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Southwest Journal on Start Reading Now

5/23/2018

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One of my other community passions is around reading, and ensuring kids have plenty of books to read.  To further that mission, I co-founded the non-profit Start Reading Now. Every year in Minneapolis we fund $50 vouchers for kids to buy 10 new books each at the start of the summer, in order to help address "summer slide" and the achievement gap. In 2018 we are serving 5,500 kids in 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grade.

This year we honored to be part of the Minneapolis Public Schools' kickoff event for their summer reading initiative, which they held at our book fair at Hmong International Academy in north Minneapolis. 

Nate Gotlieb of the Southwest Journal wrote a great, thorough article about what we do, and even snapped the nearby photo to capture much of the day's story...kids, books, backpacks, volunteers (that's Hannah from Atomic Data in the grey t-shirt), Clifford, etc. 

Thank you, Nate!
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kt talks Start Reading Now on KTLK - 5,500 kids served this year!

5/7/2018

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The guys at KTLK, Justice and Drew, were once again kind enough to let me talk about the non-profit that I chair, Start Reading Now. We will serve 5,500 kids this year, at the 30 highest poverty elementary schools in Minneapolis Public Schools.

​In addition to the details on the program, you'll discover just what sort of reader I was in 6th grade...My segment starts at 19:15.
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Met Council property tax levy larger than entire budget of most MPOs - updated

5/3/2018

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One of the crazier things about the Met Council is that it is free to increase the property tax levy that funds part of the operation, without any elected body being able to stop them. Supporters of the current Met Council governance model like to say that this levy is quite small, and we shouldn't be concerned with this taxation without representation question.

​For a moment, let's ignore the un-American principle underlying that viewpoint, and look at the numbers:  I'm in the process of updated my 2016 report, The Twin Cities Met Council, A Comparative Assessment, and this is one of great examples of how out of step the Met Council is with the rest of the country. As you can see, the Met Council's "small" property tax levy is in fact bigger than the entire budget of all but a handful of the largest regional authorities in the country. 

What rationale supports that as a legitimate form of government Of, By, and For the People?
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    Kevin Terrell

    Sure, e-books have a place in the world. I just prefer real ones, in order to make the job a bit harder for any real life Winston Smith who might be out there.

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