Republicanless (mostly) in St. Paul: RNC rolls up its tent and heads out

It’s all over, including the shouting.

The Republican National Convention, which landed in St. Paul accompanied by high expectations and lofty political ideals, wrapped up Thursday night under a blanket of 200,000 balloons (inside the Xcel Energy Center) and clouds of tear gas (outside on the streets).

We’re much more Republicanless in St. Paul than we were a week ago, and we’re also missing a few windows.

The convention left in its wake more than 800 protest-related arrests, 300 jailed protesters, dozens of broken windows in downtown St. Paul, and the dashed expectations of many Twin Cities merchants and restaurateurs, who expected much more business than they got when the GOP came to town.

“We haven’t seen a big boost in sales,” said John Netsch, assistant manager at clothing store Patagonia on St. Paul’s Grand Avenue. “We thought there could be, but it hasn’t really happened.”

Although some locations saw increased sales, Netsch’s disappointment was echoed by a number of other businesses, most of which added staff and increased hours because of the expected GOP bump and got little in return. (One notable exception was Macy’s in downtown St. Paul, which reported a brisk business in red neckties.)

One of the main reasons for the dashed retail expectations seems to be the distance between St. Paul, where the convention was held, and Minneapolis, where most of the delegates stayed: It appears that most conventioneers didn’t stray too far from either the Xcel or their hotels.

But even if retailers and restaurants are disappointed with the numbers, most visitors whose opinions were sought had only positive things to say about the Twin Cities — even “Daily Show” host Jon Stewart.

“I like being here because it’s at sea level,” Stewart told the audience before his Thursday taping of “The Daily Show” in St. Paul. “Being here, you’re in a fully oxygenated environment.”

At a press conference on Friday, St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman said: “We are confident that people will leave here with a positive impression and that they will want to come back.”

However, you probably can’t count among those newly minted Minnesota fans the approximately 800 protesters (many of them non-Minnesotans) who were arrested during the week in downtown St. Paul.

The largest protest came on Monday, when 8,000 people marched from the Capitol to the Xcel and back. When some of them veered off the protest route into downtown St. Paul, sporadic riots broke out throughout the afternoon and evening; windows were broken (including seven on the First National Bank building, which houses the offices of the St. Paul Legal Ledger Capitol Report), tear gas and Mace were administered and 284 people were arrested. Much smaller demonstrations on subsequent days netted more arrests.

in the last wave of protests, which happened Thursday as Sen. John McCain was accepting his party’s presidential nomination, police arrested some 400 people, according to John Kostouros, court information officer for Minnesota’s judicial branch.

Protesters on foot, bicycles and skateboards circled the intersection of John Ireland Boulevard and West 12th Street near the Minnesota Veterans Service building Thursday evening, chanting, “What do we want? Troops out! When do we want it? Now!”

Police in riot gear formed a phalanx that cut off the group’s access to downtown St. Paul. At 6 p.m., the protesters were pushed eastward by police and settled at 12th and Cedar streets. A group of about 30 sat down in the street; shortly after 7 p.m., they were dragged away by police.

A larger group remained behind on 12th Street near Cedar and continued the protest, facing a line of police. The group later dispersed and reformed on University Avenue.

“I was told that there was a march scheduled for the afternoon, and they had a permit until 5 p.m.,” Kostouros said. “They got started late, so at 5 the cops told them, ‘OK, you’re done, you can’t march anymore, you have to leave.’ They wouldn’t leave, so they did a mass arrest.”

Police ticketed and released all but about 20 of the Thursday protesters, who joined their compatriots from earlier in the week in the Ramsey County Jail.

Kostouros said final numbers were not available on the total number of RNC-related arrests and jail bookings during the week, but he heard that it was in excess of 800. Calls to the Ramsey County sheriff’s office to confirm the number were not returned by press time.

The Minneapolis-St. Paul 2008 Host Committee provided more upbeat numbers on Friday, most notably the fact that according to its calculations, national and international media exposure during the RNC produced more than 8 billion media impressions, which the committee said was the equivalent of a $330 million ad campaign. (Media impressions are defined as the number of people who might have seen an article, heard something on the radio or in a podcast, watched something on television or read something on a Web page or blog.)

(The Politics in Minnesota website, where Legal Ledger Capitol Report staff posted blog entries all week, also showed an uptick in traffic, with 10,600 page views and 5,300 visits between Aug. 30 and Sept. 4.)

A Google search at midday Friday for “RNC” and “St. Paul” resulted in 802,000 hits.

“As we’ve said all along, the exposure from this convention is truly priceless,” trumpeted Jeff Larson, the host committee’s CEO. “The coverage we’ve received so far is the equivalent of purchasing 122 Super Bowl ads.”

The host committee said about 16,000 rooms in almost 100 hotels were booked during the week. Hotel occupancy rates in downtown Minneapolis ranged from 90 to 95 percent, compared with 50 to 60 percent during the same period the last few years. In St. Paul, hotel occupancy rates also ranged between 90 and 95 percent, compared to 70 percent in previous years.

More than 344 buses shuttled delegates and visitors around the Twin Cities, using 26 routes. More than 847 cabs took part in a reciprocity agreement between Minneapolis and St. Paul.

Almost 2,000 conventioneers used bicycles provided by Bikes Belong — a bicycle industry trade association that advocates the use of bicycles — to get around. All together, bicyclists logged about 13,000 miles and burned 400,000 calories, equaling a carbon footprint reduction of 4.5 metric tons.

And if you want to talk food (and really, who doesn’t?), consider these statistics.

The Xcel Energy Center’s catering company served 34,000 hors d’oeuvres, more than two tons of Chateaubriand steak, almost 1.5 tons of crabmeat, more than 240,000 beverages and 12,000 shrimp during the four days of the RNC.

About 10,000 people (2,000 more than those involved in Monday’s protests) attended a media party Aug. 30 on the Mississippi riverfront in Minneapolis. Those in attendance consumed 2,300 ears of corn, 2,000 Kobe beef sliders, 1,500 “shrimp shooters” and 16,000 hors d’oeuvres.

And in addition to 3,000 Minneapolis-St. Paul press kits and 5,000 lapel pins, the host committee distributed more than 150 pounds of Frango mints, almost 100 pounds of Jelly Bellies and 110 pounds of peanuts to the media during the week.

So, Chateaubriand for the delegates, peanuts for the media and tear gas for the anarchists — what’s on tap for this week?