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 2311 - 2335 of 4092
In a normal year, the oppressive heat over the Fourth of July weekend may have kept people home or at the lake. But 2021 isn't a normal year. We are free to go about our community business as the Covid-19 pandemic eases. And as the temperature gauge rose into the mid-90s Sunday, people kept flocking to downtown for the 11 a.m. parade. Not everyone made it through the entire lineup, seeking shade here and there or some other cooldown. The scene was a sure sign that things are coming back to...
Sixth District Judge Robert Macaulay will retire Aug. 31, the Pine Knot confirmed on Tuesday. Macaulay has served as a Carlton County judge since he was appointed in February 1995 by Gov. Arne Carlson, winning elections in 1996, 2002, 2008, 2014 and 2020. Prior to his appointment, he served as an assistant Carlton County Attorney from 1984 through 1995. Macaulay, 64, served as mentor judge to the other Carlton County judge, Rebekka Stumme, who was appointed to a vacancy on the bench in Carlton County in May 2019. Minnesota’s Judicial S...
It’s official. Nancy Klassen, longtime finance director for the city of Cloquet, is retiring. And she will be missed by city administrators. “I already tried to tell her no. That didn’t work,” city administrator Tim Peterson joked with council members during Tuesday’s unusually short meeting, which lasted all of 23 minutes. Klassen, who wins accounting awards like clockwork for her work for the city of Cloquet and the Cloquet Area Fire District, said her last day will be Sept. 30. The personnel committee will conduct interviews and the city hop...
Minnesota officials have settled a long-running tax case with Enbridge Energy, agreeing to pay the oil and gas company more than $45 million for overvaluing pipeline property after losing in state court. In conjunction with the deal, state lawmakers approved almost $30 million on Wednesday to cover the share owed by local governments along the pipeline routes. Even though the Department of Revenue had made faulty evaluations, the refund bill threatened to blow a hole in the budget of 13 counties, plus numerous cities, towns and school boards... 
Website
Minnesota has a new $52 billion, two-year state budget, but it didn’t come easy. The Legislature needed almost all the time between the end of the regular session on May 17 and the end of the fiscal year at midnight Wednesday to finish the budget. The special legislative session was one of a series over the past year and marked the first time many lawmakers were able to meet face to face in months. The budget came together without any of the tax increases that DFL Gov. Tim Walz and House Democrats had proposed earlier in the year, when the s... Website
A Cloquet man who was suspected of shooting a man in the leg was arrested last week. Nicholas Joseph Ammesmaki, 26, was taken into custody July 1 on an unrelated charge and is being held at the Northwest Regional Corrections Center in Crookston, Minnesota, according to a press release from the Cloquet Police Department. An arrest warrant for Ammesmaki was issued in Carlton County for possible charges of first-degree assault and possession of a firearm, stemming from two incidents in May. That’s when CPD officers responded to Scotty Drive in C...
Despite Covid-19, despite protests that called for defunding the police, last week Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College graduated every single student who enrolled in the law enforcement training program two years ago. The students made it through the difficult program and faced other challenges from Covid-19 to some who lost jobs and housing. "I was really excited and proud of this class," said program director Wade Lamirande. "With everything, all the unintended obstacles, we had everyone...
The nonprofit group Solar United Neighbors (SUN) is partnering with the Iron Range Partnership for Sustainability to launch the second Iron Range solar co-op. The group will help homeowners, farmers, and small businesses on the Range go solar. Carlton County residents are welcome, organizers said. The first community meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, July 14 in Virginia at Hope Community Presbyterian Church (212 S. 5th Ave.). A second community meeting will be scheduled for Grand Rapids Aug. 11 at the YMCA (400 River Road). Both meetings...
Although it squeaked through at the very last minute, Carlton County had a lot to celebrate in the final budget bill passed by state legislators and the governor last week. The agreement (see Page 1) that the state would cover Enbridge tax repayments for counties, schools and townships was a tremendous relief for local officials. Additionally, legislators also approved two different local sales tax requests and the fire district’s ongoing plea for appropriate taxing authority for emergency m...
Health insurance helps individuals and families prepare for life’s unexpected challenges. To enable more Minnesotans to gain the security of health insurance during the COVID-19 pandemic, MNsure has offered a five-month special enrollment period (SEP) that closes this Friday, July 16, 2021. If you’re uninsured or are currently enrolled in a health plan outside of MNsure, the COVID-19 SEP is a unique opportunity for you to find affordable, comprehensive health care coverage for 2021 through MNsure. The next open enrollment window won’t be until...
In the waning shadow of the pandemic, something special is happening at Evergreen Senior Living in Cloquet: residents of the two memory care wings are "waking up." No one died from Covid-19 at Evergreen Knoll, but the cure of social distancing brought its own challenges. When visitors were no longer allowed, in response to the pandemic, 95-year-old Evelyn "Evie" Graham had a hard time understanding why her family stopped visiting her in the memory care unit. This spring, she broke down in tears...
Because July Fourth falls on a Sunday this year, the official federal holiday will be celebrated Monday, July 5. Look for most public offices, courts, banks and the post office to be closed Monday....
There were no injuries from a crash between a passenger truck and a train in Twin Lakes Township Friday afternoon. According to a press release from the Carlton County Sheriff’s Office, deputies and officers from the Fond du Lac Police Department responded to a report of a train striking a passenger truck at 2025 Highway 210 at approximately 4:31 p.m. Friday, June 25. The crash involved a Chevrolet pickup truck driven by Cloquet’s Chase Luing, age 20, and passenger, Brandon Jenny, 49, of Hermantown and a cargo train owned and operated by BNS...
Northern Lights Academy will offer day treatment to students in the ninth and 10th grades at Carlton High School, a local option to help older students who struggle with mental or emotional issues that don’t require 24-hour care. NLA is a special education cooperative serving 12 districts, including all Carlton County schools. Cloquet superintendent Michael Cary told board members during Monday’s meeting that this will provide an alternative to sending students to Duluth, where there is a wait list. “We have Northern Lights Academy downs...
The Carlton County Board of Commissioners took the next step toward the construction of a new hangar and relocated fuel system at the Cloquet Airport this week, but the price tag was higher than originally predicted. On Monday, commissioners approved a $2.066 million bid for a new hangar at the airport, along with a bid for $660,000 to relocate and upgrade the fuel system. The majority of the costs are being covered by federal and state grants; there are fees for use of the fuel system. When the...
Villains Logan Carlson and Juniper Jablonski tie damsel in distress Ella Anderson to the tracks as town folk cry out for a hero. The County Seat children's theater summer program is highlighting silent movies while still keeping kids as safe as possible. The show "When Silents Was Golden" is a musical tribute to the early years of the 20th century when silent movies mesmerized and enthralled avid theater audiences. Young performers will take to the stage each week at Cloquet's Encore Performing...
The Fond du Lac Band is leveraging funding from the Volkswagen emissions settlement to build electric vehicle charging stations and replace diesel vehicles with cleaner technologies. A $2.8 billion Mitigation Trust Agreement was created from the $14.7 billion series of settlements Volkswagen entered into after the Environmental Protection Agency's allegations of Clean Air Act violations six years ago. The trust was set up to offset excess emissions caused by Volkswagen's vehicles, some of which...
Kids up to age 18 can pick up free summer lunches again at Cloquet High School, Door 23, or Washington Elementary School, Door 3, from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. July 12 through Aug. 20. The program is closed July 5-9. No registration is required and there are no forms to fill out. Just show up and eat. To find other sites, visit www.hungerimpactpartners.org and download its mobile app....
The Minnesota Judicial Branch announced that face coverings will no longer be required in court facilities effective July 6, 2021. “As the pandemic’s impact on Minnesota continues to recede, so too will some of the health and safety protocols that were in place in our district and appellate courts,” said Chief Justice Lorie S. Gildea. Judges, employees, and courthouse visitors will still be allowed to wear face coverings in court facilities if they choose to do so, although judges may direct people to remove face coverings as necessary to co...
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, State Patrol, county sheriff’s offices, and other public safety agencies will increase patrols for intoxicated boaters through the holiday weekend as part of Operation Dry Water, a national campaign aimed at deterring boating under the influence of drugs and alcohol....
Several building projects around Cloquet are being noticed after the ebbing Covid-19 pandemic shut many projects down due to a shortage of materials in the past year. The Pine Knot News talked to a few business owners and representatives about their projects. If your businesses has similar new, moving or expanding news, send your information to PKN reporters at [email protected]. Dance studio The building at 1404 Cloquet Ave. has lost its round roofline, a vestige of its original use as a...
The Northridge Park stage needs to be updated, according to the Thomson Township board of supervisors and a local resident. The stage is experiencing structural problems with the footholds, and the stairs on the side of the stage are also in need of repair. Dawson Broman, a resident of the township, brought these issues to the attention of the board at their June 17 meeting and proposed some solutions. Prior to the meeting, Broman met with a contractor, who proposed repairing the stage, including the footholds and stairs. After some discussion...
The Frank Lloyd Wright house known as Mäntylä, Finnish for “under the pines,” that formerly made its home in Cloquet, was featured on the CBS “Sunday Morning” program June 27. Mäntylä was commissioned by the same family that built Cloquet’s Wright-designed gas station: Ray and Emmy Lindholm. Their daughter Joyce and her husband, Daryl McKinney, had fallen in love with Wright’s work when they were students at the University of Minnesota. In 2016, Peter and Julene McKinney donated the Cloquet hom...
Wrenshall High School Fourth Quarter B Honor Roll Bruddy Axtell Bryce Barczak Eli Beetcer Gavin Beetcher Joseph Bergman Hennessey Bilges Ethan Blanchard Othin Carter Pidge Eckdahl Easton Everett Briar Fernquist Brennen Fisher-Merritt Elizabeth Johnson Jenna Johnson Mark Johnson Natalya Kacer Nathaniel Kopponen Joel Lembke Melany Lonetto Eden Loucks Anne Mattson Ryker Miller Paige Olson Austin Skagerberg Magdalene Sowada Willow Sowada Kaya Stark Wesley Ward...
Carlton Schools Fourth Quarter A Honor Roll Grade 12 Colin Emerson Elizabeth Hey Jayna LeBrasseur Trevor Ojibway Daniel Sandoval Grade 11 Olivia Anderson Kash Gibson Morgan Laveau Grade 10 Korah Crane Eliza DeCaigny McKenzie Midge Emma Peterson Dylan Schwartz Michaela Sundeen Grade 9 Michael Cadott Brayden Drake Luukas Korpela Gavin LeBrasseur Megan Matarelli Sam Ojibway Grade 8 Gavin Gibson Lauryn Hilton Jackson Korpela Amber Lawry Ayden Ojibway Julia Peterson Kayla Radtke Aryanna Rodeghiero Amy Schwoch Grade 7 Alex Gillette Riley Kedrowski...
