Ralph Remington: igniting the progressive movement

(Originally published in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder, June 29, 2005)

November 3, 2004 was a long, hard day for Ralph Remington.

I was really, really disappointed and depressed, like a lot of people, he says, nursing a cold drink at Gigi's Cafe in Uptown. And I thought, Why are we stuck with what we have? Why do we get John Kerry why are we always on the losing end of the stick in the progressive movement?'

Without missing a beat, he delivers his conclusion. And it's because people who are truly thinkers, truly progressive, people who are truly on the margins and think about things, that are involved actively in their communities in progressive ways, don't choose to run. Because politics is yucky and it's nasty, and you feel like you might compromise a part of your soul by doing it. But if people like me don't run, then we're just stuck with what's left. And I got tired of getting stuck with what's left.

It's just that lemons into lemonade orientation that has catapulted Remington into the lead in the Ward 10 Minneapolis City Council race. Winning the endorsements of the Sierra Club, UNITE HERE unions, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), and the Minneapolis Central Labor Union Council (CLUC), as well 45 percent of the vote at the Ward 10 DFL endorsement convention, Remington is on the verge of making history as the ward's first African American council member.

I spent most of my life in artistic circles and using performing arts as a way to make social change indirect social change, says Remington. I figured that this second half of my life is going to be devoted to direct social change. Because I'm 42 now, so it's time.

Remington grew up in Philadelphia, developing his artistic talents at the High School for Creative and Performing Arts, where he was school president for two years. After graduation, he attended Howard, and studied acting and directing. A three-year stint in the Army brought him to Frankfurt Germany, where he fell in love with the language and culture (and especially Europeans' appreciation of African American culture).

He came to Minneapolis in 1991, site unseen, on the advice of a friend who worked at Mixed Blood Theatre. [My friend] had moved from L.A., and he said life was really great out here, says Remington, who worked as artistic director and producer at Pillsbury House Theatre from 1992 to 1999. I founded the theater; I made it an equity, fully professional theater; I created all their educational programs (like BREAKING ICE).

Although he later left the Twin Cities to pursue work and opportunities in Santa Monica, New York and Washington, D.C., Remington eventually returned last year, and has been campaigning full-time since January.

I have great relationships with the current council. I attend every council cycle, he says. I study it like a job, because I don't want that first day after I'm elected to be the first time I'm in city hall.

Remington says he does not practice race-based politics, but instead looks at issues as a whole. Within those issues, race is certainly a factor. There's racism, there's sexism, there's ageism, issues of shutting out disabled populations or not including them.

And I think where we all move forward those of us who are progressives is to join together. Not to figure out who's the greatest victim, but to say, OK, we all have our issues, and we all want a progressive quality of life here in America, or in our cities, or our state, or whatever. How do we combine those issues, form a coalition, and move forward?'

Issues that Remington identifies as progressive include transparency of government, smart development, affordable housing, and safe streets and neighborhoods.

In the 10th Ward, we have a number of pressing issues right now. The ward boundaries are Uptown, Lyn-Lake, East Harriett, East Calhoun, East Isles, Lyndale neighborhoods, and the Wedge area. Obviously, a very diverse ward. So, you have East Isles on one end, and then you have the Lyndale Ave. down by Stevens and the freeway on the other end. Those sets of folks have two different world views.

On one end, if they're more affluent, they have needs that are pressing to them, like property taxes and also development issues, destroying the character of the neighborhoods, and many other things.

On the other end, you have people who are dealing still with Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs where do I eat? Where do I sleep? How does my baby get fed? All of those things are equally important to the people that live there... (Because what's important to you is what's important to you, because you live there.) One area has kind of survival needs, and the other area has quality of life needs. And it all feeds into quality of life needs.

So that's where someone like me can build bridges to those communities. Potentially, one area is primarily White, and in another area, you have the largest concentration of people of color in Ward 10. So, I can make those bridges between the two communities; I'm uniquely suited to do that.

In the area of smart development, Remington is especially critical of projects like Stuart Ackerberg's 13-story, 148-high foot condo, retail and office development, which is proposed for the Lagoon Theater site. (The project was approved by the City Planning Commission, but the City Council's Zoning and Planning Committee overturned the decision 4-1 last week.)

Right now, there's real estate development happening at a rate that's incredible. But the problem is that there's not a comprehensive plan. So the developers are tending to dictate the issues.

So what we need to do, and once we get progressives in there, we can try to work towards some inclusion and re-zoning, where if people are going to build one property at Lagoon, they can build two in an area that really needs economic development, like on East Lake or something.

Or that if they're going to build a property that's 13 stories and they want to bust height caps, or if they want to go to six stories when it's a four, they can have 15 percent of those units for affordable housing. And by affordable,' I don't mean that we just call it affordable,' and that's what it's called because it's a popular term. I mean people that earn 50 to 65 percent of the area medium income can afford to live there.

As far as safe streets and neighborhoods go, Remington says that this is a top priority, although he adds, One thing I don't necessarily know is that if you throw more police at a problem, it gets better. You need police that are effective in doing their jobs, and we need to find a way to do that. And that may be one of the ways to do that.

But if we want more police, if we want anything like a mass transit system that actually works, we need to figure out a way to pay for it. I propose that we have a commuter fee on people that live in the suburbs and come to work in the city. They use the resources of the city, but yet they don't pay into the City. I believe that if you have a commuter wage fee, where people that live in the suburbs, work in the city, that a certain part of their wages let's say it's $10 or $5 tax goes into the City, so that goes in to pay for some of the infrastructure that these folks benefit from, as well as everybody else.

What's probably a little less controversial than that, but in addition, would be a parking fee on all City-owned parking ramps. So let's say 25 cents of every hour goes to the City, so that the City can then afford mass transit, and put money into education, in safe streets, safe neighborhoods, and more police if necessary.

What gets Remington really excited, though, is the possibility of having three Black council members serving at the same time (potentially, Jeff Hayden or Zachary Metoyer in the Eighth, Natalie Johnson Lee or Don Samuels in the Fifth, and Remington in the 10th).

If that happens, you have a historic critical mass of folks so that, not just the Black community, but all communities of color, have a voice. We would be able to educate, illuminate, and then implement ideas that right now are given short-shrift. Areas of housing, education, poverty, joblessness all the issues that affect people of color. Obviously, we're not just representing people of color, but all those issues I spoke about as well, which affect people across the board.

So I think that that would be really an amazing thing. Jeff and I, if that happens, come from the South Side. If Natalie gets elected, she's from the North Side, then all of the sudden you have for the first time, true cross-community communication. So North Side and South Side can now talk, and link together, and find commonalities. So that we now truly become one city, as opposed to the South Side, Minneapolis, and North Side.

For more information on Ralph Remington or his campaign, call 612-821-3819, visit www.ralphremington.com, or write rembuz@aol.com.

Shannon Gibney welcomes reader responses to sgibney@spokesman-recorder.com.