[Posted with permission]

Hey Minneapolis folks,

If you have not already voted for mayor, I hope you would take a few minutes to read this. Below is a list of over 30 alarming observations reflecting on Mayor Frey's record as the city’s top boss under a “strong mayor” system and the head of public safety. You are all familiar with the first one.

I have been paying close attention to our city’s leadership since the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder. What I observed compelled me to drop everything in the summer of 2021 and run for mayor myself. And I have been paying close attention ever since.

I wish there were a nicer way to put it, but what I have seen has confirmed again and again that we need new leadership immediately. Mayor Frey has abjectly failed to implement the kind of transparency and accountability he often talks about. He has failed repeatedly when tested in crisis. He has been way too slow in addressing the city’s top issues. He has obstructed fact-finding. Are you better off in this city than you were eight years ago? The answer for most of us is a resounding "no." The proof is in the pudding – I see no evidence that under his leadership we will even get back to where we were eight years ago.

1. An outside review concluded that Frey failed to follow existing protocol in crisis. A city-commissioned review of Frey’s response to the George Floyd aftermath found widespread chaos and poor communication among city leaders. Among a long list of failures, it noted that Frey remarkably failed to follow the city’s own “’well-written, comprehensive’ emergency operations plan.” The report also noted that interviewees “felt the Mayor’s Office showed no leadership and was ‘rudderless.’”

2. Lied about banning no-knock warrants. In his 2021 reelection campaign, Frey claimed that one of his “top achievements” was banning no-knock warrants. We later learned that it was not true. In early February 2022, an MPD officer killed 22-year-old Amir Locke in a no-knock warrant raid. Bodycam video showed police using a key to enter an apartment and rushing in with flashlights and guns pointed, yelling undecipherable commands over one another. Seconds later, an officer kicks the back of a couch and a young man under a blanket starts to rise. He is holding a gun, and he is shot three times before getting fully upright. Mr. Locke was not the target of the warrant. He had a license to carry a gun. We learned that MPD in fact continued conducting no-knock warrants despite Frey’s campaign claims.

3. Twisted the truth about the killing of Amir Locke. Frey and his hand-picked interim MPD chief Huffman abruptly walked out of the press conference about Mr. Locke’s death while being grilled from reporters about misleading statements by Frey’s MPD, including statements mischaracterizing what happened during the raid and repeated references to Mr. Locke as an “adult male suspect” (he was not a suspect in the warrant).

4. Allowed his MPD to promote a once-fired MPD officer to lead all police training. On February 7, 2022, KARE 11 broke a story that in January 2022 Frey’s MPD promoted a once-fired MPD officer to lead ALL police training (and promoted other officers with checkered pasts to other positions) with no explanation until the media caught on. It was unbelievably ironic that the same mayor who in 2020 declared that Minnesota law should be changed to prohibit fired cops from being reinstated to any position in the force allowed the promotion of a once-fired cop to lead training.

5. Promoted large numbers of disciplined officers as field training officers. On February 24, 2022, KARE 11 published a story titled “KARE 11 Investigates: Nearly 150 MPD cops with misconduct history served as trainers” observing that nearly a third of the more than 400 MPD officers who had served as field training officers between 2016 (a year before Frey was elected mayor) and 2022 (five years after he was elected) had been “disciplined or named in lawsuits that have cost taxpayers more than $34 million.”

6. Failed to implement basic accountability for “violence interrupters.” Frey failed to ensure accountability for “violence interrupters” who were receiving millions of dollars in city contracts. In February 2022, 5 Eyewitness News covered a story about a lack of transparency and accountability. Alarmingly, the city failed to provide a single written report from the violence interrupters in response to formal requests under the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act. The city shockingly responded that “written reports were not required of contractors.” Experts in Minnesota’s open records laws found the city’s lack of recordkeeping very surprising and that requiring written reports would be “‘good governance 101.’”

7. Dedicated major resources to a futile challenge to the city charter’s minimum police officer requirement. Frey has been in violation of the city charter’s minimum police headcount requirement for years. Instead of directing every resource possible toward efforts to recruit new police officers to meet the minimum requirement immediately once the MPD started hemorrhaging officers, Frey spent a huge amount of time and money (that could have instead been used to recruit new police officers) in a years-long losing battle to convince the courts that the mayor is not required to keep police staffing levels at the charter’s minimum level and thus he should not be subjected to having to show good cause for his failures to recruit enough officers to meet the minimum threshold. Frey took the case all the way to the Minnesota Supreme Court, which summarily rejected his position.

8. Signed a police contract in 2022 that undermined accountability. In March 2022, after proclaiming repeatedly to the media following George Floyd’s murder that meaningful steps in police reform depended on strengthening accountability in the police union contract, Frey signed a new contract that the StarTribune said made ‘few discipline tweaks,” did not improve accountability, and instead included provisions that would work AGAINST reform by deterring people from seeking public records about police officers.

9. Allegedly obstructed Minneapolis police oversight commission’s work. Also in March 2022, Abigail Cerra, a former public defender and Minneapolis civil rights investigator, resigned as head of the Minneapolis police oversight commission, frustrated with internal city politics and bureaucracy that she said prevents the board of changing policy. The StarTribune quoted her as saying that “a combination of inaction and resistance in City Hall has obstructed” the commission’s work.

10. Failed to take disciplinary action for an overwhelming majority of police misconduct complaints. On May 14, 2022, the StarTribune published a story titled “Black citizens recount fear, distrust as complaints against Minneapolis police go nowhere.” It concluded that “[e]ven as a global spotlight has been trained on the Minneapolis Police Department since George Floyd's killing two years ago, the overwhelming majority of people who filed complaints with the OPCR have not seen their cases lead to disciplinary action.”

11. Ignored the accounts of large numbers of current and former city staff members regarding a “toxic, racist and unsafe culture." On June 13, 2022, the StarTribune published a piece observing that Frey ignored the accounts of over 75 current and former city staff members requesting that he drop his efforts to permanently appoint his hand-picked interim City Coordinator. He continued pushing the City Council to vote for permanent appointment despite the staff members’ accounts of a “toxic, racist and unsafe culture.”

12. After making a previous controversial hire, Frey’s MPD made an offer to a former MPD officer with a checkered past. On July 20, 2023, 5 Eyewitness News broke a story about a former MPD officer that was given an offer to rejoin the force despite the MPD knowing about a 1997 incident in which he shot a Black teenager in the back and another incident six years later when he shot and critically wounded a fellow MPD officer with a submachine gun that resulted in a $4.5M settlement.

13. Paid a law firm over $1 Million to fight AGAINST mandated police reform. While Frey claims to favor accountability and reform, in June 2022, the Minnesota Reporter reported that the city had paid over $1 Million to the law firm Jones Day to FIGHT a state-mandated consent decree for police reform. The city paid Jones Day an average of nearly $157,000 per month ($315 to $893 per hour) for five straight months. Frey argued paying $1 Million was money well spent to avoid having two consent decrees, one with the state and another with the U.S. Department of Justice, which was at the time also investigating MPD for racist policing. It turns out that after spending all that time and money fighting, the city ultimately signed a consent decree with the state anyway, in March 2023.

14. Hand-picked the city’s first community safety commissioner who resigned after less than a year, saying he lacked sufficient support. In July 2022, Frey nominated Cedric Alexander to serve as Minneapolis' first community safety commissioner, overseeing police, fire, and 911, and touted him as a hire that would transform public safety in Minneapolis. He quit less than a year into the role; after saying he lacked sufficient staff support to transform public safety.

15. The former co-chair of the City Community Safety Working Group concluded we need a new mayor. In 2022, Dr. DeWayne Davis was appointed by Frey to co-chair the City Community Safety Working Group. He became so concerned about the Frey administration not implementing recommended reforms fast enough that he is now challenging Mayor Frey in this current election (and I will be voting for him).

16. Failed for many months to simply shift MPD resources to account for a huge loss of personnel. In September 2022, FOX 9 published a piece titled “Data show Minneapolis PD hasn’t shifted resources despite losing hundreds of officers” stating that data requested from the city showed that the First Precinct (downtown) alone lost nearly 50 shifts since 2020, that despite that the majority of crime happens during evening hours the MPD did not shift resources to cover those hours, and that the officers being assigned to the most demanding shifts and locations were among the most inexperienced in the department. FOX 9 also reported that 27 of 69 emergency (911) dispatcher positions remained unfilled.

17. Failed to determine why police left the city. To date, the Frey administration failed to conduct any survey or other analysis to determine why a third of MPD’s officers left the force following George Floyd’s murder.

18. Failed to recruit new officers despite having the budget to do so. In late 2022, the City Council approved a budget with funds for hiring 260 new police officers, as well as civilian members of the MPD, but hiring has been anemic. Blame for this understaffing mess should not be heaped on City Council. After initial calls for defunding, and regardless of certain members’ views on the effectiveness of police, the Council has consistently approved budgets for headcounts much higher than they are. At the end of 2020, the Council approved a budget to keep the number at 888. Shortly thereafter, at a time when the headcount dipped into the 600 range, they voted to provide the MPD with $6.4 million to hire and train new recruits. Then, at the end of 2021, they approved over $191 million for the MPD, which restored its funding to nearly the level it was before 2020. At the end of 2022, the Council approved the Mayor’s proposed 2023-2024 budget, which included funding for 731 officers and four new recruit classes in both 2023 and 2024. And at the end of 2023, the Council allotted an additional $16 million for recruiting dozens of hires in 2024.

19. The U.S. Department of Justice’s report cited egregious leadership failures. On June 16, 2023 the U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, released an 89-page report titled “Investigation of the City of Minneapolis and the Minneapolis Police Department” setting forth a long list of problems including evidence of systemic racism and a pattern of MPD using excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment. The report concluded that the problems were caused in part because of a lack of accountability, training that did not ensure constitutional policing, and inadequate supervision. The DOJ criticized the MPD’s overuse of “coaching” instead of formal investigations as an example of the city’s “fundamentally flawed” accountability system. The DOJ referred to an example of an officer who “smacked, kicked, and used a taser on a teen accused of shoplifting” and was referred for “coaching” instead of formal discipline. Frey has been the top boss for the MPD and has had “complete power” under the city charter to make improvements in all those areas since 2017. The report noted that “neither the city nor MPD has tasked anyone with regularly and systematically assessing MPD's enforcement data to identify and take action to avoid unwarranted disparities."

20. Car thefts surged in Minneapolis while they declined in St. Paul. On July 22, 2023, the StarTribune released an article regarding the record-high surge in auto thefts in Minneapolis (while noting that car thefts in St. Paul had declined), observing that roughly 24 vehicles were being reported stolen on an average day.

21. Failed to provide shelter space for homeless. Frey made a pledge in his 2017 mayoral campaign to end homelessness in five years. A July 30, 2023 StarTribune article observed that homeless remain a huge problem. Indeed, in 2022, homeless people were turned away a shocking 7,000 times from shelters in Hennepin County.

22. MPD police levels reached an historic low more than three years after the George Floyd aftermath and six years into Frey’s stint as mayor. A September 16, 2023, StarTribune article noted that not only was the staffing level at an historic law, but “[w]ith 585 sworn officers, the city holds one of the lowest ratios of officers to citizens among many major American cities.” The article goes on to state that “[s]ome days, the Minneapolis Police Department's ranks are so thin that just four officers in a given precinct are expected to patrol wide swaths of the city during their shift.”

23. A November 2023 lawsuit claimed the city’s Neighborhood Safety Office used an illegal procurement process. The office oversees the Violence Prevention Fund and Gang Violence Initiative. Each program has paid out millions of dollars since 2019, two years after Frey was elected to nonprofits and private contractors. The lawsuit alleged the evaluation process for choosing funding recipients fails "the most basic competitive bidding or proposal evaluation process," and is therefore illegal.

24. Allowed his MPD to promote a once-fired MPD officer who forwarded a racist email to other officers. In November 2023, the StarTribune reported on Frey’s MPD’s promotion of a police officer who had forwarded a racist email to other officers. The first line of the article reads “What will it take for Minneapolis police leaders to show they're serious about reform?”

25. Declared “change isn’t cheap!” in proposing $1.8 billion budget in 2024. Frey’s proposed budget included a roughly 6.2% property tax levy.

26. Failed to explain why it took him three years into his second term before launching a “full court press” police recruiting campaign. In the 2024 press conference announcing the recruiting campaign, Chief O’Hara said that “I have been very clear that the MPD cannot address the challenges in recruitment alone, we need our city leaders to help support us in that effort.” That obvious fact should have been clear to the Mayor all along, yet he has not explained why he wasted years of time.

27. Failed to put guardrails on the MPD’s use of “coaching” in lieu of formal misconduct investigations. to avoid having to disclose misconduct claims to the public. Both the Minnesota Department of Human Rights and the federal DOJ raised the alarm about MPD’s widespread use of a practice known as “coaching,” instead of a formal investigation or discipline, even for serious complaints against officers. Referral to coaching shields complaints from public scrutiny. Indeed, the city has denied outside watchdog groups access to records about coaching. Despite calls from a coalition of grassroots group to put clear limits on the use of coaching in the most recent police union contract signed in 2024, Frey signed the contract without guardrails on the use of coaching. And it explicitly states that coaching is not a form of discipline, which continues to give MPD cover to withhold records.

28. Frey’s MPD did not formally investigate many serious officer misconduct cases. On May 29, 2024, the StarTribune published an article stating that “Minneapolis police leaders used a secretive process to handle serious officer misconduct cases while keeping the details confidential, despite repeated claims to the contrary.” It pointed to court documents that reveal that MPD used “coaching” instead of formal discipline for many cases of serious misconduct even though MPD maintained to the media that it only uses coaching for lowest-level violations, such as problems in writing a report.

29. Continued to fail to implement accountability measures for violence interrupters. On February 17, 2025, the StarTribune published an article stating that the City Council said they lost faith in Frey’s Neighborhood Safety Department. The article quoted Luana Nelson-Brown, the former director of Neighborhood safety as saying “city leadership [i.e., Frey] prevented her from speaking publicly about millions of dollars paid to contractors ‘without a shred of documentation,’ and that when she tried to raise accountability to a higher standard than other departments were used to, she found herself with ‘no allies.’” Then, in March, FOX 9 published a piece titled “Minneapolis failed to track millions in violence prevention funding. It just approved even more.” The article states that “[r]ecords obtained by the FOX 9 Investigators through a series of data practices requests reveal organizations contracted to provide violence-prevention services that go beyond traditional policing have routinely submitted invoices for tens of thousands of dollars over the past few years without providing detailed timesheets or descriptions of the work” even though the providers are contractually required to provide that information. Nelson-Brown is quoted as saying “‘It was a system that, in the way that it was developed, makes the environment ripe for corruption.’” The article cites an example where W Berry Consulting LLC submitted invoices totaling more than $270,000 during one contract cycle but the city failed to produce a single receipt from the entity supporting the charges and the entity declined requests to provide receipts. The article states court documents in a related lawsuit revealed that the city “‘admitted it did not have a regular practice of requiring violence prevention contractors to provide documentation’ for the invoices they submitted.” Another violence interrupter group submitted timecards for staff members at $30/hr without even identifying who the supposed staff members are. A Minneapolis attorney who filed the lawsuit is quoted saying “‘The city was paying over $70 million of invoices without getting any backup for the invoices -- no canceled checks, no receipts for expenses, just invoices saying, ‘pay me the money.’ And they did pay the money.’”

30. Failed to communicate with City Council or constituents regarding the June federal agent raid on Lake Street, setting constituents up for failure. A “Committee of the Whole” review of city actions repeatedly emphasizes Frey’s failure to communicate any information to City Council members or other constituents that might have diffused tensions that resulted in a clash and arrests. The review notes that “[c]uriously, no member of the City Council was included in the initial information channels.” It states that “because the Administration did not notify the City Council of transpiring events for nearly four hours after the Chief of Police was first informed, speculative communication occurred.” It notes that an individual Council Member sought information and clarity through official City Administration sources but received no response. It states that “[t]he presence of federal agents wearing different types of clothing and uniforms, some with ICE iconography, along with military-style gear, face coverings, military-style vehicles, and long guns created an environment like that of recent ICE immigration enforcement actions in other jurisdictions.” It states that “[i]t is understandable that without the most up-to-date information, and with many visual cues like those depicted by media in other jurisdictions, some residents and City Officials at the scene near Lake & Bloomington could reasonably assume that the events unfolding were an immigration enforcement action. It follows that emotions for many were high and that circumstances felt urgent.” It states that “Council Members were left with a void of information and an urgency to respond to constituent concerns.” The confusion caused by a lack of communication from the mayor led to multiple arrests of community members and a loss of trust between community and city leadership.

31. Allowed his MPD to promote four officers who had been accused of using excessive force in civil lawsuits as trainers. In August of this year, MPR broke news that the MPD appointed four officers to be trainers despite accusations against them of using excessive force in civil lawsuits the city settled before they received their current assignments.

32. Frey’s MPD failed to cooperate with internal audits regarding high-profile matters. In October this year, MSN published an article about the MPD’s lack of cooperation in ongoing internal audits into the department’s handling of several high-profile public safety cases, including the MPD’s response to the shooting of Davis Moturi by his neighbor after Moturi had made many requests over many months for police intervention. City Auditor Timmerman told the Minneapolis Audit Committee that his office has repeatedly encountered delays and resistance from MPD officers and leadership. According to Timmerman, the department has ignored more than a dozen attempts by city auditors to schedule interviews, request documents and gain access to systems.

33. Serious allegations of deleting communications regarding important city business. On October 15, 2025, the StarTribune broke a story about Minneapolis for the Many accusing Frey of improperly deleting text messages relating to city business in violation of public disclosure laws. The group had requested requests Frey’s communications surrounding the June Lake Street raid and last year’s shooting of a man by his neighbors. The city responded that such records did not exist. The article reveals Frey refuses to use a city-issued device for communication about city business. He only uses his personal cell phone (which in and of itself is a violation of Minneapolis city employee policy). Minneapolis for the Many understandably assumes Frey must have texts or phone records relating to these incidents. Jane Kirtley, professor of law and media ethics at the University of Minnesota is quoted as saying that she is skeptical of the city’s (circular) position that because any deleted communications must have been “transitory” the law does not require Frey to keep them. Professor Kirtley is quoted as saying “‘[t]he contortions they appear to be prepared to go through to circumvent the spirit of the [law’s] presumption of openness are astounding,’” casting skepticism at what Frey’s office defines as transitory. Don Gemberling, who worked for three decades at the state Department of Administration helping governments comply with state open records laws is quoted as saying “I think [Frey] is breaking the law.”

34. The Third Precinct remains a burned out shell of a building, more than five years later.

35. Has done next to nothing to stop the rapid decline in enrollment at Minneapolis Public Schools. Minneapolis public schools have seen a rapid decline in enrollment in Frey’s time in office and have a $75M budget deficit. Although the Minneapolis mayor has little official responsibility over the schools, as the figurehead of the city with the mayoral bully pulpit, a mayor has significant power to persuade the state and other sources to provide whatever resources are needed to improve the schools and should do everything he or she can do to help the public schools because quality public schools are vital to the health of the city as a whole.

I talk to some smart people who have bought into the notion – pushed by certain PACs – that most if not all of our city’s problems are the City Council’s fault. But it was Mayor Frey, not the City Council, who is responsible for each of the above listed issues.

We are in a crisis – definitely at a national level but also at a local level. Big money is running government. Big money directs media narratives and skews elections. Big money forms PACs upon PACS upon PACs. I believe big money has led us to the divisiveness that Frey now oversees in Minneapolis politics. When I voted for him in 2017, I had serious reservations given his age at the time and his apparent limited real-world experience. I thought to myself “this could turn out to be a disaster.” It turns out I should have listened to that inner voice.

I plan to vote for DeWayne Davis and Jazz Hampton. I hope you would look into them too.

#minneapolis

#DEWAYNEDAVIS

#jazzhampton