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St. Paul woman granted extension on boulevard garden removal

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After initially being told she had a week to remove her St. Paul boulevard garden because it violated city code, Iris Logan has been granted a six-month extension.

Logan, 69, has been building an elaborate garden of rocks, sculptures and mosaics at her home, including on its boulevard, on Sherburne Avenue in the Hamline-Midway neighborhood for many years.

Neighbors rallied behind her after her daughter posted on Facebook in November that Logan was being required to remove the boulevard garden. A petition supporting Logan has gathered nearly 800 signatures.

Logan has removed much of the display on the boulevard already, but the neighborhood group advocated for a six month extension because of the scope of the work.

Logan was originally supposed to remove the garden by Nov. 13. On Tuesday, the council was set to vote on a new deadline of Dec. 22, but agreed instead to extend it to June because frost makes it difficult to move large rocks and the boulevard will need to be re-graded.

At Tuesday’s council meting, Ward Four City Council Member Mitra Jalali, who represents Hamline-Midway, apologized for the distress Logan has experienced from the city’s process, and said the city needs to find a more holistic way of addressing such situations.

“I want to just highlight the human side of this, which is that a completely well-intentioned and beloved community member is experiencing this challenge and the community has asked very clearly for time,” she said, as well as discussion on policy change on boulevard gardens.

Justin Lewandowski, a community organizer with the Hamline Midway Coalition, said he is in talks to find a way to honor Logan’s contributions to the neighborhood at the nearby Midway Peace Park.

“We’re really happy that the city worked with us in recognizing the special circumstances which Iris found herself in, and really happy and looking forward to continued conversation … around reporting and enforcement of code violations in the future,” Lewandowski said.

Separately, the council is discussing an amendment to city code that would allow some raised bed planters in boulevards.



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Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, on the campaign trial, gives a pep talk to the Mankato West High School Scarlets, a team he once coached.

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MANKATO – The football players in their pads jogged out to face their rivals Friday night as Gov. Tim Walz, back home briefly as he campaigns across the country as vice presidential nominee, cheered them on.

“Don’t forget to have fun, enjoy,” Walz told players on the football team at Mankato West High School, where he worked as a geography teacher and assistant football coach before launching a political career that carried him to the Democratic Party’s national ticket.

Since choosing Walz as her running mate, Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris has touted his background as a football coach, hunter and gun owner, as Democrats reach out to Midwestern voters and look for inroads with men.

Walz’s stop in Mankato is one of a series of media stops in the battleground states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, where the governor is talking high school football and hunting.

“This is the best of America,” Walz told reporters after greeting the players of Mankato West ahead of their rivalry game with Mankato East. He said he would visit his old classroom, before heading to watch the game.

A quarter center ago, Walz was the assistant defensive football coach for the 1999 Mankato West football team that won the state championship. That year’s crosstown rivalry game was a spark for Mankato West as it headed toward its state championship, said John Considine, a Mankato West alum and right tackle on that 1999 Class 4A championship team.

“It’s good to have him back,” Considine said Friday.

Local Republicans called Walz’s appearance a stunt. “They’re getting desperate to get the word out,” said Yvonne Simon, chair of the Blue Earth County GOP, adding she’s doesn’t think the governor’s “coach” branding is catching on.



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Longtime owner of Gunflint Lodge dies at 85

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“There’s a fair amount of stuff we’ve digested over the years,” Kerfoot told the Star Tribune at the time of the sale. “It’ll take a while to pick all of it out of me.”

In recent years, he and Sue have spent summers in Minnesota and then traveled back to Missouri to be close to family for the rest of the year.

Visitors love to drop in and talk about Justine Kerfoot or Bruce Kerfoot or the years they spent working at the lodge, Fredrikson said. He’s found that Bruce’s energy seemingly matched that of his mother, who died in 2001 when she was 94.

“He was one of those people that was able to get stuff done more easily or better than other people,” Fredrikson said. “Maybe because of who he was, or maybe because the stars align for this kind of person.”

In a social media post, Kerfoot’s family said they had peace knowing he and his mother “were paddling together to their shore lunch spot.”

Mark Hennessy knew Kerfoot for 40 years, but has had a closer view for the past three years. He said without Kerfoot, the Chik-Wauk Museum and Nature Center, located near the end of the Gunflint Trail, wouldn’t exist. Whenever there was a work project, the executive director said, Kerfoot would show up.



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Motorcyclist, 17, killed in collision with SUV in Burnsville

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A teenage motorcyclist was killed in a collision with an SUV at a Burnsville intersection, officials said Friday.

The crash occurred shortly after 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Burnsville Parkway and Interstate 35W, police said.

The motorcyclist was identified by the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s Office as Peter Vsevolod Genis, 17, of Burnsville.

An SUV driver was turning left from westbound Burnsville Parkway to northbound 35W when Genis went through a red light while heading east and struck the SUV.

The SUV driver and a woman with him, both from Burnsville, were not hurt.

The other vehicle was a Mercedes SUV. The driver was a 30-year-old male from Burnsville, with a 29-year-old female passenger from Burnsville. Neither of them was injured.



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