Jennifer VogelPeople in the small western Minnesota city of Hoffman are trying to figure out how to weather the closing of a nursing home, the biggest employer in town. Read more →
MPR News How communities are facing the future
Archives for November 2013
Dave PetersOn Wednesday, I noted that nearly 75 percent of Minnesota households now have Internet access at speeds that reach the state’s goals, yet three Minnesota counties still have no access at those speeds. One of those is Cook County, the northeastern Minnesota recipient of federal stimulus dollars to make fiber available to all residents. So I called Joe Read more →
Those tracking broadband speeds in Minnesota say some mobile service recipients have fast enough connections to count toward the state goal of ubiquitous high-speed Internet connections by 2015. As a result, three-quarters of households now have access, by that definition. Read more →
As we were wrapping up work in International Falls this week for the Daily Circuit special “Rethinking a Company Town,” the federal Economic Research Service put out a sobering view of rural employment. This is how our friends at the Daily Yonder put it: “Folks looking for good news in the 2013 “Rural America at Read more →
Bill Dougherty runs a houseboat rental business on Rainy Lake and he thinks he’d benefit if International Falls and Koochiching County put more effort into promoting tourism. Read more →
To keep International Falls vital, Library Director Diane Adams is helping kids explore their dreams and consider new career paths Read more →
Voyageurs National Park Superintendent Mike Ward is exactly the kind of person who can bring nature-loving tourists and International Falls residents together. Read more →
Falls High School in International Falls added an engineering class this year with the aim of broadening job options for local kids. Read more →
We invited nine International Falls residents — natives, newcomers, left-and-came-backers, old, young, layoff sufferers and entrepreneurs — to the back room at the Coffee Landing to share with us and themselves the hopes and misgivings they have for this place. Read more →