March 25, 2002 - MPR’s Lorna Benson talks with capitol reporter Michael Khoo about Minnesota House expected to vote on a ballpark financing plan first proposed by Governor Jesse Ventura's administration.
March 26, 2002 -
March 26, 2002 -
March 26, 2002 - Andrew Zimbalist, a professor of economics at Smith College and the author of a book called Baseball and Billions, comments on local stadium actions. Fifty St. Paul business owners started a campaign against a proposed food, beverage, and lodging tax to fund a Twins stadium, while Minnesota House approved a bill for a $330 million open-air stadium that allows the host city to levy the tax to help repay bonds.
March 27, 2002 - Last week, the six largest US airlines, including Twin Cities based Northwest Airlines decided to stop paying most commissions to travel agents who sell their tickets. Airline industry analysts say the commissions are an unnecessary expense at a time when carriers are struggling to restore their financial health following September 11th. But the decision to end commissions has major implications for travel agencies throughout the nation. Minnesota travel agents say the airlines' decision is forcing them to revamp their businesses, and to charge consumers higher fees for booking airline tickets. Minnesota Public Radio's Andrew Haeg reports.
March 27, 2002 - The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has re-affirmed that cities do have legal authority to restrict adult businesses. In the case between Jake's Bar versus the city of Coates the court ruled in favor of the city. It's a case that may influence decisions in other cities where the locaiton of strip clubs is an issue. Minnesota Public Radio's Laurel Druley has this report.
March 27, 2002 - Northwest Airlines is recalling about 500 ground workers who were among the nine-thousand employees laid off after the September eleventh terrorist attacks. A Northwest spokesman says most of the employees being recalled to permanent jobs are customer service agents and equipment service employees in the Detroit and Minneapolis hubs. This is the second time since the terrorist attacks that Northwest has called back employees to permanent jobs. Previously, the carrier recalled a little over 300 part-time reservation agents to permanent jobs. Airline analyst Joel Denny says Northwest's recall is similar to what's going on at other carriers and indicates the industry is SLOWLY rebuilding.
March 28, 2002 -
March 28, 2002 -
March 28, 2002 - Last month Federated and Peter Lytle's business Development Group signed a non-binding letter of intent to explore purchasing Fingerhut, which employs 47 hundred people in Minnesota. The group was expected to respond in early March, but received at least one extension. But with no committed financing for the Business Development group Federated Spokeswoman Carol Sanger says it's time to open the process to the dozen or so other parties that have expressed interest in parts of Fingerhut.