Monday, August 2

Cheryl Glaser joined us from Marketplace in Los Angeles for a look at today's financial news.

The Minnesota Vikings are back. Training camp practice begins today at Minnesota State University in Mankato. Yesterday, hundreds of anxious fans waited for hours to welcome the arriving players and grab an autograph or two. Minnesota Public Radio's Michael Khoo has more.

A group of lawyers with over 300 years of experience in the Minnesota Attorney General's office were either fired or resigned during Mike Hatch's refocusing of office priorities. Hatch says he wants the office to spend less time on broad public policy and more on consumer issues. Last week, MPR broadcast a two-part series on Hatch's agenda during his first seven months in office. At the time, we didn't have detailed information on the employees who've left the office, and those who've joined it. The office has since given us that information, and Minnesota Public Radio's Laura McCallum has a follow-up report.

As surfing the web grows more popular, people are discovering there can be downsides. One is the loss of privacy. Now a Canadian company thinks it has a solution. Zero Knowledge Systems is preparing to sell a product that will let you surf the web and send email anonymously. The software, called "Freedom," is the first of its kind designed for average computer users. Privacy advocates say it has great potential, but as MPR's Jon Gordon reports, it could complicate electronic commerce, and make criminals harder to catch.

Governor Ventura is bringing a group of 18 regular Minnesotans together this week to study the state's property tax system and suggest ways to fix it. Ventura wants to simplify the system, and says he'll base his proposals to the legislature on the group's ideas. Former St. Paul Mayor George Latimer studied the same issue in the 1980s. The Latimer Tax Study Commission resulted in two volumes of work, and several recommendations. Mr. Latimer is on the line now.

Seven weeks after Yugoslavia accepted NATO's terms for peace in Kosovo, many Kosovar refugees are leaving the United States and heading home. But most of those in the Fargo-Moorhead area are staying put, at least for now. Nearly 97,000 ethnic Albanians were brought to the United States after fleeing the war in Kosovo. Barry Nelson is Director of Refugee Resettlement for Lutheran Social Services in Fargo, and he's on the line now.

Monday Markets: Inflation jitters continue to rattle the financial markets. Minnesota Public Radio's chief economics correspondent Chris Farrell still thinks the inflation worries are overblown.

Cheryl Glaser joined us from Marketplace in Los Angeles for a look at today's financial news.

The national conversation on urban sprawl has reached rural Minnesota. Specifically the Brainerd lakes area, where the city of Baxter has seen such commercial growth it's now trying to expand its boundaries, and its tax base. Leif Enger of Mainstreet Radio reports.

The Minnesota Twins have reached a deal with St. Paul on building a new downtown ballpark. The agreement, reached last night, contains several provisions intended to persuade reluctant St. Paul residents and state lawmakers to support the effort. A key element requires the current team owners - the Pohlad family - to sell their entire stake in the Twins. Minnesota Public Radio's Michael Khoo reports.

Star Tribune Writer and Minnesota Public Radio Sports Commentator Jay Weiner joined us for a look at Mayor Coleman's deal with the Minnesota Twins on the stadium issue.

Neighborhoods around the country celebrated National Night Out last night. The 16-year-old annual event, which began as an anti-crime effort, is particularly strong in Minneapolis, where nearly 1,500 block clubs marked the evening in some way. Minnesota Public Radio's Eric Jansen reports.

As congress debates the farm crisis, the major agriculture organizations are showing a surprising degree of unity on what lawmakers should do. On the first day of Farmfest near Redwood Falls, the presidents of three major farm groups made a rare joint public appearance. While they all said emergency farm aid is a good short-term solution, there were deep divisions on the more difficult question of a long term fix. Minnesota Public Radio's Mark Steil reports.

The Minnesota Vikings first-round draft pick Dimitrius Underwood will return to training camp today, his agent said after tracking down the rookie. Underwood disappeared on Monday after his first NFL practice. His agent said he left to attend a "family matter." Vikings Coach Denny Green joins me now.

The federal government is increasingly doing is business on computers and computer networks instead of on paper. That presents a big challenge for the National Archives and Records Administration, the agency charged with making sure citizens have access to the important business of government. The National Archive's Ken Thibodeau says his agency has sought the help of the San Diego Supercomputer Center for dealing with the sheer volume of electronic records - as well as the unique challenge of preserving fragile digital files. Ken Thibodeau of the National Archives and Records Administration.

St. Paul mayor Norm Coleman went to the state capitol yesterday to try to temper legislative criticism of his downtown ballpark proposal. Coleman met with republican house speaker Steve Sviggum, who was an ally in Coleman's gubernatorial bid last year but has refused to endorse a stadium subsidy. Minnesota Public Radio's William Wilcoxen reports.

A small Minneapolis brewery is taking an unusual approach to raise funds to expand production - it's turning to its customers. The James Page Brewing Company hopes the move will also help boost the local brew's sales. Minnesota Public Radio's Eric Jansen reports.

Fifteen-year-old Kelly Schmiedt is on her way to Sweden next week to compete in what may be the worlds most sophisticated Science fair. Last spring the Little Falls sophomore won the Stockholm Junior Water Prize for her project tracing the water quality of a stream flowing into the Mississippi River. As Mainstreets Leif Enger reports, Schmiedt's project stemmed not from a science book - but from an issue close to home.

In several other cities, strong public opposition hasn't kept politicians from using public funds to build stadiums. In at least one case, officials approved a tax increase to fund a stadium even after voters specifically rejected one. Andrew Zimbalist is a professor of economics at Smith College in Massachusetts. He says two cities make interesting case studies - Seattle and San Francisco.

3M is defending itself against a tiny competitor in an anti-trust trial scheduled to begin today in Philadelphia. LePage's Incorporated, a Pittsburgh-based tape company, says 3-M illegally protected its monopoly in transparent tape by giving retail superstores big rebates and other incentives to stock its products and keep competitors' goods off the shelves. LePage's is seeking $35 million in damages. Maplewood-based 3-M acknowledges it has a monopoly on tape, but denies any illegal practices. William Sippel is partner at Oppenheimer, Wolff and Donnelly in Minneapolis and a former anti-trust official in the Carter and Reagan administrations.

You may not be noticing those pesty mosquitoes quite so often, and that's because there aren't as many around the Twin Cities area as there were earlier this season. Jim Stark of the Metropolitan Mosquito Control District is on the line now to tell us why.

Farmers have finally received some good news as the US senate agreed on a $7 billion farm relief package. The package still has a long way to go before any money reaches farmers but it promises some cash this fall. As this year's FarmFest wraps up near Redwood Falls, many of those walking the long rows of machinery doubted the federal aid will be of much help. Minnesota Public Radio's Mark Steil reports.

Today is the last day for dairy farmers and co-ops around the country to get their ballots in on a new milk pricing system. The national referendum sponsored by the US Department of Agriculture looks to change the current system that sets different minimum prices for milk in different parts of the country. The new pricing system would reduce the disparity in minimum prices around the nation. Mainstreet Radio's Brent Wolfe reports upper Midwest dairy experts believe the new system will help the region's dairy industry.

A reorganized district administration has begun its task of improving St. Paul public schools. Superintendent Patricia Harvey has promised big reforms in the district and says the new leadership team will help her make the changes. The new administrators began their jobs this week and were echoing their boss's goal of raising student achievement. Minnesota Public Radio's Tim Pugmire reports.

This fall, some Minnesota teachers will begin teaching a new subject in the classroom: character. Educators are meeting in Bloomington this week to learn new ways of teaching virtue and good behavior. The Center for the Study of Ethical Development at the University of Minnesota is coordinating the four-year project. Professor Darcia Narvaez directs the center. She says its important for students to study basic ethical questions: how to decide between right and wrong, how to get along with others and how to act according to your beliefs.

Since Monday, a group of regular Minnesotans has been learning about the state property tax system and today they'll suggest ways to fix it. The "Citizen's Jury" is expected to deliver its recommendations this afternoon, and Governor Ventura says he'll use those recommendations as a starting point for his tax proposals to the legislature. Doug Nethercut is Executive Director of the Jefferson Center, a nonprofit organization that conducted the tax jury, and he's on the line now.

Teams of architects - from students to employees of some of the Twin Cities' most prominent firms - will meet in St. Paul's Mears Park tomorrow to tackle a tricky problem: how to design a baseball stadium that fits into downtown's Lowertown neighborhood. The exercise is the focus of the third annual Unauthorized Design program organized by the American Institute of Architects. Since it's only an exercise, the architects can design a stadium unhindered by budget restraints or client demands, in fact, they can choose not to design a stadium at all if they find a better alternative.

An exhibit of more than 250 rarely seen drawings by Andy Warhol opens at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis this weekend. While many people associate Warhol with big, Technicolor prints of Marilyn Monroe and Campbells soup cans, many of the drawings on display at the Walker are of a different scale. Curator Anastasia Shartin showed me some of the works as they were being hung. She says the exhibit traveled abroad before coming to the Walker and it arrived with very little text to explain the drawings.