This today from Paddle and Portage:

"There was a report from the Star Tribune this week that the Gunflint Ranger Station in Grand Marais “has no employees.” The Paddle and Portage Podcast team went to the office Feb. 20 and found it was open and there were people at the front desk."

It would appear the Tribune was in error. It happens.

Is that entire article fake news then?

The Star Tribune known for this type of journalism?

JimEb: "Is that entire article fake news then?


The Star Tribune known for this type of journalism?"

No. The paper was quoting a woman who got fired. She's the one who actually made the statement that the station had no employees there. Should the writer have followed up and actually verified that the station had no employees, yes, but to call them "fake news" is inaccurate.

I posted to let people know that - as of today - the station has employees there as opposed to the thread saying it doesn't. Nothing more.

Interesting. I do not like the current state of journalism on either side of the aisle. Seems as if everything is overstated.

The good news is the ranger station is, in fact, staffed and open.

Question was who is staffing it. Someone from Tofte come up, is it some field personnel -perhaps a Ranger or someone usually not at the Station?
In past situations often they pull someone else in from another area?
I don't know, maybe someone does? One person left?

Feb. 20th
A spokesperson from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the umbrella agency that includes the Forest Service, told the News Tribune on Wednesday that the jobs of “2,000 probationary,


When asked again about how many were Superior National Forest employees, the spokesperson said, “I am afraid that this is all I have to share at this time. Please do check back soon and I may have more to share then.”

Pinetree: "Question was who is staffing it. Someone from Tofte come up, is it some field personnel -perhaps a Ranger or someone usually not at the Station?
In past situations often they pull someone else in from another area?
I don't know, maybe someone does? One person left?"

After listening to the accompanying Paddle and Portage podcast, it appeared there were many staff in and around the building. It didn't sound like anyone was pulled from some other facility.

Thanks for correcting.

I find journalism (on all sides) has really gotten lazy. Some of it is an effort to be first reporting, but most of it seems to be just lack of effort to verify.

Terminated employees (wrong or rightly terminated) have been unreliable sources of information from the beginning of time—all of us included. It’s human nature…a journalist should know that.

T

OneMatch: "

Pinetree: "Question was who is staffing it. Someone from Tofte come up, is it some field personnel -perhaps a Ranger or someone usually not at the Station?
In past situations often they pull someone else in from another area?
I don't know, maybe someone does? One person left?"

After listening to the accompanying Paddle and Portage podcast, it appeared there were many staff in and around the building. It didn't sound like anyone was pulled from some other facility."

They said the person at the front desk was from Tofte and filling in.

timatkn: "I find journalism (on all sides) has really gotten lazy. Some of it is an effort to be first reporting, but most of it seems to be just lack of effort to verify.


Terminated employees (wrong or rightly terminated) have been unreliable sources of information from the beginning of time—all of us included. It’s human nature…a journalist should know that.


T"

Yes, even basic journalism is getting to be a thing of the past. For just about any significant news event I can find actual experts on YouTube with way more accurate and in depth details than any major news outlet. Of course there's a lot of clickbaiters and political activists posing as journalists, but over the years I have found a few key trustworthy sources. There are no mainstream outlets that I trust when a story first breaks anymore. You can't even trust that the video or pictures they are providing are showing the full story instead of just the part that fits the narrative they are trying to reinforce.

The most disturbing trend IMO is mainstream news "stories" that are mostly screenshots of what celebrities and/or completely random people are posting on social media, treating them as some sort of authorities on topics they clearly have no clue about. It's no surprise so many "journalists" are getting replaced by AI, which is still bad, but not really much worse.

Well I disagree about YouTube :)…unfortunately we tend to gravitate towards what feeds our opinions or beliefs and any social media uses algorithms to feed that…it’s big money, but you won’t see viable arguments against your personal thoughts anymore—the exchange of ideas—back and forth—-it’s science, feed people what they already believe, it drives the chemistry in our brain. It feels good. This is for every single one of us BTW. Even the YouTubers I have more respect for fall for this… Joe Rogan included. I mean I watched a fake moon landing video once and it took months to get that out of my algorithm. My relative that went to the moon was turning over in his grave—-I was worried I would get haunted :) These fake videos do a great job BTW. If you don’t have direct knowledge or research the points it’s easy to fall for.

I agree about lazier news…so many times I see the news reporting twitter or X posts of some celebrity or a random Joe Schmoe as “news”. I know eye witness interviews are flawed too, but at least it was from someone in the area. Not Randos “posting”.

T

timatkn: "Well I disagree about YouTube :)…unfortunately we tend to gravitate towards what feeds our opinions or beliefs and any social media uses algorithms to feed that…"

To be clear I absolutely agree with that...but there ARE channels out there as well with actual experts. "blancolirio", for example, is a good one for the recent plane crashes. Juan does an excellent job of presenting the facts and explaining them.

JimEb: "Is that entire article fake news then?


The Star Tribune known for this type of journalism?"

The answers to these questions depend on whether or not they've issued a correction. I don't subscribe to the Star Tribune, so I don't know.

How hard is it to look up the phone number and call the place to see if someone answers?

timatkn: "Thanks for correcting.


I find journalism (on all sides) has really gotten lazy. Some of it is an effort to be first reporting, but most of it seems to be just lack of effort to verify.


Terminated employees (wrong or rightly terminated) have been unreliable sources of information from the beginning of time—all of us included. It’s human nature…a journalist should know that.


T"

That's because most of today's "journalists" are more interested in pushing an agenda than in reporting the unadorned facts. And that's true for media outlets on both sides of the sociopolitical aisle.

I just called the station. At this time, they will remain closed Sat-Tues THROUGHOUT the paddling season-they will only remain open Wed-Fri.

The guy I talked to said Tofte will be open throughout the paddling season come May, and if anyone has a permit to pick up in Grand Marias Sat-Tue, they should change their issuing station which, according to the guy I talked to, can be done online this year.

Of course, by next Monday all the above could be moot.

Good info. Thanks!

You can criticize the Tribune, but he took his info from the gal that was fired and the supervisor that quit. As far as office staff nobody has said there is anyone left. Why would Tufte be manning the station otherwise.
Yes staff will be shifted to cover. Bob who wrote the article has a good track record, maybe the next scenario what they were going to do was missing. Maybe all data points weren't covered.
Also I see no one, no one really care about office workers their selves who spent years serving us. Sounds very selfish by some. They lost their career.
Biggest ones who criticize had a extended agenda=-political.
Enough said, everyone is thin skinned and walking on egg shells hoping they don't break.
Thank you moderators for keeping the info line open and those who called the Gunflint station for new info.
Like a wildfire it always changing and wind directions shifting.
Take care everybody.

Pinetree: "Take care everybody."

Well said, PT. Thank you.

Pinetree…did you listen to the podcasts?

They went to the Ranger station where they allegedly had “Zero people left”

15 cars in the parking lot, multiple employees there. They brought someone from Tofte to run the front desk that day, but far from shut down or zero people left.

I’ll still blame the Star Tribune for lazy reporting…a legit article would include “we could not verify if there were no employees left or we called and the station is still open” This used to be standard operating procedure. It’s junk like this that drives people to even worse sources. If ya defend it or don’t call it out, it’s only going to get worse.

T

I agree with T.

In my opinion this was not an unbiased article. The reporter had an agenda, you can see it from the choice of words he used, fired instead of laid off. Also, from my experiences working in the public sector, there are a lot of things that can be done to make the public sector run more efficiently and cost-effectively. Do we really need 52 different permit issuing stations?

Thanks Pinetree. I too feel terrible for the many laid off people, in all departments, especially based on the reasons given.

EVERYONE on this website feels bad for the employees. If they don’t they should look in mirror…

I doubt anyone is going to say anything different…

But this is classic bait and switch argument…the OP’s post is correcting mis-information. There is misinformation that hasn’t been corrected in another post.

I think we can all agree people losing their jobs is bad
The effect on the BWCAW looks potentially bad
I would argue the majority on the website don’t like these specific cuts. I certainly don’t.

But also…many of us are sick and tired of lazy or biased journalism. This reporter didn’t do their job. They took an interview of a recently terminated employee at 100% face value…most likely because it fit their biased agenda. It’s lazy…it’s poor work. There is no defense for this.

T

briar: "I agree with T.


In my opinion this was not an unbiased article. The reporter had an agenda, you can see it from the choice of words he used, fired instead of laid off. Also, from my experiences working in the public sector, there are a lot of things that can be done to make the public sector run more efficiently and cost-effectively. Do we really need 52 different permit issuing stations?"

Do we really need people being terminated for no reason other than to downsize and then be told that they were let go due to performance issues? Hard NO.

Most people agree that the way our government behaves fiscally has a lot of problems. Just look at the national debt. But virtually nobody agrees on how to rein it in. There are two ways to balance a budget - spend less, or generate more revenue. The problem is that virtually nobody wants to pay more taxes, and everyone is opposed to spending cuts when those cuts affect them directly, or things they personally care about. As long as it only affects other people, that's okay. That's just human nature. So how are we supposed to get out of this mess? I don't have any good answers, but I have little patience for people who just complain about things without offering alternative solutions.

timatkn: "But also…many of us are sick and tired of lazy or biased journalism. This reporter didn’t do their job. They took an interview of a recently terminated employee at 100% face value…most likely because it fit their biased agenda. It’s lazy…it’s poor work. There is no defense for this.


T"

I hope you are taking your concerns directly to the Strib and not just sounding off here.

Frenchy19: "

timatkn: "But also…many of us are sick and tired of lazy or biased journalism. This reporter didn’t do their job. They took an interview of a recently terminated employee at 100% face value…most likely because it fit their biased agenda. It’s lazy…it’s poor work. There is no defense for this.



T"

I hope you are taking your concerns directly to the Strib and not just sounding off here."

I emailed about 5 sources of info coming out from it was closed to it was not
Bob who wrote the article in the tribune is the only one who responded and he did immediately. Give him credit.
HE Wrote what info he had available, and thought was 100% correct. He did mention in the article the downsizing last year also. Yes maybe he should of looked at other sources of info also. WE are all guilty of not doing that. I AM.
As it stands from other info available the front office staff and support staff is mainly gone.
Nobody has cleared it up who and how many remain.

The messenger the tribune I believe wrote it good faith, maybe he like most of us including me don't have all or the correct information all the time.

Sometimes you wonder who let the sharks out.
But will say it has been very cool and civilized questions by most.
Thanks.

I wouldn't mind paying a lot more taxes to maintain the present federal services, especially providing housing, food, and medical care to those in need. Also in the same camp as the economists who are not that concerned by the national debt considering over 3/4 of it is held by US citizens. Besides inflation adjusted it's about same as after WWII, 80 years ago.