Mark Altenburg was our first interview in Moorhead this morning. He was the DFL nominee against Morrie Lanning in the last election, so he is obviously well-informed on the issues impacting district 9A, and also has a certain political perspective. He really was able to bring to light the impacts of the education cuts on the Moorhead public schools and the choices that we are facing as a state, and what will happen if we continue down this path. Here is a little bit of video from the full interview, which we will post tonight from hotel central.

Border towns like Moorhead are in constant competition like Mark had said earlier in the video with their out-of-state neighbors. Education shifts and cuts like the ones Tim Pawlenty has used to "balance" his budgets really put these districts at a disadvantage. Moving across the river to a better school district isn’t nearly as big of a hurdle when the better school district is just acorss a river. If we continue to move towards being the "Mississippi of the north" like Mark said, our image as a national leader in education is endangered. The MSU-Moorhead stories will also get to this struggling story of education in out-state Minnesota, and many folks out here feel this shift going on. The sense from the people we’ve talked to is that we can’t continue doing this in the upcoming budget cycles or struggling to survive will become the normal way of life and class sizes will continue to balloon.