Minneapolis, MN
Minneapolis police award Medal of Valor to officers for water rescue
Minneapolis police officers awarded medal of valor for water rescue
Two Minneapolis police officers were awarded the MPD Medal of Valor on Tuesday for saving a young boy’s life last year.
Sgt. Jeremy Depies and Officer Ashley Bergersen were both working on Sunday, Nov. 26 when a call came in that a young child had fallen through the ice.
“I didn’t think it was real at first,” said Bergersen, who was working as a field training officer that day.
She rushed to Bryn Mawr Meadows Park, where Sgt. Depies was already running towards the water. He’d been doing a ride-along, showing a civilian city parks, when he got the call.
4-year-old boy in critical condition a day after water rescue at Minneapolis park
“I was in the right place at the right time and just arrived on scene at the moment I needed to be there,” he said.
Depies told us he arrived to the scene within 30 seconds, where a little girl told him her brother was in the water.
“I went down to the ice, ran down there and I saw his snow pants sticking up out of the water,” he said. “I knew he was in there longer than he’d ever be able to hold his breath.”
Depies ran into the water with Bergersen right behind him.
“I told myself to feel light as a feather on that ice because I could see that the ice was not thick at all, might have been an inch, if that,” she said. “I just ran as fast and as far as I could to the hole to get Eli.”
Bergersen added, “[I thought] we gotta get him out now or he’s not going to survive.”
Instinct took over for both of them.
“This isn’t anything that either one of us has been trained to do,” said Depies. “In that moment, it didn’t matter, I had to figure out a way to get Eli out of the water.”
Bergersen carried the little boy out of the water and handed him off to her partner, who raced him to the pavement. They started CPR and called for an ambulance.
Bergersen went with the four-year-old to the hospital, where she met his mother.
“The first thing I did when I saw her was I knelt down next to her and gave her a hug,” she said.
After speaking with the child’s mother, she determined he’d been in the water for about six minutes before they arrived.
The four-year-old survived and met his heroes in the weeks that followed.
“Eli’s a fun-loving kid and super great to spend time with,” said Depies
“Amazing to see him walking and talking now, it’s surreal,” said Bergersen. “I am glad that I was working that day, that I was able to respond to that specific call and that I had enough courage to jump into that pond. It was an instinct. I just thought if that was my son, I sure hope someone would go in and save them.”
A halt on the construction of data centers in Minneapolis took effect in July after the Minneapolis City Council discussed the need for more time to understand the facilities’ potential environmental impacts.
The Council approved the halt through November by an 8-5 vote in May. Members said the halt allows time to study the environmental impacts of data centers and plan their development more conscientiously.
However, Council members not in favor of the halt said it will result in reduced tax revenue and may drive away businesses willing to invest in downtown Minneapolis.
Data centers are not new to the Minneapolis area, but community concerns have grown in recent months, President of Minnesota Building and Construction Trades Council Dan McConnell said.
“Data centers have been around for decades,” McConnell said. “They’re not new. There just seems to all of a sudden be this hysteria around data centers.”
Celeste Robinson, policy aide to Minneapolis Council member Robin Wonsley, said the city should not rush the process because of the potential environmental trade-offs compared with the promised economic benefits. She said the halt could be extended to allow a full 12 months of analysis.
Robinson said the Council’s halt on data centers allows for a more thorough evaluation of their impacts.
“I think that there’s a misconception that the City Council being deliberative and taking the time to do it right. I think that there’s been a portrayal that that’s somehow a bad thing,” Robinson said.
Robinson said, although data centers are often seen as an investment, there is no evidence the developments generate the economic benefits for communities that supporters claim they do. She said the Council wants to determine what resources they would potentially take from the city.
“It is corporations who see land, fresh clean water, and electric grids that they can use for their profit, and that those profits get moved out of state to shareholders,” Robinson said. “They are not reinvested in our community, and so a lot of the rhetoric around data centers has really been about unverified claims around them being a source of investment.”
The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations’ website claims that data centers are a staple for the modern job market and help to create more jobs, but labor protections for workers and regulations to protect surrounding communities are needed.
Resolution 7, a plan created by the AFL and CIO, outlines labor protections for data center employees and regulations aimed to protect surrounding communities. The plan calls for legislation that would require data centers to conserve water and energy. It seeks transparency from data center operators, union labor agreements and policies requiring data center operators to pay their share of energy and water costs.
In recent years, a lack of development in Minneapolis has seen a decline in commercial property value, leaving a shortfall of about $50 million in expected commercial property tax to fall onto the shoulders of residents, according to the Minneapolis Times. To help offset that shortfall and alleviate the burden that was placed on residents, Minneapolis must find new sources of revenue, Council member Elizabeth Shaffer said.
Some believe data centers, often being large-scale commercial developments, can relieve these financial pressures. Shaffer said the data center located in the Sleep Number headquarters in downtown Minneapolis has had a positive financial impact on the city.
“The Sleep Number building increased its valuation to eight times what it was a year ago because of a data center,” Shaffer said. “That helps relieve the property tax burden that residents and apartment owners have been feeling.”
When property values increase, property tax revenue also increases, helping Minneapolis generate revenue and address its estimated $50 million deficit, Shaffer said.
Robinson said data centers are not the only way for Minneapolis to generate revenue within the city.
“Council member Wonsley has been looking at how do we tax the rich, how do we put fees on real estate transfers for extremely high-value real estate,” Robinson said. “There are so many things that the city council can be doing to bring in new revenue to shift the property tax burden off of working-class people, that is not related to letting big tech corporations build data centers.”
Extreme Heat Warning
from SUN 8:00 AM CDT until TUE 1:00 AM CDT, Norman County, Kittson County, Wadena County, Roseau County, North Beltrami County, Mahnomen County, Wilkin County, North Clearwater County, Clay County, Red Lake County, West Otter Tail County, West Marshall County, East Marshall County, Pennington County, West Becker County, South Beltrami County, Lake Of The Woods County, West Polk County, Grant County, South Clearwater County, Hubbard County, East Polk County, East Otter Tail County, East Becker County
-
Videos1 hour agoNew explosions near Iranian port cities, says state media | BBC News
-
Los Angeles, Ca1 hour agoBig rig crash spills cinder blocks on 101 Freeway; lanes blocked in Tarzana
-
Detroit, MI2 hours agoHow to watch ‘The Odyssey’ in IMAX, 70mm and more in metro Detroit
-
San Francisco, CA2 hours agoSold-Out SF Marathon 2026: The Races, Routes and Road Closures (Plus How to Watch It All) | KQED
-
Dallas, TX2 hours agoTop 10 Dallas Cowboys of 2026: Rashan Gary is Complete EDGE Dallas Needed
-
Miami, FL2 hours agoGirl, 12, shot while sitting in parked car in northwest Miami-Dade, deputies say
-
Boston, MA2 hours agoGBH Daily: Come sail away
-
Denver, CO2 hours agoNew ice cream shop with a ‘waffle theater’ bets big on downtown Denver
