Ground Level®: Amplifying Community Voices

Your story is powerful. The stories you share with others honor the complexity of our communities while forging a more equitable and vibrant future.

Call 651-228-4800 and leave us a voice memo. If you're more comfortable texting, you can text “Hello” to 1-833-870-4111. You can also email us at tell@mpr.org and join in on conversations in our Ground Level Facebook group.

We’d like to hear your thoughts and questions. Your ideas about solutions. How are your communities? What are you seeing today? And what do you want to see tomorrow?

Note that while we will exercise editorial judgment for language, length and avoiding personal attacks, we will not sacrifice your meaning. We will ensure your main message comes through on air and online.

On Wednesday, I noted that nearly 75 percent of Minnesota households now have Internet access at speeds that reach the state’s goals, yet three Minnesota counties still have no access at those speeds. One of those is Cook County, the northeastern Minnesota recipient of federal stimulus dollars to make fiber available to all residents. So I called Joe Read more →
Mobile broadband boosts Minnesota access figures
Those tracking broadband speeds in Minnesota say some mobile service recipients have fast enough connections to count toward the state goal of ubiquitous high-speed Internet connections by 2015. As a result, three-quarters of households now have access, by that definition.
Feds: Rural job growth flat
As we were wrapping up work in International Falls this week for the Daily Circuit special “Rethinking a Company Town,” the federal Economic Research Service put out a sobering view of rural employment. This is how our friends at the Daily Yonder put it: “Folks looking for good news in the 2013 “Rural America at Read more →
Willing success in the back room of the Coffee Landing
We invited nine International Falls residents — natives, newcomers, left-and-came-backers, old, young, layoff sufferers and entrepreneurs — to the back room at the Coffee Landing to share with us and themselves the hopes and misgivings they have for this place.