NICHOLAS CLAYTON, Associated Press
JOHN HANNA, Associated Press

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Doubts are growing that Kansas legislators can pass a plan for raising taxes to avoid balancing the state budget with deep spending cuts.

Lawmakers on Tuesday canceled a full day’s worth of public negotiations over tax proposals.

Three senators and three House members were supposed to meet Tuesday morning but postponed talks three times before canceling them in the evening.

The Republican-dominated Senate approved a bill Sunday that would increase sales and cigarette taxes to help raise $423 million during the fiscal year beginning July 1.

Many members of the GOP-controlled House don’t think the measure would pass their chamber. But House Republicans are deeply divided over alternatives.

Budget Director Shawn Sullivan has told lawmakers that failing to pass a tax plan will likely force $400 million in spending cuts.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Sedgwick County authorities have charged a man in the death of a Wichita restaurant owner.

KSN-TV reports that Curtis Mitchell was charged Tuesday with one count of first-degree murder in the death last week of 45-year-old Tanya Tandoc.

Mitchell appeared Tuesday in Sedgwick County court before Judge Joe Kisner, who read Mitchell the charge and advised him to get a lawyer before entering a plea. The judge said Mitchell’s bond is $500,000.

Tandoc, owner of Tanya’s Soup Kitchen, was found dead in the basement of her home last Thursday night.

MEDFORD, Okla. (AP) — Earthquakes that have shaken parts of Oklahoma and Kansas will be the focus of an event dedicated to raising awareness about earthquakes and their connection to drilling techniques used by the oil and natural gas industry.

The event is scheduled on Saturday in the northern Oklahoma city of Medford, just south of the Kansas border. The free event is sponsored by the Oklahoma Sierra Club and the Kansas Sierra Club.

Residents of the region are invited to discuss the ongoing threat of earthquakes and examine the practice of hydraulic fracturing which utilizes underground injection wells to dispose of drilling wastes and by-products.

The governments of both Kansas and Oklahoma have acknowledged that the use of underground injection wells can be linked to the swarm of earthquakes experienced in both states.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Wichita police want the city to spend $2.2 million on body cameras for officers over five years.

The Wichita Eagle reports  the cost would include buying the cameras, licensing fees and data storage in the first year for $712,000, and licensing and data storage fees of $360,000 for subsequent years.

Captain Brian White presented the recommendation to the city council Tuesday and said police recommend that the city buy Taser’s Axon system. White says the department is also seeking federal grants and plans to also use narcotics seizure funds to help offset costs.

He says the department has 60 body cameras now, and there’s a waitlist of officers who want to use them.

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MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) — Kansas agriculture officials have issued an order prohibiting movement of Kansas poultry in a move to prevent the spread of a devastating form of bird flu.

The order announced Tuesday effectively cancels all poultry-related shows and events through the rest of this year. That includes regional and county fairs, festivals, the Kansas State Fair, swap meets, exotic sales and live bird auctions.

The order was signed by Kansas Agriculture Secretary Jackie McClaskey. The department says the measure is an effort to prevent the spread of highly pathogenic H5N2 avian influenza. Kansas had a positive case of it this year in Leavenworth County.

Deputy Animal Health Commissioner Justin Smith says the decision was not made lightly, but says it was necessary to do everything possible to protect the Kansas poultry flock.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Gov. Sam Brownback’s budget director says state hospitals for the mentally ill and developmentally disabled and the agency that runs them could lose a total of nearly $46 million if lawmakers don’t increase taxes.

Budget Director Shawn Sullivan said Tuesday that the state Department for Aging and Disability Services would lose $41 million during the fiscal year beginning July 1. Its four hospitals would lose nearly $5 million.

Sullivan has told lawmakers that if they don’t approve tax increases, Brownback’s most likely option for balancing the budget is an across-the-board cut of 6.2 percent to save $400 million.

The state’s hospitals for the mentally ill in Larned and Osawatomie would lose almost $3.5 million. State hospitals for the developmentally disabled in Parsons and Topeka would lose nearly $1.3 million.

OTTAWA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas judge says he won’t allow some documents in a quadruple murder case to be unsealed.

Kyle Flack is charged in the deaths of two men, one woman and the woman’s 18-month-old daughter in May 2013. The adults’ bodies were found outside Ottawa. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reports Franklin County District Court Judge Eric Godderz said Tuesday he would reschedule a hearing on sealed documents in the case until June 30.

But Godderz also was clear that he wouldn’t unseal documents detailing proposed jury questionnaires and instructions because he doesn’t want those “published on the front page of the newspaper.”

The Ottawa Herald filed a motion seeking a court order, saying the court had failed to justify sealing court records in the case.