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GARY EICHTEN: You're listening to Minnesota Public Radio. We have a cloudy sky. It's 43 degrees at KNOW-FM 91.1, Minneapolis and St. Paul. Should be partly cloudy through the afternoon. Might actually warm up another couple of degrees. Cloudy tonight with flurries possible, low 25 to 30. Tomorrow, windy and colder with some flurries. Temperatures dropping through the 20s tomorrow.

CRAIG WINDHAM: From National Public Radio news in Washington, I'm Craig Windham. Terry Nichols' wife is trying to convince the jury in her husband's trial to spare his life. Marife Nichols has testified that her husband is a loving father to their two young children. She was called to the stand as the defense began its case in the sentencing phase of the trial. Earlier, Judge Richard Matsch rejected a defense motion to halt the proceedings.

Nichols' attorney, Michael Tigar, claimed that the emotional testimony by relatives of bombing victims had prejudiced the jury. Tigar wanted Judge Matsch to decide the sentence. The medical examiner's office in Chicago says comedian Chris Farley died of an accidental drug overdose. From member station WBEZ, Emily Hanford reports.

EMILY HANFORD: The Cook County medical examiner says the 33-year-old actor died of opiate and cocaine intoxication. A narrowing of the arteries supplying blood to the heart was a significant contributing factor. At the time of his death, the 5 foot 8 inch Farley weighed 296 pounds. The medical examiner has determined that Farley's death was an accident. Chris Farley was born in Wisconsin and came to Chicago in 1987 to join the Second City comedy troupe, where legends such as John Belushi, John Candy, and Dan Aykroyd got their start.

Farley made the jump to Saturday Night Live in 1990. He made his big screen debut in the smash hit Wayne's World. At the time of his death, Farley was reportedly pursuing other movie opportunities. He was found dead December 18th in his apartment in Chicago. For NPR News, I'm Emily Hanford in Chicago.

CRAIG WINDHAM: A tent has been set up next to the Kennedy family compound at Hyannis Port, Massachusetts to accommodate the family and friends expected today for the wake for 39-year-old Michael Kennedy. He was killed in a skiing accident on New Year's Eve in Colorado. Funeral services are planned for tomorrow. The Russian space station Mir has experienced a malfunction of its orbit control computer. The space station is now drifting out of control around the Earth. David McGuffin reports from Moscow.

DAVID MCGUFFIN: NASA officials in Russia say they discovered the motion control device on the space station Mir was experiencing problems early Friday morning, and that the station's central computer had shut the device down. Since then, Mir has been drifting through space. But NASA officials say that the crew, which includes American David Wolf, has isolated the malfunction and will have it repaired soon.

The officials also say that all other systems onboard Mir, including life support and power supply, are functioning normally and that the crew is in no danger. This latest malfunction comes as a bit of a surprise after a summer of serious breakdowns and accidents on Mir, which included a collision with a cargo vessel. Life on board the 11-year-old space station had calmed down to a routine in the past few months, largely due to a series of successful repair missions carried out by the current crew. For NPR News, I'm David McGuffin in Moscow.

CRAIG WINDHAM: On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is up 28 points at 7,937 in light trading. On the NASDAQ, the composite index is up two points. This is NPR News.

SPEAKER 1: Support for NPR comes from Borders Books and Music, a place to satisfy existing curiosities and discover new ones. Location information at 800-644-7733.

SPEAKER 2: Good afternoon. I'm Karen Barta with news from Minnesota Public Radio. At least three people were killed in Minnesota traffic accidents during the New Year's holiday, including a 16-year-old St. Paul boy who drove after a drinking party. A teenage girl is Minnesota's latest snowmobile fatality. 13-year-old Kari Ash of rural Wadena was killed yesterday when the snowmobile she was a passenger on ran into a barbed wire fence.

Minnesota taxpayers will be able to file their state income tax forms electronically for the first time this year. The telefile system has been used by the federal IRS for the last three years. And this year, the Minnesota revenue department will use it. Annual tax forms from the IRS are in the mail and some will receive them today. St. Paul IRS spokesman Eric Smith encourages Minnesotans to take advantage of computer-based tax filing.

ERIC SMITH: These e-file methods really save on mistakes. They slash mistakes by more than 90%, we find. Returns that are right to start with are really much better, both for the taxpayer and for the IRS. I think it's pretty well-known fact that electronically filed returns get processed more quickly. You get your refund sooner.

SPEAKER 2: Taxpayers who file electronically are receiving a simple notice by postcard. Smith says there are few changes in the 1997 tax forms. The biggest change can be found in Schedule D, where rates are lower for capital gains. The state forecast, mostly cloudy. Near record warmth in the south, highs from the middle 20s to lower to middle 50s in the Southwest. For the Twin Cities, partly sunny with near record high from 40 to 45.

Around the region, skies are mostly cloudy. In Duluth, it's 32 degrees. Rochester reporting 41. It's 43 in the Twin Cities. That's news from Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Karen Barta.

GARY EICHTEN: Six minutes now past 12 o'clock.

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And good afternoon. Welcome back to Midday here on Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Gary Eichten. Glad you could join us. Both Minneapolis and St. Paul are getting new city governments today. Incumbent mayors in both cities, Sharon Sayles Belton and Norm Coleman, were of course re-elected to second terms last fall. They're being sworn in today, and they'll be serving another term. But several veteran council members in both cities did not seek re-election this year. And as a result, there are some major changes at the city council level.

This is especially true in Minneapolis, where three members with a combined total of 65 years of service stepped down this week. And this hour, on Midday, as part of our Voices of Minnesota series, we're going to hear from those three veteran council members, Alice Rainville, Dennis Schulstad, and Walt Dziedzic. First of all, Alice Rainville, who was leaving the council after 22 years in office.

Alice Rainville's mother died when Alice was very young. She was raised by her father. And Alice Rainville herself became a single parent when her husband died. She says politics has always been a big part of her family's life. And sure enough, when Rainville decided to retire, her daughter, Barbara Johnson, was elected to Rainville's seat, continuing the family tradition of political activism. Alice Rainville talked with Minnesota Public Radio's Dan Olson.

DAN OLSON: Was it a political family? I mean, was it always around the table and political science was the family?

ALICE RAINVILLE: Absolutely, yes. That was our discussions. We had a big family. And we had a huge table. We dined our evening dinner in our Sundays. Those meals were held in the dining room because we just had a breakfast nook in the kitchen. And so there was that opportunity, which is a wonderful opportunity, for all to be seated at the table. And that was kind of an important event.

And I remember one of my sisters came for a Sunday afternoon dinner. She had gone upstairs and taken a nap. And she was out working at the time. I mean, she was out of school and working. She came to dinner in a bathrobe. And my father said, you must go upstairs and dress for dinner. So it was a respected time. And we all learned from that. And he never had to tell anybody that after that.

DAN OLSON: Sounds like your father was a really strong figure in your family.

ALICE RAINVILLE: Yes, he was.

DAN OLSON: Then when you were married and your husband died, you were, all of a sudden, the sole parent and in charge of the family. And that must have been a big change.

ALICE RAINVILLE: Yes, it really was. And I grew up without a mother. And I kind of wondered why that happened in two generations, that it happened to my brothers and sisters. And then it happened to me, to raise those children. But there again, I was supported by a big family, brothers and sisters and brother in-laws that thought about my children and watched out for them. And so I was not without support like it could have been. And I'm grateful for them.

DAN OLSON: What would you say were the values you brought to the government? What were your guiding principles that you wanted to have in place as you made public policy?

ALICE RAINVILLE: Well, I hold great respect for the taxpayer. I don't want any dollars, public dollars or my personal dollars, spent frivolously. And I always would tell the council, you are the guardians of the public purse. And I take that very seriously. And I don't want to be the people's banker. I only want government to assess what the needs are and fund them, but not to have a comfort blanket over government so that we never have to have a stomach ache or a headache about where the money is going to come from.

I think the government should be quite lean, but not mean. I'm not saying mean. But I think government has a role, but it has to be very cautious of that role because it's easy when you can just buy a vote, increase the dollars people have to send to you. And I think we sometimes forget how tight people's budgets are in their own homes and the demands in families. I think government has encroached into families a great deal, certainly with dollars and rules. And I don't know that they're the best persons to do that.

DAN OLSON: As a woman who worked in the trenches for candidates and then as the third woman to serve on the Minneapolis City Council, I think, and then the first woman president of the Council.

ALICE RAINVILLE: Yes. Yes. I established a lot of precedents. And I believe I was the fourth woman. There were three before me. So I was the fourth woman in 100 years of city government to serve on the city council. So it was a bit lonely coming down here with 12 men. And at that time, I was the only woman on the council.

DAN OLSON: You don't wear your feminism on your lapel. What did you call yourself, a feminist with a small f?

ALICE RAINVILLE: Yes. I think the description that people understand is that I have done a lot of things and never felt that I couldn't do something because I was a woman. And I'm told psychologists will say that women that are raised by a man, a father, there's less kissy huggy stuff and more reality and more risk taking. And I think that that's the reality. I have a sister who was a Minnesota State senator as well, Betty Atkins. She's the baby in our family.

And so it wasn't by chance that we all had interest, attended precinct caucuses. Some have fallen from the DFL ranks in Minnesota to a Republican concept there politically. So we never quit thinking. I think that's-- we never quit making decisions.

DAN OLSON: Do you have a favorite political moment, a time that stands out as something that you were either very proud of and proud to be present at that time, or some other remarkable moment that you will carry with you?

ALICE RAINVILLE: Well, what I'm carrying right now is the concept of creating a convention center in the city of Minneapolis. And we were always in that business. We had the old auditorium. We had that small Trade Center attached to it in the late '50s, early '60s. But we did review it in 1979, had a consultant look at it. Our then coordinator, David Nicholas, brought it to our attention. And correctly so, he, I think, had gone to the national seminars and realized that was the thing that was going to make cities strong, a strong airport, a convention center.

The Governor of Perpich thought a World Trade Center was critical to growth. And I think that has been disproven because, across the country, I have seen World Trade centers diminish in their role in marketing the global economy. But I do think probably the convention center consumed a lot of my time over the years. Mayor Fraser says-- well, we sat for probably six years on that implementation team. We co-chaired it. And his attendance and mine at those Monday evening meetings from 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM, the attendance was just outstanding because we really cared a lot about it.

DAN OLSON: Is the Minneapolis City Council, 13 members, too large or about the right size? Your friend and colleague Walter Dietrich has said, nine is fine.

ALICE RAINVILLE: I think we are a very large council, especially for a full-time, salaried position. And if there's any criticism, it is that-- but I do think that I know, personally, that the council member, Arthie Alderman, in earlier years, it was the one elected officials that the people knew how to get a hold of and they knew your name.

And you can't say that about your county commissioner. You can't say that about their state representative or their state senator. Precious few people know that and know their congressman. They're not aware of that either. So we are the front line troops. And we make a lot of referrals because a lot of problems that come here are not under our purview, but they still expect you to understand them, and why can't you do something about it?

DAN OLSON: We face the prospect, perhaps, in the Minnesota legislature by the year 2000 or just after of a so-called suburban majority. What is your prediction for what that may mean for in the case of City of Minneapolis, specifically, the all important local government aid equation, but other issues, too?

ALICE RAINVILLE: Well, we've lost strength 10 years ago and representation. And the representation, you can count them. But unless they are understanding of your issues, it doesn't do any good. And we sometimes have trouble with the Minneapolis delegation, so defined as truly understanding the function of a city that's the largest city in the state of Minnesota and produces so much for the state of Minnesota.

And sometimes, our suburban neighbors understand that more because they know they cannot recreate a downtown in Brooklyn Park. They will never have the estate or the Orpheum. They won't have Orchestra Hall. They won't have the medical complexes. They won't have the big corporate-- they'll have some expansion, perhaps, but you cannot recreate a downtown. And that is what they-- and they are beginning to understand that because their people get a little bored sometimes with the suburbs and come down to the big city here.

DAN OLSON: What's been your advice to your successor, your daughter, the incoming council member?

ALICE RAINVILLE: Well, I hope she'll always care about the people. And I know she will because there's no surprises. She knows what the job entails and when the phone rings. But across the board, we I have represented very wonderful people and very generous people who would not deny help to anyone.

Their resentment is that they don't think people help themselves enough. And I think that welfare reform, hopefully, will start the beginnings of change from a thinking that we must do for ourselves. And we all are better for that if we do that.

DAN OLSON: Alice Rainville, thanks so much. Nice to talk to you.

ALICE RAINVILLE: Thank you very much.

GARY EICHTEN: Former Minneapolis City Council member Alice Rainville. This hour, we're listening to conversations with three longtime Minneapolis City Council members, three members who, this week, retired from the council. Later this hour, we're going to hear from Dennis Schulstad.

But next up is Walter Dziedzic, who, like Alice Rainville, grew up on the north side of Minneapolis. Mr. Dziedzic was raised in poverty, the son of Polish immigrants. He was a gifted athlete, though, who went on to play Minor League Baseball. He's a former police officer and a Korean War veteran. He served 20 years on the Minneapolis City Council. Walter Dziedzic talked with Minnesota Public Radio's Dan Olson.

DAN OLSON: It sounds like your mother played the biggest hand in raising you. You lost your father. And did that mean that you grew up fast, you were out of the nest fast, working around town doing jobs?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Well, it's 1935. It's the Depression. There's seven in the family. My younger brother John was born shortly after my dad died. And there wasn't a lot of wealth. I can remember when the street crews were doing Randolph Street back then or other streets near where we lived down by the river, that we would take the tar blocks and we'd burn them in a kitchen stove for heat. Or if they left lumber laid around, it was gone the next day because it wasn't just the Dziedzic family. Everybody would take all the wood and burn it up.

DAN OLSON: It was hand to mouth. It was find what you could find and use it.

WALTER DZIEDZIC: I was at the decathlon club yesterday. My brother-in-law took us there for a brunch. And I was telling some of my nephews and nieces, eat up. And there was a layout of food there that, when I was a youngster, it would have been I thought I died and went to heaven because, a lot of times, there wasn't enough, to be honest.

I don't know how my mother, in a depression, raised seven kids. And they're all fairly successful people. And there wasn't any welfare. She could make food out of nothing. Absolutely unbelievable the things that she could do in the kitchen.

DAN OLSON: So then what happened to you? You were a teenager. You finished school. What did you do after that?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Well, even before then, we used to work. I went to work about six, seven years old. You could get a job out in the truck farms just north of Camden. They'd come around and pick you up every day, every morning real early. And you'd go out there. The mother would fix you a sandwich or two and you'd go out there and weed.

DAN OLSON: Seven years old?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Yeah, six maybe. Six, seven. You would hope that you could get strong enough because, if you could lift a bushel of potatoes, you could go to Hal's potato farm. They came around, picked up the kids from northeast. These were second generation kids. And those families were hungry.

DAN OLSON: This time, this is a farm that was literally a short drive from where you live.

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Yes, it's a truck farm right outside of Minneapolis. And you'd go there and we graduated from the weeding to the picking of potatoes.

DAN OLSON: What were you getting paid for this?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: $0.06 a bushel. When you got to the potato farm, you could make 40 bucks a week. That was good dough. And you had to be able to not only pick the potatoes, put them in a bushel, you had to be able to lift the bushel. If you couldn't lift the bushel, they didn't want you. And then, at times, you had to stack the truck. And then, sometimes, you drive the truck.

So I started out there about nine years after graduating from the truck farm. And then later, I went to work as a carpenter apprentice when I was about 12. So, yeah, you grow up and you get a little slice of life early. And I played sports. I loved sports and found enough time to develop some skills there.

DAN OLSON: And you stayed on the straight and narrow. You weren't getting into trouble. You were growing up in what some people would call poverty, I suppose. And you were a straight kid?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: We were so poor, we didn't know what being in poverty was. But you say, you stayed out of trouble. Well, to a degree. I wasn't an angel out there. I was a big kid and tough kid and mean to extent. And I think when Pete [? Guzi ?] got me in ninth grade in high school, that kind of turned me around because all that energy went away from being a jackass out there to learning how to go to school. Between the nuns at Saint Hedwig and the Edison High School, and Pete kind of took me under his wing because he knew the family history.

DAN OLSON: He was a coach, a teacher?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: He was a teacher and a coach. He'd do things like take advantage of my-- or use my athletic ability. He'd say, come on, now, Dziedzic, you got to do this. And we'd run a kind of an obstacle course in the gym. And one day, I set a record there. God, he made a big deal out of it. Pumped me all up. And gives you a lot of confidence.

And that's why I'm a great believer in youngsters, at an early age, getting involved in athletics and having some success at it. You don't want to overdo it when a kid doesn't have success. But whether it's playing in a band, or the marching band, or debate, any of the extracurricular activity, including sports, is a way to keep kids out of gangs and to get them into constructive activities.

DAN OLSON: We're doing a lot of that. I'm jumping way ahead in the conversation. You're doing a fair amount of that. There's the Police Athletic League. There are still after-school activities at Minneapolis public high schools and at other public high schools around the Twin Cities. Although, now, there's some charge for some of those extracurricular. What's the difference--

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Wilson is doing a great job in especially that area. I've had some fights with him on the number of cops on the street, but the Pell Program has just been so successful. You get people like Mark Rosen, Joe Senser behind you. You got Lieutenant Stanek, who's a state legislator, doing a great job. And Chief Olson is to be commended for the job he's done there. And the reason that I support that so heavily, it kind of mirrors what I've been trying to do here. And we could use a lot of help in that area. It kind of mirrors my life.

DAN OLSON: No dispute that it's a good program. Is it enough when you see the number of kids out there who you see on a given afternoon after school, and given the state budget surplus, should more be done?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: I would put that as an extremely high priority. We built that hockey arena at Parade Stadium. We just built one northeast. And those volunteers from the Edison Youth Hockey Association, you should give them an Olympic gold medal. They've just done a fabulous job. A buck at a time from pool tabs that that arena, $2.3 million, has gone up. And it's being used, overused already.

But you've got to have facilities. And you got to have volunteers. And if you don't have volunteers, you got to pay them to come and help coach these youngsters to get-- I'm going to tell you. I think you can eliminate gangs if you divert that energy into a constructive activity, mainly sports. I really believe that and that we should give it a shot. And we don't enough.

Legislators and council members in election year are going to go out and say, I do this, this, and this. They don't back it up with the bucks. You got to have money involved. The Edison Ice Arena is a good example where, had they not taken the initiative himself, that would have never been built.

DAN OLSON: Are you pretty optimistic about the future for most kids in Minneapolis, or do you just see a tide of a number of children rising, growing up without the kind of person to step in who made the difference that he made with you stepping in to make the difference with those kids?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: We have some of those people. We don't have enough. And that's one of the reasons that I'm really considering running for one of the large seats, if there's a vacancy, for the Park Board. Because I think that the Park Board, over the last ten, 15 years, has gone from taking a real strong position on recreation, and athletics, and all that to other activities.

And those other activities-- don't get me wrong. The lakes are great, the trails are great. I don't know about not mowing the grass, but all those kinds of things that keep youngsters busy. And you could wear out possibly two or three gym floors, like they did at Logan Park, in the Park Board gyms and in the school gyms that close at three o'clock in the afternoon. You could eat off the floor 20 years later because they're not used enough.

DAN OLSON: Now, you were a bright kid. You were an athletic kid.

WALTER DZIEDZIC: I don't know if I was a bright kid.

DAN OLSON: Well, you were bright enough to stay out of trouble after Pete got hold of you.

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Yeah. Yeah, I was.

DAN OLSON: And then you got interested in police work somewhere along the line. You did a stint for one year as a teacher. What got you into police work?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: The job. The opportunity to make some money. I just got married in 1961, and I needed to get a job that paid a little more. My teaching job at De La Salle paid about $3,000. The police paid about $4,000. So it wasn't a hard decision to make. And I always kind of wanted to serve people. And this was a good opportunity. A lot of Northeast people had gone to municipal jobs.

DAN OLSON: And then you got shot.

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Right. I got shot in 1971-- no, '73 at a bar that I was moonlighting at. He was drunk. He's from New York. He was an art dealer. And they'd come to town for those starving art sales in the hotels back in the '70s and had a little too much to drink. It was crowded in Duffy's on a Friday night and we try to put them out.

And all of a sudden, he thought we were putting them out in the alley to beat him up or whatever. That's what he told the detectives later. And there was nothing to the case. And I told him I was a cop and he started to put his hand under his shirt. He had a gun and a belt. I said, if you got something in there, don't come out of there with it. And he emptied his 45 on me.

And luckily, two bullets went through my leg and didn't hit anything. And that's why I say luckily. He was using hard jacketed bullets. And so that kind of-- at that time, I was laying in the hospital. I thought, well, I'm going to go for all of it. And when the seat opened up later-- Sam [INAUDIBLE] retired-- I felt I could do more for the east side, northeast, especially southeast on a city council than I could out of a squad car. And we had done a lot out of the squad car, out of the station. We'd done some recreation programs. We started Joe Pudlik day after Joe Pudlik was shot, youngsters playing tee-ball. We had a flag football team.

DAN OLSON: This was another police officer?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Joe Pudlik was killed in the line of duty. One of the last killed in Minneapolis in the '70s.

DAN OLSON: Did that shooting turn you against police work or was it just another part of the job?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: I worked with Joe. And Joe was a hands-on guy and that hands-on work was what did him in. They were at the door. They were serving a warrant on a mentally disturbed person. Joe said, I'll show you how to do this. And Joe went in first and the guy come running out of another room and shot him.

GARY EICHTEN: Former Minneapolis City Council member Walter Dziedzic. He served 20 years on the Council before retiring this week. Now, actually, while Walter Dziedzic has retired from the council, he has not left city politics. He was elected to a Minneapolis Park Board seat last fall. Let's return to that conversation with Dan Olson.

DAN OLSON: We got to the police work and that took us away from a portion of your life I wanted to ask you about. You went off to the service and served in the Korean War, I think, as an artillery spotter, according to the newspaper piece I read. But you went off to the Korean War as a draftee?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Yes, I was drafted. And I always thought of going over to Korea after basic training that what if you get captured? What do you tell them? I say, what? What are you doing here? The Chinese came in to help the North Koreans. And I was with the 49th Field Artillery Battalion of the 7th Infantry Division.

And we sailed from Tacoma or-- yeah, Tacoma, Washington, from Fort Lewis to Japan, trained there for three days, get your weaponry, and went to Korea. And on the first night, we were sleeping in a replacement depot. About 2:30 in the morning, some major came in there. Get up, you recruits. We're going up. Jeez, I thought. Holy cows. We grabbed our stuff. He said, get in the truck. We're going up.

And we go and we drive with the night lights and we're going out. We have no idea where we are. We just got in that afternoon. And we get to the place. The trucks are stopping. And get off the trucks. Line up. Colonel comes up. He says, fix bayonets. I thought, what in the holy hell are we doing? We ain't got any ammunition. No ammunition was issued.

So we fixed bayonets. We're running up and down the hill. Have no idea what we're doing. Didn't have the password. I thought, holy cow. I was never so happy to see morning come in my whole life. And you think about it now and you laugh, but I've been scared in my life, but never like that.

DAN OLSON: What was that all about? Just an indoctrination? Just a hazing?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: No. No, it was real combat. Yeah, we were in the trenches, but we pushed them back off the hill, and then they'd come back and lay a barrage down, and we had to get out of there. And we were cannon fodder. The major and the colonel just asked for replacements. Guys would go-- in those days, the last few months of the war, guys would go up there with a company of 270 and maybe come back with 135.

DAN OLSON: This was your first night on the ground in Korea, practically?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: It was. Yeah, it was the first day there. And when he said, fix bayonets, I thought, oh, Lordy.

DAN OLSON: The move from the secure and white enclave of Northeast Minneapolis and then going to boot camp, training camp must have been quite a revelation for a young man?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Well, I already had played a couple of years of baseball in the Dodger Organization, so I already had indoctrination. But you're right. Early in my life, around Marshall Terrace Park, there weren't any Black-- there was no diversity.

DAN OLSON: Well, what was your reaction to seeing this segregation?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Well, we never had any cars. We would walk over to North Commons or walk over to Falwell and those kinds of places where we would play against the Blacks. And the stereotype would be amplified by some of the older people. So it gives you a different perspective. And was it a racist kind of atmosphere? To an extent, it was. And mainly because they didn't know each other.

And then when I signed a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers Organization and went to Vero Beach, I can remember going there on a train. And as you got into the south, you would see the lavatories were marked colored, white, and the fountains. And what the heck is that? I didn't have any background for any of that.

DAN OLSON: And this was all pre-Jackie Robinson?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: No, no. No, no. Jackie already had-- this was 1950, '51. And Jackie broke in at '47. But we all trained together at Vero Beach. It was an old Air Force base. And I didn't know Jackie Robinson. I would see him in the hallways and nod to him and those kinds of things. And once in a while, if they needed a catcher for big leagues over the noon hour, he'd say, Dziedzic, get out there and catch.

Some of the better names, Newcomb and those kinds of people. Campanella was my favorite because I was a catcher and Campi was a catcher. And it was a mutual dining room. And at night, Campi would tell stories about the old Negro league. And I was one of his better listeners. So I knew Campi. But there were others that came along. And Junior Gilliam and some of the-- Maury Wills, some of the famous ones. So you get to know Blacks better.

And then when the Dodger Organization was the one that broke the color line, but people don't know about, in the minor leagues, what that did. There was segregated seating in these towns in Georgia. And I can remember, one time, the manager told us we're going in a Moultrie, Georgia. And this was in 1951. He says, don't get too close to the stands. They might grab you and drag you in and beat the hell out of you.

So it was really tough especially for the young Black ballplayers that we had on the team. Segregated seating. And when we'd come to town, you can imagine the way the crowds of Black people would come out. And they'd have to go into the outfield. They'd ring the outfield. And back when the Millers were playing the Saints years ago, especially on the 4th of July, if you could get into the game either at Nicollet Park or Lexington Park in Saint Paul, you're lucky to get a seat on the playing field in the outfield. So if the ball went in there, it was automatic double. And that's the way it was with the Blacks in the outfield.

So those were interesting times. And it was kind of-- sports actually led the changing of society. They were the leader, especially in the race field. And one of the biggest disappointments that I've had is I don't think we've handled the race situation in Minneapolis the way we should. And if there's anything that I'd do different, if I had to do it over, I would do something on the East side a little bit different with race relations.

DAN OLSON: Minneapolis has changed dramatically, of course. There is, in some important ways, racial integration to point to. But I guess a lot of people would say, not in some other important ways. Housing appears to still be, to a degree, fairly highly segregated to a couple of general areas in Minneapolis on the near North side, near South side. What would you have done differently?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Well, that would be one of them. The housing patterns that we have need to change. And as I said earlier, I personally think that the youngsters, especially Black youngsters-- and we're going to start some hockey programs at that new arena for minorities. But I think that, just all in all, back when people said, there aren't any gangs, there were gangs. And Councilmember Van White, who's the first Black Council member ever in the City of Minneapolis, he had a foresight that-- he was an athlete and he saw the value in that. And I think that's where I would have pushed harder earlier.

DAN OLSON: How do you change housing patterns? Do you pull the realtors in and say, listen, realtors, here's what you have to do? Do you pull housing builders in? Do you pull neighborhood residents in and say, this is how it has to be?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Well, you do all those kinds of things. We had a plan for the housing on east side of Central Avenue, but the federal government's broken. There wasn't any money. And we asked Marty Sabo to come in, try to get us some money when had his hands out of control of the budget, but there just wasn't enough money.

But I think that HUD has to do all the things you mentioned. Mayor Belton is through her initiative for better race relations, get that jacked up. And you don't want to do some of the things that are happening where the Jews are criticizing the Blacks, Blacks are criticizing Jews. You got to get away from that kind of long stereotyped hatred and get all those people. And I said earlier, my lesson in life from playing with the Blacks, going into towns with Blacks served me well because I could see the value of doing all those kinds of things peacefully.

DAN OLSON: Is the racism in Minneapolis and in the culture at large still running pretty deeply? We're living in an expanding economy. A lot of boats are rising economic tide here, higher wages, more jobs being created. But to a pretty high degree, do you think. people of Color are still being left out?

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Well, I always use the phrase, give everybody a piece of the pie. And everybody's not getting a piece of the pie in Minneapolis and that's what some of the problems are. There's a lot of optimism out there, especially the people who come here from all the standard-- you heard of Saint Louis, Chicago, LA, Gary, Detroit. They come here figuring they're going to have a better life. And sometimes, it doesn't turn out that way.

DAN OLSON: Stadiums, metrodome, theaters downtown. Still, the concern is, in neighborhoods, that all of that attention is, indeed, at the expense of neighborhoods. We know that's not true because a huge amount of money is going to neighborhoods through Neighborhood Revitalization. But there is the concern that, in this ring of neighborhoods closest to downtown, they're still not getting the attention, the help that they need.

WALTER DZIEDZIC: Well, and that's the help being jobs. And I think that those people need to employ more people in those areas. But you mentioned the NRP, the Neighborhood Revitalization Program. And that money came-- that's tax dollars. When we did originally city center, I said, this has either got to be the biggest rip off ever or, pinch me. It's utopia.

And what has occurred there, that $20 million a year would have gone to the Minneapolis Community Development Agency for different kinds of programs. It's now going into the neighborhoods and being spent on neighborhood activities. That wouldn't have happened except for downtown and building those towers downtown where the increment increased the taxes is what it really-- an increase in taxes.

You take a property that was paid $100,000 worth of tax a year and, all of a sudden, it's paying $2 million, you got almost $1,000,009 in increment that only the city gets, not the schools or anybody else. And that's what the people are spending out there in those 81 neighborhoods called NRP.

GARY EICHTEN: Former Minneapolis City Council member Walter Dziedzic. This is Midday coming to you on Minnesota Public Radio. We're listening to Voices of Minnesota, conversations with three former Minneapolis City Council members. Dennis Schulstad's retirement marks the loss of the last Republican voice on the Minneapolis City Council. Schulstad served 22 years. He's also a Brigadier General in the Air Force Reserve. He, too, spoke with Minnesota Public Radio's Dan Olson.

DAN OLSON: As you depart after all these years of serving Minneapolis, the City of Minneapolis, do you feel the city, especially based on the booming downtown real estate economy, is in good shape?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: I think the city is in very good shape. Our downtown, in particular, is our success story. Downtown Minneapolis pays 42% of the total property tax dollars in Minneapolis. That's remarkable compared to other cities around the country. And I see the downtown only getting stronger, and that helps the entire city. The problem I see is crime, and it's crime in the center cities of Minneapolis. And it will spread to Saint Paul and the inner city suburbs. And this is something tragic that we have to get a hold of.

DAN OLSON: I didn't check with the police department before we started our conversation on what the homicide rate so far this year in Minneapolis is. I'm guessing you may know. Is it at about 72, 73?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: No, it's below 60, I believe. 57 was the last number I saw, which is certainly lower than it was last year, but it is still much, much greater than it has been in past years. And so we have to work to hold down crime. What's happening is Minnesota has a well-deserved reputation of being very soft on criminals. We, for years, were 49th out of the 50 states in the rate of incarceration. That's how many people are in prison based on your population. Only North Dakota ranked below us. Now, we're 50th. We are even below the state of North Dakota.

And people who live in the area don't realize that you have to be convicted of stealing cars half a dozen times before you do a day in jail. You have to be convicted of breaking into homes four or five times before you do a day in jail. The public doesn't understand this, but I will guarantee you that every criminal and every police officer knows that.

And criminals move into this state because they know they won't have to pay a consequence. And police officers-- and just ask any police officer, you see, and they'll tell you about many cases of people who have been arrested ten, 15, 20, 30, 40 times for the same types of crimes and don't do a day in jail. They catch people stealing cars red-handed. They don't do a day in jail. They catch people breaking into homes red-handed. They don't do a day in jail.

Even hardened felons, after three felonies in other states, they add many years to their sentences. In Minnesota, we are very, very lax. We have many felons who will spend only a couple, three years in prison even after three or four felonies. And so we have to change that, or we are going to continue down that slippery slope.

DAN OLSON: Along the chain of justice, where is the important point at which to apply the pressure to answer the situation you described?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: It's at the state legislature and it is determined at sentencing. We have police officers who catch a goodly number of the criminals. We have a county attorney's office and a city attorney's office that does a good job of prosecuting. They can't prosecute all of them, but they prosecute a goodly number.

The court system, while we see how difficult it is, looking at some of the highly publicized trials, we see how difficult it is to find a person guilty. But a goodly number are found guilty. Then nothing happens to the individual because our determinate sentencing laws that are passed by the state legislature are among the most lax in the United States.

The state of Illinois, for example, the Police Chief in Chicago told me one day that he could name 15 or 20 of his worst felons who now live in Minneapolis, moved here from Chicago. And he said it's because, in Illinois, after three felonies, they add 20 non-parolable years to their sentence. He said they will then move to a city like Minneapolis or Saint Paul where they don't have to worry about having that lengthy prison term after three felonies.

DAN OLSON: The scenario that's been created is that it's Minneapolis's fairly-- and the Twin Cities area, fairly wealthy economy that attracts especially the crack and cocaine dealers to this area because, in fact, we are vast consumers of the drugs that are for sale out there.

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: That's correct. When I talk to law enforcement officials from the FBI, through police chiefs and so on, I am told there are two ingredients causing people to move into the state to commit crime. Number one is that their lack of fear of retribution, they don't worry about going to prison. And number two, there is a very good economy here for them to sell drugs. And that absolutely is our fault. And so we have to cut down the opportunity in buying drugs and then we also have to tell people, if you move here to commit crimes, you're going to have some kind of a penalty to pay. And right now, they don't pay that penalty.

DAN OLSON: What do you think is the outlook for the City of Minneapolis. Downtown and neighborhoods, we have this stream of revenue coming off the commercial industrial property tax base that is going into the neighborhoods to help fund the neighborhood revitalization process. Is that working?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: It's working and the neighborhoods are benefiting from our strong downtown. It's the downtown that provides so much employment. It provides our tax base. It's what helps us retain a AAA bond rating. We're one of only two cities in the country with this AAA bond rating. Downtown has been the savior of Minneapolis. And the neighborhoods, which are strong, are benefiting from that downtown. And so Minneapolis remains an incredibly good city in which to live.

DAN OLSON: As you look at the economic horizon here, and we apparently still have a strong national economy, we may or may not get a ballpark. Even if we didn't get a ballpark, even if we lose a Major League Baseball team, are you still pretty optimistic about the future of downtown?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: Oh, absolutely. A ballpark downtown is not what saves downtown Minneapolis. It is one of many different things. It's our state and Orpheum theaters. It's the Nicollet Mall. It's the strong shopping. It's the Skyway system, the Target Center, all of the good restaurants we have. It's all of the people who live downtown. We are competing with Lake Minnetonka for top executives, and many of them are choosing to live in downtown Minneapolis. So downtown Minneapolis is strong, not just because there's a Metrodome downtown. Although, that's one of the things that has helped contribute to it.

DAN OLSON: What's your reflection on the fact that the Minneapolis legislative delegation, I guess, except for one person, voted against a stadium package, funding package of some sort? I guess some people would look at that and say, what's the City of Minneapolis thinking? This is bound and destined a brand new ballpark to benefit them most directly.

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: Whether or not Major League Baseball is in Minneapolis is an important decision, but it's not the most important decision. Crime is far more important than whether or not we have Major League Baseball. Education is far more important. The fact that we have many Fortune 500 companies choosing to headquarters here is far more important. The fact that we have an incredibly successful convention center in downtown Minneapolis is far more important.

Major League Baseball is one of those things that we definitely want to have. It is a vital part of our community. It's important for our prestige and the enjoyment of living here, the quality of life. But whether or not we have that is not going to make a huge difference in the economics of Minneapolis.

DAN OLSON: What's your advice for your colleagues, currently colleagues, soon to be former colleagues on the Minneapolis City Council as they look at the transit picture, the transportation picture, and within that, the transit picture for downtown Minneapolis? Thousands of additional employees apparently headed downtown here. Maybe up to 30,000, 40,000 additional workers added to the 150,000 workers already downtown. Reliance on the cars still very heavy. You have been present throughout almost the entire history of the Hiawatha Avenue transit issue, trying to expand that to a freeway, that not coming through. What should be the shape of the transportation picture for the future, do you think?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: Well, Hiawatha Avenue is something that was being discussed when I was first elected. In fact, it was being discussed when I was a senior in high school at Roosevelt. And Hiawatha Avenue goes right through my ward. We absolutely have to have Hiawatha Avenue upgraded into a good, safe road for people from Minneapolis and the suburbs to use to come downtown and do their shopping and their working.

But at the same time, we have to move away from the reliance on cars. We can't turn into a Los Angeles or another major city-- Washington, D.C. is a good example-- where people will commute an hour or an hour and a half each way to work. We can't let that happen because then people just will choose not to come into the city.

And I think the best way of addressing this is with light rail transit. And Hiawatha Avenue is the best corridor because we have the land for it. And we can connect downtown Minneapolis with the airport, with great big park and ride lots out there, and with the Mall of America. And it's just the good first link. Then other links will have to be going out to the west and connecting Minneapolis with Saint Paul. And we do need to have mass transit. It's not going to happen next year or the year after, but there's good planning that's going on now that will allow this to happen in five, seven, 10 years. And that's when we're really going to be needing it.

DAN OLSON: Looking way ahead at the year 2030, in the apparently somewhat unlikely prospect, but still possibility that Minneapolis, Saint Paul would have a new airport somewhere, maybe way far away, maybe 30, 40 miles away from downtown Minneapolis, does that materially change the complexion and the direction of downtown?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: No, I don't think so. Because if a new airport is built-- and I don't think a new airport is needed or will be built for at least 20 or 30 years-- but like you said, we're looking out to 2030 and we have to look out in the future. Nobody knows what the role of air transportation will be then. Perhaps, people won't be doing any business travel at that time because they'll be working with computers from their homes and they won't have to go to business meetings elsewhere.

But if a new airport is needed and it's out in Dakota County or someplace outside the city, what will happen at that point is there will be fast non-stop transportation to that airport. And that's where light rail or other types of transportation from the core cities to the new airport will be done. Or perhaps there will be a terminal at the existing airport and there will be the high speed underground trains or something to haul people out to the runways. There will be very important ties between any airport and any Metropolitan area, but we will not have to face that for many years to come.

DAN OLSON: City of Minneapolis council members have spent an extraordinary amount of time trying to do what you can do-- you're not police officers-- to help fix neighborhoods, especially the handful of Minneapolis neighborhoods that are the most fragile in terms of low income, decaying housing, people moving into neighborhoods that cause crime. Although, they are in the minority. The vast majority of the neighborhood residents are peaceable residents. Do you see a tipping point? Do you think there's a balance now and a tipping point where the neighborhoods that have faced the most difficulty are, in fact, getting better?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: I think they're leveling off a little bit. I don't know they are getting a whole lot better, but they aren't progressively getting worse. And that's a real accomplishment.

DAN OLSON: Why has that happened?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: Because the Council and the Mayor have worked very hard, along with our police department, to try to catch people and prosecute people who are committing some of these lower level crimes, the prostitution, the lower level drug dealing, some of the weapons violations. The people are being caught. The people are being prosecuted. They're being convicted.

Then, unfortunately, nothing happens to them. And that is the great frustration that our police officers have. They can tell you about people they have caught dozens of times shoplifting, in prostitution, in drug peddling. And these people are back on the streets laughing at the police officers. It is very frustrating being a police officer in the cities these days because they try so hard. They catch the people, they get them convicted, and then there's no penalty to pay. And that's where we need help from the legislature.

DAN OLSON: Over a long span of history-- 50, 60 years-- I guess Minneapolis has lost a huge number of manufacturing jobs. And this is lamented very often. And I wonder if it's a big concern, if it's a legitimate concern, if we are, instead, becoming a city of services. I mean, how many good jobs can a city create when you have people selling tickets for theaters, people cleaning up the streets, and, in other words, jobs that do not have the level of pay of manufacturing jobs? And is this the kind of economy that Minneapolis has come to is, essentially, a service economy for the surrounding areas?

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: That's always a concern. We were dismayed when 3M, for example, decided to have a huge expansion in Texas. You'll notice their corporate headquarters are still in the Twin Cities and their executives still live here, but they did move some of their manufacturing into Texas and others have done the same. And that's partially because of the tax rates here, because we are a very high taxing state. We provide a lot of services, but we also collect a lot of taxes.

You want a community to be broad based. We don't want to be like Houston where, if they have a bad year for oil, the whole city goes downhill. Or Seattle, if Boeing is having a bad year, Seattle is having a bad year. In the Twin Cities, we find that we have 32 Fortune 500 companies headquartered here. And it's such a diverse group that, if the entire country's economy is going downhill, well, we feel it, too. But if it's just one particular industry, we're pretty well isolated and insulated from those. And so keeping a broad based economy, which we do have, is keeping us very healthy.

I worry about being just a service community, but I don't think that's happening. I think we are still looked at as a very high technology area. We still have among the best education systems in the country. I do a lot of work for the Air Force Academy. And we find that people from this community can compete nationwide and we get twice as many people selected by the Academy than almost any other community in the country based on our population. And it's because we have good education here. Not just in Minneapolis, but I'm talking about the Twin Cities area as a whole.

DAN OLSON: Dennis Schulstad, thanks so much. Nice talking to you.

DENNIS SCHULSTAD: It has been a real pleasure. And I've always enjoyed working with you and I will miss it very much.

GARY EICHTEN: Former Minneapolis City Council member Dennis Schulstad. Earlier, we heard from former Minneapolis City Council members Alice Rainville and Walter Dziedzic. The three serve for a total of 65 years in the Minneapolis City Council before they all retired this week. Our Voices of Minnesota Interviews were conducted and produced by Dan Olson.

Well, that does it for our Midday program today. I'd like to thank you for tuning in. And a reminder that we will be rebroadcasting these three interviews at nine o'clock tonight. So second chance to hear from the Minneapolis City Council veterans who are moving on to other things. Nine o'clock tonight, a rebroadcast.

On Monday, first of all, at 11:00 AM, at this point, we're planning to take a closer look at the new welfare rules that have taken effect with the start of the new year. Welfare recipients, essentially, have been told to go to work. That's at 11:00 AM and then conservative commentator Fred Barnes over the noon hour.

Mike McCall-Pengra and Sarah Meyer, the producers of our Midday program this week. We had production help on that flood program from Eqan Kare, John Rabe, and Hope Deutsche. I'm Gary Eichten. Thanks for tuning in.

LYNNE ROSSETTO-KASPER: It's Lynne Rossetto-Kasper. This week on The Splendid Table, it's our sense of taste with Dr. Linda Bartoshuk. Low fat food may be doomed. That's Saturday at 2:00 and Sunday at 7:00 on Minnesota Public Radio KNOW FM 91.1.

GARY EICHTEN: You're listening to Minnesota Public Radio. We have a cloudy sky. 43 degrees at Kenner WFM 91.1. Minneapolis and Saint Paul. Should be partly cloudy through the afternoon. Temperature might go up another degree or so. Cloudy tonight with flurries possible. Low 25 to 30, windy, and colder tomorrow with flurries. High temperatures dropping through the 20s tomorrow.

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IRA FLATOW: From National Public Radio in New York. This is Talk of the Nation Science Friday. I'm Ira Flatow. It's a new year with new discoveries. Ever wonder why it's so hard to remember your dreams? Well, computer pictures of the brain taken while people dream have given scientists an explanation and also a reason why dreams can be so weird.

Another research team can make cells change color from green to blue when genes inside the cells are activated, a feat that may help discover new drugs. This hour, we'll look at some of the first science stories of the new year. And then it's open phones. What stories would you like to talk about? You make the call, but only if you make the call. It's all coming up, so stay with us.

CRAIG WINDHAM: From National Public Radio news in Washington, I'm Craig Windham. A private wake is being held at the Kennedy family compound in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, today for Michael Kennedy, who was killed in a skiing accident. Deborah Becker of Member Station WBUR reports from Boston.

DEBORAH BECKER: The wake is being held at the home of Michael Kennedy's mother, Ethel Kennedy. It is the summer home she had shared with Michael's father, the late Senator Robert Kennedy. A funeral mass will be held tomorrow morning on Cape Cod. After that, Kennedy family members and friends will make the 90-minute trip for the burial at the Holyhood cemetery in Brookline, Massachusetts, where Michael's grandparents and brother David are buried. Toxicology tests indicate that drugs and alcohol were not behind the accident in which the 39-year-old Kennedy slammed into a tree, apparently while playing football as he was skiing in Aspen, Colorado. For NPR news, I'm Deborah Becker in Boston.

CRAIG WINDHAM: A medical examiner's report says comedian Chris Farley died of an accidental overdose of cocaine and morphine. The 290-pound actor also had a narrowing of the heart arteries, which contributed to his death. Farley was found dead in his apartment in Chicago the week before Christmas.

Terry Nichols's wife was the first defense witness in the sentencing phase of his Oklahoma City bombing trial today. She testified that he is a good father to their two young children, even changing their diapers when they visit him in prison. Earlier, the judge rejected a defense motion to halt the sentencing proceedings. Defense attorney Michael Tiger said the emotional testimony from victims' relatives had prejudiced the jury. The opposition in Kenya is crying foul even before final election results have been reported. But it appears that President Daniel arap Moi has won another term in office. Jennifer Glass reports from Nairobi.

JENNIFER GLASS: Opposition leaders say they want another presidential election in Kenya in the next 21 days because this week's vote, they say, was not fair. Mwai Kibaki is in second place behind President Moi. He says Moi has stolen hundreds of thousands of votes. Kibaki would not say what his supporters will do if Moi is declared the winner as expected. The government has warned it will deal severely with anyone inciting Kenyans to violence. In 1992, the opposition made similar claims just before Moi was sworn in, but they were unable to do anything to invalidate a vote widely believed to be flawed. For NPR news, I'm Jennifer Glass in Nairobi.

CRAIG WINDHAM: A computer failure that has left the Russian Space Station Mir short on power is expected to be fixed quickly, according to NASA officials. The problem left the station's solar panels unable to track the sun properly. The faulty components will be replaced later today. Adventurer Steve Fossett is halfway to Europe in his quest to become the first person to fly around the world non-stop in a balloon. He's expected to be over Europe later today. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial average is up 14 points in light trading. The NASDAQ composite is up, too. This is NPR News.

SPEAKER 1: Support for NPR comes from Borders, Books, and Music, a place to satisfy existing curiosities and discover new ones. Location information at 800-644-7733.

KATHLEEN HALLINAN: Good afternoon from Minnesota Public radio, I'm Kathleen Hallinan. Failed state Senate candidate John Darius is suing the Minneapolis Star Tribune for defamation of character. Darius says the paper defamed him and ruined his state senate bid in 1996. Minnesota Public Radio's Mark Zdechlik reports.

MARK ZDECHLIK: Darius is seeking more than $50,000 from The Star Tribune. His attorney, Clinton Collins Junior, says the newspaper harmed Darius's reputation by recklessly placing his picture next to a charity fraud story on primary day 1996.

CLNTON COLLINS JUNIOR: Not only is John entitled to compensation, The Star Tribune needs to be taught a lesson, that they just can't play with people's lives like this and just say, we're sorry, and walk away from it.

MARK ZDECHLIK: Shortly after losing the primary, Darius unsuccessfully petitioned the state Supreme Court to order a new election. No one from The Star Tribune was available for comment on the defamation suit. This is Mark Zdechlik, Minnesota Public Radio.

KATHLEEN HALLINAN: Environmentalists plan to file suit today to block logging of old growth red pines in Superior National Forest. Protesters are blocking the logging road to the Little Alfie site near Ely. Protests a year ago spared old growth white pines. The US Forest Service is trying to remove protesters, saying they're blocking access to noncontroversial logging sites as well.

Brown and Williamson Tobacco says it will pay a $100,000 fine to the Ramsey County court today. A judge fined the maker of Lucky Strikes for failing to surrender documents in Minnesota's lawsuit against the tobacco industry. He's threatened a daily fine of the same amount if the company fails to turn over the complete documents by a 10-day deadline. The case goes to trial January 20th.

Minneapolis Police plan to expand a strategy they believe helped reduce gang related killings in 1997. Next month, police will begin computer-assisted analysis to target robbery, burglary, car theft, and petty crimes. The state forecast through the afternoon includes mostly cloudy skies. It will be windy with near record warmth in Southern Minnesota. There's a chance of light snow in Northern Minnesota. Highs should range from 10 degrees near Crookston to 55 near Worthington. This hour in the Twin Cities, it's cloudy and 43 degrees. That's news from Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Kathleen Hallinan.

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IRA FLATOW: This is Talk of the Nation Science Friday. I'm Ira Flatow. Later this hour, it's open phones where we'll take all your comments and questions about anything that has to do with science. But before we do that, two studies out today in the Journal of Science that are quite interesting. I want to get to them. The first takes us inside the brain to find out what happens during REM sleep when we dream. Now, you've heard over the years that.