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Minnesota Democrats plan to grow state government to historic size

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

The Minnesota Legislature is just days away from enacting a historic transformation of state government, adding $20 billion in spending to the next two-year budget to fund an unprecedented amount of new and expanded programs and services.That broad expansion will require hundreds, if not more than a thousand, new state employees as well as ongoing costs that will entail billions in new tax revenues to support it. The next state budget is expected to hit $72 billion, up 38 percent from the current $52 billion two-year spending plan that expires in June.Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party leaders have described their plans as a progressive vision for the future — a new “Minnesota Miracle” — that residents want. They plan to use the state’s $17.5 billion budget surplus to launch it.There’s a variety of new and expanded social programs including paid family leave, expanded access to government-backed health care as well as billions in new money for public schools and h...

Horoscopes May 14, 2023: Cate Blanchett, connect with the right people

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

CELEBRITIES BORN ON THIS DAY: Miranda Cosgrove, 30; Amber Tamblyn, 40; Cate Blanchett, 54; George Lucas, 79.Amber Tamblyn (Photo by Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images) Dia Dipaupil/Getty ImagesHappy Birthday: Take care of pressing issues and move on to what matters to you. A change will require your undivided attention and energy, but once completed, you’ll feel good about your accomplishments. Make this a high-energy year that can be far-reaching if you connect with the right people. Model yourself after someone who doesn’t stop before victory takes place. Love is in the stars. Your numbers are 7, 15, 23, 26, 34, 37, 45.ARIES (March 21-April 19): Take matters to heart. Listen, and do your best to correct any misunderstanding or error quickly. Keeping the peace will help you further your intentions and encourage others to contribute to your goal. A simple, direct approach will pay off. 3 starsTAURUS (April 20-May 20): Take care of personal matters yourself if you want thing...

Ask Amy: Deadbolt may be wrong solution to creepy housemate situation

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

Dear Amy: I’m responding to the question from “Locked In,” whose bedroom surveillance camera caught housemates sneaking into the locked room.I am a landlord. In my jurisdiction (and probably many others) it is illegal to install a lock with a key on a bedroom door. It’s a fire hazard and can impede firefighters.So maybe the letter writer should hand off valuables to a trusted friend for safekeeping and then make plans to move ASAP, rather than add a deadbolt to the door.The whole thing sounds creepy.LandlordDear Landlord: Great point! I also agree about the creep factor.Looking into this topic, I stumbled across a ton of security camera footage of roommates sneaking into others’ rooms — sometimes taking things, and other times just … snooping.Dear Amy: Six years ago, I developed a difficult cancer with a life expectancy of three to six months.After many months of chemo, I received a donor bone marrow transplant from a specialty hospital where I was for several more months. The trans...

Lawsuit challenging DC noncitizen voting law moves to federal court

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

After the D.C. Council passed a bill allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections, a group of voters — including a previous Republican mayoral candidate for the District — sued the Board of Elections. That case has now moved to the federal court system.The lawsuit challenging the Local Resident Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2022, which allows green-card holders and residents who entered or live in the country without legal permission to cast ballots in local races, was initially filed in D.C. Superior Court.According to court documents, the case was moved to the U.S. District Court on May 4.Seven voters are listed plaintiffs in the suit. They include former GOP mayoral candidate Stacia Hall, former GOP candidate for at-large DC Councilmember Ralph Chittams and Dick Heller, whose 2008 Supreme Court case struck down key gun legislation in the District.Complaints from the group filed on March 14, allege that the D.C. law infringes on their right to vote, discriminates against citiz...

Clouds and a Few Showers for Mom

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

Happy Mother’s Day to all moms out there! Unfortunately, we won’t get to enjoy the sunshine and bright, blue skies today but the day overall won’t be too bad. An upper level disturbance to our south and headed toward the Bahamas and swirling in more mid to upper levels clouds over South Florida this Sunday, making for mostly cloudy conditions. Most areas are looking to be dry today, at least, with only a 30% chance for rain. The best chance for seeing isolated showers and storms will be through midday today, then this activity should shift farther inland during the afternoon and evening hours. Highs will be near normal into the mid to upper 80s.On Monday, rain chances look to be slightly higher with scattered showers and thunderstorms expected, again especially during the morning and midday hours — very fitting for the start of rainy season in South Florida. Highs will remain in the mid to upper 80s with more clouds around due to that upper disturbance over t...

Howie Carr: Ex-Massachusetts State Police union president Dana Pullman, a crooked cop’s crooked cop

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

The bad news for crooked ex-state cop Dana Pullman is that he got a 30-month sentence in federal court last week for his sordid career of corruption and rampant thievery.Herald file photoDana Pullman, then of the State Police Association of Massachusetts talks in Chelmsford on July 23, 2013. Last November, he was convicted in federal court in Boston of major fraud in his running of the union. (Matt Stone/Boston Herald)The good news is, it’s not going to immediately affect the $65,439.12-a-year state pension that he’s been collecting since 2018, when he was losing a photo finish with the grand jury.Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.Yanking the career criminal’s pension is now up to the State Retirement Board, and I was told on Friday that Pullman’s high crimes will likely be discussed at the next open meeting May 25.But that doesn’t mean anything is going to happen right away to this hideous 61-year-old thug, who looks like an old-style Dick Tracy cartoon villain, a cross betwe...

Guregian: Emptying the notebook after a 38-year run at the Herald

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

Muhammad Ali clenched his fists, put up his dukes, and urged me to engage.Standing a few feet in front of him, looking at the sparkle in his eyes, I was equal parts amused, awed, and perplexed. Was he really asking me to throw a few jabs?You bet he was. And if a boxing legend asks you to shadow-box with him during the course of an interview, there shouldn’t be any hesitation. Just dive right in.And I did so with absolute pleasure.This was one of the countless pinch-yourself type of assignments the Herald sent me on during my 38-year run with the paper. Ali, who was in town in November 1994 to receive the Courage of Conscience Award at the Peace Abbey in Sherborn, also made an appearance at a local college during his stay.That’s where I found him, along with his unusual greeting.I guess this was the champ’s way of playfully testing me before we chatted. While it still seems surreal many years later, Ali and I actually traded shadow punches for a bit. He won by TKO, since I was ...

MassGOP identifies $262G+ in media invoices it says Geoff Diehl campaign responsible for

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

The Massachusetts Republican Party says that its own audit of its whopping debt shows that at least $262,620 in media invoices should properly be billed to the campaign of Geoff Diehl, who lost his campaign for governor last year.“Thus far, while we continue to review various documents, we have determined that at least two invoices that were included in the total billed to the MassGOP for Diehl campaign TV ads should in fact be billed to the Diehl for Governor campaign,” MassGOP Chairwoman Amy Carnevale wrote to Bruce Mittman, the president of Needham marketing agency MITTCOM, in a letter dated Thursday.In total, MITTCOM had billed nearly $440,000 to the state party — part of the huge $600,000 debt the state Office of Campaign and Political Finance (OCPF) said the party was on the hook for.At the time of the audit finding, Carnevale — who beat out former Chairman Jim Lyons, who was running for a third term, in January — wrote that $404,000 of the unpaid invoices she inherited upon a...

Tree Alliance program to help preserve Boston’s canopy

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

Mayor Michelle Wu has organized a coalition dedicated to providing resources to residents who have trees growing on their properties but might not be aware of how to properly care for them.Mass Audubon will lead a group of two dozen strategic nonprofits from under-resourced communities in collaborating with residents about the tools that are needed to preserve tree growth.“If we are serious about preserving and expanding this tree canopy, we not only have to take public efforts where we have full jurisdiction but also make sure we can provide support on private land,” Wu said Friday when announcing the creation of the Tree Alliance.More than 60% of the city’s trees are on private land, the mayor said, and the Tree Alliance will at first focus on what environmentalists call ‘environmental justice communities,’ those that are primarily of color and have many residents below the poverty line.“Because of redlining and systemic disinvestment,” Wu said, “tree canopy is already less ...

Thailand counts votes in key election with opposition favored to win

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:11 GMT

BANGKOK (AP) — Vote counting was underway Sunday in Thailand’s general election, touted as a pivotal chance for change nine years after incumbent Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha first came to power in a 2014 coup. He is now running against the daughter of the politician who is the military’s top nemesis.The polls closed at 5 p.m. and some results were expected in early evening, with a fuller picture coming later Sunday night. Thai elections use paper ballots that are counted publicly at polling stations. The opposition Pheu Thai Party, headed by Paetongtarn Shinawatra, is widely predicted to win at least a healthy plurality of the seats in the 500-member lower House. After casting her ballot, Paetongtarn said every vote is important for effecting change in Thailand and that she has high hopes for the final result.But who heads the next government won’t by decided by Sunday’s vote alone. The prime minister will be selected in July in a joint session of the Ho...