Surdyk’s looks for a new deal. Says Erin Adler in the Strib, “Minneapolis liquor store owner Jim Surdyk will pay a larger fine but face a shorter license suspension than previously suggested as punishment for opening his doors on a Sunday in March, nearly four months before the new Sunday liquor sales law takes effect. Under a new proposed deal with the city, Surdyk will pay a $50,000 fine and Surdyk’s Liquor in northeast Minneapolis will be closed on three Sundays — July 2, 9 and 16 — according to Minneapolis City Council documents.”
Forest Lake will make it official. Also from Adler: “Addressing several hundred residents via Facebook Live Sunday night, Mara Bain, a Forest Lake City Council member, congratulated a city that had “just accomplished the impossible” and predicted the City Council would approve a new contract with the Forest Lake Police Department Monday night, effectively preserving the force. … The City Council will vote Monday night on the new contract, a sharp turnaround from a controversial decision just a week earlier to disband the force.”
Just another detail from the 2016 election. The AP reports, “State Sen. Mary Lazich was adamant: The bill Republicans were about to push through the Wisconsin state Senate, requiring that voters present identification at the polls, would do no harm. ‘Not a single voter in this state will be disenfranchised by the ID law,’ Lazich promised. Five years later, in the first presidential election held under the new law, Gladys Harris proved her wrong. By one estimate, 300,000 eligible voters in the state lacked valid photo IDs heading into the election; … She had lost her driver’s license just before Election Day. Aware of the new law, she brought her Social Security and Medicare cards as well as a county-issued bus pass that displayed her photo. Not good enough. She had to cast a provisional ballot that ended up not being counted.”
Need some Franken/Klobuchar for President talk? In the Washington Examiner Paul Bedard says, “What’s in Minnesota’s water? For the second time in the modern age, two hopefuls from ‘Minnesota Nice’ are eyeing a presidential bid, and it could come as soon as 2020 in the Democratic primary. Left-leaning Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken, the former writer and actor for ‘Saturday Night Live,’ are getting lots of buzz about a potential run. The Klobuchar chatter is based on her recent visit to Iowa, the first caucus state, and Franken’s generating talk because of his ‘high-profile grillings’ of top Trump Cabinet officials.”
Well, the idea was to be first. Says Paul Walsh for the Strib, “Now that Edina has approved raising the age for buying cigarettes and other tobacco products from 18 to 21, the idea is winning support elsewhere in Minnesota. A community health manager in northwestern Minnesota wrote last week in a letter to the editor that what Edina and more than 200 other communities around the country have done ‘will help prevent more kids from being addicted to tobacco products’. … Early in May, Edina’s City Council made the suburb the first community in Minnesota to boost the minimum age to buy tobacco-related products to 21.”
Trepidation downtown. Jeff Wagner at WCCO-TV says, “ … as the temperature continues to rise, so too does the possibility of crime. To address that, Downtown Inspector Michael Sullivan with the Minneapolis Police Department’s First Precinct said it begins with a stronger police presence. Not only seeing the officers on foot patrols, but making sure they’re interacting with people. It was part of his plan he revealed alongside other MPD inspectors representing the other four districts earlier in the month. MPD will use its police reserves, mounted patrol, bicycle officers as well as get assistance from Metro Transit Police.”
But they’are also “fed up and angry”? KSTP-TV says, “Several downtown business owners said they are ‘fed up and angry’ with Minneapolis city leaders after a Saturday evening shooting. … Some downtown business leaders told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS the timing and location of this latest shooting has them especially concerned for the public’s safety, the safety of their employees and the economic vitality of the downtown area.”
Snubbed. The PiPress’ Dane Mizutani writes: “Well, if the Gophers softball team needed any extra motivation to reach its first College World Series in program history, it got it on Sunday night. Despite boasting the best record in the nation, the Gophers (54-3) will enter the NCAA tournament unseeded, meaning the selection committee deemed that there were 16 teams more deserving of a seed.”
There’s a warning here, I guess. A KARE-TV story says, “As fish stories go, you may have to account for a bit of fabrication. For Aron and Lacey Kastern, fishing is a big part of life. They live in northern Wisconsin and for Lacey, who was 10 days overdue with their second child, fishing on Mother’s Day weekend is the way she wanted it. ‘It was quite a fight,’ Kastern chuckles. The fight was with a 54-inch lake sturgeon on Lake Superior Saturday morning. It was the biggest fish Lacey had ever reeled in.They took a photo and said goodbye, but would quickly realize they would be saying hello to a new family addition. ‘Then he released it and my water broke right then and there,’ Kastern says.” And no, I know what you’re thinking. They called the baby Bella.
