(bright music) - [Announcer] Funding for this program is provided in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.

- Our talent show about Rochester kicks off the new year and the new season with resilience Coach Maria Serbus, and we learn more about the Olmsted County legislative priorities.

We also grab our baseball bats and hit the batting cage and visit the big tent to see the magical spectacle at Cirque Italia.

All that coming up next on "R-Town", the show about Rochester.

(upbeat funky music) (upbeat funky music continues) Coming to you from 125 Live in Rochester, Minnesota, "R-Town".

(upbeat funky music continues) It's the new year and for many of us that means making resolutions, setting goals and intentions for what this year might look like.

We're joined today by resilience Coach Maria Serbus here to chat with us about how to manage our stress and live our best life so we can get the most out of our year ahead.

Welcome to "R-Town", Maria.

- Thank you, Nicole.

Thank you for having me.

- Of course.

So many of us are feeling that pressure to hit the ground running right after the holidays and as we start the new year.

And in many ways, I think this first year, this is like the first year that we can really feel a little normal after the pandemic.

How do you balance the pressure to do all of the things but also make time for self-care and mindfulness?

- Absolutely.

Yeah, I think it's really hard because you come out of the holidays, a lot of hustle and bustle, and then we get bombarded with New Year, new me.

Are you at the gym yet?

Are you doing this?

Are you doing that?

So oftentimes I work with Type A, busy, on the go people in general.

So oftentimes I'm telling people it's helpful to try to pause and take an intentional moment just for yourself.

I think sometimes we get stuck in that all or nothing mentality.

So it might look like, oh well if I'm gonna go to the gym, I need to go to the gym five days a week right now.

And it might just be like, nope, I might just start doing a five minute walk over my lunch break.

So I try to tell people, just be intentional about just pausing every now and then, despite the fact that we have a lot going on and also trying to make, giving yourself some grace for January that you don't, even though you know, you think you have to start everything in January, allowing yourself kind of like a collective ah sigh into the new year.

So I'm trying to practice that myself.

- Sounds great.

I know stress, a lot of people do have stressful holidays and end of the year time if that, you know, organizations have end of the stressful end of the year times.

And stress management I think can sound a little bit official for something that's very much about your everyday life and your emotions.

What is stress management and what are some of the simple things that we could be doing right now to help with that?

- You're right, and I also think stress management, it's almost become cliche because everyone's like, oh, manage our stress, we all have it.

And oftentimes people might just wanna distract, right?

Like let's throw myself into my work then that's managing it, or I'm just gonna do X, Y, Z.

So I often describe to people like stress is a normal response to everyday life.

So stress hormone is gonna be released if something is kind of making us stressed.

For me, stress management is how are you gonna handle that?

How are you gonna try to lower your stress level?

And again, I know that it sounds, again very cliche, a lot of times people are like, pause, take a breath.

And most people are like, oh sure, is that really gonna help?

I utilize biofeedback when I'm working with clients because they actually get to see how effective taking a breath is.

So one thing people can do is truly pause, take a breath.

But if that's not enough, I also am very, I use different like essential oils, different rollers because smell is a really great way to calm your body and your nervous system.

So to be honest, right before I came on today I was putting on my own like essential oil rollers 'cause I'm like, okay, just pause, breathe, especially something that you find pleasant.

So oftentimes a lavender or peppermint are great for people and if you just keep those nearby, keep one in your car, keep one next to your nightstand.

Having a calming smell can be really a helpful way to manage stress.

- Wonderful, thank you for those tips.

You're a resilience coach.

And I'd love for you to talk a little bit about what resilience means and how do we practice it.

- So oftentimes when people come to me, they want their stress management tools and I'm like, that's great.

Let's find ways to lower your stress.

When I think of resiliency and why I call myself a resilience coach, I think of it's a way to make it more of a practice.

So you might use a stress management tool in a moment or in an instant, like for example how I put the oils on before this.

But to me resiliency is leaning into a practice of how do I actually embed these tools into my everyday routine.

And more importantly, when I'm working with clients, businesses, whatever that is, it's not, you know, only reaching for your tools when you think you need them.

Resiliency is actually how can I reach for these tools proactively so that your nervous system or your body starts to actually notice that as normal.

So I often like working with clients or people on how do you make resiliency a practice and lean into that.

- Wonderful.

In the last few seconds we have here, how can community members learn more about your work and connect with you?

- So my website is MariaSerbus.com.

If you go there, you can join my newsletter and I have a "Calm the Chaos" ebook that people can use to give them some more practical tips.

- Wonderful.

Well thank you so much for sharing with us some ways that we can take a pause and giving me some permission to maybe cancel some of the gym me memberships I did at the beginning of the year.

- [Maria] Yes.

- Thank you so much Maria.

- Thank you.

(upbeat funky music) (upbeat funky music continues) - Be sure to stick around, we have much more coming your way on "R-Town".

We practice our home run swing at D-BAT Rochester and get our homes in order with a little organizing help.

We also catch up with the chair of the Olmsted County Board of Commissioners as we discuss the 2023 legislative priorities.

But up first we take a fantastical, watery journey with Cirque Italia in this week's Our Culture segment.

(fantastical music) - We are the first traveling water circus in the United States.

So we have everything from aerialist to acrobat, jugglers, contortionists, and it's all set on our dynamic water stage.

So it's this really beautiful atmosphere inside the tent.

Everything from with rain and fountains and it just creates this magical experience.

My name is Morgaine Rosenthal and I am the manager and a performer with Cirque Italia.

When the owner of Cirque Italia, when he created Cirque Italia, he wanted to do something different for the American audience and so he decided to create a show that was animal free and it's all just based around human performances.

He wanted to focus on the ability of the human body and all of its capabilities.

And so he, that's when he came up with the idea for the water stage.

He wanted something that was unique, something different, something that you can't find anywhere else.

And so he combined the, this water concept with all of these incredible circus acts from all over the world.

At Cirque Italia, we have something for everyone, something that everyone will enjoy.

Our clown is great for the little ones.

He's really actually funny and you know, we don't have any scary clowns.

It's just a really unique experience for the whole family.

We have four touring shows and our fifth touring show will be opening soon.

So we have two water shows that are family friendly, good for all ages.

And then we also have our two paranormal cirques, which is geared towards adults.

And then we also, our brand new show that we're very excited about is our Nitro Circus, which is fast cars, motorcycles, monster trucks, something for that the kids will surely enjoy.

So this year it's a brand new show, it's a pirate adventure story.

And so our clown Rafinha, he is, he finds a treasure map and the show is his search for buried treasure and the acts are sort of some of the people that he meets along the way.

My favorite thing about my role in the circus is of course performing.

I'm an artist at heart and I do two acts in the show.

I do an aerial act that's a mermaid pirate love story.

And then I also do an acrobatic roller skating act.

And so just being able to share my, my skills and my, my passion with the American audience, I feel very grateful and very fortunate to be given that opportunity.

You know, the, the owner of Cirque Italia, Manuel Rebecchi, when he came to the United States, he just, he really was striving to bring a new kind of entertainment to the American audience and so he decided to leave the elephants and the tigers in the jungle.

And here we are.

We're in a different city every week, 11 1/2 months of the year.

So we get about two weeks off and during that time, you know, we all get to spend a little bit of time off, but then we come back together so we can start rehearsing for the next year.

We're like a big family, you know, we work together, we travel together and we all have the same goal in mind, which is to put on the best show that we can in every, you know, every town, every city that we go to.

And so our, our crew is about 60 people and that's everything from the people who set up and tear down the tent to concessions, the ticket office, the performers and everybody here, everybody wears many hats.

And so sometimes when you come to the show you might see that the person who sold you your tickets is also on stage or the person who is bringing your popcorn, maybe he's also setting the tent up and down.

And so it's really a group effort where we all get to work together to put on the best show that we can.

- [Nicole] For more information about this story and other "R-Town" features, connect with us on Facebook, Twitter at KSMQ #RTown or ksmq.org/rtown.

(upbeat music) - This is Danielle Teal with "R-Town" Spotlight.

I'm excited we're back for the new year and what does that mean?

New Year, new us.

And I have some awesome guests with us from Tidy Peaches and it's exactly how it's stated.

Hi Sarah.

- Hi.

- So share a little bit about each other real quick and then let's talk about Tidy Peaches 'cause it's a home kind of tidying and organization kind of concept.

- Yep.

I'm Sarah.

I was mostly raised here in Rochester and the three of us have been friends for 10 years and we-- - Really quick, you're still friends, right?

- Yes, we are.

(all laughing) - Okay, good, good.

- We started Tidy Peaches last year, so we're in our first year of business.

Haven't celebrated our first year anniversary yet, but we will be soon.

And Tidy Peaches is a professional home organizing business.

- Awesome.

And we have Shannon right next to you.

Share a little bit about yourself.

- Yes, I'm Shannon Astorino.

We started the business because we were helping a friend with their home and I said, I asked them, do you wanna do this?

And it's been working and it's been going really good.

- [Danielle] Awesome, awesome.

And Rechel?

- Yes.

Well I am a mother and live here in Rochester and we are entrepreneurs and we wanted to do something with each other for other people, so we wanted to give back a little bit and have fun doing it.

So, and we're having a lot of fun.

- It's a wonderful concept and I'm excited for your year celebration.

- Thank you.

- That's quite phenomenal.

Share a little bit how you rock it out.

How do you get your clients and then you know, you know, go into a home and and organize?

- Well we do a lot of promoting on Instagram.

You can find us on there and a lot of our, people that reach out to us see stuff that we've done and they email us or call us.

Our process is kind of fun.

We usually try to tackle an area like each of us so we kind of divide and conquer and then we always rely on each other for advice or you know, we might say, "Hey come look at this, what do you think?"

And we just work really well together.

It's a lot of fun.

- That's perfect.

And Rechel, people need help, right?

They're in their home and sometimes they have, you know, kind of the blinders on where they may not see where they need help.

Can you share a little bit how you inspire the homeowner to be engaged?

- Yeah, so a lot of times the homeowner wants to be there with us and a big part of organizing is decluttering.

So we will say, "Hey, do you really need four spatulas or 30 spatulas?"

I mean we've seen that.

- Though some of us do, Rechel.

(all laughing) How do you convince them?

- We, we make piles.

- Right.

- We make piles of what we think should be purged and then it's ultimately their decision.

But a big part of organizing is first decluttering so that there can be room for the necessary items.

- Awesome.

And Sarah, where can folks find out more information about Tidy Peaches?

- Our website, tidypeaches.com or on Instagram.

Our handle is The Tidy Peaches.

- Awesome.

Rechel, any parting words of inspiration into the new year?

- Well if you need any categorizing and decluttering, please count on us.

We would love to help out.

- [Danielle] Awesome, thank you so much for being on the show.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

- Awesome.

Thank you so much.

This is Danielle Teal with "R-Town" Spotlight.

(upbeat music) - Hello, this is Michael Wojcik with your legislative rundown.

For those of us who love policy, it's the most wonderful time of the year.

The legislature is back in session.

This is a little bit different than we've had in previous years because one party now controls the House, the Senate, and the governor's office.

So we do have the potential to see movement on certain issues this year.

But we, looking at the city of Rochester, are always interested in knowing who represents us and it's changed quite a bit since the last legislative session.

Previously we had about six legislators representing the area.

Now there were a lot of districts that were partially in Rochester and the makeup was four Republicans and two Democrats.

Even though Rochester grew significantly and the districts within Rochester actually got smaller, we actually have five people representing us now with just a sixth person just having just a hair of South Rochester.

So our delegation is now five members and made up of four Democrats and one Republican.

So there's a lot of new faces in new places as well.

Of course our governor Tim Walls won reelection by a little under 200,000 votes.

And one of the interesting pieces of data that I found out in looking at some of the min post data that was put up is that Governor Walls won the 50 largest cities in the state of Minnesota by over 400,000 votes, but won the governor's office by less than 200,000.

That talks about how much cities have become important players in statewide politics in Minnesota.

And obviously Rochester is one of those that went with that same trend.

Locally here, our representative Tina Liebling is our senior member in the state legislature and she focuses a lot on healthcare and healthcare finance issues.

A new member of the house, Kim Hicks, represents the northern parts of Rochester and some surrounding areas and she is particularly interested in early childhood education.

And a much of central Rochester, another new representative is Andy Smith and he has a small business, Gray Duck Theater, which has been featured on the program before and he's focused on small business, energy, climate issues.

Moving to the Senate, Carla Nelson is one of the more senior members of the Senate, though she's in the minority party because of the closed split, she'll probably have a lot of ability to use her experience to shape legislation that affects Rochester.

And then our new senator, former representative is Liz Bolden, who represents much of Central and North Rochester.

And she's also interested in healthcare and education issues.

Though this is just beginning of the session, we're starting to hear about some priorities and I look forward to covering them with you in future episodes.

This is Michael Wojcik reporting on the Minnesota legislature.

(rock music) - I'm Danielle Teal and we're here with Gary Marta.

He is the general manager and co-owner of D-BAT.

- Correct.

- [Danielle] As you can see, D-BAT is.

- D-BAT is a premier baseball and softball training facility located here in Rochester, Minnesota.

There are other D-BATs around the country, but we're the first in Minnesota.

We always had thought of an idea of some sort of batting cage.

And then I came across a facility down south in Arizona, fell in love with the idea.

Essentially you don't need a membership at all to be here to use any of the services.

So how these lanes work, they're non-reservable.

People can come in and and use them at any time.

- [Danielle] There's a camp that happens.

Share a little bit more about that.

- Sure, so pretty much any time the kids have off school, you know, we're we running a camp.

We also are going to be doing a ton of summer camps, very popular, all aspects, just trying to get the kids in and keep 'em active.

- And I know that you mentioned there were different technical things that you and skills that you, you work on.

What are those things?

- [Gary] Primarily hitting and defense, but yeah, we do the, the longer form camps, we also do small group training in the way of clinics and then of course one-on-one lessons as well.

And then that you can get to any, you know, niche that you, you want to work on pitching included.

- Speaking of working on, how about I give this a hit?

- [Gary] I just walk up and tap or swipe.

- [Danielle] It's quite easy.

Ooh.

- [Gary] Start hitting.

So there's baseball, fast pitch and slow pitch.

We're gonna put you on slow pitch for today.

- Oh, okay, good.

This is Danielle Teal with "R-Town" walkabout.

I'm gonna go practice my swinging.

- [Gary] Keep your eye on the ball.

Yeah.

- Ooh.

- Perfect.

- [Danielle] This is a bit of a workout.

- [Gary] Yeah, absolutely.

Perfect.

- So really easy to get to.

Come on down to D-BAT in Rochester, Minnesota.

(lively music) - Earlier this week, the 93rd Minnesota legislature convened.

Each year the Olmsted County Board of Commissioners approves a set of priorities for advocacy during the legislative session.

And here to tell us more about these priorities is chair of the Olmsted County Board of Commissioners, Gregg Wright.

Welcome to "R-Town", Gregg.

- Thank you Nicole.

- So how does the Board of Commissioners identify these legislative priorities each year?

- Well, it, it actually is about a year process 'cause we start after the legislative session ends and we start on a new one.

It was a little bit different this year because the legislature really didn't act on any, anything last year.

But basically the ideas circulate, percolate up from, from the ground with our employees, levels, our department chair people, a rise to the administrative level.

And then there are many things that they, that they feel that need to be fixed, that they would like on the list of priorities.

But there are, like with everything else, there's many priorities and so that we have to narrow them down.

So eventually then it goes to administrative team and to the Board of Commissioners who are on a committee that work with these things and try to narrow them down to the most essential things.

The purpose of of course, the legislative priorities is is that we wanna save the taxpayers money and we do not want to have any greater levy than we, that we might need.

And by making sure that these priorities are met by the state legislature, we can save the county residents money by not having to have additional levy.

- Thank you so much for giving us that overview.

Now there's several different levels of priorities.

So there's a statewide priorities, local countywide priorities, and then there's also several priorities that are around county delivered services that are supervised by the state.

We can't go through all of them, but I was was wondering if you could talk a little bit about the Minnesota Comprehensive Mental Health Act and the Family's First Prevention Services Act.

What are these, what are these services cover and why is the board advocating for more funding?

- Well, let's look, talked about mental health first.

The county is responsible, the agency for the mental health of the people in the county.

And I think that you're probably aware that that's one of the needs throughout the nation, not just in Minnesota and the county is for more mental health services.

But that requires that we have to have mental health workers.

It requires that we have to have access to psychiatric services.

And all of those things are very limited right now in the state of Minnesota.

And so that what we advocate for is to fund these kinds of services and to make sure that our people can get to psychiatric services.

Now, we've been very fortunate in the past that the legislature has afforded a crisis center, which is a regional crisis center, which is very helpful.

But in addition to that, there are just daily needs that we have.

And we know that by improving the mental health of the county and the people in the county, that we can reduce problems that will be created later on that are more expensive.

- Great, thank you for that.

- Now the other one that you mentioned was the-- - [Nicole] The Family's First.

- Family First, of course, that's a federal rule that they have and, and you know, we wanna meet that rule as well.

And that, of course is directed at making sure that children are safe, and they're safe in their homes and they're safe from abuse.

And, and the, the direction of that is to, is to help families so that those children do not have to be moved out of the home.

And so we work on that, but that also requires a great deal of preventative services, which the state has not funded.

And in order for us to carry out those rules, we really need them to follow the rule with money in order to take care of that.

- So there are also some county budget priorities.

We're getting tax relief.

And you talked about earlier the, the purpose really being about saving the residents, you know, those tax dollars.

What would the impact, what impact does the Board of Commissioners hope that these budget priorities around the tax relief will afford residents?

- What we're hoping to accomplish is to have less levy, if that answers your question.

But in order to do that, there are several areas.

For instance, the levy is based on the value of the property and just talking about residential right now, there was the market value exclusion that if your house is less than $413,000, you got a home state credit.

But if your value goes over $413,000, you lose all the credit.

Well, that hasn't been changed for years.

And of course, you know, through inflation, everybody's home value has increased.

So a lot of people hit that limit.

But at the other end of that, we have people that are in, in great need and the bottom end of that was $70,000.

Well, there aren't any homes in Rochester that are really $70,000.

So that inflationary has to be brought up so that those people who are less well off will receive more of their property tax increase.

If we don't have that, the only way that the county can get the money, of course, is through property tax.

- Well, in the last minute here, you've had a busy week, you just assumed the role of chair this week.

And in many ways, 2023 marks a really historic transition for the Board of Commissioners.

Can you briefly just share what your vision for your role as chair of the board is?

- Well, I, I'm always interested by the vision that one would have, but I, you know, long term, I don't think that my vision is any bit different than anybody else that would be board chair.

And that's to make sure that our Board of Commissioners work well together.

That we have forthright and frank discussion so that we can reach a decision.

And that we do that without ranker and without partisanship because that's the best way to reach a good decision.

That's what's best for the county and the people in the county.

It's very fortunate that we don't have people that wanna be a star or a standout.

We act as a group and we make sure that we are all together on a group.

- Well, thank you so much, Gregg for joining us.

Thank you so much for all the work that you're doing on the Board of Commissioners.

And thank you all for joining us today.

Hopefully you picked up some good tips to calm the mind and clear your clutter.

And after the legislative rundown and our chat with Commissioner Wright, I feel ready to follow the legislative session over the coming months.

For more wonderful content produced right here in Rochester, please be sure to check us out on Facebook and Twitter at #RTown.

I'm Nicole Nfonoyim-Hara for "R-Town", the show about Rochester.

Be well and stay safe.

We'll see you next week.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (soft music) - [Announcer] Funding for this program is provided in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.