Summer rains flood roads and parking lots



Heavy rain fell in the early afternoon of Thursday, July 18, creating flash floods throughout the county. Damage was spread throughout the county with washed out driveways and flooded basements. Unfortunately it was just the beginning. Another downpour hit just after midnight, wreaking more havoc in the early hours of Friday, flooding county roads and Highway 61 with water and […]

Moose calf study: fifteen calves left to monitor



The moose calf morbidity study begun in May 2013 with 49 calves captured and collared with GPS homing devices by Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) workers now shows there are only 15 calves left to track. But the high rate of mortality has slowed down, said Glenn DelGiudice, Ph.D., the research scientist in charge of the study. “The last […]

County board wars over zip line loan



Evidently it pays to be assertive. Especially when talking to the county board. After a motion to approve a loan failed for lack of a second at the July 23, 2013 county board meeting, a heated debate broke out, but it resulted in a favorable outcome for the applicant. Hal Greenwood of the Cook County Revolving Loan Fund Committee brought […]

Hospital/care center remodeling for efficiency and patient satisfaction



In anticipation of a possible facility remodel, the Cook County North Shore Hospital & Care Center board toured the facility June 20 and July 18 in order to understand the needs as seen by staff and administration. The care center The care center is a really good place, said Resident Care Coordinator Mark Abrahamson, but improvements could be made to […]

Political Cartoon



Not a good week for taxpayers



The July 13 issue of the paper was interesting to say the least. How about expensive to the taxpayer? Headlines from page one included: contingency fund running low for YMCA and state authorizes two new county taxes for road and bridge funds. The recently passed 1 percent tax has not even finished all its spending and now more is needed […]

Grand Marais makes great impression



It is a community of trust and honesty where people can leave tons of fertilizer bags in the open or plants on display. Where one can leave his belongings on an open trailer without fear of losing them. This is a village where people purposely smile and give a warm greeting of “good morning.”.. and mean it. I grew up […]

Mining companies must plan for perpetual treatment



Polymet will be releasing a revised environmental impact statement (EIS) for its hard-rock mining project located in the St. Louis River watershed later this summer. In their revised EIS they will be making the claim that pollutants from their operation will be treated using a series of submerged tailings ponds, reverse osmosis and other methods of treating acid rock bi-products, […]

Judgmental Facebook comments not helpful



Ah, Facebook. You can request friends and you can deny access, you can even delete your posts but really, what you are putting out there the whole world will see if someone wants it to be seen. Take for instance “Mr. Local Gym Owner.” He recently posted on his Facebook page, “I can’t help to laugh and shake my head […]

Serendipitous shots



We take a lot of photos at the Cook County News-Herald. After events like the Grand Marais Arts Festival or Fisherman’s Picnic, we have literally hundreds of digital files to go through. We have good photos and bad. We have dozens of unusable pictures that are out of focus or too dark. It’s easy to dump those. But then we […]