Rybak denounces park board petition effort for referendum on tax authority

Photo: MnIndy

Accusing the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board of trying to “put half-baked ideas on the ballot,” Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak urged voters this afternoon to reject a referendum effort seeking independent taxing authority for the park board. “People need to stop playing petty politics and spreading false fears about non-existent threats,” Rybak said in a statement.

The proposed referendum would grant the city’s quasi-independent (and chronically broke) park board the ability to impose its own levies, without oversight of the city council.

The City Clerk’s office told the Minnesota Independent that Tuesday is the last day for turning in referendum petitions. Staff there are date-stamping petition sheets as they arrive; already the park-referendum petitions are stacked high. The next step is to verify that each signature belongs to a registered Minneapolis voter. State statute gives the clerk’s office 10 days to determine whether a petition has the minimum number of valid signatures: at least 5 percent of the votes cast in the city in the last general election.

Earlier in the summer, a separate referendum effort that would have eliminated the semi-autonomous park board to clear the city’s charter commission or city council. At that time, the referendum’s co-sponsor, Council Member Paul Ostrow, told the Minnesota Independent it was too late to mount the daunting task of gathering enough signatures to force the referendum onto the ballot via petition, particularly when the minimum number of signatures would be based on a high-turnout election like the one in 2008.