Join us for a neighborhood meeting on racial covenants in Waite Park

The Waite Park Community Council will host a special neighborhood meeting on Thursday, June 30, to address a shameful chapter in the city and neighborhood's history in which Black residents were prohibited from buying or renting homes in the community.

Racial covenants were documents recorded against a home's legal title which banned property owners from selling, renting, or allowing their home to be used by people of certain races. The discriminatory language was not always the same, but most covenants targeted Black people.

Racial covenants were recorded on homes in Minneapolis by developers and homeowners starting in the 1910s. The use of racial covenants forced Black community members to live in racially segregated areas where they could not get mortgages, buy property, or build wealth.

Racial covenants were outlawed by 1968 and are no longer enforceable. Yet, Black people and other people of color in Minneapolis still experience the harm caused by these covenants. In 2010, Minneapolis’ population included 69% white residents and 19% Black residents. However, in the neighborhoods where racial covenants had been common, the population was still 73-90% white.

From 2016 to 2020, the Mapping Prejudice team at the University of Minnesota used technology and volunteers to review thousands of documents looking for racial covenants. They found over 8,000 racial covenants recorded against properties in the City of Minneapolis alone, including more than 200 in the Waite Park neighborhood.

The City of Minneapolis is offering Minneapolis homeowners the chance to learn about and discharge the racial covenants recorded on their properties. It also allows homeowners to reclaim their homes as equitable spaces.

Join us for an informational meeting on the city's Just Deeds project to learn how homeowners can eliminate this hurtful language and reclaim their homes as equitable spaces. Assistant City Attorney Amy Schutt will give a presentation on history of racial covenants and other discriminatory housing practices in Minneapolis, and also take questions from residents.

The meeting will take place at 7pm on Thursday, June 30, on Zoom. Register or sign-in to the meeting at https://tinyurl.com/WPCCjustdeeds

Watch: The TPT documentary ‘Jim Crow of the North’ tells the story of racist, restrictive real estate covenants in the Twin Cities.

Anti-racism conversation series concludes with focus on next steps for neighborhood

Waite Park community members gathered Sunday, October 3, to finish a six-month conversation series on anti-racism and discuss next steps on how the community can continue to challenge systemic white supremacy. 

The gathering was an opportunity for participants to reflect on themes of the twice monthly meetings, which included topics such as raising anti-racist children, creating welcoming and inclusive neighborhoods, and challenging implicit bias. 

The series was facilitated by artists and Waite Park neighbors, Shá Cage and E.G. Bailey of Freestyle Films and Trú Rúts. As experienced community organizers, healers, and conversation facilitators, they created space and invited guest facilitators to challenge the group to lean into the discomfort that talking about race creates to think creatively about ways to unlearn internalized racism. 

The conversation series was funded by the Waite Park Community Council after community members suggested the idea to the board and more than 30 neighbors signed up to participate in the new initiative. 

At the final, and only in-person gathering of the six month series, members of the group discussed ways to continue the momentum on working toward becoming a more anti-racist neighborhood. Stay tuned to the newsletters for opportunities to engage in conversation with neighbors.

—Hayley Nemmers

Raising Anti-Racists: An Interactive Conversation with Ruth Chan

Join us June 7 for a special event of the Waite Park Anti-Racism conversation series featuring acclaimed artist and illustrator Ruth Chan.

Ruth will discuss the creation of her new children's book Thank You, Neighbor (as well as the real life neighbors that inspired the book!)

She will read the book and lead a discussion about the ways that books can help parents and families cultivate the values of inclusion and promote anti-racism.

This event is free, but registration is required and limited on a first come, first serve basis at tinyurl.com/wpars

Waite Park Anti-Racism Series: What Can I Do?

Please join us THIS THURSDAY for a community conversation on anti-racism

In honor of Ahmaud Aubery, Breonna Taylor, Nina Pop, George Floyd and countless others whose lives were taken unjustly, the Waite Park Community Council is grateful to partner with Tru Ruts on a series of neighborhood conversations focused on anti-racism and transformative change. 

The discussions will be held over Zoom every 2nd and 4th Thursday from April through September. They will be led by artist activists and Waite Park residents E.G.Bailey and Shá Cage, who will work with neighborhood liaison Michelle Filkins and facilitators trained in diversity, equity, inclusion and anti-racism work.

Sessions will integrate conversation/discussion, often using books, essays and films as points of departure. Each session will be grounded in basic principles of respect and discipline allowing for the cultivation of honesty, debate, research, action and relationship building.

REGISTER HERE on a first come first serve basis as space is available. Waite Park residents and community members will be given priority, but other participants will be allowed if space permits.

Confirmations will be sent out by March 31st.

Tru Ruts and the Waite Park Community Council hopes this forum can grow to become a city-wide model for other neighborhoods.

E.G. Bailey, recently named one of Filmmaker magazine's 25 New Faces of Independent Film, and a McKnight Media Artist Fellow, is an Emmy and Ivey award-winning artist, filmmaker, director and producer. He has won several awards nationally and internationally and has contributed over 20 years to community organizing efforts in the Twin Cities using art to influence change.

Shá Cage is a consultant, a film and theater producer, director, writer and actress. She has been named a Changemaker by Women’s Press, Artist of the Year by City Pages and Star Tribune, a leading artist of her generation by Insight and a Mover and Maker by Mpls STP magazine with her co-conspirator E.G. Bailey. Her work and activism has garnered distinguished awards and has taken her across the U.S, to Japan, South Africa, England, France, the Netherlands, Mali, Croatia and more.

Just Deeds Project helps homeowners remove racial covenants

The City of Minneapolis has launched a new initiative providing Minneapolis homeowners with the opportunity to learn about, acknowledge and discharge racial covenants recorded against their properties. The City’s Just Deeds Project, led by the City Attorney’s Office, will allow people to reclaim their homes as equitable spaces.

Racial covenants were binding documents recorded against a property’s title, which prohibited all future owners of the property from selling it, renting it, or allowing it to be used by people of certain races or ethnicities. Racial covenants were recorded on residential properties in Minneapolis by developers and homeowners beginning in the 1910s to prevent the sale and use of these properties to non-white Minneapolitans. 

Mapping Prejudice, a research project based in the Borchert Map Library at the University of Minnesota, has compiled a map of over 8,000 properties in Minneapolis with racial covenants, including more than 200 homes in the Waite Park neighborhood.

Through the City’s Just Deeds Project, Minneapolis homeowners can acknowledge and disclaim the racial covenants recorded against their properties by recording a discharge form against their property title. The City Attorney’s Office staff will assist homeowners in completing this process free of charge. Hennepin County has also waived its typical fees associated with this process. Participation in the City’s program will be first-come, first-serve, subject to staffing availability. Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis.

Learn more about the Just Deeds Project by visiting the City’s website or by emailing JustDeedsProject@minneapolismn.gov. —via the City of Minneapolis