U center director to run for governor

Since he joined the University of Minnesota more than two years ago, Steve Kelley has been working to connect science and policy. And after the 2010 election, he’d like to be doing it from the governor’s office.

Though the former Minnesota legislator hasn’t officially announced his candidacy, Kelley began fundraising in December for a 2010 gubernatorial bid , and said he is intent on running as a DFLer.

Kelley, whose students describe as a smart and sincere communicator, said his work directing the Humphrey Institute’s Center for Science, Technology and Public Policy has influenced some of the things he’d like to do as governor, such as supporting arts programs to encourage innovation.

Policymaking background

Kelley has lived in Hopkins , Minn., where his father was raised and his grandfather worked at the post office, for the past 26 years. He’s married and has two adult children, one of whom graduated last year from the University’s Medical School.

He represented Hopkins, St. Louis Park and Golden Valley in Minnesota’s Legislature between 1993 and 2006. First as a representative and then a senator, he worked on a range of issues, including information technology, biotechnology, education and health care.

University tenure

He started at the Humphrey Institute in early 2007 as a senior research fellow, but soon after was asked to direct the Center for Science, Technology and Public Policy, a role that involves teaching, research and outreach.

“I’ve had a great time,” he said. “I like the teaching, I like the students and the work is really interesting, but I haven’t lost my passion around the issues.”

Part of the motivation for his gubernatorial bid comes from his students, he said. Last fall, he asked students in his science and policy making class why they enrolled, and many said they wanted to affect policy on energy, the environment or climate change.

“It’s cool to be able to teach them ways to do that, but they need somebody in public office who is on board with the game plan,” Kelley said.

Kelly Wilder , a graduate student in science, technology and environmental policy , said as an instructor Kelley brings balance to the program she’s in because he isn’t an academic. “He gives us a good idea of what it’s actually like out in the real world,” she said.

In the classroom, he’s flexible, she said, giving students readings and ideas to consider, but “letting the discussion go where it may.” She said Kelley is easy to work with and able to get along with people who have different viewpoints.

“I don’t know anyone who doesn’t get along with Steve really well,” she said.

The research aspect of Kelley’s job involves providing the Legislature with technical expertise. So far, he’s led projects on energy efficiency in public buildings, cable television regulation and most recently, how to govern the revenue from a cap and trade carbon regulatory system.

Luke Hollenkamp , a graduate student in the same program as Wilder, has been working on the cap and trade research with Kelley and was one of several students who recently testified at the Capitol about the results of the project.

It was interesting, he said, to see Republican legislators who were openly “hostile” to climate change shaking Kelley’s hand and acting jovially towards him.

Maybe it was just political pleasantry, Hollenkamp said, but “I think on both sides of the aisle he has a lot of friends still in the Legislature.”

But Hollenkamp said he and some of his left-leaning friends wonder whether Kelley’s willingness to see the other side — key to his work at the Humphrey — could become a liability as the campaign progresses.

“Maybe he’s too nice of a guy,” Hollenkamp said. “Inevitably all campaigns pretty much turn negative and I don’t know if he has the stomach for that.”

But University of Minnesota Morris political science associate professor Paula O’Loughlin said it’s unlikely Kelley’s friendly demeanor would turn into a drawback for him. “It’s really about him making a positive impression on the voters.”

“You can’t get elected even to state Senate unless you can stand up for yourself,” she added. “He may be more skilled in the art of Minnesota nice, but that doesn’t make him too nice to be in office.”

Whatever it means for his campaign, the center’s assistant director Leah Wilkes said Kelley’s ability to collaborate is an asset for the center, which works with legislators, researchers, educators and science organizations.

Moreover, she said, he tries to find new ways for the public to access science. Kelley said that’s an important part of connecting policy and science because ultimately, lawmakers respond to their constituents. Connecting science with other parts of the culture, like art, is one way he’s been trying to do that.

For example, Wilkes said, at science conferences he’ll bring in artists focusing on the environment. “I believe that art raises the profile of that particular subject,” she said.

For Kelley, arts education is essential to encouraging innovation. And since he’s been working at the Humphrey, Kelley has come to see innovation as a policy goal in itself, he said.

“How we as a society encourage higher rates of innovation … I think is really important,” he said.

That’s something he’d like to work on as governor, he said.

“I think the governor gives lip-service to the concept of innovation and then doesn’t follow up on it,” he said.

Kelley said he thinks encouraging creativity — in both art and science — is essential.

“You can’t get more innovation by adding rigor to science and math education without also encouraging peoples’ sense of expression in the arts. You do them both at the same time, so that’s one thing I see missing,” he said.

He’d like to see “innovation centers,” places where K-12 students can work creatively in arts and science and engineering, all over the state.

A ‘wide open’ field

Kelley, who made an unsuccessful bid for the DFL gubernatorial nomination in 2006, said the 2010 race is different because there is no presumptive frontrunner.

“A lot of us see an opportunity to win … this one is much more wide open,” he said.

He’ll be vying for the nomination against a large field — at least nine other DFL contenders have registered with the Minnesota Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board .

But O’Loughlin said she thinks he has enough state legislative experience across a wide swath of issues to compete.

“He’s not seen as a partisan hack, so I think his biggest issue is that he’s probably not as well-known as others,” she said.

But she said the lack of name recognition “is a huge thing, though; huge.”

On the other hand, he doesn’t have some of the negative associations as more well-known candidates, O’Loughlin said.

Setting him apart from the large candidate field, Kelley said, is his experience working on a broad range of issues and the fact that he has represented districts where a Democratic win isn’t a given.

And along with making innovation a policy goal he’s also trying to implement it into his campaign. “We’re going to try some things that are a little more creative,” he said, including events bringing together arts and policy.