St. Paul

So, Thursday evening about 9:15, as John McCain was starting his acceptance speech, my brother-in-law, Randy, and I headed into the LoTo bar in St. Paul’s Lowertown neighborhood just off downtown, about eight blocks from the Xcel. And a bunch of crazy-seeming women were screaming and cheering and jumping up and down on their seats on one side of the oblong bar.

I couldn’t figure out what the six or so women were making all the fuss about – were these McCain fans? The way they were dressed – in a general style I’d call “crunchy,” with a lot of pink, so perhaps “crunchy pink” – they didn’t look like McCain fans. And, man, were they loud

Actually, I was a little annoyed – I just wanted to have a couple of beers with Randy and maybe catch a bit of what McCain had to say. Unfortunately, the only available table was a table away from the obstreperous women. Though Randy and I were right next to a nice big-screen tube, we couldn’t hear a damn thing McCain was saying.

These women were loud and excited and in almost constant motion. As different members of the group kept running in and out of LoTo, new members kept showing up, eventually even a couple of guys – a young black guy with dreadlocks and an older white guy wearing a baseball jacket with “Kenya” written across the back.

Many St. Paul businesses along West 7th Street are disappointed by the drop-off in business they’ve experienced during the Republican National Convention.

And the letdown in sales during the week of the RNC hasn’t been for lack of trying.

The Glockenspiel restaurant, 605 W. 7th St., is adorned with a banner on its facade that says “WELCOME CONVENTIONEERS.”

Another sign advertises breakfast at 8 a.m. for the week of the RNC. Glockenspiel manager Rusty Hill says the breakfast was a one-time feature for the restaurant that was intended to draw RNC visitors. He staffed the breakfast with a bartender and server in addition to other staff.

Macy’s reports increased traffic at its downtown St. Paul and downtown Minneapolis stores during the RNC. Jennifer McNamara, local spokeswoman for Cincinnati-based Macy’s, Inc., declined to cite specific sales figures, but confirmed the uptick.

On Monday, Macy’s made headlines when protesters broke three display windows at the retailer’s downtown St. Paul store. McNamara said that Macy’s promptly replaced the windows on Tuesday morning.

McNamara noted that like any good retailer, Macy’s added some merchandise of particular appeal to shoppers in town for the RNC.

“We did add some specific items like red ties, making sure that we had an assortment of red ties,” McNamara said. She was quick to add that the neckwear would endure beyond the current political season. “It’s also a great traditional item to have year-round."

 

On Thursday morning, as the RNC geared up for its final day, storm clouds were gathering over downtown St. Paul -– both literally and figuratively.

With police preparing for another wave of protests and possible riots in the downtown area – protesters’ last gasp – the management of the First National Bank building, 332 Minnesota St., in which the Saint Paul Legal Ledger Capitol Report has its office, is warning tenants to be careful in advance of a “large demonstration/protest march” planned for 4 p.m. this afternoon.

In an e-mail sent to all tenants, Tanya Hemphill, general manager of the building for management firm Cushman & Wakefield, writes, “We have been informed that today’s protest has a possibility to escalate into ‘riot’ conditions.”

The building is taking this step, Hemphill explains, because of the potential for trouble: “Activities may not occur around the vicinity of the First National Bank Building, but activities were not projected to be in our location on Monday when the building sustained damage during the protests.”

Macy’s was open for business in downtown St. Paul on Monday. But protesters apparently took no interest in the annual Labor Day sale.

At about 2 p.m. Monday, protesters broke three Macy’s display windows at the normally calm corner of Wabasha Street and East 6th Street.

Pete Crum of the St. Paul Police Department said protesters used hammers, rocks and “improvised items” such as poles and concrete to break windows Monday. In response, building owners ramped up already heightened security for their properties.

Around 2 p.m. Monday, writer Betsy Sundquist reported from 5th and Jackson, on the edge of Mears Park about eight blocks east of the Xcel Center, that protesters are breaking windows with rocks and bricks and throwing tear gas.

A police officer who would not give his name said, "People are getting hurt, and it's just the beginning."

As he spoke, ambulances flew past on 5th Street.

Sundquist said that protesters tossing bricks had shattered a big picture window along the front of Galtier Plaza, 380 Jackson St. A woman helping clean up the debris asked, "What does this have to do with ending the war?" 

Terri Dresen, a spokeswoman for United Hospital at 333 Smith Ave. N., reported about 3 p.m. that the hospital's emergency room had seen no RNC-related injuries yet. "It's really quiet over here," she said. 

No, Tim Pawlenty did not get the vice presidential nod from the McCain campaign.

But there’s still a Minnesota connection in McCain’s selection of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to be his VP.

Palin’s new director of communications and press secretary, Bill McAllister, spent a chunk of his career in Minnesota, including a stint at our own Saint Paul Legal Ledger. McAllister returns to St. Paul next week during the RNC.

“I haven’t been [there] in five years. It’s kind of a weird way to come back,” McAllister said on Friday afternoon. “The governor was already scheduled to speak to the convention.”

McAllister, 52, was born in New York, but his family moved to Minnesota when he was 15 years old. McAllister graduated from Washburn High School in south Minneapolis in 1974 and earned a degree in mass communications from Hamline University in St. Paul.

McAllister worked at the St. Cloud Times from 1980 to 1991, where he spent seven years covering the state Legislature. McAllister served as managing editor of the Saint Paul Legal Ledger from 1997 to 1999.

Prior to joining Palin’s staff, McAllister had been Capitol bureau chief for NBC affiliate KTUU-TV in Anchorage, Alaska.

A campaign blog on the Washington Post has already reported that McAllister got the news of Palin’s selection from his former fourth estate colleagues very, very early Friday morning.

SuperRondo Superhighway? MnDOT, NASCO, and plans for the I-35 NAFTA Superhighway

• UPDATE December 14, 2007: More documents from MnDOT were released in November, shedding further light on how NASCO is set up, its federal contract, and the effect of Minnesota's Lockheed office on earmarks. See PIM Exclusive: SuperRondo II: New NASCO NAFTA Superhighway Docs Released From MnDOT.
• The new batch of documents combines the MnDOT documents first described here in July, and the new releases. Download the 60 MB ZIP PDF pack here.

St. Paul's Rondo Days festival is right around the corner on July 21st. Rondo, of course, was the primarily black neighborhood obliterated when I-94 was built and blasted through, a route selected because of the neighborhood's lack of political clout. Deploying the "Stops-4-Us" message, the University Avenue Community Coalition plans to raise awareness about the potential damage to their neighborhoods because of the proposed Central Corridor light rail project, which they fear will remove parking, disrupt commerce and fail to offer enough stops for their community. The federal government wants fewer stops on the Corridor to reduce trip time, or else federal funds will be jeopardized. As one UACC organizer said to PIM, this federal policy has effectively removed transit stops from other urban communities around the nation.

On a much larger scale, proposals are now being drawn up for large transportation networks across America piggybacking on the interstate highway system. PIM has obtained documents from the Minnesota Department of Transportation about proposals to create major international transportation corridors along I-35 and I-94. The documents were obtained from MnDOT via the Minnesota Data Practices Act by local lawyer Nathan Hansen and posted on his blog and law firm's website. We have packaged the PDFs into a 66 MB ZIP archive available here through PIM's website.

The major group coordinating this effort is North America's Supercorridor Coalition, or NASCO. The MnDOT files include many strategic public relations emails among NASCO, lobbyists, government employees across the country, in Canada and Mexico, as well as grant applications specifying the exact nature of NASCO projects. Many emails among MnDOT personnel are also included. These documents formed the basis for a report by Jerome Corsi at WorldNetDaily, which also discussed MnDOT's views of U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman's (R) position on the matter. (Officially, he doesn't have one). The documents confirm that MnDOT agreed to join NASCO for a specially discounted price of $15,000, money that perhaps could have been better spent patching I-35W's potholes.