SAUK CENTRE

1 killed in rollover crash Sunday near Sauk Centre, Minnesota

St. Cloud LIVE — Mon, 05 Jun 2023 20:49:55 GMT

SAUK CENTRE: A Detroit Lakes man was killed Sunday, June 4, in a one-vehicle rollover crash near Sauk Centre.

At about 1:32 a.m. Sunday morning, a 911 caller reported the crash in the 43000 block of County Road 17, about 2 miles northwest of Sauk Centre, according to a Stearns County Sheriff's Office news release. The caller reported a vehicle in the ditch and an adult male laying in the middle of the roadway.

When law enforcement arrived, they found a man, later identified as Collin James Flynn, 24, of Detroit Lakes, lying in the roadway, according to the release.

A 2012 GMC Terrain was in the southwest ditch of County Road 17. The sheriff's office says the GMC was "significantly damaged" and appeared to have rolled over several times.

Review of the crash scene indicated that Flynn was driving a 2012 GMC Terrain southeast on 17 toward Sauk Centre. The Terrain went off the road to the right, struck a field approach, vaulted, and subsequently rolled several times, according to the release. It was found in the southwest ditch of County Road 17.

Flynn was taken to a hospital where he was later pronounced dead, according to the release.

The cause of the crash remains under investigation and alcohol is suspected as a factor, according to the sheriff's office. The Stearns County Sheriff’s Office was assisted by the Sauk Centre Police Department and Sauk Centre Ambulance Service.

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Cannon Falls gathering says a country doctor should train, practice and be paid differently

Paul John Scott — Thu, 29 Sep 2022 17:08:15 GMT

CANNON FALLS, Minn. — When it comes to practicing medicine in small communities, is health care set up all wrong? That was just one of the big questions to come up this week during a Cannon Falls town hall on health care in rural Minnesota.

The Tuesday, Sept. 27, gathering, which was moderated by Kerri Miller of Minnesota Public Radio and organized by a trio of regional foundations with sponsorship from Compeer Financial and Mayo Clinic Health System, had a simple goal:

Gather a wide array of policy experts, farm leaders, community leaders and family doctors from competing health systems, and start a conversation on the state of community hospitals.

Though a mic was open to all, the weekday evening turnout favored the views of stakeholders more than patients. As a result, the hour returned again and again to structural problems holding back health services in small towns.

"I've been really struck by how fragile our health care system really is," said Dr. Ulrika Wigert, a Sauk Center family practice physician for CentraCare. "There isn't enough staffing at those bigger facilities to be able to take in our sick patients. It's very tiring to have to call hospitals all over the state to get our patients the level of specialty care they need."

The staff shortages afflicting metro providers are only compounded in rural facilities, participants said. Part of that is due to small-town providers who choose a job in the city over one in the community.

"It's great to live in a small town," Wigert said. "I grew up in a small town, and I chose to work in a small town. But right now, people can commute to a bigger facility to get paid more, all while keeping a different lifestyle in the small communities."

Others said the attrition underway within rural health systems could only be reversed by training physicians in small towns.

"Do you think we are going to get rural physicians by educating them in Minneapolis?" asked Dr. Cindy Firkins Smith, the Willmar-based senior vice president of rural health for CentraCare.

"No offense, but do you think we can educate them in Minneapolis, then expect them to move into our rural areas? We need to educate them in rural areas, they'll discover why we love it, and we hope they'll stay."

"Our research is finding financial incentives are effective in attracting workers in small communities, but they are not the only thing, or even the main thing," concurred Carrie Henning-Smith, deputy director, University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center. "Having grown up in a rural area is by far the biggest predictor of rural practice."

Henning-Smith said rural providers could also be enticed by being told they can practice "the way they want to practice," which she described as "seeing a lot of different kinds of patients, and having continuity with those patients and their family members."

For Wigert, this very closeness was what makes her job rewarding.

"We know our patients really well in a rural practice," she said. "When I see them in the grocery store or when their kids are in school with my kids, I can say to them, let's try this first, and come back to me if that doesn't cut it and we'll do an MRI. It's about knowing you will have that follow-up relationship."

When an online participant asked if allied health professionals could take on bigger roles, Dr. Terry Cahill, a family doctor for Allina Health in Faribault, said he supported the idea.

"I've sat in a room with nurse practitioners and physician assistants who do things that a lot of medical students would be very uncomfortable doing, but they have the experience and support to do it ... Patients want to be able to come in and talk to somebody who cares about what happens to them, that's the bottom line."

For Katy B. Kozhimannil, professor in the Division of Health Policy and Management in the �� of Public Health at the University of Minnesota, the situation won't change for rural medicine until payers rethink how to pay for health care in remote places.

"We get paid based on the number of people who walk through the door," she said. "But in rural places, fewer people come through the door ... So there's a need for a lot more thoughtful ways of supporting the higher fixed costs that rural facilities face."

She said special critical care hospital payment status was not enough, and that value-based payment approaches in which doctors are paid for keeping patients healthy were equally as fraught in small practices.

"When you have small numbers or you care for a population that's sicker, may have higher risk factors, or may not get care as often, you're more likely to show quote-unquote 'low-quality care' on metrics that are predominantly created in urban communities and academic health centers."

"Many of our credentialing entities are using quality standards that are not rural relevant," Kozhimannil said. "You don't necessarily have the volume to have something available that might be considered some sort of basic level of care. That's not how we roll in rural areas all the time. The money doesn't come in for that."

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Abortion doesn't lead to emotional damage. Why does Minnesota fund centers that tell women otherwise?

Paul John Scott — Thu, 08 Sep 2022 14:00:00 GMT

ROCHESTER, Minn. — In towns across the state, crisis pregnancy centers tell often economically disadvantaged and women of color they risk lasting emotional harm if they get an abortion.

According to authoritative medical research it's a false message. Yet in many cases it is delivered through centers subsidized by the Minnesota Department of Health.

The medical-sounding diagnosis in question is so-called post-abortion syndrome, and the apparent fallacy says abortion can lead to psychological trauma resembling post-traumatic stress disorder, a malady that can go unnoticed for years.

Owing to legislation created in 2005, a Minnesota Positive Alternatives Grant Program requires the state health department administer over $3 million annually to organizations that assist women facing unplanned pregnancies. A Forum News Service review found that websites for eight of these 27 MDH-funded crisis pregnancy centers mention "post-abortion syndrome," or the need for counseling about a previous abortion.

Critics point to such messaging as a part of a larger problem of inaccurate information provided by crisis pregnancy centers to vulnerable pregnant women. The issue, noted in a recent Rochester Post-Bulletin investigation of so-called "abortion-reversal" efforts within state-funded crisis pregnancy centers, has lately become the source of increasing scrutiny in the wake of the Supreme Court's decision to reverse federal protections to abortion access.

On Aug. 23, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison joined California and Massachusetts in releasing a consumer alert about crisis pregnancy centers. That report warned that "CPCs may often make misleading and exaggerated claims about the health risks associated with obtaining an abortion." It cited research that included the notion of emotional trauma following abortion.

"They are offering treatment for a syndrome that there is not good evidence to support," said Dr. Jonas Swartz, referring to centers promoting the message. A board-certified obstetrician and gynecologist at Duke University and researcher of health disparities affecting the underserved, Swartz was coauthor of "Why Crisis Pregnancy Centers are Legal But Unethical," a 2018 article in the AMA Journal of Ethics.

"If state funds are limited, and often these clinics are serving a vulnerable population that needs help, it feels unethical to me to give money to organizations that ... have been shown overall to provide inaccurate counseling," Swartz said.

"Abortion is a social good. Abortion is health care," said Kimberly Kelly, a sociologist at Mississippi State who has studied the use of messaging about so-called post-abortion syndrome. "When you are telling a pregnant person if you have this abortion you will have PTSD for the rest of your life ... you're scaring someone away from having an abortion that is in fact in their best interest as determined by that person."

Unsupported information

The belief that abortion leads to emotional harm has circulated in some form since the early 1960s, according to an early study in the American Journal of Psychiatry. It found such harms to be "very rare" in the years before Roe, however, "markedly less than mental illness related to pregnancy and childbirth."

The author wrote that this myth of psychiatric harms following abortion was resistant to correction, and that it likely functioned to provide "enforcement of a taboo" against abortion.

Today, even the Mayo Clinic website writes without providing evidence that "having a medical abortion is a major decision with emotional and psychological consequences," and that women "consider the impact the procedure may have on your future."

Although it does not cite "post-abortion syndrome" the site states that "after an abortion you may have a mix of emotions, including relief, loss, sadness or guilt." Mayo further advises that "if these feelings bother you it might help to talk to a counselor about them."

Asked for comment, Mayo Clinic communications provided a response which did not directly address questions about the statements concerning abortion on its website.

Well-designed studies counter that such concerns are unsupported. The publications refuting a risk of lingering distress following abortion include a 2008 task force by the American Psychological Association, a July 2018 Position on Abortion by the American Psychiatric Association, and results from the five-year Turnaway Study from the ANSIRH Center at the University of California, San Franciso, a project comparing women who had an abortion with those who wanted one but were too late.

All have concluded there is no evidence that having a wanted abortion leads in itself to mental harm.

To the contrary, the Turnaway Study found that risks of abortion were associated with those denied the procedure. Such women "were more likely to stay in contact with violent partners" the authors reported, "putting them and their children at greater risk than if they had received the abortion."

"The most common emotion immediately after an abortion is relief," Kelly said, citing Turnaway findings. Moving forward to a point years later, she adds, "the research is pretty clear there are a variety of emotions," ranging from happiness to indifference. "It can be regret that they weren't able to be a mother at that point in time, but that doesn't mean they regret the abortion."

"But what they have found is actually regretting the abortion, and wishing you did not have the abortion, is incredibly rare."

"Post-abortion syndrome" nonetheless figures prominently on the website of Life Connections of Alexandria, Minnesota, a crisis pregnancy center located in an office park on the state highway north of town.

As a State of Minnesota Positive Alternatives Grant Program recipient, Life Connections was recently selected for funding by the Minnesota Department of Health. That means for the next five years the facility will receive over $106,000 in state funding annually.

Those monies are designated to support maternity and family services which include crib and safe sleeping education and distribution, car seat education, Spanish translators, baby formula, diapers, pregnancy and parenting education and material assistance.

"Your health is worth asking questions about," reads a Life Connections webpage about their use of MDH-published materials on medical risks to pregnancy and abortion. "We will answer those questions using Mn Dept Of Health facts and information, so that you know it is not biased or untrue."

A few sentences later the facility warns that abortion "can have some very serious and long-lasting side effects," however, and that the "one effect that more women suffer from silently but is talked about the least is PAS, or Post-Abortion Syndrome."

"It’s a form of PTSD and it’s very real," the webpage reads. "Just like not all soldiers have obvious signs of PTSD, not all women who have had an abortion will notice PAS, but more recent numbers are showing that a good majority are being affected emotionally by a past abortion that was promised to 'make everything go away.'"

In an email, Life Connections' Julie Desautels and president Chris Wieberdink said the facility "is not funded by MDH for any activities or materials related to [post-abortion syndrome]." They said that "to date, the topic of PAS has never come up with our clients," and that should a need for counseling arise, Life Connections would refer to licensed mental health professionals only.

Asked for evidence of post-abortion distress, Life Connections noted the Mayo Clinic webpage and provided links to research published in a Turkish medical journal and papers by the founder of an Illinois-based anti-abortion organization known as the Elliot Institute.

"We respect that research in this area is very complicated," the center stated. They stressed the social assistance provided by their center including their work with Hispanic communities in particular, and stated that the criticism of crisis pregnancy centers is misdirected.

Other state-funded Minnesota crisis pregnancy centers have asserted the existence of such a syndrome as well.

It’s "important to remember there are emotional and mental side effects to abortion," reads the website of state-funded Options for Women in Sauk Center. "Many women experience feelings of loss, regret, guilt, depression, anxiety, and can have trouble bonding with their partner or other children as a result."

Forum News Service reached out to Options for Women in Sauk Center but received no response.

"Your choice for abortion may provide great relief initially," warns the website for state-funded Choices Pregnancy Center in Redwood Falls, Minn. "However, you may experience what many women have faced days, months and years after their abortion."

The website then lists 19 symptoms for "post-abortion syndrome," including anxiety disorders and irritability, difficulty concentrating, a sense of hopelessness about the future, and "repression or denial of feelings about the abortion."

Forum News Service reached out to Choices Pregnancy Center in Redwood Falls which directed media questions to the Virginia-based National Institute of Family and Life Advocates, who did not provide answers for emailed questions.

"The way activists have constructed post abortion syndrome and its symptoms," Kelly said of her research on this message as delivered elsewhere across the country, "it's so broad that any negative emotions a woman experiences after an abortion, even ten, twenty, thirty years later, is tied back to her abortion."

"That's really handy, right? Literally anything bad that happens, your marriage breaks up — you have unresolved trauma. You suffer from depression or addiction or you're having trouble bonding with your kids, it's all about the abortion, no matter when the abortion was, how you felt about the abortion, why you had the abortion."

"So they've wrapped this up in a very neat little bow where everything negative in your life is tied to your abortion, and if you don't agree, you're in denial, and that's also because of your abortion."

"This is a massive ethical problem," she said at another point of the practice. "You're taking someone who does not identify as struggling emotionally or mentally, and you are doing everything in your power to convince them that they have an untreated, very serious mental illness, and they are so ill, so deeply in denial, that they don't even know they are sick."

State oversight?

"Designed to Deceive" is the 2021 report cited by Minnesota attorney general Keith Ellison's consumer alert on misinformation and crisis pregnancy centers. It was produced by a multi-state alliance of abortion advocacy organizations that included Gender Justice of St. Paul.

As part of that project, Gender Justice made a Minnesota Data Practices Act request of MDH for materials explaining how it selects and oversees the awarding of Positive Alternatives Grant Funding.

For Gender Justice legal counsel Christy Hall, the data returned did not bolster faith in state oversight of Minnesota CPC's receiving funds.

"Based on what we were able to get, we don't think that the Minnesota Department of Health is really overseeing these grants very well,"Hall said.

Asked to explain how Positive Alternatives grantees can reference information contraindicated by expert opinion, MDH spokesperson Erin McHenry replied via email that the state's hands were tied.

"MDH is required by statute passed by the 2003 Minnesota Legislature to provide funding to eligible entities to deliver a specific set of services, outlined in statute," she wrote.

"Grantees may get funding from other sources, and the department would not have jurisdiction over materials developed or services performed using outside funds."

"We reiterate our position that information regarding pregnancy provided to Minnesotans should be accurate and up-to-date based on the body of scientific evidence."

Kelly, the Mississippi State sociologist, believes the very name of the state of Minnesota Positive Alternatives Grant Program reveals bias.

"By calling it 'Positive Alternatives' you're implying abortion is a negative," she says. "It's not. The only person who knows if it's the right choice is a pregnant person."

"Saying that any alternatives to abortion is a positive? We know that's just not true. The Turnaway Study is proof that not all alternatives to abortion are positive. So they are showing their bias right off the bat."

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Why group of Minnesota farmers support driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants

Dave Orrick / St. Paul Pioneer Press — Sat, 06 Apr 2019 00:53:09 GMT

ST. PAUL — It’s a paradox:

Minnesota farmers, those northern European-stock, stoic symbols of the prairie, are standing alongside undocumented Mexicans, Guatemalans and Liberians who now call Minnesota home. Together, they’re supporting a Democratic-backed plan to offer driver’s licenses to people in this state, and the country, illegally.

The Minnesota House approved the plan Friday, mostly along partisan lines, with all but a few Republicans voting against it, many decrying it as an incentive for illegal immigration.

But there’s no question about backing: A major coalition of farm groups, as well as meat processors, the hospitality industry and even the conservative Minnesota Chamber of Commerce, have voiced strong support.

That’s because, in short, much of Minnesota’s economy, including much of the agricultural sector, relies not just on immigrant workers, but, according to those in the sector, on

illegal

immigrant workers.

“Everybody knows that it’s happening, and yet nobody does anything,” House Majority Leader Ryan Winkler acknowledged on the House floor Friday. “That is the reality.”

What’s going on?

Immigrant farm workers on the rise

Generations ago, a family worked a farm.

Then farms got bigger, and families got smaller, said Daryn McBeth, who represents Minnesota Milk Producers and the Midwest Food Producers Association.

“Farms used to have 10 to 50 head of dairy cows, but today the average size of a Minnesota dairy farm is 100,” McBeth said. “When the farms get bigger, they need workers — immigrant or not. The cows cannot not be milked.”

For various economic reasons, farms continue to grow. Meanwhile, the labor market has gotten tighter, especially in rural parts of the state, where the population has often fallen.

Tom Sedgeman, a third-generation dairy farmer in Sauk Center, said he’s seen the number of immigrant workers especially on the rise in central Minnesota in the last decade.

“It’s a labor shortage, and it’s work that most people don’t want to do,” said Sedgeman, who works 400 head of dairy cow. “It’s hard work, and it’s not the cleanest work, working on a dairy farm, or working in a meat plant or any of the other types of work in central Minnesota.”

‘Not an issue of pay’

Sedgeman described the jobs he’s generally talking about as “entry level” — work for unskilled workers.

The traditional resident labor force, he explained — the descendants of that northern European-stock of Minnesotans who’ve been there for generations — often enter the labor force with skills that can garner them better jobs. They’re not being displaced by immigrants, he emphasized.

“It’s not an issue of pay,” he said. “I hear about this $15 living wage in St. Paul and Minneapolis. I’m there. That’s what we pay — and this is where the housing stock and everything else is much cheaper.”

Why hire undocumented workers?

But people here illegally aren’t supposed to be hired, right?

Several representatives of business groups said that employers don’t want to hire undocumented workers — few knowingly do.

But they all know it happens.

Sedgeman, whose $2 million-a-year operation employs seven people, said he follows the law: He requests documentation and fills out the federal I-9 work authorization form as required. But he doesn’t hire a private investigator or somehow further vet the documentation he’s given.

“I don’t have a human resources department,” he said. “I get a little bit frustrated that as an employer, the burden is on me to figure out if someone is in this country illegally.”

In other words, as Sedgeman and others acknowledge, apparently some of these workers aren’t here legally.

System is ‘broken’ and fear is pervasive

That, in essence, is the often-described “broken” immigration system, come home to roost in rural Minnesota: A national immigration policy that, at various times, doesn’t allow enough legal immigration to fill the jobs that are needed. Workers here illegally flow into that vacuum. In recent years, they’ve flowed, along with legal immigrants, into the farms and processing plants of rural Minnesota.

And to get to those jobs, people need to drive.

But beyond that, Sedgeman said he believes many legal immigrants, including some he knows, are afraid to apply for driver’s licenses.

“There’s so much uncertainty about the immigration system, and so much fear among these people, what happens is that many are afraid that if they haven’t crossed every ‘t’ and dotted every ‘i,’ they’ll get in trouble if they apply for a license,” he said.

For Sedgeman, the answer is twofold: First, federal officials — the White House and Congress — “need to figure out the national immigration system.” But in the meantime, he said, Minnesota needs to allow them to get driver’s licenses.

He said the safety benefits — more drivers passing exams and carrying insurance — protect everyone, including people here legally.

“We want our families, and our employees, to be safe on the roads, that’s all,” he said.

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Side by side, veteran Minnesota wardens train rookies

John Myers — Sun, 02 Dec 2018 11:00:00 GMT

ISLAND LAKE, Minn. - Leah Kampa approached the trap, set for fisher or marten, that was sitting on top of a horizontal fallen tree about 18 inches above the ground.

“This one looks good. It’s legal,” she said as she got closer. Inside a small wooden box a conibear 120 trap was set, ready to grab one of the forest furbearers that are open to harvest for just six days each year.

At this site, north of Island Lake, the trap was legally placed and marked with the trapper’s name and address. That wasn't the case the day before when Kampa, a Minnesota conservation officer in training, and her veteran partner, Kipp Duncan, found two illegal traps.

With their pelts valued at over $100 each, fisher and marten are worth the while for trappers to go after this year. Trappers can take two of the animals each season. But because of a special rule in Northeastern Minnesota’s “lynx management area,” aimed at protecting the small forest cat, fisher/marten traps must be a specific size in an effort to keep lynx out.

“The opening is clearly too big,’’ Kampa said measuring the non-conforming box the trap was set into. “And the setback is too much. They also didn’t have the proper identification on it.”

The trapper in question did respond to a note left on the trap by Kampa to call her, so the officers now know the guilty party. If the case is prosecuted it could cost the trapper their trapping privileges for a year, along with a hefty fine.

“We’ll see where it goes,’’ Kampa said.

For the last few weeks Kampa has been in full uniform in the woods and now frozen waters north of Duluth, patrolling firearms deer season, trapping and early ice fishing along with other outdoor related activities. Duncan meanwhile has been in civilian clothes, dressed like a hunter or trapper, sitting in their patrol truck’s passenger seat and staying in the background at stops, incognito, as Kampa dealt with the public. He’s watching how she carries herself, how she interacts with the public, how she sorts legal from illegal activities and how she makes sure to protect herself from any dangers.

“She runs the show. The goal is that she is in charge. I’m just observing,’’ Duncan said.

“The problem is that everyone up here knows him and wants to talk with him,’’ Kampa said with a smile.

Duncan is Kampa’s primary field training officer. She spent a month with him in late summer before going off to spend four weeks each with veteran officers in Sauk Center and Willow River then returning for her last month of training with Duncan.

It’s pretty clear Kampa has passed muster and, after her last day with Duncan on Tuesday, Dec. 4, she will assume her permanent new post in Hutchinson in central Minnesota on Wednesday - one of 18 new conservation officers statewide that will help fill some of the DNR’s 40 open positions.

“She’s on her way,’’ Duncan said.

Like many applicants who seek to become conservation officers, Kampa is already a cop. She’s served with county sheriff’s offices and with a tribal natural resource agency, with eight years of law enforcement already under her duty belt. The Sauk Rapids, Minn., native says she’s been trying to gain as much varied experience as possible with the goal of becoming a warden.

“I grew up in an outdoor family... hunting, fishing, a lot of camping,’’ she said. “This is what my career goal has always been. I just took my time and tried to make sure I had the right skill set before I went for it.”

So you want to be a warden

Minnesota conservation officers are full-fledged cops - licensed peace officers who enforce laws related to fish and wildlife, state parks, trails, forests, waters and wetlands as well as other state laws. They also perform public relations and education duties throughout the state and assist other law enforcement agencies such as the State Patrol, sheriff’s offices and local police departments.

There are 155 conservation officer field stations across the state. Right now, 40 of those are unfilled. When the 18 rookie officers currently in training take their new permanent posts on Wednesday, the number of vacant posts will be down to 22.

The hiring and training process is long and sometimes grueling. Applications may open in the summer of one year with 18 months passing before new officers take their posts. (The application process for 2019’s class of new officers is already closed.)

Dozens of applications are weeded down over time. This year offers were made to 21 candidates, of which 18 have continued to pass through the process that includes a written examination, interviews, background investigation (essentially only applicants with pristine financial and criminal records are accepted) pre-work screening (functional capacity exam) psychological assessment and medical evaluation.

Successful candidates (many are already officers for sheriff’s offices or police departments) are hired in the spring and placed into training, including 16 weeks over the summer in the Conservation Officer Academy at Fort Ripley and then another 16 weeks of field training alongside three different veteran officers.

For more information go to www.dnr.state.mn.us/enforcement/jobs/

Side by side, veteran Minnesota wardens train rookies

Minnesota conservation officer Kipp Duncan listens as officer-in-training Leah Kampa talk about two fisher/martin trapping sets they confiscated for violations of state law. Steve Kuchera / Forum News Service

Minnesota conservation officer-in-training Leah Kampa demonstrates one of the reasons two fisher/martin trapping sets were confiscated. In the state’s lynx management zone the opening to a box set has be less than 50 square inches. Steve Kuchera / Forum News Service

Minnesota conservation officer-in-training Leah Kampa. Steve Kuchera / Forum News Service

Minnesota conservation officer Kipp Duncan. Steve Kuchera / Forum News Service

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Investigators identify man accused of shooting Minnesota officer with arrow

Forum News Service — Sun, 16 Sep 2018 02:14:22 GMT

ST. CLOUD, Minn. - Authorities have identified the man suspected of shooting a Stearns County deputy with an arrow.

Ramey James Olson, 31, of Alexandria, was released from a hospital Saturday, Sept. 15, and booked into the Stearns County Jail on probable cause felony assault, according to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension.

During a standoff, Olson allegedly struck Stearns Deputy Paul Orvis in the arm with an arrow fired from a compound bow from the second floor of a Sauk Centre home on Thursday, Sept. 13, according to a Stearns County Sheriff's Office news release. More than one officer returned gunfire, Stearns County officials said.

The BCA on Saturday identified Minnesota State Patrol Trooper Anthony Butler and Melrose Police Department Officer Patrick Nechanicky as having fired gunshots at Olson. Sgt. Joseph Jensen of the Sauk Center Police Department fired his Taser.

Butler and Nechanicky are on standard administrative leave.

After officers fired back, Olson was taken into custody with a gunshot wound to his shoulder and buttocks and a grazing wound on one of his hands, the sheriff's office said.

The Bureau of Criminal Apprehension is investigating the officer-involved shooting portion of the incident. The St. Cloud Police Department is investigating the assault on Orvis.

The incident started with a call of a stolen pickup in Osakis, which crashed into a garage in Sauk Centre. Olson is accused of using the homeowner's bow to shoot Orvis.

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Pheasant opener proved predictably tough

Sam Cook — Sun, 22 Oct 2017 10:30:00 GMT

DULUTH - How tough was Minnesota pheasant hunting for last weekend's season opener? Here's a sampling of reports.

From a Marshall-area hunter: Total bust. Six hunters, six dogs, two days, one bird. Private land.

From a Madison-area hunter: Four hunters, four dogs, one missed rooster. Public land or walk-in areas.

From a Sauk Center hunter: Two hunters, good dogs, two days, one rooster shot, one rooster missed.

"It's a corn conundrum," said Anthony Hauck, director of public relations for Pheasants Forever, and a Minnesota native.

As of Oct. 15, just 7 percent of the state's corn had been harvested, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and until much of the corn is down, that's where many of the birds will be, Hauck said.

The corn harvest was two weeks behind the 2016 pace and 22 days behind the average harvest pace, according to the USDA.

For starters, the state's pheasant population index was down 26 percent from last year, 32 percent below the 10-year average and 62 percent below the long-term average. Throw in the corn conundrum, and it made for a tough opener.

"I haven't heard too many great reports," Hauck said.

He knew of a hunter in the Pipestone area who hunted only the "golden hour" - the last hour before sunset, "and really laid into them," Hauck said.

That's the best strategy, he said, when so many birds are in the corn.

"Roosters are tough to chase down except for that last hour of the day," Hauck said. "They're grass-nesting birds. They're going to return to roost in the grass or the edge of cattails. They may be feeding in the corn during the day, but they're on a tight schedule that last hour of the day."

Trouble is, it's hard for most hunters to restrict themselves to that little hunting, especially on opening weekend.

Of course, the golden-hour strategy works throughout pheasant season as well.

Weather was expected to be good over the past several days, and farmers likely have made progress harvesting both soybeans and corn.

"I wouldn't let an opening weekend without seeing a lot sour it just yet," Hauck said.

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