Ice trumped just about everything but the sand trucks. They tried but school districts cancelled classes throughout most of the listening area. Originally the plan was to delay classes for 2 hours but after getting out on the rural roads, most cancelled. The roads and sidewalks were skating rinks yesterday afternoon but street crews were out getting sand and salt down as fast as they could reload. Nfld. Streets and Parks Supervisor TJ Heinricy said they went “old school” using a salt/sand mix. His crews were out till nearly 11 last night. Then it snowed all night and at 4 this morning he had 3 trucks out opening things up.
He said right now, they’re shifting gears and plowing everything. He added that it’s going to take a “hecuva lot of deicing products to get this stuff off, that’s all”. There were no serious crashes, however, Rice County Sheriff Troy Dunn reported a semi rolled over yesterday afternoon in Forest Township. It was carrying about 100 hogs owned by Holden Farms of Northfield. The driver was taken to District One Hospital with non-life threatening injuries. Staff from Holden Farms removed the hogs from the trailer with minimal losses to the cargo.
Immigration law Part One
With the election there’s been a lot of fear within the Latino community regarding immigration and undocumented workers. Ben Casper, a Northfield residents is, among other things, an attorney with nearly 2 decades of of experience litigating cases before immigration courts, the Board of Immigration Appeals and all the U.S. Supreme Court. He likens immigration law to tax law, saying it’s one of the two most complex, convoluted and complicated areas of law, it’s political and it’s always changing. A Federal law, set by Congress, Casper says it’s been bogged down in politics for 20 years. While there’s a pathway for immigrants coming to the US due to persecution, there are many more undocumented people who have long standing family ties, citizen children and/or spouses. Casper said, “and in those situations, laws that were changed going back to about 1996, that are still in place, made it very difficult to gain (citizen) status as was possible in the past”. n order to gain political capital to pass comprehensive immigration reform that would create a path for undocumented immigrants, Casper said, the Obama administration, was deporting about 400,000 people a year, which is an historical high. We’re investing $18.5 billion per year in immigration law enforcement, or $4 billion more than all other federal law enforcement agencies combined. I’ll have more on this story including Casper’s best guess on what President-elect Trump might do or not. That’s tomorrow.
Not so sunny for solar gardens
Greenvale Township’s Board of Supervisors will be voting tonight on changing their current zoning ordinance. They are currently zoned agriculture, but have been asked to change it to allow for solar energy gardens. They’ve had some lively discussions surrounding the issue with many residents opposed to the idea. The meeting starts at 7 o’clock tonight.
Healthcare dwellings, County Road 1 and the Fire facility on Nfld agenda
On the Northfield City Council agenda tonight is the first reading of an ordinance pertaining to temporary health care dwellings, County Road 1 reconstruction participation and a resolution affirming their support of the Fire Facility upgrade. Administrator Ben Martig and Mayor Pownell will be in studio tomorrow morning at 7:20 with a recap.
Click below to listen to the 1-17-17 NEWS pocast:
Listen for News daily at 6, 7, 8, noon, 3 and 5
