Metropolitan Council

[Nick]

http://www.startribune.com/local/183658661.html

This article is about both the Met Council and MAC, but it occurred to me that we don't have a topic specifically for the Met Council yet. There's a lot of talk in there from Republicans and Democrats about making the Met Council an elected body. Which...I dunno. I'm probably not in favor of that myself. We already have too much democracy. I remember Judith Martin making that point in the Intro to Urban Studies class years ago, because I think at the time I was saying that it should be elected. She argued that there's value in having at least one body that could sit around and make decisions without having to worry about an election. That was in 2008, before everyone in Delano started throwing boxes of tea into their subdivisions' drainage ponds.

What do you guys think?

[thatchio]

I'd be more open to it being made up of elected officials who are appointed, elected, or otherwise from a peer group. I see both sides of the elected vs. appointed side but generally fall on the appointed by the State side because there is conflict of interest if it's how I first suggested and I don't think elected is advantageous because it'd be above a conservation district and below a county commissioner as it relates to interest from the electorate. i think Metro issues are one of the most complicated politically and some insulation may be good.

[twincitizen]

I don't see any harm in it being elected, as long as things are still decided by a simple majority. I don't think there's any threat of a directly elected council going Tea Party wacko on us, even in a 2010-like year, given the political leaning of the 7-county area. However, under a Republican governor, things could theoretically get ugly for the council. There are some worst-case scenarios out there that would be way worse than having an elected council.

The funny thing about paranoid conservatives getting all riled up about the "unelected council" is that they don't really make any actual decisions. Sure, they vote on things, but it's all for show. Everything at the Met Council is a completely staff driven process. The whole wastewater arm is pretty self-sufficient. The rest of it is heavily reliant on federal and state grants for things like parks, planning, and affordable housing. The figurehead council members make $20,000/year to show up for votes and ribbon cuttings. It's a part-time gig. They have real jobs to worry about. The decisions are made by the staff, who stick around the organization a heck of a lot longer than 4 or 8 years. In addition, there are bodies within the Council that do the important decision making (the TAB is the big one). The TAB is a 33-member board made up of citizens AND elected officials from cities and counties.

It's probably best to think of the TAB as the real Met Council, for all intents and purposes. Sue Haigh and Co. only get trotted out when there's a podium to stand behind.
[hr]
Short, short version: Electing the Met Council to the same part-time figurehead roles they have now isn't going to hurt anything and could actually save the Council from total destruction in a future Tom Emmer-as-governor scenario.

[fehler]

Part of me likes the non-political nature of an appointed body of professionals. But part of me steams when nutjobs like Annette Meeks get appointed to represent North Minneapolis.

[MNdible]

I think the CTIB could be a model going forward. I like the idea of the members being elected representatives from the local jurisdictions -- they tend to be less ideologically pure and more practical.

[mattaudio]

Any thoughts for how things could be structured so we're more regional in our approach and less municipal-parochial? Seems dangerous to have a metro body where 2/3 of the population can create an anti-urban regional government, which would bite the hand that feeds the suburbs.

[MNdible]

Not that there's any guarantee that things would work out well, but this group is pretty fantastic. There are a lot of suburban mayors out there who really get it.

[twincitizen]

The problem with CTIB-like structure is that it's undemocratic, just like the US Senate. Hennepin County gets 2 seats at the table, same as Washington County with 1/5 of the population.

I'll take an unelected Met Council divided into population proportionate districts over some cobbled-together board of elected officials that would almost certainly have an anti-urban bias.

[kbee]

Another major problem with a CTIB-like structure is the elected officials that make up the board are only responsive to their respective constituencies. The members of CTIB are charged with making regional decisions while really only representing their counties. Thus we end up with each member trying to bring home the bacon to their county, even if the project isn't really in the interest of the region as a whole (see: Cedar Ave BRT, Gateway Corridor, refusal to fund arterial brt, etc).

[MNdible]

CTIBs votes are weighted by population. Hennepin County's two votes basically count as much as all the other voters put together, IIRC.

I'd agree that a couple of at large members would help things.

[LRV Op Dude]

In March, the Metropolitan Council will launch a new website designed.

[Anondson]

Some thread necromancy to add this. The Met Council will be considering an controversial parks funding proposal that will require any park district getting money from the Clean Water, Land and Legacy Amendment funds (that has been building up from a 0.375% Metro counties sales tax voters approved in 2008) to spend some amount of getting youth, immigrants, and ethnic and racial minorities to regional parks.

http://www.startribune.com/controversia ... 394057971/

Turns out some districts really dislike it how it prioritizes spending on programming over rebuilding aged facilities. Conservationists arguing the program was sold to voters as funding clean water and protecting resources.

[David Greene]

Yes, because God forbid they spend 1/10 of a grant on outreach to underrepresented groups. This is why people hate MPRB.

Sent from my Z958 using Tapatalk

[RailBaronYarr]

So, there's a legitimate question there: what does the actual legislation say the money can be spent on? The conservationists are throwing rocks at this saying the status quo doesn't meet the intent (protection) but is instead used for building trails and buildings - totally separate from programming to draw in visitors. My reading of the amendment says conservationists are wrong. 14.25% of the Legacy funds may go towards parks, and "may be spent only to support parks and trails of regional or statewide significance" - totally separate from the water/prairie/forest/etc protection & enhancement money requirement. So as long as the total amount of money allocated from this Legacy Fund going towards trail/structure building + programming is not more than 14.25%, it's all good.

But yeah, I don't really see how this is super duper controversial to the local parks people.

[MNdible]

I'm sure more fliers will solve the problem.

[David Greene]

It doesn't have to be limited to fliers. That's MPRB spin being dismissive of racial minorities.

Nothing is going to change unless we're willing to put money behind efforts to combat structural inequities.

[grant1simons2]

What did I just find..

https://archive.org/details/ontransit11

[Anondson]

The Met Council had an idea that in order to stop sprawling development leapfrogging outside of the seven county area, they would extend sewer service to some rural cities on the edge.

http://www.startribune.com/exurbs-seek- ... 414212473/

It didn't go well after the housing crash.

[Silophant]

Lol at Lakeville suing to prevent suburban sprawl.