St. Paul Council appointee to League of MN Cities missed 8 of 10 meetings

Yahoo

06-05-2025

Not long after being elected to the St. Paul City Council, HwaJeong Kim was appointed as the capital city's representative to the League of Minnesota Cities, the state's largest municipal membership association. The organization brings together city leaders to discuss legislative bills, salary surveys and employee hiring and retention strategies, among other issues facing municipalities.
Kim, who is the city council's vice president, was sworn in as a voting member of the league's board of directors in February 2024, but missed the next month's meeting. She has also missed almost every meeting since.
In all, Kim has attended two of the 10 league meetings held from February of last year through February of this year, and none since April 2024, according to meeting minutes available online. That's almost a solid consecutive year of monthly absences.
St. Paul City Council Member Rebecca Noecker, who became council president in February, said Kim had frequent scheduling conflicts and another council member will soon step into the role.
'We were recently informed by the city of St. Paul that councilmember Kim is no longer the city's representative to the league board due to some reshuffling of committee assignments on their end,' said Donald Reeder, a spokesperson for the league, in an April 30 email. 'We have not yet confirmed a replacement.'
'We also recognize that board members (typically councilors, mayors, and administrative staff from a variety of cities) wear many hats in their own communities and often have scheduling conflicts that do not permit them to attend all meetings or league activities,' Reeder wrote.
Kim did not return a reporter's phone call and email on April 21 and a follow-up phone call and email on May 2, or a text message on May 5. A receptionist at City Hall said she does not work from the office on Mondays as the role is part-time.
City council attendance
Kim's attendance at the regular weekly meetings of the city council has been more up and down, but her frequent lateness and absences have not gone unnoticed by voters, some of whom have noted her outside duties as the executive director of a get-out-the-vote organization. So far this year, from Jan. 1 through the end of April, she has missed more than a fourth of the council's regularly-scheduled Wednesday afternoon meetings — or four out of 15 weekly voting sessions.
Kim, who represents the Ward 5 communities of Como and the North End, was one of two council members absent from St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter's 'State of the City' address on April 21, even though it was held at the new North End Community Center, a $31 million rec center and community hub that opened last month within her own political ward.
'I do know she really wanted to be at the North End Community Center for the mayor's speech but she had a long-planned trip, so they had the grand opening a few days earlier and she was at that,' said Amy Brendmoen, a former city council president who previously represented Ward 5.
Kim was also absent from the city council meeting on April 23, where a sizable line of Ward 5 homeowners arrived to object to tree removal near Como Lake for a sidewalk project that will leave them shouldering assessments of $10,000 or more.
'It is a little frustrating that all of us took time off work and our council member isn't even here,' said Osage street homeowner Nathan Rue, addressing the council during the hearing. 'We're just going to have to come back again.'
Noecker explained to the line of homeowners that the public hearing will resume in early May, by which time Kim — whom she said was out of the country on vacation — would be there in person to hear their concerns. Noecker assured them that Kim would also watch the video recording of their remarks.
'I will be calling on you to step down'
For some, that wasn't good enough. In a recent email to the Ward 5 office, Parkview Avenue resident Jane Sommerville noted that Kim is the executive director of Minnesota Voice, a progressive nonprofit dedicated to voter registration, civic engagement and training community organizers. While serving on the city council is officially a part-time job, and nothing bars outside employment, it's unusual for council members to split their time doing something as time-consuming as running an outside organization. The council position pays about $77,000 annually.
'It is unclear to me how you can maintain two jobs concurrently, especially one as demanding as City Council Vice Chair,' wrote Sommerville, in a recent email to Kim's office. 'On Nov. 12 … you attended a meeting at North Dale Recreation Center regarding the street project. However, you stood in the corner, did not introduce yourself, engage with your constituency, answer questions, nor appear to write down any questions. It was quite unclear why you were even there.'
Sommerville was one of four plaintiffs in an unsuccessful legal action against the city aimed at blocking tree removal from Parkview Avenue. She noted that before the lawsuit was filed, residents of the impacted area had reached out to the Ward 5 council office by phone and email over the course of several months.
'Some neighbors received generic or templated responses from your office, and a few received emails from your staff,' Sommerville wrote. 'No one received a response from you specifically. Neighbors have invited you to come out and meet with us. You have likewise not responded nor come to our block to meet with us.'
'I will be calling on you to step down in your role as City Council representative for Ward 5,' Sommerville added. 'We deserve better.'
Kim isn't alone in her council absences. Last year, she attended 37 of the council's 43 weekly meetings, or about 86%. That still put her ahead of Council Member Anika Bowie, who attended 36 meetings. Nelsie Yang attended 29 meetings after a 12-week maternity leave. The full council was together last year about 44% of the time — or 60% not counting Yang's maternity leave.
Kim, a former legislative aide to Brendmoen, won the election to the Ward 5 seat in November 2023 with 2,745 votes, or 52% of the vote in a four-way race that included David Greenwood-Sanchez, Pam Tollefson and Nate Nins. St. Paul has since moved to an even-year calendar for municipal elections, shifting the next full council election to November 2028.
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