Park Board seeks more independence

Minneapolis park commissioners are making a bid for greater financial independence from City Hall, but they're facing a tight deadline to get their charter proposal on the ballot.

Some commissioners began circulating petitions last weekend for a charter referendum aimed at giving the Park Board its own taxing and budget authority. That authority would be subject to a mayoral veto, but in practice the Park Board overrides such vetoes.

The parks referendum proposal is a reaction to Park Board complaints that its finances have suffered in recent years and will get worse if another charter proposal passes this fall. That proposal would abolish the city's Board of Estimate and Taxation, which sets taxing limits and borrows money, and shift those powers to the City Council. The proposal is headed for a Nov. 3 referendum.

But the chairman of the city's Charter Commission said Monday that the Park Board is up against a tight deadline for getting its proposal on the ballot this fall. Jim Bernstein said the petition deadline is Aug. 11.

Plan supporters would need to gather the signatures of registered voters amounting to 5 percent of the turnout in last fall's election, or about 10,000 people; they hope to gather 15,000 signatures. The last charter amendment proposed by petition and approved by referendum was a 1997 prohibition on the city spending more than $10 million on pro sports facilities without voter approval.

Park Board President Tom Nordyke said that voter approval of the parks proposal would provide a popular mandate for the board to go to the Legislature to work out further details of the Park Board's powers.

Park commissioners have been chafing under what they view as increasingly stringent limits imposed by City Hall over their share of property taxes collected by the city and city borrowing allotted to park facilities. But city officials say those limits reflect an overall tightening of finances at City Hall caused by cuts in state aid.

In Minneapolis, the Board of Estimate and Taxation sets the maximum tax increase each year, while its members then decide their share of that fiscal pie. The Park Board has one seat on the board; the mayor, two members directly elected by voters, and two City Council members make up the balance. The Park Board proposal is aimed at giving the board its own pie levied by property taxation.

One of the factors spurring the Park Board proposal was the Charter Commission's decision last week not to place on the fall ballot a charter proposal to give the Park Board a second seat on the Board of Estimate, now that the defunct Library Board is not represented. Another factor was the commission's rejection of a proposal by Park Board member Scott Vreeland to provide proportionate shares of tax increases and borrowing to parks.

He said that the Park Board has lined up former mayors Don Fraser and Sharon Sayles Belton, former Council Member Pat Scott, former Park Commissioner Scott Neiman and former County Commissioner Mark Andrew as the sponsoring voters required by law for charter petitions.

The Park Board organized enough popular support this spring to persuade the Charter Commission to vote against putting a proposal on the fall ballot to abolish the board and make parks a city department. Now it's banking it can translate that support into a successful campaign.

The board will try to portray its proposal as providing money to preserve a nationally recognized park system. Opponents argue that diffusing responsibility for city taxation is a step away from more accountability over city finances.