AM.MN: Who forgot Medtronic?

Don’t let health care reform put a new tax on med-tech companies. That was the message of a letter sent last week by a bipartisan group of Minnesota members of Congress to U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, chair of the Senate Finance Committee that takes up a reform bill today. But somehow the letter failed to mention Fridley-based Medtronic, the world’s biggest maker of medical devices. Shrugs all around: U.S. Rep. Erik Paulsen’s office said the omission was made for “purposes of brevity,” while a staffer for Rep. Keith Ellison, whose district includes Medtronic’s HQ, said he heard about the letter too late to sign on.

Elsewhere in Minnesota headlines this morning …

ST. CLOUD: Town Hall meeting Wednesday. Mayor Dave Kleis calls the first town hall meeting for an actual town in an actual hall in recent memory. [St. Cloud Times]

STATEWIDE: A Pawlenty tax hike. Ending tax-reciprocity for Minnesota and Wisconsin residents who work in the other state also ends the governor’s no-new-tax pledge for thousands of his constituents. [The Plum Line]

ST. PAUL: No help at all. Attorney General Lori Swanson will lay out her case today against three firms that added to customers’ debt instead of helping them get out of it. [Associated Press]

IRON RANGE: Newspapers start charging for Web content. Papers in Hibbing, Virginia and Grand Rapids will mine their online readers’ wallets for valuable minerals, beginning Wednesday. [Duluth News Tribune]

HIBBING: “The weather is screwing the trees up.” Fall color is all over the map this year. [Hibbing Daily Tribune]

VIRGINIA: Bulging bricks doom 99-year-old landmark. The “historically beautiful” Troy Building won’t see 100 if a rehab grant comes through. [Mesabi Daily News]

GRAND RAPIDS: Cabin owners fight federal fees in court. Plaintiffs hope revolt spreads like wildfire from Chippewa National Forest to other national forests. [Grand Rapids Herald Review]