-
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.…
-
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…
-
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…
-
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…
-
Marty interview coming Tuesday
I’ll be posting my interview and campaign analysis for DFL gubernatorial candidate John Marty at noon on Tuesday. I interviewed Sen. Marty last Wednesday but my crazy life has slowed the writing of the story. And then it dawned on me that I wasn’t being paid for any of this. Anyway, my conversation with Marty…
-
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…
-
All Hail Greenland!
Hey, I missed this. Apparently today Greenland begins limited self-governance, having been granted partial independence from Denmark. Find out more. Check out their cool new flag. Call the flag store, City of Chisholm. (h/t TYWKIWDBI) Related posts: No related posts.
-
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.
-
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.
-
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…
-
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.…
-
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…
-
Quaint election of bygone days to be decided
Word is that Thursday is going to be “Official Minnesota Supreme Court Decision Day” for our state’s long enduring U.S. Senate recount battle. I have an inside source who tells me the winner of our Senate seat will be … Amelia Earhart. NOOOOOOO! OK, I still haven’t decided if that’s funny, but Politics and Minnesota…
-
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…
-
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…