Good morning. I hope you had a good Thanksgiving. Here are some items you may have missed.

President Joe Biden is headed to Rosemount tomorrow to talk about the infrastructure funding measure he signed into law.  The president is set to speak at about 3:30, the White House says. Here’s more from the administration: Biden will visit Dakota County Technical College, which has programs to train the next generation of workers to build, operate, and maintain infrastructure supported by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, and deliver remarks on how the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law will deliver for the American people, create good-paying union jobs, and lower prices by improving the infrastructure for our supply chains. According to the White House, there’s $4.5 billion coming to Minnesota for highways, $302 million for bridge replacement and repairs and $818 million for public transportation. There’s at least $100 million for broadband internet expansion in communities around the state. And there’s $68 million for electric vehicle charging stations. There’s also money for water treatment facilities and improvements at airports.

MPR’s Dan Kraker reports Minnesota expects to receive $680 million dollars over five years from the infrastructure law to improve water systems around the state.  That includes, in some communities, the removal of lead pipes. Duluth Mayor Emily Larson said her city can demonstrate the need for about $50 million to replace 5,000  publicly owned lead service lines. "We're operating infrastructure that's more than 90 years old,” Larson said. “We want to get rid of the lead in the service lines as much as possible. And we know that that's about $8,000 to $10,000 for each lead service." Larson said that doesn't even count the lead pipe connections to private homes, including hers. She said it's still being determined how federal infrastructure funding given to the states will be distributed among local communities. 

As health officials around the world track the spread of the new omicron variant of the coronavirus, Sen. Amy Klobuchar is urging state residents to get vaccinated to slow the spread of Covid-19 . The omicron variant has not been confirmed in the United States, but speaking Sunday on ABC's "This Week," Klobuchar noted the ongoing spike in COVID cases in Minnesota. “It’s hard for everyone. People have been going through hell all over the country because of this pandemic,” Klobuchar said. “Get vaccinated. Get your appointment to get a booster, to get your kids vaccinated. If you say you care about our healthcare workers who are increasingly exhausted,  get your vaccine, get your booster.” Minnesota has been averaging more than 30 deaths a day over the past seven reporting days - the highest that average has been since mid-January. And the number of active COVID cases in Minnesota is at levels not seen in nearly a year.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota called Friday for House leaders to take “appropriate action" against Colorado Republican U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert for using anti-Muslim language in describing a recent encounter she had with Omar at the U.S. Capitol. The Associated Press reported Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other House Democratic leaders demanded Boebert retract her comments. Omar said Thursday that Boebert had fabricated the story she told. Boebert tweeted earlier Friday that “I apologize to anyone in the Muslim community I offended with my comment about Rep. Omar. I have reached out to her office to speak with her directly. There are plenty of policy differences to focus on without this unnecessary distraction."

Think you’ve had a tough year? Take a look at the National Guard. Reid Forgrave of the Star Tribune reports : Since the beginning of 2020, the governor has activated the Minnesota National Guard for 18 state active duty missions. Soldiers and airmen served a total of 82,870 "man days" on state active duty during 2020, and the total man days for 2021 are expected to approach that number. That's 10 times more than the entire decade leading up to it, when they served a total of 15,071 man days on 21 state active duty missions. This past week brought one more call, when Gov. Tim Walz activated 400 more soldiers and airmen to train as certified nursing assistants and temporary nursing aides.

And two national stories out of Minnesota over the weekend: The New York Times had a piece about the school desegregation effort in Minneapolis focused on North Community High School. And CNN had a story about one family’s terrible experience with the school board election in Hastings. Both stories are worth a read.