Star Tribune
A guaranteed income program for Minnesota artists gets extended and expanded
St. Paul is among the cities that have tried sending money to very low-income residents, studying the results. When Springboard launched its project in 2021, it was one of the nation’s first guaranteed income programs aimed at artists.
“It’s not because we think artists are more deserving or more worthy than anyone else,” said Laura Zabel, Springboard’s executive director. Creative work is one form of labor that, like caregiving, “our economy doesn’t value” but that communities need — now more than ever, she said.
“I love thinking about guaranteed income as a way of honoring that we all have contributions to make to our community, and we need a little bit of time and space and breathing room to make those contributions,” Zabel said.
A similar experiment also started in 2021 in San Francisco, run by the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, has ended. In 2022, the Creatives Rebuild New York program began providing some 2,400 artists in New York with $1,000 per month for 18 months. That same year, Ireland’s government began providing 2,000 artists about $350 a week, or about $18,200 a year, as part of a three-year pilot program.
Every 18 months, Springboard has extended its program’s funding. Now, it’s guaranteeing artists five years of income. The first 25 participants, who have received income since 2021, will see that money continue for two more years. Those who started receiving it 18 months ago, including 25 artists in Otter Tail County, will continue. And the 25 new recipients there will begin the program knowing they’ll get money for five years.
“So, from a research perspective, that’s very exciting — to be able to research and understand some of the difference between folks who know from the beginning the longer time horizon,” Zabel said, “and what that allows them to do in terms of planning and commitment to their community.”
LAFAYETTE, Wis. — About 25 children and adults were injured Wednesday when a wagon carrying them overturned at a western Wisconsin apple orchard.
The children, parents and chaperones were on a field trip to the orchard in Lafayette when one of two wagons being pulled by a tractor turned sideways and rolled over, Chippewa County Sheriff Travis Hakes told reporters. Hakes said the tractor was traveling at a low speed when the wagon rolled over while going downhill.
Three people suffered critical injuries, while injuries to five others were considered serious. Authorities didn’t say how many of the injured were children.
The elementary school-age children attend a school in Eau Claire. Lafayette is northeast of Eau Claire.
After about five minutes and several warnings that students participating in the protest would be suspended,, the protesters exited Northrop and Cunningham continued her speech. They later gathered outside on the mall afterwards to shout, “Cunningham, you will see, Palestine will be free.”
Cunningham recounted the story of Norman Borlaug, the U alumnus and agronomist whose research in wheat saved millions from starvation, and said she would prioritize keeping a college education affordable for students.
Cunningham actually took over presidential duties on July 1, replacing Interim President Jeff Ettinger. She oversees a budget of more than $4 billion to run the university’s five campuses, which enrolled more than 68,000 students and employed 27,000 people during the last academic year.
She was chosen for the job last winter over two other candidates: Laura Bloomberg, president of Cleveland State University and former dean of the U’s Humphrey School of Public Affairs, and James Holloway, provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at the University of New Mexico. She is the U’s second woman president, following Joan Gabel who held the office from 2019 to 2023.
Cunningham will be paid more than $1 million per year — about $975,000 in base pay and an additional $120,000 in retirement contributions. The compensation puts her in the top quarter of Big Ten university presidents.
Sgt. Gordon Blackey, once a security guard to Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, allegedly admitted to tracking the woman’s movements in her vehicle, according to a criminal complaint.
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