November 6, 1997 - Midday features a Mainstreet Radio special about deer hunting, broadcast from Bemidji. A huge number of Minnesotans participate in this annual event. In the first hour of program, host Rachel Reabe talks with guests Jim Bryant, regional wildlife supervisor with Minnesota DNR; and Joe Wood, executive director of the MN Deer Association about the hunting regulations, management of season, and environmental impacts. Program closes with James Baden, editor of Mille Lacs Messenger, providing a commentary from the non-hunter perspective.
January 14, 1998 - MPR’s Leif Enger reports on cold weather tourism on the Gun Flint Trail, and the debates of what exactly that should be. Report includes various interviews and commentary.
January 16, 1998 - The debate over managing Minnesota's wolf population got contentious last night, as friends and foes of the wolf clashed over what should be done. The timberwolf may be taken off the endangered species list as early as next year... and at a public meeting in the Twin Cities, there was little common ground between the two sides.
January 20, 1998 - The US Fish and Wildlife Service is seeking federal protection for a Minnesotaow found in the upper midwest. Farmers who may have to change operation practices resent the governmental intervention. While environmentalists say the decline in population of the Topeka shiner should be a sign and we should all sit up and notice.
January 26, 1998 - Recently there have been almost daily announcements of major gifts to various educational and charitable institutions in Minnesota. Minnesota Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor gave Mankato State University 8-million dollars; the Ordway theatre received a 4-million dollar gift from Minnesota actress Ruth Easton to stage new shows in the future. Minnesota Public Radio's Gretchen Lehmann (lay-mun) examines the reasons behind this spurt of giving and it's implications for the future.
January 26, 1998 - Long time critics of the Metropolitan Mosquito Control District are taking another swipe at the agency. The Sierra Club and other environmental organizations are pushing a bill that would require the Mosquito Control District to notify individual property owners before spraying. The agency, one of the largest mosquito control programs in the nation, sprays some 120 thousand acres annually for adult mosquitoes. Minnesota Public Radio's Mary Losure reports.
February 2, 1998 - Opponents of so-called "factory farms" rallied at the state capital, calling for a two year moratorium on the expansion of large feedlots. They say new, concentrated livestock operations are polluting Minnesota's air and water, and squeezing out family-sized livestock farms. Minnesota Public Radio's Mary Losure reports. Wearing "Stop Factory Farms" buttons and carrying signs with slogans like) "land of ten thousand hog lagoons" signs, the crowd of 150 voiced its support for the feedlot moratorium. Monica Cahout farms in Renville County, where some of t
February 10, 1998 - The Minnesota River valley could look different in a few years...and the river water may be much cleaner. What may be the most concentrated effort ever in Minnesota to clean a river is set to begin this spring..... assuming the U.S. Agriculture Department okays the state/federal effort. That approval is expected this month. The goal is to reduce the amount of agricultural run-off entering the river. Mainstreet Radio's Mark Steil reports: This southern Minnesota field doesn't look much out of the ordinary with its spikes of brown grass poking through ice-encrusted snow: SOUNDS OF FOOTSTEPS FADE UP UNDER PREVIOUS :11 (We got good snow cover out here, we're looking
February 12, 1998 - For more than a year, Minnesota environmentalists and the timber industry have been fighting over a small stand of pines in the Superior National Forest. The Little Alfie stand, as it's known, is only 100 acres---about the size of the state fairgrounds---but it represents much larger issues. Loggers in northern Minnesota worry Little Alfie is just the first attempt to make many of the state's off limits to logging, in the same way old growth trees in the west were protected to save the spotted owl. Minnesota Public Radio's Mary Losure reports.
February 25, 1998 - A fumigation company already under investigation for pesticide spraying which officials believe killed one man and injured three others in Minneapolis has agreed to move chemicals it was storing out of Minneapolis. Industrial Fumigants Company took the action at the urging of officials who recently discovered what they say were unsafe storage condictions. Minnesota Public Radio's Mark Zdechlik reports.