03/17/09: This week's Minnesota news from other media

A spring flood outlook issued by National Weather Service hydrologists March 13 "includes a 90 percent chance the Red Lake River in Crookston will reach 21.5 feet, a 50 percent chance it will reach 23.5 feet, a 20 percent chance it will reach 26 feet, and a 10 percent chance it will reach 27 feet," writes Mike Christopherson in the Crookston Daily Times. "In more general terms, the outlook states that there's a 50 percent chance or greater of major flooding in Crookston."

The father of Fargo journalist Roxana Saberi said Sunday that the next three days will be critical in trying to secure her release from an Iranian prison, writes Helmut Schmidt at the Fargo/Moorhead Inforum.

Officials from Goodhue Public School has been speaking with representatives from Zumbrota-Mazeppa and Kenyon-Wanamingo Public Schools about the possibility of forming a charter school within the school districts, writes Annette Jorissen, Goodhue reporter for the Zumbrota News Record.

University of Minnesota officials are moving ahead with their long-planned high-energy physics project, with construction slated to begin June 1, writes Marshall Helmberger of the Ely Timberjay. The proposed laboratory, named the NuMI Off-Axis Electron Neutrino Appearance (NOvA) Detector Facility at Ash River Site, will be constructed on a 90-acre site about one mile south of Voyageurs National Park.

Attendees at a recent New Ulm Chamber of Commerce breakfast heard details of a mixed economic outlook for the city, writes Kevin Sweeney in the New Ulm Journal. Among negative developments, MCG, Inc. announced it is closing its operation in New Ulm, displacing about 80 workers, and two industrial prospects who had been looking at a local facility have put their plans on hold. On the positive side, Kraft Foods added a product line this past year, South Beach Living Bars, bringing 60 new jobs to the plant and involving a $19 million capital investment.

It's an unusual dilemma in the making, writes Tom Cherveny in Willmar's West Central Tribune: Rural Electric Associations see a need for new sources of electricity, and many of their member-owners are eager to become the generators. "But small wind power can be too much of a good thing for REAs."