Carter announces expansion of St. Paul’s guaranteed basic income experiment

Josh Verges and Frederick Melo write in the Pioneer Press: “St. Paul is expanding its guaranteed basic income experiment, giving monthly checks to more families while also making deposits into some of their children’s college savings accounts. … Carter announced Wednesday that the next phase, which he’s calling CollegeBound Boost, will send money to two groups: 333 families will get $1,000 added to each of their children’s College Bound St. Paul savings accounts; 333 additional families will get the same $1,000 for college, plus two full years of monthly $500 checks.”

Steve Karnowski writes for the AP: “Federal prosecutors asked a judge Wednesday to sentence one of the four former Minneapolis police officers convicted of civil rights violations in George Floyd’s killing to as many as 6½ years in prison but to impose significantly stiffer yet unspecified sentences on two others. They urged U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson to follow the nonbinding federal sentencing guidelines for former Officer Thomas Lane and impose a penalty between 5¼ and 6½ years on prison. Prosecutors also said former Officer J. Alexander Kueng deserves a ‘substantially higher’ sentence than Lane’s, but less than the 20 to 25 years Derek Chauvin is expected to get.”

The Forum News Service’s Dana Ferguson writes: “During a visit to the Minnesota Capitol on Wednesday, Latvian Prime Minister Arturs Krišjānis Kariņš urged continued support from the U.S. and other nations in defending against additional attacks from Russia. … Krišjānis Kariņš, along with a group of dignitaries from the Eastern European nation that borders Russia, is in Minnesota this week for a six-day Latvian song and dance festival in St. Paul. It’s the first visit of a Latvian head of government to Minnesota.”

A Star Tribune story by James Walsh says, “Nick Perin’s Highland Park neighborhood near Talmud Torah’s Newman School is close-knit — so much so that neighbors have set up a text chain to update each other on what’s going on. So, when Perin received a text early Monday from a neighbor who’d discovered an anti-Semitic flier behind his garage, he set out to find more before the schoolyard was full of children  … On Wednesday, St. Paul police confirmed they have assigned an investigator to the case. Talmud Torah is a Jewish school founded 66 years ago in a neighborhood long considered the center of St. Paul’s Jewish community.”

At WCCO-TV there’s this: “Democratic Gov. Tim Walz’s campaign on Wednesday clarified remarks he made on abortion a day earlier, acknowledging that only one Minnesota Supreme Court justice will hit the mandatory retirement age in the next gubernatorial term, not three. Walz made the comment after telling reporters, ‘The governor’s office is now the last line of defense against an abortion ban in Minnesota’. Walz was contrasting his position with that of Republican challenger Scott Jensen, who has called for a ban. But Walz campaign spokesman Darwin Forsyth said the governor misspoke, and meant to say only that he thinks three retirements are ‘probable’ in the next term.”

At KMSP-TV Kastie Wermus reports, “A Minneapolis teenager was charged for violently carjacking a woman outside her work at a Northeast Minneapolis Restaurant on June 9, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.  Shamir Black, 18, is charged with one count of carjacking after he allegedly went up to the woman and demanded her car keys before pushing her to the ground and hitting her in the head with a firearm, according to court documents. A bystander attempted to help the woman when Black allegedly pointed the firearm at the bystander and pulled the trigger. However, the gun did not discharge a bullet, according to the court documents.”

Another MPR story says, “Hundreds of acres of woods and wetlands, including three miles of St. Croix riverfront, join preserved public land in an east central state forest, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources and the Trust for Public Land announced Tuesday. The national nonprofit bought the land from Xcel Energy and donated it to the state DNR.”

At KSTP-TV, Rebecca Omastiak says, “Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP) is set to become the first in the nation to use a new program that aims to help travelers with medical conditions. MSP and Metropolitan Airports Commission officials are teaming up with the company behind the Vitals app, which allows first responders to gain medical information voluntarily provided by travelers and their caregivers. The app alerts first responders of any physical or mental conditions a traveler is experiencing, and a special beacon informs first responders how they can best interact with the traveler.”

Jim Buchta writes in the Star Tribune: “Kris Lindahl built one of the fastest-growing and in-your-face real estate brands in the Midwest in part by plastering photos of himself with enthusiastically outstretched arms on billboards, buses and just about any flat surface in Minnesota. That pose, which he calls the ‘Lindahl stretch,‘ has become synonymous with the brand, Lindahl said, and now he wants to prevent others from using it. Attorneys for the company recently filed an application with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) that would trademark the pose.”