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How to fight the T-Paw cuts: "We’re getting the band back together"
A small victory in the HCC Theater debate, with a price. Hibbing Community College Theatre Director Mike Ricci has announced a major HCC Theatre Support Gala, featuring the return of the original Blues Brothers who performed on the HCC Theatre stage in 2004. This event will be held at Hibbing High School Auditorium on Thursday,…
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15 percent and counting
Unemployment on northern Minnesota’s Iron Range is at 15 percent but that doesn’t include the miners who are laid off but have an expectation of being called back at some point. Nor does it include those working part time after having been laid off from a full time job. It “feels” like unemployment is much…
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GUEST POST: "Landmarks"
Elanne Palcich of Chisholm has offered me this guest post and I’m passing it along for discussion. LANDMARKS I can remember trips to Duluth when I was young, before the Miller Hill Mall days, when you actually went shopping downtown. It was always an awesome journey to Duluth, waiting for that view of Lake Superior.…
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Oh, what the tourists must have thought!
Virginia, the only Iron Range city named for the British monarchy, is nicknamed the “Queen City.” The water tower reads (verbatim): VIRGINIA “QUEEN CITY” Seeing this water tower is a little like seeing a gun hanging on the wall in a Chekhov play. You know that at one point the gun must fire, or in…
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John Marty: The MinnesotaBrown interview
Today I continue my semi-regular series of posts featuring candidates for Minnesota Governor with a look at State Sen. John Marty. This is the first post written after Gov. Tim Pawlenty announced he wouldn’t seek re-election and, if anything, the field on both sides is even more chaotic than before. Starting about a year ago…
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Dismal state of affairs for Iron Range schools
Read this lede from yesterday’s statewide AP story about education funding (Story link from WCCO). I read this in the Hibbing Daily Tribune. ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — There’s no band anymore at Nashwauk-Keewatin Schools. Art and music are history, too. Almost a quarter of the teachers were laid off to fix a deficit. This…
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A soulful take on HCC Theater
Mesabi Misadventures has a great take on the downsizing of the Hibbing Community College Theater program, offering the much needed perspective of someone from the community who has enjoyed the fantastic work done on the HCC stage these last few years. It’s so easy for these discussions to become personal when administrators, staff and students…
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Share and share alike
The moves have been made and N-K and Greenway schools will be sharing a superintendent next year. Both of these Iron Range districts face massive long term debt and budget issues and this is just one part of what the ultimate solution might look like. Related posts: No related posts.
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Better off Red
The Mesaba Co-op Park near Cherry holds its 80th annual Midsummer Festival starting tonight and running through this weekend. Related posts: No related posts.
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MinnPost covers Iron Range theater rally
Catherine Conlan of MinnPost offers this piece exploring the downsizing of the Hibbing Community College theater program. The story is a fair analysis of the factors at play here. This is the winnowing of Minnesota culture, especially greater Minnesota culture, caused by the state budget situation. I work at HCC (to repeat, my blog is…
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The trouble with criminals
Lots of madcap antics on the East Range in today’s Mesabi Daily News. A police car drove through the newspaper’s lawn in pursuit of a suspect. Meantime, in Aurora, a reckless driver crashed his truck (on purpose) into a gas pump at the Lucky Seven. These things always happen in threes. I wonder what’s next.…
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State broadband task force meeting in Grand Rapids today
Minnesota’s Ultra High Speed Broadband Task Force is meeting in Grand Rapids today for a public forum about rural high speed internet. Stop by the Sawmill from 3-5 to share your thoughts. And, for the record, “Ultra High Speed Broadband Task Force” is the coolest committee name I’ve seen in awhile. Related posts: No related…
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Unallotment: a product of a less friendly Minnesota that wants to be average
Unallotment has come. Yesterday, in a fiery press conference Gov. Tim Pawlenty announced his unilateral solution to the budget debate he was unwilling to negotiate during the legislative session. Yay, executive power! Good luck in ’12, bub. But the outcome is devastating and the governor and his allies are unwilling to admit the role they’ve…
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New GOP chair is from Iron Range
It bears mentioning that Tony Sutton, the new Minnesota Republican Party chair, is originally from Hibbing, right in the heart of the Iron Range DFL bastion. The Hibbing Daily Tribune reminded me of this today. I’m embarrassed I didn’t recall that detail on my own. Though the Iron Range reliably produces 2-1 DFL majorities, it’s…
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Marty and Gaertner interviews on the way
In the next week I’ll be featuring more interviews with DFL Minnesota gubernatorial candidates. Today I’ll be talking to State Sen. John Marty. That interview synopsis and analysis will be posted in a few days. In the next week or so I hope to be in touch with Susan Gaertner. I’ve done four interviews already…