Agriculture

In a Farmfest speech that was as much national as state-focused, Gov. Pawlenty urged ailing dairy farmers to increase demand by selling to China and India and promised to create a Minnesota Farmer Assistance Network (MFAN) for one-stop advice. State Rep. Al Juhnke, a DFLer from Willmar, said the guv’s “words ring true but his actions [...]

Although only about four million of the estimated 44.3 million people of Latino descent in America live in Midwestern states, cultural differences and economic realities associated with those populations have created additional challenges for rural health care delivery systems that are already stretched thin.

Because mental health care is hard to access in rural parts of the country, the few behavioral health professionals serving rural populations are testing and utilizing more technological tools for outreach.

The plight of Minnesota’s dairy farmers occupied the time of Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Reps. Tim Walz, Collin Peterson and James Oberstar, who worked this week to find relief for farmers hard hit by economic and natural disaster. That and other highlights from Minnesota’s congressional delegation inside.

Norm Coleman used to sit on the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, which oversees the U.S. Census Bureau. But now that he’s out of the U.S. Senate, he won’t have to worry about turning a corner at the Capitol and running into U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann and her deep suspicions about the [...]

“We’ll support Norm to the bitter end,” said U.S. Sen. John Cornyn last March. This month, Norm Coleman’s end as a U.S. Senator became a bit less bitter for Cornyn when the Texas Republican took Coleman’s old spot on the Senate Agriculture Committee.

After the 1980s farm crisis, states like Iowa and Nebraska developed crisis hotlines designed specifically to serve the needs of agricultural workers. Today, in the wake of natural disasters and amid heightened economic uncertainty for farmers, the hotlines are seeing a spike in activity, likely helping prevent more tragedies.

Healthcare reform and the confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor dominated headlines this week, but many of Minnesota’s congressional representatives have been busy working on a slew of issues from food-borne illness andhydrocephalus to highway funding and aid to Liberia.

As the U.S. Senate takes up debate on climate legislation, environmental groups are slamming a biofuels provision.

Proponents in the U.S. House of Representatives needed every Democratic vote they could get Friday evening – and even a few from Republicans — to pass the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES) by a vote of 219–212 to cheers on the House floor. Eight Republicans backed the climate-change energy bill, with 44 Democrats voting against. Minnesota’s House [...]