St. Paul police and school staff have found four guns inside or near two high schools in a week’s span, the police department said Friday.

Two of the cases happened Thursday: At Humboldt High School on Baker Street, a 13-year-old was located with a gun; and outside Harding High School on East Sixth Street, police arrested a 15-year-old who had a gun and who’d made threats against the school, said Sgt. Toy Vixayvong, a St. Paul police spokesman.

Last Friday, April 11, police found two guns in a student’s backpack inside Harding, Vixayvong said.

There had been no previous instances of guns found on St. Paul Public Schools property this school year; last school year five guns were discovered, said school district spokesperson Erica Wacker.

St. Paul police and the school district provided this information about the recent incidents:

Harding

On Thursday, just before 2:10 p.m., police received a report that a student might be armed outside Harding. He had not been on school property but he made threats to show up at the school with a gun, Vixayvong said.

Police searched and found the 15-year-old student, who had a gun, in a wooded area near the Harding Arena, Vixayvong said. He was arrested.

Earlier Thursday, at about 9:40 a.m., police were told that a different Harding student made a video with a gun and sent it to another student as a threat, said Alyssa Arcand, a St. Paul police spokeswoman. Police checked the student and found no gun.

Additional security measures were taken at the school on Thursday, Principal Tony Chlebecek wrote to parents.

Last week at Harding, the school notified police about 9 a.m. April 11 that a 15-year-old student had posted himself on social media holding a gun, Vixayvong said. Staff brought the student to the office and searched him, but did not find a gun. They checked surveillance video and saw he’d handed a backpack to a female student.

A search of the female student’s locker turned up a backpack with two guns inside, one of which was stolen, Vixayvong said. Police arrested the 15-year-old male. The other student said she didn’t know there were guns in the bag.

“No threats were made and no one was injured,” Chlebecek wrote in a letter to parents about that case.

Humboldt

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Police were notified around 3 p.m. Thursday about the situation at Humboldt. Earlier, staff searched a student’s backpack and found an empty holster, and they dismissed him for the day, Vixayvong said.

Staff received a tip that another student, a 13-year-old, had the gun and they found it in his backpack, according to Vixayvong. Police arrested him.

The other student had reportedly asked the 13-year-old to hold onto the gun for him. The 14-year-old turned himself in to police Thursday night, Arcand said.

Humboldt Principal Valerie Littles-Butler wrote to parents that there had not been threats made in the case.

Both she and Chlebecek also wrote: “I can’t stress enough for all members of our … community to say something if you see or hear any safety concerns. If you have any weapons in your home, make sure they are safely stored and not accessible.”

By Aisha Sultan, St. Louis Post-Dispatch

With less than a week to see dramatic rugged coastlines, lush rainforests, mountain ranges including glaciers and volcanoes, stunning waterfalls, acres of colorful tulips and three unique cities, our travel itinerary to the Pacific Northwest featured zero downtime.

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Few places in the country jam as much geographic diversity, culinary delights and cultural and historic interest as Oregon, Washington, Idaho and British Columbia. We designed our mini-adventure to include Portland, Seattle, Vancouver and nearby surrounding areas.

We planned our visit during the annual Skagit Valley Tulip Festival during the month of April in Mount Vernon, Washington. This festival draws hundreds of thousands of visitors to the vibrant bloom of tulips across several farms in the Skagit Valley region. It’s much closer than the iconic tulip fields in the Netherlands and can be worked into a longer trip to the region.

Since there were no direct flights from St. Louis to Portland, it took more than seven hours of travel time just to get from airport to airport. Our return trip took even longer due a layover in Dallas.

That left us five full days to cram in as much sightseeing, hiking and eating as possible. For travelers who prefer this style of intense vacationing, these are some highlights from each area worth a visit. It’s hard to do justice to this entire region in such a short span of time, but for those constrained by budget and vacation days, who want to focus on both natural splendor and city life, it’s possible to maximize the potential of a shorter visit. It required planes, trains and automobiles to make it happen.

Here’s how we did it:

Oregon trails

The Columbia River gorge is a river canyon, 80 miles long and up to 4,000 feet deep, outside of Portland, Oregon. Scenic vistas feature cliffs, spires and ridges and peaks of the Cascade Mountain Range.

We left early in the morning from downtown Portland to drive about 45 minutes east on State Route 14 to the Columbia River Gorge — one of the most stunning landscapes in the country. The Columbia River carved this terrain of cliffs, forest and waterfalls as it cut through the Cascade Mountains.

It stretches for about 80 miles along the Oregon-Washington border. The views of the river canyons and towering forested cliffs are breathtaking and provide several scenic stops along the way.

Columbia River Gorge from Vista House, Crown Point, near Corbett, Oregon. (Jay Beiler/Dreamstime/TNS)

The historic Vista House atop of Crown Point is a must-stop overlook for panoramic views of the Columbia River. In mid-April, the gusting wind felt bone-chilling, and we were glad to have our jackets. We stopped to take photos in fields of wildflowers along the way.

Multnomah Falls is Oregon’s famous waterfall and most visited natural site, while a short mile away is the more delicate Fairy Falls. Lush rainforest drape the gorge.

We made a point to visit Hood River, the windsurfing capital of the world, during our 35-mile scenic drive of the “Fruit Loop” through orchards, vineyards and farmlands. Mount Hood dominates the background landscape while the river gorge features dramatic canyons. This scenery often feels magical and ethereal, especially earlier in the season when fewer tourists are around.

We drove back to Portland to have dinner in one of its renowned eclectic eateries, Gado Gado, an Indonesian and Malaysian-centered restaurant featuring Southeast Asian fusion cuisine in the Hollywood district. We were not disappointed by the spicy beef rendang and zucchini and corn fritters.

The next morning we visited the Portland Japanese Garden, considered one of the most authentic Japanese gardens outside of Japan. We meandered through the stunning, strolling pond garden, visited a traditional tea house and admired the traditional Japanese landscape. Having visited gardens in multiple states, this is one of the most unique immersions in nature and culture.

Chinatown in Seattle

The Chinatown-International District in Seattle has a rich history dating back to the late 1800s and is one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city.

From there, we took off for our two-day excursion into Washington, during which we planned to eat as much as possible in Seattle and take a train to Mount Vernon to frolic through the fields of blooming tulips.

Our first stop was Pike Place Market, where I’m almost embarrassed to reveal everything I consumed. I started with a drink from Tiny’s Apple Cider stand and a red bean sesame ball from Mee Sum Pastry. I sampled both sweet and savory crumpets from The Crumpet Shop — salmon for the savory and a honey, walnut, ricotta for dessert. We tried the flaky croissant from Le Panier and an Aditi Chai and mango from a fruit stand. These were just the snacks.

In Chinatown, we had to dine in Bruce Lee’s favorite restaurant, Tai Tung, where we sat at his table and ordered his favorite dish — beef with oyster sauce. We also tried the sweet walnut shrimp and almond chicken. We took pictures in the Bruce Lee room with life-size cardboard cutouts of the martial arts movie star.

We couldn’t leave Seattle without having seafood. The next morning we enjoyed Lowell’s Restaurant Dungeness crab omelette in Pike’s Market. We waited outside before it opened to avoid the line. And for dinner we dined at Elliot’s Oyster House, a classic waterfront restaurant, and feasted on oysters, chowder and scallops. Of course, we drank coffee and ate Top Pot Doughnuts before heading to Mount Vernon, which takes about an hour by car and two hours by train.

There are five different farms offering tours and visits during the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival. We bought a self-guided tour at RoozenGaarde, which cost $16 for weekdays and $20 for weekends when purchased online during the festival. The 50-acre tulip fields created spectacular blocks of color. There were so many photo opportunities among the rows of vibrant flowers and from elevated points for a different artistic angle.

Vancouver

We left our rental car behind in the States and took the scenic Cascade route on Amtrak, which connects Seattle and Vancouver. It takes about three and a half hours, but the time flies by when looking out the large windows at views of clear lakes, snow-capped mountains and dense forest. It’s worth springing for the business class seats for the extra room and larger, reclining seats.

Since we only had two days to see as much of Vancouver as possible, we decided to purchase a guided bus tour that included top attractions — Stanley Park, Capilano Suspension Bridge, Granville Island, and downtown highlights like Gastown and Chinatown. Proving that some stereotypes are rooted in truth, a Canadian woman in the back of our bus apologized to the tour operator for having to take a call during her introduction. We found the Canadians to be exceptionally nice, polite and always happy to talk about hockey.

Our finest dining experience of this trip was at the downtown, award-winning restaurant, Five Sales, where we ate scallops while gazing out the floor-to-ceiling windows at the breathtaking view of the harbor and Lion’s Gate bridge.

©2025 STLtoday.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By CHRIS MEGERIAN

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is preparing to make one of the controversial personnel changes laid out in the conservative Project 2025 blueprint for his second term.

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He plans to reclassify 50,000 federal employees under what’s known as Schedule F, which means they’ll have less civil service protection. The proposal follows an executive order signed at the beginning of his term, and it’s expected to be published in the Federal Register on Friday afternoon.

Trump announced the move on social media before the rule was published Friday.

“If these government workers refuse to advance the policy interests of the President, or are engaging in corrupt behavior, they should no longer have a job,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform. “This is common sense, and will allow the federal government to finally be ‘run like a business.’”

Administration officials argue that it’s necessary to increase accountability in the workforce. The change is expected to make it easier to replace career employees who have “important policy-determining, policy-making, policy-advocating, or confidential duties,” according to a White House fact sheet. Details were first reported by Axios.

Once the rule is finalized, the president plans to sign another executive order to conclude the process.

It’s the latest step in Trump’s battle against what he describes as “the deep state,” which frustrated his goals in his first term. Now he’s moving more swiftly to fire people and reshape the government bureaucracy, steps that have alarmed labor unions and political opponents who worry about him consolidating power and violating worker rights.

The fact sheet said the plan “empowers federal agencies to swiftly remove employees in policy-influencing roles for poor performance, misconduct, corruption, or subversion of presidential directives, without lengthy procedural hurdles.”

Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, criticized the move.

“President Trump’s action to politicize the work of tens of thousands of career federal employees will erode the government’s merit-based hiring system and undermine the professional civil service that Americans rely on,” he said in a statement.

While gathering outside a West Side clinic in St. Paul on Friday, clerical workers at HealthPartners and their union representatives with the Office and Professional Employees International Union Local 12 announced that they are prepared to go on strike starting May 5.

More than 1,000 Local 12 members work at HealthPartners around the metro in clerical roles including clinic assistants, administrative workers, claims staff and more, according to the union.

Issues that have recently stalled contract negotiations, according to union officials and members, include an allegedly disrespectful work environment for some, disagreements over fair wages, affordable health care benefits and more.

“HealthPartners has lost its way,” said Cesar Montufar, co-lead negotiator/union representative, outside the HealthPartners Clinic on Wabasha Street in St. Paul.

As one example, they cite that some clerical workers have been turning to food banks in the face of inflation while their current contract ended in November and negotiations recently stalled.

Union members shared other experiences and stories, including those of an increasingly hostile work environment for some. A union sign at the event urged: “End Harassment and Discrimination.” About 20 people were in attendance on Friday, including union officials, union members and current and past employees and supporters.

On Friday, as the strike date looms, Montufar said union members are open to continuing negotiations.

The Pioneer Press reached out to HealthPartners for comment; a spokesman replied in an email: “Our colleagues represented by OPEIU Local 12 work in various office and administrative positions in our organization, and they are a valuable part of our team. We remain committed to reaching a fair and financially responsible agreement with the union and hope to avoid a strike. If Local 12 representatives choose to proceed with a work stoppage, we will continue to support our patients and communicate with them directly as needed.”

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