[Mpls] 6,000 housing units?

[Steve Brandt]

Margaret Hastings asks whether Mayor Rybak is correct in claiming credit for 6,000 new housing units.

I didn't hear the mayor's claim firsthand, but here is what his Web site says:
Since January 2002, 5,839 new units of housing have been started in the city. In 2004 alone the City issued building permits for 2,730 units of housing worth over $387 million.

Here's what's on the Metro Council web site for the number of Minneapolis new housing units permitted during the first three years of the Rybak administration:

2002: 1606
2003: 1235
2004: 1700

I successfully avoided higher math, but my computer tells me that adds up to 4,541 units.  I doubt that another 1,459 units have been completed this early in our wet spring.

I'm just a reporter who is paid not to write about housing issues in Minneapolis any more, so maybe better minds with more current information can weigh in.

Steve Brandt
Kingfield
Home of the 2005 William E. McGee Public Defender Award of Excellence winner