July 6, 2000 - Wing Trahn has no memories of the small Vietnamese town where she was born, but thats about to change. The twenty-seven year old is leaving today for Cow Lahn Vietnam. There she will spend three weeks teaching English with a group from the Twin Cities based organization, Global Volunteers. Trahn fled Vietnam with her family when she was just two years old. She says today's plane flight to Vietnam will be dramatically different than her journey to the United States twenty five years ago:
July 5, 2000 - The Minneapolis School district is considering a new policy to require 95 percent attendence from students. At the highschool level, that means students couldn't miss more than four days a semester. Angele (ahn-ZHEL) Passe (PASSY) is the Executive Director of the Student-Family- Community Partnership. She led the process to shape the new attendance policy. She says that as attendence goes up, so does achievement:
July 4, 2000 - The Independence Day holiday is the beginning of peak swimming season in Minnesota. But already a number of drownings have occurred. In the past two weeks, a 25-year-old St. Paul man drowned in Lake Phalen when he tried to retrieve a frisbee, a 23-year-old man drowned in Carver County's Lake Ann, a woman in her 40s was found submerged in a lagoon on Minneapolis' Lake of the Isles and a 14-year-old boy drowned when he tried to swim across the St. Croix River. Barb Pierce is a Water Safety Specialist with the Minneapolis Red Cross. She thinks the weather has played a role in the drownings.
July 4, 2000 - MPR’s Lorna Benson interviews Cathy Quinn, a crew leader on the eastern end of the Gunflint Trail. She says it may be two years before the clean-up is complete and speaks to the enormity of change to landscape.
July 3, 2000 - MPR’s Lorna Benson talks with Kevin Hennessy, an analyst for Total Sports Publications, about the Minnesota Twins signing starting pitcher Brad Radke to a new four-year contract worth a reported $36 million. The deal will keep the right-hander with the club through 2004. Radke joined the Twins in 1995. He would have been eligible for free agency at the end of this season.
July 3, 2000 - The Kenyan-Community-Abroad International Conference wrapped up today at Concordia University in St. Paul. The conference tackled two issues... the current political climate in Kenya and the country's growing AIDS crisis. HIV or full-blown AIDS infects almost 14 percent of the adult Kenyan population... one of the highest rates in Sub-Saharan Africa. Dr. Moses Djenga helped organize the conference. He stresses that it's hard to underestimate the affect the AIDS virus has had on Kenya:
June 30, 2000 - It wasn't the ultimate victory they were hoping for, but supporters of campaign finance reform are celebrating the passage of a bill yesterday that forces tax-exempt political organizations to disclose their contributors and reveal who they represent in their advertising. The bill is now on its way to President Clinton who has promised to sign it. David Schultz, is a Professor of Public Administration at Hamline University in St. Paul. He says this bill closes a loophole, but doesn't do nearly enough:
June 30, 2000 - St. Paul police are conducting an internal investigation of two officers who misrepresented themselves as census workers earlier this month during an undercover drug investigation. Police spokesman Michael Jordan says the officers were approached by the suspect while they were talking with a neighbor and they didn't want to blow their cover before the sting:
June 27, 2000 - The Federal Government released new guidelines today on smoking cessation. The recommendations urge health insurers to provide coverage for tobacco treatment just as they do for treating other chronic diseases like high blood pressure and diabetes. Dr. Richard Hurt is the Director of the Mayo Clinic Nicotine Dependence Center. He says health care professionals know what help people need to quit smoking, and they need the authority to act on it:
January 5, 2000 - Travelers could have a few more options for airline travel in the coming months. The Metropolitan Airports Commission is close to approving a plan that will free up seven gates for new carriers at Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport. The MAC has been under pressure to make it easier for Northwest's competitors to gain a foothold in the market. Jeff Hamiel is the executive director of the Metropolitan Airports Commission. --------------------------------------------------------- | D-CART ITEM: 6511 | TIME: 3:53 | OUTCUE: "...gates at MSP." --------------------------------------------------------- Jeff Hamiel is the executive director of the Metropolitan airports commission. The full Metropolitan Commission will vote on the