For seven years the City of Duluth and the Fond du Lac Band have been engaged in a series of litigations and after five months of conversations, meetings and negotiations, the two have announced a settlement that allows them to put this chapter behind them and begin writing a new story, together.

Xcel Energy crews are working to make progress toward restoring service to customers impacted by Thursday's severe storms.

Duluth, Minn. — Minnesota Power is conducting aerial assessments of its infrastructure following heavy storm damage across its service territory Thursday morning. Once the assessment is complete, more informationabout estimated restoration schedules will be known. As of Thursday morning, about 36,000 customers are estimated to be without power, including customers in Duluth, Cloquet, and the Brainerd Lakes area.Among the hardest-hit areas is the city of Duluth where an estimated one-third of the city’s 65,000 customer are without power.  An estimated 100 power poles were broken by trees brought down by the storm and will need to be replaced. The affected area is a 10-mile swath from Island Lake to Lake Superior in the easternpart of Duluth.Restoration efforts will focus first on the transmission system before outages to the distribution system, which feeds residential and business customers, are addressed.  Removing trees and downed power lines from public roadways will be the first priority in coordination with St. Louis County and the City of Duluth.All line crews have been called in to assist along with 15 tree removal crews.