"Because Mary Gaines Copied Our Name"

Photo By John Hoff

During the Tuesday meeting at the Fourth Precinct, a woman gave a presentation on behalf of Community Justice PROJECT, which is NOT to be confused with Community Justice PARTNERS.

Yeah, I guess I noticed right away the similarity in names, so I asked my one-and-only raised hand question of the night: why? Why the similarity between the names of the two organizations which, arguably, have similar missions? And I was told...

"Because Mary Gaines copied our name."

Yeah, that pretty much explains it. See, Community Justice PARTNERS is (in my observation) a "means well but doesn't have diddly squat" organization, which doesn't keep CJPartners from all the time trying to get their hands on a building in North Minneapolis--preferably in Hawthorne, it would appear--and pack it to the rafters with felons who desperately need to be rehabilitated and, of course, LOVED.

Yes, that's what we need in North Minneapolis. More felons.

(Sarcasm font is broken. Notifying the reader manually)

However, CJPartners can't even keep their frigging WEBSITE up to date, which says a whole lot. Click here. See if I lie.

Community Justice PROJECT, on the other hand, has the backing of the City of Minneapolis...and a church council...well, they've got a lot more to work with, and a lot more creditability. I mean, if you go for that kind of thing. Some people feel a need to reach out in that way, make a hurting soul some delicious s'mores, sing a few rounds of Kumbuya.

Me, I'll reach out to my handy cell phone, dial 911, and make sure these fine volunteers don't run out of clients.

But I was glad to have the little name mystery solved. I figured it was something like that. Yes, kind of like when I was married and my baby boy was crazy about Teletubbies, so his Grandma Nina bought him what dear old Grandma THOUGHT was a Teletubby...only it was some Chinese made rip-off, knock-off, not-really-a-Teletubby but an evil Teletubby imposter.

So here's a handy dandy mnemonic device to keep the two straight: A PROJECT is something with actual hard work. A PARTNER might be somebody who comes along and says, hey, now that so much work has been done, LET'S SHARE.

(Above, 3101 6th St. N., "The Apartment Complex of Anarchy," which CJPartners wanted to purchase but did not succeed in doing so.)