You might find the man who would be mayor of St. Paul seal-coating streets in Highland Park around this time. You’ll definitely find him covered in black tack and grit, which he wears with pride.
By his own admission, Kurt “Dirty Kurty” Dornfeld’s mayoral campaign started as a joke.
Dornfeld, a former radiator fixer, spring maker and street sweeper in private employ, has been working for the St. Paul Department of Public Works for the past 10 years. “I’m named ‘Dirty Kurty’ because of the job I do,” said the street maintenance worker, during a quick break on Tuesday morning. “I get real dirty when I’m doing it. They call us painters. Filling potholes, skin patching, we put that black gooey stuff in there, tack.”
Dornfeld — who included his nickname on his campaign filing with Ramsey County — said several Public Works co-workers jokingly urged him to run for mayor, and then the joking stopped. He decided to make his unhappiness with his employer and the administration of St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman public, starting with bike paths and moving on to seal-coating.
Coleman, who will deliver his budget address on Wednesday at noon, has said bike paths are increasingly important transportation modes for a generation of young people who want to live in cities and live relatively car-free.
“There’s a lot of people that are sick of paying for things that we really don’t need,” Dornfeld said. “There’s bike paths all over the place. There’s one down on Lower Afton — I don’t know if St. Paul has anything to do with it — but I’ve never seen anyone use it. And then there’s a street, Battle Creek Road, it’s just terrible, horrible. I grew up in the Battle Creek area, and I’ve never seen it fixed.”
“There’s some people that disagree with a lot of things here in Public Works, and that’s what I’m going to try to fix,” he said. “Bike paths, making wrong decisions, like there used to be a seven year cycle for seal coating, and somebody made the decision to go to 10 years, and now we’re paying for it. Now we’ve got so many holes, it’s costing us more money than it ever should have cost us. We should have stayed on that seven year course.”
About three years ago, a Channel 5 News crew filmed Dornfeld’s peers apparently loafing around on the job during a busy pothole season, and a number of workers were lined up for discipline. In many instances, the union stepped in, and the discipline didn’t take, though the Public Works Director in place at the time resigned the position.
“They had my name, I was never disciplined for it,” said Dornfeld. “That was a bunch of baloney. That was just a power struggle. … All the stuff they had down on me wasn’t actually punishable.”
Beyond bike paths and seal coating, why else is Dornfeld running against Coleman? He’s careful not to get too specific.
“I work for the city of St. Paul in street maintenance, and some of the things that he’s said, and some of the things he’s done, in all of Public Works, there are a lot of people who aren’t happy,” Dornfeld said. “I really can’t say anything, because I have to work here if I don’t win the post. … I see a lot of stuff going on, and I don’t agree with it, and there’s a lot of people who don’t agree with it. I’ve lived here all my life.”
Dornfeld has never held or run for public office before, though he is a Mason and former lodge master at Montgomery Lodge No. 258 on East Plato Boulevard. In addition to Coleman and Dornfeld, others on the ballot so far are University Avenue Realtor Tim Holden and perennial candidate Sharon Anderson.