Good morning and welcome to another work week.

Minneapolis teachers and education support professionals approved a new contract Sunday. Over the weekend as members voted, the union and district agreed to a plan to to bring educators back on Monday as a transition day, with students returning on Tuesday. The strike lasted nearly three weeks. The union said nearly 76 percent of teachers voted in favor of the contract, while close to 80 percent of the education support professionals voted yes. To help make up the missed school days during the strike, students will be in school longer, 42 minutes a day beginning April 11. The school year will end Friday, June 24. Spring break remains on the schedule, April 4 - 8.

Minnesota is in line for about $300 million from a national settlement with major opioid manufacturers, but, as MPR’s Brian Bakst reports, how soon that money gets put to use fighting addiction and its spillover effects is up to state lawmakers.  A bill that ratifies terms of the legal settlement and guides cities, counties and tribal governments could reach final votes soon. At least that’s the hope of legislation backers, who say it will enable Minnesota to start collecting its share as early as possible.  “Minnesota could begin receiving our lawsuit settlement funds as early as April if this bill was passed,” said Julie Ring, executive director of the Association of Minnesota Counties. “We know that's probably an aggressive timeline in the Legislature, but the sooner it's passed – meaning this session – the sooner the money will begin to flow in Minnesota.” Thousands of lawsuits were filed by government entities around the country over the past eight years over the devastation caused by highly addictive prescription painkillers. The medications were freely prescribed and subsequently abused. Known opioid overdoses have killed more than 5,000 Minnesotans and had a much broader societal toll.

Via a news release: Minnesota is rolling out a new at-home COVID testing program, as it phases out mail-order lab tests at the end of this month. Beginning tomorrow, Minnesotans will be able to order two test kits (for a total of four tests) per home through an online ordering system. Minnesota has secured 500,000 test kits (for a total of 1 million at-home tests) and the program will be available until all the test kits are ordered. Minnesota will use this program as a model for providing more access to COVID-19 rapid testing in the months ahead. “Our goal has always been to ensure that when Minnesotans need a test, they can get one quickly and easily,” Walz said in a statement. “Even as case numbers decline, it’s important that Minnesotans test for COVID-19 if they are feeling sick. That’s why we’re continuing to work to make tests easily accessible – now and in the future.”

Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar said on ABC News Sunday that Senate Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas should recuse himself from some cases after news broke last week that his wife sent text messages to former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows urging him to help overturn the 2020 election results. "The facts are clear here. This is unbelievable," said Klobuchar, who is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. "You have the wife of a sitting Supreme Court justice ... advocating for overturning a legal election to the sitting president's chief of staff." Klobuchar said the integrity of the court is at issue due to Ginni Thomas’ texts. “She also knows this election -- these cases are going to come before her husband," Klobuchar said. "This is a textbook case for removing him, recusing him from these decisions."

Klobuchar's office played a role in getting Tyler Jacob, 28, of Winona, Minn., released after he was captured by Russian troops in Ukraine.MPR’s Matt Sepic reports Jacob was trying to leave the country when Russian forces detained him. His mother Tina Hauser said her son got on a bus expecting a ride out of the country with other foreigners. Instead, the Russian military took him to a jail in Crimea and held him there for about 10 days. "All I know right now is that it was not a very good situation, but he wasn't treated badly or anything like that,” she said in an interview with MPR News Friday. “He was released and is now in a safe area."

Highly pathogenic avian influenza has been confirmed in two poultry flocks in Minnesota, the state Board of Animal Health announced Saturday. The agency said the affected poultry flocks are a commercial flock of nearly 300,000 turkeys in Meeker County, and a backyard flock of 17 chickens, ducks and geese in Mower County. Samples collected from both flocks were tested on March 25 and confirmed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The state Board of Animal Health said they're the first confirmed cases in Minnesota in 2022. Back in 2015, 9 million birds in Minnesota were killed by the virus, or euthanized to slow its spread. The virus is believed to be spread by migrating waterfowl in the spring. Poultry producers in the state had been on high alert for weeks, and taking steps to increase biosecurity, after the virus was detected in neighboring states, including Iowa and South Dakota.

Some incumbent legislators lost their party endorsements at conventions over the weekend, according to reports on Twitter. In the newly formed Senate District 54, Sen. Eric Pratt, R-Prior Lake, lost to Natalie Barnes. In Senate District 40, where Democrats John Marty and Jason Isaacson had been paired, Isaacson dropped out after Marty had strong support on the first ballot. And in House District 67A in St. Paul, Liz Lee won the endorsement over incumbent Rep. John Thompson.

And Rep. Jen Schultz, DFL-Duluth, is expected to announce a run for Congress today against 8th District GOP Congressman Pete Stauber. Schultz is a professor of economics with a specialty in health care at the University of Minnesota Duluth. She filed paperwork with the FEC to launch a campaign on Friday.

The Star Tribune had a good Sunday piece from Stephen Montemayor about Republicans wrestling with how to move on from former President Donald Trump’s baseless claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him : As Minnesota Republican candidates try to win back statewide elected offices for the first time in more than a decade — and also control of the Minnesota Legislature — at least a half dozen are mixing false claims about mass election fraud and the COVID-19 pandemic with other talking points on public safety and the economy. Now under new leadership, the Minnesota GOP is at a crossroads as it approaches this spring's convention: Forcefully rein in discredited and conspiratorial claims, or stay quiet while levying allegations of the same practices against their political opponents? "It keeps us from moving forward — which has to happen," said Amy Koch, a GOP operative and former Minnesota Senate majority leader. "We do run the risk of getting bogged down and looking backwards and fighting a fight that's over and resolved and decided."