North Sioux City, Yankton and Vermillion are among 11 South Dakota cities that sent representatives to a major convention for manufacturers of medical devices in Minneapolis this week.

The S.D. cities, which also included Aberdeen, Brookings, Madison, Mitchell, Pierre, Rapid City, Sioux Falls and Watertown, joined forces with the Governor’s Office of Economic Development to help bring new jobs to the Rushmore State.

”The state has been targeting medical device manufacturers for some time, and this show is a great way for us to showcase South Dakota’s advantageous business climate and develop new leads,” said Richard Benda, secretary of the Department of Tourism and State Development. “The MD&M show is among the top shows in the industry. Banding together to represent South Dakota as a unified entity has proved to be a very effective recruitment tool.”

In this Sunday’s edition, the Star-Tribune published a front-page story on a half-finished residential development in the suburb just west of Minneapolis, ‘“Minnesota’s housing wasteland.”

The investigative piece explores the collapse of an unregulated lender, Lakeland Construction Finance, which loaned hundreds of millions of dollars to developers, sometimes with appraisals or site visits.

The piece notes that one of Lakeland’s major financial backers was Sioux City native and Gateway co-founder Ted Waitt, through his investment firm, Avalon Capital Group. According to the Star-Tribune, Avalon, headquartered near Waitt’s La Jolla, Calif. residence, referred all questions to its general counsel, who did not return calls to the paper.

The article mentions that Waitt two years ago recruited Joseph Burke, a one-time Gateway chief financial officer, to be Lakeland’s CEO. Burke replaced the Eagan, Minn.-based firm’s founder, Jeff Majkrzak, who resigned as CEO in 2003 over “strategic differences with Avalon,” according to the Star-Tribune.

The piece paints Majkrzak, a former manager with Northwest Airlines, as the chief villain in the land development, which left contractors holding the bag and homeowners who managed to build in the developments surrounded by empty lots and unfinished roads.