Created: December 14, 2020 10:27 PM
Duluth councilors discussed a wide range of topics on Monday night. Among them was whether to establish a commission to meet the needs of the LGBT community.
Community members who spoke out at Monday night s council meeting expressed their support for the LGBTQ+ commission, and for councilors putting forward the initiative. This commission is an essential resource not only to city staff, but also to our community in forming a better, brighter future for queer, trans and two spirit youth locally, said Courtney Cochran of Duluth.
WDIO-TV/File
The goal of the commission is to advise the mayor, city council, city departments, and community at large about issues of concern affecting non-binary and binary queer, trans, two spirit, lesbian, gay, bisexual, intersex, and asexual communities.
Our View: Council can pick fairly, resist divisiveness
Hard decisions need to be made today regarding tourism tax distributions; Duluth city councilors can resist allowing personal feelings and divisive language to muddy their deliberations.
Written By:
News Tribune Editorial Board | 11:00 am, Dec. 14, 2020 ×
Throughout the pandemic, the apparent picking of winners and losers by government has been a source of anger and frustration. Big-box retailers OK’d to stay open while mom-and-pop stores were ordered closed, for example. Or authorities looking the other way from packed, nearly maskless political rallies and streets-filled protests while cracking down on smaller, family-and-friends get-togethers in parks and elsewhere.
A proposed reallocation could come at the expense of Fourth Fest fireworks or Spirit Mountain. Written By: Peter Passi | ×
Glensheen Mansion, 3300 London Road. (2004 File / News Tribune)
The Duluth City Council will consider an amendment Monday to Mayor Emily Larson s proposal as to how the city should divvy up tourism tax collections next year.
While Larson had proposed to zero out funding to Glensheen Mansion in 2021, Councilors Terese Tomanek and Derek Medved are recommending the city provide $25,000 in support next year half of what the museum was slated to receive in 2020, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Glensheen was one of nine organizations that would not receive any tourism tax funding next year under the mayor s plan, which anticipates collections from the hospitality tax will remain about 25% below what they were in 2019, due to the lingering impact of the COVID-19 outbreak.