PARK RAPIDS — The Park Rapids School Board voted unanimously to decline a donation that would display the Ten Commandments outside the newly landscaped Park Rapids High School next year.
The Park Rapids Enterprise reported that the Board based its Monday, June 3, decision on the mostly negative feedback on the proposed monument offered by former school board member Dennis Dodge.
Dodge’s monument proposal prompted a response from the Wisconsin-based Freedom From Religion Foundation, which warned the district that it would be open to litigation should it accept the monument.
Park Rapids High School is currently under renovation as part of a voter-approved referendum that passed in 2021, with landscaping expected to be completed by September 2025.
Itasca County recently painted over a Ten Commandments display at its new jail, and a decades-old Ten Commandments display at the Hibbing Courthouse was removed in 2018.
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Plus: Government and energy leaders gathered in Hermantown to celebrate major electric grid upgrades at Minnesota Power's Arrowhead substation; the Salvation Army is looking for Kettle Campaign coordinators for Carlton and Itasca Counties; and the National Weather Service in Duluth is looking for new observers for its Community Collaborative Rain, Hail & Snow Network. -
Contributed/Crow Wing CountyKiosks will help minimize barriers and enable more residents to access Crow Wing County services in locations that are convenient to them, the county stated. -
After a failed referendum vote in November 2023, Pequot Lakes School Board members are planning four sessions to gather public feedback for future decision-making. -
KAXE/Charlie MitchellKAXE Staff Phenologist John Latimer provides his weekly assessment of nature in Northern Minnesota. This is the week of Oct. 8, 2024. -
Heidi Holtan/KAXEIt's apple season in Northern Minnesota! What are your favorite ways to eat an apple? -
Retired non-game wildlife biologist Pam Perry regales us with insight into Harris's Sparrows, Eastern Towhee and an Oriole sighting in Little Falls. -
Plus: the Crow Wing County Sheriff's Office released more details on the suspicious deaths in Mission Township Sunday; a Red Lake woman was sentenced for her role in the death of a child in her care; a juvenile suspect was apprehended related to South Ridge's school threat; a third fire is actively burning in the Superior National Forest; more than 800 market-rate rental units will be created with $40 million in new state funding; and KAXE's 2024 election guide is now complete.
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Maria Hileman/KAXEKAXE's weekly list of concerts features Wussow's One Week Live Festival, Mark Joseph, The Brothers Burn Mountain and MorningBird. -
Andrew Dziengel/KAXEAuthor Steve Hoffman joins “Area Voices” to discuss his memoir “A Season for That: Lost and Found in the Other Southern France,” about his family's move to a tiny French village. -
Jennifer Barr/KAXELook for Lea Friesen’s paintings of fish and other creatures on sidewalks near the Mississippi River, Crystal Lake and East Rapids Elementary.
