To: City of Minneapolis Business, Housing & Zoning Committee
From: Defend Glendale & Public Housing Coalition
Subject: Comments regarding Minneapolis Public Housing Authority’s Report
Date: October 20, 2026
The crisis at Heritage Park, as the Minneapolis Public Housing Authority describes it, is a 25-year-old consequence of MPHA’s privatization agenda. We ask that this committee investigate the scope of this crisis, including MPHA’s inaction despite over a decade of advocacy by Heritage Park tenants. As this crisis worsens, it draws attention to the disinvestment, mismanagement, and waste of funds that occur when publicly-owned housing is given to private interests. This will continue to worsen, as MPHA has privatized over 80 percent of its family-designated public housing, leaving 20 single-family homes and the 184-unit Glendale Townhomes alone to serve a waitlist with thousands of households and thousands of people. As MPHA describes its plans to convert Glendale Townhomes to deeply affordable units, understand this was the same promise and premise offered to Sumner Glenwood residents following the Holloman decree that demolished Sumner Glenwood Section 9 Public Housing, the oldest, historic, and largest in the City of Minneapolis. Thousands of low-income Black and Hmong families were displaced after being misled by the city, MPHA, and housing nonprofits. With over 14 acres of Section 9 public land still vacant, Heritage Park was built in the early 2000’s. Heritage Park will be the destiny of the Historic Glendale Townhomes and the hundreds of homes privatized in recent years. Beyond neglect and abandonment, privatization also leads to corruption; this was noted when Sharmarke Isse, CEO Abdi Warsame’s friend and pick for MPHA board chair, was arrested for misconduct and fraud. Public housing residents have uncovered a pattern of dishonest conduct, neglect, and fraud conducted by MPHA during the privatization of public housing. We request this committee fully investigate MPHA’s current and recent conversions, audit the organization as a whole, and specifically investigate the sale of former Section 9 public housing single-family homes to MPHA staff.
To provide context, during the first term of the Trump administration, the U.S. Department of Housing & Urban Development (HUD) deregulated a Section 18 Demolition & Disposition, a tool used to convert and privatize Section 9 public housing. As a result, MPHA used Section 18 to privatize approximately 717 of 736 Section 9 single-family homes—known as scattered sites—throughout Minneapolis, which housed larger, low-income families. Although participation was optional, Mayor Frey and the Minneapolis City Council lobbied HUD to approve the application. MPHA disseminated misleading public information and engaged with residents inadequately. At the same time, MPHA activated a nonprofit CHR to acquire the homes for $1.
Attached is the 2019 HUD approval letter for Section 18. The letter states that MPHA had the option to sell the homes to the families living there. MPHA stated it would not sell the homes to residents because the properties would be converted to Section 8 project-based units under CHR. Section 18 Conversion led to higher rents and additional fees.
Attached documents, which are data requests from MPHA, show that several of the former Section 9 single-family homes were sold to MPHA staff at half of their market value. These were the homes that were nicely renovated. Why did MPHA not offer the homes to the families that lived there? How can MPHA tell HUD they are not selling homes to residents, yet sell homes to their staff? To our knowledge, there were no public announcements of sale or letters from MPHA to city residents. Residents displaced from their homes due to the conversion were not offered the option to buy those homes.
Attached are PDF copies and Excel spreadsheets as evidence. The file titled “Property Dispositions” was provided on August 22, 2025, and the file titled “LTO Units” was provided on September 8, 2025. After receiving the first file, we requested clarification on whether the property purchasers were employees, etc. Also, when contacted, the city’s ethics department (see attached response) stated that the City of Minneapolis has no oversight of MPHA. Considering the legal charter (Rule 420) requires MPHA to submit quarterly reports, the mayor and city council’s responsibilities in appointing MPHA’s Board and CEO, setting the policy agenda, and this committee’s role in engaging MPHA policy, the ethics department’s statement that the City of Minneapolis has no oversight of MPHA is clearly untrue. Why is the city denying responsibility? At the same time, all Section 18 and RAD privatization applications are approved by the City, and a resolution authorizing privatization schemes was adopted.
We ask this committee to critically examine MPHA and the city’s role in the current crisis at Heritage Park. Understand that Heritage Park is the legacy of privatization, and the city has a responsibility towards the rights and dignity of public housing residents and taxpayers. Our communities should not subsidize home sales for government employees or finance the neglect and mismanagement of city property and city residents by major corporations such as McCormack, Baron and Salazar, especially when those homes were previously managed by MPHA with lower costs and better long-term results. Public housing residents have been raising the alarm on the long-term impacts of privatization in Minneapolis for nearly three decades. Now, the agency responsible for the city’s privatization agenda is providing a case study on the real-world results of those processes. There is very little public housing left in the city for families who may not be served by the Section 8 program (which is also at capacity) due to income, disability, or other disqualifying factors. According to MPHA’s proposals, they would like to privatize and convert what little remains. In 20 years, residents of this city will ask what happened to all the public housing. Will your committee members cosign this legacy of privatization and neglect? Or examine the facts as a whole and represent the best interests of public housing residents? Audit MPHA and investigate fully to prevent another Heritage Park Crisis.
https://lims.minneapolismn.gov/File/2018-00866
(https://lims.minneapolismn.gov/File/2018-01015)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ad-Lo6y7oHI The MPHA item starts at around 52 minutes.