Aisha’s Accomplishments & To Do List

Safety is an accountable, restrained, and community-controlled police force.

Accomplishments:

• Expanded the Behavioral Crisis Response program to provide non-police responses to residents experiencing a mental health crisis to every part of our City.

• Ensured Ward 10 has a permanent representative on the Community Commission on Police Oversight.

• Funded a car theft prevention program because Ward 10 neighborhoods have the highest rate of car thefts in the 5th police precinct.

• Approved a Consent Decree with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights to ensure the MPD is held accountable for its documented history of race-based policing, invest in critical training and mental health support for officers, and give Minneapolis residents a voice in shaping MPD policy.

• Worked closely and regularly with the 5th police precinct on addressing emerging crimes and supporting victims of crimes

• Crime is down thanks to our investments in community programs.

To Do:

• Work with leaders at every level of government to work together to meaningfully and urgently implement restorative solutions to address the rise in violence perpetrated by young people.

• Establish community control over MPD, as modeled in Chicago, to ensure timely investigations are completed when we’re victims of crimes, and gives us a voice in how we are kept safe.

• Oversee implementation of the consent decree with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights, so we finally see significant and required reforms to the Minneapolis Police Department, like banning searches based on the smell of cannabis. It is going to save so many people in our community from becoming victims of police violence.

• Invest in programs that ensure the appropriate responders come when we call 911.

• Data shows that investments in addressing the root causes of crime such as poverty, lack of access to public mental health services, and the shrinking number of truly public gathering places are the best ways to reduce crime.

Safety means everyone having access to stable, affordable, and dignified housing as their human right.

Accomplishments:

• Doubled the renter representation on the Rent Stabilization Work Group — leading to the recommendation of a strong policy that ensures renters can stay in the communities they love. A strong rent stabilization policy will hold corporate landlords that exploit our communities to the same standards small local landlords hold themselves to.

• Invested in fire suppression systems in public housing high rises to make sure being on a fixed income isn’t a death sentence.

To Do:

• Pass a strong rent stabilization policy.

• Pass ongoing investment in public housing through a dedicated levy to address the maintenance backlog in existing public housing and build more public housing to the maximum allowed under the federal law.

• Pass a Tenant Opportunity to Purchase.

• Advocate for Just Cause eviction policy.

• Remove toxins and lead from homes.

• Weatherize homes.

• Continue to advocate for housing as a human right.

Safety means a humane, compassionate response to homelessness.

Accomplishments:

• Worked with county, state, and federal partners to open a 40-bed women’s shelter and bring 130 new units of emergency and transitional housing to the Ward.

• Got a majority of 8 votes for a package for a humane response to homeless encampments through the City Council, only to have it vetoed by the Mayor.

• Worked with social service providers and encampment residents in a Ward 10 encampment to model what a more humane encampment closure process could look like

To Do:

• Primarily designate places where encampments can exist without fear of removal.

• Ensure unhoused residents receive public health services like bathroom facilities, hand-washing stations, and safe needle disposal to address livability concerns for both encampment residents and residents in surrounding neighborhoods.

• Work with Hennepin County and the State of Minnesota to create more welcoming and accessible shelter beds so residents who want to stay in a shelter can.

Safety is reliable and accessible transit. Safety is infrastructure and roads that work for everyone. And safety is vibrant commercial corridors.

Accomplishments:

• Passed a Hennepin Avenue redesign plan. At first passed a historic alignment that was vetoed by the Mayor that included 24/7 bus lanes. I fought for our vision and we got the best possible solution passed.

• Increased funding for neighborhood traffic calming projects by 50% because Ward 10 is home to some of our most dangerous streets for pedestrians, cyclists, and transit riders.

• When a giant sinkhole opened up on 27th and Girard, I immediately worked with Public Works leadership and frontline staff to ensure the City addressed the issue and as a result we are working with partners to replace all of the crumbling infrastructure at the site.

• Passed a Legislative Directive to study the cost and implementation of a municipal sidewalk snow and ice clearing program

• Increased funding for b-tap and c-tap programs (technical assistance funding) in our community to make sure small businesses have the support they need to stay here.

• We’ve welcomed so many new businesses to our beloved commercial corridors: Eat Street Crossing, Green Room, Slurp Pop Up Noodle Shop, Boludo Uptown, Arts + Rec, Pinoli, Les Sol, bb.q Chicken, and more.

To Do:

• Continue the critical work to bring Uptown back and make sure locally-owned businesses can open up and stay in Uptown,

• Invest in dedicated bus lanes, better street lighting, and traffic calming measures near bus stops and transit stations, schools, parks, and shopping centers.

• Update signal prioritization for public transportation.

• Implement municipal snow and ice removal.

• Implement the Complete Streets and Vision Zero policies in every neighborhood of the city.

• Explore the creation of a municipal bank to allow for more creative financing options in developing businesses and housing in Minneapolis

Safety means clean air and clean water and taking action to repair decades of environmental racism.

Accomplishments:

• Worked closely with Ward 10 residents leading the fight for the People’s Climate and Equity Plan to advance their bold vision inside City Hall.

• As one of the board members to the Clean Energy Partnership, I’ve been able to work with the City’s Sustainability Division to hold the energy monopolies – CenterPoint and Xcel – accountable to doing their part in helping the City meet its climate goals.

• Supported every effort led by East Phillips residents, Little Earth residents, and Councilmember Jason Chavez to advance the East Phillips’ community’s vision for the East Phillips Urban Farm.

To Do:

• Implement the People’s Climate and Equity Plan to make bold investments in resilience. Raise the revenue for these initiatives by using sources like Pollution Control Annual Registration fees and Xcel Energy and CenterPoint Energy franchise fees.

• Prepare for the extreme temperature and weather impacts of the climate crisis by creating cooling and warming centers for public use.

• Ensure all homes, especially our aging rental housing, are weatherized.

• Ensure just utilities use and distribution during extremely high and low temperatures.

• Give reparations to communities harmed by environmental injustice.

Safety is a stable, living-wage job, free of intimidation, free of wage theft, and with the right to organize in the workplace.

Accomplishments:

• Proud to be the only labor-endorsed candidate in this race with endorsements from MFT, SEIU, AFSCME, and LiUNA. These organizations are showing up for me because I’ve shown up for workers in their movements and on picket lines: from teachers and nurses, to clerical workers and refinery workers, I’ve stood with workers in their hardest moments.

• Sat at the bargaining table as a Councilmember to help workers at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts get a fair contract and make sure visitors from around the state continue investing in our community.

• Showed up on over a dozen picket lines and talked with hundreds of workers who live and work in Ward 10.

• Stood with BIPOC frontline City workers when they bravely came together to call out racism and other toxic workplace issues. Met their demand to vote against the appointment of the City Coordinator, who is the most powerful unelected bureaucrat in City Hall

To Do:

• Pass fair scheduling policies.

• Pass protections for gig economy workers.

• Increase dedicated funding for co-enforcement of wage theft and earned sick and safe time violations.

• Increase the city's minimum wage and index the wage to inflation.

• Ensure that the Minneapolis Labor Standards Enforcement Division is fully-staffed.

• Partner with LIUNA and the Building Trades to create pathways for expanding union construction career opportunities for women, veterans and people of color, through Project Labor Agreements and training programs.

• Partner with labor unions representing City employees to ensure frontline City workers get fair contracts.

Safety is an end to discrimination and ensuring LGBTQIA2S+ folks have safe, supportive, and just spaces.

Accomplishments:

• Dedicated permanent resources for the City to hire a staff member to support work related to sexual orientation, gender expression, and gender identity.

• Funded the creation of a publicly accessible registry of LGBTQIA2S+ -friendly and -specialized care providers so community members can more easily access the care they need.

• Allocated resources for businesses to implement gender neutral bathrooms at no cost to business owners.

To Do:

• Re-imagine safety to ensure that Black queer and trans folks are no longer afraid to seek support and justice, and are no longer over-criminalized, harassed, and abused by police.

• Increase funding to social services, fighting for workers’ rights, and increasing access to affordable housing, so that Black trans women and femmes aren’t forced to enter or stay in unsafe living or employment situations for financial reasons.

• Work with grassroots advocacy organizations to decriminalize sex work, which currently has a disproportionate impact on trans and non-binary BIPOC folks.

Safety is making sure City Hall acts like the last line of defense for our most vulnerable neighbors.

Accomplishments:

• Led the effort to fund expanded immigration support services for our immigrant families as Ward 10 welcomed new Afghan and Ukrainian refugees.

• When a synagogue was threatened and 2 mosques were victim to arson, I worked with our Police and Fire Departments to make sure that going forward, 911 calls from places of worship are prioritized.

• When access to abortion fell at the federal level, I worked with the Mayor to secure $300K for reproductive health care in the budget to make sure Minnesota was a safe haven for abortion access.

• As attacks on LGBTQ residents around the country have increased, I worked to fund the creation of a publicly accessible registry of queer -friendly and -specialized care providers, and help businesses implement gender neutral bathrooms across Minneapolis.

• This Ramadan, we updated Minneapolis’ noise ordinance to finally allow mosques the ability to play the call to prayer 5 times a day that were already allowed in state statute but restricted by the city. While the language does not give preference to any religion, it will allow Muslims the same religious freedoms we were offering other religious institutions

To Do:

• Continue working with immigrant communities and organizations toward full equality for our immigrant residents.

• While the GOP is waging war against equity, multiculturalism, and inclusion the city must be ready to act as the last line of defense for oppressed people.

• Advance progressive and equitable policy to maintain cities as the last line of defense, setting an example for other local, state, and national leaders.

• Hold existing crisis pregnancy centers (fake abortion clinics) accountable to ensure patients are not manipulated out of receiving quality reproductive care. Use creative regulations to ensure no new crisis pregnancy centers can open their doors in Minneapolis.