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IN THIS ISSUE Healthline • Pg 2 Federation Update • Pg 2 News & Events • Pg 3 Arts & Culture • Pg 4 In the Community • Pg 5 FUTURE OF FORT SNELLING Garden • Pg 6 Page 5 Bulletin Board • Pg 7 SERVING WEST END NEIGHBORHOODS, DOWNTOWN ST. PAUL TO FORT SNELLING, SINCE 1970 PHILIP PROWSE VOL. !" NO. #$ DECEMBER !"!" CIRCULATION #$,""" BUILDING A NON-RACIST COMMUNITY Facing Pandemic Racism, Runny Noses and the Myth of Local Businesses Carve Paths Forward Freedom for All by Tim Johnson Retired Pastor, Cherokee Park United Church [Editor’s Note: This is the tenth article in Tim Johnson’s series on racism. Comments and insights are welcome: send to editor@ communityreporter.org.] Although my own memory of the incident is vague, it was told often enough by adults I trusted that I believed it. The small-town church attended by my family was hosting its annual Christmas pageant in which children acted out the story of Jesus’ birth. Joseph, Mary and the baby Jesus, the wisemen, angels and the shepherds along with various animals were all assembled in the front of the church. Some had speaking parts, others of us, like the sheep, stood in quiet adoration. I was 6. My brother was 4. We were sheep. At some point in the solemn telling of the story, I noticed an unsightly strand running from my brother’s nose. Without fanfare, deviating from the script we had been given, I walked across the stage and, with a Kleenex, The biergarten at Waldmann Brewery & Wurstery sits empty after Gov. Walz’s Nov. 18 order to suspend in-person dining, its radiation heat system turned off. gently wiped the snot from my brother’s face. The runny nose story, as it came to be known, was retold in part for its cuteness factor, always BY DAVID LAMB facilities to new processes and business Hill (612 Selby Ave.) neighborhoods, n a year that has become known for models. Waldmann Brewery & Wurstery converted from in-person dining to a a draw for children’s Christmas pageants. But feeling to many like history’s worst I suspect the poignancy of the moment and (445 Smith Ave. N.), which relies heavily service window over the summer, allowing ever, things have been especially on the popularity of its sprawling biergarten customers to get their breakfast and lunch others like it is tough for small-businesses owners that they bring surrounded by several of St. Paul’s oldest without stepping foot inside. “We created a We are as well as their employees. The buildings, installed an elaborate system whole new website for ordering online,” said the messiness, restaurant business, where many imperfections and that will warm its entire patio with 500,00 Mary Hogan-Bard, who owns the business. imperfect, heavily rely on the tips of in-person dining BTUs of natural gas radiant heat. “The Heat lamps that Bard purchased for each of incompleteness I and higher margins of serving alcoholic effect is subtle and pleasant, since infrared the shops will keep customers warm while of humanity beverages, has been particularly threatened, incomplete squarely into this heat takes time to soak into you,” Tom they place orders outside. with the unprecedented wave of Schroeder, the restaurant’s owner, said, One St. Paul mainstay since 1975, Day sacred story. For COVID-19 infections that built throughout and messy. Christians, the noting that he installed it without tents, by Day Café (477 W. 7th St.), shook up the fall only making things worse. canopies or plastic bubbles to create the its menu to keep diners streaming into its Christmas story is a myth, which is not to say A longtime destination for dining and that it lacks historical truth, but rather that truth safest dining experience possible. secluded outdoor garden and newly added drinking—from the classic Italian fare Bad Weather Brewing Co. (414 W. outdoor seating along W. 7th over the in the Christmas story lies in its capacity to of Cossetta’s and steaks of Mancini’s to transcend time so that we might encounter our 7th St.), another brewery and restaurant, summer and through the fall. In July, it trendy destinations like Bad Weather was fortunate to have already invested in added an outdoor wood-burning oven to its own humanity, our own imperfections, our own Brewing Co. and the Keg and Case food incompleteness. redoing its patio in the fall of 2019. After facilities, ushering distinctive pizzas onto its hall that have opened in recent years—the the pandemic hit, it worked with the city list of offerings (six oven-baked sandwiches We have just finished an election in which West End has not proved immune to the one of the central issues was whether the through the spring to expand its renovated will debut soon). pandemic’s headwinds. The Bay Street patio across what had been the restaurant’s The café’s owner, Greg Ekbom, viewed American myth of “We the People” proclaimed Grill, one longtime stalwart just off W. 7th in the Declaration of Independence is an front parking lot. Realizing the importance of Governor’s Walz’s November 18 order on Randolph Street, closed in July, with heat for extending the outdoor dining season, to suspend in-person dining as a mercy idea and a story brought to perfection from its owners citing the uncertainty of the the very beginning or whether it was born Bad Weather’s owner, Joe Giambruno, of sorts, since the surging pandemic had pandemic as well as personal medical issues. worked with a welding company to build a left the business losing money in recent out of messiness, imperfections and our own In recent months, however, local incompleteness. In his book, Healing the Heart custom outdoor table, where bargoers can weeks. “Now, we can focus on takeout entrepreneurs have turned their creativity rest their glasses around an open, gas-fed fire. and delivery,” Ekbom said, adding that of Democracy, Parker Palmer notes that the to the pandemic, carving new solutions to Founding Fathers who wrote those words “fell Claddagh Coffee, a coffee house and the company had forged new partnerships survive the winter and outlast COVID-19. homemade pastry shop with outposts in the far short of their own declaration.” The novel innovations range from renovated PANDEMIC, PG ! However, by acknowledging the imperfections West End (459 W. 7th St.) and Cathedral and incompleteness, the myth lives with the power of aspiration. Any assertion of original perfection makes the American freedom myth an outright lie―or, as Eddie Glaude, author of Elected reps tell United Family Medicine Begin Again, calls it, “The Lie.” Palmer says that “when we imagine or pretend” that the to halt changes, call for outside review American myth of freedom for all “describes Health has undergirded UFM’s progressive, current reality, the myth becomes an enemy The following letter from nine elected officials, of its own aspirations.” It is is what makes listed below it, was sent to UFM leadership on professional medical staff and 21st century “Make America Great Again” so problematic. November 25: clinic facilities. Nearly $15 million was In contrast, by acknowledging snotty noses, United Family Medicine (UFM) has a raised to fund UFM’s clinic building (which messiness and incompleteness (what Palmer long and rich history of serving the medi- opened in 2009) in large part through the calls the “aspiration gap”), we give myths the cal health and wellness needs of the West efforts and initiative of the United Hospital power to transform our lives and our world. Seventh community and far beyond. The Foundation and Allina Health’s support. Black Lives Matter refuses to ignore the runny clinic’s foundational, personal patient-doc- The West Seventh community and pa- nose. Native voices who seek reparation for tients from all around the Twin Cities were stolen land refuse to ignore it, too. Immigrants, tor relationships and nationally acclaimed “To Serve and to Teach” Family Medicine distressed to learn of the clinic’s new CEO who come to this country expecting that neither and board leaders’ intentions to dismantle their skin color nor religion will be a barrier to Residency mission have demonstrated outstanding outcomes regardless of income, UFM’s “continuous health care” model, the their aspirations of the American freedom myth, model that has evolved and served so many refuse to ignore the runny nose as well. ethnicity, age and familial status. The unique collaboration between the so well over decades. As UFM’s mission and We are imperfect, incomplete and messy. No focus has long been to provide personal- group should know this more than those who community, United Hospital and Allina gather in community, as many believers do this ized primary care with a family physician time of year, telling sacred stories about love — at clinic, hospital or other venues — the that has the power to make us a better people. forced departure of UFM’s physicians and Whatever tradition one grounds their beliefs in, [A]s elected officials in this community, we call medical residents is a devastating prospect we share a fundamental a"irmation that love for patients and the entire community. which has the power to transform does so in for a halt to the impending changes to UFM's The imminent dislocation of the United the context of our brokenness. Myths, which Family Medicine Residency program (21 make room for runny noses, can unleash the successful operating model and reestablishment MDs) and the accompanying departure imagination of who we might yet become. of the United Family Medical Residency program. of the clinic’s 13 “legacy” physicians — LETTER, PG ! Follow us on Twitter: @StPaulReporter Visit us online: communityreporter.org Follow us on Facebook: /SaintPaulCommunityReporter 2 COMMUNITY REPORTER DECEMBER 2020 Follow us on Twitter: @StPaulReporter The letters, opinions, and editorials expressed on this page do not necessarily reflect the views of the Board of Directors of this Editorials & Opinions newspaper or any of our advertisers or sponsors.