Finding the Future Podcast Series

Category: Finding the Future Podcast Series

Finding the Future: “Getting to Yes” Interview with Karla Henderson

Last year, the City of Bloomington Minnesota hired Karla Henderson to help steer the city’s redevelopment as Director of Community Development. She is well qualified for the job since she served in Detroit Mayor Dave Bing’s inner circle and brings a wealth of experience turning around neighborhoods to her new job in Minnesota. Early in her career, Henderson made a critical decision to move from Ann Arbor back to her hometown of Detroit. “I really felt like my hometown was going through a crisis with the former mayor being convicted and going to jail. I remember hearing about Dave Bing running for mayor and got kind of excited about that. I did not know him, I’d never met him, but really felt like this was a fresh start for the city.” Henderson reached out to his team and landed an interview and the top job in the City’s building department. “I used a joke that was every gal’s dream job to be over the building department. But I got there and I understood quickly that we touched everything.” Henderson oversaw a large team of 300 staff members and a hundred inspectors covering everything from zoning and inspections to property maintenance and demolition. About six months later, Mayor Bing approached her to take on the role of Group Executive over planning and facilities. In that role, she tapped into HUD dollars and expertise from the Obama administration to begin the work of reinvesting in Detroit’s neighborhoods. In a move that some might see as a step down from her leadership roles in Detroit, Henderson decided to move to Minnesota during the Covid pandemic to be near family. “I always believed that a job either pulls you away or pushes you away. This job pulled me here. You’ve got the Mall of America, you have the equivalent of the University of Michigan for Ann Arbor, this is an economic engine, not to mention a Triple A bond rating.” Still, Henderson recognizes that there is much work to do. “I feel just like I did in Detroit, I can use this position to reduce some of the disparities and do things a little bit differently and focus on small businesses and our commercial neighborhoods, commercial corridors that have been somewhat ignored.” Those who get to know Henderson over coffee or over decades, are struck by the way her personality engages people and pulls them into her vision, or how quickly she affirms the vision of others, empowering them to take risks. “My whole career I’ve been fortunate, like when I talked about Mayor Bing, I’ve worked for organizations that have let me take risks – it’s okay to fail and learn from it. If we’re doing the same thing, we’re not growing.” In a recent example, a staff member suggested that they do something to connect with Muslim residents during the month of Ramadan. “I had an employee that came in my office and he said, what if we pick a day and we fast, and then we go and we break our fast at the mosque at Dar Al Farooq Dar. I said, ‘I love that idea’.” Henderson consulted the City Attorney on how to accept a meal from the mosque in light of the state’s gift law. “So, we got creative in finding a way to ‘get to yes’ and 20 employees went, including our fire chief and public works director; one of our employees brought her daughter. That’s what I want, somebody to say, ‘I have an idea. What do you think about this?’ And then we just go off and we make it happen.” In a move that really defines Henderson’s first year in Bloomington, she set out to reuse an abandoned fire station for a small business center providing space and expertise for local startups. Henderson toured the City one day with the senior planner. She recalled, “Everybody loved to show me the new fire station and I did a tour there and it is absolutely beautiful. And I said, where is the old one? So, we drove by it and I said, ‘there’s nothing wrong with this building.’ I would hope they wouldn’t tear it down.” Since then, the City set aside $500 thousand from pandemic relief funds for the small business center and the McKnight Foundation awarded the project a grant of $250 thousand. Henderson is still waiting to hear from the Federal Economic Development Agency on a grant request of $1.5 million. “The City Council had to make a 20-year commitment to operate the project. I love that I work for an organization whose leadership says ‘we’re in now’ – that is all-in. It really sends the message that we mean what we say. We are partnering with you.” Henderson has already flipped the traditional model for economic development on its head. Instead of tearing down a 60-year-old shopping center serving an existing neighborhood, Henderson would prefer to find resources to improve the building while keeping tenants in place. “We are working on a facade improvement program. There’s a smart team of planners and Port Authority members putting together the criteria.” According to Henderson, “When you start to do these incremental little things, people notice.” On the other hand, notes Henderson, sometimes tearing down a vacant building is just the thing that is needed to turn a neighborhood around. The City is using a grant to demolish an old gas station at Penn Avenue and 90thStreet. Working with the owner of Gyropolis, a Greek restaurant next to the gas station, the corner will be redeveloped replacing a building that sat vacant for 15 years. In closing, I asked Henderson for the best kept secret in a city known for its proximity to the airport and Mall of America. “I would say the best kept secret in Bloomington are the youth. The Chamber had this round table where you go and talk about your job. I met 70 young people and I was blown away by how in touch they are with issues.” On the spot, Henderson offered five students jobs at the City for the summer. Now the City is working on a program for workforce development helping businesses hire local youth. Henderson is following a model called “BrookLynk” that provides internships to young people in Brooklyn Park and Brooklyn Center. I don’t know if we’ve done a good enough job of taking that talent and growing it.” Henderson explained how changing demographics in the city is creating an opportunity to welcome and attract new talent by making sure people feel valued in what they do. According to Henderson, not only does it help the City recruit and retain people, but they have a better chance of success in their jobs and in their careers. Bloomington is like many aging suburbs in the country, full of opportunity and challenge. Sometimes, all that is needed is a strong leader who can unlock talent, ideas and initiative by making people feel heard. Bill Griffith practices real estate and municipal law and is the host of Finding the Future, a podcast that explores innovation in land use and sustainability. Listenherefor the interview with Karla Henderson. If you have a story about innovation in land use and sustainability, please reach out to Bill.

July 11, 2022

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Learning Lessons From Permaculture: Interview With Rony Lec, Founder of IMAP

On a trip to Guatemala, a friend introduced me to a unique outdoor classroom, a learning lab of sorts, for those interested in sustainable agriculture. It’s located on the shores of Lake Atitlan, a beautiful volcanic lake in the central highlands. IMAP https://imapermaculture.org/ is short for the Mesoamerican Permaculture Institute and was founded by local people to showcase the ancestral knowledge of food production in the area, which is known for its rich diversity of seeds and plants. Since the lake is situated between the tropical lowlands and the cloud forests, it is an area filled with exotic plants. Rony Lec is one of the founders of IMAP, which started over 20 years ago. He explained that much diversity in plants and seeds has been lost to monoculture farming practices. IMAP is hoping to stem the loss by educating local farmers of the value of the biodiversity which is unique to this lakeshore region. Lec explained that Meso America had 5,000 varieties of corn at one time but today they have less than half of that. “That’s because your gene pool becomes poor and the strength of life is diversity, without biodiversity, there is no life.” As the region loses biodiversity, they lose the key to growing sustainable crops on small plots and family farms. Photo Credit: The Mesoamerican Permaculture Institute (Instituto Mesoamericano de Permacultura – IMAP) Meso America is still considered a mega center for biodiversity. Lec points to a map on the wall showing all the mega centers of diversity. “Meso America is only one percent of the surface of the planet, but we have 14 percent of the biodiversity in the world.” IMAP is a two-acre compound on an undeveloped shore of Lake Atitlan, one of the last natural areas that hasn’t been developed as vacation homes for wealthy families of Guatemala and visitors from other parts of the world. Along the shoreland, local farmers plant native vegetables in small patches. Surprisingly, the seeds can be more valuable than the plants and vegetables they produce. A short walk uphill is an outdoor learning lab, lush with gardens where visitors and students learn sustainable practices like building an herb spiral or planting a tree farm. Inside the IMAP office, there is a small room with sparse furniture and plenty of shelves. The room does double duty as a small market where local farmers and producers showcase a variety of products, all rich in nutritional value and some qualifying as ancient superfoods. Networks or cooperatives of 70 nearby farmers, many of the women, produce the products on display in the market. IMAP promotes the production of superfoods that have grown naturally in the region for centuries. One of these is known as Amaranth which is rich in nutrition and easily digested. It can be eaten as a raw seed or ground down into flour or meal. Lec said, “So you have a cereal and if you grind this cereal you have flour which you can use as a nutritional supplement or you can mix it with chocolate in a traditional drink.” Next to the office is the heart of the compound where a wooden shed serves as the seed bank or the “seed house”, as Lec calls it. Inside the seed house, metal cans are stacked on shelves and labeled with a wide array of seeds from locally grown plants. The seed bank is like a micro-economy. Local farmers buy seeds on credit and return two to three times the amount of seeds in repayment. So, people can get access to seeds for free or at very low cost. “That’s our currency here. We exchange it with other seeds and can trade it for other products as well, or we can give it as a loan and in credit, and then they return it when they make their harvest,” explained Lec. Seed bank with native seeds from IMAP. Photo credit: IMAP IMAP has been working to commercialize some of its core products by creating standards around labeling. The idea is to make native foods accessible to the people who live here. At the same time, they promote local farming cooperatives that produce these superfoods. The seed bank has been replicated in at least five other locations in Guatemala, as a way to promote food sovereignty on a national scale. Lec said, “Each family and each farmer used to have their own seed bank of sorts as they grew plants and crops for both produce and seeds. As farming became commercialized, farmers here began to rely on big seed companies and stopped banking their own seeds each season.” IMAP hopes to reverse that trend and promote biodiversity at the same time. The last stop on our tour of IMAP was an outdoor learning lab protected from the heat with large shady trees and plants. The area looks overgrown but is really designed as a vertical garden. At the heart of permaculture is efficiency and reduction of waste in a closed-loop system. Everything serves a purpose, including weeds which hold moisture in the ground for the benefit of other plants. “Here you can see this little example of what we do, it’s called an herb spiral,” Lec explained, “By designing this spiral like this, we can achieve many things. If you uncoil this spiral, you will see your surface for planting will be very long. So, you’re maximizing the use of space, by using your aerial space, instead of just horizontal.” In addition to maximizing the use of space, the spiral is planted from bottom to top based on the amount of water different plants use. “The upper part of the spiral is dry and wet on the bottom. You are creating microclimates, little special niches that would not be obtained in a linear way,” said Lec. “So, that means that you can put more diversity in a smaller space – in one of these herb spirals you can plant up to 32 medicinal plants and culinary herbs.” Another concept taking hold is tree farms, which is planting crops that grow vertically rather than horizontally. A corn tree is an example. According to Lec, one corn tree will produce the same amount of food as two acres of corn. “Once that tree is established, you don’t have to do anything and it can last for a hundred years. We call it the food forest and some people call it agroforestry systems.” I asked how the programs at IMAP are funded. Lec said the seed program is self-sustaining through sales, credits and trades with local farmers. Other programs, on the educational side of IMAP, rely on tuition and donations. They are always open to new ideas and partnerships with folks near and far. Recently, IMAP was invited to support a growing family garden project in San Juan La Laguna, a village on the far side of the lake. When the pandemic stopped the flow of food to the small village, another program, called Ecolibri https://www.ecolibri.org/, encouraged families there to begin growing their own vegetables in small plots next to their homes. As travel bans are lifted, IMAP will teach sustainable practices to these families to help them get the most out of family and community gardens. Special thanks to Josh Zenner of Josh Zenner Productions who recorded the interview with Rony Lec at IMAP.https://joshzennerproductions.com/ Bill Griffith practices real estate and municipal law and is the host of Finding the Future, a podcast that explores innovation in land use and sustainability. Listen here for the interview with Rony Lec of IMAP. If you have a story about innovation in land use and sustainability, please reach out to Bill.

February 21, 2022

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Finding the Future: Building Tiny Houses for the Homeless

In cities across the country, the pandemic has brought home the plight of the homeless. Rising home prices, job losses and economic disparity have left more and more people without viable housing options. Communities everywhere are struggling to find alternatives to the tent cities that have sprung up in public parks and along highways. One solution is gaining national attention – the construction of tiny house villages. A housing nonprofit in Seattle has had great success pioneering the concept and now manages tiny house villages in Seattle, Tacoma, Olympia and King County. The organization is known as LIHI, which stands for the Low Income Housing Institute. Recently, I had the chance to sit down with Josh Castle, the Community Engagement Director for LIHI. It’s his job to run the gauntlet of community and church organizations, building support for the construction of tiny house villages and seeking volunteers. Josh has seen volunteers’ attitudes shift from concerns about the impact of the villages on neighborhoods to “tell us what residents need.” A little over five years ago LIHI started partnering with the city of Seattle on the tiny house village project. Castle explained, “There was a huge homelessness epidemic in the Puget Sound region with encampments popping up all over the city. Seattle was trying to find a solution, so they started authorizing these encampments, allowing them to be in place as long as they had some kind of an organized structure, some management and a fiscal sponsor.” LIHI stepped in to serve as fiscal sponsor working with other organizations to address homelessness. LIHI has been around for 30 years and owns or manages nearly 2,400 units of housing in six counties. About 20 years ago, the organization opened its first urban rest stop in downtown Seattle providing laundry services, showers and bathrooms for people experiencing homelessness. Eventually, that experience and working with the City led to the creation of the tiny house village concept. “We realized that if you build a structure that is 120 square feet or less, it falls below the limit for the International Building Code so it’s not considered a dwelling unit, and it makes it much quicker and easier to build the structure,” said Castle. “So, we started building tiny houses that were 120 square feet or less and very cost-effective, about $2,500 to build.” The cost has gone up with the spike in lumber prices but it is starting to come down again. Now, LIHI manages a total of 14 villages, eight in Seattle alone, two in Olympia and three in nearby Tacoma. Recently, they added a village in Skyway which is an unincorporated area of King County near the airport. Castle adds, “It’s the first one that the County has funded.” Castle points out that residents really like having their own place to live and almost 50 percent move on to permanent housing, which is way above the norm for people who live in shelters. “The idea is to serve as a steppingstone from homelessness to permanent housing, and the bridge that gets it there is case management,” according to Castle. Case managers hold regular office hours in every village and work with residents to obtain permanent housing, employment, health care, education, which usually starts with getting IDs and documentation together. Castle explains, “A lot of people come into a village after having their encampment swept away or they just simply lost their ID and their documentation. You can imagine it’s complicated to try to get an ID if you don’t have any way to prove who you are.” Castle talked about a resident who was living outside with her daughter. “She ended up connecting with a church and the pastor recommended that they go and visit a tiny house village and see what it’s all about.” He was able to refer her and her daughter into the village because his church was one of the sponsors. “When they saw the village, they said ‘this is a place we want to be,’ it was the first sense of hope that they felt in years,” said Castle. “They came into the village and she was just a natural leader and an organizer inside the village and helped with everything from working with staff to working with volunteers. She was part of the success of the village.” Working with case management in the village, the resident and her daughter eventually transitioned into permanent housing. Castle added, “And now they’re doing just great.” There’s no limit to how long somebody can stay in a village, but Castle said they want to get people in and out as quickly as possible. Homes in the villages are rarely empty and fill up within 24 to 48 hours of opening. Referrals are made through the City’s outreach services to various service providers and nonprofits. It is clear the tiny house villages are in great demand. Now that LIHI manages a number of villages, they have developed programs that are targeted to specific demographic groups. “We have a village that serves all women. We have villages that serve families with children. And then we have several villages that specifically serve African Americans, Native Americans and Alaskan native people experiencing homelessness, and they’re referred by organizations that serve those communities.” When LIHI first started the tiny house village program, there was significant resistance. Castle said, “We had these community meetings, people were very vocal and the meetings were quite dramatic, but over time people realized that the tiny house villages are transitional and it’s an interim solution to homelessness.” They presented empirical evidence that the model is actually working and is the most successful shelter program for getting people into permanent housing. Some of the initial critics became volunteers when they saw how tiny house villages created a real alternative to tent encampments in their neighborhoods. LIHI now has a record of success in rolling out tiny house villages and building community support. The Seattle experience shows a marked shift from managing tent cities and emergency food programs, to creating a solid path to housing stability – a model based on strong case management and a commitment to addressing the individual causes of homelessness on a person-by-person basis. Bill Griffith practices real estate and municipal law and is the host of Finding the Future, a podcast that explores innovation in land use and sustainability. Listen here for the interview with Josh Castle of LIHI. If you have a story about innovation in land use and sustainability, please reach out to Bill.

September 27, 2021

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Finding the Future: Reviving Downtown Minneapolis – Bisnow State of the Market Panel

Every day, business and political leaders are tackling the question of how to revive downtown Minneapolis. After a year of dealing with the pandemic, social unrest, and shuttered businesses, they are searching for ways to bring people back downtown. Even as the state has ramped up vaccinations against COVID-19, downtown remains a ghost town with few office workers, limited events, and restaurants and bars scrambling to attract customers. The question of how to revive downtown Minneapolis was recently posed to a group of real estate leaders on a panel organized by Bisnow. The panel acknowledged real challenges facing the city, however, at the same time they found bright spots on the horizon as people are ready to leave their homes in pursuit of a bit of normalcy, illusive as that may seem. Brent Robertson is the market lead for JLL’s office in Minneapolis. He’s working on several large commercial real estate projects in and around downtown. One of his clients is a large law firm tenant that was planning to move in two years and has announced they will remain downtown. “I wouldn’t say the pandemic had an effect, but it just speaks volumes to their commitment to downtown Minneapolis.” Anne Behrendt is CEO of Doran Companies, a local developer of multifamily and commercial projects. Her company responded to pandemic protocols by getting construction managers on-site more often. “That was in the works but probably happened much quicker than we thought as a result of the pandemic.” She also emphasized the focus on social issues that have come with the events of the last year. “We are having really thoughtful conversations about equity, inclusion, and anti-racism within our organization and within our community and how do we drive that in our businesses and within our spheres of influence?” Todd Simning is President of ADOR Homes, a builder of custom homes and unique multifamily projects. He noted that the pandemic has created opportunities for new business. “In single-family construction, there was a big push towards people wanting home offices. There’s still quite an appetite for people to live in multifamily apartment and condo buildings, with safety precautions.” Many predicted a mass exodus to single-family and suburban locations a year ago. The panel reported that things have slowed, but the mass exodus has not materialized either as a result of recent social unrest or the pandemic. In fact, Simning reported losing a development property to other bidders in downtown just a month ago. “This shows that people still want to invest in Minneapolis,” said Simning. “I took that as a real positive. The other thing that I’ve noticed hanging around the North loop area is there still is a lot of activity around there, whether you’re at Fairgrounds Coffee, or Martin Patrick, you see that. The Hewing Hotel is also starting to pick back up.” According to Behrendt, the multifamily market is mostly holding its own. “There are projects in lease-up right now that are doing fine, but when you look at the sub-markets within the downtown area, performance has been spotty.” “Looking forward”, Behrendt said, “as we come out of this pandemic, you’re starting to see activity continue to increase. That’s a positive but I also think, given the term of most of these leases, we’re probably 12 to 18 months out from really understanding fully what kind of impact 2020 had on the downtown leasing market.” On the investment side of things, the pandemic has slowed investment activity downtown. According to Robertson there were only two notable transactions in 2020, “the Thrivent Headquarters trade and the Millwright Building.” Still, Robertson believes buyers are committed to downtown Minneapolis. Simning, an investor in downtown, echoed that sentiment, “I truly believe that as the vaccine gets out a bit more, people are going to go back to the mean. They want to socialize, they want to hang out, they’re tired of being pigeonholed at home.” One wildcard in the downtown office market is the recent announcement that Target plans to vacate City Center, giving employees the flexibility to work from home or at its campus in Brooklyn Park. “That was an unfortunate announcement and the timing of it is tough,” said Behrendt. “We’re all trying to get some momentum, but Target was moving employees up to their Brooklyn park campus prior to the pandemic.” On the bright side, Behrendt noted the recent announcement that the Dayton’s project leased a significant block of space, “which will continue to drive momentum downtown.” Robertson responded to the news about Target saying, “They have ten and a half years left on that lease at City Center and I continue to say, this is the first couple of pages of the first chapter, of what’s going to be a long book. If it works, they’ll lean into it more and if it doesn’t, they’ll pivot.” At the same time, Robertson noted that other national companies like Google and Amazon continue to add employees and space driving real estate transactions. Another challenge brought on by the pandemic is a disruption in the supply chain for building materials, fixtures and appliances. Behrendt said she’s helping clients get out ahead of it by ordering things early or swapping out brands. “Some are just practical decisions that people have to make, but the bigger issues for us, and for everyone building wood construction right now, are lumber prices and steel prices. Material prices are really volatile.” Simning said he knows owners of lumber mills in northern Wisconsin and offered this insight. “There’s plenty of logs at the mills – the issue is getting it milled into two by fours and two by sixes, whatever we need as dimensional lumber and getting it to the distributor.” He believes the bottleneck will start to clear in the third and fourth quarter of the year as more people return to work and COVID protocols are gradually eased. All three panelists agreed that employees should be offered flexibility on whether to get vaccinated before returning to work. Behrendt said, “Number one, having people get vaccinated and being efficient about this process is so key to where we need to go. We are actually planning a big party since we didn’t have a holiday party last year and the idea is if you are going to come to the party, you need to be vaccinated.” Behrendt added, “As employers, we can strongly encourage people to take those necessary steps, but we are not going to mandate it as a company.” Robertson has been working downtown since his office reopened last summer. “With proper protocols in place, we’ve had zero transmissions. I’m not going to require anyone to come back if they don’t feel comfortable with coming back, but I’m just sensing that people want to get back.” He added, “I’m just going to be smart about it, I’m not going to be pushy about it.” Simning said his construction crews don’t take for granted the fact that they have been able to work on job sites all year during the pandemic. “The biggest thing that I’ve stressed through last summer and even this year is whatever we need to do to stay open, I think it’s our obligation to actually do the right things.” Shifting gears, I asked the panelists to look ahead five years. Behrendt is hopeful, “When we look at Minneapolis and downtown in particular, I think we are going to be back to where we were. We’ll continue to see multifamily activity, it may be smaller projects and infill type projects versus some of the larger-scale deals that we’ve seen in the last few years.” She concluded, “I think the five-year picture is bright, but I think our challenges are going to be construction costs and interest rates, something that everybody’s watching, and just how these deals get put together may shift a bit.” Robertson hopes to see more companies choosing to relocate a division to the area. “We’ve seen a little bit of it, I’d love to see more of it. With flexible work, I think we are going to see more of it in cities like Minneapolis and St. Paul, where the cost of living is much lower than the Bay Area or Seattle. He added, “We have a diverse economy, all the things that Greater MSP is promoting, so I’m hoping in five years, we have more success on that front.” Simning says he’s an optimist at heart and talks about other downturns in which investors found real estate a good investment. “We started buying development land in 2011 on the residential side and the reason I did is just knowing people always seem to go back to the norm.” As in the past, Simning sees optimism returning, “I think people want to get out again.” No one will dispute that the last year has been difficult for all of us, and it’s easy to get mired in all the bad news. It was great to spend a few minutes with some hard-working, seasoned real estate professionals who see a brighter future, not only in downtown Minneapolis, but across the region and beyond. Bill Griffith practices real estate and municipal law and is the host of Finding the Future, a podcast that explores innovation in land use and sustainability. Register here to listen the panel hosted by Bisnow. If you have a story about innovation in land use and sustainability, please reach out to Bill.

April 5, 2021

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Finding the Future: Retail Innovation Doesn’t Wait for a COVID Cure

Walk anywhere in the five and a half million square feet that make up Mall of America and you will find signs of COVID…literally signs that help keep guests safe as they visit and shop the country’s largest retail destination. Sanitation stations are a few feet apart in every hallway. Masks are required and strict limits are observed in the theme park and other entertainment venues serving guests of all ages. “As soon as we closed our doors in mid-March, we immediately began looking at how we could reopen and what to factor in to make sure guests feel safe when they reenter our property,” said Jill Renslow, Senior Vice President of Business Development for Mall of America. “It is really important to collaborate with other businesses in our industry, not only retail but also entertainment. We think every day about how to assure tenants, shoppers and employees that the country’s largest retail and entertainment venue is safe.” To quickly clean rides and other attractions, Mall of America partnered with Graco, a local industrial company, to adapt their paint sprayers for use with sanitizers. “It is important that we have a level of consistency throughout our building,” said Renslow. “Early on we learned a lot about safety parameters from essential retail and we have the benefit of our size, but it was also important to take the time to make sure that people felt like it was a different environment when they walked in.” Today, the entire building is reopened but some venues are under strict attendance limits. “Nickelodeon Universe is open, at limited capacity,” according to Renslow. “In Minnesota, entertainment venues are limited to 250 people. We have a seven-acre theme park with only 250 people, it’s like they have the whole place to themselves. We’re hopeful we can work with the state in the coming weeks and months to increase capacity a bit.” A recent innovation, virtual shopping, started before COVID hit. Renslow and her team tested virtual shopping during the last holiday season giving guests the opportunity to shop from home. After the mall reopened in June, they partnered with Popshop Live to enable mall staff to host live shopping episodes which shoppers can watch from an app on their phones. “There’s a variety of different brands and channels,” said Renslow. “You just look for Mall of America and you can find a listing of upcoming shows. You can tune in and engage with the host. They will also do some personal shopping while you’re active with the show at that time.” Renslow said, “It allows us to bring the fun shopping experience of Mall of America into your home or wherever you are to conveniently shop from your mobile device.” If the pandemic has accelerated innovation at the mall, community engagement has caused managers to reach beyond their doors. Community Commons opened in retail space at Mall of America to showcase retailers displaced by the civil unrest on Lake Street in Minneapolis following the tragic death of George Floyd in May. “We immediately reached out to community leaders to see what we could do to help,” said Renslow. “You can imagine they were inundated with support and a bit overwhelmed. It took us a few months, but our conversations resulted in a collaborative retail environment for a number of the businesses affected.” Out of 50 applications, Renslow’s team selected 16 retailers that offered a complementary mix of products. “Listening to their stories, we wanted to make sure that we were helping those with the greatest need. It’s been received so well.” Retailers receive free rent for six months and the opportunity to access shoppers during the critical holiday shopping season. Afterward, they can choose to stay, expand, or return to their old locations. If short term success at Mall of America means making guests feel safe and engaging shoppers in new ways, in the longer term, Mall of America looks to stay relevant by increasing the number of entertainment options for visitors. Attractions are the driver at American Dream which recently opened in New Jersey with a 50/50 mix of retail and entertainment. The project was developed by Triple Five, the owner of Mall of America and West Edmonton Mall. Kurt Hagen, Senior Vice President of Development for Triple Five, talked about reopening the American Dream. “They’ve received a great response from the New Jersey market – people are really excited to see Nickelodeon Universe open. The waterpark is open, they have miniature golf, and the ice rink.” Hagen added, “Again, it’s a large environment, that’s safe, where families can get out of the house and have some fun again.” Hagen hopes to restart plans for the Bloomington waterpark project soon. “As you know, we were a couple of months from getting the waterpark financed when the pandemic hit. It would be under construction now,” said Hagen. “It’s part of the secret sauce for these large projects, our resilience is driven by the entertainment component. Guests come here and experience something they can’t in a typical shopping mall or buy online at Amazon.” At five and half million square feet, Mall of America is only halfway there, as Hagen likes to point out. “We have entitlements for 10 million square feet of development, and we have some great ideas. Covid was very much a setback, but it has really amplified the importance of diversification and entertainment for Mall of America.” Clearly, a global pandemic has not shaken confidence in the business models created by Triple Five over 40 years ago in Edmonton, Canada. Neither Renslow nor Hagen would trade their careers at Mall of America for something more recession-proof. “I would just say the family ownership has always been extremely supportive of trying new things,” said Renslow. “They had this vision from the very beginning of Mall of America, and they support the management team on change and trying new things.” Renslow added, “We do a lot of pilot projects with technology companies, but we’re very careful not to lead with technology. We want to drive change, whether it’s utility or convenience for the consumer, and then find technology to support that.” Kurt Hagen echoes Renslow in talking about his experience with Triple Five. “It’s a company that really allows us to be innovative and they provide the resources to do cutting edge stuff. Where else can you build the largest waterpark in North America. What you see at American Dream – the sky’s the limit, they really push innovative ideas, innovative development.” Hagen concludes, “I love my job. COVID is a little setback we’re going through right now. We’ll get past this.” As we wrapped up the interview, it was clear that Mall of America plans to lead retail innovation in the future for the same reason they have in the past – they are driven to push the boundaries of their business model – mixing shopping, entertainment, and now virtual shopping and online retailing with new attractions. Perhaps, the most compelling indicators of future success are their care for the guest experience, and their desire to create bridges to those working to improve the community for the benefit of all. Bill Griffith practices real estate and municipal law and is the host of Finding the Future, a podcast that explores innovation in land use and sustainability. Listen here for the interview with Jill Renslow and Kurt Hagen. If you have a story about innovation in land use and sustainability, please reach out to Bill.

October 30, 2020

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Finding the Future: World Leaders Fighting Coronavirus Turn to University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME)

Bill Gates sounds like a prophetic voice today when talking about the day to day impact of a global pandemic and the need for diagnostic preparedness and self-quarantine. Still, his depth of understanding of the current crisis comes as no surprise to those who have watched where the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has awarded big grants over many years for research designed to improve global health. Last fall, I sat down with Kristen Dotson, an architect in the center of the design of the Hans Rosling Center for Population Health at the University of Washington which was largely funded by a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and reflects the foundation’s desire to help all people lead healthy and productive lives by combating extreme hunger and poverty around the globe. A key part of that global mission is reflected in the work of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington, which is also supported by Gates and others. Today, governors and world leaders are in constant communication with IHME to track the rate of infections, mortality and supplies of protective equipment for health care workers. The work of the IHME in building predictive models over many years is now providing real time data for front line decisions in every state and in many countries around the world. That same type of innovation is driving the design and construction of the Population Health building, according to Dotson. “Putting them all under one roof is designed to see how researchers can collaborate to find population health solutions further and faster, using data visualization and data tracking metrics,” said Dotson. This approach aligns with the work of the Gates Foundation, which supports IHME’s work in developing tools like the Global Burden of Diseasedatabase which in turn enables policy makers to make better decisions and investments in helping people live longer, healthier lives. Kristen Dotson, Miller Hull Partnership, Seattle A unique global mission demands a unique building. Dotson brings two decades of experience in sustainable projects to the team of stakeholders. Dotson is an architect and director of sustainability with the Miller Hull Partnership in downtown Seattle. Even the firm’s offices speak to their specialty design practice. “Miller Hull has an incredible company culture and we wanted to hold ourselves to the same standard that we try to push our clients toward. So we decided to pursue the Living Building Challenge as part of our office renovation,” said Dotson. “We really wanted to leverage the knowledge we have of red list compliant building materials to make the healthiest environment we could and also take advantage of all the daylight since we overlook the Puget Sound. No one has a private office and all of our partners are scattered among the projects that they’re working on.” Like the Miller Hull offices, the Population Health building reflects the values of its funders, designers and tenants; all stakeholders have worked collaboratively on the design. It brings together faculty, researchers and students from the School of Public Health, the Department of Global Health and the IHME. “Putting them all under one roof is designed to see how researchers can collaborate to find population health solutions further and faster, using data visualization and data tracking metrics,” said Dotson. This approach aligns with the work of the Gates Foundation, which supports IHME’s work in developing tools like the Global Burden of Disease database which in turn enables policy makers to make better decisions and investments in helping people live longer, healthier lives. A lot of time went into design on the front end to save time and money on the back end. “We pulled together as a team to really understand their goals, understanding what they were trying to achieve, not just what the program said, but infusing that mission in every aspect of the building,” said Dotson. “For this particular project, the word “Health” is on the building. So, if we’re not addressing health at every scale in this project, if we’re not at least thinking about it, then we’ve failed.” When you look at the building’s plans, something is clearly missing from most of the floors of the project, that is corridors and hallways. That missing element is intentional, it’s not like they forgot to include them or ran out of money and needed to cut costs. According to Dotson, corridors eat up space and kill collaboration, particularly if corridors lead to private offices. “We want collaboration between these three tenants. We want them to talk to each other. We want them to run into somebody they haven’t seen for a while and say, ‘What are you working on?’ Every square foot is trying to build a space where people can linger and socialize in a way that builds their community, but also builds the intellectual capital of the work there.” This fall, the Population Health building will open to faculty, researchers and students. Well before the global pandemic, the building’s stakeholders promised to use this resource to reach people around the globe, hoping to reduce disease, promote good health, and environmental resilience. Today, the urgency appears even greater as scientists and world leaders collaborate to fight disease and promote global health. Updated post from November 13, 2019 Bill Griffith practices land use, real estate and municipal law at Larkin Hoffman. He represents Mall of America and the City of Columbus, Minnesota, as well as other owners, managers and developers of real estate. He has a special interest in sustainable solutions to land use and development challenges.

April 8, 2020

Finding the Future Podcast Series

How the Slow City Movement Revived One Small Town in Central Italy

Why would any mayor want to describe his community as a “slow city”? Stefano Cimicchi is the former Mayor of Orvieto, a medieval hill town with a population of 20,000 located in central Italy. Cimicchi was one of the first city leaders to sign on to the “slow city movement” when it began in the late 1990s. Starting in Chianti, the slow city or slow food movement spread across Italy as a way to encourage restaurant owners and wine producers to prepare and sell the highest quality food and drink. The movement also led to the renewal of cultural attractions as a way to bolster local economies. In these small cities, slow food offers a sharp contrast to fast food and a homogenous global culture. The result of this movement is seen everywhere – in Umbria, Tuscany and beyond. New organic and farm to table restaurants have opened, along with reinvestment in cultural attractions. A byproduct of the movement is agritourism, where owners of rural farms and vineyards open their homes to visitors much like a bed and breakfast in other parts of the world. All over the countryside, visitors stay in small farms and stone buildings adapted to tourism, wine tasting, cooking classes and cultural engagement. Orvieto tapped into this movement when Cimicchi, then mayor, helped start the Orvieto Jazz Festival over 25 years ago. The annual five-day festival now attracts musicians and visitors from all over the world for a wide variety of concerts scheduled between Christmas and New Year’s. Parades wind through ancient streets, attracting kids and families who can’t help but follow along. Concert venues, bars and restaurants in the city offer musical performances from early in the afternoon to late into the night. All of this cultural activity helps attract business and visitors at a time of year when the Umbria region can be a bit sleepy. Back in the 1990s, Cimicchi and other local leaders convinced the Italian parliament to invest the equivalent of $150 million in rebuilding Orvieto’s failing infrastructure, crumbling city walls, and in restoration of the city’s 800-year old cathedral, known as the Duomo. They even installed digital cable beneath the city using ancient caves and tunnels. The project signaled a rebirth of the city and was the first major investment since almost 5,000 troops left the city over 20 years ago. “We managed this project to address different things – the water pipeline, the cable pipeline, the buildings, the cathedral, and the roads,” said Cimicchi. As infrastructure was improved, Orvieto also pursued what he calls the “knowledge economy” using the digital infrastructure beneath Orvieto. “Our idea was to improve the knowledge economy at the same time we improved the economy of taste, the gusto.” Today, Orvieto has programs of study with eight American universities offering classes on art, architecture, anthropology and archaeology. American students are attracted to the hills and valleys that surround Orvieto because the area acts like an open archaeological site. The Italian government supports field study of these ancient sites which date back thousands of years to the Roman Empire and the Etruscan Era. Today, military buildings that once housed soldiers are at the center of the new economy which includes slow food, university classes and the digital infrastructure that supports the knowledge economy. Cimicchi thinks back to the creation of the jazz festival, agritourism, and slow food. At that time, old infrastructure and failing restaurants closed up to make way for new restaurants, attractions, and bed and breakfasts in ancient farmsteads. Standards for food and wine improved dramatically, and visitors started flocking to Orvieto in response. Cathedral in Orvieto, Italy Cimicchi is also proud of the renovation of the spectacular cathedral in the center of the old city of Orvieto. It is clear that this medieval attraction is the starting point for this historic city, but not the end. If people like Cimicchi continue to drive the discussion, Orvieto will look as much to its future as it does to its past. Bill practices land use, real estate and municipal law at Larkin Hoffman. He represents Mall of America and the City of Columbus, Minnesota, as well as other owners, managers and developers of real estate. He has a special interest in sustainable solutions to land use and development challenges. His work has been recognized with the LexBlog Excellence Award for exemplary writing on legal blogs. He also creates the podcast series, Finding the Future: Innovations in Land Use and Sustainability.

February 21, 2020

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Finding the Future: Can the Great Lakes Survive?

When the gales of early winter whip up the waters of the Great Lakes, rock formations and sand beaches take a beating and often give way to the force of these majestic water bodies. We’ve seen recent headlines announcing the fall of the “sea stack” on Minnesota’s north shore as a winter storm reduced this often photographed landmark to a pile of rocks below the waves. Similarly, lake-shore flood warnings have become common in places like Green Bay, Milwaukee and Chicago as they deal with record water levels on Lake Michigan. Just beneath the surface lies a more insidious threat to the life of the Great Lakes which was largely created as a result of shipping and commercial fishing over many decades. Dan Egan, a news reporter and author has been covering the great lakes as “his beat” for almost 20 years. He is the author of The Death and Life of the Great Lakes. As Egan notes in his book, these threats affect more than 20 percent of all the freshwater in the world which is contained within the five great lakes. For anyone who grew up on or near one of the Great Lakes, it’s hard to imagine life without the majestic blue expanse of these beautiful water bodies. Lake Michigan contains miles of sand beaches that rival the coast of Florida. Lake Superior holds vast amounts of wilderness on both sides of the border with Canada. Even Lake Erie has made a remarkable come back from the days when the tributary Cuyahoga River famously caught fire in 1969. In a bit of irony, the fire helped give a boost to passage of the Clean Water Act and the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency. Egan’s book recounts the early days of commercial fishing, the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway and the invasive species that were unleashed with the dumping of ballast water from ocean going vessels. According to Egan, “Zebra mussels have gobbled up the plankton so critical to the food chain in Lake Michigan, resulting in a crash of many of the species of fish that have supplied stores and restaurants along the lake for decades.” Threats to these freshwater lakes abound, said Egan. “We have water quality threats tied to invasive species, which itself is a form of pollution. Toledo lost its drinking water supply back in 2014 due to an outbreak of toxic algae. The mussels aren’t toxic but they really exacerbated the algae bloom since they eat everything in the water column except the toxic algae.” Egan said Toledo officials issued a drinking water ban, “and you couldn’t boil your way out of it because that would just concentrate the toxin.” In a few days, the city restored the drinking water supply, but it was a clear warning that threats to this critical resource exist even for people living along the largest supply of freshwater in the world. Another big threat is the Asian Carp held at bay in the Chicago River by an electronic fence submerged in the river. Egan said other places are considering genetic engineering to deal with similar threats. In Tasmania for instance, scientists have considered altering the genes of invasive species to cut off the species in a generation or two. Still, Egan isn’t sure genetic engineering is the right answer. “It’s a frightening idea that you would genetically manipulate these fish so they couldn’t produce female offspring. If this book is about anything, it’s about the unintended consequences of well-intentioned actions that didn’t turn out the way people had planned.” As a reporter, Egan sees his role as a story teller, telling a story of potential environmental disaster and perhaps some practical ways to mitigate the worst of the threat. “These lakes are still ‘great’ literally, and they could get a lot worse. So we need to appreciate what we have and we need to do what we can learn from our past mistakes.” Dan Egan is on leave from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel to write his second book which takes on the use and overuse of phosphorus in commercial farming operations. According to Egan, “It’s a critical question for our food security.” He also continues to serve as a fellow for the School of Freshwater Sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. His writing makes the science of freshwater protection accessible for a wide range of readers and his commitment to protection of this unique resource is unquestionably the driving force of his career. Bill Griffith practices land use, real estate and municipal law at Larkin Hoffman. He represents Mall of America and the City of Columbus, Minnesota, as well as other owners, managers and developers of real estate. He has a special interest in sustainable solutions to land use and development challenges.

December 11, 2019

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Finding the Future: Guatemalan Fishing Village Bans Plastics

Visitors to San Pedro La Laguna typically arrive by water taxi at docks that are shared with fishing boats and tour guides. Just up the hill a couple of blocks is a long bright banner strung between buildings announcing the plastics’ ban rolled out three years ago. San Pedro is a small town of 13,000 residents, a fishing village really, which has grabbed international headlines for leading the region in efforts to remove plastic waste from a beautiful volcanic lake, known as Lago de Atitlan. It may surprise some to learn that the Lake Atitlan hosts visitors from around the world. Eleven picturesque villages offer a warm welcome, as well as a glimpse into the culture and lifestyle of its mostly Mayan residents. Among them, the town of San Pedro stands out for its efforts to clean up the lake by adopting strict bans against plastic bags, straws and Styrofoam containers, beginning in 2016. At the center of this effort is San Pedro’s Mayor, Mauricio Mendez, who is attracting international attention for his leadership in environmental protection. Mendez is rightfully proud of his community and describes the effort in this way: “San Pedro La Laguna is one of the pioneers in environmental matters on a national level. We have become, as the locals say, the ‘tip of the spear’ in planet preservation.” Mendez left the village for Guatemala City to study architecture and credits his parents for giving him the opportunity to attend University of San Carols in Guatemala City. As an architect, he decided to return home to improve the village and surroundings of San Pedro. Officials from as far away as Germany and China now come to Guatemala and Lake Atitlan to study implementation of the plastics’ ban, but Mendez doesn’t let it get to his head. “We are doing our jobs. We cannot lose our heads for press – it is only a minute of fame and fame kills, you have to be clear that your feet are on the ground.” Any praise from Mendez is for the people of San Pedro La Laguna. “We could have created a lot of laws and local norms but then the people wouldn’t have accepted it. Instead, we went door to door to convince our residents to help us rescue the lake, to rescue the planet. Also we went from classroom to classroom, from school to school, and kept talking about our planet’s conservation.” Nearby villages are now considering similar bans, including Santa Lucía Atitlan, and one of the public universities. The next project Mayor Mendez is working on is reduction of gas powered vehicles and conversion to LED lighting. “We’ve reduced our carbon footprint by 50 percent. Most of the street lights are LED and we are the only municipality that has decarbonized vehicles.” Earlier this year, the City helped residents convert to LED light bulbs in their homes. “For example, if their electric bill is $100 quetzals, we change the light bulbs and the bill drops to $50 quetzals. That means there will be $50 quetzals to buy 50 eggs so that the kids can eat better; and that improves their ability to concentrate in school.” The Mayor says that the LED project is not only an effort to improve the environment and save electricity, it is an integrated project that is intended to create a better quality of life for residents of San Pedro. In just three years, the ban on plastics has cleaned up this small village which now serves as a model for others near and far. Today, visitors who walk by stores and restaurants in San Pedro see few bags, plastic or otherwise. In fact, there is very little garbage in the streets or near the shore, which is not always the case in the other villages that ring Lake Atitlan. Bill Griffith practices land use, real estate and municipal law at Larkin Hoffman. He represents Mall of America and the City of Columbus, Minnesota, as well as other owners, managers and developers of real estate. He has a special interest in sustainable solutions to land use and development challenges.

September 17, 2019

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Finding the Future: Guatemalan Fishing Village Bans Plastics

September 17, 2019

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Mayo Expands Beyond Bricks and Mortar to Reach Consumers: Interview with Jim Yolch, Global Business Solutions

At each of three campuses, located in Minnesota, Arizona and Florida, Mayo Clinic is busy expanding hospital, clinic and treatment facilities. These building projects are designed to offer leading approaches in medicine, centered on diagnosis and treatment of difficult diseases – the key to Mayo’s worldwide reputation as one of the top providers of health care. Jim Yolch, leads Mayo Clinic’s global business solutions, taking Mayo beyond traditional medical centers into consumer ventures that include Mayo’s digital platform, as well as publishing and retail partnerships. Yolch is interested in how Mayo effectively connects with consumers. To prove the point, he notes that their website mayoclinic.org receives 2 billion inquiries for medical information each year. So, how does Mayo take 150 years of accumulated medical research and know-how and repackage it for consumption by the general public? That’s what Yolch and his team get to think about every day. “We’re, seeing more interest in digital and virtual interactions. The smart phone and the technology that we all carry around in our pockets today has reshaped how we buy things, including health care. We’re just a few clicks away. So, how bricks and mortar can serve healthcare versus how digital can serve healthcare in the future – both are being shaped by consumerism.” This doesn’t mean that Mayo Clinic is less involved in real estate. In recent years, these new commercial ventures have taken Mayo into malls, bookstores, sports medicine facilities and even resorts. Yolch said, “You may see Mayo and other providers moving into retail locations with very specific practices combining things like dermatology, plastic surgery, and ENT.” Still, the core of the medical practice can be found in three destination medical centers in Rochester, Jacksonville and Scottsdale, where hospitals and clinics combine to serve patients. The next big frontier has arrived at Mayo, as it has at other hospitals and clinics, and that is the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning to help diagnose and treat disease and illnesses. Yolch explained, “The amount of data that we now have from 10 to 15 million patient records is significant. When you think about artificial intelligence and machine learning combined with 5G technology, we can start to build models for predicting outcomes without really collecting a specimen from the patient.” This means patients may stay closer to home in the future, receiving less intensive forms of medical care or advice (Mayo/Google announcement here). Health care as an industry will soon equal one-fifth of our economy, or close to a trillion dollars in expenditures annually. No wonder technology giants and startups alike have trained their collective gaze on health care and are ready to disrupt business as usual. Yolch is in just the right place to imagine how technology can actually improve health care delivery. “Bringing that kind of technology to health care is what excites me about some of the things that I’m working on right now, where we can really serve more patients in a better way. And for those that we can help, we can get them to our campuses sooner if they need to be seen.” Yolch explains that more patients will connect with Mayo digitally or virtually, and then follow up with local providers. “We can use technology to better connect patients with the care they need. That’s what really gets me excited every day.” Bill Griffith practices land use, real estate and municipal law at Larkin Hoffman. He represents Mall of America and the City of Columbus, Minnesota, as well as other owners, managers and developers of real estate. He has a special interest in sustainable solutions to land use and development challenges.

August 28, 2019

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Introducing a New Podcast Series

Finding the Future: Innovations in Land Use and Sustainability Picture the future. Does it include automated vehicles? Will we fly from place to place in personal pods like in the sci-fi movies we have watched? What else does the future hold and who will shape it? Land planners predict the future will be shaped by compact development and multi-modal transportation, meaning choices to travel by car, transit, bikes, on foot, and even scooters. That is the idea behind Finding the Future, a series of podcasts with thought leaders and innovators in land use and sustainability. Some of the topics we will cover in the series include how Mall of America, the nation’s largest retail and entertainment center, uses innovative land use concepts to remain fresh and relevant in a turbulent retail environment. Far away, on the shores of Lake Atitlan in Guatemala, you will learn how a small fishing village is demonstrating leadership in environmental protection by banning the use of plastic bags. Another episode takes a look at the largest complex of freshwater in the world, the Great Lakes, and the vast changes to the lakes happening just below the surface. As a land use lawyer for over 30 years, I have observed how difficult it can be to balance the need for cities and towns to grow and prosper with the impact of growth and development on the natural environment. In some ways, we want it all. Safe and vibrant cities, beautiful open spaces, recreational opportunities and workplaces that are productive and healthy. Without a strong economy in which business and commerce flourish, however, none of this is possible. In every era, innovators and leaders come forward to solve the most pressing problems of the day or provide opportunities to improve our quality of life. I think of the “City Beautiful Movement” that happened in the early 1900s in places like Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit and Washington D.C. Behind the movement was a desire to link architecture and urban planning to create beauty in public spaces and monumental grandeur in growing cities. The National Mall in Washington, D.C. is an example of this type of design philosophy, as are the malls and plazas often associated with state capitals and public universities across the country. Chicago architect, Daniel Burnham, who developed the 1909 Plan of Chicago is often associated with this movement, which was featured in the grim historic novel, Devil in the White City. Another example of innovation that impacts land use around the world is mechanized farming. Norman Borlaug was an American agronomist who was born in Iowa and won the Nobel Peace Prize for his leadership in what was termed the Green Revolution. His high-yield farming practices are credited with saving over a billion people from starvation. Environmentalists now question some of his practices but there is no doubt that his work still affects how we farm, eat and maintain land. A little closer to home is former Minneapolis Mayor Al Hofstedt who chaired the Metropolitan Council in its early days and encouraged urban renewal at the same time he protected historic neighborhoods closest to downtown Minneapolis. Waymo, a spin-off of Google, is a more recent example of innovation impacting land planning. Waymo introduced self-driving cars as a taxi service in Phoenix, Arizona using real riders. Already, city planners are altering projections about the amount of parking that will be needed in the coming years and making plans to convert parking structures into other land uses. It doesn’t take much effort to discover that people in cities big and small are working on ways to make our future better and more sustainable. What that means to different people is as varied as the opinions on a social media page, but what is exciting is that people care enough to think about it, talk about it and reflect on the best way to implement new ideas in land use. Let me know if you have a unique story to tell. I’m ready to listen. Bill Griffith

July 9, 2019

Finding the Future Podcast Series

Bloomington’s Plans for the Ultimate “Wow!” Waterpark.

For years, developers and planners have tried to figure out the best way to add a waterpark to Mall of America. The mall already boasts Nickelodeon Universe, the largest indoor amusement park in the country. Now, plans for a waterpark are getting serious. The city of Bloomington recently selected Provident Resources Group, a national nonprofit to own and operate the attraction. Under a unique financing arrangement, the nonprofit model allows the City to partner with Provident to “lessen the burdens of government” by undertaking economic development on behalf of the City. What this means in practical terms is the nonprofit will issue tax exempt bonds and shield the city’s taxpayers from risk. Thanks to a 30 year partnership with the city of Bloomington, Mall of America continues to expand, grow and renew itself. Even in a time of turbulence in the retail industry, visitors keep coming helping to fill up nearby hotel rooms and expand the city’s tax base. This is the purpose of the tax exempt program the City has landed on. Kurt Hagen has been dreaming about a waterpark since he took over development for Triple Five 13 years ago. “We have to give people a reason to come back to Mall of America. We need to create something that they can’t experience or buy online.” Mall of America still attracts 40 million visitors each year and part of that success is attributed to the strong draw of entertainment. In fact, mall managers program 350 to 400 events each year in the courts outside of anchor stores. Plans for the 250,000 square foot waterpark are under development, but expect the project to contain plenty of unique slides, a large wave pool, areas for groups and families, and entertainment for young people. The current schedule calls for construction to start next February with an opening a little over two years after that. For more information, listen to the podcast, Finding the Future.

July 2, 2019

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Category: Finding the Future Podcast Series

Finding the Future: “Getting to Yes” Interview with Karla Henderson

Learning Lessons From Permaculture: Interview With Rony Lec, Founder of IMAP

Finding the Future: Building Tiny Houses for the Homeless

Finding the Future: Reviving Downtown Minneapolis – Bisnow State of the Market Panel

Finding the Future: Retail Innovation Doesn’t Wait for a COVID Cure

Finding the Future: World Leaders Fighting Coronavirus Turn to University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME)

How the Slow City Movement Revived One Small Town in Central Italy

Finding the Future: Can the Great Lakes Survive?

Finding the Future: Guatemalan Fishing Village Bans Plastics

Finding the Future: Guatemalan Fishing Village Bans Plastics

Mayo Expands Beyond Bricks and Mortar to Reach Consumers: Interview with Jim Yolch, Global Business Solutions

Introducing a New Podcast Series

Bloomington’s Plans for the Ultimate “Wow!” Waterpark.

Firm Highlights