The 2009 Minneapolis

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Minneapolis , nicknamed "City of Lakes" and the "Mill City," is the county seat of Hennepin County, the largest city in the U.S. state of Minnesota, and the 48th largest in the United States...

 municipal election

Election

An election is a formal decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy operates since the 17th century. Elections may fill offices in the legislature, sometimes in the...

s in the U.S. state

U.S. state

A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...

 of Minnesota

Minnesota

Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...

 held a scheduled general election

General election

In a parliamentary political system, a general election is an election in which all or most members of a given political body are chosen. The term is usually used to refer to elections held for a nation's primary legislative body, as distinguished from by-elections and local elections.The term...

 on November 3. Because city voters approved a city charter change by referendum

Referendum

A referendum is a direct vote in which an entire electorate is asked to either accept or reject a particular proposal. This may result in the adoption of a new constitution, a constitutional amendment, a law, the recall of an elected official or simply a specific government policy. It is a form of...

 in the 2006 election to use a ranked choice voting system , Minneapolis did not hold a primary election

Primary election

A primary election is an election in which party members or voters select candidates for a subsequent election. Primary elections are one means by which a political party nominates candidates for the next general election....

 on September 8, the 2009 date for primaries in Minnesota.

There was a lawsuit in court to prevent the voting change; it lost by summary judgment in the first court, was appealed directly to the Minnesota Supreme Court

Minnesota Supreme Court

The Minnesota Supreme Court is the highest court in the U.S. state of Minnesota and consists of seven members. The court was first assembled as a three-judge panel in 1849 when Minnesota was still a territory. The first members were lawyers from outside of the region who were appointed by...

, where it also lost. One person active in the lawsuit has filed as a candidate but is not campaigning; allegedly this is to give him legal standing to sue after the election.

Voters in the city elected:

• 1 mayor
  Mayor
  In many countries, a Mayor is the highest ranking officer in the municipal government of a town or a large urban city....
  
  
• 13 city council
  Minneapolis City Council
  The Minneapolis City Council is the governing body of the City of Minneapolis. The City Council is composed of 13 single member districts, called wards. Barbara Johnson is president of the council. The council is dominated by members of the DFL Party with 12 members. The Green Party has one member...
  
   members, elected by ward
• 2 at-large members of the Board of Estimate and Taxation, and
• 3 at-large and 6 elected by district members of the Park and Recreation Board

Party Endorsements

Conventions of the Minneapolis DFL

Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party

The Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party is a major political party in the state of Minnesota and the state affiliate of the Democratic Party. It was created on April 15, 1944, with the merger of the Minnesota Democratic Party and the Farmer–Labor Party...

, Green, Independence, and Republican parties have respectively endorsed the following candidates. Several candidates were endorsed by both the Independence and Republican parties; in the table below, these candidates' names span both parties' columns.

Seats		DFL endorsed	Green endorsed	IP endorsed	Republican endorsed
Mayor		RT Rybak, incumbent		John Kolstad
City Council	Ward 1	Kevin Reich			Thomas Alessi
	Ward 2		Cam Gordon Cam Gordon Cam Gordon is an American politician and member of the Green Party of Minnesota in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is an elected member of the Minneapolis City Council.... , incumbent	Allen Aigbogun
	Ward 3	Diane Hofstede, incumbent			Jeffrey Cobia
	Ward 4	Barb Johnson, incumbent	Marcus Harcus	Grant Cermak
	Ward 5	Don Samuels, incumbent		Roger Smithrud
	Ward 6	Robert Lilligren Robert Lilligren Robert Lilligren is an American politician and member of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is an elected member of the Minneapolis City Council. He was first elected in 2001, representing Ward 8. In 2002, the Minneapolis city council approved a... , incumbent	Andy Exley Andy Exley Andy Exley is an American politician and member of the Green Party of Minnesota in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is the current elected chairman of the Green Party of Minnesota. He was a candidate for the Minneapolis City Council, Ward 6 in the 2009 Minneapolis municipal elections...	Mike Tupper
	Ward 7	Lisa Goodman, incumbent		Michael Katch
	Ward 8	Elizabeth Glidden, incumbent	Jeanine Estime	Greg McDonald
	Ward 9	Gary Schiff Gary Schiff Gary Schiff is an American politician, member of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and an elected member of the Minneapolis City Council, representing Ward 9. He was elected in 2001 and re-elected in 2005 and 2009.- External links :* *... , incumbent	Dave Bicking	Todd Eberhardy
	Ward 10	Meg Tuthill		Dan Alvin	Kim Vlaisavljevich
	Ward 11	John Quincy
	Ward 12	Sandy Colvin Roy, incumbent		Rick Nyhlen
	Ward 13	Betsy Hodges Betsy Hodges Elizabeth A. Hodges is the current Ward 13 City Council member for Minneapolis, Minnesota, and a member of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party. In 2005, Hodges defeated Lisa Miller to become the first Democrat to represent the Ward in years. She was re-elected in the 2009 Minneapolis... , incumbent		Kris Broberg
Board of Estimate and Taxation	2 Seats	Carol Becker, incumbent		Michael Martens
Parks and Recreation Board	3 At large Seats	Mary Merrill Anderson, incumbent John Erwin, former Board member Tom Nordyke, incumbent	Annie Young Annie Young Annie Young is an American politician and member of the Green Party of Minnesota in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is an elected at-large member of the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board... , incumbent	Dave Wahlstedt
Parks & Recreation Board	District 1	Liz Weilinski
	District 2
	District 3	Scott Vreeland
	District 4	Anita Tabb
	District 5
	District 6	Brad Bourn

Candidates

There were 95 candidates total:

11 candidates for Mayor,

Dick Franson: Democratic-Farmer-Labor

John Charles Wilson: Edgertonite National Party

Tom Fiske: Socialist Workers Party

R. T. Rybak

R. T. Rybak

Raymond Thomas Rybak, Jr. , known as R. T. Rybak, is the 46th and current mayor of the city of Minneapolis, Minnesota. In the 2001 election Rybak defeated incumbent Sharon Sayles Belton by a margin of 65% to 35%; the widest margin in city history for a challenge to an incumbent...

: Democratic-Farmer-Labor

Joey Lombard: Lombard's candidacy was essentially a prank – he initially ran because his girlfriend said he didn't do enough for the community, but ended up terminating the relationship once he ran. Surprisingly, despite his lack of real campaigning, he finished in sixth place, and now plans to run for governor.

Bob Carney Jr.: Moderate Progressive Censored

Al Flowers: Democratic-Farmer-Labor

Papa John Kolstad: Independent Civic Leader

James R. Everett: Social Entrepreneurship

Bill McGaughey: New Dignity Party

Christopher Clark: Libertarian

2-6 for each City Council Ward,

6 for the 2 Board of Estimate & Taxation seats,

8 for the 3 Park Board at-large seats,

1-5 for each Park Board District seat.

Previously mentioned as possible candidates for Mayor were Bob Miller, the director of the Minneapolis Neighborhood Revitalization Program (NRP), Minneapolis City Council members Gary Schiff and Ralph Remington, Minneapolis Park Board President Tom Nordyke, former City Council president Jackie Cherryhomes, and Hennepin County Commissioner Peter McLaughlin; none of them ended up running.

General Election Results

DFL candidates won 23 of the 25 seats, with Green party candidates winning the other two. No Republican or Independence Party candidates were elected.

Mayor

RT Rybak

City Council:

Ward 1 Kevin Reich

Ward 2 Cam Gordon (Green Party)

Ward 3 Diane Hofstede

Ward 4 Barb Johnson

Ward 5 Don Samuels

Ward 6 Robert Lilligren

Ward 7 Lisa Goodman

Ward 8 Elizabeth Glidden

Ward 9 Gary Schiff

Ward 10 Meg Tuthill

Ward 11 John Quincy

Ward 12 Sandy Colvin Roy

Ward 13 Betsy Hodges

Board of Estimate and Taxation

Carol Becker

David Wheeler

Parks and Recreation Board

At large Seats

Bob Fine

John Erwin

Annie Young (Green Party)

District Seats

District 1 Liz Weilinski

District 2 Jon Olson

District 3 Scott Vreeland

District 4 Anita Tabb

District 5 Carol Kummer

District 6 Brad Bourn

External links

• Minneapolis candidate links from E-Democracy.Org