Minneapolis Speaks: Q&A with City Officials

Published October 3, 2008

In August of 2008, SustainLane spoke with Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak along with Gayle Prest, the city’s sustainability coordinator. One of the programs that most impressed us in the City of Lakes is one that offers grants to neighborhood groups and other organizations doing work in the area of climate change. One group taught Somali refugees to ride bicycles along the city’s Midtown Greenway, a bikeway built along a former railroad line. Mayor Rybak told us that sustainability was central to his platform when he was elected in 2001 and that it continues to be a core issue in his administration.

Read the full Q&A below:

SustainLane: How did the city of Minneapolis develop?

RYBAK: Minneapolis has one of the most extraordinary, natural environments of any city in the world. We have the source of the only natural waterfall on the Mississippi and a 60 square mile area filled with lakes and rivers and waterfalls. It is where the big woods meet the prairie.

When the city began, it was led by people with tremendous vision who made sure that every natural amenity was put in to the hands of the public and not private owners. So the 14 lakes within the city limits, Minnehaha Falls and Minnehaha Creek are all surrounded by public parkways. There are over a 100 miles of bike trials within the city that circle all of those amenities, but also now go through the core of the town including the former railroad right-of-way called the Midtown Greenway which is now become a bike super highway. Since the beginning of time this is the city which has been strong because of the extra ordinary lakes and parks.

The city sits on the edge of the prairies, so it can spread great distance, which is a challenge. But it’s the type of city that grew up along street car lines. Now we are trying to refocus and develop along transit corridors, and we are also beginning to develop a long term street car plan, and to add a fairly extraordinary network of bike trials as well.

PREST: We are still growing, and that’s what makes it great: we are one of the few northern cities whose population continues to grow.

RYBAK: But the key to it is that right now we have a very strong land use strategy to increase density along transit corridors because we believe that the more density we have within the city along transit, the more we can grow without hurting the natural environment. We believe we are one of the first downtowns in the country that recaptured all the population we lost after World War II. We are now 30,000 people living in downtown alone, which is more than almost any city in the country. And we want to do that throughout the rest of the city. Because, unlike most cities that peaked after World War II and have been going down ever since, our population is increasing.

SustainLane: Why is the city’s downtown population increasing?

RYBAK: Several reasons: the extraordinary network of parks throughout the city has kept strong middle class neighborhoods throughout the city. We had much less urban blight than most cities when sprawl took place. But the downtown growth has been in two areas: along a riverfront—the Mississippi riverfront that has been reclaimed from industrial use for recreation and parks, and Loring Park on other side of downtown, which again has had housing around parks in right the center of the town.

SustainLane: What challenges does the city face due to its geographical location?

RYBAK: The weather presents some challenges, but it is also one of our great amenities too. For instance, people would think that weather will limit biking in this city, but we are the number two bike city in the country right behind Portland. We have more bike commuters [than any major] city except Portland, which is extraordinary given the climate. The climate should be [a challenge], but hasn’t been.

It is very open, so air quality is relatively good, but being in the center of the country we have faced the impact of some other areas as well especially some of the great lakes region. We are in attainment under the Clean Air Act.

[Getting tourists to come here is a] big part of our work. One of the interesting things about our tourism work is that you take the ten major cities in the country, and people who haven’t been here will rate relatively low. We take those same ten cities and, among people who have been here, we almost always go up to the top one or two.

That’s one of the reasons why we went hard after both [national presidential] conventions.

The city really began with an extraordinary natural amenities and it created a green culture that’s second to no one in the country. Any environmental organization that you find in the country has a disproportionate number of members from here. And what’s nice about it is that I am just talking about the city proper. It is filled with people with green values. Because of this, the municipal government has been able to push green values very hard.

SustainLane: How long has Minneapolis been on the green bandwagon?

RYBAK: This city has always been a leader in green issues. I got elected in 2001 and at that time I made green values one of the top features of my campaign. And when I talked to other mayors around the country, they thought—at that time –that that was a little flaky.

It certainly wasn’t. What we did is we took the already-strong green values in the city and ratcheted it up dramatically. We formed working groups with every department in the city to lay out what we now call the “Green Print,” which requires every city department to have specific indicators for sustainability

SustainLane: Having talked to other cities and aware of what other cities are doing to become more sustainable, in what areas do you think that Minneapolis is really best in?

Rybak: I think the single best place that we’re in right now is that we have performance measures for every part of our plan.

Also, Land Use and Transportation.

We just remade our entire Comprehensive Plan to have sustainability one of the core issues at every level. In transportation, we have launched something called “Access Minneapolis,” which is a comprehensive transportation strategy that includes bike and pedestrian. Transit will now have an advantage over the individual car, and we will increase density along the transit corridors and build new transit to accommodate that.

I think that land use is significant and I would also mention a couple of the big victories we had that have been really significant: There’s coal conversion. The other is that, because we are at the border of the Mississippi River, we catch the issue of what’s called “combined sewer overflow.” In heavy rains, sewer systems will discharge raw sewage into the river. Last year, there were zero incidents of that, and it was done with some infrastructure and investments, but also by challenging our citizens. We created what’s called the storm water utility credit to give people incentives to create more permeable surfaces, and do other things that would help manage water better. We put a green roof on the city hall, a green roof on the library, a green roof on the fire station, and every building is now LEED-certified, but I think that leadership on some of the key issues has been very key.

SustainLane: What are some of the changes Minneapolis is making to become more sustainable?

PREST: We are doing a lot on energy and climate change. It’s such a critical issue, and particularly in Minnesota with all these different eco-systems. We are literally seeing change here and it’s a pretty devastating one: The moose population in Minnesota is suffering terribly, and we are looking at coldwater fish populations declining. While we are doing a lot, it’s going to take some big thinking to reduce climate change to the necessary levels.

RYBAK: I think this point of climate change and energy use is a good one. Because we spent a lot of times thinking how municipal government can use its leverage in the marketplace on energy; we are very proud of an Xcel Energy Renewable Development Fund grant we received to do a major solar installation our convention center;

PREST: A 600KW system will be on our convention center this fall, 600 KW will be the largest system probably by a factor of six in the upper Midwest.

RYBAK: We have been wrestling for several years with how to create locally-based energy. Wind is growing in parts of Minnesota. For the past three years, we have been trying to work on a way that we could specifically target a wind farm in southwestern Minnesota and designate that energy specifically for the city. It is tougher to do than it sounds because of the grid.

I think one of the challenges that happens in Municipal government is that there continues to be a premium charge to the people who are out in the front; so we pay them in some cases and in some cases we don’t. [I.e.]We could have moved further on alternative energy if we would have paid the premium to the companies that should be providing that at normal cost. Our legislation has some of the strongest alternative energy language of any in the country. That helped us because before we were trying to get the energy companies to do this out of the goodness of their heart; now they are required by law. They have become very good partners in exploring these actions. I think we may be making some more progress on alternative energy in the next couple of years.

SustainLane: What sources of alternative energy does Minneapolis currently draw on?

PREST: Mississippi was founded because of its search for water power. So right now—to be constructive on the green front –we are using hydro and wind and a little bit of waste energy. The state goal is that 30 percent of our power will be from renewable resources by 2025. Right now we are at 13 percent.

RYBAK: And of course Solar will have an impact on that as well.

SustainLane: If you could manifest your vision for Minneapolis tomorrow, what would it look like?

RYBAK: We would have four more light rail lines and four street car lines. We would have implemented the zoning plan we have, which allows light industrial to be within the city, so people can walk to their jobs. We would maintain swimmable lakes, so that every person, irrespective of their income, would have the opportunity to swim. And we would continue to plant trees to reforest the city.

Also, we would continue to be at the center of the green jobs revolution, where research in the University of Minnesota, which is right in the city, and talented people from every part of the town are making the green products to change our economy. We believe that we’re going to be part of a new economy where they develop new great, green products that are made right here that get us off our dependence on oil that has got us into wars around the planet and protects the earth. I believe that that’s what is happening; I believe it is happening more around Minneapolis than almost any other place in the country right now.

SustainLane: It sounds like the city is leading the people of Minneapolis.

RYBAK: The city government has led, and so have the residents [by way of] the microgrant program that has put dollars [into residents’ hands] to see some incredible innovation right at the community level.

We have known that the people in the city have phenomenal ideas. So two years ago we started a great program of microgrants, [which are in quantities of] 25,000, 10,000 and 1,000 dollars. [Residents] came back with the greatest ideas-- everything from teaching Somali immigrant women to ride bikes, to promoting and distributing clotheslines, neighbors going door to door talking about climate actions, energy audits and energy fairs.

RYBAK: It also [helped spawn] the Linden Hills Power and Light volunteer energy group.

PREST: Linden Hills Light and Power is this great little neighborhood, and they want to build an anaerobic digester. First, they want to collect organic material in their neighborhood to fuel this digester; and we are going to being starting very shortly collecting the organic compost. We have some restaurants that do organic composting. We have been collecting yard waste at the curb for probably twenty years and we have got over ten thousand backyard compost bins distributed in the city, but this would actually be an organized collection for residents to recycle their food matter and their non recyclable paper. Then, the idea is to, ultimately, turn it into energy.

SustainLane: What are the biggest challenges Minneapolis faces over the next 50 years?

RYBAK: I believe that local food is a challenge and a tremendous opportunity especially for the city and the state with so much production. I believe transportation will continue to be. We have a great plan, we just need to continue implementing it, and I think creating the new economy based on green jobs.

SustainLane: Do you have concerns about and/or a plan for climate refugees?

RYBAK: I think that’s a huge, huge issue because I looked at the maps, too, about what land may be under water, and I guess I would include that as another one of the challenges. As a city that welcomes refugees we will probably be proud of welcoming them from other places as the climate melts further and further.

Also, I am afraid of losing winter. I grew up in the city with a very intense winter—huge snowfall—and that has changed dramatically. We started City of Lake Loppet ski race, which is the first cross-country ski race in the country. It is now one of the largest ski races in the country. We have snow issues almost every year. When Minneapolis has challenges with snow, we know something is wrong. Missouri is a perfectly nice place, but I don’t want their climate; we love our four seasons and that’s why this place is this amazing jewel that it is.

Photo Caption: Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak and his plug-in electric Prius. (Photo courtesy of City of Minneapolis)