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Sertich scores historic win in final IRRRB meeting
Earlier this week I wrote that outgoing Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board (IRRRB) Commissioner Tony Sertich would either emerge from his last meeting today as Gary Cooper from “High Noon” or end up like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. We have our answer. I just checked in with my friend Rep. Tom Anzelc…
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Ambitious plans, controversy for Sertich’s final IRRRB meeting
On Thursday, the Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board (IRRRB) will hold its final meeting of the year, and the last in which Tony Sertich will be commissioner of the board’s unique state agency funded by local Iron Range mining revenue. The agenda is filled to the brim with everything the IRRRB has come to be known…
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Iron Range musicians keep ghost town alive
It was a pleasant surprise to see a front page MinnPost feature on Rich Mattson and Germaine Gemberling of Sparta Sound over the weekend. This musical pair and their merry band are keeping the small mining location of Sparta alive with their church-turned-studio a stone’s throw from an active iron mine. From the Nov. 21…
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UPDATE: MN DOT picks high bridge over mine pit for Hwy 53
Today the Minnesota Department of Transportation recommended its preferred alternative for the Hwy 53 Relocation project. MN-DOT wants the northernmost route, which will build the state’s tallest bridge — 1,100 feet — across the Rouchleau Pit outside Virginia. After hinting it would do so weeks ago, the DOT explains why it selected the northern route: After lengthy study of several…
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Massive bridge likely as Highway 53 re-route solution
Iron Range residents will soon learn the Minnesota Department of Transportation’s final decision on the new route for Highway 53 between Eveleth and Virginia. The Highway 53 route is likely to be announced in November, but a MNDOT official is quoted by WDIO saying that the most likely outcome will be one of the state’s highest bridges across the…
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Eveleth mine celebrates 50 years with public event
I spent most of my childhood trying to find shapes in the steam cloud billowing out of Eveleth Taconite’s plant at Forbes. Now known as United Taconite, the Iron Range iron mine and processing facility will celebrate 50 years of mining this Sunday with a public event. EVELETH, MN – Cliffs Natural Resources Inc. (NYSE:…
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New Cliffs leadership commits to iron ore strategy
After a dramatic company shake-up last month, the new CEO of Cliffs Natural Resources is vowing to focus on mining, processing, and shipping iron ore from the Great Lakes region, especially from the Mesabi Iron Range. Cliffs operates and co-owns half the mines on the Iron Range, including Hibbing Taconite, United Taconite in Eveleth and…
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Highway 53 plan may create ‘highest bridge in Minnesota’
Iron Rangers might have seen some barges floating out on the Rouchleau pit near Virginia, Minnesota this past week. Crews are drilling the rock formations beneath the deep, cold water pits to see if the craggy mine waste and rock below can sustain the weight of what would become “the highest bridge in Minnesota.” In a…
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Highway 53: So much to keep what we have
Planning continues for the Highway 53 reroute project between Eveleth and Virginia, Minnesota. For those just catching up, an iron mine is invoking a 50-year-old agreement that the state would move the highway when mining activity reached the ore reserves underneath. Highway 53, however, is one of the most important roads on the Iron Range.…
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Eveleth on Eveleth: the Range’s internet problem
Though most people there probably don’t know it, Eveleth, Minnesota, made The Atlantic magazine this week. Rose Eveleth, a tech writer for the venerated publication, wrote an interesting personal essay exploring how she came to know the town by virtue of it having the same name as her family. In essence, she got an e-mail…
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IRRRB mulls 2015 budget, projects, school funds
This Monday the Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board will consider its Fiscal Year 2015 budget at its regular meeting at the IRRRB headquarters south of Eveleth, Minnesota. Next year’s budget tallies in at almost $41 million, about $2.5 million less than this year. Major changes include a continued focus on shifting funds to K-12…
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Shared Iron Range high school plan falling apart
A major effort to build a shared high school for three Iron Range school districts is on the ropes after two of the three affected community school boards backed out of the plan in separate votes last night. Virginia and Eveleth-Gilbert school boards voted to end their involvement in the co-location of a new school…
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New Partners takes over for Eveleth telemarketer
The Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board today announced that a new business would be moving into the Eveleth building owned until recently by the now defunct Meyer telemarketing firm. Meyer Associates closed earlier this month. EVELETH, Minn. — Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board (IRRRB) Commissioner Tony Sertich today announced that New Partners Consultants,…
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Eveleth telemarketing firm closes; 104 jobs lost
A St. Cloud-based telemarketing firm abruptly shut down its facility in Eveleth this week, leaving 104 employees out of work. Fox 21 News has a good recap of what happened. Meyer Telemarketing was founded in the ’70s as a fundraising contractor for mostly Democratic Party campaigns and causes. As a northern Minnesota resident with Democratic…
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East Range shared school plan having bumpy roll-out
One of the biggest stories on the Mesabi Iron Range this year has been the proposal to build a new co-located high school in Mountain Iron that would serve students in the Virginia, Eveleth-Gilbert and Mountain Iron-Buhl school districts. Jana Hollingsworth of the Duluth News Tribune penned a Sunday feature on the shared high school…