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
Sorted by date Results 1738 - 1762 of 4092
As part of the process of accepting grant funding for the implementation of body-worn cameras, the Cloquet Police Department held the first of three public hearings during Tuesday’s city council meeting for public input. Police chief Derek Randall presented the draft policy for the both video and audio recordings, which was published as part of the May 17 council agenda packet at cloquetmn.gov. There was no public comment Tuesday, although Randall said the police department has received two comments, both in favor of body cameras. Anyone i...
Nearly two dozen people attended Monday's Wrenshall school board meeting, none of them to address agenda items. Four people spoke; two others belatedly said they wanted to give their time to the first speaker. That was Tony Sheda, a frequent speaker at Wrenshall school board meetings. The longtime resident repeated a litany of past complaints to the board, starting with the assertion that a petition that led to the removal of a board-appointed member, Bill Dian, last September was illegal....
The Carlton school board is searching for a new principal after it accepted the resignation of Ben Midge at its meeting Monday. Under advice from superintendent John Engstrom, the district will seek to fill a position of elementary principal, which was Midge’s job before tacking on the high school grades two years ago in a cost-saving measure for the challenged district. Engstrom said he expects there to be some remaining responsibilities at the high school, likely 10 percent of the job for a new hire, for which he could fill in alongside a p...
Construction on Minnesota highways 210 and 73 in Cromwell will be temporarily delayed, the Minnesota Department of Transportation announced last week. It did not provide details on why the project is delayed. “The new start date will be communicated as soon as possible but is anticipated to be at the end of May,” MnDOT said in a press release. The detour will be put into place once the start date is scheduled and it will likely be in place into October. Weekly update meetings at the construction site will be scheduled once work begins. The pro...
After another round of seeking funding to fix the failing outdoor back stairs to his apartment building, Roger Bruhn said this week that he has come up empty again. It likely means that by June 1, upper-level residents at the Victory Apartments will need to find housing after the city of Cloquet deemed the stairs a hazard and the top two floors "uninhabitable" without a fix. The stairs serve as the only direct exit for the upper floors of the building at 17 Eighth Street, across from the...
After years of planning by the Carlton County board of commissioners and county administration, major bid packages for the county’s justice center are scheduled to be released June 10, closing June 30. A guaranteed maximum price for the justice center will be presented to the board at its July 12 meeting by construction manager Adolfson & Peterson. There are many contractors involved in the project, which has grown to an estimated $73 million with an estimated 15 percent inflation rate built in. The final cost won’t be determined until aft...
Jury selection started Monday, May 16, in the long-awaited homicide trial of 35-year-old Sheldon Thompson, with the trial expected to last into early June. Thompson is accused of killing his pregnant girlfriend, Jackie Defoe, her unborn child, and her 20-month-old son in March 2020. Thompson faces two charges of murder in the first degree each for the deaths of Jackie Ann Defoe and her son Kevin Lee Shabaiash Jr., and one charge of murder in the first degree of an unborn child, premeditated. He also faces two charges of murder in the second deg...
After winning the state championship in a quiz bowl against a team from Cambridge, Minnesota last month, the Cloquet High School econ team ended its winning streak at the National Economics Challenge Upper Midwest region, coach Tim Prosen found out Friday. Cloquet had two econ teams that had been studying and preparing together for about two months, but it was Team 1 — Cale Prosen, Jake Mertz, Amelia Allen and Sam Buytaert — that won the sectional competition and then State. Members of Team 2 were Ilei Benson, Emily Vermeersch, Olivia Jameson a...
Minnesota lawmakers have cut a deal on how much money from the big projected budget surplus will go to cut taxes, give a boost to schools and be used to enhance public safety. The agreement came Monday with one week to go in the 2022 session. Many specific details will still have to be sorted out, but the signed framework will devote $4 billion over three years to tax cuts, $4 billion to new spending and leave about $4 billion unspent in case the economy sours. Of the new spending, $1 billion will go each to education and programs in the area... 
Website
Lake Country Power awarded the Lake Country Power 2022 Les Beach Memorial Scholarship to 32 local high school seniors from 27 schools. The scholarship honors a former co-op employee and recognizes student commitment and contribution to local communities. “The State of Minnesota permits electric cooperatives like Lake Country Power to use unclaimed funds for charitable purposes, such as scholarships,” said Lake Country Power’s Greg Schulzetenberg. The $4,000 scholarships, issued at $1,000 per year for four years, will help the following gradu...
With flooding and high water affecting multiple parts of St. Louis County, county leaders held a news conference Thursday to provide updates on the situation, resources available to citizens, and important safety reminders. The most significant flooding is occurring in the Rainy Lake Basin, which includes the communities of Crane Lake and Kabetogama. According to the National Weather Service in Duluth, water levels on Namakan Lake and Lake Kabetogama are expected to continue to rise another...
Bridget Peterson, a media specialist at the schools in Esko, held a door open for two elementary students on Tuesday. One of them said: "Thank you for being yellow." Peterson beamed. "That was so cool." "Yellow" has been the code word for kindness the past few weeks at the elementary school in a courtesy and kindness campaign dubbed "Be the Yellow," based on a national and worldwide campaign launched by a teacher in honor of one of his colleagues. "I'm the instigator," admitted kindergarten...
Chronic wasting disease is spreading in deer farms and, to a lesser extent, among wild deer in Minnesota and across the country. While there has been no CWD documented in Carlton County, a positive case in the city of Grand Rapids in March, and issues with a Beltrami County farm last year, have the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources looking at a statewide approach to disease surveillance, management, control and education. The fatal neurological disease affects the cervid family - deer,...
Carlton County commissioners voted last month to support a "No Mow May" to help bees and other pollinators, as they are struggling with habitat loss, neonicotinoid use, pathogens and parasites. By encouraging people to wait until June to mow their yards and other outdoor spaces, pollinators can take advantage of early spring flowers (yes, including dandelions) as they emerge from the unusually long hibernation this spring....
Cloquet Area Fire District firefighters lost more than an arson detection dog when K-9 Wish was euthanized Monday, they lost a friend. A mix of golden retriever and Labrador, Wish had been with the fire district and her handler, Jason Maki, for nine years. She and Maki were certified on May 9, 2013, and she served enthusiastically - nosing out arson cases - until recently, when her health began to fail unexpectedly. She was diagnosed with advanced cancer and died Monday, exactly nine years from...
Essentia Health will open its new Cloquet clinic and urgent care on May 16 at 1413 Highway 33 South, across from Bergquist Imports and south of the credit union. "We know that there is an unmet need in the community and we know this can help fill that gap," said Trina Lower, operations director for Essentia. "We see many patients traveling from the Cloquet area to receive high-quality care at our facilities in Duluth and Moose Lake. By opening this clinic, we are eliminating barriers and making...
The Thomson Township board of supervisors approved crack sealing and restriping for both the town hall building parking lot and the fire department’s parking lot, along with other roads throughout the township, during their meeting Thursday, May 5. The crack repair, sealing, and restriping of the parking lots has not been done since before the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to township engineer Joe Jurewicz. Some board members were concerned about the price increase from previous repairs, but Jurewicz assured them the township i...
The Arrowhead Library System’s bookmobile will make the rounds in the area soon: • Esko, 10:15-10:45 a.m. at Northwood United Methodist Church June 20 • Proctor, 12:15-1:15 p.m. at St. Rose Church May 26, June 16 -Proctor, 2-2:45 p.m. at Community Center May 26, June 16 • Solway Township, 3:15-4:15 at Solway Town Hall on Munger Shaw Road May 26, June 16...
Esko students, from kindergarteners to the senior class, have a lot to be proud of, according to school principals and superintendent Aaron Fischer. High school principal Greg Hexum reported to the Esko school board at its meeting Monday that high school seniors have received over $2.5 million in scholarships to pursue secondary education after graduation. According to Hexum, more than $170,000 in local scholarships were awarded at the annual Esko Educational Foundation’s scholarship night. The remaining scholarships, totalling about $2.5 m...
The Cloquet Forestry Center has hit the big time. Well, it really has already made a name for itself in scientific circles. Researchers there are always happy to share what they are working on and when National Geographic came calling, they were more than agreeable to talk about its decade of work on deciphering just what northern Minnesota's forests may look like as the climate changes. Two photographs taken from the forestry center are featured in an article in the May edition of National...
New Wine is back and better than ever, with 7 p.m. performances of "Bright Star" running nightly (beginning Wednesday) through Sunday, May 15 at Zion Lutheran Church. Featuring a toe-tapping gospel/bluegrass score by actor/comedian/banjo player Steve Martin and singer/songwriter Edie Brickell of the New Bohemians, "Bright Star" is set in North Carolina and is inspired by a true story. Spanning decades, it tells the heartbreaking yet uplifting saga of literary editor Alice Murphy. When Alice...
Cloquet school district officials have some challenges on their hands in planning for the next few school years, thanks to a “bubble” of large classes that will be entering the high school and continued fluctuations in enrollment likely caused by the pandemic, according to superintendent Michael Cary. During Monday’s Cloquet school board meeting, Cary presented the board with proposals for budget changes in the 2022-23 budget year, which begins in July. In total, district staff are recom...
Carlton County commissioners got a taste of some of the challenges they will face in crafting a budget for 2023 at Tuesday’s board meeting. “Fuel costs are at $4 and rising,” said county coordinator Dennis Genereau. “The rise of gas and fuel prices impacts everything we do in the programs we run.” Genereau explained that the costs to run the new justice center are still in the planning stage. Another groundskeeper and at least a couple of custodians are being considered. Additional staff for the Sheriff’s Office and the court system are...
When a contest needs triple overtime to determine a winner, it's usually been well-played and exciting for everyone, and maybe a little luck was involved. That's exactly what happened last Friday morning at the fifth annual Battle of the Books held in the Cloquet High School auditorium. Fourth-grade students from Cloquet's Washington Elementary, Churchill Elementary, and a group visiting from Ely gathered to compete in front of more than 100 audience members. After about 40 minutes of...
Barnum High School Quarter 3 A HONOR ROLL Grade 7 Tessa Bednarek Eli Berger Faith Bernhardson Marlene Budge Natalie Carlson Emma Dahl Lily Dahl Ruth Dinger Connor Ferrin Lillian Genereau Jillian Grott Piper Johnson Halle Kauppila Arie Koecher Ali Laveau Lucy Maher Reuben Olson-Williams Nora Piri Miah Sandberg Lauren Soukkala Elijah Wendt Jlind White-Wyman Grade 8 Alizondra Collelo Cadence Fanning Lucy Franek Sophia Frank Grace Grover Eoghan Heaslip Michael Hoover Evan Mundell MaKenna Nordstrom Morghan Nynas Ava Nyquist Iris Polecheck Isabelle...
