A volunteer-run community ambassador program recently launched in Uptown due, in part, to a perceived lack of response from numerous City systems including 311, 911, and their elected officials.
For the last three years, council members have passed and advocated for programs to specifically uplift Uptown for those programs to never materialize at the departmental level until this month.
“Safety resources specifically designated and funded for the Ward 10 area such as an additional Crime Prevention Specialist to the 5th Precinct and Uptown Safety Ambassadors have been delayed by multiple years or all together stalled,” Ward 10 Council Member Aisha Chughtai wrote to constituents in her April 13, 2026 newsletter.
Chughtai co-authored a community ambassador program in 2023. The program was fully funded in the City’s budget and was not implemented until an announcement was made by the Neighborhood Safety Department on April 15, 2026 that ambassadors were finally coming to Uptown in November.
“After years of advocacy from my office in partnership with the community, I’m so happy to announce that... we did it! Safety Ambassadors are coming to Uptown,” Chughtai wrote in an email on April 15.
The Neighborhood Safety Department was tasked in the City’s 2024 budget to “develop, implement, and deploy” an ambassador pilot program in the city’s seven cultural districts, Uptown, Dinkytown, Mill District and East Hennepin with a $3 million budget. Uptown had $300,000 earmarked for its own program.
Based on data provided by the Downtown Improvement District, the $300,000 could cover 5,000 hours of time in Uptown.
In response to Southwest Voices’ inquiries about the status of the Uptown program, a City spokesperson said in April, “The City started the ambassador program pilot less than a year ago in two areas that had the highest need based on data – East Lake Street and Franklin Avenue.”
The City spokesperson, Jess Olstad, said the City has enough funding for one more year of the pilot program before it is fully expanded.
When former Ward 7 Council Member Katie Cashman was elected she “relentlessly pushed” for the implementation of the ambassador program to “no avail,” she told Southwest Voices in April 2026.
“Since I started my term in January, I have been pushing our Office of Community Safety (Commissioner Barnette’s team) to implement the Uptown pilot program,” Cashman said in an email to her constituents in August 2024.
The Uptown Association held a meeting in 2025 with Chughtai and Cashman to discuss the implementation of the program. Despite it being funded and supported by both Uptown council members, they struggled to get City leadership to implement it.
The Office of Community Safety, led by Toddrick Barnette, is in charge of the Neighborhood Safety Department, tasked with the ambassador program.
“I was a thorn in his side about it for years,” Cashman said about Barnette. “Council members have no governance ability to direct the departments to do anything.”
The City Council voted to remove Barnette from his position as of April 9, 2026. Mayor Jacob Frey vetoed the council’s decision, two unprecedented moves that have yet to be resolved by the City Clerk.
Chughtai said she didn’t understand why it took a year and a half to get the ambassador pilot up and running.
“I’m at my wits end,” Chughtai said in an interview with Southwest Voices.
Chughtai and Council Member Aurin Chowdhury also authored a 2025-26 budget amendment for $900,000 in small business reconstruction reimbursement funds for businesses impacted by construction, including Hennepin Avenue. Hennepin Avenue’s small businesses were hit hard recently by a major reconstruction of the street.
A year after the budget’s passage, the City’s Community, Planning and Economic Development department had not designed the program.
That money is now gone.
“Due to the state of the City’s budget, CPED needed to find $5 million to fund contracted obligations and key housing program investments,” Olstad said. “Programs that did not have guidelines in place, like this one, were sources for those obligations.”
Before council members pass funding for specific programming or initiatives, there is extensive staff and legal review to make sure that it's feasible for City departments to take on the work, according to Chughtai.
Who then is accountable for making sure the things that City Council passes in its budget gets implemented?
“That’s the million dollar question,” Chughtai said. “It comes down to the mayor, the executive of the city, who oversees implementation. If something does not happen, ultimately, the buck stops with the executive.”
Frey responded to a request for an interview about pre-existing Uptown programs via a statement.
“Safety in Uptown is a top priority, and we are working with law-enforcement partners across the City to address the livability issues and support the neighborhood's comeback,” Frey said.
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