Council approves street layout for 38th & Chicago, signals support for broader community vision

After a lengthy meeting on Dec. 11, 2025, the City Council approved the flexible-open plan for reconstructing 38th St. and Chicago Ave. In addition, the council voted for a resolution in support of many of the recommendations presented by the Community Visioning Council (CVC) the week before.
The flex-open plan was first recommended by Public Works in late 2024, before the City Council voted to more fully vet the possibility of a pedestrian mall concept instead. In July 2025, however, businesses on the block made clear they would not support a pedestrian mall – meaning the city would not have the majority support from adjacent property owners required by state law to create one.
“This seems like the most prudent way to move forward,” said outgoing Ward 8 Council Member Andrea Jenkins, who with Mayor Jacob Frey has strongly advocated for the flex-open plan.
In simplest terms, the flex-open layout retains the roundabout and fist sculpture at the center of 38th and Chicago and protects the memorial space in front of Unity (formerly CUP) Foods on Chicago Ave. where George Floyd took his last breath. It allows for periodic closures of the street for community events. And it allows two-way traffic to continue along the whole 3700 block of Chicago Ave.
Advocates for a pedestrian mall have cited safety as a primary concern, especially for visitors who have to dodge traffic in a tight space to see the memorial. Businesses couldn’t get on board with the pedestrian mall, though, largely due to the perception that it would create a dead end that would cut them off from the rest of the city.
The 38th and Chicago Business Coalition did, however, suggest a southbound one-way adjacent to the on-street memorial instead of the two-way traffic in the flex-open plan. Among other changes, this was the plan presented by CVC as part of its unified vision for the Square – a compromise people on all sides seemed able to live with.
Council President Elliott Payne said he had attended a number of CVC meetings when they began and was at the CVC Town Hall that was held at Phelps Park on Dec. 2.
“I had never seen the community as united as I saw [on Dec. 2],” said Payne, expressing his support for the CVC vision. He was careful to point out that the flex-open plan is technically a different layout than the CVC plan.
“I think that we are so close, we are so close, that I don’t think it should delay to actually go back to the table and make those refinements,” he said.
A week before this vote, Public Works had told the Climate and Infrastructure Committee it would take months to evaluate the community streets plan. In a follow-up memo dated Dec. 10, 2025, Public Works agreed to evaluate some of the additional design elements proposed by the CVC, such as diagonal parking on the east side of the 3700-block of Chicago Ave. and a raised crosswalk at 37th and Chicago. The memo also states Public Works’ commitment to creating a design “that preserves the memorial space and is safe for visitors.”
The memo also states that final design will determine what tools can be used to close the streets for events, and Public Works intends “to make temporary closures convenient and safe, while reducing costs and administrative burdens so organizations of any size can safely gather.”
Ward 12 Council Member Aurin Chowdhury called for engagement with community on the process for closing the street. This would include establishing dates when this would be routinely done, for example with the annual Rise & Remember event.
“I frankly would like to see no permit fees ever required of community members to close down this intersection,” said Chowdhury, who offered several amendments that were included in the final council resolution. The business coalition plan supports pre-permitting and annual coordination of more than a dozen events, which may also include MLK Day, Black History Month, Juneteenth, Black Business Week and more.
Chowdhury also called for the administration to provide funding, support and maintenance for the memorial.
“I don’t wanna hear about people struggling to get funding or support to make sure that the memorial stays beautiful and preserved. I don’t wanna hear about organizations having to pool outside money without any support of the city to maintain the memorial of George Floyd. I don’t want to hear about needing updates to the physical infrastructure around it and people needing to struggle to get the attention of Public Works,” said Chowdhury. “I want there to be a dedicated person that community members know who they should talk to so the memorial can be maintained. And I want that reflected in our budget.”
CVC Co-Chair Mileesha Smith shared concerns about the fiscal burden on businesses and residents.
“Fund these businesses. Y’all wanna rush the construction. Have y’all made sure that the businesses gonna be okay… through the construction? Don’t wanna rush something without getting everybody prepared,” said Smith. “Did y’all let the residents know how much this construction is going to cost them”?
Public Works reported to the Climate and Infrastructure Committee that 83 properties will be assessed along 38th and Chicago, for an assessment value of more than $560,000 – regardless of layout. The total project cost is $11 million.
The votes were 9-4 for the flex-open plan, with President Payne, Vice President Aisha Chughtai and Council Members Jason Chavez and Robin Wonsley voting against it.

Real investment is needed
To focus only on the street layout would be to overlook the broader work of the CVC over the past year and the deeper needs in the community.
“It was never about the street. This was just about a street to [the city], but to the community, this was about the disinvestment and mistreatment on this corridor for longer than I’ve been alive,” said Smith.
“The city made us care about the streets. But now that we care about it, then yes, give us a safe space to be able to be community in this space,” said Smith. “There’s nowhere else in Minneapolis that people just gather… Now we need a safe space for us to be able to do that without discrediting the history of 38th and Chicago, or discrediting that this is a sacred monument space, and that there is memorials here, or all these names… How does that coexist without causing Black displacement, or businesses to go out of business?”
Asa-Azriel (“Ace”) Rice of PLOT Gallery (3730 Chicago Ave S) said after the town hall that the whole conversation around the streets is a distraction from the infrastructure support the community needs.
“The many, many years and decades of disinvestment should be backed with investment. And so we created a 38th and Chicago small business association that came up with a support plan that we shared with the city that specifically addresses things like Black displacement, safety, designing the neighborhood in a way that is attractive to people to bring in bodies and walking traffic,” said Rice. “We think that essentially leaning into that support plan, which I think in some ways dovetails perfectly with the 38th St. THRIVE plan, is where we need to focus our attention and our time.”
Along with details for how the street will look, the resolution passed by the council on Dec. 11 states: “Whereas, the Community Streets Plan stands in alignment with the 38th and Chicago Business District Support Plan, the 24 Demands for Justice, the 38th Street Thrive Strategic Development Plan, and the Neighborhoods 2030 plan.”
At the town hall, chef Lachelle Cunningham of City Food Studio shared the objectives of the 38th and Chi Business Coalition to uplift businesses and cultural assets that define the corridor and the need to ensure that economic vitality, cultural expression and memorialization work together as the area undergoes reconstruction and long-term development.
“I don’t know where else this many Black-owned businesses exist in this concentrated of an area, this much ownership. We need to be celebrating that, we need to keep supporting that,” said Cunningham. “Our vision is that our corridor is both sacred ground and a functioning neighborhood. So we really want to affirm that this corridor needs to, of course, honor the legacy of George Floyd and the global movement that began here. But we also must support the everyday lives of the residents, the workers and the small business owners and property owners here.”
Examples of the types of investment sought by the business coalition include low-interest loans and a property tax abatement program (retroactive to 2020) for impacted business owners.
38th St. THRIVE (a 10-year strategic development plan) was championed by Jenkins through its passage in 2021, but it has yet to be funded. That should soon change. Jenkins, along with Council Members Jason Chavez, Aurin Chowdhury, Robin Wonsley and Katie Cashman, brought forward a budget amendment to include $1.2 million to begin implementing the THRIVE plan. This was approved.
Lane Brown of the Central Area Neighborhood Development Organization (CANDO) and Mickella Rolfes of CANDO, Bancroft and Bryant, spoke to the need to fund neighborhood organizations who are intimately familiar with community needs from the ground up.
Meeting the 24 Demands of Justice Resolution 001 continues to be a priority for protesters at George Floyd Square. Speaking to her amendment to Cashman and Jenkins resolution, which was approved 13-0, Chowdhury acknowledged the 24 Demands as “a huge part of our history.” Several of the demands call for investing in the surrounding area via neighborhood associations and by providing housing and business support.
“We are going to hold the city accountable to doing what they agreed. We all know that the history of Minneapolis hasn’t always set right with community,” said Smith. “It’s easy to say that you agree or that you want these things, but are y’all going to put the effort, funds and whatnot behind it, and the support?”
More information is available at gfscvc.org and on the city’s website.