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Children’s MN CEO speaks out on gun violence, offers a solution
In a new book, Dr. Marc Gorelick, CEO of Children’s Minnesota, is advocating for a public health approach to combat gun violence.
MINNEAPOLIS — When news of yet another school shooting – this time in Georgia – reached Dr. Marc Gorelick on Wednesday, it brought back frustrating and familiar feelings for the former pediatric emergency room doctor.
“I’ve seen Children and adolescents who have been victims of gun violence, sometimes inflicted by others, sometimes inflicted on themselves,” Gorelick said. “You don’t forget those images, those, those patients have stayed with me for the last 35 years.”
Although Gorelick has since risen to CEO of Children’s Minnesota, those awful reminders of his past work have become more frequent.
When gun deaths surpassed car accidents as the number one killer of kids and teens in the United States a few years ago, Gorelick joined other Minnesota hospital CEO’s in declaring gun violence a public health crisis.
“I think part of what makes it so gut-wrenching for someone like me is understanding that it really is preventable,” he said.
Despite that belief, Gorelick says efforts to address the gun violence issue have remained largely stuck in place, which is why he decided to put his ideas into writing. His new book, Saving Our Kids: An ER Doc’s Common-Sense Solution to the Gun Crisis, was released last month.
“The goal of the book was to paint a picture of what would it look like if we acted like this is the public health crisis, we say it is,” Gorelick said.
To do so, he says we first need to fight the urge to run to our political corners after every mass shooting or high-profile crime.
“Too often we frame it as a moral issue,” Gorelick said. “Either you are a bad person because you have guns or you are a bad person because you want to take away somebody’s guns. It is not a moral issue. It’s a health issue. It’s the leading cause of death in Children. We need to think of it that way.”
Gorelick says that a shift in thinking would also require better cooperation between healthcare, government, families and individuals.
“A public health approach would suggest you need policies, you need education and you need community-based interventions,” he said. “I think a nice example here in the Twin Cities is something called Next Step. People who are victims of violence who come into one of our emergency departments are connected with resources to both support them and their families in the immediate trauma, but also to intervene, to help prevent them from getting reinjured.”
Though yet another mass shooting prompted the conversation, Gorelick points out that all of the other tragedies happening every day across the country are what is driving his approach.
“This happens in every single community in the United States,” he said. “It’s almost 5,000 Children and adolescents each year in the United States die of gun injury. Every one of those is a tragedy, he said.
“I know how difficult it is for our staff and for their families and for the communities. and I know that if we take the right approach, we actually can do something about this. This is not an insolvable problem.”
Saving Our Kids: An ER Doc’s Common-Sense Solution to the Gun Crisis is available for sale online. All proceeds from the sales, go to support violence intervention programs at Children’s Minnesota.
Kim Potter was convicted of manslaughter after she shot and killed Daunte Wright in 2021.
BROOKLYN CENTER, Minn. — An upcoming training session with officers at the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board was canceled after they learned Kim Potter was a part of it.
Potter, a former Brooklyn Center police officer, was convicted of manslaughter after she shot and killed Daunte Wright during a traffic stop in 2021. She served 16 months of a two-year sentence.
Daunte’s mother, Katie, said she had no idea Potter would be a part of a training session until after it was canceled.
“I was mad and hurt at the same time. I don’t understand why she would have the audacity to feel like she has that right to even go into a community and benefit off our tragedy,” she said.
Katie said she was relieved they canceled it out of respect for her and her family.
“Whenever I hear Kim Potter’s name or hear her doing anything like this it’s like tearing a band-aid off a forever bleeding wound,” she said. “She doesn’t get to triumph off of our tragedy.”
Potter was supposed to speak alongside former Washington County Assistant Prosecutor Imran Ali.
In an email, he said “We have presented before, but minimally. Her participation is usually between 5-10 percent of any training.”
He said money isn’t her objective.
“Most of the speaking has zero compensation. If the travel is out of town, I make sure her travel costs are covered and a small stipend,” Ali said in an email.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said it’s unfortunate the planned training was canceled and hopes they reconsider.
“We should all support and at least respect how victims feel. At the same time, as attorney general, we’re trying to reduce deadly force encounters between police and community,” he said. “I think it is admirable that Kim Potter would want to come forth and tell her story to help other people learn. I mean she has a cautionary tale to tell.”
Ellison believes Potter’s past could help improve policing.
“I think it could be beneficial for public safety, and it could improve policing,” he said. “She can tell them that she spent decades as a police officer, believed in what she was doing, and committed, and still despite that training and that experience committed a lethal error when she killed Daunte Wright.”
However, Katie just doesn’t see how Potter being a part of training sessions can improve policing.
“Nobody can learn from that,” she said. “I don’t think she’s learned anything. If she’d learned anything she would have written us a letter. I haven’t heard anything.”
Katie said she visits her son’s memorial three times a week to feel close to him.
“I talk to him every time I’m out here, and I feel like he hears me,” she said.
A metal sculpture details his face with different symbols crafted into the metalwork.
“This is Daunte’s face with his crown. We have a couple fists embedded into his crown,” she said. “We have the No. 23 which symbolizes his favorite number because of basketball and Michael Jordan… the infinity just means he’s just going to live on forever. His story will forever be known and told.”
A memorial sits next to the artwork that has a picture of Daunte and a copy of his death certificate.
“The death certificate was really important to me because of the fact that it shows he was, it does homicide and gunshot wound. And I want people to remember that he was killed by law enforcement,” she said.
They also planted a flowerbed by the memorial that is currently blooming with red flowers.
Katie said she is more than willing to visit police departments and explain the impact deadly force has on families.
A fundraiser aims to collect around $25,000 to cover the “upfront costs” of constructing the popular winter attraction.
MINNEAPOLIS — A local winter tradition is in jeopardy, forcing two sculptors to ask the public for help.
Austin, Trevor and Connor Bartz, the Bartz brothers, have crafted giant snow sculptures in New Brighton since 2012. Their first creation was a puffer fish, followed by a shark, an octopus, a sea turtle, a whale, a walrus and more. In 2024, the brothers created a 21-foot-tall “Sparky” the sea lion, their biggest creation to date.
Last winter the brothers told KARE 11 they had to harvest snow from parking lots across the metro and build the behemoth inside a shed at Brightwood Hills Golf Course.
“We’re taking sleds of snow from outside on the pond, we’re sledding it inside, bringing it around this way and into the snow factory,” explained Austin Bartz.
Earlier this month, the brothers started a GoFundMe to raise $25,000 to keep their tradition going.
“We still need another $25,000 to cover upfront costs (lighting, labor, supplies, machine costs, gas, lumber, rental costs). Due to the growing popularity this is NOT a cheap event to run.”
The brothers plan for all the proceeds raised by their sculpture to go to the charity World Vision to provide clean water to people in need. If they aren’t able to reach their fundraising goal to build another snow sculpture, the brothers wrote on the GoFundMe that all of the money raised will go to the charity.
Police were first called to the area for a welfare check on a person in Clarkfield, a city around 2 and 1/2 hours west of Minneapolis.
CLARKFIELD, Minn. — The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal (BCA) is investigating an incident in Yellow Medicine County after a suspect shot at law enforcement on Saturday night.
According to information from the Yellow Medicine County Sheriff, the office got a call around 3:15 p.m. for a welfare check on a person in Clarkfield, a city around 2 and 1/2 hours west of Minneapolis. Deputies learned the person had left the city while en route to the call and were told he was in a farm field with a rifle.
As deputies were evacuating people from the home next to the field, officials said the suspect pointed the rifle at them and then fled into the home. Officials said officers set up a perimeter around the house and deputies tried to contact the man.
Officers were not able to convince the man to leave the house and called a SWAT team as backup. The Kandiyohi-Meeker-Willmar SWAT team arrived and they tried to convince the man to leave the house. During the standoff, officials said the man fired a long gun at the team and SWAT returned fire.
The man was struck in the leg, officials said.
After eight hours on site, the SWAT team was relieved by another crew from West Central SWAT and BLR SWAT.
Around 6:15 on Sunday morning, the man left the house and shot a long gun at the SWAT team. One of the team returned fire and struck him.
The extent of the man’s injuries has not been released as of Sunday afternoon, but officials said the team gave the man medical attention and was taken to Hennepin Healthcare via Air Ambulance. He is in stable condition, according to officials.
No other people were injured in this incident, officials said.
The BCA was asked to investigate the use of force by officers.
KARE 11 will update this story as more information is made available.
