Minnesota

Giving birth in rural Minnesota? Be prepared for a long drive – Minnesota Reformer

Published

2 years ago

January 25, 2024

Giving birth in rural Minnesota? Be prepared for a long drive – Minnesota Reformer

Essentia Health Services recently announced that it plans to end labor and delivery services at its hospital in Fosston, a town of 1,400 people in northwest Minnesota.

The closure of the delivery ward means that mothers in Fosston and surrounding towns will now have to travel 45 minutes west to Crookston or east to Bemidji to find an obstetric unit that delivers babies.

It’s the latest in a longstanding trend of rural hospitals shuttering their obstetrics departments in the face of staffing and other challenges. Twenty years ago, more than 110 hospitals in the state offered birth services, according to the Minnesota Department of Health. Today that number stands at 76, with the closures hitting especially hard in communities in the rural northern reaches of the state.

In Grand Marais, on the North Shore, women face a two-hour drive to get to the nearest birthing center in Duluth. Mothers in Ely (pop. 3,200) need to drive an hour to get to Virginia after the local hospital ended delivery services in 2014. Virginia is also the nearest delivery hospital for residents of International Falls, a city on the Canadian border with a population of more than 5,000 people. It’s one hour and 45 minutes away by car.

Minnesotans living on reservations and tribal lands are especially likely to face difficulties in finding a nearby birthing hospital, as the map above shows. Infant mortality rates for Indigenous Minnesotans are more than double what they are for white babies, according to state data, and the maternal mortality rate is nearly 8 times higher.

Chartis, a private health care consulting firm, recently found that Minnesota had the nation’s highest number of rural obstetrics closures from 2011 through 2021, although this is partly because it has more rural hospitals than other states. A March of Dimes report found that 14% of Minnesota moms have to drive a half hour or more to reach a birthing hospital, compared to 10% nationwide.

When rural delivery wards close, “our research has shown increased risks of emergency room births as well as preterm births, especially in the more remote rural communities which are not adjacent to urban areas,” said Katy Kozhimannil, a University of Minnesota health policy professor. “We have also found that rural communities that lose obstetrics are less likely to offer other evidence-based services and supports for families, like childbirth education or lactation support.”

Rural hospitals in Minnesota have often cited staffing challenges as a driver of maternity ward closures. It can be expensive to keep staff and supplies on hand for procedures that happen infrequently.

“For obstetric services the fixed costs of staffing, equipment, and facilities are difficult to cover with volume based revenues when facilities and clinicians have few pregnant patients,” Kozhimanill explained in an opinion published in BMJ last year. “This leads to workforce shortages and unit closures in more remote, less populated areas.”

Essentia Health in Fosston, for instance, only delivered 38 babies in the 12-month period ending in June of 2022, according to state data. The hospitals in the communities of Olivia and Granite Falls saw fewer than 20 deliveries in their most recently reported years. Both have since ceased offering those services.

Kozhimanill also noted that nearly half of American births are financed by Medicaid, which “reimburses at substantially lower rates than private insurers, so facilities and clinicians caring for lower income patients in remote rural areas face exceptional challenges in generating revenue for obstetric services.”

The closure of an obstetrics unit can become part of a self-perpetuating cycle of rural decline. Young families in need of maternal and infant care may decide to move elsewhere, shrinking the local economy and making it harder for the community to fund services for those who remain.

The March of Dimes recommends expanding Medicaid eligibility and coverage as a way to reverse these trends, but Kozhimanill says policymakers should think bigger and consider ambitious investments in community public health.

“Policy solutions need to focus squarely on the structural injustices and systemic failures that have created and reproduced the statistics that alarm us,” she wrote last year. “As the closest place to give birth becomes further and further away for many people, these facts should no longer be surprising.”

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Minnesota

Minnesota’s oldest operating theater is in danger of closing it’s doors

Published

2 hours ago

March 5, 2026

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Minnesota’s oldest operating theater is in danger of closing it’s doors

One of the oldest operating theaters in the Midwest is in danger of closing its doors for good.

If you’re heading south on Highway 15, Fairmont, Minnesota, is your last gasp before you hit Iowa. It officially became a city in the late 1800s — and not long after, the Opera House was born.

“We are the oldest, operating, continuously operating theater in the state of Minnesota,” said Jane Reiman, a lifelong resident of Fairmont.

When the doors opened in 1901, operas, musicals, plays, and concerts—drew people from across southern Minnesota, and even from Iowa and South Dakota.

“We have done a lot of entertainment over the years.”

The rock band America once performed at the opera house, as did folk legend Arlo Guthrie. In the 1990’s, the opera house even got a visit from Paul McCartney. His family bought seats.

“They came here and sat in the chairs, and now we have plaques on the chairs to memorialize them.”

In 3rd grade Blake Potthoff went to his first performance at the theater, and later, he acted on stage.

“You’ve grown up with this opera house?” asked WCCO’s John Lauritsen.

“Yeah. Absolutely, it’s a part of me even before I became executive director,” said Potthoff.

But like everything else, the theater has aged over time, to the point that it’s going to cost more than $4 million just to keep it running. If they can’t raise the money, the Opera House may have already seen its final curtain call.

“The building is on life support, and we are doing everything we can to make sure we get back to surviving and thriving,” said Potthoff.

Scaffolding is there, just to reinforce the roof; that’s the biggest expense. But the Fairmont community is starting to respond. Grants and donations have raised $1.5 million so far—still short, but a start.

When renovations are complete, they’d also like to maintain the old character of this theater. That includes this hand-cast plaster, which is also 125-years-old.

The chandeliers were installed a decade before the Titanic sank, and they’re hoping to keep those too. For Blake and others, the show has to go on. For the people in the seats, the actors on stage, and for the livelihood of a small town.

“There’s reason to save this building. That $4 million isn’t impossible. Only improbable. And I truly believe it too. I have a history of performing here. And I have two young kids. I want them to perform on stage like I had the opportunity,” said Potthoff.

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Minnesota

Lawmakers demand Keith Ellison resign as Minnesota fraud grilling turns brutal

Published

14 hours ago

March 4, 2026

Press Room

Lawmakers demand Keith Ellison resign as Minnesota fraud grilling turns brutal

WASHINGTON (TNND) — Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA) called on Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison to resign during the House Oversight Committee’s hearing on the widespread fraud in Minnesota.

Higgins began his line of questioning by referring to Ellison’s open statement.

“Under Minnesota law, my Office has limited jurisdiction over criminal matters. The only kind of criminal case we can prosecute on our own is Medicaid fraud; any other criminal case must be specifically referred to us by county attorneys or the Governor,” Ellison said in his opening statement.

Higgins stated Ellison said that his office only had the authority to investigate Medicaid fraud, to which Ellison nodded his head in response.

But, Higgins pointed out that was incorrect.

“Under your own law, you have authority if the county district attorney asks you to get involved, or if the governor asks you to get involved, then your office can take the lead on any criminal investigation,” Ellison said.

Ellison remained speechless after Higgins asked him if that his statement was correct.

“So you have the authority to lead your state’s effort to respond to this massive fraud at the state level, from within the health care realm, where government money has been stolen at very, very high levels, unprecedented levels, in your state,” Higgins said.

“Are you leading that effort for the state of Minnesota?”

Ellison replied but his response was not picked up by the microphone.

“You’re addressing it,” Higgins asked. “Are you leading it?”

Ellison responded, “we are leading the effort to prosecute Medicaid fraud.”

“I’m not talking about Medicaid fraud,” Higgins yelled.

“Don’t hide behind that. You have the authority to prosecute anything criminally that the governor asked you to. And this thing is big.”

“I’m giving you an opportunity, sir. Are you leading the criminal investigative effort into this massive fraud across the board in the healthcare spectrum, in the state of Minnesota or not,” Higgins continued.

Ellison replied, saying his office was “following the law,” prompting Higgins to interject.

“You are not leading,” Higgins responded. “You’re not leading. I must say, Mr. Chairman, that the Attorney General of Minnesota should resign.”

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Minnesota

Maddy Kimbrel Named Minnesota’s 2026 Ms. Hockey Winner

Published

1 day ago

March 4, 2026

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Maddy Kimbrel Named Minnesota’s 2026 Ms. Hockey Winner

Maddy Kimbrel joined an illustrious group of players as Minnesota’s 2026 Ms. Hockey winner. The award is annually given to the best high school women’s hockey player in the state of Minnesota.

The Holy Family forward scored 37 goals and 57 points this season in only 26 games for her school.

She was also an assistant captain for Team USA at the 2026 U-18 World Championships winning gold. It was her second time representing USA at the event.

Kimbrel spent four seasons playing for Orono High before moving to Holy Family this season.

The 17-year-old Mound, Minnesota product is headed to the University of Wisconsin next season.

The other four finalists for the award were Alaina Gentz (Centennial/SLP), Jasmine Hovda (Roseau), Lorelai Nelson (Edina), and Mia Miller (Northfield).

Past winners of the award include current PWHL players such as Taylor Heise (2018), Peyton Hemp (2021), Olivia Mobley (2020), Grace Zumwinkle (2017), and Hannah Brandt (2012), and 2024 Hockey Hall of Fame inductee Krissy Wendell-Pohl.

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