20 October 2023
I came to the Twin Cities from the land of the parochial — St. Louis County, MO (which when I left a generation ago had 96 separate municipalities) — with a dozen-year detour to Front Range Colorado in between. So I have practical experience with which I view the news that a task force exploring whether the Metropolitan Council should be elected or appointed recently discussed separating the council’s transit planning from operation duties.
So far, I’ve survived 50-plus years with zero regional governance or oversight beyond a sewer system (St. Louis County, MO), a dozen years with an anemic regional governance system (Denver Regional Council of Governments, usually referred to as “DRCOG” or “Doctor Cog”) with elected members but relatively little power except in rare instances when consensus was reached, and now a bit more than a dozen years here with the Met Council, an appointed body with significant powers but a certain, um, lack of accountability.
When I was a citizen planning commissioner on the Colorado Front Range, I served on a couple of DRCOG committees at the fringes of the actual power/responsibility structure, which is where it became apparent to me that, unlike the popular perception, DRCOG’s actual power to get things done was rather limited. The regional light-rail system, which was just coming online as I left Colorado for Minnesota, was a singular accomplishment precisely because it required — and achieved — a degree of consensus that was highly unusual in the Denver metro.
I remain, if not hostile, then skeptical and suspicious of efforts to make the local Met Council an elected body, while at the same time recognizing that its gubernatorial-appointed nature is both part of the problem as well as part of the solution. Being appointed by the governor limits the viewpoints of those appointees to that of the relatively privileged, or at least well-connected (’twas ever thus), and increases the likelihood of a certain tone-deafness when local concerns grab a headline or two.
At the same time, that same vantage point provides opportunities to consider genuinely regional solutions to issues and problems that otherwise are ignored, or are figuratively swept under the rug due to local prejudices or vested interests.
Racist housing patterns and real estate practices in the Twin Cities area strike me as one of those instances where relying on local elected leaders to correct historical injustice is likely to be an exercise in futility. Elected local leaders are likely to reflect the prejudices of their constituents, and thus provide no avenues by which to address those and related issues.
Appointed Met Council members could (I emphasize “could” rather than “do” because I’ve seen little evidence of the latter in my years here) overrule local prejudice, whether racial, cultural or economic, to improve housing availability for middle- and lower-income families and individuals.
Transit is another area of yin and yang regarding local and regional policy and solutions. From my limited vantage point in Minneapolis’ far northwest corner, the southwest light-rail line has been contentious in part because the Met Council seems to have been habitually tone-deaf regarding local concerns and cost overruns.
At the same time, it seems possible to this old guy who will likely never ride the line once it’s completed (I’ve had no reason to go to Eden Prairie since I arrived in Minneapolis in 2009) that someone in a Met Council planning office thought that, in a few decades, having rail transit available for that area might bring multiple benefits to the region as a whole. And it might.
On the other hand, my skepticism regarding the Met Council’s ability to manage more local concerns remains, in large part because of a bus stop on Brooklyn Boulevard, a couple blocks from my house.
Not long after it was constructed, that bus shelter was hit by a wayward vehicle, with plexiglass panels panels shattered and aluminum supports bent severely, though not quite totally destroyed. It sat there, and continued to be used by bus riders, while providing little actual shelter from the elements, until it was finally repaired about a week ago. It took Metro Transit three years to get around to making that repair, a delay that strikes me as unconscionable.
Big organizations aren’t usually noted for their efficiency or the speed of their responses, and Metro Transit, in this instance, seems a case in point, as does Met Council overall. My admitted bias is that appointed is better than elected in this context, but that “better-ness” is marginal, and primarily because it provides a governmental structure — totally lacking in metro St. Louis, for example — with which to bypass local prejudices in favor of regional solutions. It’s a weak-kneed endorsement, but an endorsement, nonetheless.
I understand the appeal of breaking Metro Transit away from Met Council, but that appeal is not — for me — personally compelling.
While I’m happy to see it proposed, and believe it’s definitely needed for this and other segments of both Minneapolis and Hennepin County, I don’t live near the proposed Blue Line extension, so light rail will still be something I have to drive to in order to actually use. My neighborhood features lots of bus stops, and frequent buses, but they’re rarely going to a destination I want to reach, or if they are, it’s only after multiple transfers (an errand that takes an hour by car takes 4 hours by bus, if it’s possible at all). Separating Metro Transit from the Met Council seems unlikely to alter that reality.
Ray Schoch lives in Minneapolis.