[Mpls] Part 2. The violins continue to sob but play on

[Michael Atherton]

Peter Vevang wrote:

>  I think this action was prudent and well warranted.  These 
>  codes and inspection processes have been written and 
>  developed over a 100 year period and have been proven both 
>  scientifically and in practice.  We have a process that is 
>  time tested and rock solid and 'conservative' in every sense 
>  of the word.  If our action was  extreme, many buildings 
>  would have been condemned, and that would have hurt both 
>  owners and renters.  If action was weak, no citations would 
>  have been made, and kids would be at continued risk.  The 
>  inspections struck a balance and were a start at tackling 
>  the problem.  The owners are now fully aware, that the onus 
>  is on them to keep their apartments up to code.  The owners 
>  now know they are being watched by the community for 
>  overcrowding, and offending owners will clean up their act 
>  or their property will be condemned after neighborhood complaints.

There's a difference between construction codes and inspections,
and habitability inspections.

>  Your assertion is that our attempts here in Minneapolis to 
>  enforce life safety standards are nothing more than flim 
>  flam and grand standing.  I find your views to be distorted 
>  and innacurate, and as such your overall points are 
>  meaningless, and your solutions are equally meaningless.

Then please explain how the types of "sweep" inspections
done in Dinkytown will prevent the types of deaths that
prompted them.  These were visual inspections not structural
ones.  Most any fool can recognize "clutter," blocked exits,
count and measure the size of windows and doors, and so on.
We don't need highly skilled fire fighters or building
inspectors doing this type of mundane inspections.  And if
you really think they need to do it, let them earn some
extra cash as contractors rather than paying them full
scale for work that is below their skill level. And as
been pointed out, they don't have the time and personnel
to do them anyway.
  
>  Inspections is an extremely serious and tough job, it takes 
>  skilled and dedicated workers and I don't think you are 
>  giving our inspectors the credit they are due.  I have 
>  worked on projects in other cities and I will stack our 
>  system up against any city or suburb in the metro.  As 
>  inspections go, we have good service and qualified 
>  employees.  Inspections has some of the hardest working 
>  employees anywhere.

I would agree that "building construction" inspection is a 
complex, serious, and tough job and that takes skilled and
dedicated workers, *BUT* that's not the type of inspections
that were done in Dinkytown.  Can we please stay on the
same topic?

>  By the way, I think it is interesting that you bemoan 
>  'liberalism', and then advocate for intrusive government in 
>  the form of additional rules, ordinances and laws with 
>  expansive and expensive regulation and inspection that would 
>  be a burden on property owners, all of this by city council 
>  decree, and with no idea how to pay for it.  I guess that 
>  makes you one of these new 'big government' conservatives.

Fair enough, I generalize about Liberals and you generalize
about Conservatives, but I don't fit into the Conservative
Republican camp and I fit into only half of the Libertarian
Conservative camp.  You can check my political philosophy
(revised) and see that I do believe that governments should
have a role in promoting the General Welfare:
http://www.tc.umn.edu/~athe0007/mypoliticalphilosophy.html
If you find any inconsistencies please let me know.

Michael Atherton
Prospect Park