The ex-president of Minneapolis’ Regional Chamber of Commerce indicted this week for allegedly embezzling more than $200,000 from the organization has also resigned from his seat on the Mounds View school board.
The School Board for Mounds View Public Schools announced Jonathan Weinhagen’s resignation Friday, adding that his departure is “effective immediately.”
Weinhagen’s resignation comes a day after the 42-year-old appeared in federal court on charges that he embezzled more than $200,000 from the Minneapolis Regional Chamber of Commerce while working as its CEO. He left the chamber in financial straits and rattled trust within the community: Charges unveiled that Weinhagen took back $30,000 that the chamber donated to Crime Stoppers to help arrest suspects in the shootings that killed two children and critically injured one in 2021, for his personal expenses.
The board will discuss plans to fill Weinhagen’s seat for the remainder of his term, which ends on January 3, 2028.
Weinhagen worked for the St. Paul Area Chamber of Commerce before leading the Minneapolis chamber for nearly a decade, but he left in 2024 on the heels of an internal investigation into the organization’s finances. That investigation revealed a $500,000 budget shortfall which led officials to lay off five staff members and scramble for funds.
Federal charges this week unveiled more details, showing that Weinhagen’s chamber was missing $290,000 and that the he made up a consulting company called Synergy Partners. Prosecutors allege that Weinhagen entered into contracts with that fake company under the alias “James Sullivan” to fool people, and used the chamber’s credit card for a first-class family vacation to Hawaii that he documented as chamber business. And when chamber members noticed a line of credit which attempted to hide Weinhagen’s embezzlement, prosecutors say he faked “James Sullivan’s” death with sham obituary.
Weinhagen was released Thursday from the U.S. District Court in St. Paul on a $25,000 unsecured bond, but his next court appearance has not been scheduled. Court records show that he plans to hire Joseph Dixon as his attorney. Dixon did not return a message left by the Minnesota Star Tribune.
Weinhagen was involved in an effort to gift Mayor Jacob Frey’s office consulting services by temporarily loaning a chamber staffer to his office in 2022, but the City Council thwarted the plan.
