St. Paul teacher layoffs St. Paul is laying off 143 teachers, reports the Strib, with “116 non-tenured teachers let go for budget reasons, 26 non-tenured teachers let go for performance reasons, and one tenured teacher let go for budget reasons.” The district faces a $25 million deficit next year, and firing the teachers could save $6 million. St. Paul has about 3,500 teachers, and has laid off about 37 each year in the past.
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Author Archives: Mary Turck
News Day: St. Paul teacher layoffs / Court to Coleman: Pay up / Fletcher vs. Auditor / Taking weather out of MN / more
News Day: Pawlenty: Layoffs coming / Misleading Strib headline / Peach-glazed pig cheeks / Tweeting the revolution / Karen fleeing / more
Pawlenty: Layoffs coming Gov. Tim Pawlenty said Tuesday that he will announce state spending cuts within two weeks, reports the PiPress, and the cuts will mean layoffs for some state employees. The governor also plans to use “budget shifts” to delay state payments to public schools. Pawlenty vetoed budget plans sent to him by the state legislature, leaving a $2.7 billion shortfall in the two-year state budget that takes effect July 1, and leaving him with the authority to make unilateral “unallotments” to balance the budget.
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News Day: What now, Norm? / Death in Somalia: Looking for answers / Carstarphen: Go slower / Wind industry layoffs / more
What now, Norm? Politics in Minnesota has gotten several answers to that question over the past few days. First, on June 4, came a report from Roll Call that Norm was willing to bow out if the MN Supreme Court rules against him. PIM thought that sounded unlikely, and, within hours, posted:
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News Day: Going up – domestic violence, tick populations / Going down: Auto dealers, Gang Strike Force / “Stagecoach from hell” / Tweet trouble / more
Domestic violence increase “off the charts” Looking at domestic violence, St. Paul police see an “an uptick off the charts,” and Dakota County’s Community Action Council reported a 37 percent increase in women seeking services for domestic abuse from 2007 to 2008, reports the PiPress. The increase in domestic violence is attributed, at least in part, to the economic recession.
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News Day: Unemployment up, benefits down / Central Corridor challenge / Food fights and skateboards / more
Unemployment up to 9.4 percent Seasonally adjusted unemployment rose to 9.4 percent in May, up from 8.9 percent in April, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The “U-6” number, which includes discouraged workers and those working part-time because they can’t find full-time work rose to 16.4 percent, up from 15.8 percent in April. Comparable numbers for 2008 were 5.2 percent seasonally adjusted unemployment and 9.4 percent, including discouraged workers and part-time workers.
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News Day: Obama in Cairo / Nuyorican St. Paul music / Call to killing / Scared of single payer / H1N1 in MN / Doctor didn’t have to die / more
Couldn’t get to Cairo? Not to worry. If the medium is the message, then in this instance the speaker was the message, as the NYT concluded, “it boiled down to simply this: Barack Hussein Obama was standing at the podium as the American president.” Full text of the speech here, and the BBC has a generous video segment.
One soundbite:
I consider it part of my responsibility, as president of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear. But that same principle must apply to Muslim perceptions of America. Just as Muslims do not fit a crude stereotype, America is not the crude stereotype of a self-interested empire.
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Couldn’t get to Cairo? Not to worry.
The White House sent out the prepared text of President Obama’s speech (read it after the jump), and BBC has a generous video segment. If the medium is the message, then in this instance the speaker was the message, as the NYT concluded, “it boiled down to simply this: Barack Hussein Obama was standing at the podium as the American president.”
One soundbite:
I consider it part of my responsibility, as president of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear. But that same principle must apply to Muslim perceptions of America. Just as Muslims do not fit a crude stereotype, America is not the crude stereotype of a self-interested empire.
Text of the speech after the jump.
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News Day: All T-Paw, all the time / Vampire pleads guilty / Trees coming down / Recession-proof industry / more
T-Paw signing off – in 2010 As Governor Pawlenty announced that he would not run for a third term as governor in 2010, it seemed that no other news could compete. Here’s the breakdown from Eric Black, who came away from the press conference with the message that “Tim Pawlenty loves God, his wife and kids, the troops and Minnesotans”, as well as the news that House Minority Leader Marty Seifert will run for guv, the PiPress gives a straightforward report,PIM looks at Pawlenty as a Big Mac, with “Secret sauce, secret seasonings. Same thing. Extraordinary tastes for extraordinary times,” but also provides a fact check on T-Paw’s claims of success, MinnPost on possible GOP gubernatorial candidates, and the Strib.
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News Day: All T-Paw, all the time / Vampire pleads guilty / Trees coming down / Recession-proof industry / more
T-Paw signing off – in 2010 As Governor Pawlenty announced that he would not run for a third term as governor in 2010, it seemed that no other news could compete. Here’s the breakdown from Eric Black, who came away from the press conference with the message that “Tim Pawlenty loves God, his wife and kids, the troops and Minnesotans”, as well as the news that House Minority Leader Marty Seifert will run for guv, the PiPress gives a straightforward report,PIM looks at Pawlenty as a Big Mac, with “Secret sauce, secret seasonings. Same thing. Extraordinary tastes for extraordinary times,” but also provides a fact check on T-Paw’s claims of success, MinnPost on possible GOP gubernatorial candidates, and the Strib.
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News Day: GM in MN / Franken-Coleman blow-by-blow / Health care saga / more
MN GM dealers: Who’s going down? Minnesota has 149 GM dealers, reports MPR, and Tuesday they will learn which dealerships will be closed under GM bankruptcy proceedings. Thirty MN dealers had received earlier notice that GM would cut them, but now the company plans to close 40 percent of all its dealers nationwide, which could mean another 30 in Minnesota.
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Mary Turck