Hi, I'm Annamarie Cox and welcome to With Friends Like These.

Our guest this week is Betsy Houches, who is among other things, a speaker, writer,

activist, and advisor to cities seeking to improve equitable outcomes for people of color.

She's been on the show a few times, but we've never spoken very much about the reason you

might recognize her name.

She is the former mayor of Minneapolis, and her tenure here was eventful.

One event was the shooting of Jamar Clark, a black man by white police officers.

Protests over that shooting led to a two-week occupation of the fourth precinct police

station here, an endless backseat mayoring about how she handled the situation.

And for five years, she's let people opine without her input.

And even after the initial George Floyd uprisings, she stayed quiet.

But last week, she wrote about it.

She wrote a piece in the New York Times about her experience after the Jamar Clark shooting,

coming to terms with the hypocrisy of what white liberals say they want from police and

what they actually expect from police.

So finally, I will get to talk to my friend Betsy publicly about how her tenure as mayor

shaped how she sees the world now.

Though before that, we're going to have to talk about the conversion experience that

started her on the journey to being mayor and brought her to the steps of the fourth

precinct.

Coming right up, Betsy Hodges.

Betsy Hodges, welcome back to my show.

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