Bob CollinsBrigette Mengerson, one of our favorite readers from North Minneapolis, is an unabashed fan of NoMi as we’ve noted in the past. She hardly overlooks its flaws, not the way many people do with the good stories that exist there.
Like this one, which she forwarded today. It’s certainly good enough for me to pause the last days of vacation to pass it along:
I like to balance out the bitching and bragging I do about my neighborhood over on the North side. Today is a proud moment that I want to share. This morning a working-poor family woke up, looked out their window and noticed both cars parked in front of their house had all of the tires slashed… One of the family members posted on our North Vent page about how upset they were that this happened to them, a cost not many of us could begin to cover. The comments started flying in with empathy, offers to carpool, referrals for good deals, people willing to chip in a couple of bucks, etc. Then, something wonderful happened, something truly reflective of the community that I have come to know on the North side… Someone reached out to a friend at Omar’s Tires to see if he could help this family out. Omar offered up 6 of the tires he had in stock and people started offering their own time and services to get these two cars fixed up! A donation jar was even set up at one of our fine businesses. Before the morning was even over the two cars had been tracked down and neighbors had gotten to work on finding ramps and jacks to remove the slashed tires. All 8 of the tires were replaced before the family got home! One of the family members was visiting her mom at work when she heard about the story traveling on Facebook. She was so surprised and expressed her gratitude for everyone coming together to help them out. THIS is what community looks like, THIS is what NORTH MINNEAPOLIS is capable of… and we make it look easy. So proud of you neighbors! Special THANK YOU TO OMAR’S TIRES in South Minneapolis. Please let him and his crew know how much these kind acts mean to us by mentioning this story and supporting his business!
