News

The Lake County Press and KTwH-Two Harbors Community radio are hosting a forum featuring candidates for the two contested city council seats up for election this November. The forum will take place on Tuesday October 18 at 7:00 pm in the city council chambers, with questions for candidates gathered from voters. Miles Woodruff and Uriah Hefter will answer questions about their bid for the Ward 1 council seat, and Katelyn Cobbs and Mike Kassell will respond to questions related to their contest for the councilor-at-large candidacy. Watch or listen to a live stream of the forum on both the public access cable channel 13 and KTWH radio. Recording of the video will be available for viewing on the city’s online public access. A recording of the audio will be available to listen to at the radio station’s website. Watch at Two Harbors Public Access online at: https://reflect-two-harbors.cablecast. tv/CablecastPublicSite/?channel=1 Listen at KTwH Community Radio: 99.5 FM on your dial, or online at https://ktwh.org.

Dr. Trevor Diercks has recently joined the health care team at Lake View Hospital & Clinics in Two Harbors/Silver Bay, and spent a few minutes chatting with the Lake County Press to introduce himself to the community. Growing up in a small town in northeast Iowa, Diercks says even as a young person he knew that he wanted to be a smalltown doctor like the individuals he admired in his hometown.

GRAND MARAIS, MN, October 11, 2022 — North Shore Health (NSH) would like to publicly address certain conversations that have recently been circulating on local social media and radio. In August, WTIP posted to the station’s Facebook page an interview that on-air personality Joe Friedrichs conducted with Kimber Wraalstad, NSH CEO Administrator. The topic was about the staffing shortage at NSH and how the facility’s Care Center or Ambulance Service could potentially close if NSH is unable to hire sufficient staffing to maintain required service levels. While this was difficult news to deliver, NSH felt it was their duty to inform the community about the seriousness of their hiring crisis and how it could impact local families. “We knew this news would cause great concern, but imagine the outrage if we closed a critical service without providing advance notice,” said Wraalstad. “It was our hope that some of the caring and qualified people in our community would be motivated to take positive action.” There are a variety of ways in which locals can help at NSH: apply for one of the hardto- hire positions, take on a second job, work one shift per week, prompt qualified friends, family or associates to apply, or volunteer.

Funding in Partnership with CTC A grant, totaling nearly $20 million dollars, will bring fiber optic broadband services to over 3,000 homes and businesses in and around the Bois Forte Band of Chippewa community. The grant award was publicly announced on October 11th and is being administered by the National Telecommunications and Information Administrations (NTIA) Tribal Broadband Connectivity Program.

Knife River Historical & Cultural Center board member and historian Todd Lindahl was awarded the 2022 Hill – Lewis Award by the Minnesota Archaeological Society (MAS). It was announced in the Society’s spring newsletter. The award is given annually to a living avocational archaeologist who has made outstanding contributions to Minnesota archaeology. It epitomizes the MAS goals of increasing public involvement in archaeology and promoting the stewardship of the unique and Irreplaceable archaeological record of Minnesota. Nominees for the award have generally made important contributions to Minnesota archaeology (prehistoric or historic) through original research or publication, collaboration with professional archaeologists, site stewardship, public outreach, or exceptional K – 12 teaching. Susan Mulholland, president and co-owner of the Duluth Archaeology Center, nominated Todd for the award and organized the letters of support. “Todd is extremely knowledgeable about historic archaeology focusing on Lake County of Northeast Minnesota and I draw on his expertise extensively,” said Mulholland.

Three discussions will have been held by press time to discuss the direction of academic standards at Lake Superior School District (LSSD). At last Monday night’s session which took place at Two Harbors High School, new curriculum director Dan Johnson shared slides outlining the performance of the school district on standardized tests and over the past four years, as compared with state averages. Participating citizens and parents had the opportunity to ask questions. In reading, there was a clear drop in performance amongst 3rd graders during distance learning related to Covid-19. Statistics show that students who aren’t reading proficiently by 3rd grade appear more likely to drop further behind as they go through the higher grades. With a free-and-reduced lunch population nearing 40% this year, there is a distinct reading gap between the non-supported lunch group and the free-and-reduced lunch group. Less than 50% of 10th graders in the district are reading at grade level, according to the tests. “Effort” was cited as a significant barrier, some of the students reportedly took less than half the time allotted to take the test, and many students did not take the test. School administrators Superintendent Jay Belcastro and High School Principal Julie Benson stated that they felt this level was unacceptable and the recent meetings were called to begin to address the issue. In math, LSSD students scored lower percentages than the state average, with only a third of non-subsidized lunch students proficient by 11th grade, and much lower percentages than that for special education and reduced lunch students. The limitations of the testing system were and possible variables of teaching, distance learning due to Covid-19 were discussed. Graduation rates looked better, with the school district rates varying between 94% and 87%, compared with the state graduation rate of 83%. This number reflects the percentage of students that enroll in school senior year and also g