Green Party Candidate for Minneapolis Park And Recreation Board Commissioner, District 3
A long-time parks enthusiast with an environmental background, Charles Exner will bring a much-needed voice for renters and working people to the Parks Board.
Charles' plan for Minneapolis parks includes park plantings that focus on native wildlife, equitable hiring practices, class offerings, living wages for parks employees, developing parks for the use of individuals who need them most and more!
His plan to help average Minneapolitans and prepare Minneapolis for a post-oil world include:
1) Parks are needed most by people who do not have property of their own. All development should be focused on use, not on raising property values of homeowners seeking to sell or attracting corporate developers.
2) All employees of the Parks System, from maintenance workers, community ed. instructors, and park attendants, deserve pensioned, year-round union jobs that pay living wages.
3) We need to change the way funds received are earmarked from capital investments to operating costs and salaries to turn the parks department into a job-creating machine where durability is favored over new and shiny additions.
4) Instead of holding large, unused tracts of lands outside city limits, the Park Board should buy the vacant lots in District 3 and citywide and turn them into microparks. Too many people live near crowded parks or parks that difficult to access.
5) Equitable hiring practices, class offerings, and signage will be provided so all of our city's residents and transients feel welcome.
6) Park plantings should be focused on native wildlife for our nonhuman neighbors. Replace wind-pollinated plants with Milkweed and other pollinator-friendly plants to make Minneapolis a safehaven for migratory butterflies, bees, birds, and bats.
7) He will listen to his constituents, and put all park board meetings minutes online via TheUptake. Additionally, Park Board meetings should not be Wednesday at 6, which is unattainable for many hourly works just getting home from work, and should instead be on the Weekend.
