BROWNSVILLE, Minn. — A missing 22-year-old graduate student from La Crosse, Wis., was found dead in the Mississippi River near Brownsville, Minn., on Wednesday, authorities said.

The Houston County Sheriff’s Office reported finding the body of Eliotte Heinz around 10:30 a.m. Wednesday. Heinz, a graduate student at  Viterbo University, was last seen in downtown La Crosse around 3:30 a.m. Sunday, according to the La Crosse Police Department.

Brownsville is about 7 miles downriver from La Crosse.

“La Crosse Police are continuing to investigate and will await the results of an autopsy for an official cause of death. The entire department sends their condolences,” the department said in a statement.

Police had previously asked La Crosse downtown businesses and residents to check their properties and cameras in the effort to locate Heinz.

“This was not the outcome we had hoped for throughout this search. Our thoughts are with Eliotte’s family, friends and all those who knew Eliotte. We are grateful for the outpouring of support from so many within the La Crosse community, the State of Wisconsin and nationally to locate Eliotte,” La Crosse Police Chief Shawn Kudron said in the statement.

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When the professional golf tournament in Blaine made the shift from hosting the PGA Tour Champions to the PGA Tour — the top pro men’s golf tour in the world — in 2019, there was a question hanging over the event: How would TPC Twin Cities hold up to some of the best the game has to offer?

The 50-plus-year-old legends ripped up the course over three days each summer. Now, players who could hit it infinitely harder were set to take it on? It couldn’t happen as the course stood.

So, Tom Lehman guided an overhaul that lengthened holes and bodies of water, among other things, to make the course more PGA Tour tough. Not that the 3M Open didn’t want to see scoring. Tournament executive director Hollis Cavner’s consistent moniker has been the pursuit of “birdies and trainwrecks.”

And, for the most part, there’s been a good balance of both over the tournament’s first six years, as the course has held up remarkably well. In three of the past four editions, the winning score was no better than 17-under par — the same tally Scottie Scheffler posted to win The Open last week.

Adam Svensson got 65% of the way to that score on Thursday. The Canadian tied the course record — previously set in the 3M Championship — and set a new tournament record Thursday as he fired an 11-under round of 60. And his lead is just two strokes over Sam Stevens and Thorbjørn Olesen, with a hoard of others following closely behind.

Three golfers shot 8-under rounds of 63, including the red-hot Chris Gotterup, who tallied a win and a third-place finish in two weeks played across the pond.

Thirty-four players shot rounds of 66 or better. Seventy-two percent of the field is under par through one round. Svensson surmised Thursday marked the best he’s ever putted, and he did lead the field with nearly five strokes gained on the greens.

But Thursday marked the rare day on the PGA Tour where it was possible to score even while not rolling the rock well. Emiliano Grillo shot a 65, despite losing nearly 1.5 strokes to the field putting, as he stuck his approaches near the cup on nearly every hole. Only three of the 18 holes played over par in Round 1.

Cumulatively, the 156-player field shot 335-under par Thursday.

“This course, it’s a great course, but it’s pretty straightforward,” Stevens said. “Not a whole lot of adjustments, just sort of point and shoot, and make as many birdies as you can.”

TPC Twin Cities’ primary defense is frequently the wind, of which there was little to none on Thursday. That issue was compounded by the massive allotment of rainfall that came Wednesday, which wiped out three-quarters of the scheduled pro-am and severely softened the course.

The wet conditions forced the PGA Tour to instill a “lift, clean and place” protocol in which players can pick up their ball anytime it lands in a shortly mown area — such as the fairway — clean it and set it up however they’d like. That erases the opportunity for mud balls and guarantees a perfect lie, which is generally thought to shave a stroke or two off a pro’s score for a round.

Friday’s second round could potentially bring more of the same. The forecast suggests the morning wave of golfers will play its first nine holes in 2-3 mph winds, with the wind “maxing out” at 6 mph in the afternoon.

Again, benign.

If Thursday’s results are replicated in Round 2, 6-under will be required simply to play the weekend. It’s not unimaginable that Svensson, or someone else, will have the lead pushed out to 17-under by the end of Round 2.

“Still tomorrow, it’s going to be fairly soft,” surmised Rickie Fowler, who fired a 65 on Thursday.

Things will level out over the weekend with no more projected rain in the coming days and winds expected to reach double digits in miles per hour over the weekend.

Don’t expect TPC Twin Cities to surrender a score like the 31-under par Scheffler won the Byron Nelson with earlier this year at TPC Craig Ranch.

More trainwrecks are likely to come on Saturday and Sunday. Thankfully, there is enough past evidence to know the course can provide a legitimate test, even if it got embarrassed on Thursday.

“This course is still pretty challenging,” said Matti Schmid, who fired a 63 Thursday. “I think you get some crosswinds and there are some tee shots with water. You still have to drive it pretty well, and also some of the par 3s, like 17 you have to hit a really good shot.”

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American Public Media Group, the nonprofit parent company of Minnesota Public Radio, announced Thursday that it will be reducing its staff as a result of recent government budget cuts to public broadcasting.

APMG plans to lay off 5% to 8% of its staff “in the coming weeks” and reduce employee benefits as it faces a more than $6 million budget deficit due to federal and state budget cuts, the St. Paul-based media company said in a statement.

“While we are fortunate among public media organizations to be in a relatively strong financial position, these are significant cuts,”  Roycie Eppler, chief people and culture officer for APMG, said in the statement.

In a move spurred by the Trump administration, the Republican majorities in the House and the Senate last week rescinded $1.1 billion in already-approved funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in 2026 and 2027. That effectively fully defunded the organization that directs federal dollars to National Public Radio, the Public Broadcasting System and some 1,500 local public radio and TV stations around the country, including Minnesota Public Radio.

Federal funding accounts for about 6% of MPR’s budget, the organization’s news division reported.

Minnesota lawmakers, aiming to tighten the new state budget, earlier this year also cut $1 million annually from MPR’s allocation for cultural heritage and legacy programming. That left the broadcaster with $2 million through June 2027, down from $4 million in the prior state budget, according to MPR News.

With a staff of approximately 500, 25 to 40 employees at APMG could soon lose their jobs. The company did not share details about which positions could be cut.

“We are working through details with care and respect and will continue to keep our team updated,” Eppler said.

APMG includes MPR and its news division; The Current, its contemporary music service; and YourClassical, its classical music service. It also includes American Public Media, which produces national public radio programming such as “Marketplace” and “The Splendid Table,” and Southern California Public Radio, a public radio network in the Los Angeles area.

Thursday’s announcement comes on the heels of layoffs at Twin Cities Public Television, the PBS station in Minneapolis-St. Paul, which was also impacted by the clawed-back federal funding. St. Paul-based TPT announced this week that it is laying off approximately 25 people across multiple departments.

The federal budget cuts are also expected to disrupt operations at four PBS outlets in greater Minnesota as well as other public radio stations outside the large MPR network, including Jazz88, community radio station KFAI and others.

“For nearly 60 years, public media has earned the support and trust of the American people as the country’s only local, no-cost, commercial-free, nonprofit news, information and culture service, resulting from a highly efficient public-private partnership,” Eppler said. “While we work through these financial challenges, we remain dedicated to our public service mission.”

The CPB, a private nonprofit, was created by bipartisan congressional approval in the 1960s. Trump administration officials tied the current funding cuts — which passed in both the Senate and House of Representatives on slim party-line margins — to an alleged left-leaning political bias within public media programming, though such concerns have not been well-substantiated by policymakers.

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