Tate says the new North Commons fieldhouse is a destination center, not just a rec center, and that rebuilding youth development “from three to 23” starts with intention, love and presence.
Mike Tate has been at North Commons Park since 1973. That is more than five decades of coaching, mentoring, and advocating for young people on the north side of Minneapolis, mostly without pay and often without recognition. When he says he knows the community, he means it literally.
Tate joined hosts Charles Hallman and Dr. Mitchell Palmer McDonald on Blacklight on Sports to talk about the years-long fight to build the new North Commons fieldhouse, the collapse of youth sports infrastructure in Minneapolis, his family’s extraordinary Minnesota history, and what it will take to bring young people back.
The Fight for North Commons
The North Commons fieldhouse project began roughly 14 or 15 years ago with about 20 community members meeting at the YMCA across the street from the park. The group included longtime coach Larry McKenzie and others who shared a simple premise.
“We knew we were losing our kids to the suburbs because we didn’t have quality places to play,” Tate said. “We just said, ‘Hey, why not us?’”
As often happens, the group eventually dissolved. Tate and Brett Buckner kept pushing.
Tate was eventually invited to speak before the Minnesota Senate about the project, where he made the case directly to both Republican and Democratic lawmakers. He credits that moment, and a one-on-one conversation he had walking a Republican senator down the hallway, with changing the trajectory of the entire effort.
“It was the first time the park board got any money in a bonding bill ever,” he said. “On the first check, we got $5.125 million. Usually you stay in that bonding for 10 years, 20 years, maybe you’ll get it.”
Congresswoman Ilhan Omar added $2 million in federal funding. Mayor Jacob Frey committed $3 million from the city. Philanthropic partners came in behind them. The final project totals roughly $49 million.
Throughout, Tate said the park board did not believe the vision was achievable.
“They would tell me all the time, ‘You’re not going to get this done,’” he said. “I said, ‘You must don’t know who I am. I’ve been here four and a half decades. Y’all just showed up.’”
The finished facility will include four gyms in the fieldhouse plus a renovated existing building, giving the site five total courts. The configuration includes three college-dimension courts and an NBA-regulation court.
Tate was clear about the distinction between how he sees the facility and how the park board classifies it.
“For us, it’s a destination center. For the park board, it’s a rec center,” he said. “We know this thing will make money. It will save lives. It will create a safe place for all our communities to play in. We can rent it out for weddings. We don’t have to go outside the community anymore.”
The Collapse of Minneapolis Youth Sports
The conversation turned sharply when Hallman asked about the state of the Minneapolis City Conference and youth sports pipelines. Tate did not soften his assessment.
“Right now, football is gone in the city of Minneapolis unless you’re playing traveling,” he said. “Park board, which had 4,000 kids playing, just got two teams this year.”
He attributed the collapse to decisions made during the pandemic and the period following the murder of George Floyd, when programs shut down and did not come back.
“They didn’t listen during the pandemic. They didn’t listen during George Floyd that you still have to be open for kids,” he said. “That’s what we did. I kept coaching. I kept doing things in my neighborhood, whether it was picking up litter or coaching flag football or doing something with the youth.”
He pointed to a specific operational decision as evidence of misplaced priorities: park board recreation centers closing at 8 p.m. while the park board’s own hockey arena stays open until 10.
“Why would we close at 8? This is where they want to be,” he said. “What does that tell you?”
Tate also described the broken connection between park programming and high school athletics, noting that the park board has historically refused to acknowledge its role as a feeder system.
“We are it,” he said. “Because if we don’t do it, it is going to die.”
Family Roots in Minnesota Going Back to 1907
One of the most striking portions of the conversation was Tate’s account of his family’s arrival in Minnesota. His great-grandfather was among roughly 85 formerly enslaved people who traveled from Campbellsville, Kentucky to Fergus Falls, Minnesota in 1907.
“Second largest Black population to leave the enslavement that my great-grandfather was part of,” he said.
His grandfather arrived in Fergus Falls at a year and a half old and went on to play football for Fergus Falls High School. His mother and her seven siblings grew up there before the family moved to St. Paul and then Minneapolis.
Tate grew up at Phyllis Wheatley, in the projects, and described the progression that many north side families made: from the projects to Plymouth Avenue, then Oliver, then Hospitality House, then North Commons. He named Spike Moss, Herb Fifer, Dennis Howard, and others as mentors who shaped him along the way.
“I stand on them shoulders as a Black man,” he said.
He also recalled North Commons opening in 1973 as the gym where Division I players came to compete.
“If them walls could talk,” he said.
On Clyde Turner and the Camps
Tate and Hallman both spent time remembering the late Clyde Turner and the basketball camps that brought kids from across the city together for a week or two at a time.
“Those kids remember that more than anything,” Tate said. “It got those wonderful kids from all over the city to that camp. They didn’t have to hear sirens and all the stuff that happens in the neighborhood. They’re over there listening to mosquitoes and going swimming and eating great food.”
He connected that experience directly to what he believes is needed now.
“We got to get back to that. And that starts with youth development at an early age. I say three to 23,” he said. “Give them the opportunity to be something more than an athlete. To be a doctor. The same things we talked about when we were young.”
Show Up to the Meetings
Asked about gentrification concerns surrounding the new facility, Tate was direct about where the responsibility lies.
“If we don’t go to these meetings, yeah, we could get gentrified,” he said. “Nobody showed up. And then the board voted on these rules and regulations to keep us out.”
He described his message to friends and neighbors.
“We got to go to the meetings. And if you can’t go, just go to one. Go and voice your opinion. Quit telling it to the guy down the street how unhappy you are about the park and how unhappy you are about the school,” he said. “Bring your family. Bring your kids. Because the only thing these politicians know is the people you bring.”
He also noted that the demographics around North Commons have already changed significantly, something he said many in the community have not fully reckoned with.
Open Mic
Tate closed with a message about where change actually begins.
“The important thing about what we do and how we do it is with love in our hearts,” he said. “The heart has to change for our community to thrive. We got to get some of those bad tastes and some of them trauma-driven things that are playing with our mind out. We got to build ourselves from the heart up so the mind will follow.”
He pushed back on a familiar phrase.
“People say change the narrative. No, just tell the truth.”
He described the litter league he started during the pandemic, now in its seventh year, where he takes youth out to clean up north Minneapolis streets in spring, summer, and fall, and shovels fire hydrants for firefighters in the winter.
“You want to be in community, you want to do these things, but you have to be the driver,” he said. “Don’t wait for somebody else to do it. With a little ball, you can do amazing things in any community, especially for our Black kids.”
Asked about legacy and recognition, Tate made one request.
“Don’t name a court or a street after me when I transition,” he said. “If I can’t see it and be around it, then guess what. I do want to hear about it. I want my ear to hear.”