A league of her own

It is the “deer thing,” as she calls it, that Geralyn Barone remembers. The deer population around Minnetonka, Minn., had exploded. Deer were everywhere, eating people’s pansies, destroying their well-kept lawns and, more seriously, smashing into their cars. After the third straight year of 150-plus deer-car collisions, the city prepared to take action.

Barone was — and is — Minnetonka’s assistant city manager. The time remains vivid in her memory because Minnetonka is not a place given to controversy. The tidy, conservative suburb of Minneapolis/St. Paul is home to 53,000 people who long ago learned the fine art of getting along with each other.

Then “Bam!” Or more precisely, “Bambi!” The community split like an overripe watermelon — animal rights advocates on one side and frustrated property owners on the other. The city’s decision, based on extensive study and painstaking counts of the area’s deer population, was to trap and kill nuisance deer.

The results were predictable. Lawsuits were threatened; untruths were disseminated as fact; death threats were received. Plainclothes officers were stationed at public hearings in case things got out of hand.

Karen Anderson was fairly new at her job as the city’s mayor. The job, part-time and paying just $9,600 a year, was low-profile in Minnetonka’s council/manager form of government. But it fell to Anderson to make the decisions — and the peace. How she handled the mini-crisis is what Barone remembers most. And it is why Barone admires Anderson and considers her both a colleague and a friend.

“It was as threatening a situation as we have had as a community,” Barone says. “It was a very emotionally charged issue. We got through it as well as we did because of Karen. She was always diplomatic and respectful of people with opinions different from hers. She allowed people to talk.” (Minnetonka’s deer management program still is in place, but the controversy died down once residents realized that fears of hunters running willy-nilly through the streets with rifles were unfounded. In fact, the city contracts with a hunter who sets traps for the deer, shoots them and hauls them away, all before 6 a.m. The meat is given to local charities, as are the hides.)

“Karen is good at finding the nuances of the things that bring people together, and she knows how to do that so that things get done. She is one of the most sincere, most passionate people I have ever known,” says Louisburg, N.C., Mayor Lucy Allen, whom Anderson calls “my friend and mentor.”

An advocate for community

Anderson will take over the National League of Cities presidency at the group’s December meeting. Those who have worked with her say that her ability to bring people together to get things done makes her effective not just as a politician, but as an advocate for her interests. That ability also spurred Anderson to seek public office.

“I had been active on various city committees,” she says. “I was appointed to chair the city’s zoning ordinance committee. We rewrote the zoning ordinance, making it more flexible and more current in terms of environmental standards. We created one of the first wetlands protection ordinances in Minnesota. Then, when we finished, I realized that there was no guarantee that it would be adopted or implemented.” To ensure that someone would be around to rally the troops for the ordinance’s adoption, Anderson ran for and won a seat on the city council. In 1993, she was elected mayor and, in 1997, she was re-elected. She currently is seeking a third term.

If zoning is what got Anderson to the mayor’s office, community is what keeps her there. She has many passions — gender equity, affordable housing and community — but it is community that drives her. The word peppers her speech: “I worked with the League of Women Voters. That got me involved in the community.” “Minnetonka is a very conservative Republican community.” “We passed an open space preservation referendum that reflects our community values.” “The big challenge is getting community involvement.” So it seemed natural that Anderson would be chosen to chair the Livable Communities Advisory Committee of the Metropolitan Council, an organization of local government leaders that helps set policy for the Minneapolis/St. Paul region. It makes further sense that she would make building better communities a central issue for the National League of Cities’ Advisory Council, which she did as a member of that body from 1997 to 2000.

Indeed, Anderson has chosen “Building Quality Communities” as the theme for her NLC presidency. She is aware that the topic is broad, incorporating everything from housing and land use to regionalism and open space preservation. “It’s an issue that resonates nationally,” says Allen, who chairs NLC’s Building Quality Communities committee. “People are concerned about growth. They want to know what investments we can make that will give us more of what we want our communities to be. Everything is a tool to build the tangible and intangible communities we want.”

Anderson is the right person to lead NLC on the issue, Allen notes. “She is a lady who has wide respect in NLC because people know how hard she works, and they do not see her as self-serving in any way,” she says.

Jim Miller goes even further. “She’s the model for elected officials,” says Miller, president of the League of Minnesota Cities and former Minnetonka city manager. “She is a very good listener who doesn’t form opinions without input. She is inclusive and always strives to find ways to involve everyone in the process, regardless of their positions.”

Local accomplishments

That quality will serve Anderson well as she takes on community growth and development issues, some of which, she knows, can seem threatening. In Minnetonka, she has managed to put open space preservation, affordable housing and other “social service” issues not commonly associated with conservative Republican suburbs on the local agenda, and she is proud of the results.

Recently Minnetonka residents passed a bond referendum that will provide $15 million for park renovation and open space preservation. (The referendum squeaked by, and Anderson admits that voter turnout was low because of the vote’s Sept. 11 date.) The city also has created partnerships with school districts, the business community and non-profit organizations that have allowed it to build new facilities and institute new programs for children.

Minnetonka also became one of the first cities in the state to take advantage of grant money available under the Minnesota Livable Communities Act, which mandates creation of affordable housing opportunities in redevelopment projects. The issue of affordable housing is “a biggie for me personally,” Anderson says.

Minnetonka used a $770,000 grant to redevelop its West Ridge Market area, which had badly deteriorated. The development now offers 250,000 square feet of retail space that provides the economic engine that supports more than 400 units of housing — 200 of which qualify as affordable. Housing ranges from totally subsidized units to $500,000 condos. In the development, parks have been renovated, and a community center has been built. There also is a day care center and a major transit stop that provides express bus service into downtown Minneapolis.

Anderson credits the city council with providing the impetus for the development of affordable housing in Minnetonka. “Over the last four years, the council has approved over 550 units of affordable housing,” she notes. “Some of the projects have been controversial, and the council has taken very courageous stands.”

Highlighting regionalism

On at least one topic — regionalism — Anderson brings a unique perspective to the NLC table. Since 1945, when the league began electing its presidents solely from mayoral and city council ranks (rather than from the ranks of state municipal leagues), it has not had a president from a suburb. Minnetonka’s status as both a suburb and part of a regional government gives Anderson an opportunity to address issues that might have been pushed aside in the past. Regionalism is one such issue, though it has not so much been pushed aside as pushed out the door.

“Regional governments are seen as very threatening in many parts of the country,” Anderson says. “The question is: How can you work in partnership to make good decisions without giving up your soul, your autonomy?”

Minnetonka has managed to walk that fine line as part of the Metropolitan Council. The city is part of regional transit and sewer systems, and Anderson encourages the regional cooperation. “She has been a great voice for cities on the national level,” says Minneapolis Mayor Sharon Sayles Belton. “And she is a great partner for us on the local level. She knows how important it is for us all to work together.”

The Metropolitan Council is the product of a long history of cooperation between Minneapolis/St. Paul and their suburbs. Still, working together could have been tougher for Anderson; Belton, an African-American Democrat; and Norm Coleman, a Brooklyn, N.Y.-born Republican who is mayor of St. Paul. It is a tribute to all three — and to the idea of regionalism that binds the area — that it has not been that difficult. “We always knew that, when it comes right down to it, our differences are not as great as what we have in common,” Belton says.

One of the first challenges the three faced together was the development of the area’s regional transportation system, which incorporates light rail and interstate highways. “We knew that many of the factories were in the suburbs,” Belton says. “And we knew that many of the workers who supported those factories were in the cities. It was in all our best interests to find a way to get the workers to the factories. Issues like that — and affordable housing — can be very challenging for the public. They can be divisive. But Karen staked out her ground as a leader on those issues.”

Meeting the challenge

As president of NLC, Anderson also intends to stake out a leadership position on one of her pet issues — the participation of women in government. “The U.S. is actually behind a lot of countries in terms of women’s participation in government,” says Anderson, who represented NLC at a United Nations forum on women. “We’re behind the Scandinavian countries. And India just adopted a policy that women must be represented in the government based on their percentage of the population, so at some point we’ll fall behind [it]. We’ve made wonderful progress in the last 20 years in local government, but we’ve still got a long way to go.”

Anderson’s part-time job as mayor demands so much time that she could not work another job if she chose to, and that, she understands, is part of the problem for women who might be interested in local politics. “It’s not as difficult getting women elected as it is getting them to run,” she says. “Women have such huge responsibilities both in and outside the home, there’s simply no time left. The limitations are large.”

So far, those limitations have not affected Anderson, but her greatest challenge may lie ahead as she attempts to answer the question: Can a suburban mayor effectively lead an organization devoted to cities? Those who know Anderson offer a resounding yes. “She has a very good grasp of the varying needs of communities of all sizes,” Barone says. “She has worked closely with the mayors of St. Paul and Minneapolis. She does a nice job of being a ‘metropolitan citizen.’ She doesn’t see herself as a suburban mayor.”

Belton even thinks Anderson’s status as the mayor of a suburb could work to her advantage. “NLC represents all communities, from the small towns to the cities to the suburbs,” Belton says. “The president has to be able to listen to all concerns and ensure that our public policies are responsive to everyone. Karen is absolutely capable of doing that. She has demonstrated it at home.”