Af Am Writer Considering MN (Minneapolis, St. Paul: middle-class, appointed, fit in)

[Native NY MN]

I am an over 35, Af Am mother and married writer and theatre/dance professional considering a return to the Twin Cities from the East Coast. I have a thriving city life in New York with a diverse group of friends, dynamic church involvement and professional life but may return to MN due to family responsibilities and financial concerns. Can anyone hip me to the climate in MN with regards to artists, blacks, diversity, parenting, elementary education, housing/lofts/ apts, coolness?.. I left MN because I never felt quite at home. I was adopted by New York which I love but which is growing more expensive by the moment and harder to raise children in a relaxed and loving way. Thank you for your thoughtful repsonses.

[K-Luv]

Originally Posted by Native NY MN

I am an over 35, Af Am mother and married writer and theatre/dance professional considering a return to the Twin Cities from the East Coast. I have a thriving city life in New York with a diverse group of friends, dynamic church involvement and professional life but may return to MN due to family responsibilities and financial concerns. Can anyone hip me to the climate in MN with regards to artists, blacks, diversity, parenting, elementary education, housing/lofts/ apts, coolness?.. I left MN because I never felt quite at home. I was adopted by New York which I love but which is growing more expensive by the moment and harder to raise children in a relaxed and loving way. Thank you for your thoughtful repsonses.

Your asking a lot here, but here it goes;

ARTISTS-Minneapolis is a hot bed of artistic creativity. It sometimes gets to the points where it feels as though everyone is doing something. Some of it is really good but in my opinion most need to get this notion of "Hey, at least I am expressing myself" out of their heads. Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, but crappy art is just crappy art. Any five year old can apply paint to a canvas but that doesn't make them a Picaso (unless you are their parent).

You say that you are a writer in the title of this thread. If that is the kind of art scene that you are looking for then you might be a little disappointed. Minnesota is an excellent place for a writer to get inspiration but the whole writers scene [i]hey lets go hang out at coffee shops and check out open mics and poetry slams[i]doesn't really happen in the TC. It is there, somewhere, but nothing even close to the scale of what you find in NYC. The closest thing to an open mic usually falls tips towards the hip-hop crowd.

BLACKS-Plenty of them and all of the one's that I have met and known personally seem cool, but *****WARNING****** it seems that a lot of them have this inherent notion that just because you are white you are either 1-automatically afraid of them, and 2-you are a racist, period. I know that a lot of blacks move to Minneapolis from Atlanta, so maybe that is it. I dunno, it sucks though.

DIVERSITY-Minneapolis is pretty damn diverse from what ever angle you want to look at it. Here you will find many people from all of the world into just about anything that you can think of from all sorts of backgrounds.

PARENTING-Seems to be the thing to do around here, but personally I am not into it so I dunno. If you're a parent you will easily meet tons of other parents and you can go off and do parent stuff.

ELEMENTARY EDUCATION-Once again I dunno. I went to school in California, which had some elementary education, so I am assuming that you can find some in Minnesota, too. A parent might know this sort of thing as I can't be too sure.

HOUSING/LOFTS/APTS-If I were to ever buy a house, Minneapolis would be one of like three possible choices for me. I could care less about the state of the housing market, but TC homes generally tend to be extremely well built (well anything that was NOT made in the last twenty years) and that is a huge selling point for me.

I am still against the ridiculous condo craze, but some of the loft style ones are seriously awesome, although WAAAAYYYYYYYYY too overpriced in my opinion.

When I first moved to Minneapolis ten years ago the vacancy rate was something like 1 or 2 %. Not sure what it is now. What I am getting at is that if you have the time to really look and see what is out there you can find some really awesome apartments for less then the average rent. Or you could be like me and pay out the behind for a dump simply because you had no other real options.

COOLNESS-If you didn't get the memo, here it is; Minneapolis is the epitome of cool. Everyone here under 40 who is not a suburbanite is hip in one way or another including those dudes (which are my friends) who hang out in front of Muddy Waters wearing the same pair of Carharts everyday because for some reason looking like you just crawled out of a dumpster is extremely hip in Minneapolis. It's worse then that heroin chic ****e.

Anything else that you are asking can be responded by someone else. It is still too early for me........yawn.

[Native NY MN]

Thank you for your answer. I appreciate your response.
To clarify - By coolness I meant the ability to be yourself. Despite my being pretty modest or average in appearance I fell for New York first because people have the ability to express themselves through personal style and more and most others don't think much of it. I'm also trying to get a feel for where artists or writers are living and raising children. I will need to be in a place that is somewhat affordable. I'm not interested in necc. being a part of a scene. I have not sat in a coffee shop being poetic since high school! But I would like to be around or have access to people who are somewhat like minded. By that I mean people who appreciate diversity and culture and want to raise children who are conscientious. I live in a historically black (bit changing) middle income neighborhood in NY with neighbors that are Latino/Hispanic, Indian, Asian, Italian, Greek. I don't want to put my children in an environment where they feel like they're others. They are used to being around lots of different kinds of people and children.

[Lillietta]

Hope Golfgal sees this as she is very knowledgeable especially about education, geographical areas and other questions you posed as is Minnehahapolitan and some others who post here. Forget sending kids to the public schools in Mpls-St. Paul. Because of budgetary cuts, mainly, and socio-economic issues, the better schools are in the burbs, but even then, you have to pick the right suburb. Apple Rosemount Eagen is very good if you live in the Eastern part of the cities; if you can afford the western suburbs, Edina is the best, as well as Hopkins, I would guess Minnetonka and Wayzata. This is a stop-gap answer until Minneapolitan and Golfgal and other such as they can help out.

[golfgal]

Originally Posted by Lillietta

Hope Golfgal sees this as she is very knowledgeable especially about education, geographical areas and other questions you posed as is Minnehahapolitan and some others who post here. Forget sending kids to the public schools in Mpls-St. Paul. Because of budgetary cuts, mainly, and socio-economic issues, the better schools are in the burbs, but even then, you have to pick the right suburb. Apple Rosemount Eagen is very good if you live in the Eastern part of the cities; if you can afford the western suburbs, Edina is the best, as well as Hopkins, I would guess Minnetonka and Wayzata. This is a stop-gap answer until Minneapolitan and Golfgal and other such as they can help out.

That about covers it. A lot will come down to where you will be working. If you work from home and have your pick of anywhere that makes it easier. Also, what activities are your kids into? I think you will find that many of the suburbs are more diverse then you would think of a MN suburb considering as a whole the state isn't all that diverse compared to NYC.

[K-Luv]

There are a lot of parents who are also artists. It seems that most that I am aware of tend to lean more towards the hippy side of things with the rest on more of a graf style. I don't know how snobby you are but if you are fairly open minded then you can talk to people at Muddy Waters or Intermedia Arts. They'll be able to point you in a better direction.

Intermedia Arts

[Minnehahapolitan]

Arts and Culture - Mpls., for its relative size, has some of the best arts and culture in the nation. People are slowly figuring this out, we have known it for some time. Amazing museums, The Walker (Contemporary), Mpls. Ins't of Arts (Classic general museum), The Guthrie Theater (a pioneer in its field), small theater groups, Northeast Mpls., movie theaters, A Pelli designed Central Library that is the center of one of the largest municipal collections per capita in tha nation. We like our art.
Blacks - About 20% of the city of Mpls. We don't have the middle-class black areas like Houston and Atlanta. Blacks do have mobiity, and are generally well recieved in The Cities. There are alot of Somali immigrants. We aren't Chicago or Harlem, but we aren't Omaha either.
Diversity - Lots of small groups of minorities, with larger numbers of Blacks, American Indians and Hispanics. Areas like Phillips and Whittier are equally diverse among Whites, Balcks and Hispanics. (But most people won't want to live in Phillips. It is a more marginal area) Some of the largest populations of Hmong, Liberians, Somalis in the nation.
Parenting - There are alot of kind firendly things to do, but I can't say how we are in relation to anything. Public programs for parents are supported.
Elementary Education - There are good schools in Mpls., Saint Paul and all the suburbs. You just have to do your homework to find the right one. There are schools in the suburbs I would not send my kids to, there are school in The City that I wouldn't either. A school district like Mpls. is too big to have 30 of the same school. There is great variation in how good they are. So, unless it is a samll district, someone who says the Minneapolis/Anoka-Hennepin/Saint Paul/Bloomington school district is bad is making a disturbingly sweeping generalization. Minnesota loves its education even more than its arts. You will find a good school if you look for it and stay involved.
Housing - We don't have the priviledge of old brick rowhouses like Phila. or New York. There is generally a good mix of old low-rise brownstone apartments, four-plexes, duplexes and single family homes. There are exceptions, and there are a good number of highrises and lofts in very urban areas. The housing is generallyu well maintained, even an older house is sturdy (porb. more than the newer ones, IMO).
Coolness - Minneapolis is socially Laissez-Faire. If you die your hair shades of technicolor, people will look at you weird. The City allows for great leaniency in self-expression. There are things to do that appeal to most all people. Suburbs are not as keen on alternative styles. They won't say anything to you, but you prob. won't get invited to dinner.

Sorry Golfgirl, I have to disagree with suburban diversity. Places likeRichfield and Saint Louis Park (interior suburbs) have some diversity. But Wayzata, Edina, Lakeville are not dissimilar from Iowa. There are minorities, but they are few and far between. Noone is racist, but a black student as Eden Prairie High is not going to be among his black peers. If you looked at it from a Black point-of-view you would see it. I see the one black person, they see the 250 white people.

[golfgal]

Originally Posted by Minnehahapolitan

Sorry Golfgirl, I have to disagree with suburban diversity. Places likeRichfield and Saint Louis Park (interior suburbs) have some diversity. But Wayzata, Edina, Lakeville are not dissimilar from Iowa. There are minorities, but they are few and far between. Noone is racist, but a black student as Eden Prairie High is not going to be among his black peers. If you looked at it from a Black point-of-view you would see it. I see the one black person, they see the 250 white people.

And, like I said, the suburbs are more diverse then you would think for MINNESOTA also stating that MN as a whole isn't all that diverse. No, they aren't going to hanging out with 20 black kids from the same grade in Eden Prairie but then again, if you want diversity, you don't want your kids hanging out with only the black kids, you want them hanging out with the black kid, the hispanic kid, the Lutheran kid and the Asian kid, right???

[Camden Northsider]

Hi Native NY MN, I would agree with Minneahapolitan about Minneapolis and would suggest you target your search here. As for the arts and easy acess, Uptown area in Minneapolis is good for this BUT this is where people want to be part of the scene, being poetic in coffee houses as you allude to, and it is highly concentrated with young people - fresh out of college and the like so it can feel like a trendy college campus at times.

Northeast Minneapolis has a lot of arts scenes going on and many neighborhoods feel family-oriented as well, also this area is very diverse with a multitude of ethnic groups residing here, blue-collar type neighborhoods with East European immigrant roots and often attracts a lot of the young crowd but has family-type neighborhoods as well.

You might also want to check out North Minneapolis. The near-North and closer-to-downtown areas (through 32nd Street) are predominantly African-American neighborhoods where there is a cool arts scene, however many on this posting board will 'warn you' about the 'dangers' of the neighborhood (but it is true that there is a higher rate of crime and poverty in this area).

If you go further north you'll get to my neighborhood (Victory, part of Camden neighborhood) in the northwest corner that is middle class, liberal, has little to no crime, and hosts a very small, but thriving, little arts scene - a community playhouse (The Warren, an Artist Habitat), a neigborhood children's music school, a good coffee shop and a couple of great neighborhood restaurants, and I think there's a gallery or two in the neighborhood. It is very neighborly and family-oriented (almost small-townish) and in general there is not much outside of single family homes so it might be too quiet/ slow around here and not as hip as you would like, but your kids would fit in around here and go to good elementary/ high schools in the area. The larger Camden area (north of Lowry/ 32nd) is very integrated, one of the more integrated neighborhoods in the nation I believe, there is almost equal white and African-American families and a large Hmong (SE Asian) population (Victory is more predominantly white but still has a very substantial nonwhite population).

I can't remember the poster's name that mentioned the suburbs and in response to Minneahapolitan said the point would be to hang out with "the black kid, the asian kid, the lutheran kid,..." etc. If one reads Native's post, the point is not for her children to be the "one" fill-in-the-blank
'kid", but rather to be part of a plural (kids).

[Native NY MN]

Thank you for replies. I'm getting closer! Because of the arts education work I plan on doing it will probably be better for me to be in or close to the city (urban). I also think it will be too much of a stretch for me to go from living in New York City to the burbs. I'd like to be in a area that's safe but I am also use to a little bit of the streets on the streets. A friend suggested possibly Selby Grand area in St. Paul???

3 more questions. I have not decided on which Twin City I will live in. Can anyone name fearlessly name the elementary public schools (St. Paul and Mpls.) to avoid for black children and the city schools that are diverse and standouts? I saw some language immersion schools (which I want for my children) but the populations were 2-8% ethnic. Also can someone name specific loft or artist housing in the Twin Cities so I can begin doing research? Thank you.