Previously, I reported that Sheriff Stanek’s projected 2014 budget is $92 million, which is $43 million larger than Ramsey County’s projected 2014 budget of $49 million. Hennepin is way above every other urban county. Continue Reading
Both Minneapolis Mayor Hodges and Chief Harteau are committed to changing the culture of the Minneapolis police into more of community police force. The police abuse has violated community trust. Chief Harteau even called in the federal Justice Department to put on more pressure to change. The Star Tribune describes the conclusions: Continue Reading
The Ramsey Conservation District (RCD) is commonly called the water board. The board protects the quality of lakes and drinking water from storm runoff. Controlling water runoff also conserves our good top soil. The board encourages people to have rain gardens that trap rain and redirect back into building back up our water table. Since water is our most critical resource, the people who serve on this board are unnoticed heroes. Continue Reading
The newest candidate for Hennepin Sheriff is Eddie Frizell, a Deputy Chief of the Patrol Bureau with the City of Minneapolis Police Department w Continue Reading
Both Rebecca Otto and Shawn Otto exemplify grace under pressure. Still under shock of a unexpected opponent, they rallied and organized an outpouring of support. Shawn personally ensured that every request of mine was fulfilled. Every one I know said the same. So every DFL event and parade became focused on persuading for Rebecca Otto. It also helped that Rebecca Otto had done great work, that was easily documented with awards and online-published papers. Continue Reading
Wow, deputies endorse the new candidate for Hennepin Sheriff, Eddie Frizell, not the incumbent Rich Stanek, by a vote of 170 to 14 votes. There must be some serious reasons because I am sure that endorsing against one’s current boss is a risk. An announcement is expected out soon. Continue Reading
Unbelievable and yet still true! There are many reasons why the Minnesota Republican endorsement of Michelle MacDonald, Minnesota Supreme Court justice is just very wrong. Continue Reading
An uncontested race is one of the best circumstances that a candidate can have. While almost all legislative and state races are contested, many local races are not contested. So all over the state, people who had no one file against them were refreshing the candidate filing web page over and over again on the last filing day. Some people received discreet spotter phone calls. Groans and condolences would be expressed for any discovered new filing. Suddenly a casual campaign would become an intensive campaign taking up every weekend. Continue Reading
We are facing the destruction of everything so that oil oligarchs can extract more money for another decade or two. Never mind that there is no happiness left for the oil oligarchs left to buy. If we allow the oil oligarchs to burn the carbon reserves they currently own, total warming in 300 years would lead to 2.75 doublings of CO2, or a global temperature rise of about 12 °C. One more study says 12 °C would cause too much heat stress for humans to survive. Even if we could shelter humans under such conditions, the problem is that our main staples of food will not grow. Continue Reading
On a regular basis, Minnesota has insect plagues. The most famous is the locusts that would look like an incoming snowstorm. This year we may have the tent caterpillar invasion. Our cold spring may have saved us this year, although there is just enough seed population that the tent caterpillar invasion will happen one of these years. Just to give you an idea of the cycles, here is a chart published by the Minnesota DNR. Continue Reading