The cause of Wednesday’s fire that destroyed Abilene’s historic Kirby House Restaurant remains a mystery.

The State Fire Marshall spent Friday on the scene. The blaze started about 6 p.m. on Wednesday and the building is considered a total loss.

On their Facebook page, the restaurant owners wrote,” “Wednesday we suffered a devastating fire at our restaurant,” the message says. “We have appreciated all the hard work and long hours that the firefighters and police have put in, for our sake. We would like to say thank you to every customer that came thru our doors. Also, thank you to everyone who has had wonderful comments and stories to share.”

A twenty five year old man remains hospitalized in Russell today after the car he was driving slid on I-70 and hit a KDOT snow-plow truck. The accident happened Friday near Dorrance.

Matthew Robert Wayne Cagle of Joplin, Missouri was taken to Russell Regional Hospital. The KDOT driver not injured.

Despite 14 thousand signatures on a petition, the Wichita Planning Commission has rejected a request to rezone the former site of an abortion clinic.

The Metropolitan Area Planning Commission voted 6-4 against the proposal.

The vote follows the petition from the group “Kansans for Life” asking the city of Wichita to rezone the area where a clinic once operated, in an effort to keep another women’s clinic from opening there.

Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt has joined attorneys general from 19 other states in asking the US Supreme Court to affirm the Second Amendment rights of citizens who wish to lawfully carry concealed handguns outside their homes.

The attorneys general have asked the Supreme Court to review a lower federal court’s ruling that had upheld the authority of a state to limit the right to keep and bear arms to an individual’s home and also had allowed states to require that a permit application show a reason the permit is needed.

“The Second Amendment clearly protects the rights of our citizens to keep and bear arms, and in 2010 Kansas voters made clear their view that the right to keep and bear arms is an individual right,” Schmidt said. “Legally permitted concealed carry of handguns falls within that right and the Supreme Court should affirm that. This is an opportunity for the Supreme Court to clarify its recent decisions in favor of Second Amendment rights.”

The pending case is Kachalsky v. Cacaces. The states petitioning the US Supreme Court include Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia and West Virginia.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) – A Kansas House committee is considering a resolution declaring the Legislature’s opposition to expanding Medicaid following the federal government’s overhaul of health care.

The Appropriations Committee was having a hearing Friday. The measure says the Legislature doesn’t want to expand Medicaid to make tens of thousands of additional people eligible for the program covering health care for the needy.

Republican Gov. Sam Brownback is a vocal critic of the federal health care law enacted in 2010. But he’s said he’ll leave a decision on expanding Medicaid to the GOP-dominated Legislature.

The federal government has committed to paying almost all costs associated with the expansion, but many Republicans doubt the promise.

The administration and Kansas Hospital Association have released conflicting studies on the expansion’s potential cost to the state.