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Minneapolis City Council
Jeremiah Ellison: ‘Workers have allies and advocates on the City Council’
From the Minneapolis Labor Review
October 21, 2023
By Steve Share, Minneapolis Labor Review editor
MINNEAPOLIS — “I want workers to know they’ve got allies and advocates on the City Council,” Jeremiah Ellison says. “A growing and increasing labor movement makes our job that much easier.”
With the endorsement of the Minneapolis Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, Jeremiah Ellison is running for a third term for the Ward 5 Minneapolis City Council seat.
Ellison’s other labor endorsements include the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers and the SEIU Minnesota State Council.
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In addition to endorsement by the MRLF, Ellison’s other labor endorsements include the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers and the SEIU Minnesota State Council |
Ward 5 in north Minneapolis is bordered largely by Lowry Ave. on the north, Basset Creek and Interstate 394 on the south, Xerxes Ave. N. on the west, and the Mississippi River and downtown on the east.
“Representing north Minneapolis, it is a working-class neighborhood,” Ellison says. “It is a neighborhood that has a steep depth of need.”
“Housing dignity and stability has been my biggest focus,” Ellison reports. He’s worked on a renter protection ordinance and also worked to hold landlords responsible without displacing tenants.
In partnership with the building trades unions and CTUL, Ellison worked to pass the city’s wage theft ordinance and backed strong enforcement measures.
Going forward, “it’s really important that we get the Labor Standards Board up and off the ground, “ Ellison says. While the proposal has had lots of discussion, he says, “we have to be committed to making it real next term.”
Ellison supports a green jobs facility developed in partnership with unions.
“I also think it’s important for us to revisit rent stabilization,” Ellison says. “I think there’s a reasonable policy [that can work] and not be a doomsday scenario.”
Ellison wants to see the city promote measures such as rent-to-own to eliminate the home-ownership gap between whites and everyone else.
He’s also concerned that private investors are buying up single-family homes and renting them. “I think it’s the wrong direction,” he says, and suggests one idea to counter this trend could be to limit the number of rental licenses someone can have.
Ellison maintains that the perception of division on the City Council is over-hyped. “It’s easy to write about conflict; It’s less exciting to write about ways council members work together… There are disagreements but we’re all trying to learn from each other… Disagreements are okay; They’re healthy… We’re not going to be aligned 100 percent of the time but when it comes to working together, that’s what mostly exists.”
Website:
jeremiahforward5.com
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