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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

I have to be honest, this is not a very convincing argument about who I should vote for instead.

Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

That’s a reasonable argument. I spent a lot of time with all of the candidates backgrounds and platforms and I was frankly pretty appalled with how little time most of them spent on the budget, transparency, and bringing more accountability to district leadership. He was different.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

I don’t think that’s a good idea, and thankfully something that’s well beyond the purview of the school board. The oversight from the board has been a nightmare and we need to try something new.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Michael Baskins, running for Minneapolis School Board, has a really impressive background and vision. Lots here on transparency and financial responsibility. He's a mechanical engineer and emphasizes collaboration. Seems like exactly what we need. baskinsforschoolboard.com/my-vision/

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Very fun vibes at the free parts of the Flickr MODE festival on Nicollet Mall. Recommend checking it out.

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Reposted by Charlie Rybak

Alex Schieferdecker @alexschief.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Tomorrow, Saturday the 19th! Ribbon cutting and celebration for Upper Harbor Park from 10:30-12:00. If you haven't gotten a chance to check out this incredible new space yet, you've got to get over there (and if you already have, here's an excuse to do so again).

An ad that reads:

You're invited!

Ribbon Cutting at Upper Harbor Park.
Saturday, September 19, 10:30 am - Noon
3700 West River Road North.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

The school that we plan (planned?) to send our kid to in our neighborhood is on the list. So I feel you. The math is the math and they have to close something somewhere but the timing and rollout have been handled very poorly.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

A great question that I do not know the answer to.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Among the many small details here that look sloppy at best - Lake Harriet Lower is on the list of closures, and two months ago they completed a major HVAC overhaul at the school. That makes no sense at all. www.mpschools.org/departments/...

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

The CDD was a failure pushed through at the worst possible time and I hope people reflect on why as a part of this. This plan was somehow years overdue and feels incredibly rushed. And that’s hard to stomach.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Also, no plan that I have seen for what you do with a school that closes. You can put a lot more money back into the system if you sell the building or land. But the district currently has three empty buildings. Are we about to pay to keep the pipes from freezing every winter at 16 more?

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

The district needs to show its work on how this would improve finances than they have. It is batshit that there is even a conversation about spending $100 million to construct a new school right now and I hope this puts and end to that. www.longfellownokomismessenger.com/stories/mps-...

longfellownokomismessenger.com

MPS plans to demolish Cooper, build $90-105 million facility for Anishinabe Academy - Longfellow Nokomis Messenger

Plans to demolish Cooper School and the newly rebuilt playground that the community raised funds for to construct a new building for Anishinabe Academy are moving forward despite the district’s $50 mi...

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

The district has lost 6-7k kids since 2019. Schools keep getting stripped down. Bigger schools with more arts, extracurriculars, etc is better than watching schools lose more resources to keep buildings open. Whatever the outcome the district desperately needs stability.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

I’m pretty gobsmacked at the timing of this. Announcing a plan of this scope two months before and election and scheduling a final vote on it one week after the election is going to maximize the chaos. Throwing a grenade into the middle of the school board races is not a good idea.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

Most of these companies have admitted that they have an endless appetite for compute and that they are almost definitely going to overspend to get it. AI will continue to be more of a part of our lives but many of the investments won’t work, kind of like the fiber internet buildout.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

It is a tricky issue and a fair point to raise. The route to lower construction & goods costs is paved with a collapse of the AI bubble and a recession. I think there’s a good chance there are good things on the other side of that, I’m just scared about how long we all end up in the ditch first.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

There’s no way to cut the numbers where it makes sense to be turning away tax base. There’s a pretty bare pipeline today and interest rates aren’t going down soon. We will feel that in two years if not sooner.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

I wrote about power bills in the piece and stand by what I said there. The utility $$ and environmental impact matters a lot and planned correctly, it can be addressed. It is a technological problem with a technological solution.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

A longer discussion for a longer day but you know that I very much agree with that and think that there aren’t really any thriving local papers that have it all figured out right now. The market is brutal.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

We need a Godwin’s Law for Kmart because you are right and it is a devastating idea to even imagine! But yes, the point of my argument is that the power lies in the leverage of the conditions you can demand today, which may not exist in a year or two.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Definitely - the fundamentals of the business are the fundamentals. But they already moved the printing and looking out at McClatchy et al today next to the jobs they’ve already cut, I think this could sting. I hope they can find a new buyer soon but even $20M off the sales price will hurt.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Yeah. I’m worried about economy, interest rates, lack of any movement on housing, huge budget crunch, qnd more. And I think that should open people up to things they would’ve found objectionable 3-4 years ago.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Yeah, good for tax $$ but bad for the Strib, which seems to need the money. For taxes, i believe data centers pay 2% rate and multifamily pays 1.25%. What you net from that comes down to structure value obviously. My concern is that we get neither for a long period of time. Hope I am wrong.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

I hope that you are right. Price will likely be lower and sale later, which means less $$. FWIW it seems like Legacy floated it but didn’t ever fully commit. If that situation arises again I hope the city will find a way to negotiate, lock it in, and take the deal before this happens again.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

I think this deal blowing up is bad news for the city. The lost tax revenue will be paid for in property tax increases and budget cuts, and the city budget is nearing crisis levels. I wrote about why we need to rethink our approach a few days ago here: tcbmag.com/some-data-ce...

tcbmag.com

Some Data Centers Are Good

People really hate data centers. There’s no sugarcoating it – they’ve become one of the most politically toxic issues in the midterm elections, with the governors of previously data center-friendly st...

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Really loved this article on how AI is bending the relationship between small businesses and their customers, especially when it comes to art. So many great anecdotes in here from both sides. www.startribune.com/ai-use-is-st...

startribune.com

AI use is straining customer loyalty. It’s playing out in a local grocery store.

As more small Minnesota businesses embrace AI to compete, many customers are saying they feel betrayed.

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Reposted by Charlie Rybak

David Brauer @dbrauer.net · 11/09/2026

Anyway, here’s a section that will cut you to your core. Odds are 1-2% of the local Latino population has been deported & one community member thinks 25% have left.

“We lost a lot of our community,” said Rudy Trujillo, owner of accounting firm Trujillo Service at 420 E. Lake St., whose clients are mostly Latino immigrants.
He estimates that one in four Latinos left the Twin Cities, either by self-deportation or moving to another state.
No hard data is yet available. About 235,000 Hispanic people lived in the seven-county metro area in 2024, according to census data. The 5,000th detainee (most detainees were of Latin-American descent) was flown out of Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in August, Minnesota Reformer reports.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

It’s the best thing there and number 2 isn’t close.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Minneapolis is getting an event that’s aiming to be the world’s biggest photography festival from Sept. 18-20. They want MODE Photography Festival to be like SXSW was for music in Austin & Sundance was for film in Park City. I talked to their President & COO about it here: youtu.be/wSLOakPnUv8?...

youtu.be

Why Flickr Chose Minneapolis for the World’s Biggest Photography Festival

YouTube video by Twin Cities Business

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Minneapolis and St. Paul both get mentioned in here. Minneapolis had slower growth, while St. Paul’s population actually declined. Also really stark how closely Minneapolis growth track with Chicago, which would lead you to believe they’re both following bigger trends.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Interesting data from Brookings - after a few years of post-pandemic growth, most big cities in the U.S. saw their growth slow down or go negative last year. www.brookings.edu/articles/big...

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

Pretty amazing how well you can see the tv markets on the map. The margin in the primary was pretty stunning given the spending gap, even more so when you look at this and see that it looks like the $$ helped in some places.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

It is so great. And yeah, that’s the best feature. The show is the street and the river. Very well done.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

New top 5 place in Minneapolis to have a drink just dropped

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

Pretty great that General Sports Bar looks like they’re going to bring back the skate sharpening the area lost when General Sports died. Finally an option west of Flanders Bros, which is excellent but not enough for an area this big!

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

This essay about how hyper-politicization is eating the world around us is one of the best things I’ve read this year: www.nplusonemag.com/online-only/...

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 30/07/2026

Damn, we’re actually going to the playoffs.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 18/07/2026

Can’t believe the Twins are actually going to the playoffs. Damn.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 12/06/2026

I think you will change your mind when you see the 2027 highlights I have imagined in my head

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

If you lived in Minneapolis, you too could stumble upon random backyard concerts while on evening dog walks.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

Can anyone tell me the name of the band playing a backyard show on the 2500 block of Aldrich? Because they absolutely ripped it.

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Reposted by Charlie Rybak

Wes Burdine @wesburdine.bsky.social · 25/05/2026

George Floyd should be alive today. Feels like everything and nothing changed the day he was murdered 6 years ago.

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Charlie Rybak @charlierybak.bsky.social · 15/05/2026

Been trying to figure out a good comp and I’m settling on Steve Nash & Lamelo Ball (on court only). She is such a star.

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