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Before we begin, a note for listeners.
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This episode discusses fatal shootings and workplace violence.
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A rental office is where people come to find a home, ask a question or get help.
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It should never be a place where someone fears for their life.
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This summer, three members of Minnesota's multifamily community were killed on the job.
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They were colleagues, friends and deeply loved members of their families and community.
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Six weeks later, two residents were killed and several other people were wounded during another shooting.
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For people who work in rental housing, these incidents hit close to home.
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They also brought wider attention to something many in our industry have been saying for years.
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Staff are being asked to handle hostility, threats and situations far beyond their job descriptions.
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Today, MHA President and CEO Sehsil Smith joins our managing producer, Aubrey Albrecht, for a candid conversation about what these tragedies have meant for Minnesota's multifamily community, how MHA is responding and what needs to change.
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There are no simple answers.
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Keep listening.
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This is The Brief.
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You're listening to the Brief, a podcast from the Minnesota Multi-Housing Association.
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Whether you're a property owner, manager, maintenance pro, product/service partner, or just curious about the industry we've got fresh insights, and quick takes, to keep you informed and ahead of the curve.
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No fluff.
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No filler.
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If it affects your residents, your business, or your bottom line.
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You'll hear about it here.
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This industry provides more than buildings.
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It offers Minnesotans a solution for home That solution is multi housing.
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Welcome to MHAs, The Brief.
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This episode of The Brief is proudly sponsored by our founding partner, Citizens State Bank.
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Rooted in the Upper Midwest with a growing presence in Minnesota, Citizens State Bank is deeply committed to supporting the region’s housing providers and small businesses through personalized financial solutions.
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Equal Housing Lender.
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Thanks to Citizens State Bank for backing this podcast and helping us bring valuable industry insights to Minnesota and beyond—week after week.
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Cecil Welcome welcome to The Brief.
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Thank you.
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It's great to be here.
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I wish we were sitting down under different circumstances.
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Absolutely.
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Before we talk about policy, training, and what comes next, I want to begin by saying the names of the three people in our industry we lost at Davoren Park: Nancy Fuentes-Zambrano, Dina Silcox, and Adam Wilwarding.
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They were at work serving residents and caring for their community.
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This conversation is about remembering them, acknowledging what their families, coworkers, and our broader industry continue to carry, and talking honestly about how we can support and protect the people who do this very important work These losses have been felt across our industry, but I know they have been personal for you as well, both as a leader and someone who has spent a lot of your career in rental housing.
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So let's start there.
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When you first learned what had happened at Davoren Park, what went through your mind, and what has stayed with you in the weeks since? Well, the first thing was just disbelief that it was so shocking, so Um, deeply disturbing and heartbreaking.
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And then I quickly learned which company they worked at, and I even know the leaders of that company personally Frank and Angie French, and have been longtime colleagues and friends And I just couldn't imagine what they were going through as leaders having lost three of their people, colleagues, coworkers, and what was being felt in that organization and then the ripple that was going out across the industry.
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So it was a, moment to, pause and remember those that we'd lost, but also, all the questions started flooding in.
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How? Why? And then the answers started coming, which was there was really nothing that could have been done.
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And that was probably even more troubling, that it was just so, unanticipated and that in itself still lingers as something that's deeply troubling.
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Only six weeks later, there was another shooting at Shoreline Plaza in Minneapolis.
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Two residents were killed, property staff and police officers were injured.
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Talk about what it was like to see another rental community experience that kind of violence so quickly after Davoren Park.
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Again, it's like, this is a nightmare.
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How is this happening again? And obviously, the focus immediately turned to the survivors and, how they were, doing, what was the prognosis, what could be done to assist.
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And then the details started emerging and that started answering some of the questions, and that was very troubling.
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And that caused me, and MHA to assess the situation and say, "We need to start speaking publicly about this."
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At Davoren Park Apartments, we wanted the, those closest to the circumstance to be able to share their grief and to honor those who had fallen.
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But in this circumstance, there was very clear policy implications, procedural failures, and there was things that could have been done by parties outside the management who didn't, and that included policymakers.
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And that made me very, very upset and many of our members very frustrated and angered by the circumstance The public often sees property management as collecting rent, enforcing a lease, and coordinating maintenance.
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What do people outside the industry misunderstand about what on-site teams are actually being asked to manage today? Well, first of all my observation o-of most people in our industry is that they're there because they love the mission.
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They love caring for people.
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They love making home for people.
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In fact, I, I heard a comment the other day that this is sacred work, and, that really resonated with me because home is sacred.
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It's something that we all have an identity with.
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Every one of us wants a place to call home, and we know a place called home And yet it's not about bricks and mortar, it's about people and their safety, their dignity, their security, their sense of wellbeing, their sense of peace, and joy living in their homes.
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But increasingly, we're called upon to be public safety specialists, mental health specialists, social workers, and the list keeps growing of the responsibilities that keep arriving at the door of leasing offices right across our industry.
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And this is symptomatic of many of the challenges that we see right across our society, and, it is not fair for all of that to be landing on housing providers I've mentioned this a couple times, but you have personal experience.
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If you're comfortable sharing it, what happened, at your property, and how did that affect your understanding of what happens at the front line? Well, throughout my years as a property manager, I had faced numerous threats, verbal abuse, and so forth at different times, but I'd never been physically assaulted.
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I never suffered workplace violence.
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And a guest of a resident in the parking lot decided to, assault me unprovoked.
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I basically looked at their vehicle, and they weren't meant to be where they were parked, but I avoided a confrontation, and decided it just wasn't worth it at that moment to try and enforce the rules.
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Nevertheless, they saw my curiosity and decided that, I was going to be victimized.
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And fortunately, I wasn't alone in the parking lot.
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There were other people, further away, and I was able to call for help.
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And honestly, it was my residents who saved me from severe injury.
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I w- I was injured, and they were able to get my assailant away from me.
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But the m- experience was deeply shocking because I just didn't anticipate, and I shouldn't have to anticipate, that I should be on guard for being assaulted, in my workplace Thank you for sharing, Cecil.
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That really...
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I know that hits home for you personally.
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I do wanna pause our conversation here.
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We're back with Cecil Smith, president and CEO of the Minnesota Multi-Housing Association.
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Cecil, before the break, we talked about what these tragedies have meant for people working in rental housing and for you personally.
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Now I wanna talk about MHA's response and where we go from here.
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In the days and weeks after Davern Park, MHA reached out to support MCMC, and we offered trauma and resilience sessions for the broader industry.
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We've also increased our focus on mental health first aid, de-escalation, workplace safety education.
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What do you see as MHA's responsibility immediately following the shooting, and how do you see our role now? I think there's several layers to this.
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One is the immediate response, which has been superb, and thank you especially for leading that effort, in organizing that professional education and skill-based training, which is so important, when we're facing these kinds of circumstances to really equip our frontline teams I think the examination of each of the incidents takes us down separate paths.
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The Davenport incident clearly highlights that we have very serious mental health concerns out in the community, and those can impact.
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And as much as you try to work to prevent workplace violence, horrific events can happen.
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And we can just work as much as we can to be on alert, to prevent, to be observant, to get support for people who may be facing difficulty At Shoreline Plaza, we have a different circumstance where I think at the root of it has been some policy failures and things that MHA has long opposed.
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And in particular, I'm referring to the Minneapolis screening ordinance, which came into effect, around twenty eighteen, and that was strongly opposed by MHA.
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We actually ran a grassroots campaign called the Safe and Affordable Campaign to try and, win a majority of the Minneapolis City Council to not support their, tenant screening ordinance.
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And then, in fact, we took them into federal court because we believe that there were unconstitutional elements to that law, and we still believe that despite, being unsuccessful in that effort.
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So we have resisted through all the means that are available to us to protest that policy.
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And yet, I believe that policy allowed the perpetrator in the Shoreline Plaza incident to, be protected by policy.
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That his previous history of convictions and his previous eviction history was outside of, the viewpoint of the management at Shoreline Plaza.
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A-and furthermore, he received, a automatic statutory expungement.
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And I think that that state law is also seriously problematic.
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And so MHA is raising these concerns.
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We've obviously raised them publicly.
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It's been in the media.
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We've raised it with policymakers, and we will be raising it at the Capitol in the forthcoming session.
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These policies failed.
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The two deceased residents, our housing provider professionals that were wounded, one of them seriously wounded, and the two police officers who came, to the rescue of everyone involved.
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That is a very serious and devastating incident, and that should have the attention of the most powerful individuals in our state.
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From, the governor and senior lawmakers, to every industry leader, and we need to rally to the cause of, seeing that these, laws are repealed We did have one win during the last legislative session, and I know, MHA's advocacy team and yourself were at the helm which took effect on August 1st.
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So the law expressly allows a housing provider to request an expedited eviction hearing when residents assault a property manager, employee, or contractor.
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Talk a little bit about how that became law and why this is so important, and does it go far enough? So we had long argued for this law change that Other residents are protected from, assaultive behavior by, a perpetrator of the property, but property management staff and our vendors and other providers are not.
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And so, there's a differentiation on who ought not to, be given the opportunity to pursue an expedited hearing.
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And I'll just note, an expedited hearing just gets you into court sooner after assaultive behavior.
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It doesn't mean that the entire process is going to move in an expedited manner.
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It just starts the process more quickly than a normal eviction hearing.
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But the problem with that policy is it still doesn't protect guests.
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And in the case of, the incident at Shoreline Plaza, if the incident had just remained, the initial shooting, of the, former partner of the perpetrator in the parking lot, and there'd been no other circumstances, such as the already existing eviction, they would not have been able to pursue an expedited eviction hearing because guests are not protected at the property.
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And yet we have a person engaging in serious assaultive behavior.
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So, I believe that this law is deeply flawed, and I am shocked that we still have struggled to get, that part of the law changed.
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And we will be trying again this legislative session to see that that is corrected So to clarify, the tools that are missing is a protection for guests.
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Is there anything else you would like legislators, courts, law enforcement to consider? Well, I think the whole process needs to be expedited.
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Everybody's entitled to due process, but it can move at, at two different speeds.
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It can move slowly, which is how most evictions happen right now.
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But I believe in the case of violent, assaultive behavior, it needs to move in a very expedited fashion.
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Yes, gather all the facts, enable a defense to be, provided before an independent arbitrator, usually a judge.
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But this needs to happen in short order so that the other residents, the professionals who are there as housing providers, can all feel safe in their homes and at their workplace.
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And we need to get the policy changed so that that can happen, and we need the cooperation of the courts in that they need to realize that having people at our property who engage in assaultive behavior does not dignify the homes of the other residents at that property So you mentioned the screening ordinance in Minneapolis is really about information housing providers can access when assessing risk.
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There's an additional backstory here for the Shoreline Plaza.
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Can you tell that backstory a little? Well, from the record that we've been able to establish, Carlton Johnson had a, history of, aggressive and violent behavior Some of those incidents were pled down to lesser nonviolent convictions But on his record was a conviction that was more than three years old since the date of conviction when he applied to move into Shoreline Plaza.
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And under the Minneapolis ordinance, you can't look at anything older than three years for misdemeanors since the date of conviction, felonies seven years since the date of conviction, and serious felonies ten years since the date of conviction.
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Which means in the case of serious felonies, you might have been in prison for that entire ten-year duration and then are released from prison, and now we're not able to factor that into a decision about whether you are qualified to reside, at the property where you've made an application.
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That's problematic.
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That is very problematic How about the court systems? Should judges have discretion to keep a record publicly available when there is a serious or significant threat to residents, employees, the public? I believe there, there should be judicial discretion.
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I believe in the separation of powers doctrine in our Constitution, and the court records are the court records to be adjudicated and presided over and managed by the court system, not by the legislature or anyone else.
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And when we have automatic expungements that are merely a piece of paper that gets filed with the clerk requesting the expungement, and it's granted on an automatic basis, that's deficient.
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Do I believe we should have expungements? Yes.
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Have some people made some bad mistakes in the past and have completely turned things around and made restitution and are living a different life now? Absolutely.
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Should that be held against them in perpetuity? No But should people who have a pattern of behavior, who have, multiple eviction expungements, and in this case, the perpetrator did have, multiple evictions and then expungements, should they be allowed just to keep getting expungements? I don't think so.
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And I think a reasonable judge who examines that record would say others have a right to know.
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And a Minneapolis city ordinance that prevents us also from looking at eviction history beyond three years, even when there's a judgment, further enforces that.
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And I think all of that is wrong.
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I think there are circumstances where people have a right to know So as you're looking towards this next legislative session, what information would be good for MHA members to contribute to this conversation? How can we make that case? Well, I think if you have stories, perhaps not nearly as tragic as what we've viewed this summer, but stories where you think, "This is ridiculous.
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This is outrageous," and, "If we had known, we wouldn't have rented to this person," then we would love to hear, those stories.
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We would love the, the advocacy team in particular at MHA would love to collect those stories.
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May not necessarily mean that it's used in testimony, but we can document that this is just not an isolated incident, but there are continued challenges in the rental housing market with screening practices that are imposed upon us by policy.
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And for our members listening, how can members follow along as we move through the legislative session? The weekly update is our weekly communication directly to the industry of what is happening in the moment.
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Obviously we report on things in the Advocate magazine, both in the print and online edition.
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But week to week, especially during the legislative session, you know, there's a section of the, the weekly update called At The Capitol, and we would encourage members to, review that, as it comes to your mailbox, usually on Monday afternoons.
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So let's close out here, and I wanna give you an opportunity to say something directly to property managers, leasing professionals, maintenance teams, our members directly what would you like to say to them, and is there a message of hope there? I think there's two things that they should know.
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In MHA, you have a passionate advocate.
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We know our members.
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We're listening to our members all the time.
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We know their challenges.
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I've personally lived many of those challenges, and you have an advocate, and we take that job extremely seriously, and we give, everything to that effort On the other hand, I want to also say we're very honored and proud to represent you because you do noble work.
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Being a housing provider, making home for people, as I said earlier, is sacred work because everybody needs a place to call home.
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And we get the privilege of providing something that is deeply personal for hundreds of thousands of people across this state.
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And seeing people making home, building a family, building a life, in our properties is a real privilege.
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And you do very, very important work.
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People would not have a safe place to call home if you didn't show up every single day.
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So please keep showing up, and please keep working with us and keeping us informed so that we can make this the best possible industry that it can be and that we can work to convince policymakers of what is workable, functional policy Because our residents deserve it.
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We've lost two residents this summer in addition to our three housing provider professionals, and residents are the people who we have a moral obligation to provide a safe place to call home, and that includes being free from violence.
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And we know you take that seriously, and we're doing everything we can to make sure that the most that can be done is being done.
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That's a great place to stop.
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Thank you, Cecil, for taking the time today.
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Thank you, Aubrey.
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It's, unfortunate that we have to have this conversation, but it's a very important conversation.
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I definitely agree.
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MHA will continue to remember Nancy, Deana, and Adam and support those who are grieving, provide education and advocate for laws that protect rental housing professionals and residents.
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To everyone listening, please continue checking in with colleagues, supporting the people affected after public attention moves elsewhere.
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Thank you so much, Cecil.
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Thank you.
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This has been The Brief, an original podcast produced by the Minnesota Multi Housing Association.
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It is hosted by your two favorite AI voices—me, Denise Wilson… …and me, Logan Garcia.
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Our story editor is Todd Lillgenquist.
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Aubrey Albrecht is our showrunner and managing producer.
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The Brief’s executive producer is Sesil Smith.
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Follow and listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, mmha.com,
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and wherever you get your podcasts.
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And one more big thank-you to Citizens State Bank, our founding sponsor.
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Their support powers this podcast—and their team powers smart financial solutions for Minnesota’s housing providers.
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Visit csbnet.net
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to learn more.
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See you next time!
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Before we begin, a note for listeners.
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This episode discusses fatal shootings and workplace violence.
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A rental office is where people come to find a home, ask a question or get help.
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It should never be a place where someone fears for their life.
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This summer, three members of Minnesota's multifamily community were killed on the job.
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They were colleagues, friends and deeply loved members of their families and community.
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Six weeks later, two residents were killed and several other people were wounded during another shooting.
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For people who work in rental housing, these incidents hit close to home.
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They also brought wider attention to something many in our industry have been saying for years.
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Staff are being asked to handle hostility, threats and situations far beyond their job descriptions.
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Today, MHA President and CEO Sehsil Smith joins our managing producer, Aubrey Albrecht, for a candid conversation about what these tragedies have meant for Minnesota's multifamily community, how MHA is responding and what needs to change.
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There are no simple answers.
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Keep listening.
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This is The Brief.
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You're listening to the Brief, a podcast from the Minnesota Multi-Housing Association.
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Whether you're a property owner, manager, maintenance pro, product/service partner, or just curious about the industry we've got fresh insights, and quick takes, to keep you informed and ahead of the curve.
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No fluff.
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No filler.
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If it affects your residents, your business, or your bottom line.
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You'll hear about it here.
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This industry provides more than buildings.
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It offers Minnesotans a solution for home That solution is multi housing.
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Welcome to MHAs, The Brief.
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00:01:50,263.71448348 --> 00:01:54,743.71470371
This episode of The Brief is proudly sponsored by our founding partner, Citizens State Bank.
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00:01:54,986.57117875 --> 00:02:05,893.23792261
Rooted in the Upper Midwest with a growing presence in Minnesota, Citizens State Bank is deeply committed to supporting the region’s housing providers and small businesses through personalized financial solutions.
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Whether you're financing a new property in the Twin Cities, refinancing in Rochester, or expanding your operations across the state, their experienced team is here to help.
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Citizens State Bank specializes in property management banking solutions tailored to meet the unique needs of Minnesota’s property owners and managers.
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From commercial real estate loans, competitive deposit accounts, and a state-of-the-art business online banking suite, they provide the local insight and resources you need to keep your business moving forward.
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Experience the difference of working with a bank that understands Minnesota communities.
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Visit csbnet.net
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to learn how Citizens State Bank can help you achieve your goals.
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Member FDIC.
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Equal Housing Lender.
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Thanks to Citizens State Bank for backing this podcast and helping us bring valuable industry insights to Minnesota and beyond—week after week.
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Cecil Welcome welcome to The Brief.
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Thank you.
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It's great to be here.
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I wish we were sitting down under different circumstances.
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Absolutely.
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Before we talk about policy, training, and what comes next, I want to begin by saying the names of the three people in our industry we lost at Davoren Park: Nancy Fuentes-Zambrano, Dina Silcox, and Adam Wilwarding.
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They were at work serving residents and caring for their community.
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This conversation is about remembering them, acknowledging what their families, coworkers, and our broader industry continue to carry, and talking honestly about how we can support and protect the people who do this very important work These losses have been felt across our industry, but I know they have been personal for you as well, both as a leader and someone who has spent a lot of your career in rental housing.
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So let's start there.
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When you first learned what had happened at Davoren Park, what went through your mind, and what has stayed with you in the weeks since? Well, the first thing was just disbelief that it was so shocking, so Um, deeply disturbing and heartbreaking.
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And then I quickly learned which company they worked at, and I even know the leaders of that company personally Frank and Angie French, and have been longtime colleagues and friends And I just couldn't imagine what they were going through as leaders having lost three of their people, colleagues, coworkers, and what was being felt in that organization and then the ripple that was going out across the industry.
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So it was a, moment to, pause and remember those that we'd lost, but also, all the questions started flooding in.
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How? Why? And then the answers started coming, which was there was really nothing that could have been done.
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And that was probably even more troubling, that it was just so, unanticipated and that in itself still lingers as something that's deeply troubling.
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Only six weeks later, there was another shooting at Shoreline Plaza in Minneapolis.
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Two residents were killed, property staff and police officers were injured.
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Talk about what it was like to see another rental community experience that kind of violence so quickly after Davoren Park.
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Again, it's like, this is a nightmare.
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How is this happening again? And obviously, the focus immediately turned to the survivors and, how they were, doing, what was the prognosis, what could be done to assist.
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And then the details started emerging and that started answering some of the questions, and that was very troubling.
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And that caused me, and MHA to assess the situation and say, "We need to start speaking publicly about this."
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At Davoren Park Apartments, we wanted the, those closest to the circumstance to be able to share their grief and to honor those who had fallen.
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But in this circumstance, there was very clear policy implications, procedural failures, and there was things that could have been done by parties outside the management who didn't, and that included policymakers.
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And that made me very, very upset and many of our members very frustrated and angered by the circumstance The public often sees property management as collecting rent, enforcing a lease, and coordinating maintenance.
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What do people outside the industry misunderstand about what on-site teams are actually being asked to manage today? Well, first of all my observation o-of most people in our industry is that they're there because they love the mission.
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They love caring for people.
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They love making home for people.
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In fact, I, I heard a comment the other day that this is sacred work, and, that really resonated with me because home is sacred.
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It's something that we all have an identity with.
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Every one of us wants a place to call home, and we know a place called home And yet it's not about bricks and mortar, it's about people and their safety, their dignity, their security, their sense of wellbeing, their sense of peace, and joy living in their homes.
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But increasingly, we're called upon to be public safety specialists, mental health specialists, social workers, and the list keeps growing of the responsibilities that keep arriving at the door of leasing offices right across our industry.
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And this is symptomatic of many of the challenges that we see right across our society, and, it is not fair for all of that to be landing on housing providers I've mentioned this a couple times, but you have personal experience.
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If you're comfortable sharing it, what happened, at your property, and how did that affect your understanding of what happens at the front line? Well, throughout my years as a property manager, I had faced numerous threats, verbal abuse, and so forth at different times, but I'd never been physically assaulted.
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I never suffered workplace violence.
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And a guest of a resident in the parking lot decided to, assault me unprovoked.
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I basically looked at their vehicle, and they weren't meant to be where they were parked, but I avoided a confrontation, and decided it just wasn't worth it at that moment to try and enforce the rules.
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Nevertheless, they saw my curiosity and decided that, I was going to be victimized.
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And fortunately, I wasn't alone in the parking lot.
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There were other people, further away, and I was able to call for help.
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And honestly, it was my residents who saved me from severe injury.
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I w- I was injured, and they were able to get my assailant away from me.
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But the m- experience was deeply shocking because I just didn't anticipate, and I shouldn't have to anticipate, that I should be on guard for being assaulted, in my workplace Thank you for sharing, Cecil.
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That really...
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I know that hits home for you personally.
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I do wanna pause our conversation here.
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We're back with Cecil Smith, president and CEO of the Minnesota Multi-Housing Association.
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Cecil, before the break, we talked about what these tragedies have meant for people working in rental housing and for you personally.
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Now I wanna talk about MHA's response and where we go from here.
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In the days and weeks after Davern Park, MHA reached out to support MCMC, and we offered trauma and resilience sessions for the broader industry.
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We've also increased our focus on mental health first aid, de-escalation, workplace safety education.
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What do you see as MHA's responsibility immediately following the shooting, and how do you see our role now? I think there's several layers to this.
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One is the immediate response, which has been superb, and thank you especially for leading that effort, in organizing that professional education and skill-based training, which is so important, when we're facing these kinds of circumstances to really equip our frontline teams I think the examination of each of the incidents takes us down separate paths.
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The Davenport incident clearly highlights that we have very serious mental health concerns out in the community, and those can impact.
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And as much as you try to work to prevent workplace violence, horrific events can happen.
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And we can just work as much as we can to be on alert, to prevent, to be observant, to get support for people who may be facing difficulty At Shoreline Plaza, we have a different circumstance where I think at the root of it has been some policy failures and things that MHA has long opposed.
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And in particular, I'm referring to the Minneapolis screening ordinance, which came into effect, around twenty eighteen, and that was strongly opposed by MHA.
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We actually ran a grassroots campaign called the Safe and Affordable Campaign to try and, win a majority of the Minneapolis City Council to not support their, tenant screening ordinance.
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And then, in fact, we took them into federal court because we believe that there were unconstitutional elements to that law, and we still believe that despite, being unsuccessful in that effort.
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So we have resisted through all the means that are available to us to protest that policy.
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And yet, I believe that policy allowed the perpetrator in the Shoreline Plaza incident to, be protected by policy.
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That his previous history of convictions and his previous eviction history was outside of, the viewpoint of the management at Shoreline Plaza.
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A-and furthermore, he received, a automatic statutory expungement.
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And I think that that state law is also seriously problematic.
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And so MHA is raising these concerns.
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We've obviously raised them publicly.
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It's been in the media.
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We've raised it with policymakers, and we will be raising it at the Capitol in the forthcoming session.
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These policies failed.
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The two deceased residents, our housing provider professionals that were wounded, one of them seriously wounded, and the two police officers who came, to the rescue of everyone involved.
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That is a very serious and devastating incident, and that should have the attention of the most powerful individuals in our state.
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From, the governor and senior lawmakers, to every industry leader, and we need to rally to the cause of, seeing that these, laws are repealed We did have one win during the last legislative session, and I know, MHA's advocacy team and yourself were at the helm which took effect on August 1st.
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So the law expressly allows a housing provider to request an expedited eviction hearing when residents assault a property manager, employee, or contractor.
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Talk a little bit about how that became law and why this is so important, and does it go far enough? So we had long argued for this law change that Other residents are protected from, assaultive behavior by, a perpetrator of the property, but property management staff and our vendors and other providers are not.
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And so, there's a differentiation on who ought not to, be given the opportunity to pursue an expedited hearing.
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And I'll just note, an expedited hearing just gets you into court sooner after assaultive behavior.
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It doesn't mean that the entire process is going to move in an expedited manner.
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It just starts the process more quickly than a normal eviction hearing.
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But the problem with that policy is it still doesn't protect guests.
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And in the case of, the incident at Shoreline Plaza, if the incident had just remained, the initial shooting, of the, former partner of the perpetrator in the parking lot, and there'd been no other circumstances, such as the already existing eviction, they would not have been able to pursue an expedited eviction hearing because guests are not protected at the property.
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And yet we have a person engaging in serious assaultive behavior.
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So, I believe that this law is deeply flawed, and I am shocked that we still have struggled to get, that part of the law changed.
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And we will be trying again this legislative session to see that that is corrected So to clarify, the tools that are missing is a protection for guests.
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Is there anything else you would like legislators, courts, law enforcement to consider? Well, I think the whole process needs to be expedited.
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Everybody's entitled to due process, but it can move at, at two different speeds.
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It can move slowly, which is how most evictions happen right now.
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But I believe in the case of violent, assaultive behavior, it needs to move in a very expedited fashion.
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Yes, gather all the facts, enable a defense to be, provided before an independent arbitrator, usually a judge.
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But this needs to happen in short order so that the other residents, the professionals who are there as housing providers, can all feel safe in their homes and at their workplace.
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And we need to get the policy changed so that that can happen, and we need the cooperation of the courts in that they need to realize that having people at our property who engage in assaultive behavior does not dignify the homes of the other residents at that property So you mentioned the screening ordinance in Minneapolis is really about information housing providers can access when assessing risk.
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There's an additional backstory here for the Shoreline Plaza.
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Can you tell that backstory a little? Well, from the record that we've been able to establish, Carlton Johnson had a, history of, aggressive and violent behavior Some of those incidents were pled down to lesser nonviolent convictions But on his record was a conviction that was more than three years old since the date of conviction when he applied to move into Shoreline Plaza.
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And under the Minneapolis ordinance, you can't look at anything older than three years for misdemeanors since the date of conviction, felonies seven years since the date of conviction, and serious felonies ten years since the date of conviction.
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Which means in the case of serious felonies, you might have been in prison for that entire ten-year duration and then are released from prison, and now we're not able to factor that into a decision about whether you are qualified to reside, at the property where you've made an application.
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That's problematic.
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That is very problematic How about the court systems? Should judges have discretion to keep a record publicly available when there is a serious or significant threat to residents, employees, the public? I believe there, there should be judicial discretion.
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I believe in the separation of powers doctrine in our Constitution, and the court records are the court records to be adjudicated and presided over and managed by the court system, not by the legislature or anyone else.
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And when we have automatic expungements that are merely a piece of paper that gets filed with the clerk requesting the expungement, and it's granted on an automatic basis, that's deficient.
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Do I believe we should have expungements? Yes.
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Have some people made some bad mistakes in the past and have completely turned things around and made restitution and are living a different life now? Absolutely.
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Should that be held against them in perpetuity? No But should people who have a pattern of behavior, who have, multiple eviction expungements, and in this case, the perpetrator did have, multiple evictions and then expungements, should they be allowed just to keep getting expungements? I don't think so.
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And I think a reasonable judge who examines that record would say others have a right to know.
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And a Minneapolis city ordinance that prevents us also from looking at eviction history beyond three years, even when there's a judgment, further enforces that.
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And I think all of that is wrong.
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I think there are circumstances where people have a right to know So as you're looking towards this next legislative session, what information would be good for MHA members to contribute to this conversation? How can we make that case? Well, I think if you have stories, perhaps not nearly as tragic as what we've viewed this summer, but stories where you think, "This is ridiculous.
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This is outrageous," and, "If we had known, we wouldn't have rented to this person," then we would love to hear, those stories.
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We would love the, the advocacy team in particular at MHA would love to collect those stories.
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May not necessarily mean that it's used in testimony, but we can document that this is just not an isolated incident, but there are continued challenges in the rental housing market with screening practices that are imposed upon us by policy.
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And for our members listening, how can members follow along as we move through the legislative session? The weekly update is our weekly communication directly to the industry of what is happening in the moment.
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Obviously we report on things in the Advocate magazine, both in the print and online edition.
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But week to week, especially during the legislative session, you know, there's a section of the, the weekly update called At The Capitol, and we would encourage members to, review that, as it comes to your mailbox, usually on Monday afternoons.
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So let's close out here, and I wanna give you an opportunity to say something directly to property managers, leasing professionals, maintenance teams, our members directly what would you like to say to them, and is there a message of hope there? I think there's two things that they should know.
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In MHA, you have a passionate advocate.
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We know our members.
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We're listening to our members all the time.
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We know their challenges.
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I've personally lived many of those challenges, and you have an advocate, and we take that job extremely seriously, and we give, everything to that effort On the other hand, I want to also say we're very honored and proud to represent you because you do noble work.
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Being a housing provider, making home for people, as I said earlier, is sacred work because everybody needs a place to call home.
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And we get the privilege of providing something that is deeply personal for hundreds of thousands of people across this state.
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And seeing people making home, building a family, building a life, in our properties is a real privilege.
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And you do very, very important work.
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People would not have a safe place to call home if you didn't show up every single day.
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So please keep showing up, and please keep working with us and keeping us informed so that we can make this the best possible industry that it can be and that we can work to convince policymakers of what is workable, functional policy Because our residents deserve it.
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We've lost two residents this summer in addition to our three housing provider professionals, and residents are the people who we have a moral obligation to provide a safe place to call home, and that includes being free from violence.
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And we know you take that seriously, and we're doing everything we can to make sure that the most that can be done is being done.
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That's a great place to stop.
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Thank you, Cecil, for taking the time today.
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Thank you, Aubrey.
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It's, unfortunate that we have to have this conversation, but it's a very important conversation.
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I definitely agree.
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MHA will continue to remember Nancy, Deana, and Adam and support those who are grieving, provide education and advocate for laws that protect rental housing professionals and residents.
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To everyone listening, please continue checking in with colleagues, supporting the people affected after public attention moves elsewhere.
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Thank you so much, Cecil.
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Thank you.
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This has been The Brief, an original podcast produced by the Minnesota Multi Housing Association.
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It is hosted by your two favorite AI voices—me, Denise Wilson… …and me, Logan Garcia.
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Our story editor is Todd Lillgenquist.
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Aubrey Albrecht is our showrunner and managing producer.
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The Brief’s executive producer is Sesil Smith.
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Follow and listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, mmha.com,
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and wherever you get your podcasts.
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And one more big thank-you to Citizens State Bank, our founding sponsor.
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Their support powers this podcast—and their team powers smart financial solutions for Minnesota’s housing providers.
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Visit csbnet.net
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to learn more.
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See you next time!
