Robin Wonsley

Both continue to resist the change, and they are using their power over the budget to do it.

Before Tuesday's event, Payne and Council Minority Leader Robin Wonsley announced that they are, quote, are advancing a proposal that would restructure and consolidate city government by eliminating the Office of the Community Safety and Performance Management and Innovation Department and consolidate the work of the Racial Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging Department into the Neighborhood Community Relations Department.

All proposed changes impact departments that were created in the 2022 Government Structure Implementation Ordinance and have struggled to demonstrate efficacy.

Their stated goal may be to cut unnecessary costs, but if that were their main motive, they could have brought their ideas to Mayor Frey before mid-October and worked toward an agreement.

So they want a drivered driverless car, which seems to sort of defeat the purpose.

[laughs] Authored by Council Member Robin Wonsley, the measure aims to prevent, or aimed to prevent tech-driven displacement of Minnesota's 10,000 rideshare drivers, address what they see as the potential job loss from automation, and keep driver earnings circulating in the local economy.

Thankfully, the mayor, Jacob Frey, got his head on right, vetoed the measure, calling it a backdoor ban that risks state-level preemption, something they experienced just recently when it came to rideshare driving, not only for the ultimate law, but also when they passed the law, uh, mandating a certain level of wages.

That really kind of woke up the folks in the state capital.

The ordinance is called Workers Drive Minneapolis, paced, uh, passed on a 7-6 vote.

"Workers Drive Minneapolis is about public safety and protecting immigrant workers from losing their jobs to automation," said City Council Minority Leader Robin Wonsley.

"Rideshare drivers and their families are invested in our city and our communities.

Big tech companies are not." Well, they are.

State legislators drafted regulations for autonomous vehicles last year, but didn't pass any.

Council member Robin Wonsley said that leaves a lot of unknowns in the rules

And that is why we're like, at the bare minimum, we need something in place.

So this gives us that very basic protection while we're further, you know, developing our comprehensive regulatory, uh, framework for commercial AVs