SOURCE COMPARISON 01

Uncertainty and secondhand information in the City’s hearing explanation

At approximately 9:28–10:52, the Parks Director used phrases including “I think,” “I believe so,” “he-said-she-said,” and “maybe even some hearsay” while explaining reported information supporting the exclusion. He also said the referenced documentation was not with him.

Search visibility and source authority

The substantive comparison below is crawlable static HTML. Source links identify the transcript passage, notice, exhibit, official city source, or approved public record supporting the statement.

SOURCE HIERARCHY

Governing Rules

Read the City rule first, then applicable Minnesota authority, the national constitutional standard, judicial interpretation, and the original record. The final layer states the supported application and its limits.

Governing Saint Paul rule

The Council-adopted Parks Rules, Chapter 1, Section 2 (“Authority”), state that “serious or repeat violations” may result in a longer expulsion under §170.10(e). Chapter 3, Section 1 (“General Conduct”), states that an exclusion of 24 hours or longer requires reasonable cause to believe the identified person violated the listed general-conduct rules by intentionally disrupting the orderly operation of a park, program, or event. The current online code and adopted rules are linked separately because the exact April 6, 2026 codified text remains a historical-source gate. ^L-01 ^L-05 ^L-06

Minnesota statewide authority

Minnesota Constitution article I, section 7 provides that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. Whether a protected interest was deprived and what process was required remain issue-specific questions. ^L-03 ^MN-05

National constitutional standard

The Fourteenth Amendment supplies the federal procedural-due-process framework. The governing question is whether any protected interest was affected and whether the notice and hearing were meaningful in light of the timing, stakes, available evidence, and risk of error. ^US-01 ^US-02 ^US-03

Judicial interpretation

Goss, Loudermill, and Brock address notice, the substance of supporting evidence, and a meaningful response opportunity. Sabes explains that administrative flexibility does not make unsupported hearsay or a mere scintilla substantial evidence. These authorities define review questions; they do not prove that the unidentified allegation was false or that this hearing was unlawful. ^SC-01 ^SC-02 ^SC-03 ^MN-02

Record evidence

The controlling evidence is the notice and the appeal transcript at 9:28–10:52: unknown resident names, “I think,” “I believe so,” “he-said-she-said,” “maybe even some hearsay,” the statement that documentation was not present, and Josh’s immediate denial of the described sibling conversation. ^R-01 ^R-05

Application and limitation

The combined sources support a serious question about specificity, provenance, reliability, and evidence availability when Josh was asked to respond. They do not establish that the allegation was false, that hearsay was categorically inadmissible, or that a court found a due-process violation.

Evidence integrity

What this page separates before making comparisons.

City’s stated position

The City’s hearing explanation referenced resident reports, a sibling-related allegation, and documentation the Parks Director said could be provided.

What the documented record shows

The transcript shows the Director said he did not know residents’ names, used uncertain wording, acknowledged possible hearsay, said documentation was not with him, and Josh immediately denied the described sibling conversation.

Limits of the available evidence

This page does not determine whether the underlying allegation was true and does not state that a court found a due-process violation.

Open questions

What specific names, incident details, and documents supported the allegation when Josh was asked to respond?

Records still needed

Underlying complaint material, named incident records, and any documents considered before the April 6 exclusion.

01 — Record comparison

1. Uncertainty and secondhand information in the City’s hearing explanation

At the City-designated appeal hearing, the Parks Director was asked to explain the factual basis for an already-effective 180-day exclusion. In describing one alleged interaction, he said he did not know the residents’ names, used uncertain and secondhand framing, acknowledged possible hearsay, and said the referenced documentation was not with him. Josh immediately denied the described interaction.

What the City said

9:28Parks Director

“Um, so a couple things. Um, I can just note—and I don't know residents' names—residents have claimed that there have been, um, issues with the filming, or giving—that, “I did not give permission, but yet I was still filmed,” or there was one instance where I think it was a sibling of one of the residents was upset, um, about you filming one of their sisters or something like that. That escalated maybe into a more heated conversation. I don't know.”

Read this passage in the full transcript

9:53–9:58Direct exchange

Josh Liljenquist: “With me?”
Parks Director: “I believe so.”
Josh Liljenquist: “I—I never had a conversation with a sibling.”

Read this passage in the full transcript

10:00Parks Director

“Yeah, a sibling, um, was in the parking lot, and there was an exchange between you both. So that was one. Um, I can understand on the event stuff, like, I—I feel like I am in the middle playing a lot of he-said-she-said of who's involved, right? Um, and it sounds like, for some of those names, there might be affiliation between some of those different groups. Um, maybe even some hearsay. Um, but trying to break that all down has been admittedly complicated.”

Read this passage in the full transcript

10:00 turnDocumentation

“I believe, um, we can get you some documentation on that. I don't have it with me, but I can—it's public.”

Read this passage in the full transcript

What the transcript establishes

The Director said he did not know the residents’ names.
He described the sibling allegation using “I think,” “or something like that,” “maybe,” and “I don’t know.”
When Josh asked whether the alleged incident involved him, the Director answered, “I believe so.”
Josh immediately denied ever having the described conversation with a sibling.
The Director described portions of the information as “he-said-she-said” and “maybe even some hearsay.”
The Director said he did not have the referenced documentation with him at the hearing.

Josh’s concern about the process

Josh’s position is that he could not meaningfully answer an unidentified allegation when the official describing it was uncertain whether it involved him and did not have the referenced documentation available at the hearing. His concern is not based on one isolated phrase; it is based on the combined lack of names, uncertain description of the alleged encounter, acknowledged secondhand information, and absence of the supporting document when he was asked to respond.

“We provide due process by notice and an opportunity to be heard. This is your opportunity to be heard.”
Assistant City Attorney, approximately 21:05

Read the City attorney’s statement at 21:05.

Because the City itself characterized this meeting as Josh’s opportunity to be heard, Josh contends that the factual basis needed to be presented with enough specificity and reliability for him to understand and answer it.

Legal and accuracy boundary

This section documents what was said during the appeal hearing and Josh Liljenquist’s concern about the process. It does not independently determine whether the underlying allegation was true or state that a court found a due-process violation. Hearsay may be treated differently in administrative proceedings than in criminal trials; the concern presented here is the specificity, reliability, and availability of the information when Josh was asked to respond.

What happened next

Following the appeal and a subsequent review, the Parks Director wrote on April 22, 2026 that he was “rescinding your ban from our parks, effective immediately.”

The rescission letter does not expressly admit wrongdoing, decide that every allegation was false, or announce a legal ruling.

Primary-source links

Read the verbatim transcript beginning at 9:28 Read the “I believe so” exchange at 9:53 Read the “he-said-she-said” and possible-hearsay explanation at 10:00 Read the City’s description of the hearing as Josh’s “opportunity to be heard” at 21:05 View the original 180-day parks exclusion letter — PDF, privacy-redacted ↗ View the City’s April 22 letter rescinding the ban — PDF, privacy-redacted ↗ Review Saint Paul’s official Parks and Recreation rules ↗

Methodology and change history

Source-linked documentary review.

Author: Josh Liljenquist
Reviewer / methodology: Prepared from privacy-redacted source records and checked for source-linking, cautious wording, and privacy boundaries.
Publication date: Pending production publication; staged for review on August 14, 2026.
Substantive modification date: August 14, 2026
Corrections contact: Contact Josh about corrections
Change history: August 14, 2026 — dedicated indexable discrepancy page added for “Uncertainty and secondhand information in the City’s hearing explanation.”