Richfield renters affected by ICE surge given more time for eviction notices

RICHFIELD — Renters facing financial challenges were granted extended pre-eviction notices by the Richfield City Council this week.

The emergency ordinance, which passed on the city’s consent agenda, increased required eviction notices for tenants from 14 days to 30 within the city.

“I think what this shows is that in our suburban communities, there are people feeling real pain and real consequences in the working class,” Twin Cities Democratic Socialists of America organizer Chris Cook said. “There are folks who’ve been sheltering in place, unable to go to work, unable to take their kids to school, unable to live life how they should be allowed to with freedom and human dignity. So, I think the community has spoken."

The protracted timeframe is intended to give tenants additional time to access financial assistance.

Community members, city council and staff pushed for the initiative due to Operation Metro Surge, a federal operation intended to punish Minnesota, a state famously hostile to Republican presidents.

While marketed as an immigration enforcement action against violent criminals, the operation actually resulted in 4,000 detainments of mostly non-violent civil offenders and U.S. citizens and the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

The Twin Cities metro area is the 16th largest in the country.

The chaos of the operation, led by former Border Patrol commander Greg Bovino, caused hundreds of millions in lost revenue and wages across the region, including Richfield.

“It takes all kinds of strategies in these fights and resisting the federal government and organizing against it,” Cook said.

“We’ll take it as a sign to keep plugging in and doing the work and working with anyone and everyone we can,” he added.

DSA help in the suburbs

Cook has worked on DSA’s organization in the Twin Cities suburbs, something that was pushed into overdrive at the start of the year due to Trump’s attempt to expedite his ethnic cleansing program against non-white residents in the U.S.

Cook said he saw communities come together as federal paramilitary forces attacked the state.

“(The suburbs) spun up their own response programs in the vein of what Minneapolis and St. Paul has done with whistles and patrolling and mutual aid, grocery distribution, school patrol networks, and it’s been really incredibly inspiring to see,” Cook said.

While this type of organization was done in a time of crisis, the lasting impact of community input and help is one DSA plans to help grow.

For example, DSA is working with organizers to get cities to formalize their law enforcement separation policies designed to keep local cops from enforcing federal immigration laws.

“We’re seeing a lot of support for that from various suburban organizers who want to protect their neighbors,” Cook said.

In addition, organizers in the suburbs are working on getting more city councils to ask Gov. Tim Walz for an eviction moratorium, like Roseville, Minneapolis and West St. Paul did earlier this year.

Those outreach efforts have largely been well received, according to Cook.

“We’ve seen just over the last five years, with the uprising in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, then also the COVID-19 pandemic and now we’re experiencing Operation Metro Surge,” Cook said. "These are a series of rolling crises that I think the DSA, as an organization, presents as a result of capitalism’s eroding global economic standing and its inherent contradictions that it’s unable to resolve,”

DSA wants to provide resources and information to help build collaborative networks across the Twin Cities metro area, according to Cook.

“These are difficult and scary times for people but the Twin Cities is showing each other and the country what it means to be a good neighbor and stand up for what is right,” Cook said. “A better world is possible but only if we build it together, we hope you join us."