MINNESITA CITY, Minn. – Mayor Don O’Neil said he received a citizen complaint about overweight truck traffic on Michigan Street downstream from the Garvin Brook bridge.  The issue was a dump truck, the mayor said. The sheriff’s office promised ok pass on the complaint to the trucking company, he said.

Memorial Day. First-responders are immortalized at the Belvidere Avenue park in the Wabasha County community of Kellogg The statues are the work of David and Shelly Speedling , whose studio, SVJ Creative Designs, is just out of  town up State Highway 42. The federal holiday is Monday. Image: Steve Lunde

ST. PAUL, Minn. — The state Legislature adjourned on its mandated date to end its 2025 session without completing a state budget for the next two years. On the budget: Legislators passed only nine of some 20 bills that were in the pipeline. Without a complete state budget, state agencies will go into shutdown at the start of the new fiscal year on July 1. Only the governor can call legislators back into session to get their act together. This ignominious end to the 2023 regular session was a bookend of a session that got off to a bad start. In January a Democratic boycott over control made it impossible for Republicans to assemble the quorum necessary to do business. After 23 days the Supreme Court ended the boycott in the Democrats favor. But legislators in both the narrowly divided Senate and House never caught up.

Partisan showdown on healthcare

Lawmakers got hung up trimming proposed spending within projected revenue of $66 billion to $67 billion.  The parameters reflected a projected a significant drop in revenue. .Republican refusal to agree to any new tax revenue. As a compromise, Governor Tim Walz and Democratic leaders agreed — at Republicans behest — to remove undocumented adults from the MinnesotaCare subsidized health insurance for the working poor but still covering children. Republicans dug in.  In the final minutes before the session’s mandatory shutdown, Democratic leader Melissa Hortman said: “Until the last gavel drops, Democrats are going to keep fighting to try to get Republicans to relent.”

Other undone business

The bills on the table also included a specific plan to extend some tax breaks for data centers. Also mired in the partisan showdown was a bill to borrow for new buildings and bricks-and mortar improvements at state facilities. These included $700 million for a mental health treatment facility in Anoka. Other funding in limbo ranged from schools to parks to health care and services for people with disabilities.

Baseball: Galesville Gale-Ettrick-Trempealeau Red Hawks 4, Black River Falls Tigers 0

Baseball: LaCrosse Aquinas Blugolds 8, Holmen Vikings 3

WINONA, Minn. – Police had their hands full with a series of unsavory incidents that ended with a Winona man, Matthew Ryan Nguyen, being jailed on multiple counts:

> Assault on a police officer.

> Indecent exposure.

> Disorderly conduct.

> Drug possession.

Although Nguyen wasn’t booked into jail until 9:20 p.m. the incidents began about 2-1/2 hours earlier at Mulligan’s in the downtown bar district. Police were called about a man passing through the bar and making threats. The man was gone when police arrived. No one wanted to press charges but described the man and his clothing. Within an hour, police received a call about a man banging his head against a soda pop machine 11 blocks away at Mankato and Wabasha streets. Besides the head-banging, a woman told officers that the man had pulled down his trousers, underwear and all, and jiggled his gonads. Police located Nguyen three blocks away, in the same clothing as described at Mulligan’s bar and the soda machine. Police said he resisted arrest:

> Banging his head on the squad car hood.

> Banging his head on an interior panel.

> Spiting outside the squad car window at an officer.

> En route, spitting from the back seat through a partition, the wad striking an officer on the back of the hair, the neck and shoulder.

At jail Nguyen was found to be carrying 0.3 grams of of meth, officers said.

Nguyen. Erratic behavior in an early but short night around town. Age 40.

PLATTEVILLE, Wis. – Two women were killed in a shooting inside a dorm at the University of Wisconsin- Platteville. The 5,800-enrollment campus went into immediate lockdown. The victims:

> Kelsie Martin, 22, of Beloit, a proctor at the dorm, who was graduating with an education degree.

> Hallie Helms, also 22, of Baraboo, who had planned to graduate in forensic science this summer.

The only official word, from Chancellor Tammy Evetovich, was vague – only that there had had been a “targeted and isolated” incident and to shelter in place.

Wilgus Hall. An old-style dorm with windowless central hallways and gang showers and bathrooms down the hall on each floor. Licensed for  occupancy by 230 students. Built 1963.

WINONA, Minn. – Bad judgment in passing on County Road 17 may have led to a three-car pile-up outside Winona on State Highway 17 halfway to Witoka. Two persons were taken to the Winona hospital with non-life threatening injuries. Sheriff’s officers pieced together this sequence of what happened:

> A slower driver – in Car A – had four vehicles queued behind. Call them B, C, D and E.

> The back-most driver, in Car E, pulled out to pass everybody but realized there wasn’t enough room to make it so darted back in ahead of Cars C and D.

> The oncoming car in opposite lane went by safely.

> Seeing a new opportunity to to get ahead of everybody, Driver E pulled out again, this time  to pass Cars B and A.

> At this point something went seriously awry. Ether Driver E clipped Drive B or Driver B pulled out also to pass and sideswiped Car E, which already was in the process of passing.

> Either way,both Cars A and B went into the ditch and overturned.

This was about 3:35 p.m. near the Sheltered Drive entrance to County Road 17. It’s a long straight stretch but only two lanes. No citations were issued pending a further reconstruction of what happened, deputies said. Witnesses reported that Driver E had been speeding in the 50 mph zone and was passing erratically. This story doesn’t end there. The ambulance carrying one driver to the hospital was involved in a new collision inside the U.S. Highway 61 round about at Mankato Avenue — two block short of the Winona hospital. These drivers quickly exchanged insurance information, and soon the injured person from the County Road 17 accident, a Houston teenager, was in the emergency room  being checked over. .

David Drew (KBMX, May 17, 2023): “Cause of Recent Minnesota Wildfires Found; Criminal Charges Possible”

Ryan Faircloth (Minnesota Star Tribune May 17, 2025): “Walz Was a Darling of the Left a Year Ago but Now at Odds with Minnesota Progressives”

Soumya Karlmangla and Jeff Ernst (New York Times, May 18, 2025): “Minnesota as a Refuge from Climate Change? Three Wildfires Otherwise”

DULUTH, Minn. – Human activity caused three major fires that devastated more than 37,000 acres of boreal forest in Minnesota’s Arrowhead last week and have continued burning The state Natural Resources Department reported:

> Jenkins Creek Fire (16,200 acres near Fairbanks and Hoyt Lakes and just north of the Camp House fire). Also started May 11. Tentatively attributed to someone discarding a cigarette along Highway 16. Culprit not yet identified.

> Camp House Fire (at last report 12,300 acres near Brimson). Started around 1 p.m. on Sunday, May 11. Campers left a campfire unattended. The fire was out when they returned and notified authorities. Criminal charges possible.

> Munger Shaw Fire (1,600 acres near Cotton and about 25 miles southwest of the Camp House fire). Started with a bale of hay catching fire and spreading quickly. Was reported by the homeowner immediately.

Penalties for starting a wildfire under Minnesota range from misdemeanors with fines to felonies with jail time. A judge can order restitution for damages. Dollar amounts of the losses haven’t been assembled. Lost have been 30 permanent homes and 120 seasonal residences and cabins. With miles of roads blocked, shops, outfitters and resorts have been affected. Firefighting itself is costly. More than 300 ground and air personnel were assembled for the Camp House and Jenkins Creek fires. About 65 were assigned to the Munger Shaw fire. The loss of dense pine and spruce forests is hard fathom

Earlier: One of three Up Norh wildfires contained

Lightning? Not cause for these fires. Nature had an an indirect role, however. The forests were dried up and vulnerable from less than normal precipitation over the winter and this spring. This, though, according to state forestry experts, was a result  of human-induced  climate change. Nature didn’t help.  Once started, the fires spread quickly due to winds.

Historical record. Image: Minnesota Natural Resources Department

WINONA, Minn. — Minnesota State Southeast has invited the finalist for a new position as the college’s information officer for on-campus interviews. Gary Szabo is currently is the county information director in Monroe, Wisconsin. Szabo, age 62, has 20 years experience in building information systems in higher education, healthcare and nonprofit sectors. His higher-ed experience includes the University of Washington-Bothell and Centralia College. He holds a business degree from the University of Tulsa. As an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, Szabo would help align the college’s strategy with institutional goals and values, said college President Natha Danielson.

Szabo. Campus interviews to be Thursday.

Baseball: Claremont-Mudd-Scripps 11, UW-LaCrosse 2

Baseball: Claremont-Mudd-Scripps 6, UW-LaCrosse 2

WINONA, Minn. – A Winona driver who sped away from a police officer, reportedly as fast as 104 mph, finally pulled over 2-1/2 miles south of town at County Road 33. This was on U.S. Highway 61 about 3:20 a.m. The officer quoted Gregory Alexander Clark, age 40, that he had seen the officer’s flashing lights but then changed his recollection and said he hadn’t. More to the point, the officer said, Clark was drunk and failed roadside sobriety exercises. Clark admitted to three beers at a Winona drinking establishment, the officer said. His blood-alcohol level, however, was 0.14%, which suggested more. Anything more than 0.08% and you’re in trouble.

Clark. Charged with drunken driving. fleeing police.

So little water, so big the fire. Look carefully You’ll see a helicopter unleashing water at an edge of the Munger Shaw wildfire. It’s only 2,500 pounds per trip. Water is scooped from Lake Superior 20 miles away and also from inland lakes. Images: U.S. Forest Service

Property losses climb to 150 structures

LANSING, Iowa – The Black Hawk Bridge over the Mississippi River, well past its prime at 93 years, has been closed to traffic – again. Authorities put barricades in place at both ends after monitors detected ominous structural movement overnight. The bridge had been on close watch for 16 months since shifts were first detected. Temporary fixes were made back. After 53 days the bridge reopened — until now. If the bridge collapses, it would drop 68 feet into the Mississippi River navigation channel. Such would block grain exports from the Upper Midwest to the Gulf of Mexico. The new closure of highway traffic already is problematic. The bridge is the only highway link across the river for 68 miles between LaCrosse and Prairie du Chien. Meanwhile a replacement span is under construction alongside the old bridge, but it won’t be completed until  2027.

Earlier: Ice being kept clear of Lansing bridge construction

Earlier: Temporary hold on Lansing bridge project

Earlier: Bridge at Lansing carrying traffic again

Earlier: Early-warning system failed on Lansing bridge

Earlier: Water taxis subbing for disabled Lansing bridge

Earlier: Traffic banned on wobbly Lansing bridge

Baseball: UW-LaCosse 8, Claremont-Mudd 6

Softball: Samt Mary’s 10, Simpson 2

Softball: Simpson 3, Samt Mary’s 2

Baseball: St. Charles Saints7 , Cannon Falls Bombers 4

Baseball: Pine Island Panthers 1, Caledonia Warriors 0

Baseball: New Prague 7, Rochester Century Panthers 4

Track and field (boys): Saint Charles Saints 561.2, Eden Prairie Eagles446.5

Track and field (girls): Winona Cotter Ramblers 543.5, Grand Meadow-LeRoy-Ostrander 538

MINNESOTA CITY, Minn. — A speeding stop led to the drunken driving arrest of a Winona man on the Garvin Brook highway just outside Minnesota City. An intoxication test of San Ubaldo Javier Ithehue Tzompaxtle, age 23, showed his blood-alcohol at 0.10% — a fifth more than legally allowed. The stop was on Highway 248 at Lone Pine Drive about 9:20 p.m. The arresting officer said tyzt Ithehue Tzompaxtle had been clocked at 72 mph in a 55 zone.

HART, Minn. – A Lewiston driver was injured in a two-vehicle collision at this south Winona County crossroads. Trevor Jon Rasmussen, 61, was taken 24 miles to the Winona hospital. A passenger in the other vehicle was also taken to the Winona hospital but with only minor injuries. This was about 6:30 p.m. Rasmussen was charged with driving while intoxicated. He refused impairment tests, but a judge-sighed blood draw produced a sample that was sent to the state crime lab for analysis for possible prosecution. Deputies said Rasmussen, driving a Ford 150 pickup, slowed but didn’t stop at the County Road 4 entrance onto State Highway 43. The other driver wasn’t hurt.