Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of what local media outlets and Twitter-ers are gabbing about.
The Police Killed Emma Krumbee’s—With Money!
Beloved orchard, restaurant, and general store Emma Krumbee’s has been attracting apple pickers to Belle Plaine for decades. But this year and forevermore people are going to have to go elsewhere for their wholesome fall vibes. “Closed. Thanks for 43 years!” a hand-written sign outside the entrance states. Turns out the property, the general store building in particular, is going to be turned into... a police station.
“I think it will come to the surprise of a lot of people that the city is buying or proposing to purchase this property,” said Council Member Patricia Krings during an August 7 meeting, following much discussion on whether or not to disclose why they were looking to buy the land. If the deal goes through, they'll be spending $1.85 million on two parcels totaling around 25 acres (get that paper, Emma!). Bring Me the News also points out that this is a great deal for the police; consultants estimated that the city would need to spend $18 million to build a new station, while converting the store for their purpose will only set them back around $4 million. Meanwhile, the old restaurant building is set to become a Ruby’s.
Prestige for Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner
Take it from four former City Pages staffers—there is no easier way to exploit someone than to give them a “cool” job. The folks who work at the Minnesota Science Museum might also have something to say about that. In January, the museum employees voted to join AFSCME Council 5 as the Science Museum of Minnesota Workers Union. (Racket has been covering their union drive from the start.) But as Amie Stager at Workday Magazine puts it in an excellent look at what’s happened since, “When workers vote to form a union, the struggle is not over, but is just beginning.” Layoffs followed the union vote, and six of the laid off employees were only reinstated after the intervention of the Nation Labor Relations Board. These employees say that even though they are technically back at work, their jobs are being done by outside contractors. (The museum denied this.) And that's just the start of what the Science Museum workers are facing—give the whole story a read.
West Coast Firm Snatching up Minneapolis Apartments
Is Weidner Apartment Homes your landlord? If not they may soon be, especially if you live in Uptown. The Strib reports that last week the company, based out of Kirkland, Washington, paid $111 million for eight Uptown apartment buildings that have a combined market value of $163 million. Not a bad deal if you’ve got that kind of money to throw around. The company, which now owns 918 units in Uptown, has also invested in downtown Minneapolis and Loring Park. We swear, it’s not just the midwestern homer side of us that gets nervous about this kind of activity. Consolidation means less competition among landlords, and out of town consolidation means less of a connection to the city where tenants live. We recently spotlighted a Minnesota Daily story about how students had been screwed by a non-local developer, as well as this Kelly Rogers piece on how bad things can get when you’re dealing with out-of-town luxury management. Oh, and yes, as you’d guess, the financial geniuses of the Strib comments section are certain that Weidner’s gonna take a bath on this because no one wants to live in the crime-ridden hell hole that is Minneapolis, etc.
Winona: The Miami of Minnesota
Winona, Minnesota, really wants more tourists to come to town. So they launched an ad campaign comparing themselves to Miami, Florida, with a website featuring a variety of things you can do in the south Minnesota destination, including swimming with alligators, riding flamingos, and, possibly, dying. “It was completely outrageous, silly, and dumb, and it was so much fun,” Visit Winona’s Cynthya Porter tells KSTP. “It’s supposed to be just super tongue-in-cheek and really that makes people laugh.” Ah yes, bringing in that Gen X money through our one weakness: irony.
