Star Tribune
Fond Minnesota memories went up in smoke when Lutsen Lodge burned
As news was breaking Tuesday morning of a devastating fire at the Lutsen Lodge on Minnesota’s North Shore, the Star Tribune asked its readers to send their own memories of a place that for decades hosted tourists both near and far to one of the state’s jewels. Here’s a few:
“How do you sum up a place that has meant so much? I was there as a kid, then on my 10th wedding anniversary in 2009, came back two years later with my now 19-year-old daughter, made another trip a few years later with both of my daughters. Finally, the four of us visited during July of 2020 during the pandemic … I’ll never forget sitting on the beach with the fam, eating, drinking and skipping rocks with our new puppy. Does it really get any better?”
— Don Beauclaire, Minnetonka
“Our family memories go way back. My parents honeymooned there in 1952 … Growing up, Lutsen was always a favorite stop along the North Shore. Later, in the 1980s, my husband and I developed an annual tradition of staying at Lutsen Lodge over a fall weekend when there were few people around and the waves were often wild … We’d have dinner in the cozy lodge — in those days there was a fire in the big stone dining room fireplace and Swedish dishes on the menu.”
— Gloria Gunville, Afton
“This lodge touched so many over the years so I know I’m not alone. From falling in love with the North Shore while attending [University of Minnesota-Duluth] almost 40 years ago … It was the fanciest place for dinner after an annual canoeing trip in the [Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness]. Since then booking one of their two amazing corner room suites was always such a special treat on Labor Day! I’m sure they will rebuild something amazing but we can’t replace such amazing history.”
— Scott Weilage, Mankato
“My mom, Mae Contos, worked at and ran a ski bus from the Continental Ski Shop parking lot in Duluth up to Lutsen a few times a winter when I was a kid. We of course would park and get on at the little historical marker parking lot at the Ryan Road and Highway 61 … One time when the bus was overbooked my sister and I rode up and back laying in the luggage racks above the seats.”
— Lori Stroner, Minnetonka
Star Tribune
Celebrity chef Justin Sutherland gets two years of probation for threatening girlfriend
According to the criminal complaint:
Police were twice called on June 28 to an apartment in the 800 block of Front Avenue. During the first call, a woman told officers that everything was fine despite previously reporting that Sutherland had choked her and tried kicking her out of the apartment.
During the second call about 90 minutes later, the woman told police that Sutherland had briefly squeezed her neck with both hands, said “I want you dead,” pointed a gun at her and hit her in the chest with it, and at one point said he would shoot her if she came back after running off. Officers then arrested Sutherland.
Staff writers Paul Walsh and Alex Chhith contributed to this story.
Operators of the Hennepin County Juvenile Detention Center (JDC) have agreed to consolidate housing units, create a new programming schedule and retrain correctional officers in an effort to satisfy state regulators, who rebuked the downtown facility last month for violating resident rights.
Changes come in the wake of a scathing inspection report that accused the center of placing minors in seclusion without good reason to compensate for ongoing staff shortages. An annual audit by the Department of Corrections found that teens were frequently locked in their rooms for long stretches, due to a lack of personnel rather than bad behavior.
In response, county officials vowed to bolster staffing and retrain all officers tasked with performing wellness checks. Last week, the facility closed its “orientation mod,” typically reserved for new admissions, and combined male age groups to reduce the number of living units and provide heightened supervision.
The moves, including a new schedule, are expected to help prevent the undue cancellation of recreation, parent visits and other privileges to children in their custody.
“[Previous] staffing levels did not allow for all units to run programming simultaneously while having sufficient staff available to respond to incidents and emergencies in the building,” JDC Superintendent Dana Swayze wrote in a seven-page letter to state inspectors. “Programming is only cancelled on an as-needed basis based on the JDC’s ability to safely accommodate [it].”
In a Dec. 4 email to the County Board, Mary Ellen Heng, acting director of Hennepin’s Department of Community Corrections and Rehabilitation, assured elected officials that they had begun taking corrective actions but asserted that some of the report’s findings lacked context.
Heng pointed to a violation where teens were allegedly confined without cause, even when multiple correctional officers were sitting in a nearby office. She explained that, during the dates of the inspection earlier this fall, several officers observed in the office were still in training — and therefore not permitted to interact with the youths alone.
She also contended that while programming has been modified by staffing limitations, “this additional room time is not reflective of punishment, disciplinary techniques, or restrictive procedures.”
Tired of surging gun violence across St. Paul, community leaders and police are asking residents to help create a safer city.
The call for community support came Thursday night when officials from the St. Paul NAACP, St. Paul Police Department, Black Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance and the African American Leadership Council gathered at Arlington Hills Lutheran Church to talk about ways to decrease gun violence in the city.
St. Paul has recorded 30 homicides so far this year according to a Star Tribune database, two fewer than last year. But four of this year’s homicides happened in the same week, frustrating law enforcement and alarming residents.
St. Paul NAACP President Richard Pittman Sr. said that solutions to gun violence are “right here, in the room.” But without the community’s help, Pittman said their efforts could fall short.
“Over the last several weeks and months, we have experienced an uptick in violent crimes in our communities. [That’s] turned on a light bulb that it’s time [to] not have the police feeling like all the pressure is on them,” Pittman said. “Nobody wants to the responsibility of having to shoot someone down in the street. Nobody wants the responsibility of hurting somebody’s family. We all want the best outcome.”
Attendee Carrie Johnson worried generational trauma is derailing youth’s behavior, adding that she’s seen boys in middle school punch girls in the face. Migdalia Baez said mothers living along Rice Street feel they have nowhere to turn for help in redirecting their children. Some worry that their child would be incarcerated if they ask for help.
Larry McPherson, a violence interrupter for 21 Days of Peace St. Paul, said some issues stem from youth with no guidance. McPherson and others patrol hot spots for crime across the city, including near the Midway neighborhood’s Kimball Court apartments where fentanyl drove a spike in robberies and drug violations.
“We’ve got a lot of mental health [struggles]. We’ve got a lot of doggone drug addiction that’s going on in our neighborhoods. We all got the best interests at hand for all people in our community, but we’re just not working fast enough,” McPherson said. “Until we get feet on the ground, people coming out of their own community and standing up for this real cause to take back the community, we’re going to have the same outcome.”
