JOHN HANNA, AP Political Writer

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Democrats have found a candidate for state treasurer, a Republican state senator has filed to run for insurance commissioner and one of the Legislature’s leading social conservatives isn’t seeking re-election.

The announcements all came ahead of Monday’s noon deadline for candidates to file for the Aug. 5 primary ballot.

Democrats completed their ticket for statewide offices when Carmen Alldritt, a former Harper County treasurer and ex-Department of Revenue official, filed Friday for state treasurer. She is only challenger so far for State Treasurer Ron Estes, a Republican who is seeking his second four-year term.

Alldritt is a business development consultant from Topeka, but she was elected as treasurer in the south-central Kansas country for 15 years, starting in 1988. She also served as the Department of Revenue’s director of vehicles, overseeing the division that handles driver licensing and vehicle registrations, for seven years, from 2003-2010.

Among Republicans, state Sen. Clark Shultz, of Lindsborg, officially filed for insurance commissioner Friday, though he’s already campaigned for months. He’s seeking to replace Commissioner Sandy Praeger, a three-term Republican not seeking re-election.

Shultz was appointed to the Senate earlier this year to fill a vacancy after serving 17 years in the House, including nine years as Insurance Committee chairman.

“I am guided by the value that to have a healthy insurance marketplace it must be good for business and responsible to consumers,” he said in a statement.

Five Republicans and one Democrat are running for insurance commissioner. The other GOP candidates are Beverly Gossage, of Eudora, director of a health insurance consulting company; David Powell, an El Dorado insurance agent; Ken Selzer, of Leawood, an accountant and a managing director of a global reinsurance firm; and John Toplikar, of Olathe, a Johnson County Commission member.

The Democrat is Dennis Anderson, of Overland Park, who operates a company providing education services to banks, insurance companies, investment brokers and financial services firms.

Meanwhile, veteran state Rep. Lance Kinzer, an Olathe Republican who has been one of the Legislature’s most vocal opponents of abortion and gay rights, announced on his website that he would not seek a sixth term. He is chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

In recent years, he’s helped draft new abortion restrictions, backed “religious freedom” measures to protect individuals and groups who have moral objections to gay marriage and same-sex relationships and authored an unsuccessful bill to ban local governments from establishing domestic partner registries.

Kinzer was first elected to the House in 2004. In his statement, Kinzer said he first decided not to run again in December 2012.

HUTCHINSON, Kan. (AP) — The trial for a Kansas bail bondsman accused of coercing several women he bailed out of jail to have sex with him has been pushed back for a sixth time.

The Hutchinson News reports 67-year-old Dwight Jurgens was granted another continuance Friday, nine days after he suffered a major heart attack.

Jurgens is facing 10 counts, including human trafficking, criminal sodomy and rape. He is accused of using his influence to coerce women he bailed out of Reno County Jail to have sex with him between February 2010 and September 2012.

Jurgens posted $100,000 bond after he was arrested.

The Hutchinson man was scheduled to go on trial June 3, but his doctor has advised a six-week delay to give him time to heal.

HUTCHINSON — Just before 5 p.m. Friday, Thursday, Reno County Sheriff’s detectives arrested a 59-year-old Hutchinson man with charges associated with child sex.

Harold Dryden faces charges that include two counts of electronic solicitation of a child 14 to 16 years old, two counts of indecent liberties with a child in the same age range. Dryden is also charged with sexual exploitation of a child for having possession of a visual depiction of a child under 18.

District Attorney Keith Schroeder said Dryden was a mentor at Victory Village in eastern Reno County, and the alleged crimes involve a child who was here from Colorado between May 2010 and January 2012. It wasn’t reported until last year, which began the investigation. Schroeder said he got the final reports in the case earlier this month and filed the charges in mid-May, which led to the arrest.

Sheriff’s officials said the case is still under investigation and when Dryden will make a first appearance on the charges is unknown.

Bond in the case set at $50,000 dollars.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach says he expects to give up hosting a Sunday night radio talk show while he campaigns for re-election.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reports it’s not Kobach’s choice to drop out of the two-hour program on Kansas City station KCMO-AM.

Federal regulations allow Kobach’s political opponents to demand equal time.

Kobach recently asked his opponent in the Aug. 5 Republican primary, Lawrence attorney Scott Morgan, to sign a waiver.

Morgan refused and said the program keeps Kobach from focusing on his state duties. Kobach said the program gives people access to an elected official.

Kobach also doesn’t expect a waiver from Democratic challenger and former state Sen. Jean Schodorf of Wichita. In 2010, Kobach’s Democratic opponent refused to sign a waiver.

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — The opening of the world’s tallest waterslide has been pushed back again as Schlitterbahn water park crews continue to tweak the attraction.

Schlitterbahn officials on Friday announced the Verruckt is now slated to open June 29. The Kansas City Star reports the slide initially was to open May 23, but that was delayed until June 5 to allow for more testing.

The Kansas City, Kansas, water park says Verruckt is “now functional and a few operational tweaks are ongoing.” Schlitterbahn also says the opening will coincide with a one-hour Travel Channel special.

Guinness World Records in April called it the world’s tallest waterslide at 168 feet 7 inches.

The opening of a second highly anticipated area ride, SteelHawk at Kansas City, Missouri’s, Worlds of Fun, also has been delayed.

STAFFORD, Kan. (AP) — Under a new plan, a federal wildlife refuge in south-central Kansas will remain closed to hunting when whooping cranes are migrating through, but hunters will get a chance to go after deer and turkey in the refuge.

The plan approved by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for the Quivira National Wildlife Refuge requires Quivira to remain closed to hunting when whooping cranes arrive there.

Sections of the refuge have been opened to waterfowl hunting but then closed when the whooping cranes show up during their fall migration. The agency was considering keeping the refuge open to hunting when the whooping cranes were there, but decided to keep it closed.

The new plan also calls for eventually adding deer and turkey hunts, which had been prohibited in the refuge.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A prominent southeast Kansas businessman and his wife are locked in a dispute over a $42 million tax bill and questions over which state they resided nearly a decade ago.

For the past two years, Gene Bicknell has fought the tax bill that was levied based on where he lived at the time of the 2006 sale of National Pizza Company — the nation’s largest Pizza Hut franchise holder.

He argues he was a Florida resident. But the Kansas Department of Revenue disagrees, citing its definition of domicile imposed around the time of the sale.

Bicknell, formerly of Pittsburg, lost a ruling from the Kansas Court of Appeals in March, but a petition for review by the Kansas Supreme Court is pending.