A Look At Who Is Running The Show Here, Part 2
September 8, 2016
This blog entry has been a long time coming, and it’s going to be a difficult one to write. When talking about the subject of Willie Lumpkins, deceit, and lack of transparency with regards to the Greenway project… there’s almost TOO MUCH subject matter to cover.
Misrepresentation has been the name of the game for those promoting the Greenway encroachment, and no one has exemplified “misrepresentation” quite like Willie has.
To start at the beginning, Willie was a board member of the Greenway Council, before he… wasn’t. Popular rumour has held that he was fired, yet no one seems to want to clarify WHY exactly he is no longer on the board.
All we know is that whenever Willie has gotten out of line, various board members have been quick to point out that Willie does not speak for the board, as he is no longer a member.
Why is it, then, that any time there is a news piece on the Greenway, Willie is still selected to be one of the mouthpieces of the project? Why does the Greenway council take great care to distance themselves from him when he acts out, yet routinely turns to him as a spokesperson?
Additionally, if distancing themselves from Willie, WHY has the official Northside Greenway Council had Willie in charge of their official Facebook page (recently renamed “Northside Greenway Now”)?
Now, you’ll note in that last image, the corresponding Will post is by a name other than “Will Lumpkins”
That is because this is one of his fake accounts, as he recently outed himself on:
By Willie’s own accounts, he’s not only a (former?) board member, but someone who is paid to “engage the community” with regards to the Greenway project.
On the subject of that “community engagement”… Will uses this fake account to “engage” residents on a local Greenway Facebook group:
… It was only recently that he outed himself as being the same person with a fake account, and that came around by accident. In the months leading up to it, he not only posted under the fake account to support the Greenway – making it appear that the Greenway has more support than it does – but also went so far as to reply to his own posts with his fake account, “converse” with his fake account, etc.
THIS is the “transparency” we’ve come to expect from him, the Greenway Council, and the City of Minneapolis. Fake accounts, misrepresentation of the level of support, and more.
… who pays Willie? This is an answer that many of us on the Stop the Greenway group have been asking, but – much like many other questions we have about the project, particularly with regards to money, where it’s coming from, and to whom it is being paid – we are left without answers.
Is the city paying his salary / fees? Is this abuse and deception coming from our tax money?
How exactly can the city claim to be a “neutral party” in this (per Lara Pratt, on many public occasions), while paying extremists to alienate those against the greenway, and basically act as a crass cheerleader for the project?
How was Willie hired for the “Community Engagement”? What vetting was in place? Was he truly the best choice for such a role, given that he’s blocked basically everyone involved with fighting against the greenway?
Wouldn’t “engaging” the detractors, trying to win us over be a smarter plan of action?
Can we really not expect that our tax dollars – especially when actively being used AGAINST us – to be used to hire someone of some degree of professionalism?
This IS, after all, the person that publicly stated that we were in the wrong for being concerned about “1 old lady with cancer”, rather than “the future”.
Comments
Marty loso
September 13, 2016 at 4:08 am
Great piece of journalism.
