Speech team wins subsection

FAIRMONT — Fairmont High School’s speech team recently won the Subsection 2A South speech tournament, with 22 of the school’s students advancing to section competition.

Fairmont scored 188 points, easily besting runner-up Mankato Loyola, which earned 77 points.

In individual results, the following Fairmont students finished in first place: Annika Wheeler, storytelling; Apoorva Komaragiri, prose reading; Bergen Senf, discussion; Bethany Linse, great speeches; Eric Head, creative expression; Grace Higgins, original oratory; and Isabell Geiger and Tabitha Thatcher, duo interpretation.

The following Fairmont students finished in second place: Ameya Komaragiri, original oratory; Emily Kerekes, informative speaking; Kaycie Brookens, prose reading; Tabitha Willner, poetry reading; and Weston Loughmiller, extemporaneous speaking.

The following Fairmont students finished in third place: Izzy Munsch, dramatic interpretation; and Sydney Hainy, humorous interpretation.

The following Fairmont students finished in fourth place: Briana Joseph, original oratory; Eleanor Hamlet, discussion; Jacalyn Reischl, extemporaneous reading; and Kara Fischer, dramatic interpretation.

The following Fairmont students finished in fifth place: Gracia Heille, humorous interpretation; Lilly Laven, informative speaking; and Paige Hainy, extemporaneous reading.

Hagedorn backs ‘WAGE Equity Act’

WASHINGTON — Congressman Jim Hagedorn of southern Minnesota is co-sponsoring Rep. Elise Stefanik’s “WAGE Equity Act.”

He says the act would do the following:

o Empower employees to utilize flexible work arrangements.

o Create a “self-audit” system that would incentivize businesses to rectify pay disparity proactively.

o Protect an individual’s ability to negotiate employment based upon merit while also offering the flexibility to voluntarily disclose prior salary history.

o Protect employers’ ability to ensure negotiations in good faith by explicitly protecting the employer’s ability to have a salary expectation conversation and allowing the employer to act on salary history if it is voluntarily offered during interview process.

o Protect employee ability to discuss compensation with their colleagues while giving employers the right to set reasonable limitations on the time, location and manner of this activity.

o Authorize a grant program for targeted negotiation education for women in college and career/tech programs.

o Instruct the General Accounting Office to conduct a study on the causes and impacts of the “manager’s gap,” which is a time when many women leave the workforce for parental reasons and has been shown to be a significant cause of pay inequity.

Body of Amboy man recovered

AMBOY (AP) — Authorities have recovered the body of an elderly man presumed drowned while clearing a drainage ditch west of Amboy.

The body of Marvin Borkenhagen, 92, of rural Amboy was found Tuesday morning around 1 1/2 miles downstream from where he is believed to have fallen in, according to the Blue Earth County Sheriff’s Office.

The search for Borkenhagen began the evening of March 21 after someone reported his unoccupied vehicle parked near a ditch a half-mile west of the intersection of county roads 32 and 144, Family members and friends who are familiar with the area helped authorities search.

Investigators believe Borkenhagen was attempting to clear a field culvert that empties into the ditch.

The Ramsey County Medical Examiner is conducting an autopsy.