This is our weekly edition of our newsletter, which goes out every Friday. We share our top stories from the week and events for the upcoming weekend. We'll be taking a break on Monday for the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday, but will see you daily subscribers on Tuesday.
OUR TOP STORIES THIS WEEK
On Monday, we published auto theft and carjacking data for Southwest. There were a lot more auto thefts than carjackings. Certain neighborhoods have been hit harder. To have a productive conversation about public safety in our part of the city, we have to get our hands around what we’re actually talking about when we think about crime. Our perceptions of where crime is happening many or may not match up with the data.
Minneapolis Public Schools had a lively week. As our MPS reporter, Melissa Whitler, was live tweeting from Tuesday's school board meeting, there was growing confusion around the process of how and when MPS can move to online learning. The next day, MPS announced it was moving to online learning Jan. 14 through Jan. 27. Charlie tweeted out a bunch of information from the district about online learning on Twitter that has more details. Here's Melissa's summary of the full meeting if you want to go deeper.
A social studies teacher at Southwest High School wrote an article about what it's like to be in the schools right now. "Students are anxious as they see more of their peers missing in their classes... Many students have also expressed anxiety related to missing class to quarantine or recover from COVID."
Next week, if you plan to head out to any Minneapolis or St. Paul business that serves food or drink, grab your vaccine card. Starting Wednesday, Jan. 19 patrons need to show their vaccine card or proof of a negative COVID test that was taken within 72 hours (rapid tests don't apply, so check out the details).
Kids under 2 are exempt, but kids older than that are not. If you are 3 or 4 years old and can't get vaccinated yet, I don't know what to tell you. COVID test or no in-house pizza for you.
OUT & ABOUT THIS WEEKEND
We launched an events calendar! It's live now, so go check it out. It includes a link for you to submit events, and buttons that let you add events directly to your calendar so you feel like you have a ton of social plans even though we are in a pandemic. We've started by adding every event from the Great Northern and a few others, and we'll be adding a lot more events in the days ahead. Cool, huh?
TONIGHT: If you've joined the Dry January Club or you are already a non-drinker, be sure to purchase a ticket for the NA cocktail and bevvy pop-up held at Proxy Bar, a weekly pop-up hosted by Kieran's Kitchen, 3LECHE and ABV Technology at the Food Building in Northeast. Guests will taste innovative cocktails by 3LECHE and beverages from more than a dozen local producers to discover how far "near beer" and other nonalcoholic beverages have come. Appetizers will be provided by Food Building vendors.
SATURDAY AND SUNDAY: The Art Shanty Projects start this weekend and we are stoked. Hence why we keep telling you about them. If you take any pictures, will you send them to Melody (melody@southwestvoices.news)? She loves to feature neighborhood art in the newsletter.
