Today's special session on potential encampment litigation

September 8th, 2025

Dear Community, 

I am reaching out today to share updates related to an encampment located on East Lake Street in Ward 9, just south of Ward 2. The Mayor originally called for a special session related to this encampment for Wednesday, August 27th, but it was cancelled due to the devastating violence that occurred at Annunciation Church. This past Friday, the Mayor called a special session for today, Monday, September 8th, at 9:30am, regarding “Potential litigation matter concerning the property located at 2716 Lake St E. / 2932 28th Ave S,” the location of the encampment. 

I know that encampments and homelessness are high priorities for many Minneapolis residents, and that the encampment on East Lake Street has impacted Ward 2. I do not believe encampments are a humane or dignified solution to homelessness. I and the majority of City Council support Housing First, an effective approach to homelessness that starts with providing no-barrier housing to unsheltered people. 

In response to the City’s failed strategy of evicting encampments without reducing homelessness, my office spent over a year working with Hennepin County and the Minneapolis Public Housing Authority (MPHA) to learn about their nationally-recognized success with Housing First. Hennepin County and MPHA used Emergency Housing Vouchers (EHV) funded by federal covid relief dollars in 2020 to successfully house chronically unsheltered people. This data-backed program aligned with the Council's goal of zeroing out encampments through humanely and effectively housing people. This approach is dramatically different from the Mayor’s policy of shifting encampments from neighborhood to neighborhood.  

Council approved the proposal by Council Member Osman and I to fund a partnership with MPHA and Hennepin County to provide housing and wraparound social services to 50 families and 50 individuals starting in 2025. 

Earlier this month, MPHA shared with my office that despite the City Council allocating these dollars in December, the Frey administration spent months putting up barriers that resulted in unnecessary delays and jeopardizing implementation of the funding. Just a few weeks later, the Mayor announced he was proposing cutting the Emergency Housing Vouchers from the 2026 budget. Mayor Frey did not provide any reasoning for cutting the Emergency Housing Vouchers, or provide a substitute plan to address unsheltered homelessness. Our governmental partners in Housing First have not been informed of what this means for the anticipated 100 Emergency Housing Vouchers they have been working on since early 2025. Mayor Frey and his administration continue to demonstrate that they do not want the city to have a Housing First policy in response to encampments in spite of clear evidence having shown that the administration’s eviction policy has been proven to be costly and ineffective in reducing homelessness. 

Instead of implementing the funding Council allocated to house unsheltered people, the Mayor has now called Council into a special session to take some kind of legal action regarding a private individual who is hosting an encampment on private property. It is unclear what the Mayor is asking the City Council to do, but it is clear that the encampment on East Lake Street is a result of the Mayor’s failed encampment strategy. 

The property owner sent the Mayor and Council a letter about Mayor Frey’s proposed litigation pushing back on the City’s threat of litigation. The property owner writes:

This is hypocrisy of the highest order. Instead of offering humane, effective solutions, the administration chose evictions and erasure—and now wants to punish me for refusing to do the same. For years, Mayor Frey has demonstrated no real plan beyond shuffling human beings like pawns on a political chessboard. He clears an encampment one week, only to watch people reappear blocks away the next. Then he repeats the cycle—bulldozers, fencing, police sweeps—leaving behind traumatized residents, destabilized neighborhoods, and wasted taxpayer dollars. This “musical chairs” approach is not policy; it is failure dressed up as action. 

I also have questions about why Council has any role in this lawsuit. Many of my colleagues also have serious questions regarding the intention of this special session, which prompted us to send a letter to Mayor Frey a week ago requesting he address key shared concerns and questions during the special session. 

Complementing the concerns raised in the letter, here are some questions I intend to raise during today’s special session:

• Why was Council not able to be included in the legal strategy to support police accountability, but is now being included in litigation related to encampments? How, when, and who decides when City Council is included in legal strategies prior to action taken?
  • Since January, I and several of my colleagues have tried to amend the City’s settlement agreement over MPD misconduct to include the provisions from the federal consent decree that were dismissed by the Trump administration. In response to that request, the City Attorney wrote a memo asserting that the City Attorney could act on behalf of the City by direction of the Mayor without involvement of the City Council, as well as act independently without the advice of the Mayor or the City Council. Given this context, it’s not clear what role the Council has in this potential legal matter, or why the Mayor and the City Attorney are requesting Council approval. 
• If the Mayor and City Attorney are now willing to sue an individual citing public health reasons, how can the City Council take action to sue other businesses and landlords whose properties have caused significant public health and safety harms to residents?
  • Evicting this encampment without a Housing First plan in place will disperse the unsheltered people into the rest of the city. What is the Mayor’s plan for surrounding neighborhoods who will likely see an uptick in encampments? Many small encampments in Ward 2 have been formed in direct response to large evictions that took place in nearby wards. 
• Earlier this year, the Mayor’s administration recently reported that there were 27 unsheltered people in Minneapolis. How do these numbers relate to the encampment on East Lake Street?
• There is a $13 million fiscal cliff that will result in the loss of nearly 500 existing shelter beds that serve Minneapolis. Since the Mayor is proposing defunding Emergency Housing Vouchers, what is his Mayor’s long-term plan to address the increase in encampments in partnership with Hennepin County, MPHA, and other partners? 

I hope to receive answers to these questions from the Mayor’s administration today, and I will keep you updated.