A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
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Not everyone needs a will. But everyone should consider having one anyway. In Minnesota, if you pass away without a will, the law takes over: everything you own will pass to your heirs. If you have children, it goes to them. If you don’t have children, it passes to your parents if they are still around, or to your siblings. No siblings? The law of intestate succession continues down the family tree, so cousins, second cousins and so on inherit. Eventually, if there are no relatives, the state ke...
Queen of Peace school has been around town a long time. Since before the big fire. Since 1911, to be precise. The new principal, David Douglas, is just finishing up his first year at the school. He’s breathed some new life and energy into the school, which has an enthusiastic staff and student body, but is always under the scrutiny of the parish due to its immense costs. Running a private school isn’t cheap, and our strong public schools make the decision difficult for those choosing bet...
Most of us take the mail for granted. For years, you dropped a letter into the mail and it reached its destination, for the small price of a stamp. “Lost in the mail” is a joke: Mail doesn’t get lost very often; it’s quite reliable and always has been. Until recently, that is. After the mail sorting station in Duluth closed, most of our mail is routed through the Twin Cities, and now takes longer than ever to get a simple letter from Moose Lake to Proctor. To that problem, I say: So what? I have...
There’s a lot of talk about the bias people bring to their jobs, especially in the media. Most of the grousing is by people who don’t like to hear any news that challenges their own beliefs. For example, many political stories are dismissed by those who don’t want to hear other viewpoints. So they often complain that the reporter or the media is biased. But there is bias everywhere. In the legal profession, we are required to attend courses every three years to help us recognize bias in our prof...
I appreciate Rick Nolan. After Chip Cravaack broke the stranglehold Jim Oberstar had on the 8th Congressional District seat in 2010, Rick Nolan came out of political retirement and challenged Cravaack two years later. He won handily. Now, I was a fan of Chip Cravaack, although I didn’t vote for him and didn’t agree with his politics. But he embodied what I believe is the spirit of American politics: representative democracy by engaged citizens, willing to work for the people. Cravaack, unf...
When someone is looking to start or expand their business in Cloquet, they usually call City Hall first. If they do, they’ll be directed to Holly Hansen, Cloquet’s community development director. Holly Hansen has been with the city for over a decade, working behind the scenes (and in the forefront, too) to make sure Cloquet stays healthy, businesswise. She joined us on Harry’s Gang this week to explain what she does, how she does it, and what is happening around town. Many people are famil...
The state Legislature is considering Governor Walz’s proposal to add 20 cents per gallon to Minnesota’s gas tax over the next two years. Walz believes the tax is essential to repair Minnesota’s crumbling roads and bridges, as he calls them. The gas tax, if implemented, would eventually raise the gas tax to 48.6 cents per gallon. The governor proposes to increase the tax by a nickel every six months or so for two years. Then, he wants the gas tax tied to inflation. Fixing roads and bridges has b...
The Legislature is considering a proposal to make Minnesota employers of a certain size keep employees on the payroll, even while they are taking family leave. Essentially, the proposal would allow workers to continue to get paid while they are on leave for family and medical emergencies. This makes some sense, because most workers dedicate their work life to their jobs; they expect to spend most of their day, five days a week, year after year, doing their jobs. In exchange, the employer pays...
Do you get frequent emails from your political party, favored candidates and elected officials? I don’t. Not anymore. Last year, I signed up for updates from the candidates for Congress. I figured it would be a good way to keep track of the candidates and the issues they felt were important. At first, I got occasional emails, detailing upcoming campaign events and discussions of the issues they were running on. Soon, I was getting emails from everyone: Democrats, Republicans, candidates, s...
One of the nice things about spring break is that your children are home for a whole week. One of the things that strikes terror in the hearts of parents is that their children are home for a whole week during spring break. It’s times like this that I advocate for year-round school. Six days a week. 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Twelve months a year. Maybe an extra day off at Christmas, and maybe an occasional Saturday. I’m joking, of course. I love spending quality time with my children. They’re fun, inqui...
Colorado just passed a state law where its electoral votes will go to the winner of the national popular vote. As you probably know, the Electoral College is used only to elect the president. In the past 30 years we’ve twice elected a president who did not receive the majority of the popular vote. This rankles some people, who believe the popular vote is the most democratic way to elect a president. They are right: it is the most democratic way. In a democracy, a simple majority of the people d...
The Town of Thomson — popularly known as “Esko” — held its annual meeting Tuesday night. About 15 residents plus Thomson Township officials and employees reviewed the annual financial statement, heard from department heads, and discussed town business at the one-hour meeting at the Thomson Town Hall. The most significant vote was approving the 2020 tax levy, which increased by 3.35 percent to $1.6 million, which is a similar increase from recent years. Although the voters asked some questio...
I recently had the chance to chat with Nicole Lackus, a Cloquet middle school teacher, about procedure in the event of a lockdown at Cloquet schools. Over the past six months or so, school resource officer Eric Blesener and others have trained staff at each Cloquet school (and a number of the county schools) in a protocol called “ALICE,” which helps schools develop the best strategies possible in case of an armed intruder. ALICE — which stands for Alert, Lockdown, Inform 911, Counter and Evacu...
Legal ethics is not an oxymoron. Generally, I enjoy a good lawyer joke. Unfortunately, there are not very many good lawyer jokes. But there are a lot of good lawyers. Michael Cohen — President Trump’s personal attorney who is now headed to prison for lying to Congress — is not one of those “good lawyers.” Sure, he is educated, and probably quite skilled. But so are most lawyers, believe it or not. In order to practice law in Minnesota, lawyers are required to attend law school, pass a rigorous t...
Minnesota has a history of progressive politics. Think Hubert Humphrey and his groundbreaking civil rights work, and Paul Wellstone with his pro-labor work as well as his major impact on mental health issues and domestic abuse issues. And by a vote of the people, Minnesota was the first state to reject a constitutional amendment proposing to ban same-sex marriage. But it’s not necessarily “progressive” to legalize marijuana. There is a lot of support out there for legal recreational use. A rec...
There’s a reason why Minnesota has advanced so many presidential candidates over the years. Some, like Eugene McCarthy and Harold Stassen, ran so often they lost credibility. Others, like Tim Pawlenty and Michelle Bachman never really had a chance, although Tim Pawlenty might have been a decent president. And two others actually came pretty close to the presidency: Hubert Humphrey in 1968 (he lost by less than 1 percent of the popular vote) and Walter Mondale (well, 59 percent to 41 percent isn...
There was an uproar last week when we discovered the governor of Virginia had an odd picture in his 1984 medical school yearbook: a caricature of a black man and a KKK member, both seemingly smiling and clueless. Nothing in the photo or its caption explains why the photo was on his page. The governor was apologetic and remorseful but refused to resign. He still has the support of many of the state’s black population, according to polls, although a significant number are upset. Understandably s...
The pickup truck was stuck, nose-deep in the snowy ditch. In Brainerd for the weekend, I was exploring a bit as 4-year-old Eleanor napped in the back seat. Rushing her brothers to and from the swim meet and accommodating my wife, Tara, as she volunteered at the event, meant that Ellie didn’t get her nap. She fell asleep as I dropped off her brother Tommy and I knew if I woke her up, she’d stay awake and be very cranky by dinner time. So I drove. I headed up Minnesota Highway 371 towards Nis...
I recently had the fun of attending the local Rotary Club meeting. Rotary, for those of you who don’t know, is a service club of local professionals and businesspeople, whose mission seems to be networking coupled with public service. They meet for lunch weekly, and get involved in community projects from providing books to young readers to maintaining Fauley Park in Cloquet. When I first got to town in 1999, then superintendent Russ Smith sponsored me in my membership, mostly as a favor to o...
In some past issues of the Pine Knot News, we’ve implored citizens to step up and serve on city commissions, boards, and committees. It’s a great way to get involved in our community. But what’s the point of serving on a commission if the city leaders don’t even bother to consult that commission when making long-term decisions? That’s what is happening with CAT-7. City administration is suggesting substantial changes in the way our cable access channel is managed, and has already cut the coord...
I had the good fortune to interview Dr. Michael Cary, Ed.D., the new superintendent of the Cloquet schools, on “Harry’s Gang” this week. Cary has been on the job since last summer, and is now just halfway through his first school year in Cloquet. He has quite an interesting story. His undergraduate degree is in biology and chemistry at UMD, and he went into education afterward, teaching at a couple of schools before becoming a principal of a high school in Bismarck, N.D. He eventually becam...
Standoffs are a terrible way to govern. The reason we have so many people in the legislative branches is to allow diversity of opinion. The more people we have, the more we need to compromise. So, why is there no compromise in the federal government? Instead of looking for solutions, we’re all arguing that we must “Save Our Country From Terrorists and if you are opposed to a wall you must Hate America And Should Leave. Or if you build a Wall, You Hate Anyone Who Looks Different Than You.” Every...
Harry “Grandpa” Newby Sr. took a liking to me early in my career at his son’s law office. I’m not sure why, but we got along very well and had many happy arguments over the years, up to just two days before he passed away in 2002. One of his last wishes was for us to continue the cable access TV show, “Harry’s Gang,” which he started in about 1983. He suggested that we rename the show “Pete’s Gang” but such heresy would not be tolerated. It’s still called “Harry’s Gang” and always will be....
We’ve been down one in the Carlton County Attorney’s Office since the last election. It seems that Thom Pertler, who served our county very well for about two decades, stopped showing up for work after he lost his re-election bid. As an employer, I am usually a little irritated when people quit without notice. In my businesses, I often ask job applicants if they will agree to give me as much notice as possible if they plan to leave their job with me. In exchange, I will: a) promise to give the...
Some people are frothing this holiday season after some #MeToo people pointed out that the holiday classic “Baby, It’s Cold Outside’ is a little creepy. These people are furiously offended that some other people are offended by things that don’t offend them. Confused? Extremists are always confusing. Well, the song is a little creepy, if it’s judged by today’s standards. Certainly, a song written about the boy-meets-girl cat-and-mouse mating rituals of post-war American culture would never...
