Hi! My name is Sam.

A proposal at the Minnesota Capitol to increase criminal penalties for people who assault firefighters, paramedics, and other emergency medical personnel was aired in a Senate committee after a man received a nine-month sentence for attacking a Hennepin County paramedic last July.

Nathan Burr, a member of the Minnesota National Guard, went to a resort near Ely called Veterans on the Lake for the first time in 2019 to reconnect with his wife and two young children, fresh from a year-long deployment in the Middle East .

“I’ve done four deployments but only one with kids, and it’s a completely different thing,” Burr said.

A year later, Burr heard the organization that runs the resort needed board members, and after conferring with his wife, decided to give back to the organization after a stay that had meant so much to him and his family.