McQuade issue needs redirection Iver Bogen DPPA member Point Of View - Duluth News Tribune - mid Oct.2000 The editorial board of the Duluth News Tribune seems to have assumed the political work of the McQuade Public Access Committee (MPAC) for promoting the McQuade boat launch. Since the Duluth City Council meeting of July 24, when the Council voted not to lease the Congdon Trust land to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources for the boat launch, the newspaper's editorial staff has written and published four editorials supporting McQuade (Oct. 15, Oct. 4, Aug. 8, July 26). There was also a column by News Tribune Publisher Mary Jacobus, who demeaned the council by saying, ``The message from the council is clear: Make the most noise right before the council votes and you get your way.'' Her statement doesn't jibe with the facts. This council had already voted twice, at two separate council meetings, against pushing McQuade forward. The July 24 vote was merely consistent with these previous votes. In supporting McQuade, the newspaper's editorial board is recommending that the city negate the contractual agreement made with Chester Congdon in 1915 in Ordinance 606. Playing at being legal scholars, they suggest, ``Nothing in the concept of a public parkway would preclude the proposed McQuade project for the North Shore.'' This reasoning distorts and alters the intent of Ordinance 606. Contrary to the oft-stated News Tribune position, McQuade was deemed ethically and fiscally unacceptable to six courageous city councilors. To allow this crack in Ordinance 606 would let the ``camel's head into the tent.'' Developers would be eyeing the rest of the 13-mile gift as a location for further development. Choice and environmentally sensitive sites are always vulnerable to developers with a pot of money. After the City Council's historic vote, the newspaper's editorial board tried to place responsibility for improving this portion of the shore on the council by saying that ``each one of those six -- Ken Hogg, Lynn Fena, Greg Gilbert, Russ Stewart, Russ Stover and Gary Eckenberg -- has to answer the question, what's Plan B for the McQuade Road area?'' In addition, the editorial said, ``Those who wrapped themselves in the mantle of Chester Congdon's public parkway language to reject the proposed plan now owe it to residents of Duluth to propose an alternative improvement plan for the McQuade Road gateway to Duluth.'' It's fallacious to suggest that those who were opposed to allowing the use of dedicated land should now be responsible for a plan to make this area more presentable. It would appear that the editorial board is suggesting some form of atonement or punishment (cleaning up this area) for those persons and council members who in their well-supported reasoning rejected McQuade. Even so, when a Friends of the North Shore press release suggested that a convenience store would dress up the area and provide a replacement for the aging buildings there, the newspaper attacked this idea in an Oct. 4 editorial. These attacks on those opposed to McQuade are unseemly. This is also what MPAC did at its public meetings. A rational way of dealing with the McQuade area, now that the buildings there have been burned, would be for the newspaper to appeal to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources to clean up this area and erect a welcoming station with tourist facilities. After all, the DNR owns this land and should be responsible for its improvement. In all of its apparent political posturing, the editorial board has never criticized MPAC for its lack of candor. MPAC said that from its inception, there was a member of their group who spoke for the Congdon family and who assured MPAC that a boat launch was consistent with their wishes; that was not true. MPAC said in their application for funding to the Legislative Council on Minnesota Resources and the Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board that they already had the city land that was needed for the boat launch; that was not true. MPAC said that they had dropped support of the Knife River Marina because the Lake County Board did not want trailerable boats using this facility; that was not true. In addition, MPAC said that the Congdon Trust land that was needed for the boat launch was valued at $500,000 by the Duluth City Assessors office. The Assessors office said it never did any assessment there. With the News Tribune's editorial board now carrying MPAC's water, MPAC has become silent on McQuade as seemingly have the pro-McQuade readers. It's time to level the playing field. It's time for the newspaper to give the political football back to MPAC and let them create their own stories. Bogen is a professor emeritus, University of Minnesota-Duluth, and a member of Duluth Urban Wilderness. These articles are retained on the web for historical interest and do not necessarily reflect the views or goals of DPPA today.

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