To the Editor,  Effective advocacy requires understanding the legislative process and employing strategic communication. Constituents can impact legislation by providing their perspective on a bill and explaining the reasoning for their position. As a former Iowa State Senator from Maquoketa, I served in the Iowa Senate from 2011 to 2019 and saw countless examples of advocacy in action…. Read More

By Tyler Trieglaff Notes from the Chief Notes from the Chief… I’m typing this week’s report from the big city, not Perham or Detroit Lakes, but Minneapolis, Minnesota.   I came down here as part of the representation from Frazee-Vergas School District for the annual conference of the Minnesota School Boards Association (MSBA). There are two days of… Read More

By Felicia Teiken Special to the Forum The fires in California have been relentless. For over a week, I’ve been in and out of one the evacuation warning zones, caught between home and work. I packed my first ever “in case of an emergency” bag which is now known as my fire bag. I threw it together… Read More

To the Editor, It’s January and we are back at the Capitol, starting another legislative session. After everything that has transpired over the past two years, especially noting the Democrats’ abuse of power to end last session, we knew coming into the year that we’d have a lot of work ahead of us. So much of… Read More

To the Editor, Last week, Seventh District Representative Fischbach updated us on her work in Washington.  She highlighted her bill “Defund Planned Parenthood Act.” She wrote this, “in 2020, they performed 383,460 abortions while the amount of prenatal services that they provided dropped from 40,000 to 9,000 in just 10 years.” Here’s what she didn’t show. 2.16… Read More

By Tyler Trieglaff Notes from the Chief Here is the breakdown of Calls For Service for the Frazee Police Department. The variety of calls that you read about each week are tallied for 2024. Most of these calls are self-explanatory, but I will explain a few so you won’t be scratching your heads wondering what these calls… Read More

To the Editor, I am writing to ask my friends and neighbors to take action to keep Social Security solvent and to keep the Medicare options that are currently available. I strongly oppose the proposals I’ve seen for privatizing those programs.  Like many Americans, I am dismayed and disturbed by the seeming takeover of our lives by… Read More

To the Editor, End of another brutal election cycle and gearing up for the next with lessons to be learned and new strategies to adopt. Don’t see much hope of getting both parties to at least try to work together to put our country and our democracy above party and individual interests. Been saying that for years. … Read More

Garver’s Movie Review Bob Garver Like many critics, I despised the 2019 CGI version of “The Lion King.” The new animation was ugly and the rehashing of the story from the 1994 classic without many changes made the whole thing seem unnecessary. But unlike many critics, I’m not ready to throw prequel “Mufasa: The Lion King”… Read More

By Tyler Trieglaff Notes from the Chief Notes from the Chief….Well by the time you read this, I will be another year older. We are planning on a night out in the metropolis of Fargo/Moorhead with a hotel and fancy supper.  With another turn of the New Year, it might make my retirement a little closer, but… Read More