There was a lot of fun-filled action on a warm, windy day at the Pincushion Mountain Festival held Sunday, February 12, which was once again hosted by the Cook County Ski & Run Club. Max Hollmann, a high school cross country skier from Thunder Bay, Ontario, won the 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) classic cross country ski race held Sunday, February […]
County board hears Keystone Consulting Compensation/Class Study report
At the request of the county board, Cook County Administrator Jeff Cadwell was tasked with performing a worker compensation/class study for county employees, something that hadn’t been done since the 1980s. Cadwell, his assistant Judy Hill and the Keystone Consulting Group, which was hired to assist with the study, began working with department heads and employees in June. The finished […]
Meet the candidate
Four candidates are running for the District 1 Cook County Commissioner seat vacated by Frank Moe, who left office due to concerns about his health. With the primary election in April, two candidates will move on following that vote and compete in the general election in June. This week the Cook County News- Herald is introducing you to Ryan Bottger. […]
Nolan’s aide gets an earful
“Silence is a tacit way of saying you accept things,” said an emotional Pete Cavanaugh to Mark Privratsky, Eighth District Congressman Rick Nolan’s Field and Constituent Service representative. “Congressman Nolan has to speak out on the congressional floor the way that, excuse me, what is her name? Yes, Senator Elizabeth Warren does. He can’t remain silent on issues that are […]
PUC considers future of aging infrastructure
During the February 1 meeting of the Grand Marais Public Utilities Commission (PUC), Wastewaster Superintendent Tom Nelson remarked that water lost due to aging infrastructure and leaks is down to 30 percent as compared to last year’s average of 50 percent. “We’ve had a handful of infrastructure improvements. A good chunk will be replaced with the highway project in 2019 […]
Cook County Republicans elect officers
About 15 Cook County Republicans met in the log cabin at the Cook County Community Center on Monday, February 13 to select officers and discuss business for the coming year. It was a peaceful, well organized, congenial meeting. Mary Petz was elected temporary chair, and Pat Brandt gave the invocation. Petz read the treasurer’s report because GOP Treasurer Vance Benedix […]
Kicking the can down the road
If you happened to catch any of the 2017 county budget proceedings, you couldn’t help but hear the oft-quoted cliché, “Kick the can down the road.” The expression, meaning to procrastinate or put off solving a problem until later, exhibits a type of gamesmanship similarity to the childhood activity “kick the can” – when somebody kicked a can full of […]
Taxing our way to prosperity?
For many years, politicians and elected officials have tried to convince citizens that increasing taxes is a great way for the country, county or city to prosper. The only problem is I can’t find one occurrence where increasing taxes has made any municipality prosper. If officials continue to frivolously spend any new tax increases, the municipality will have a shortfall […]
Liberals need to stop complaining
We as Americans are witnessing some amazing things these days. We have seen the Federal Courts of the West Coast commit a “coup d’etat.” So to speak. They have taken away by their “eminent domain” the right of a sitting president of the United States of America to carry out a lawful right to make decisions based on the Constitution […]
Report sheds light on plight of rural Minnesota
A couple of weeks ago I read through a lengthy report put out by the Minnesota Department of Administration’s State Demographic Center for Greater Minnesota. Here are some items that stood out. . Rural, small town, and large town residents who work full-time are two or more times more likely to live in poverty than urban dwellers. . Residents of […]