Governor Tim Walz is requesting a U-S Agriculture Department disaster designation to help farmers having a tough harvest because of bad weather. The governor says in his conversations with federal officials he “conveyed to them the deep impact that this is making, that people are hurting — and then the issue I touched on a little bit:… I’m simultaneously adding mental health counselors, ’cause I’m concerned about suicide.”
Walz is requesting aid for a dozen northwestern Minnesota counties (Polk, Clay, Norman, Marshall, Pennington, Lake of the Woods, Kittson, Roseau, Red Lake, Wilkin, Becker and Mahnomen). He made the announcement at the Minnesota AgriGrowth Council’s Ag and Food Summit in Minneapolis.