South metro news briefs: Lakeville job fair is May 22

The Minnesota School of Business is bringing together more than 30 employers for a job fair Wednesday, May 22.

The event will be held from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the school, located at 17685 Juniper Path in Lakeville.

Openings include full-time, part-time and volunteer opportunities. Employers who are expected to attend are in the fields of banking and finance, retail, health care, insurance, the nonprofit sector, state jobs and a variety of other businesses.

For more information, contact Christine Kleckner, director of career services at the school, at 952-892-9019 or ckleckner@msbcollege.edu.

Laura Kieser, the public face of the University of Minnesota's Extension Service in suburban farm country in Scott and Carver counties, is leaving for a job in private industry.

Her last day is Friday, after nine years on the job.

Kieser is taking a job with a firm called AgStar Financial Services, where she will assume the title of market intelligence specialist.

The endless winter has caused a change in the timing for drop-offs of yard waste at the Shakopee tribe's organic recycling facility.

The city of Shakopee reports that residents can take material there for free now through June 8, instead of the previous cutoff of late May.

Drop-offs are from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturdays. The facility is at 1905 Canterbury Road. Enter off the east side of Canterbury Road/County Road 83.

Waste accepted includes leaves, grass clippings, sod, brush, branches and logs less than 10 feet in length.

Residents of Prior Lake and Savage may also partake. The process resumes in the fall.

Prior Lake is imploring contestants to keep "music content and performances... appropriate for a family audience" as it invites young people to take part in a Battle of the Bands in July.

Registration is open for the July 18 event at Lakefront Park, with the winner getting a chance at the Dakota County Fair's Grand Battle, whose top band takes home $250.

To register, go to priorlake recreation.com and click on "activities click here!"

Most band members must be high school or college aged. To learn more, call 952-447-9820.

Prior Lake is asking folks to help it save money and upgrade the city by volunteering to adopt parks and planters.

Volunteers under age 18 must have "responsible adult supervision" and submit a parental release form.

Shakopee's City Council has narrowly agreed to move to a full-time firefighting operation.

With Matt Lehman and Pamela Schurman dissenting, the council last week greenlighted the hiring of four full-time firefighters as a way of helping improve its daytime response times.

Like many suburbs with volunteer departments, Shakopee has struggled to make sure fire response is adequate at times of the week when many volunteers are out of the city at work or within the city but in jobs whose employers frown on frequent interruptions.

The department has been relying on 45 of what it calls "paid-on-call" firefighters to clarify that they aren't actually just volunteers.

Postings will go up within the next few weeks at www.ci.shakopee.mn.us/employ ment.cfm.

A first-in-the-county flashing yellow traffic signal is arriving this month in Shakopee.

The left-turn arrow is being installed at the intersection of Canterbury Road and 12th Avenue.

The arrows are meant to speed up traffic flow while remaining safe.

Drivers can turn left, but must do so cautiously and yield to oncoming traffic. The city reports that studies show drivers find them "more understandable than traditional yield-on-green indications."