Don Blyly, owner of Uncle Hugo's Science Fiction Bookstore and Uncle Edgar's Mystery Bookstore, Minneapolis, Minn., which were burned to the ground in the protests in late May after the murder of George Floyd by city police, continues to struggle in an effort to rebuild the "Uncles." His GoFundMe campaign remains open and has raised almost $170,000 toward its goal of $500,000.
The Star-Tribune outlined a key problem Blyly faces, one that is not faced by businesses in neighboring St. Paul: "Minneapolis requires owners to prepay the second half of their 2020 property taxes in order to obtain a demolition permit. St. Paul does not.
" 'Minneapolis has not been particularly friendly toward business for some time,' said Blyly, who prepaid $8,847 in taxes last week but still hasn't received his demolition permit. 'They say they want to be helpful, but they certainly have not been.'
"City officials say their hands are tied, pointing to a state law that prohibits the removal of any structures or standing timber until all of the taxes assessed against the building have been fully paid.
"The law, however, leaves enforcement to the county, and Hennepin County officials said they made it clear to the city of Minneapolis this summer that they would not enforce the requirement for any riot-damaged properties.
" 'We don't feel like we have an ability to block these permits, and I don't see why we would,' said Derrick Hodge, one of the managers in Hennepin County's property tax office. 'One of our missions in the county is to reduce disparities, and if we took action to block these permits, that would arguably be creating more disparities instead of reducing disparities.' "
The paper noted that about 100 properties were destroyed or severely damaged in the protests and estimated that most property owners must pay $35,000-$100,000 to clear the debris on their sites--before they can even start construction. "On average, the owners of properties destroyed or significantly damaged owe $25,000 in taxes for the second half of 2020, which come due in October, according to a Star Tribune review of county property records."
Blyly's other problems include a neighboring business whose contractor destroyed several shared walls owned by Blyly and pushed the debris into the Uncles' space; water bills (the city says that the water into the ruined location may not have been turned off, and the meter is buried under debris); and clearing up invoices and getting credits for undelivered books has been taking a lot of time.