ideally, I want to hardcode, e.g. use_staging = True, enqueue it; and then via clone-edit_user_properties-enqueue in UI start the second instance (edited)

Oh I see!
Actually the easiest would be to use a Section:
` task = Task.init(...)
my_params = {'use_staging': True}
task.connect(my_params, name="General")
if my_params['use_staging']:
# do something

scheduler = TaskScheduler(...) `wdyt?