Star Tribune
University of St. Thomas baseball, softball moving to Highland Bridge
The St. Paul City Council on Wednesday gave the green light to the University of St. Thomas baseball and softball teams to move to new homes 2 miles south of campus.
By a 6-0 vote, the council approved changes to the Highland Bridge master plan that will allow St. Thomas to build two new stadiums, an indoor practice facility and surface parking at the development’s southeast corner.
Phil Esten, St. Thomas’s athletics director and former baseball player at the St. Paul school, thanked council members and city staff and said the vote allows the university to begin fundraising in earnest.
“This is the result of months of really hard work,” Esten said. “Ultimately, it’s a really important part of the process. It allows us to move forward.”
Nearly a year ago, officials from St. Thomas and Ryan Cos., creators of St. Paul’s 122-acre Highland Bridge development, unveiled a broad plan to redevelop a vacant 13-acre tract just outside the development boundaries into new athletic facilities for the university’s softball and baseball teams.
At a community meeting in Highland Park, officials touted the benefits they say will come: economic development, environmental cleanup, community amenities and expanded park space. Dozens of neighbors that night said they had their doubts.
But over the ensuing months, City Council Member Chris Tolbert said St. Thomas officials worked to ease community concerns bout traffic and parking. Early on, St. Thomas officials had floated the idea of building a hockey arena there, but pulled back on that. Saying they’d make the fields available to youth and high school teams helped, Tolbert said.
“Obviously their proposal has evolved. They want to put the arena on campus and not not on the Highland site,” Tolbert said. “They’ve refined it. And the St. Thomas administration has done a really good job of going down and working with the neighbors to figure out how to be a true neighbor. And that goes a long way.”
The athletic facilities will be built on land owned by Canadian Pacific Railway. Save for the stadiums, Ryan officials had said it was doubtful anything else would be built there.
The St. Paul Port Authority will work to clean the site in preparation for the ballparks.
St. Thomas recently made an unprecedented jump from NCAA Division III athletics to Division I and officials have said they need to upgrade its facilities. It has proposed a joint basketball/hockey facility to be built on campus — at the former St. Paul Seminary. The conjoined baseball-softball stadiums at Highland Bridge will each hold 1,000 to 1,500 fans.
Highland Bridge’s ongoing transformation from the former Ford assembly plant has been dramatic, with the development of new parks, housing and a winding water feature. A new Lunds & Byerlys grocery store has opened and dozens of expensive rowhouses are in various stages of construction.
“I’m excited about what expansion of their athletic program will mean just for the vibrant upgrade to the neighborhood,” Tolbert said. “Division 1 baseball and Division 1 softball is going to be a great addition.”
Mohamed Omar is the new board chair of Hennepin Healthcare System, the organization that runs HCMC, making him Minnesota’s first Somali American hospital board leader.
The health care system board permanently appointed Omar to the position Wednesday at their regular meeting. He had served as interim chair since Babette Apland stepped down in September.
Omar has been on the volunteer board for three years, working on the finance, investment, audit and compliance committees. He is the chief administrative officer at the Washburn Center for Children and previously was chief financial officer at the Greater Minnesota Housing Fund.
In a statement, Omar said he was excited to lead a hospital board in the state with the largest Somali American population in the U.S. He said he shared the health system’s dedication to providing “equitable, high-quality care.”
“My commitment is to deepen our community engagement, build more authentic connections between patients and team members, and build a confident future together,” Omar’s statement said.
CEO Jennifer DeCubellis and Nneka Sederstrom, chief health equity officer, praised Omar’s selection to lead the board. They said more inclusive leadership with a commitment to ending health disparities are key to HCMC’s success.
Hennepin County Board Chair Irene Fernando, who is also on health system board, said she was excited to work with Omar. She said county leaders are dedicated to good stewardship of the “state’s last public safety-net hospital.”
“As the first Hennepin County Board Chair of color, I know how impactful it is for our communities to see themselves represented in public leadership,” Fernando said.
DULUTH – The Superior National Forest has lifted its forestwide campfire ban, including the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, effective Friday.
Recent rain and humidity have improved conditions across the national forest’s 3 million acres, forest officials said in a news release.
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources has also lifted fire restrictions in Cook, Koochiching, Lake and northern St. Louis counties.
Fire danger is still a concern this time of year, said Karen Harrison, DNR wildfire prevention specialist.
“As leaves fall and vegetation continues to dry out, it’s important for people to be cautious with anything that can cause a spark,” she said.
The national forest imposed its broad campfire ban nearly two weeks ago, after a third wildfire, named for Bogus Lake, was discovered on forest land. No significant fire activity has been reported in recent days for any of those three fires. A fourth fire inside the forest, the 8.5-acre Pfeiffer Lake Fire, started Oct. 17. It was contained within 24 hours, the Forest Service said.
Much of northeast Minnesota is still classified in the “severe drought” stage by the U.S. Drought Monitor.
WASHINGTON — Vice President Kamala Harris was asked this week if she thought Donald Trump was a fascist, and she replied ‘’Yes, I do.’’ She subsequently called him the same thing herself, saying voters don’t want ‘’a president of the United States who admires dictators and is a fascist.’’
But what exactly is a fascist? And does the meaning of the word shift when viewed through a historical or political prism — especially so close to the end of a fraught presidential race?
An authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement. It is often associated with the far right and characterized by a dictatorial leader who uses military forces to help suppress political and civil opposition.
History’s two most famous fascists were Nazi chief Adolf Hitler in Germany and Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. Known as Il Duce, or ”the duke,” Mussolini headed the National Fascist Party, which was symbolized by an eagle clutching a fasces — a bundle of rods with an axe among them.
At Mussolini’s urging, in October 1922, thousands of ”Blackshirts,” or ”squadristi,” made up an armed fascist militia that marched on Rome, vowing to seize power. Hitler’s Nazis similarly relied on a militia, known as the ”Brownshirts.” Both men eventually imposed single-party rule and encouraged violence in the streets. They used soldiers, but also fomented civilian unrest that pit loyalists against political opponents and larger swaths of everyday society.
Hitler and Mussolini censored the press and issued sophisticated propaganda. They played up racist fears and manipulated not just their active supporters but everyday citizens.
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