"If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor."

Desmond Tutu.

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Good morning everyone:

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There is no nuance, no gray-area, no let’s-wait-and-see at play in Minneapolis: 

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When a horrific film shows a black man fully restrained and compliant being murdered by police officers, but is not deemed sufficient cause for the Hennepin County Attorney to charge . . .  

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When live television coverage of the scene in South Minneapolis shows a CNN reporter of color presenting press credentials to Minnesota State Police, expressing a willingness to cooperate fully, and lawfully exercising his First Amendment rights and yet, that action is deemed sufficient basis for an arrest on the spot . . . 

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When the story of pain, and furor, and fatigue being felt by people of color going about their daily lives is somehow papered over by the narrative of a city whose black and brown residents are bent on destruction, looting and fire-bombing people’s property – a narrative fueled by the President of the United States calling out the “thugs” in Minneapolis . . . 

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When the best attempt that our President can make to calm the situation is to tweet: “When the looting starts, the shooting starts” . . . 

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When the police culture not just in Minneapolis, but all throughout our nation, year-after-year, incident-after-incident, takes two steps forward with DEI trainings, inclusive hiring practices, and community outreach, but then, inexplicably, suddenly, jumps four steps back with acts of brutality, abuse, and disregard of civil liberties  . . . 

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When a city celebrated for its long history of progressive, principled, moral, and effective leadership through the administrations of Don Fraser, Sharon Sayles Belton, and R.T. Rybak, is forced to fall into the abyss before it can fully summon the will to act decisively, to move to higher ground, and to root out the most invidious manifestations of racism that still poison a great city’s soil.

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No, there is no ambiguity.

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My great friend R.T. Rybak, the mayor of Minneapolis from 2002-2014 and now president of the Minneapolis Foundation, wrote an excruciatingly powerful commentary the first thing this morning. He said it would be OK if I shared portions of it with you:

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Sleepless and mortified, my heart melts in real time as parts of the city I love so deeply burn away. Knowing these neighborhoods as I do, I see way too clearly what is going up in smoke. While the TV showed things on fire, I saw flames getting closer to the first-generation entrepreneur who so proudly showed me the new business where he invested everything he had, the neighborhood kids who cheered so loudly at the opening of that library, the seniors in that wonderful care facility where they must be trapped because of COVID.

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It is nearly impossible to get these horrifying images out of our heads, but we must, because right now our eyes have to stay focused on one single image: 

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A human being, staring calmly off into the middle distance, while his knee suffocates another human being. Our repulsion should boil over as we see this is a white police officer, who took an oath to protect and serve that person on the ground, who is a black man, who we know would not be treated like that if he was white. We should be shocked again when we see other officers doing nothing to prevent a death. 

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And nothing should shock us more than the fact that we are no longer shocked, because this image is so familiar.

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Until every one of us can see that image for what it is we cannot move another inch forward. Our country, and our beloved imperfect city, has tolerated two tiers of justice too long when we never should have tolerated it in the first place. We need to acknowledge that on some level, every one of us had a role in keeping this inequity in place.

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I’ll go first, because after 12 years as mayor of this city, I should. My own efforts to change a police department and its culture failed badly. That will haunt me for the rest of my life, and it should. As each of us sees and acknowledges our own part it can be paralyzing. It was for me. But I was touched deeply yesterday by my colleague at the Minneapolis Foundation, Chanda Smith Baker. Growing up and raising a family as an African American in north Minneapolis, and for years leading Pillsbury United Communities, she has seen so many more of the consequences of our deep, endemic racism than I ever will. But as we surveyed the damage and pain in our community she said simply, and clearly: “We have no choice but to act.”

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[R.T. then describes in detail what his institution will do and what he believes the police department of the City of Minneapolis needs to do to set a different course.]

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R.T. is so right. We have to act. Every grant we make, every energy we dedicate, has to take direct aim at deconstructing the racial inequities that continue to impede opportunity, equity, and justice. We will not waiver from that charge.

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I have also asked our senior leadership team to consider how we might best create safe, healing spaces – spaces that permit us to bear witness, to listen and support one another, to chart a course of kindness, respect, and inclusion within our own organizational culture. In the immediate-term, I’ve asked Dexter, Joi, and their colleagues on the Boys and Men of Color workgroup to think hard about how we can all lean into that challenge.

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Thank you,

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Rip