Here are some interesting links from around the South Metro for you to read up on and discuss:
1. Jeff Achen interviews Elizabeth Kautz, Will Branning, and Beverly Miller from the MVTA on Thisweek’s The Show.
I find it disturbing that Kautz praises the MVTA for its hard work in keeping fiscally conservative and berates the Met Council for forcing them to increase costs to the taxpayers/riders, while she wants to waste $300,000 more taxpayer dollars on the failing Burnsville Performing Arts Center. I’m also quite disappointed that Beverly Miller didn’t take this opportunity to apologize to the general public for claiming that traditional media outlets are more important than everyone else.
2. A quick and easy recipe for making your own homemade butter in less than 5 minutes.
Hello, we’re the Buttertons! Mmm mmm good.
3. The Pioneer Press and the Star Tribune report that the former owner of the King of Diamonds strip club has been sentenced to prison.
20 months in prison at 66 sucks but so does evading taxes by using an ATM to funnel money into a secret bank account.
4. According to this article in the Savage Pacer, District 191 is now on Twitter.
So far they have used entirely too many exclamation points! Other than that, it’s just the same old shit that no one cares about! If districts really wanted to save money and utilize Twitter in an important manner, they’d use it to notify parents in the event of an emergency!
5. Thisweek’s Jeff Achen praises, via Twitter, a recent South Metro crime statistics article written by their intern.
I took a quick look at it and immediately noticed that it was missing many important crimes (arson, rape, homicide) and that the charts could easily be misinterpreted to say that while thefts were still high, the rest of the crimes (especially those that weren’t listed at all) aren’t as big of a deal. Well that and the fact that the article states that crime is holding steady even though it’s rising–in some areas (like Burnsville–which is a big part of the South Metro population–at nearly 9.5%).
It’s my opinion that journalists, especially if they are using visual representations to help sell their stories, need to take the time to properly represent the data on a chart. If they are unable to do so, they should put it in a table and let people determine themselves the true meaning w/o nearly as much room for skew. This is not to single out the Thisweek intern as it’s a problem with many journalists using data represented by visuals in their articles.
6. A contributor to Overheard in Minneapolis reports that people are sharing wives in Burnsville.
Wasn’t there a 70s Show episode about this? Yup, there was.
7. Lifehacker gives us a great article on how to stock your bar for $100.
Considering I spent $55 on beer for one day (and it was cheap beer), I think I could take a lesson or two ;-)
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That’s it for this week’s roundup. I’m mainly interested in what you think about Thisweek’s crime statistics reporting. Is it fair to say that crime isn’t rising that much when in fact, Burnsville has risen by nearly 9.5% alone and that they aren’t including some of the most heinous crimes? Whatever you think about any of these topics, please go ahead and comment on and share what you have to say!
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August 21st, 2009 at 12:16 pm
‘Before he was sentenced, Kladek told the judge he was sorry and remorsefull’!
larry, larry, larry!
900 large in back taxes!
unreported income!
skimming off the atm into his pocket!
and who knows what else that may have slipped through the cracks.
what a a.h. with a capitol A!
i guess good old larry didn’t think that premeditated fucking with the irs wasn’t a bad deal. well larmo, from al capone on down, they’ll get you in the end. he’s lucky he only got 20 months. they should have given him an extra 12 months for stupidity!
bb
August 21st, 2009 at 1:24 pm
Whoa, whoa, whoa!
#6?!?!
I gotta start hanging out at the Post Office more.
August 21st, 2009 at 1:26 pm
You can have mine–if you like pregnant women.
August 21st, 2009 at 3:22 pm
I will take Kim! I can use the two extra deductions and someone additional to boss me around.
August 21st, 2009 at 3:42 pm
Hey, congrats Bill and Kim!
August 21st, 2009 at 8:54 pm
Who doesn’t love a pregnant woman?
That being said.. most news outlets are completely incapable of presenting accurate statistical data. Some problems include randomly changing the units that numbers are refering too. I.e. Random Crime numbers are shown implying that crime is up by 242 incidents so far this year. And yet, in the next sentence they say arrests are down by 11%. So if crime is up and arrests are down, doesn’t that mean that police are less effective? They would do better to stick with either reported crimes and ignore actual arrests. Or ignore reports, and stick to arrests.
They also do the same thing that the Burnsville chief did in his report. State that other serious crimes are growing, yet only discuss burglary. The graph only shows a change in a total 181 “Crime” (whatever that is) and yet they state crime is up by 242. So what makes up the remaining 61 crime increases? Could any of these be the unnamed “other serious crimes”?
I love Lakeville’s idea of directed traffic control:
I’m glad they are only issuing tickets to people that are involved in traffic violations. It would be a bad thing if they were issuing tickets where no violations occurred. Then, that always leaves me with the same question I often have about police work. If you knew that was an area where traffic violations often occurred, why did you wait until now to enforce them? Sounds like a revenue generation scheme to me. p.s. Lakeville, Farmington, AppleValley cops… use a turn signal once and a while, will ya please? (haven’t seen burnsville cops not doing it, but I have the other 3)
Way to put yourself out there on a limb Chief Lindquist. Wouldn’t want to into too much depth on anything.
The reporter really didn’t do too good of a job there. Each of the cities have had budget issues and addressed them in different ways that place an impact on their Police Force. That recent letter to the city administrator of Burnsville alone should have prompted some hard questions for that police chief, and I’d suggest asking that same tough question of all the police chiefs to see if they are dealing with any similar challenges. Oh well, it is sad when a blog asks more questions than the press does.
August 22nd, 2009 at 8:02 am
b, that’s the official announcement, giving away your dearly beloved? :) so next mothers and fathers day you’ll both be getting some recognition?
congrats to the both of you!
bb
August 22nd, 2009 at 2:18 pm
Congrats Bill and Kim!
August 23rd, 2009 at 4:18 pm
I congratulated you on Twitter earlier, but congrats again!
The bar stocking article was interesting. I disagree with them on some of the supplies, though — there’s no point in getting, say, grenadine unless you’re sure you’re going to use it and it’s not something you just need on hand (it’s not in that many common drinks). Other than that, though, I think they were right on. Interestingly, it’s pretty much the exact method my wife and I used for a big party a few years ago, only hardly anyone showed up and as a result, we had a *very* well-stocked liquor cabinet for the better part of a year. :)
August 24th, 2009 at 10:56 am
Congratulations-how exciting! Can’t wait to hear your take on fatherhood!