The Time Is Up HERC Townhall

Join us at this townhall on December 18 at the Urban League Twin Cities (2100 Plymouth Ave. N.) to urge the city to shut down Hennepin Energy Resource Center (HERC). Doors will open at 5:30 p.m., and the event will start at 6:00 p.m.

Invites have been sent to Commissioners Fernando and Conley, and an invite will be going out soon to Commissioner Greene as well. This is a pivotal gathering after years of advocacy demanding that this trash burner be shut down.

Throughout the past year, dozens of us have testified (including Judy Gregg and Mary Malotky) at multiple Hennepin County Board meetings. We have met with every County Commissioner (including Heather Edelson). We worked with the City of Minneapolis to pass a unanimous resolution calling for the county to shut HERC down by 2027.

We’ve gotten Minneapolis to increase their budget for zero waste funding, and we have also made major progress at the state legislature towards zero waste—and along the way, we blocked Hennepin County from building another giant waste processing facility in another community of color.

Our coalition has operated in extreme good faith. We have done everything asked of us. We have remained patient these past two years since the county resolved to create a closure plan for HERC.

What have we been met with in response? An endless stream of excuses, deflection, and gaslighting—even when we have shared deeply concerning information about mismanagement in operations and oversight of the HERC and how the county suppresses critical information about HERC from the public to shield itself from scrutiny.

But we aren’t backing down. In an intense and powerful meeting two weeks ago, constituents got Commissioner Fernando to agree to release an updated assessment of the issue by December 18. We are holding a HERC Townhall on December 18 at 5:30 p.m. to discuss that assessment and to propose ideas on how this campaign can escalate to shut down HERC. 

The three Minneapolis County Commissioners—Angela Conley, Marion Greene, and Irene Fernando—are all running for re-election in 2026. Each one of them have backtracked on closing HERC, have consistently shared misinformation, and, perhaps most concerningly, have cut our community out of decision-making and input at almost every meaningful point of this process.

This includes the original county resolution in 2023 that called for a closure plan with no requirement to actually close HERC, the unilateral decision to place a giant waste facility in Brooklyn Park without the community’s knowledge, and the undemocratic proposal to convert HERC into a giant waste facility with zero input from community.

It is time for accountability. It is time for the excuses to stop and real action to start. We have a climate crisis to address and we need these commissioners to join us instead of wasting precious time and resources.

Please save the date and come and support this important climate justice issue.