April 27, 1999 - Minnesota's new welfare system has been in place for a year and a half now. The program has helped welfare recipients wade through obstacles to finding jobs, medical care, transportation and child care, but for many families, it still falls short. The Greater Minneapolis Council of Churches is trying to fill that gap. The council has already recruited more than 2000 volunteers to serve as mentors to families on welfare. Many of the volunteers have been involved in a 30-week pilot program that ran this past year. The council will officially launch the program at a town meeting tonight and try to recruit three-thousand more mentors. Reverend Gary Ry-er-son, the president of the council says the volunteers provide a unique form of support to families moving off welfare.
April 27, 1999 - The Minnesota House has approved a bill to spend $7-point-8 Billion dollars on K-through-12 schools over the next two years. The bill is $90 Million dollars more than Governor Ventura budgeted, and spends almost one Billion dollars more than in the previous two-year period. Still, many Democrats say the legislation doesn't spend enough on all school districts.
April 27, 1999 - 2nd District Congressman David Minge today put one foot in the race to challenge Republican U.S. Senator Rod Grams. The DFLer from Montevideo announced the formation of a so-called "exploratory committee," which will allow him to raise funds for the 2000 race without formally calling himself a candidate.
April 27, 1999 - Tucked into agriculture bills before the Minnesota Legislature is a small proposal to study the merits of a publicly owned grain-loading facility in the port of Duluth. The idea comes from a Litchfield area farmer, who's frustrated with large grain companies, and those companies' domination of the grain export business.
April 27, 1999 - The Minnesota Attorney General's "Safe Schools Survey" is out. And the results show students' perceptions of violence in schools haven't changed much in the last five years since the survey began. The survey questioned students from around the state. Most say if they witnessed a violent act--they didn't report it.
April 27, 1999 - Governor Ventura today made one of the last major appointments to his adminstration. This afternoon Ventura appointed Brooklyn Center resident Charles Nichols Chairman of the Metropolitan Airports Commission. Nichols is something of an unknown quantity at the Minneapolis /St. Paul airport.
April 28, 1999 - Teachers, parents and students throughout Minnesota are waiting today for results of this year's 8th grade basic standards tests. The tests measure minimum skills in reading and math and are a requirement for high school graduation. Minnesota Public Radio's Tim Pugmire reports Minnesota school districts have spent a lot of time and money the past year to raise scores..
April 28, 1999 - Senate DFL leaders say they'll cut deeper into income tax rates than they originally proposed last week. The plan announced Tuesday cuts car tab fees and the lower two income tax rates. DFLers says the proposal is aimed at the middle class, but House Republicans scoff at the package, which is still about a billion dollars less than their plan.
April 28, 1999 - AT&T says US West is illegally preventing customers from transferring business to US West's competitors for in-state long distance calls. The charges and counter-charges are the latest dispute to erupt as deregulation reshapes the telecommunications industry.
April 29, 1999 - Tales of torture and abuse are the stuff of nightmares: this weekend a such a story is being retold, but this has, if not a happy, at least a hopeful, ending. The Macalester College theater department is presenting the world premiere of "Return to Kanburi" a remarkable story of how Eric Lomax, a British soldier tortured in by the Japanese during World War 2, found one of the men responsible decades later, and forgave him.