As the district lines were redrawn, so were some political careers. A number of legislators found themselves out of their old districts, and some were faced with a decision to run against a former colleague, or retire.

So it was with Senate Minority Leader Melisa Lopez Franzen (DFL, Edina), pictured at left. Her neighborhood was shifted to Senate District 46 (Edina/Hopkins/St Louis Park), which has been the home territory of Sen. Ron Latz (DFL, St Louis Park). Latz declared for re-election, and Franzen chose to retire after the current session ends in May.

As a result, the MN Senate seat in Senate District 50 is now open. Former legislator Dr. Alice Mann (DFL, formerly from Lakeville) has declared her intent to run for this open seat.

Similarly, Rep. Andrew Carlson (DFL, east Bloomington) found out on February 15 that he was suddenly living in the same district as Rep. Steve Elkins (DFL, west Bloomington). They appear to be set to square off against each other for the House District 50B seat. Rep. Heather Edelson (DFL, Edina) plans to run in House District 50A.

Redistricting rendered the House District 51B seat (east Bloomington) open. Nathan Coulter, re-elected to the Bloomington City Council in 2021 and a legislative assistant for the DFL House Caucus, has declared for the open seat.

Sen. Melissa Halvorson Wiklund (DFL, Bloomington Richfield) will run for re-election, now in Senate District 51.

With two open seats in Senate Districts 50 and 51, there is opportunity for conservative candidates. If you are passionate about changing the direction that our state is going and would consider running for office, please let us know. Please call and leave a message at (952) 856-3028 and we will get back to you. 

At noon on February 15, the special judicial panel empowered to rebalance the voting strength of Minnesota’s legislative districts, issued its maps. Suddenly, we are no longer Senate District 49. We are, in a somewhat altered form, now Senate District 50.

Our new district is shown in green on the map above The area shown in pink that includes the eastern portion of Bloomington and all of Richfield is now Senate District 51.

NOTE: it may take a few weeks to convert websites and email addresses over to the new senate district designations. In the interim, we will continue to use the SD49GOP domain name.

Nine of our 34 precincts have been ceded to adjacent redrawn senate districts. Three precincts on our far west are now part of a new Senate District 49, comprising primarily Eden Prairie and Minnetonka. Six precincts in northwestern Edina (the neighborhoods north of Highway 62 and west of Highway 100) have now been joined with the city of Hopkins and much of St Louis Park to make up the new Senate District 46.

To compensate for the loss of those nine precincts, the southeastern boundaries of the new Senate District 50 have moved east. Parts or all of nine Bloomington precincts in the center of Bloomington have now been joined with the 11 western precincts and 14 Edina precincts.

The new Congressional and Senate District boundaries divide some old precincts because the Court uses census tract boundaries that don't align exactly. Usually municipalities have been prompt and efficient in adjusting precincts. MN Statute 204B.135 requires cities with wards (including Bloomington and Edina) to redistrict at least 19 weeks before the primary. With the primary this year falling on August 9, we should expect new precinct maps by March 29.

You may view more detailed maps showing the district boundaries at the MN Legislature’s Mapping Service page CLICK HERE. You may also choose the interactive map to lookup district assignments by street address. 

Our January article described the legislative and court processes that established the new boundaries. And our February 7 article described the preparations needed by Senate District leaders to react the to changed boundaries.

Tom Weiler is one of three Republicans who have announced their candidacy for the Congressional seat in the 3rd Congressional District.  We will cover all three prior to the CD3 endorsing convention on April 23

Tom Weiler has retired from the Navy, but his passion to serve his country remains strong.  He said that he has seen countries that don’t have our system of government, and it has reinforced his drive to serve and defend our nation.  He wants to ensure his children, and all other American children, have the opportunity to achieve their American dream.

Tom grew up and went to high school in Eden Prairie. Many of the friends he made while playing baseball and football have gone on to enjoy what he considers “very successful lives”:  solid careers, happy marriages, great families.  He is proud and thankful to have grown up with classical Midwestern values, where parents instilled the importance of service to community and country.
 
Weiler’s proudest memory while growing up occurred during a trip his family took to Washington DC his junior year.  While there, they encountered a March for Life.  With a mix of curiosity and passion, Tom skipped the museum and monument tours that his family had planned to join the march. He remembers it vividly because he stood up for his beliefs.
 
Tom was drawn to the University of Notre Dame because of football and faith – and a Naval Reserve Officer Training Corp scholarship. He graduated in 2000 with a degree in Civil Engineering and a commission in the US Navy.
 
For much of the next 20 years, Weiler’s Navy career was literally underwater, as a submarine officer.  He started out focused on the nuclear propulsion systems and worked his way up through the levels of responsibility in preparation to take command of a submarine.  His superior performance on front line submarines conducting missions vital to national security led to his selections for Submarine Command early, to be an aide to the Commander of the Pacific Fleet, and many other competitive assignments. 

Among Tom’s accomplishments on shore tours:

• Worked contingency planning in the Joint US European Command headquarters in Europe, including planning force protection measures in response to the Avian Flu pandemic.
• Served as a Legislative Defense Fellow assigned to Congressman Rob Wittman (R, VA), the ranking Republican on the House Armed Service Committee.
• Successfully completed the very demanding United Kingdom Submarine Commander Course. 
• Identified as the top-rated Executive Officer in his submarine squadron.
• Selected for a sought-after slot in the Political & Military Masters Program at Harvard and was accepted into Harvard’s Masters Program in Public Administration.
• Served as the Executive Assistant in the Office of Legislative Affairs in the Pentagon. 
• Served in the role of Strategic Communications for the Admiral for Undersea Warfare.

If you were elected as a precinct delegate or alternate during the recent caucus, you will remain in that capacity until the next caucus in 2024.

The new Senate District 50 will hold a convention at Bethany Church at 6900 Auto Club Road on Saturday, March 19. The formal call to register and attend the convention will be sent out, via email,  on or before March 9. It will provide the start time and registration fees associated with the meeting. If you are a delegate or alternate and do not receive a "call" email by March 9, please contact your precinct chair.

The purpose of the convention will be to:

• debate and approve new bylaws
• elect senate district officers
• elect delegates and alternates to the Congressional District 3 (CD3), Congressional District 5 (CD5), and State Conventions
• review and approve/disapprove resolutions to the MN GOP party platform
• potentially endorse MN House and/or MN Senate candidates

Committees are being formed to draft the bylaws, to review the platform resolutions that were approved in the recent precinct caucuses, to seek legislative candidates, and to identify potential delegates and alternates to the CD3 and state conventions. If you are interested in serving on any of these committees, please call the Senate District telephone number, (952) 856-3028 and leave a message.

Please let your precinct chairs know by February 23 (this Wednesday) if you are interested in being a district or precinct officer, a convention committee member, and/or a delegate or alternate to a higher-level convention. If your precinct did not elect a chair at the caucuses on February 1, or if you do not know how to contact your precinct chair, state your interest in an email to [email protected] by February 23.

A “slate” of proposed delegates, 1st, 2nd and 3rd alternates will be drafted by the committee of precinct chairs before the convention, to include those who’ve expressed interest. This preparation helps shorten the time needed at convention by having lists of correctly spelled names, and confirmed intention to serve if elected. Some nominations / self-nominations from the convention floor are also anticipated. Depending on the number of people interested, the positions could be subject to rounds of voting at our March 19 SD50 Convention.

Regarding delegates and alternates to the higher-level conventions, you should know the following:

• If you live in CD5, the CD5 Convention will be held at the Crystal VFW Hall on Saturday, April 2
• If you live in CD3, the CD3 Convention will be held at Wayzata High School on Saturday, April 23
• The State Convention will be held in Rochester on Friday and Saturday, May 13-14
• You will need to attend the full meetings and you will need to cover your costs of registration, transportation, and food/lodging (as required)
• Depending on the number of people interested, the positions could be subject to a vote at the convention

Please email [email protected] if you have any questions.

People throughout MN are heeding the call to public service and declaring as Republican candidates for election this year. How about you?

Soaring crime in our cities and suburbs, failure of many of our public school students to meet expected grade standards, divisions with our society, heavy-handed and unequally-applied mandates, pressures to increase density in our neighborhoods, inadequate support to our small- and medium-size businesses, and insistence on spending budget surpluses rather than returning them to taxpayers are several of the issues that we need to address in our own state legislature.

This is the year to take a stand.

If you are passionate about changing the direction that our state is going and would consider running for office, please let us know. Please call and leave a message at (952) 856-3028 and we will get back to you.

In our September 2021 edition, SD 49 Newsletter carried a story outlining how our Rep. Elkins plans to social engineer our residential neighborhoods to fit his vision of how we should live.

Rep. Steve Elkins recently introduced his “Legalize Affordable Housing” Act for consideration in this session of the Minnesota House. It really should be called the “Kill Our Neighborhoods” Bill, as it is a real KON Act. Comparing the bill Rep. Elkins actually submitted to the draft bill we analyzed last September, SD49 Newsletter confirmed that the new bill retains these features:

1. Elkins’ Kill Our Neighborhoods (KON) bill both requires cities to allow and encourages builders to build low-income, high-density housing. The costs of that housing will still be imposed on the original, single-family residents of the neighborhood, not on the low-income occupants of the high density housing. The new low-income residents are exempted from impact fees intended to make developers pay the costs of new development to the city -- street, sewer and other improvements needed to support the new development. (Article 1, Sec 8 of the KON). In other legislation, projects qualifying as low-income must have at least 30% of their units cheap enough that people earning 30% of the median income for their area can buy them.

2. Rep. Elkins’ KON specifically allows use of various fees authorized by the KON to build mass transit into our neighborhoods. (Art. 1, Sec. 5 (1))

3. These fees for “fixed transit infrastructure” must be apportioned to all developed parcels in the district (Art. 2, Sec. 1, Subd (1)(c). However, ‘developed parcels’ is undefined. Fees for street improvement districts must be based on vehicle trips to and from developed parcels over the quarter before the fees are set – based, in other words, on trips by owners of the single family homes which existed before Elkins’ KON strips away their single family zoning and converts our neighborhoods to the high density, low income housing Elkins wants.

As we pointed out in our January article, Rep. Elkins told us that if we oppose his bill we are NIMBY racists. He told the MinnPost, ““These kinds of zoning restrictions have a clearly disparate impact on communities of color and in some cases have their origins in racism,” said Elkins. “Anyone who has served on a city council in a developing suburban community encountered people at the podium talking about this density will bring ‘those people’ into the community.”

Rep. Elkins has announced he will seek re-election. If he is re-elected, he will push his KON in our legislature. And if you dislike having your single-family-zoned neighborhood eliminated, you are one of the ‘people at the podium’ Elkins paints so clearly. You could not possibly just prefer low density neighborhoods. In Elkins' view, if you support neighborhood, single-family zoning, you are a racist.

In late January, the cost overruns on Southwest Light Rail were formally acknowledged and a new 2027 first-service date was announced, as reported in the StarTribune.

On February 15, State Sen. Julia Coleman (R, Carver County) wrote to her constituents,

“I am appalled and frustrated by the mismanagement of the Southwest Light Rail project. It is projected to cost an additional 210 million dollars, and is delayed another 36 months. From my understanding, this is just the tip of the iceberg, with additional challenges and problems coming down the tracks (pun not intended, but appreciated).

“As Chairwoman of the Legislative Commission on Metropolitan Governance, I am committed to holding the Metropolitan Council accountable, and finding ways to reform this organization so the taxpayers and voters have a greater say over their operations.”

We on the Senate District 49 GOP newsletter staff support the police and appreciate the work that they have stepped forward to do. However, the killing of Amir Locke by Minneapolis police during the police intrusion authorized with a “no-knock” warrant has sparked renewed discussion and broad agreement across Minnesota. We oppose the use of no-knock warrants.

If you woke up on a dark morning with armed strangers bursting into your house, screaming at you and you had your pistol in hand, what would you have done? Nobody comes awake and to full awareness in seconds, especially when confronted with that scenario in the supposed security of their own home.

Your police don’t protect you from violent crime. They can’t. Most violent criminals don’t allow you to call the cops while they rob or assault you, and even if they did, violent crimes are usually over so quickly cops could almost never get there in time to stop it. Minneapolis police have told SD49GOP newsletter reporters that they don’t record how many violent crimes they actually stop in progress because “…it almost never happens.” Minneapolis police also don’t record how many crimes are prevented by citizens using – or more often just displaying – a personally owned firearm.

Bryan Strawer, chair, Minnesota Gun Owners’ Caucus was quoted this week in the Star Tribune: “Amir Locke, a lawful gun owner, should still be alive. Black men, like all citizens, have a right to keep and bear arms. Black men, like all citizens, have a right to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable search and seizure.”

Recent letters to the SunCurrent newspaper highlight local opposition to the City Council’s proposed ESSL ordinance (Earned Safe and Sick Leave) to mandate that all businesses with more than 6 employees provide paid sick-leave for all employees – full-time, part-time, seasonal, or temporary.

A short Dec 26, 2021 letter by Bloomington business man David Clark, who ran for city council in 2021, mentioned the budgeted city staff-increases associated with this as among the unneeded “strategic initiatives” which burden local tax-payers. 

In the January 9, 2022 edition, city council member at-large Nathan Coulter, who works as a legislative assistant for DFL Senator Melissa Wicklund, provided a lengthy justification for the council’s sick-leave initiative that boils down to “we want our opinion to control exactly how business owners manage their businesses.” You may read the full letter on the SunCurrent website.

Contrary to Coulter’s assurances regarding timing “just beginning” and consideration of all views, a Task Force  was appointed by the City Council last summer to study this issue and they have virtually completed their work, as discussed at the January 3 City Council meeting. Very little public input was sought and one business/business owner on the Task Force is located in Minneapolis, not Bloomington. Three advocacy groups are also on the Task Force but none are pro-business. Pro-business advocacy groups were excluded.

This idea is not new and COVID is only the latest “hook” upon which the urgency of government intervention is hung. The DFL/Democratic Party’s desire to mandate whether and how businesses offer sick leave benefits has been demonstrated for years, with legislation proposed at national, state and city levels. A quick news search for “mandatory sick leave” will show a relentless yearly succession of proposals that have been defeated at national and state levels. The city-by-city approach has seen some success in Minnesota since 2010 – Minneapolis in 2017, St. Paul in 2016, Duluth in 2020. A 2017 interview with the departing president of St Paul’s Chamber of Commerce describes the anti-jobs statements of the policy-advocates.  In 2020, the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that Minneapolis (and by extension other cities) had the authority to impose such mandates.

Earned Sick Leave policies are already offered by 60-70% of employers.  We believe the choice to offer this or any other benefit should be left to the employer based upon their industry, ability to recruit employees and financial condition.  And YOU should be able to keep the balance of benefits that made you choose your employer, not be pigeon-holed into a structure of sick-leave benefits mandated by a government committee. Nor should you then be faced with a bigger tax bill for local government oversight of your employee benefit plan.

Letter to the Legislator

Dear Representative Elkins,
Your proposed bill to promote the rezoning of local single family residential housing into multiple unit housing zones under the guise of improving housing affordability and addressing racism appears to be ill-conceived.  Where on earth did this idea come from?  What majority of your constituents is asking for such a bill?  Aren't they who you are supposed to represent?  Or is it Ken Martin and the far left of the DFL Party?  George Soros?  Who?

Since we moved into our upper middle class Bloomington neighborhood in 1979, we have enjoyed numerous Black, Asian and Hispanic neighbors. Currently, out of 9 homes on just our block alone, lives a black family and two Asian families all of whom have lived in our neighborhood for decades.  When we first moved in, our neighbors across the street were a very nice mixed race (black/white) couple.  We all enjoy living in our pleasant single-family neighborhood.  Everybody worked hard to be able to buy a home here.  The notion that single-family zoning is racist sounds more like far-left ideology than truth.

In today's America, anybody can get educated, get a job or start a business, start moving up the ladder and, depending on their level of ambition, buy any house in any neighborhood that they want to live in.  The evidence of this is all around us.

Access to affordable housing isn't the main problem for minorities. It's a symptom of the real problems affecting minorities disproportionately.

The real problems are that too many minorities live in Democrat-controlled inner cities where the quality of public-school education is poor and the teachers unions are the Democrat's first priority.  Add in that too many minorities become dependent on government social programs that destroy personal initiative and incentivize too many dysfunctional single parent families.  Minority kids suffer greatly in this kind of an environment. This is well known by black leaders who are working to address these problems without much political support from Democrats.

It's pretty tough for a young minority person to get a good education, get a good job, afford a house and move up the economic ladder with a start in the poor circumstances noted above.  Zoning single family neighborhoods so that lower income multiple unit housing can be built will do nothing to help minorities significantly improve their circumstances.  Only after the above-noted social catastrophes are addressed will minorities make real economic progress.

Please drop your single-family rezoning bill.

Sincerely,
Tom Spitznagle
Bloomington, MN

The response from Rep. Elkins: