Amid intense blowback over a new local law that is driving Uber and Lyft to pull out of their city, some members of the far-left Minneapolis City Council are proposing to spend $150,000 to seed small, upstart transportation companies looking replace the rideshare giants.
The proposal, which is slated for discussion during the council’s budget meeting on Monday, would dedicate $150,000 in unobligated general-fund money “for small business financing for transportation network companies,” according to a resolution by four council members.
In the weeks since the council jacked up mandated pay rates for rideshare drivers, leading Uber and Lyft to announce their departures from Minnesota’s largest city, several small companies have “expressed eagerness” to begin operating in Minneapolis, according to a background document submitted with the proposal. “These emerging and expanding businesses are ready to comply with city ordinances and pay minimum wage equivalents,” the document says.
But many Minnesota leaders remain highly skeptical that any new company can scale up and be ready to take Uber and Lyft’s place by May 1, the date they’ve announced they’re leaving Minneapolis. Uber has said the company will be exiting the entire Twin Cities metro area.
“We have what I can only describe as magical thinking that in the next 30 days, somebody’s going to create a new app that folks around the world and country are going to know to use when they come to Minneapolis, and they’re going to figure out how to make the economics work on that,” Tim Walz, the state’s Democratic governor, said on Monday, according to a CBS News report. “So I’ve been asking all the folks to get back to the table.”
Omar Adan Ahmed, vice president of the Minnesota Rideshare Association, or MRDA, which has opposed the Minneapolis council’s action, told National Review that expecting some small, relatively unknown company to replace Uber and Lyft in a few weeks is “far-fetched.”
