Minneapolis, MN
MPD Wants ShotSpotter In South Minneapolis – Racket
Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.
Oh Great, More Surveillance
RoboCop isn’t becoming reality anytime soon and hundreds of traffic cameras can only do so much, so the Minneapolis Police Department is looking to re-up and expand its ShotSpotter contract for three more years. According to the Star Tribune, the City Council could end up paying $963,000 or more for the company’s services, which include placing microphones throughout neighborhoods to listen for gunshots. If approved, Minneapolis could see new stretches of surveillance in Whittier and LynLake.
But wait a minute! Isn’t ShotSpotter kinda controversial? It sure is! Last February, Wired got its hands on a map of every ShotSpotter mic, discovering that the vast majority of installations in Minneapolis are in poor, predominantly Black neighborhoods on the North Side. And when Minneapolis Public Schools were hacked, leaked data revealed that the company has been mic’ing up North Side schools for over a decade without public knowledge. Critics say this kind of stuff leads to over-policing and grants cops more access to schools; police argue this tech helps them do their jobs more efficiently.
And as for whether this tech even works? Unclear! Though the company has been around for about two decades, there’s surprisingly little info out there. Liz Sawyer and Jeff Hargarten at the Star Tribune analyzed 911 data from 2022 and found that of the 4,100 police responses to ShotSpotter that year, about 70% indicate that the “police didn’t encounter anything—no victims, shell casings or physical evidence of a shooting—upon arrival.” In Chicago, Cook County’s State’s Attorney’s Office ended its contract this year after findings showed that only 1% of the city’s shooting arrests were ShotSpotter tips and that most sensor-related arrests weren’t for gun violence. Several City Council members, including Robin Wonsley, are calling for an independent study of ShotSpotter in Minneapolis—the first of its kind in town.
There Are 63 New Ways To Get Drunk at the Fair This Year
There are about twice as many alcoholic drinks at the State Fair this year as there are new foods. And while Racket will definitely be making our way through all the eats, I’m pretty sure we’d die if we tried to do the same with dranks. Last year’s list featured a lot of “beer for dessert” brews (the Birramisu, the funnel cake brew, the chocolate cookie beer, the PB&J Hard Honey). This year’s menu, which just dropped, looks to continue the sweetness, though in a more fruit-forward vein: a bunch of pear and/or prickly pear mixes, a handful of blackberry bevvies, a lot of watermelon-laced stuff, and a few cake-inspired beers. The worst sounding drink (to me) is the Tutti Frutti Bubble Gum Slushie (I normally love you, Lift Bridge!), but I’m down for an Agua Fresca Hard Slushie (Indeed) or a Black Currant Mead (Sociable Cider Werks). You can check out the entire roundup of offerings and plan your fair pub crawl here.
Downtown Rochester Is Thriving (Minus the Music Scene)
Turns out when you have Mayo money, you can make a real pretty city. That’s what MinnPost’s Bill Lindeke discovered on a recent trip to Rochester, which offers new streets, fresh sidewalks, beautiful parks, and a skyway system with legit human beings walking around inside. So what are they doing right, and what are downtown Minneapolis and St. Paul doing wrong? One thing they’re blessed with is a huge community of medical employees that can’t work from home, meaning they gotta spend time downtown (that’s what they call a “captive audience” in the cruise vacation lingo). It’s also the result of money; in 2013 the local government earmarked $585 million for public infrastructure. “In a sense, Rochester’s new streets remind me of what the 2017 Nicollet Mall remodel was supposed to accomplish,” Lindeke writes, “intended to bring street life, public art, and event flexibility into the heart of downtown Minneapolis.”
But it’s not all sunshine and open skyway storefronts. Rochester is expecting a massive population boom over the next decade, in part due to a $5 billion revamp to the Mayo campus. And Lindeke points out that the area lacks public transportation to the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport and the Twin Cities in general. (And the hyperloop pipedream has died.) Also, the doctors may have overtaken the musicians. This piece from John Molseed at Post Bulletin explores why the city’s once-vibrant music scene isn’t bouncing back post-Covid.
Francis Is Moving Into Peppers & Fries Space
Well dang, that was fast! Last June, Longfellow Whatever founder Trevor Born got the scoop that Peppers & Fries would be closing after nearly a decade, and that the building had been sold “to a yet-undisclosed buyer.” Well it turns out the buyer of the 39th & Lake Street space are the owners behind Northeast vegan burger joint Francis, and, according to yet another scoop from LW, they hope to open their second location sometime next month. Born says the kitchen and patio are ready to go, the inside just needs a little on-brand reno (I’m anticipating lots of black paint and red neon signs). Offerings at their Northeast location that we expect to see in south Minneapolis include the vegan Jucy Lucy (read Racket’s review here), local beers on tap, an Earl Giles-curated cocktail menu, and those addicting McD’s-style shoestring fries.
Minneapolis, MN
Minnesota weather: Gorgeous Sunday with a warmer Monday ahead
MINNEAPOLIS (FOX 9) – A sunny and warm Sunday is in store for the Twin Cities, with even higher temperatures expected on Monday before a chance of rain and cooler air returns later in the week.
Sunday forecast
Local perspective:
Sunday is starting with some cloud cover before sunshine moves in with highs near 70 degrees around the metro and southern parts of the state.
Winds will be much lighter than Saturday, coming from the south at 5 to 10 mph with only occasional gusts up to 15 mph.
The Brainerd Lakes area will see temperatures in the 60s, while the North Shore will be cooler, which is typical for this time of year.
Sunday’s weather is expected to be dry and pleasant.
Overnight, temperatures will drop to the upper 30s and lower 40s, with some clouds moving in ahead of Monday.
Extended forecast
What’s next:
Monday could be the warmest day of the week, with highs in the lower 70s for the Twin Cities and some spots in southern Minnesota possibly reaching close to 80 degrees.
Winds will shift from southerly to southeasterly and then easterly as the day goes on, but should remain light.
After the warm start to the week, a cold front will move through on Tuesday, bringing a chance for a few rain showers in the early morning.
Temperatures will likely drop to the upper 40s by Wednesday and Thursday, with another front possibly bringing showers late Friday into early Saturday.
The rest of the extended forecast calls for temperatures close to or just below average, with highs in the upper 40s to lower 50s.
The Source: This story uses information from the FOX 9 weather forecast.
Minneapolis, MN
Man found dead in south Minneapolis house fire
MINNEAPOLIS (FOX 9) – Firefighters are investigating the Minneapolis’s second fire fatality of the year after a man died in a house fire Saturday afternoon.
Fatal fire on 28th Avenue South
What we know:
According to the Minneapolis Fire Department (MFD), fire crews arrived shortly after 1:00 p.m. and found smoke coming from the second floor of a single-family home on 28th Avenue South. Bystanders alerted firefighters that someone might be trapped inside.
Crews had to work through heavy debris to reach the upstairs area. It took about 40 minutes to fully put out the fire.
During the primary search, firefighters found a man in his 60s dead on the second floor. No one else was found after searching all the floors.
Minneapolis Animal Care and Control took in a dog found outside the home.
Assistant Chief Wes Van Vickle said, “The department is grateful to the neighbors who alerted fire crews that someone may still have been inside, allowing them to act quickly.”
Fire safety reminders and community response
What they’re saying:
“This afternoon’s tragic loss of life weighs heavily on all of us, and we extend our deepest condolences to the family and friends of the deceased,” said Van Vickle.
He also encourages the public to regularly check and maintain smoke detectors and fire extinguishers at home.
There were no other injuries reported. The Hennepin County Medical Examiner is working to confirm the man’s identity.
What we don’t know:
The cause of the fire has not yet been determined, and the man’s name has not been released.
Minneapolis, MN
Minnesota serves as the flagship for nationwide ‘No Kings’ protests against Trump
ST. PAUL, Minn. — Organizers of Saturday’s “No Kings” rallies across the country are predicting that the protests against the actions of President Donald Trump and his administration could add up to one of the largest demonstrations in U.S. history, with Minnesota taking center stage.
Organizers say more than 3,100 events have been registered in all 50 states, with more than 9 million people expected to participate.
And they’ve designated the rally at the Minnesota Capitol in St. Paul as the national flagship event, in recognition of how the state where federal agents fatally shot two people who were monitoring Trump’s immigration crackdown became an epicenter of resistance.
Headlining that observance will be Bruce Springsteen, performing “Streets of Minneapolis,” which he wrote in response to the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, and in tribute to the thousands of Minnesotans who took to the streets over the winter. Springsteen’s Land of Hope & Dreams American Tour, which has a “No Kings” theme, kicks off Tuesday in Minneapolis.
Minnesota organizers have told state officials they expect 100,000 people could converge on the Capitol grounds, where last June’s event drew an estimated 80,000 people.
The St. Paul rally will also feature singer Joan Baez, actor Jane Fonda,Sen. Bernie Sanders and a long list of other activists, labor leaders and elected officials.
The White House dismissed the nationwide protests as the product of “leftist funding networks” with little real public support.
“The only people who care about these Trump Derangement Therapy Sessions are the reporters who are paid to cover them,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement.
Rallies are also planned in more than a dozen other countries, from Europe to Latin America to Australia, Ezra Levin, a co-executive director of Indivisible, a group spearheading the events, said in an interview. Countries with constitutional monarchies call the protests “No Tyrants,” he said.
For those unable to attend in person, another activist group, Stand Up For Science, is hosting a “virtual and accessible” event online.
National organizers told reporters in an online news conference Thursday that they expect Saturday’s protests to be larger than the first two rounds of No Kings rallies, which they estimate drew more than 5 million people in June and more than 7 million in October.
“This administration’s actions are angering not just Democratic voters or folks in big blue city centers – they are crossing a line for people in red and rural areas, in the suburbs, all over the country,” said Leah Greenberg, the other co-executive director of Indivisible. “The defining story of this Saturday’s mobilization is not just how many people are protesting, but where they are protesting,”
Two-thirds of the RSVPs have come from outside of major urban centers, Greenberg said, listing registration surges in conservative-leaning states like Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Utah, South Dakota and Louisiana, as well in competitive suburban areas of Pennsylvania, Georgia and Arizona.
“Millions of us are rising up from all walks of life, from rural communities to big cities at No Kings,” said Katie Bethell, executive director of MoveOn, another major organizer. “And as we do so, we will send the loudest, clearest message yet that this country does not belong to kings, dictators, tyrants. It belongs to us.”
Copyright © 2026 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
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