Minnesotans made nearly 9 million visits to the food shelves in 2024, a steady increase in visitation rates since pre-pandemic levels, according to a new report’s findings.

The Food Group, a nonprofit working toward food justice and equity, released the report Wednesday, Feb. 26, in partnership with the Department of Children, Youth and Families. Highlights show grocery prices increased by 28% over four years.

The same groceries that cost $100 in 2019, according to the report, cost $128 in 2024.

Meanwhile, monthly assistance provided through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program tracked downward. Last year, SNAP recipients had an average of $100 less each month to spend on food in comparison to early 2023, according to the report.

“While food shelf visits continue to rise statewide, the good news is they aren’t rising as quickly as 2022 and 2023,” said Sophia Lenarz-Coy, executive director of the Food Group. “I applaud Minnesota food shelves for strategically expanding their programming to meet rising need. Tighter safety nets like the state child income tax credit and universal free school meals also make a meaningful difference for families experiencing hunger.”

The report highlighted how many food shelves adapted mobile or other delivery models to help distribute food to make it more accessible to the community.

In Mankato, ECHO Food Shelf saw an uptick in the number of families it serves. ECHO went from assisting 45 families per day during the pandemic to about 130 families per day currently.

Manager Deisy de Leon Esqueda said that to meet clients’ needs more quickly, the food shelf continued using curbside pick-up services, which were initiated during the COVID-19 pandemic. That allowed ECHO to serve more people than their physical space accommodates, reducing wait times for clients to receive food.

“For us to be able to keep serving our community, we just realized that the system that we had used during COVID would just stay in place until our numbers drop,” Esqueda said.

The report shows food shelf visits increased by an average of 18.4% between 2023 and 2024 in Minnesota’s 87 counties last year.

Jill Westfall, the Food Group’s statewide food access manager, said the food shelf use increased across all demographics.

“From 2023 to 2024, you can see the number of kids and adults is rising a little faster than the total number of seniors,” she said. “But we are seeing increases in all three age categories.”

Higher grocery prices were a big factor driving the increase in food shelf use in 2024, according to Westfall.

Related Articles

Minnesota seeks private landowners to help update state’s forest inventory

No charges filed in fatal Clay County, Minn., deer hunting accident

Federal immigration officials are said to have arrested 5 members of Duluth roofing crew

Ellison’s appearance at Red Wing school event canceled over security concerns

Trump makes US copper mining a focus of his domestic minerals policy

The Minnesota Forestry Association, in partnership with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, is looking for private woodlot owners in northwestern and western Minnesota who are willing to share information about their forest lands as part of an effort to build and update the state’s forest inventory.

“We basically need a few more plots in all of western Minnesota, all the way past Crookston to Clearwater County and all the way up to Kittson County,” said Brian Huberty, president of the Minnesota Forestry Association, which is based in Grand Rapids.

The MFA, which dates back to 1876 when the organization formed to promote tree planting, is helping the DNR recruit landowners for a plot-based inventory program the agency launched in 2024.

Using Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) aerial imagery and pairing it with Plot-Based Inventory sites, the DNR is working to assess Minnesota’s diverse landscape. To this point, PBI efforts primarily have focused on public lands, but with nearly half of Minnesota’s forests under private ownership, expanding inventory efforts to include private woodlands will provide a more comprehensive picture of the state’s forest inventory and ecosystem, Huberty said.

“For western (and northwestern) Minnesota, there’s like five to 10 or 20 more plots needed, ideally, scattered around to improve the model,” he said. “With northeastern Minnesota, we’re basically done as far as needing more plots. They’ve already measured the state and federal lands, so that’s already been done.”

Help from private landowners ultimately benefits all forest owners, both public and private, Huberty said.

“Minnesota forests and woodlands are constantly changing and evolving,” he said. “Just like any business, accurate information on your tree species, volume, forest structure and overall forest health is critical for effective woodland management. More importantly, our forests grow for years and require careful foresight and planning.”

Understanding forest structure is critical to preventing and mitigating future wildfires such as those last year in Lahaina, Hawaii, and this year in Los Angeles, Huberty said.

“You need to understand what’s growing in your back yard,” he said. “Because, when these climate swings happen and things dry out, that nice vegetation you may have in your back yard is really the next wildfire that’s going to happen and could burn down your house.”

The challenge, Huberty says, is getting the public to understand why a forest inventory is important.

“It’s technical for a lot of people, and I don’t blame anybody, because we take our trees for granted,” he said. “We just sort of look at it as, ‘Well, it’s a woodland, the back 40,’ or whatever you want to call it. But we never quantify it. We never think about different heights and different species that grow at different rates.

“It’s not just a tree — it’s a potential source for fuel, but it’s also a source for wildlife and a source for enjoyment,” Huberty said. And it needs to be managed.

According to the DNR, private woodland owners with more than 2 acres of forest can contribute to the information-gathering effort now underway and receive high-quality forestry inventory data of their woodland at no cost.

By enrolling, selected landowners voluntarily agree to have forest inventory plot data collected by a professional forester on their land. Participants will be selected based on the geographic data needed by the program.

After signing up, landowners will be contacted to confirm details and discuss the next steps. Landowners who are selected to share their woodlot information will receive a PBI report with details about the inventory data that was collected. A more comprehensive report will be sent after the project is completed at the end of 2025.

For more information, including a link to sign up for inventory plot data collection, go to the DNR Forest Inventory website at mndnr.gov/forestry/resource-assessment/forest-inventory.html or contact the Minnesota Forestry Association at minnesotaforestry.org, by phone at 218-879-5100 or by email at info@minnesotaforestry.org.

Related Articles

Trading snowflakes for sand dunes: Your Colorado winter desert escape awaits

Skywatch: Absolute perfection

Skywatch: A stellar baby factory

The ‘3 Old Guys’ hit the trail on 4,000-mile snowmobile trek to Newfoundland and Labrador

Skywatch: Valentine sky 2025

Authorities have closed the investigation into a deadly hunting accident that occurred in Clay County, Minn., on Nov. 9, determining that no charges will be filed.

“We don’t believe there was any type of recklessness or carelessness in this incident, just an unfortunate, terrible hunting accident,” Clay County Sheriff Mark Empting said this week.

The accident happened just minutes into rifle season northeast of Moorhead. Jace Srur, 34, of Dilworth, Minn., was shot in the head by a family friend from his hunting party.

“They had mapped out where everybody was going to be at, so everybody had an idea where everybody was sitting and everybody was hunting at mapped out (sites),” Empting said.

According to a letter from County Attorney Brian Melton, Srur moved from his designated location after it was believed he had shot a deer. Another hunter then fired a shotgun at a deer, unaware that Srur was in the direction of the shot. The hunters were 315 feet apart, and officials say the slug may have ricocheted through the trees.

“This round went through some trees, so it’s hard to say if it ricocheted off a tree or branch, what exactly happened,” Empting said.

Melton wrote that the hunters were experienced, took safety precautions and did not act negligently.

“A lot of hours go into these investigations, we want to get them right. For those advocates out there, I would say these people out there hunting were doing what they needed to do properly and correctly,” Empting said. “We feel that’s what the investigation found, sometimes when there’s trees in the way, you just don’t know what’s going to happen.”

A second hunting accident happened hours later in Norman County, Minn., where a hunter was shot in the face by a member of his party. He survived, and no charges were filed in that case.

Related Articles

Attempted carjacking in St. Paul leads to gunfire Thursday night

St. Paul man charged in fatal stabbing of wife in city’s first homicide of 2025

St. Paul City Council proclaims Mike Smith Day for retiring fire captain, longtime firefighter union president

As longtime St. Paul police officer battles stage 4 cancer, community rallies around him

St. Paul boy, 11, accidentally shoots himself while recording cellphone video

A solid regular season from Minnesota women’s basketball came to a close on Saturday with a 73-58 loss to No. 23 Michigan State at Breslin Center in East Lansing, Mich.

Now, the Gophers have a conference tournament to prove to NCAA tournament selectors that they are worthy of the program’s first invitation to the Big Dance since 2018.

Grace Grocholski finished with a game-high 23 points, added six rebounds and four steals, but as they have against ranked clubs all season, the Gophers would occasionally gain the upper hand before ultimately falling apart late.

This time, the Gophers couldn’t contain the Spartans on the offensive glass and were careless with the basketball, outrebounded on that end 14-8 and were outscored 14-8 on second-chance points. They also committed 18 turnovers, another rough game on that end marking a 1-4 end to the regular season.

“We were kicking out to open shooters on the perimeter, then missing 3-pointers, or over-driving into the paint and making bad passes that resulted in turnovers,” coach Dawn Pitzuweit said during a short postgame interview with KFAN-FM.

The Gophers were 3-14 from 3-point range, two from Grocholski and one from Tori McKinney, who finished with 17 points.

Minnesota (20-10 overall, 8-10 Big Ten) is now 0-7 against teams that were ranked in the Top 25 when they played, and 0-7 in so-called Q1 games, an important NCAA tournament qualifier that emphasizes the RPI and rank of an opponent, and the site at which it is played.

Last year, the Gophers advanced to the WNIT championship game, losing there to St. Louis.

The Gophers finished 13th in the Big Ten, earning one of the league’s 15 conference tournament spots in Indianapolis. They will likely start with a 2:30 p.m. tip against the No. 12 seed, probably Washington (17-12, 8-9), which whizzed past them last Wednesday at Williams Arena, 72-62.

Grace VanSlooten finished with a team-high 15 points and eight rebounds, six on the offensive glass, and 13 apiece by Julia Ayrault and Ines Sotelo for the Spartans (21-8, 11-7).

The Gophers took a 50-45 lead on Grocholski’s 3-pointer

Despite committing six third-quarter turnovers, the Gophers hung in there on the strength of their offense. They shot 60 percent from the field in the period, and were 8 for 8 from the line — the last two by Grocholski and pulling Minnesota to within a single point at 46-45.

A driving layup and 3-pointer by Grocholski gave the Gophers a 52-48 lead early in the fourth quarter but it unraveled from there — largely because of turnovers, four during a 17-4 Spartans run that made it 63-54 with 3:51 remaining.

The Gophers missed five of their first six shots from the field and committed four turnovers in the first 4 minutes of the game. Both teams, in fact, traded turnovers (seven total) until Ines Sotelo made a 3-pointer at 7:05.

Battle gave the Gophers their first lead, 12-11, by completing a three-point play, and Stewart’s jump shot capped a 9-0 lead that built the score to 14-11. The Spartans, however, made it 14-13 when Mallory Heyer lost a defensive rebound and Sotelo hit a layup as time expired on the quarter.

The Spartans scored the first three baskets of the second period, including a 3-pointer by Emma Shumate that gave them a 20-14 lead. But Minnesota kept playing defense — despite allowing seven offensive rebounds — and hung in there because of it.

Battle’s jumper with 4:09 left was the last field goal either team scored the rest of the half — Sophie Hart added one free throw — and the Spartans didn’t score at all for the last 4:56. Minnesota trailed 25-24 at intermission.

Related Articles

Women’s basketball: Gophers can’t keep up in 72-62 loss to Washington

Grace Grocholski, Sophie Hart push Gophers to ragged win at Purdue

Women’s basketball: Turnovers killing Gophers during 1-5 skid

Women’s basketball: Gophers squander early lead in loss to Oregon

Women’s basketball: Gophers push No. 9 Ohio State to overtime but fall 87-84