and we want to be accountable to the leaders accountable to the uh responders, and um just general accountability from the community about the services that we provide, um, integrating their feedback into our practices and any of our problem solving moving forward.

So we rework some responder teams to ensure high quality services, meaning we've switched people around for effectiveness, and that's always something that again, our responders are so flexible and so professional that whatever we need to do for the effectiveness of the program is what folks are willing to do.

Further developing current staff training to deepen knowledge and increase service quality.

Um, this is a big focus since I've been the program manager, and for those of you who don't know, it's been about five months for me so far.

Um, and so um this is a big focus of mine to make sure that our training, meaning our orientation and our ongoing training for our staff is top notch.

So that again, we're increasing that effectiveness and giving the community what they asked for.

So right now uh we are embarking upon an overhaul of that responder training, um, updating the program wide policies, rethinking how we support responders doing the work, right?

Um, just refining what we have to offer.

So we did hire one of our largest cohorts in response to high staffing needs.

I believe that was um six months ago, and then um additionally still refining training methods to fit the team needs.

So that was a success for us.

All right, so I'm going to ask one of our leave responders, Tyana Ingram, to come up and share a story with you all about being in the field and the services we provide.

Thank you.

Welcome, Tayanna.

Hi, um excuse me.

Uh my name's Tiana Ingram.

I am a Minneapolis resident, um, but I've also been with Kennedy Roots for two years.

I was a responder for about a year, and then I've been a leave responder for a year.

Um I am very passionate about the work that we do.

I absolutely love my job, so I could be here talking to you guys about calls all day.

I was told I get one, so um one that's kind of always stuck with me.

It was for a recipient, that's who we call the people that we see.

Um there are recipients.

So it came in that a female was crying to the dispatcher, and that's ultimately all they were able to get.

Um, so we went in pretty blind.

We just knew somebody was upset and needed some help.

So we get there, and it takes a little bit for her to let us in.

Again, we can hear it on the other side of the door just crying, um, very escalated.

So there was some just talk about who we were through the door, build a little bit of trust that way.

So she eventually opened it up.

So me and my partner were able to go in at least into the home and try and do some of those assessments.

It was hard for us at first to get any information from her because she was so escalated and crying.

So one of the de-escalation techniques that we had to use was just mirroring breathing.

So I just sat there with her, told her to copy what I do, took some deep breaths.

Eventually she was able to de-escalate a little bit so we could kind of talk about what was going on.

And she was having some relationship issues, but deeper to that, she had this overwhelming feeling that nobody was there for her.

She didn't have anybody to support her.

Of her support system.

So at that point, she didn't want to be here anymore.

She was talking about how if this wasn't gonna work out, she didn't want to be alone.

So she was adamant that she was gonna commit suicide.

We did our suicidal assessment.

She had the ideation, so she had the thoughts.

Um she had the plan, she's gonna shoot herself.

So that put up a red flag for us because now we need to know do you have the means?

Like, do you have a weapon here that you could do it with?

Um come to find out she did.

Um in her bedroom, she had a gun.

So at that point, we have to call PD, and they came very quickly.

They removed the gun from the scene, as we're just continuing to talk to her outside of the home.

Um, the gun was inside the home, so we made sure that we all left the building until PD could come and clear it.

Um, Petey came to clear the gun, and there was one in the chamber.

So she was, I believe that if she did not get what she needed in that moment, we could have lost this Minneapolis resident.

Um so after the gun was cleared from the scene, a lot of just um de-escalation, we did um emotional support.

We talked about okay, you don't have any social supports, but maybe we can get you some, like um, we call them like social not social sports, but like clinical supports, right?

Um connected to some resources, but ultimately she felt that she was still would not be safe being at home.

So we were able to transport to the hospital.

Um, we got her to a point where EMS wouldn't be needed, right?

Because we took away that major means in that moment, and because we had built that rapport, um, we felt safe enough to make that transport, and she felt safe enough with us.

So that's just one of the many calls where I feel like we were able to do very important work.

Um, they all aren't like that.

Um sometimes it are it is calls where we might be too late, or it's maybe someone just needing help navigating the shelter system for the first time.

But all of these calls are extremely important to us.

Um, they're important to our community members.

I'm a part of the city, so they're important to my neighbors.

So I am thankful that I get to be a part of this program.

Um, and I look forward to all of the work we continue to do.

Thank you.

Thank you, Taliana.

Switching out computers here.

All right.

So moving into some of the successes and challenges so far.

Um challenges and opportunities, that's what it is.

Okay.

So for us, um, as you all may know, the BCR switched um January of 2025 from being under neighborhood safety department to fire.

Um, you know, this any time there's a transition like this, there are challenges, right?

Change is hard, especially for an organization that got used to operating one way, right?

Um, so communication and collaboration, we're still trying to work together on that with FIRE.

Um, you know, we do see an opportunity in here, sort of to learn from FIRE, which is an established um, you know, organization that's been around for so long.

Um, and so we're interested in and continuing to learn from them, but as we continue to move forward together, we're problem solving that communication and that collaboration piece.

Additionally, leadership changes, right?

So, me, six months or five months so far.

Um, we'd had some turnover in our leadership.

Um these things are always um, you know, these things are not fun, they're not um, they're a transition for our staff, but um, you know, for me, having the opportunity to build upon the leadership successes of those that came before me is a real big honor.

Um, I intend to pour every bit of my innovation and skills into further improving the service that we have been tasked with.

Again, I'm a Minneapolis resident as well, and so I see this as a service that we are providing to our neighbors and our friends.

Um, and so I take that responsibility very seriously, and again, hoping to build on top of those successes from the past.

Um, there have been um situations where, or there has been a situation where the one-time funding that the council had previously allotted, um, you know, has it's been a long process to kind of get um get connected with that.

Um, and though this has been kind of a challenge, we choose to see this as an opportunity to understand more about what's needed from the city from us, um, and we stand ready to provide what is needed from us to advance this process, but again, it is still uh that's still in the works.

So, something else that we um a concern that happened sort of this year is the concept of scope creep.

Um, and what that means is basically when a program is intended to fulfill a certain purpose when there are other needs that exist, that program can begin to fulfill not only the purposes that they were originally intended for, but also the other niche needs that are in existence, right?

And so um realizing that you know we are moving into areas that were not a part of our original intention, um, we have found ourselves sort of um trying to pull back and roll back and really refine our scope, right?

Making sure that everything that we are involved in is mental health related.

Um, and some of the items that we have been involved in.

I mean, these this was because we wanted to help.

These are things like assisting someone with wheelchair, a wheelchair issue.

Um, this would be things like doing a non-mental health welfare check, right?

Again, things that needed to be addressed that we kind of got pulled into because we wanted to be helpful, but understanding that we have a very specific purpose and a very specific contract, and we want to we want to fulfill that particularly.

Um, and so that's what we've been we've been focusing on, kind of bringing it back.

Um we've had to educate our um collaborating first responder, first responders about this limitation, and um additionally, our you know, we had to kind of retrain our responders as well to really focus on what our mental health scope is and what we are trained to do.

So we're in the process of pulling that back and reworking that so looking forward, so you want to continue to develop the skills of our workforce to provide the highest quality of services possible.

Um, it is, like I said, our laser focus, our absolute passion to provide the people of Minneapolis with the highest quality mental health crisis response services as possible.

Um, the story of the previous year has been continuous improvement, and that will continue to be the story of the BCR moving forward.

Um additionally, we'd like to make sure that the public knows about our services so that all of the residents that have invested in this work and are and care about this work also understand that this is a service to be accessed.

So we'd like to continue educating the public about our services.

We additionally, like despite challenges and um, you know, having to work and rework together.

Um we want to continue good faith efforts to collaborate with the city while staying true to our scope and our values as an organization.

Thank you.

Thanks so much for the presentation and for being here.

I'll first off with Councilmember Pamsano.

Thank you for this presentation.

I had a chance to speak briefly with Chair Chavez about this presentation that got loaded just a couple hours ago.

Is there a report or something more like the fire department has with more metrics at this point?

Well, um I know that there's various metrics.

We keep lots of records ourselves, and I know that the city has begun to dispatch does in particular.

Um those can be provided to you all.

I know that we also have worked with um Minnesota Research Justice Center, who has been studying our program for the last year, and um coming out later on this year, we should have those specific numbers for you all about details of the program.

Thank you.

Um I think we can all agree that this program has been successful in allowing unarmed responses to behavioral or mental health calls, um, and I truly believe in that model of response.

Thank you for your part in that.

Now that we are two full years into 24-7 service, I was hoping for more data other than the number of calls received per year and per ward.

Absent those metrics, I will say I'm not sure I can accept that something that broadly needs a behavioral crisis response in my ward should go unanswered or be pushed off by the BCR team, and that's something that I can take up through the fire department.

I did, and because you are new, I have a legislative directive that I looked back, Mr.

Chair.

It's actually due back in June of next year, that asks for a lot more qualitative and quantitative details, such as response time, how long calls take on average.

I know there's a pretty wide variation.

I was on a ride-along where I think it was about three hours, and I was on a ride along where I think it was about three minutes.

So it but how long calls take on average, staffing resources, outcomes by type, that sort of thing.

Um we just approved an amendment to this contract for another seven million dollars.

Um I'm not questioning the value of this service, but I would like us to receive robust data every year on the effectiveness of it.

Um because of the incredible work of Director Harrington's teams and OCS and even the Coppola lawsuit, we require other contractors within the city to provide a lot of data for contracts that are a lot less in value.

Um we talk about the council's role of oversight.

Um, and I do believe that in this case we need a lot more data to perform that oversight duty.

I was very glad to say you stand at the ready to provide us what we need to advance that process, and I think that we'll get there.

Absolutely.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Next up we have Councilmember Rainbow.

Thank you, Chair.

Uh, and welcome.

Uh this is gonna be an exciting uh news uh career for you to take part in.

So thank you so much for coming today.

I really uh appreciate uh your point about continuing education, more education for the public.

I think you have a great service, but so few people know about it.

I I myself have called many times with problems in the ward, and it's always been a great result.

So thank you.

I do have one question though.

Uh on slide seven, um, you talk about behavioral crisis welfare check as opposed to behavioral crisis response.

Could you tell me what the difference is, please?

Um there could be a lot of differences, but the main one is you know, there are two different problem nature codes and the BCR is the priority one, meaning this is an emergency that needs to be gotten to immediately, right?

Uh oftentimes our teams are able to stop what they're doing and um and even pull from other precincts to make sure those priority one calls are answered right away.

So that's the BCR code.

Yeah, and what and the BCRW, what what is that?

So everything else that is broad mental health crisis support.

And maybe it doesn't have to be like an immediate response.

Maybe it is a welfare check, and it's something that we don't have to tend to immediately, and so we'll take those as they come up, but the priority ones we kind of stop what we're doing, right?

And the difference is there are some differences in the type.

So with BCRW, the call that Tyana was able to discuss where perhaps someone is suicidal, those are the BCR calls.

And the BCRW might be more like there's an individual on the sidewalk who appears to um be talking to themselves or something like that, might not be as emergent, um, but it is still a mental health possible crisis.

So that's a BCRW.

And that makes sense.

Thank you very much.

Yes.

Next up, we have Vice Chair Once Lee.

Thank you, Chair Chavez.

Thank you for this presentation.

Um, just a couple of questions regarding uh forgot what slide this was on, but the community advisory board.

Can you share a little bit more about the process of that, where that's housed, how people are able to participate?

Yep.

So this is something that we're in the works of starting.

So it's it's a work in progress.

Um essentially, there are members of the community who um are interested in serving on this board.

Um the particular, and that's always existed, but the particular oversight function is what we're really building here, and it is the ability for um any of our community complaints that come in to be reviewed by the board, um, any of our policies that might need updating that um we want community feedback on.

That would be something that the oversight function handles, um, and any variety of issues.

Sometimes, you know, I might come with concerns that I want to know what they think about it to inform any policy that I'm changing, um, or that I'm improving, which is a big focus of what I'm doing.

Uh, that would be those would be items that I would ask the community advisory board about.

Um I would have to give our uh our community outreach um staff.

I would have to engage them to give you a more direct answer on that.

Um, but we're we're still working on it at this moment in time.

Thank you.

And um just for clarification, this is housed under Canopy roots, correct?

Yes.

Okay.

I will know for a staff follow-up just around some more of the kind of specifics around the board itself, how people are able to join, those type of things.

I also want to flag too um for also staff follow-up, because I don't see either Office of Community Safety.

I don't I see fire leadership here, but not sure if you would know this answer, Chief Tiner.

But um, this body also passed in collaboration with the executive uh something called the Safe and Thriving Communities uh virus report, and it's essentially around supporting initiatives like BCR.

So figuring out ways in which those respective boards will relate to each other and give feedback and things of that nature.

Sounds great.

Um the next question, this was related to slide 11.

Yes, can you share how many was a part of the the cohort that you hired uh who this part of this cohort one?

I'm going to say 13, if I remember correctly.

You know, I know it's only been like three years on average, what it's been typically.

I would say, and then some of this is before my time to be honest.

I would say between six and eight is probably more normal.

Thank you.

And then this one might be for you, and also um, Chief Tiner, just thinking of the the scope creep piece and uh talk about some of the gaps that you all have fulfilled that you're you know reigning back on.

Um I am very much aware that the city paid uh the policing project or CUNY to do a gaps analysis of all of our safety services that also included BCR, and they have a whole section on um exactly what you're talking about, things that BCR has responded to that could be diverted elsewhere.

So I would like to know if Chief Tyner, how you and the Office of Community Safety are working together to kind of reconcile that because this report essentially reinforced some of those things and gave recommendations on what the city could do to kind of protect you know you all's focus of work while also saying, well, maybe these are other areas that you need to develop as services, new services, or absorb in existing services.

So just wanted to get a sense of where you all are at with those recommendations.

So uh right now we're pretty much in the exploratory phase.

Uh we've figured out early on that uh we were having some scope creep uh with BCR and canopy roots.

Uh they were being used for like everything that uh you know we didn't have somebody to do, whether that was somebody needed a ride or somebody needed some resources or like it was a lot of different things.

If you know, we needed a ride for a wheelchair.

So we were able to kind of really bring that back and really focus it on behavioral crisis and what it was originally tended to do.

And so some of those other things uh we're still exploring solutions too, but we haven't uh come up with the what the solution is just yet.

Okay, do you know if there is any at least like follow-up on the explicit recommendations in the QT report?

Because also thinking of scope creep, I think also like scope evaluation, they for instance recommend revisiting the persons in crisis calls as possibly something that does fit into you all's um scope of focus, or also they talk about jumper or threat to jump um as also a potential thing to revisit as part of like being in the scope.

So they get very clear suggestions around things that should maybe be absorbed into the scope and what should be removed.

So just if y'all are doing anything specifically with the CUNY recommendations, so I think that's probably a better question for OCS.

But for us, we we do respond to threats to jump and things like that.

So we've got that things like that covered, but it's more of the more uh mundane things like you know, getting ride for a wheelchair or you know, ride for citizen that just needs to ride and things like that that we really still have a gap for.

Okay, so it sounds like OCS who's overseeing this piece of the gaps analysis hasn't really worked closely with you all around those specific recommendations, and I'll note that for a staff follow-up then for OCS.

Yeah, I don't know if I would characterize it that way.

You know, they have their uh work to do.

We have our work to do.

Our work is right now working with Canopy Roots and BCR.

Um a lot of that other stuff is happening outside of the fire department.

If the fire department needs to be involved in that, then we're happy to be involved in that, but uh it hasn't got to that point yet.

And that's where I'm a little why I characterize because why I'm confused is these recommendations is specifically for BCR, which is under fire.

So that's why I'm a little confused as to why fire wouldn't be involved in conversations because essentially it would be up to you all to enact these recommendations, because some of this sounds like this will have also like impacts on the contract, then if we're talking about revisiting the scope.

And I think you all are handling the contract administration piece too.

So this isn't all the way isolated in OCS, it will require like coordination with fire directly to get actual changes.

So it some follow-up on where those things are happening with OCS and then how they're planning to incorporate you or whoever comes after you, uh Chief Tyner, around it proceeding or advancing these recommendations.

Oh, I see.

Oh, I did that for you.

Oh, excuse me, uh Chief Rugger.

Yeah.

Committee Chair Chavez and committee members.

Um, so when um BCR was transitioned over to fire, um, there was a lot of um uh changes and and in the scope process that we were made aware of.

So um originally when BCR was established, they were responding to all different types of scopes, and they um were they were okay with it.

And so when it transitioned over to FIRE, um working with MECC and uh Canopy Roots, uh, their management, um, there was some like calls that they were rejecting, and and there was like a misunderstanding, like okay, what calls are you gonna respond to, what calls are we not gonna respond to, what what does that scope look like now?

Um, working with um Cherie and Candace, we and and MECC and MPD and FIRE, we kind of visited scopes of the calls and revisit the scopes, and um BCR was telling and Canopy was telling us that their scope has changed according to their insurance and things like that.

So we had to revisit what the scope of calls were looking like, just even from just the original part.

So as we are going through revisiting those scopes and what they are able and capable of responding to, we have been working on um is it gonna be expanded, what's gonna be pulled back.

So it has that conversation has been uh taking place as a whole, and as well as coming up with clearing forms to collect data, how that data is collected, what data can be collected in the city, if if it's HIPAA violations, so things like that.

So there these conversations are happening as to what the response is and what the outcomes are.

So that conversation is taking place.

I actually think I know where the disconnect is on this.

I get you all are having those conversations.

Have you both had the opportunity to see the gaps analysis done by CUNY on the behavior crisis response?

So we have had that has been presented to us, but in actually again uh delving into it, we still have to see you know what those gaps are.

So as we're collecting data as to where those gaps are, we we haven't even had a chance to collect enough data to see and to really revisit where those gaps are from you know, you know, because there was a when they came over to fire, there was a gap in actually having data and collecting that data and what data is collected into the city.

So until we have a full amount of data to even look into what those gaps are, uh, we haven't even been able to delve into, you know, expanding, you know, and and having BCR expand to to fill certain levels.

And that just to get just a bit of a disconnection there.

So I think the analysis reason why I asked they did that.

So with the data, and I think this was largely when you were all still in neighborhood safety department, it looked at years of data that was collected for BCR 2023, I also believe 2024, and that's where they make these specific recommendations around persons in crisis or no jumper calls, like they they're pretty specific, and they're referencing the data that has been provided.

I want to say, like of all the safety programs that we've had, and even in this report, it hasn't been behavior crisis response in terms of an issue of flagging of providing data.

They were able to have a really good sample of data to do a substantial analysis on what gaps are currently existing.

And this was from almost like a year and a half ago, so I know still it co-aligns with the transition.

So that's where I'm still a little bit, it sounds like of course you all are doing ongoing analysis, but there was a deep analysis done by external contractor and talks about specific gaps that could be readily addressed, and it sounds like you all are figuring out some other outstanding ones, and that's why I'm asking of like the ones that could be readily addressed that external contractor that was paid to look at data and come up with what's the process for those.

And it sounds like all of this is still ongoing and requires follow-up from OCS too.

And if I may, one thing I will say is some of this speaks to the leadership changes that we've had, right?

Some of this information being passed from previous leaders about what has already been done.

Um, there's some catch up that needs to be done on my part, um, and in the role of program manager as a whole.

And so I'm looking forward to problem-solving that with uh FIRE, and um, I'm glad that you brought that up because this means that we can address it moving forward.

Yeah, I hopefully you've also gotten to see the substantial report too, because I it sounds like it's I think it's with the goal of helping you all have that alignment, and it pointed out and reinforced what you share with us around certain calls were being relegated to BCR that should have been diverted elsewhere.

Yes.

And so it's it's very much like here is just like making sure we're not duplicating work when you already have a vendor that did it and it's still on payroll to help you figure out like that troubleshooting of gaps.

Thanks.

There is no one on the cube.

Thank you so much for the presentation for the data on BCR, which is a service that's really important to our constituents and a service that they value a lot.

So I just want to thank you for being here today.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, colleagues.

See no more discussion.

No, I'll ask the clerk to file.

Mr.

Oh, I'm sorry.

My apologies.

No, no, go ahead, Michael.

I thought you were about to adjourn there, but yeah.

No, no, no.

I'll ask the clerk to file that report.

And lastly, colleagues, our next item is a presentation provided an overview of the Homegrown Minneapolis Initiative.

I'm by Alison from the Homegrown Minneapolis.

Welcome.

Uh good afternoon, Chair Chavez, Vice Chair Wansley, and members of the committee.

Um I am Alison Babb.

I manage the Homegrown Minneapolis Initiative based in the Health Department, and we're here today to provide an update on our work.

So launched in 2008, Homegrown Minneapolis is a city community partnership to expand our community's ability to grow, process, distribute, eat, and compost more healthy, sustainable, and local foods.

Homegrown supports community gardens, including the city's garden lease program, farmers markets through the farmers markets of Minneapolis Collaborative, food waste and food waste prevention efforts, including resources to help restaurants prevent wasted food and boost their bottom line.

We also staff the Homegrown Minneapolis Food Council, including managing food systems projects co-created with those community members.

Thank you and welcome.

Oops.

Hello, Chair Chavez, Vice Chair Wansley and the members of the committee.

Thank you for having me here today.

So I'm a ward for a resident uh and seventh generation farmer, uh very interested in the food uh uh kind of the food systems and even just urban agriculture space.

Um and I've served on the uh food council since January of 2024.

Uh and so the Homegrown Minneapolis Food Council is a 25-member city advisory group that was launched in 2020 in 2012 and it was re-established this year on with a new membership structure uh in July.

And uh it was it is appointed by and reports to the mayor and the city council, and uh the food council works with diverse stakeholders to build healthy resilient local food systems and connects local government businesses, organizations, and residents.

And so uh one of our guiding documents uh is the Minneapolis Food Vision, which is a 2033 vision for a more equitable climate resilient uh just and sustainable food system and local food economy.

Uh and it was adopted by a city council in March of 2023.

Um, and so this includes priority areas, strategies, uh, and suggested metrics, and it's focused on what city council city and food council can take action on.

So this is a companion plan to the climate equity plan uh and it connects us to over 300 cities worldwide who have signed the Milan Urban Food Policy Pact and developed their own plans to develop sustainable food systems that are inclusive, resilient, safe, and diverse.

And so the Minneapolis Food vision is organized uh around these six priority areas that you see here with 29 strategies to support them.

Uh and so now I'll pass it off to my uh colleague Jenny to talk about implementation of the food vision.

Thank you, and welcome, Jenny.

Thank you, Chair Chavez, Vice Chair Wansley, and members of the committee.

Thanks for having me here today.

I am a public health nutritionist, chef educator.

I spent half my time teaching at the university and the other half running a teaching kitchen here at the hospital, Hennepin County Medical Center.

And I'm extremely invested in sustainable food systems and food justice.

I've served on the council since 2021, but I was a part of the founding group in 2008 that developed the council.

Much of our work intersects with the city's climate work, and we were able to integrate.

Sorry.

Is that right?

Thank you.

We were able to integrate many food vision strategies in the 2023 Minneapolis Climate Equity Plan.

Here's an example of one such strategy.

This resulted in homegrown receiving some funding from the city's climate legacy initiative, which is currently used to fund homegrown community projects around urban agriculture and preventing food waste.

Is that the speaks far?

Or Grace, you could just do it for me, please.

After the vision was adopted by the city, the food council community members and staff created the Minneapolis Food Action Plan to guide the first phase of implementation, which is from 2024 through 2026.

It includes five work plans with actions, tasks, potential partners, and metrics for each, and it was approved by the Food Council in November 2023.

Overall, our goal is for the action plan to be a living collaborative document shaped and implemented with the help of community partners and stakeholders.

Included in the action plan are five work plans addressing the following priorities: urban agriculture, food skills, local food procurement, equitable food access, and wasted food prevention.

The food council is guiding and monitoring the implementation planning as it did the development of the food vision and action plans.

Sorry.

It's been about 20 months since staff and the food council began working to implement the food action plan.

It is an ambitious plan, and we can't do it alone.

In addition to working closely with the food council, staff are also working with other city departments, county government partners, academic partners, nonprofits, and community members.

So three of the five work plans have action teams, staffed by homegrown Minneapolis staff and made up of Food Council members and other interested community members.

The Wasted Food Action Team has planned three 86 food waste events for food businesses to learn more about preventing and diverting food waste.

One in April, one last week, and one to come in November.

The urban agriculture team is focused on designing an urban agriculture resource hub to support and connect farmers and gardeners in Minneapolis.

And the food skills action team has prioritized creating an inventory of food skills learning opportunities in Minneapolis.

We're also interested in amplifying food skills literacy as part of high school education.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Welcome back.

In addition to the food council's role in implementing the Minneapolis Food Vision, homegrown staff are also leading work that's aligned with implementing the food vision.

Overall, the work that we do is guided by community priorities, taking advantage of opportunities as they present themselves, and of course, available resources.

Our work would not be possible without the help of many partners.

Today I'd like to highlight some of our efforts related to wasted food prevention, urban agriculture, the homegrown Minneapolis community projects, and our farmers markets.

So, with support from a USDA Compost and Food waste Reduction Pilot project grant, we are implementing a new program focused on wasted food prevention in restaurants.

You have a handout in your packets.

Food Forward is a free four month training and coaching program being presented by the city to help restaurants prevent wasted food, improve kitchen operations, and boost their profits.

Participating restaurants will receive hands-on support from expert coaches, connections to other local restaurants, paid training hours, and public recognition for their efforts.

We just wrapped up recruitment for the first cohort that are all within our midtown global market, and we're very excited to have the program orientation for participating restaurants next week.

Urban agriculture has been a homegrown priority since our beginnings, and we continue to refine and expand this body of work.

There are several projects underway, but today I would like to focus on two.

So, as you well know, Homegrown collaborated with Public Works to bring forward a boulevard ordinance amendment.

Following approvement of the amendment earlier this year, residents can now use the boulevard in front of their homes to grow fruits and vegetables.

To support implementation of the amended policy, we created a series of web pages with boulevard gardening guidance.

These pages share information about how to grow food safely and successfully in the boulevard while following the ordinance.

Finally, this fall, we launched a social media campaign to spread the word about these online resources just in time for fall planting, and we plan to promote those resources again in the spring.

We are very excited to be launching a new urban agriculture project that provides long-term access to land to sustainably grow food in our city.

Through the 2025 budget process, Homegrown was allocated $50,000 for quote community ownership and operation of an urban farm in an underserved area.

After carefully considering community input, we released a request for proposal for growers to propose a lot to be purchased and put into trust.

The City of Lakes Community Land Trust will own the lot and have a long-term agreement with the selected grower.

The RFP closed on October 7th, and the awardee will be notified soon.

In 2024, with Climate Legacy Initiative funding, Homegrown was able to fund 16 community-led projects to support actions in the climate equity plan, so particularly around wasted food prevention, sustainable growing, and energy efficient season extension.

Many of the projects combine two or more of these focus areas.

This year we continued funding with 14 of those projects at a reduced amount.

And through these projects, we're building healthier, more climate-resilient communities, and also helping residents get better access to fresh, healthy food.

Our partners are doing all these things while also helping to advance health and racial equity in our city.

From 2020 to 2024, Homegrown Minneapolis distributed 2.4 million dollars in federal funding to support food shelves and other food distributions.

That funding ended in 2024 as the last of the ARPA funds expired.

However, food insecurity continues at record levels across the city, as you can see in these maps.

With SNAP benefits in peril due to the federal shutdown, many of our residents will have an even bigger struggle to put food on the table starting next week.

Approximately 61,000 Minneapolis residents receive SNAP, which is 14% of our population.

So it's a really significant impact.

And even after the shutdown ends, upcoming SNAP cuts and other federal changes will make food security an even bigger problem for many of our residents.

We are working closely with partner organizations and agencies to coordinate our efforts to address food insecurity, especially during this time of crisis.

And while the homegrown community projects are small in scale relative to the need, our sustainable growing projects are distributing their harvest for free to community members struggling to access fresh healthy food.

We're also funding food rescue that takes safe, healthy food that would otherwise go to waste and gets it to those who need it most.

By addressing climate change and helping address food insecurity in our communities, these efforts are really a win-win.

Our farmers' markets in Minneapolis are important pieces of both the food access landscape and the local food economy.

Supporting our farmers market means supporting the hundreds of small businesses that sell at them, as well as supporting access to affordable, fresh local produce.

In 2024, the 16 farmers markets across the city saw 1.45 million visitors.

Most farmers' markets in Minneapolis accept SNAP EBT, and as you can see in the graph, SNAP usage at farmers markets is high.

When combined with market bucks and produce market bucks, which are matching programs that increase customers' spending power to buy healthy local food, SNAP spending represents hundreds of thousands of dollars spent with local farmers and producers.

Sadly, the federal funding for produce market bucks is currently at risk.

The Minneapolis Farmers Market on Lindale is on city-owned property.

This is our city's biggest farmers' market with about a hundred vendors, a thousand customers per hour, and over five million dollars in sales per year.

In anticipation of the Royalston Light Rail Station opening very nearby.

There is a current project to update the infrastructure and make the facility more sustainable.

In partnership with property services and with support from intergovernmental relations, the city received an earmark of eight hundred and fifty thousand dollars in community project funding from housing and urban development.

That funding will be used for design services, which should be finished this December.

$4.15 million was allocated for construction in the 2025 capital improvement plan, and construction is set to begin in spring of 2026.

We're very much looking forward to seeing those improvements.

Finally, there's just a few things to keep an eye out for.

We will be doing community engagement with garden lease program stakeholders with the goal of making some equity-focused updates in time for the 2027 growing season.

We will obviously continue to monitor changes at the federal level that impact SNAP, WIC, and other programs that impact food security, and plan to deepen our collaboration with our Hennepin County colleagues as they implement their soon-to-be-released Hinnepin County Food Security Plan that's anticipated to come out next month.

We plan to release a new RFP in 2026 to advance the food systems goals in the climate equity plan while continuing to address food security.

So that completes our presentation, and we're happy to respond to any questions that the committee may have.

Thank you so much for the presentation.

I'll first pass it to Vice Chair Wancy.

Thank you, Chara Chavez.

First, just want to say thank you for the presentation.

No questions, but uh mostly uh invitation around collaboration.

So this body has been exploring two of the priorities as adopted by the Food Vision Plan, specifically around uh healthy foods access and healthy food skills, and then also food systems research and outreach as it pertains to addressing food insecurity and food deserts in key pockets around the city.

In my ward, it's around the University of Minnesota.

We worked with our legislative staff to come forward with a pretty comprehensive report looking at the scale of that uh insecurity when it comes to access to affordable groceries and food, and learned that one of four students right now are currently going without access or just going without a meal each day, which is just ridiculous.

Um, and in response to that, looking at other innovative models around what it looks like to have a city-owned grocery store to fulfill that need, as opposed to relying upon corporate grocery or grocery chains that we're seeing all across the city, especially in North Minneapolis.

They come in and then they flee and have not been a reliable presence in meeting this particular need and what ways in which government institutions can show up.

Um, so would love to work with homegrown council, specifically our advisory board members as well as the staff on those efforts.

Um our office has been able to coordinate with uh specifically our neighborhood association partners and the University of Minnesota to get some um C funding to actually hire uh experts to look at what concrete next steps we could explore in getting uh actual grocery store in the university area um to meet that need, and they're gonna be working to get a presentation to the community sometime next year.

But would love to be part of ongoing conversations as we're awaiting that, and then also things that we're looking to do at the city side at really looking at pushing this very new model.

And I think we're gonna have to be very creative in light of what you highlighted in terms of the federal cuts that are targeting our residents and working families access to fresh and affordable produce, which was already growing in this accessibility in general.

I mean, eggs are nine dollars, that's ridiculous.

I might want to buy some chickens, it might be cheaper at this point.

Um, but just wanting to make sure that we're not limiting ourselves as as governmental partners in the ways in which we can show up.

Um, I'm happy to hear about the disbursement, and also sad that those dollars have expired essentially the ARPA dollars to uh support food shelves.

And I know there there are some people in my ward who believes as opposed to pursuing other options like our grocery store or sitting on grocery store, we should just simply rely on or tell people to rely on food banks.

And I think that is very much a needed mitigation effort, but in itself cannot be the ultimate goal towards addressing and resolving and solving food insecurity and basically eliminating food deserts in our city.

We have to look at building sustainable permanent infrastructures that meet those needs.

And I'm really excited around this body's efforts to explore that more broadly and comprehensively.

So just want to extend that uh invitation and really excited to continue the work that you all have been leading on, and look forward to what we can do together to improve outcomes in the coming months and years.

Thank you.

Next up we have Councilmember Ponsano.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

And thank you, Ms.

Babb for this presentation.

I want to just say and lend weight to something that um was mentioned previously, which is I really see the homegrown food council needing to lead heavy into food insecurity these next few years.

Um I just can't emphasize that enough.

That's what I've uh heard from the person that I've appointed, or that we as a body appointed that lives in my area.

Um it is so dire.

Um and I I see it every day, and I help out constituents that I can.

Um so I appreciate some of the movement toward that, and I know that um some of these other aspects will help that effort largely.

Um but thank you for what you're doing on that.

Thank you.

And I'll be quick.

I just want to thank you for showing us the map of the evolution of food security work.

Particularly, you know, even looking at the red, it's in every single ward.

So this is happening across every ward in Minneapolis where residents are dealing with food insecurity.

So I just wanted to at least thank you for providing that detailed map to us to be able to evaluate and at least look into because this is something that's really impacting every single ward in Minneapolis.

And with federal funding cuts, a lot of issues happening uh in this country.

Uh, I don't expect that to get any better.

So I think it's important to at least be able to highlight that here today.

But I also just want to say thank you to staff for bringing forward this important presentation.

I think uh it was robust, it's really helpful.

Uh, I really appreciated the update on the urban farm community garden program.

I think that's an example of work that we can be doing here in Minneapolis to help mitigate the future of food insecurity.

How do we uh support uh people to be able to purchase lots or lease them?

This program the way you you've done it has been really great and it could help like hopefully in my opinion, something we can do to help uh mitigate food deserts, mitigate food insecurity, uh help get fresh access to food to community members.

So I at least want to just thank staff for the presentation that was pretty robust and appreciated seeing the map because I think it puts a picture into the situation that we have seen for since if this is 2023, but that we're gonna face if um the continued federal funds continue to happen.

So I just wanted to say thank you.

Yeah, so thank you, Chair Chavez, Vice Chair Wansley, and members of the committee for the opportunity to give this presentation.

Just know that we were in the audience when Ashley Jook presented, and we actually had her give a presentation to the Homegrown Minneapolis Food Council at our August meeting.

Um we are very interested in collaborating with this council or whoever the next council is as well to address food insecurity in our city.

So I you know my contact information is on the slide.

Um please feel free to reach out.

I would be happy to meet with any of you individually or return to the committee um as desired.

Our city has a high degree of food insecurity.

Um I recently had the privilege to attend the Milan Urban Food Policy Pact Global Convening in Milan.

I was just there two weeks ago, and they talked about nutrition poverty, and that feels like a better term to use.

I know Ashley quoted the Minneapolis Food Vision in her presentation talking about food apartheid, um, and how food deserts uh tend to imply that it's somehow a naturally occurring phenomenon, and it is not.

It is the result of um systems and policies that have been in place for a long time, the legacy of redlining and other historical discrimination, that certain parts of our city lacks access to resources to have acts you know, full access to healthy and affordable food.

Um I think none of us think that food shelves are per are the solution.

Um all of us everybody that I know that works on these issues thinks that families should have enough resources to feed themselves by shopping at regular grocery stores and buying what their cultural preferences are and what their dietary needs are.

Um so we're we're happy to support that in whatever ways we can.

Thank you.

And lastly, have Vice Chair Wansley.

Oh, never mind, we're good.

If nobody else is on queue, just thank staff for this presentation.

It was really helpful, and we really appreciate the work that you all do.

So thank you.

Thank you.

All right, colleagues.

Uh seeing no further questions, I will ask the clerk to receive and file that report.

And seeing no further business before us, I would declare this meeting adjourned.

Oh.