FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Jana Kooren, jkooren@aclu-mn.org, 651.645.4097 x123, 651.485.5925 (c)
St, Paul, Minn – Today, the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota announced that it has voluntarily dropped the lawsuit it filed on May 8 challenging the Clean Zone the City of Minneapolis established that had limited speech activities in the 15 days surrounding the All Star Baseball Game.
The lawsuit was filed on behalf of two members (Jim McGuire and Robert Kolstad) of a street festival planning committee who will be holding an event during that time period. Cooperating attorneys in the case were: Tom Hamlin and Mahesha Subbaraman of Robins, Kaplan, Miller and Ciresi LLP, along with Teresa Nelson of the ACLU-MN.
Shortly after the ACLU-MN filed their lawsuit the City of Minneapolis made substantial changes to the Clean Zone Resolution.
The following statement can be attributed to Charles Samuelson, Executive Director of the ACLU-MN, regarding the changes made to the Clean Zone Resolution:
We are pleased that the City reacted quickly to address the constitutional concerns that we had about the Clean Zone. The City has agreed to grant the necessary permits for the One Day in July Street Festival and has provided assurances that they will not expand or otherwise modify the Clean Zone resolution in the future. We have agreed to dismiss our lawsuit "without prejudice", which will allow us to reinstitute the lawsuit if future problems arise.
Our First Amendment rights should not be held hostage by private corporations, and we are glad that the City of Minneapolis recognized that and made the appropriate changes to the resolution. We hope that moving forward the City Of Minneapolis will be more aware of our constitutional concerns and ensure that future resolutions better protect our Constitutional Rights.