Lake Hiawatha clean-up

The Lake Hiawatha Earth Day Clean Up was held on Saturday, April 23. From Friends of Lake Hiawatha Facebook page: 320 pounds of trash and 102 volunteers! THANK YOU! Hosted by Friends of Lake Hiawatha, Gay4Good, Northern Coffee Works, Bakers Wife and @MPRB volunteers. Wow! The day started out with…

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Ingebretsen’s Nordic Marketplace is SBA’s Minnesota Family-Owned Small Business of the Year

MINNEAPOLIS – The U.S. Small Business Administration has named Ingebretsen’s Nordic Marketplace the 2022 SBA Minnesota Family-Owned Small Business of the Year. In recognition of National Small Business Week, SBA’s Minnesota District will recognize its 2022 state winners at local events in the weeks ahead. “The Family-Owned Small Business award honors businesses…

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Abortion: Mexico/U.S.

BY JOHNNY HAZARD In the wake of the passage last year of a series of anti-abortion laws in Texas, there are signs that the opposite tendency is shaping up in Mexico. The Supreme Court there has issued various decisions liberalizing abortion laws in recent years but last September came the…

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Swamp Creatures rise from the dead

BY ED FELIEN Just when you thought you were safe on dry land, the Swamp Creatures rise from the dead and take you back into the muck. Last year was a painful and exhausting struggle. After months of arguing, the Minneapolis Park Board voted 5-4 to not flood the Hiawatha…

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Teachers strike settled, but unsettling

BY ELINA KOLSTAD As the teachers strike unfolded and the district appeared more interested in the visuals of negotiating than they were in trying to meet the teachers’ demands, my husband and I had several conversations marveling at how little the district seemed to care about its own school system…

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East Phillips Farm dream – still alive

BY CAM GORDON On March 10, supporters of the East Phillips Urban Farm project were celebrating. An 8-5 majority of the Minneapolis City Council had just approved a motion by 9th Ward Council Member Jason Chavez which rescinded the 2021 compromise that allowed the city to demolish the Roof Depot…

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The mental and emotional stages of environmentalism

BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Chances are, if you know 10 people who consider themselves environmentalists or some version thereof (ecosocialist, ecofeminist, environmental anarchist, left-wing prepper) you will notice that they all have different approaches to their activism, and often different “takes” on what informs their beliefs, what matters the most,…

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Spring on Lake Street

BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE So many changes, so few column inches What a year this has been for Lake Street! I have to warn you right at the start, there is no way we can cover everything new and different since April 2021 along South Minneapolis’s most vital street. It’s…

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Tribute to Disco T

BY ELAINE KLAASSEN Disco T was a well-known DJ in Minneapolis. He died of brain cancer on Dec. 31, 2021. At his memorial event, on his birthday, Feb. 19, everyone spoke of him as a legend, an icon. He was beloved and admired. I knew him by his given name…

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Markets indoors and out, square donuts, sushi and more

BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Closings in food and drink From Racket.com and other sources we learned that Tin Whiskers, one of the original artisanal Minnesota breweries, is closing this year. Buy up their inventory while you still can, if you’re a fan. From Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, we learn that 35-year Dinkytown…

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Ukrainian heartbeat in Northeast Minneapolis

BY LYDIA HOWELL The Ukrainian language demeaned as a dialect, “Little Russian,” or censored; a beloved folk musical instrument suppressed; prison or death for poets, artists and dissidents since the 1860s – all these things have been done to maintain Russian domination of Ukraine. Whether under czars or Soviets, from…

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America’s foremost institution

BY TONY BOUZA I’m given to hyperbole. Can’t seem to help it. “Best this,” “greatest that,” whatever. The U. S. has earned my devoted study. It has, to put it modestly, really lifted me out of certain defeat. No small feat. I owe this great country. So, what would a…

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