Minnesota State Senator Tom Neuville

Not only was the Temperature close to 100 degrees this weekend, but there were also many events all around District 25 which kept me busy and hot.

The big event of the weekend was the annual Kolacky Days Festival in Montgomery. Fewer people attended events this year because of the heat. But, Kolacky Days has become a huge event and draws people from far and wide. Of course, I love eating kolacky, and there is ample supply to buy during the weekend.

On Sunday is the Grand Parade. I walked with State Representative Laura Brod in the parade. Many people are dressed up in traditional Czech clothing and there is always lots of great polka music, dancing and concertina playing. The Grand Parade even drew several Statewide Political candidates. Minnesota Secretery of State, Mary Kiffmeyer was present, and let me buy her some apple kolacky. (I prefer prune and appricot). State Auditor Patty Anderson, Republican Attorney General Candidate Jeff Johnson and Congressman John Kline also attended.

It’s always nice to meet the Queen and attendants for the events and their parents. Here is just one of the photos of my visit with last years Kolacky Royalty. They told me that they attended over 40 events around Minnesota to publicize Montgomery’s Kolacky Days event. I also met last years Queen for the Webster Harvest Days festival, which is coming up again this year in August.

On Saturday, I attended the Dedication of the Trailhead facility for the Mill Towns Trail in Faribault. It’s a beautiful facility and provides a concrete accomplishment on our way to completing the rest of the Mill Towns Trail from Northfield, thru Dundas, to Faribault. Next, the City of Dundas will be awarding bids soon to build a trail head facility in the center of downtown Dundas. I’d like to see the trail location finalized, and some land right of way acquired, before we go to the Legislature’s Bonding committee again. This year, the Mill Towns Joint Trail Board was awarded $1 million of State Bond Funds to continue development of the trail. It’s important to show tangible movement and progress with the money we’ve been given by the State. The two trail head facilities in Faribault and Dundas are great starts.

Competing with Kolacky Days this weekend was the Vintage Band festival held in Northfield. What a wonderful event, which was organized in large part by Paul Niemisto, one of the great musicians at St. Olaf College. Marilynn and I attended several of the concerts over the weekend. The Vintage Bands came from all over the U.S. and even from Europe. I hope that this event can become an annual affair in Northfield. We truly have wonderful Arts opportunities in Northfield.

And lastly, I ended the weekend with a piece of super pie (peach) at the Old Trondhjem Lutheran church Ice Cream festival in Lonsdale. In years past, it’s been pretty hot in the Church. But, they’ve done a great job of restoring the old church and adding air conditioning. Blue-Grass style music was playing in the church, while people visited and ate pie in the social hall. I’ll be back again next year. This is another event which makes dieting at this time of year a real challenge for me. But, it sure is enjoyable !

One of the nice things about District 25 are all of the Community Events and Church Festivals. Every event has a flavor of its own, and Marilynn and I greatly enjoy visiting with people when we attend each event. ( Of course, it’s hard for me to lose weight, when homemade pie and Kolacky are served at most of them.)

Here, are just a few pictures of today’s festival at St. Patrick’s Church in Cedar Lake. One of the people I had a chance to visit with was Ron McBroom, who was selling raffle tickets. Ron is a long time friend, and also a trustee of the Church.

It was a beautiful day, complete with bands, baseball game, quilt auction, and of course the country store with lots of vegetables, jams and other items.

I just mailed out my 2006 Session Review (PDF) which we’ve also added to the left sidebar. The text of it reads:

Dear Friends,

The past few years have been challenging indeed, as we dealt with huge budget shortfalls.

It seems like the media mostly reports about our failures and fighting. But, it’s important for you to know that 90% of the work we do is collegial, non-partisan, and approved by nearly unanimous vote. A good example of this is the eminent domain bill passed this year, which will make it harder for government to take private property for economic development.

As the only Republican senator to chair a committee (Family Law subcommittee), I was able to author a major change in Minnesota’s Child Support law. This new law will become a national model and will reduce some of the conflict in divorce and family cases. Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome to my new Weblog. I just converted my Website to a Blog format. This is my first official “post”. I just had a quick tranining session on how to do the basics of blogging from the Blog Master, Griff Wigley of Northfield.

I intend to go pretty slow at first. Some of you are regular readers of Representive Ray Cox’s Blog. I don’t think that I’ll be able to match Ray’s record of keeping current on activities. But, I do intend to post every few days, and give people a flavor of the things that I do as the State Senator for District 25.

This is an election year. So, my days are full. I am still busy carrying a full load in my law office practice. In addition, even though legislators are in campaign mode, we still have lots of constitutent services to fulfill. For example, Representative Cox and I are working closely with the City of Belle Plaine concerning a key intersection with Hwy. 169.

Hopefully, as my Re-election Campaign goes into full swing in September and October, I’ll be posting more information on this Blog concerning issues and events. Right now, I am raising campaign funds, attending lots of fairs, parades, church dinners, community events and door knocking. I’m always looking for volunteers. So, if you want to get involved in “grassroots” politics, contact me.

I expect that this new way of communicating with constituents will be very helpful when the next Legislative Session starts in 2007!

I’m one of three local citizens who produces a podcast (internet radio show) called Locally Grown.

On our May 26 episode (recorded at the James Gang Hideaway on Division St. in downtown Northfield), we hosted Mill Towns Trail board member Peggy Prowe, with Senator Neuville and Rep. Ray Cox. The legislature had just allocated $1 million dollars for the trail.

Earlier that week, I took the photo on the right of Tom and others involved with the trail after a lunch at the Northfield Rotary. (Click photos to enlarge.) Below is the audio from the podcast.

Click the play button to listen (30 minutes)

Back when I was volunteering for Northfield.org, I took these photos of Tom at a party for Maggie Lee in May of 2004, celebrating her 60th anniversary at the Northfield News. On the right: Tom with former Governor Al Quie and Rep. Ray Cox. Click photos to enlarge.

Watch for weblog posts from Senator Tom Neuville, along with a revamped website, coming soon. - Griff Wigley, Wigley and Associates