This may help us gain a better understanding of festering housing issues before they erupt, like this case that Jeff Skrenes has been reporting on at Johnny Northside’s blog. In that case, a husband and wife team formed a business partnership and appear to have purchased over 50 Minneapolis properties that later all fell into foreclosure. Here is a map of what they own in North Minneapolis, according to Jeff Skrenes’s sources:

Pulling back, here is a city-wide look at their empire.

See how this could be useful? If someone in the Hawthorne Neighborhood figures out that a particular landlord is behind a series of problem properties, they could tip off involved community members in Whittier or Phillips about properties that may deserve a closer look. People from various communities could work together to identify who’s making life difficult for people across the city.

But, this can only be done with better data. Community activists shouldn’t have to stumble upon cooperative gatekeepers to public data. If the data is truly public, it needs to also be more readily accessible than it is today.

Here’s one example of what I have in mind. The Hennepin County Property Information Search site provides information on who owns each property in the county. This includes the address of the taxpayer and whether the property is a homestead (owner-occupied primary residence) or non-homestead property.

As an experiment, I decided to check out where the taxpayer of each property on Lyndale Avenue North actually resides. Obviously, quite a few live in the homes they own on Lyndale, but what about the rest? I checked every address starting from 2102 Lyndale Ave N heading North to the Northern border of the city. Each marker on the map below plots the address of a Lyndale Ave N property owner. This shows that a significant portion of the properties on that street belong to taxpayers who also live on that street.

However, if I zoom out on the map to a display greater Twin Cities Metro view, you can see that a significant portion of the homes on Lyndale Ave N are owned by people who live a significant distance from their properties:

This is where rentals come into play. How close of an eye does a landlord keep on a property that’s 30 minutes away?

Pulling back on the map one more time, the markers below show that properties on Lyndale Ave N are actually owned by people and companies all over the United States.

At the national level, it looks like a common theme is bank ownership. Foreclosures on Lyndale Ave N are now owned by banks in New York City, Houston, and Rancho Cucamonga.

Why does this matter? It turns out that home ownership rates have a significant correlation with neighborhood challenges, such as crime rates.

For three types of incidents (disturbances, assaults, and drugs), landlord remoteness from properties is positively associated with reported criminal activity. This association may be caused by management quality deterioration due to the increased costs of conducting business from a distance or a remote landlord’s ability to ignore some of the external costs imposed by tenant misbehavior on neighbors. Non-resident landlords may be less selective in choice of tenants, more accommodating of behavior and lifestyles that they would not accept if located ‘next door’ to their own residence, and less likely to employ effective surveillance and security measures.

This isn’t suggesting that all landlords living outside of North Minneapolis are automatically slumlords, or that those who live there are not. What I’m interested in is figuring out which landlords are failing to run their businesses in a community-friendly manner.

In future posts, I’ll attempt to lay out some of the challenges community activists face in their attempts to turn around problem areas of neighborhoods.

I’ll give some examples of how we can better use technology to arm community activists with the data they need to uncover slumlord enterprises.

And, I may ask you for some time and money to help gather and aggregate public data into more usable formats so we can help the helpers make positive changes faster.

In return, you’ll gain access to some insight into the economics of slumlording and contribute in a small but significant way to making Minneapolis an even better city. If that interests you, leave a comment of send and email. If you’d like to get involved while remaining anonymous, that’s fine with me. My contact information can be found on my About page, or click here to send me an anonymous message.

This will likely be broken up with pictures of TP and rants about yellow pages, of course. Good times ahead.

Lake of the Isles was the turnaround. This is a shot looking North near 28th St.

Grace Trinity Community Church is at the corner of 28th & Humboldt is a home to Presbyterians and Baptists who worship together.

I can’t figure out the story behind this house of worship (or former?) at 28th & Garfield. It looks like it may house the Central City Theatre.

Fire Station 8 at Blaisdell is definitely active. A truck returned to the station just after I snapped this shot.

Simpson United Methodist Church, at 1st Ave S, works fervently with and for the homeless in the area to help improve their lives.

The West Phillips neighborhood sign is the first I’ve seen, I think, that includes a company name, with the old Honeywell smoke stack showing up. I dig the Midtown Greenway receiving a nod.

Honeywell today is now home to Wells Fargo Home Mortgage. That entrance to the property used to be a popular place for protests by those who didn’t appreciate Honeywell profiting from weapons systems. If you’ve never walked the grounds of this location, check it out in the spring. The landscaping is impressive.

Open Door Evangelistic World Ministries (warning, sound) has has been in many locations around town, including an apartment basement, and has called Oakland & 28th home for around a decade now.

Abbott Northwestern Hospital, at Chicago Ave S, has been around since 1887. An excellent time line can be found here. And they have information on how to get started running.

I can’t tell if St Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, at 15th Ave S, is still open. Anyone?

Bloomington Avenue S, in this area, has had its share of problems in past years. This corner seemed like a common spot for retail drug sales, although that seems to have dropped off a bit recently.

The Midtown Greenway benefits from the Sabo bridge over Hiawatha Ave. However, there are still two relatively high traffic crossings in this area. This is the first, where the Greenway crosses 28th on the way to the bridge. Notice that the cyclist is cutting behind the waiting car. An experienced defensive biking move. There are signs warning cars about bikes at this crossing and a painted crosswalk, but 28th St E has a bit of an arterial feel that seems to lead to rushed driving. The other busy crossing is Minnehaha Ave S.

An example of sustainable landscaping can be found behind The Green Institute just to the West of Hiawatha.

Katar River Restaurant & Bakery is a relatively new Ethiopian restaurant. Have you tried it yet?

Anne Sullivan School, at 31st Ave S and 28th St E, is a High-5 through eighth grade school and the citywide specialty school for deaf and hearing impaired students.

Brackett Park, at 36th Ave S and 28th St E, is one of the most heavily used parks in the neighborhood. The Rocket used to be a playground item, was removed for new child safe equipment that doesn’t seem all that much safer to me, then repurposed as this art piece. This is a popular park for kickball, broomball, and softball leagues. There is also a skate park, a pool, and room for Ren Fest characters to brush up on their juggling.

I took a right at 39th Ave S and passed the First Free Methodist Church at 29th St E, who’ll be celebrating its 103rd year this year.

This vacant retail property at 39th & E Lake St was last home to a SuperAmerica, but that’s been gone for more than 5 years, I think. It looks like they currently property owners are doing a better job recently of maintaining the property. During the reconstruction of E Lake St, bringing in new businesses would have been tough, but it seems like a great opportunity for a business now. How about a Punch Pizza?

Blue Moon Coffee Cafe (Warning: Sound) at 39th & Lake has some solid rice krispy bars. The Other Mike is the mayor on Foursquare with 22 checkins. Remember when they were having issues with WiFi squatters? I was in there the other day and saw a decent sized crowd of people buying things, so perhaps that’s blown over?

Back on a pre-snowfall November 28th, I crossed Minneapolis on 26th and 28th Streets. But first, I picked off a few streets South of that route to get things started.

El Norteno is one of my favorite Mexican restaurants in the city. Very friendly service. Authentic food. Awesome. The only person to give the place a 2-star or lower review on Yelp lives in Woodbury, which reinforces place’s awesomeness. Next time try Don Pablo’s, John G.

I’m the mayor of East Lake Liquor on Foursquare. So far, that hasn’t earned me any deals there.

Video Lease is Longfellow’s finest porn shop. And only.

Heading North, I connected with W Mississippi River Rd near 26th and started West from there. The Immanuel Baptist Church is at 36th Ave S.

Hexagon Bar is a cool music venue and some excellent Heggies pizzas. Their pizza oven is damaged, so the bartenders have to keep a close eye on things to create an even cook job but they have it down. It’s also a great spot to for morning drinking.

The Hearing and Service Dogs of Minnesota headquarters near 26th St & 25th Ave is where dogs are trained to help Minnesotans live more independent lives. Volunteer opportunities are posted on their website.

West of Cedar on 26th, things get a little rough, but people are proving that they care and are fighting back against the bad eggs by taking steps to prevent graffiti on their property through murals like this one.

Boarded up properties are fairly common in Phillips. It’s one of the harder hit areas on the South side of Minneapolis.

I don’t know what this Praxair contraption behind Abbot Northwestern Hospital does, but I’m impressed by the ice that hangs off it year round.

The Zurrah Shrine and Event Center resides in the old Harrington Mansion at Park Ave & 26th. Partying in the Red Fez room in the carriage house sounds like a good time to me. Depending on how closely you follow Freemason real estate deals, you may not realize that this is being put up for sale, so you could own your own event center soon.

Here’s the Minneapolis skyline from the 26th St E bridge over 35W.

Whittier shows off the neighborhood’s draws, including art museums, theaters, and Eat Street restaurants on their sign.

One of my favorite late night stops, Little Tijuana, is just East of Nicollet on 26th. As reviews consistently suggest, the hours are the best thing this place has to offer.

Calvary Baptist Church, at 26th & Blaisdell, has been at this corner since 1883, and the current building dates back to 1902.

Common Roots Cafe, at 26th & Lyndale, is one of Carly’s favorite restaurants in the city. Great food with a strong focus on fresh non-industrial local ingredients.

The CC Club feels like the kind of place that should have an exemption from the smoking ban. The place describes what it’s looking for on its MySpace page as, “Local Minneapolis people, drunks, punks, hip hop kids, pool sharks, rockers, scenesters, indie kids, emo kids, and anyone willing to buy me a drink.”

Jefferson Community School’s playground abuts Hennepin Ave at 26th. The school has a NASA partnership, which may interest SpaceVidcast.com’s Bencredible.

A few blocks past Hennepin, I ran into Lake of the Isles. Not literally. While working my way over to 28th for the return trip East across town, I remembered how much I like this house. If I ever end up owning it, expect to see me on the top balcony shooting trap shot out over the lake.

I’ll save 28th St for another post.

I started highlighting where I’d ran, starting this this 4-ish miler at the North end of North Minneapolis:

As of now, the map looks like this:

Optimistically, I thought I might be able to run the entire city in 2009. However, I’ve fallen far short of that goal for a variety of reasons. I lost at least 2 months to travel, one month recovering from an ankle sprain, and a least a month to laziness.

On the plus side, I’ve discovered some really cool Minneapolis neighborhoods, lost 10 pounds, and enjoyed blogging about what I’ve run past to date. I’ve also increased my average running distance as I’ve gotten into better shape.

Barring injury or something unforeseen, I’m confident that I’ll be able to finish this project in 2010. I know it would be easier with some help from you, so if you’re up for a run anywhere in the city that I haven’t hit yet, send me an email or give me a ring. I’ve already run with quite a few of you during this project, and always appreciate the company.