RED WING, Minn. — Dakota people from several communities gathered at a repatriation site in the Red Wing, Minn., area beginning Monday night, Sept. 8, to plan for the week’s events. They gathered at a quiet place atop a gently rolling terrace surrounded by trees on one side and farmland on the other.

Earlier the same day, Prairie Island Indian Community cultural resource workers completed preparations for the return of ancestral remains, along with hundreds of funerary items.

Taken from burial mounds in southeast Minnesota, the remains had been held by Minnesota institutions for many decades.

Beginning Tuesday morning, the Prairie Island Indian Community held ceremonies to rebury the remains of 59 people and almost 500 sacred items. The ceremonies are a part of the tribe’s ongoing commitment to care for their ancestors and their burial mounds.

Franky Jackson is the compliance officer for Prairie Island Indian Community. Jackson said he had started the work to bring home the remains in 2007 and that his office has prioritized the care of their relatives. He said there are many more still waiting to return home.

“This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to our responsibility,” said Jackson.

The ancestral remains that were returned Tuesday had been held in collections at the Science Museum of Minnesota and by the Minnesota Indian Affairs Council at a special repository at Hamline University. The remains cared for by MIAC at Hamline had come from collections at the University of Minnesota and the Minnesota Historical Society, among others.

The remains and sacred items were returned by both institutions in compliance with the 1990 Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, or NAGPRA, a law that requires federally funded institutions return American Indian remains and funerary items in their custody back to tribal nations.

‘It’s long overdue’

The Prairie Island Community’s tremendous love and respect for their ancestors required the cultural resource staff to build the relationships necessary to complete the process, according to Jackson.

Jackson said the repatriation was a collaboration among the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Minnesota Indian Affairs Council, the Science Museum, aided with research from Minnesota State University Mankato and neighboring Dakota communities.

On the Tuesday morning drive to retrieve the remains, Prairie Island historic preservation officer Noah White was joined by researcher Ron Schirmer, a professor at MSU Mankato, and Jay Renville, Sisseton Wahpeton Dakota. Renville is also a member of the Kit Fox Society, a traditional group that helps lead repatriations

“This process is long overdue,” White said.

Prairie Island’s historic preservation office invited MPR News to observe the procession held Tuesday.

On the ride to St. Paul, White, Renville and Schirmer shared stories about their experiences.

They recounted trips across the country over the past decade to repatriate ancestral remains. Shirmer recalled participating in as many as six repatriations. Renville remembered taking part in a recent trip to bring the remains of students from Carlisle Indian Industrial School back to South Dakota. He reflected on the differences between that experience and the one at present.

“Each one of these repatriations is a little bit different,” Renville observed.

While the drive to and from St. Paul was somber in tone, it was filled with a sense of purpose, and the mood in the van was largely positive.

Some of the remains repatriated Tuesday were removed during archeological digs which took place several years after the federal law requiring the return of remains to tribal nations had been passed.

“A lot of archeologists simply aren’t trained to know how to identify human remains. Students have to be properly trained,” Schirmer said.

Schirmer trains archeology and anthropology students at MSU Mankato on how to identify human remains at archeological sites. He also teaches students how to work alongside tribal nations on repatriation projects.

“When you are doing the right thing, you feel good about it,” the researcher said.

There were also moments of levity during the trip Tuesday. The conversation turned to the results of Monday night’s football game. There were moments of good-natured humor sprinkled in — a way to care for fellow team members and honor those who were going home.

“The relatives, they appreciate a little bit of humor too,” Renville said.

A collaborative process

Institutions who receive federal funding are required to publish inventories of American Indian remains in their custody. The process of returning remains to the Prairie Island Indian Community this week began in the 1990s when the Science Museum of Minnesota first published its inventories of human remains, according to Ed Fleming, a curator at the museum.

In an email to MPR News, Fleming explained that the most recent inventory was published early September 2024. Prairie Island completed their part of the repatriation process with a letter to the Science Museum in January.

Historically, institutions have denied the requests of tribal nations to return ancestral remains by claiming the remains were not “culturally affiliated” with a particular tribe. Recent updates to federal law closed those loopholes and strengthened tribal authority to make decisions regarding the return of their ancestors.

“All of the relatives returned (Tuesday) had been designated as ‘culturally unaffiliated,’ and so had not been claimed,” Fleming wrote. “The new regulations removed ‘culturally unaffiliated’ as a category and allowed for traditional knowledge to be a significant basis for claims, streamlining the process.”

Fleming added that it is the policy of the Science Museum to follow the leadership of tribal nations.

“We aspire to hold a cultural collection that is 100 percent ethically stewarded, and that may require in some cases going ‘beyond NAGPRA,’” Fleming wrote.

Almost two-thirds of the ancestral remains returned this week were in the care of the Minnesota Indian Affairs Council. The council represents 10 of the 11 tribal nations in the state and is written into the state’s burial laws. The group maintains a relationship with Hamline University to care for human remains at a special repository there.

Jackson said starting in 2017 he insisted the council’s cultural resource staff complete the necessary work of inventorying the remains.

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“Every meeting we went to, we would not let them off the hook,” Jackson said.

After visiting the Science Museum and Hamline University, the caravan returned to the reburial site near Red Wing. The caravan was met by more than three dozen Dakota people waiting near the entrance to the site. The vehicle carrying the remains was carefully unloaded.

After several minutes, a procession had formed by those carrying boxes containing the remains. They walked about a quarter of a mile, carrying their ancestors to the place where they would be reburied.

There’s no telling where Kody Clemens might be had Kyle Hendricks’ errant pitch not struck Luke Keaschall’s forearm in exactly the right spot to cause a fracture.

The night Keaschall got injured, the Twins’ front office went on the prowl for a replacement. Enter Clemens, who hadn’t gotten much of an early-season opportunity with the Philadelphia Phillies, and had been recently been designated for assignment.

“I keep telling everybody, I’m very grateful that the Twins brought me over here and gave me an opportunity to play,” Clemens said. “I haven’t had that in the big leagues and it’s been a roller coaster every year for me — hot and not, hot and whatnot. So, I’m just very thankful that they’ve given me this leash and given me the opportunity to try and show what I’ve got. And it’s definitely changed my career going forward.”

Not much has gone right for the Twins this season, but bringing in Clemens — who hit three home runs and tied Kirby Puckett’s single-game Twins record with 14 total bases on Friday night — is one thing that has.

Clemens hadn’t received more than 150 plate appearances in any season prior to this one. But the Twins had a need and Clemens has filled it, playing in his 100th game as a Twin on Saturday night. In those games, he has hit 19 home runs.

And for his efforts, he’s found plenty of support within the Twins’ clubhouse.

“He’s a guy that does all of the stuff you ask him to do every day,” manager Rocco Baldelli said. “He handles that stuff really well. He’s got a great attitude. He comes in ready to play.”

And while there’s no telling what the Twins’ roster might look like next year after an offseason that’s likely to feature changes following yet another disappointing season, Clemens has positioned himself well moving forward.

“I think he’s someone that can certainly help us and contribute to the Twins going forward. Can’t state specifics. I don’t know what goes on next year or the year after that here,” Baldelli said. “But what I can tell you is he has a lot of traits we’d desire. And he also just wants to play. He’ll do whatever he can do to help himself and help the team. And when you have an attitude like that, it generally leads to good things happening to you and people valuing your contributions.”

Laweryson gets the call

Cody Laweryson, 27, has been one of the St. Paul Saints’ best pitchers this season and on Friday, for that, he was finally rewarded with his first call up when the Twins placed Justin Topa on the injured list. Laweryson, who began his season at Double-A Wichita, was promoted to Triple-A in early June and had a 2.84 ERA across 25 1/3 innings with the Saints. Laweryson also spent time in 2023 at Triple-A.

“It was shocking at the time,” he said of getting the call. “I had high expectations for myself. I had a really healthy offseason and felt ready to go. At the time, it was a very surprising moment, but I’m excited.”

Briefly

The Twins will send Bailey Ober to the mound on Sunday in the series finale against the Arizona Diamondbacks. … With Friday’s dramatic walk-off win, Baldelli moved into a tie for third on the Twins’ all-time managerial win list with 522. He tied Sam Mele and trails just Tom Kelly and Ron Gardenhire.  “To appreciate that and be behind those two guys on that sort of list, I think that’s pretty sweet,” Baldelli said. … Catcher Ryan Jeffers, who is on the concussion injured list, is “doing more and he’s doing better,” Baldelli said.

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St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter’s no fun, no frills budget proposal calls for city department leaders to freeze most hiring and keep vacant positions unfilled. It’s a stiff request for the St. Paul Public Library system, which plans to cut four hours weekly from the Arlington Hills Public Library as a direct result.

The library budget proposal also funds security improvements to the Rondo Community Library, which would close during construction, and the remodel of the Hayden Heights Library.

Twice a week come January, the Arlington Hills Public Library would open at noon instead of 10 a.m., a direct response to losing the hourly equivalent of 1.3 librarians and custodians to vacancies and retirements. That adds up to about a $129,000 cut to the library system’s staffing budget.

The budget for substitute staffing also would be reduced $44,000, or 18%, equivalent to losing 34 hours of fill-in staffing per week throughout the library system, and a position in library operations will be repurposed from executive assistant to office assistant.

“I don’t want to reduce public services hours anywhere,” said Maureen Hartman, director of the St. Paul Public Library, addressing the St. Paul City Council on Wednesday as they convened as the city’s library board. “Nothing that I’m putting here on this list makes us happy, and yet these are some choices that we’re putting forward.”

Tough decisions

Forced to make tough decisions, Hartman said she queried staff and looked at circulation times and foot traffic to decide where to reduce hours, and found that Arlington Hills was busiest in the afternoons and evenings, or on select mornings when there’s a children’s story time.

That came as little consolation to council member Nelsie Yang, who said the city needs to prioritize keeping recreation centers and libraries open despite budget challenges.

“I am very opposed to the hour reductions here,” Yang said. “Not everybody who comes into the library comes and checks out books.”

“They’re there for a play space, as well. It serves many other purposes,” Yang added. “This is an area of the East Side where there are very high needs. It’s very, very shocking to see this be part of the proposal, and I’m very opposed to it.”

Rondo to shutter for security improvements

That’s not the only change in store for the library system, which will temporarily shutter the Rondo Community Library at Dale Street and University Avenue to make security improvements following a number of incidents that have put staff in conflict with unruly guests or young patrons.

The $793,000 project, to be funded by state public safety aid, will reconfigure the library’s entryway, relocate restrooms deeper into the building and move the service desk closer to the entrance.

A timeline has yet to be finalized, but during construction, which could get underway before the end of the year, books and services will be relocated to the Hallie Q. Brown Community Center on North Kent Street through a $100,000 lease.

“We’ve let our staff know that we may not need all of our staff at Hallie Q. Brown,” Hartman said. “All of our staff will remain employed. What that may mean is they may be temporarily working out of another library.”

Budget proposal

Carter’s overall city budget proposal, which was released last week, calls for a 5.3% increase to the city’s property tax levy. Yang said Wednesday that she wants to see that number drop further, though other members of the city council have said they appreciate that the proposed increase wasn’t larger.

The mayor opened budget season a year ago calling for a 7.9% increase, which the council reduced to 5.9% last December through an acrimonious process involving last-minute vetoes.

The library would operate next year on a $23.14 million budget, an approximate increase of $636,000, or 2.3%. That’s in addition to $4.26 million in special funding, which includes the state aid for work on the Rondo Library, among other projects.

For library materials, or the collections budget, the mayor’s proposed 2026 library budget includes $967,000 in general fund support, a reduction of $65,000 compared to 2025. That would be partially offset by up to about $40,000 in funding from the Friends of the St. Paul Public Library, which also is reflected in the special fund budget.

Funding to maintain the “Read Brave” student literacy program also would come from the special fund, backed by another one-time $20,000 donation from the Friends of the St. Paul Public Library. It’s unclear how the program will be funded after 2026, Hartman said.

Public safety incidents down

The library system drew 1.7 million visitors last year, a 10% increase over 2023. Numbers this year are trending a bit less as a result of a lengthy cybersecurity incident interrupting access to public-facing computers and other services, according to library officials. Including both its website and mobile app, the library system also drew 4.5 million online visitors last year, a 20% increase from 2023.

Hartman said reported public safety incidents throughout the library system are on track for a 40% reduction this year compared to 2024, in part due to monthly or bi-monthly staff training that is also becoming a standard part of onboarding new employees.

Six library “safety specialists” and a safety manager have been installed at hotspots, including the George Latimer Central Library and the Rondo, Rice Street and Sun Ray libraries.

Throughout 2026, the library system also plans to fully roll out a restorative practices initiative aimed at determining when and how to allow a patron who has violated codes of conduct back into a library building. Some staff have objected to managers calling the St. Paul police on youth misbehaving at the Rondo Library and other locations, even when some patrons call it necessary.

“Always the tension in our safety work is what is the line between (barring someone for unacceptable behavior) and ‘you’ve made a mistake, but we want to restore your library access,’” Hartman said.

Hartman said she planned to present more on the library safety strategy to the city council’s public safety committee in September.

Major construction and enhancements

Meanwhile, major renovations or rebuilds of three libraries are on the horizon.

Construction of a new, $10.4 million Hamline-Midway Library on Minnehaha Avenue has been underway for months, with an opening expected by the end of 2026. With about $3.5 million in funding falling into place from the city’s Capital Improvement Budget, the remodel of the Hayden Heights Library will begin next year.

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The Capital Improvement Budget proposes $784,000 to be put toward the $11.2 million renovation of the Riverview Library in 2027, on top of funds already in hand, but that still leaves about a $9 million budget gap before construction can begin. Work could, in theory, run from 2027 or 2028 into 2029.

The library system has selected a vendor for the creation of design standards for new “Play and Learn” interactive learning services in all locations, with enhancements coming to the Sun Ray Library next year.

With its remaining American Rescue Plan Act dollars, the library system plans to complete a $1.25 million RFID-related modernization project by the end of 2026. Technology enhancements to the Merriam Park and Rice Street libraries will be completed later this year.

There are few things in life as reliable as Cheryl Reeve coaching the Lynx into the WNBA playoffs.

Since being hired as the head coach in 2010, Reeve has vacationed during the postseason twice — once in her debut season and the other in 2022, when All-Star forward Napheesa Collier missed the majority of the season while pregnant. Otherwise, when the leaves are starting to turn in Minnesota, Reeve is presiding over a championship contender.

Minnesota Lynx guard DiJonai Carrington (3) and head coach Cheryl Reeve talk during the second half of a WNBA basketball game against the Indiana Fever, Sunday, Aug. 24, 2025, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

The consistency of success makes it easy to take Reeve’s coaching for granted. Despite the Lynx wrapping up the WNBA’s best record in two weeks before season’s end, the Associated Press voted Reeve’s opposition in the first round, Golden State’s Natalie Nakase, for its Coach of the Year award.

Game 1 of the first-round series with the Valkyries starts at noon Sunday at Target Center.

What shouldn’t be overlooked about this Lynx season is it represents something nearly unprecedented in basketball. Rarely has a coach in the modern era — on the men’s or women’s side — reinvented themselves with the same franchise after the end of one dynasty to rise to the top again.

Most times, when a coach returns to the peak, it does so with another team the way Phil Jackson did with the Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers, or Brian Agler with the Seattle Storm and Los Angeles Sparks.

One comparison to Reeve may be former Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich, who won championships 15 years apart. But he still had Hall of Famer Tim Duncan on the floor for his title runs. There are no players left over from Reeve’s Lynx dynasty, four WNBA titles from 2011-17. I

In fact, after last week’s induction ceremony, four of the starters are in the Naismith Hall of Fame and another, Rebekkah Brunson, is on the coaching staff. Reeve was able to rebuild a championship-level contender around Collier, an MVP contender this season, and a group of veteran players who aren’t likely to someday have busts next to Maya Moore, Sylvia Fowles, Seimone Augustus and Lindsay Whalen.

This group, which took the New York Liberty down to the final possession of the WNBA Finals last year, has relied on complimentary skillsets, interconnectedness and Reeve’s complete schematic overhaul from the dynastic days.

“The expectations are still the same, but how she goes about things changes throughout the years,” said Whalen, an assistant on Reeve’s staff.

One way in which Reeve has adapted is by leaning into the modern style of play, with a reliance on ball movement and 3-point shots. This year, the Lynx made the second most 3s per game, hitting the highest percentage (37.8%) of attempts from beyond the arc. They created their looks from deep with an unselfish style, registering assists on 72.6% of field goal makes, second-best in the league.

During their last championship run in 2017, the Lynx moved the ball effectively, but they ranked eighth of 12 teams in 3-point attempts (16.1).

The emphasis on ball movement has multiple players posting some of their best career seasons. Collier became only the second player in WNBA history to record a season in which he shot north of 50% from the field, 40% from 3-point range and 90% from the free-throw line. Key starters Courtney Williams and Alanna Smith set career highs in win shares, and guard Kayla McBride finished second in the WNBA in total 3-point makes.

“One of the first conversations she had with me was, she said, ‘We probably don’t have to talk much because I trust in you that you’re going to do the right thing,” Smith said. “That was before I even started training camp. When you have that confidence instilled in you from Day 1, it only helps elevate you.”

Bench players thrived, as well, with Sixth Player of the Year hopeful Natisha Hideman tying her career best in points per game, and forward Jess Shepard leading the league by shooting 63.8% from the field.

The Lynx’s head coach has also changed with the times.

When Reeve won her last title with Moore, Augustus, Fowles, Whalen and Brunson, social media was just starting to take hold, and Moore’s shoe deal with Nike was about as far as branding went. Now players put much more emphasis on sharing their personal lives with fans. That has been highlighted this year by Williams and Hiedeman’s popular Twitch stream Stud Budz, which was recently featured in Vogue magazine.

“They keep telling me that Cheryl wasn’t like this before me and (Hiedeman) got here,” Williams said.. “I don’t even really know the Cheryl that they’re talking about because they said Cheryl changed once we got here.”

McBride, who arrived in 2021 as the dynasty was coming to an end, confirmed that things have changed quite a bit with Reeve’s approach to players.

“It’s with the times. The players who are here, it’s a different vibe,” McBride said. “Those first three years she was still very strict from the dynasty times. …That’s not a knock, she’s just opened up. And I think it takes a special type of coach to be able to adjust to the players around you, and our players are different from players she’s coached before.”

That doesn’t mean Reeve has gotten softer when it comes to pushing players on the court, or calling them out after a game. Last week following a loss that meant nothing in the standings, Reeve snarked, “We haven’t played defense in about a month.”

But McBride says Reeve wouldn’t have built two squads over separate decades that are competing for championships by going easy on her players.

“The accountability, it’s kind of a lost art,” McBride said. “It’s very old school in that she holds everyone to the same standard, it doesn’t matter if you’re the MVP or if you are just coming in as a rookie.”

To open the postseason, the Lynx face off with expansion Golden State, a team they beat in all four regular-season matchups. Sunday’s opener begins their playoff journey with an aim for Reeve to win another championship outside of the dynasty.

“She’s our anchor, she’s our leader,” McBride said. “It’s really, really special what she’s doing, and we just want to continue to make it special.”

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