Category: Rural Headlines

EXCERPT: “Employment data released last week showed Minnesota hit its lowest unemployment rate ever recorded, 2.2 percent statewide, and a little higher in some parts of the state, last month. That astonishingly low number might feel like cause for celebration — especially less than two years after unemployment rates spiked to 10.8 percent in May of 2020.  But ...

EXCERPT: “Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison on Thursday made a $1.8 million ask of state lawmakers that he said would help his office bring on additional prosecutors and yield more criminal convictions in greater Minnesota. Ellison, a first-term Democrat, said he has proposed additional funding for his office’s criminal division three years in a row with ...

EXCERPT: “By day, Martin Healey teaches science classes at Waseca High School. At home, his pager stays on for 12-hour stretches two nights each week and on occasional weekends, alerting him to calls for the Wells Community Ambulance Service, with which the 48-year-old has served over the last dozen years. Such is the life of an EMT ...

EXCERPT: “Work to expand another 12 miles of U.S. Highway 14 to four lanes in southern Minnesota is underway. It’s the last leg in a decades-long effort to create a four-lane transportation corridor between Rochester and New Ulm. Local, state and federal officials gathered in Courtland, Minn., on Tuesday morning for a ceremonial groundbreaking. In addition to ...

EXCERPT: “Results from a Minnesota Department of Health survey confirm health care worker burnout and show workforce shortage trends are affecting a wide range of health care professionals. The report, Minnesota’s Health Care Workforce: Pandemic-Provoked Workforce Exits, Burnout, and Shortages (PDF), is the first report of its kind covering the effects of the pandemic on ...

EXCERPT: “Paramedics are often the most highly skilled medical providers on emergency response crews, and their presence can make a lifesaving difference in rural areas where health services are scarce. Paramedics are trained to administer specialized care from the field, such as placing a breathing tube in a blocked airway or decompressing a collapsed lung. ...

EXCERPT: “Administrators of rural hospitals providing obstetric care in the United States reported needing at least 200 annual births for safety and financial viability, according to a study from the University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center published today in the journal JAMA Health Forum. The study also revealed that community maternity care needs strongly influenced hospital decisions ...

EXCERPT: “The challenge is really two sides of the same computer disc. On one side, there’s been an identified need for affordable computers in Lyon County. On the other side, Lyon County as a landfill county is trying to figure out how to lessen its e-waste footprint. Lyon County, located in rural southwest Minnesota, has ...

EXCERPT: “Motorists will see a significant State Patrol presence on freeways around the state through August as troopers focus on excessive speed enforcement and criminal activity. The patrols begin today in the Twin Cities metro area and will continue in greater Minnesota in the near future . . . Troopers stopped 516 vehicles for speeding ...