SALINE COUNTY – Law enforcement authorities in Saline County are investigating an alleged case of criminal damage to property following a disagreement between siblings.
Deputies arrested Tyler Wolf, 24, McPherson, on Saturday after he allegedly jumped on the hood of a Pontiac G6 while it was parked at Outlaws, 1676 State Street in Salina just after 2a.m.
Wolf damaged the hood, kicked in the windshield, tried to rip off a windshield wiper, and kicked the sides of the car, causing dents, according to deputies.
He became upset while leaving the club.
The car is owned by Ashley Walton of Salina. She is Wolf’s sister.
Wolf was booked into the Saline County Jail on requested charges of felony damage to property.
The Ellis County Sheriff’s Office is investigating the thefts of multiple motorized dirt bikes and ATV’s from rural storage locations around Hays.
The thefts were reported by various people within a 90 day period, from locations owned or rented by the victims, all within a ten mile area of Hays.
“The perpetrator has used force to gain entry into storage building and had a manner to transport or haul the motor bikes,” according to a release from the Sheriff’s office. “The stolen bikes are of a variety of makes, models and colors and are for off road riding.”
Anyone with information about the thefts or the location of the stolen vehicles is asked to contact the Ellis County Sheriff’s Detective Division at 625-1040.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — An effort to improve large, blighted shopping centers in Topeka, Kansas, is getting a $500,000 boost.
The Topeka Capital-Journal reports the Joint Economic Development Organization’s board has approved a 2016 budget for the use of revenue from a countywide, half-cent sales tax. Revenue from the tax is used to finance infrastructure improvements and economic development.
That budget includes setting aside $500,000 to finance a new business initiative to enhance the attraction of blighted shopping centers.
Go Topeka is the economic development arm of the Greater Topeka Chamber of Commerce. It administers the use of the tax’s economic development revenue.
Go Topeka’s plans call for the incentive program to provide a 25 percent match in funding for developers who invest in any of the locations.
“Generations in the Workplace” will be the first workshop offered this spring by the Management Development Center at Fort Hays State University.
This event will take place at 1 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 28, 2016, in the FHSU Memorial Union’s Stouffer Lounge. Participants will have the opportunity to learn how to leverage the talents and experience of others, regardless of their age.
Ruth Bealer, director of human resources for Adams Brown Beran & Ball, will facilitate.
“Generational diversity, and the communication gaps associated with it, can create difficult obstacles to overcome in the workplace,” said Sabrina William, director of the MDC. “This workshop provides solutions to these obstacles by finding common workplace needs across generations and developing ways to overcome age-based stereotypes.”
The workshop is designed to provide participants with a more thorough understanding of the four generations that contribute to today’s workforce and how their interactions can affect work productivity. Recent studies highlight key similarities across age groups in terms of motivations and values.
Needless age stereotyping, overgeneralization from isolated examples, and even prejudice and discrimination toward both older and younger workers, create tensions among generations.
Each person who completes the workshop will receive a completion certificate. The cost is $119. The MDC asks that applicants register before Jan. 22. Hays Area Chamber of Commerce members are eligible for a 15-percent discount.
To register, learn more about this workshop or to receive discount codes, contact Conni Dreher by phone at (785) 628-4121 or by email at [email protected]. Registration is also available online at www.fhsu.edu/mdc.
Image Flighwaware over Kansas at 9:15 a.m. on Monday
The Associated Press
The latest developments on the severe storms across the U.S. (all times local):
8:45 a.m.
Over 900 flights have been canceled across the U.S. and another 500 have been delayed due to the large storm system moving through the middle part of the country.
Flight-tracking service FlightAware showed that more than a third of the cancellations were at Chicago’s two main airports. Another large chunk came from Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport; several tornadoes touched down Saturday in the Dallas suburbs.
Other cities with an unusually large number of cancellations included Houston, Denver, Detroit, Kansas City, Missouri, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and Lubbock, Texas.
A typical day sees about 150 cancelations and 4,000 delays.
Heavy rain and strong winds, like forecast for parts of Missouri, Illinois and Arkansas on Monday, are often more troubling for airlines than snowfall.
___
8:35 a.m.
The Texas Department of Transportation says many roadways across West Texas and the Panhandle have been closed due to ice and blizzard conditions, with traffic coming to standstill where Interstate 10 splits into Interstate 20.
The department said early Monday morning Interstates 40 and 27 were closed and that travelers should expect long delays across the region.
Vito Randazzo, of Alpine, California, is driving across the country and was among those who got stuck on Interstate 10.
He said Monday morning that he’d been sitting on the icy interstate since 8 p.m. Sunday and that “everybody’s just sleeping in their cars.”
He also said he couldn’t believe the “road was left in this condition” — snow-packed and icy — and that he had water, but not food.
National Weather Service officials say that while the snow has stopped across the area, temperatures are to remain near or below freezing.
___
7:35 a.m.
Authorities say more than 180 Missouri roads are closed because of flooding.
The Missouri State Department of Transportation says the closures include eastbound lanes of Interstate 70 in St. Charles County. Though both lanes closed Sunday because of rising flood waters, the westbound lanes reopened Monday morning.
Several bridges in southeastern Missouri counties also are closed because of flooding.
The National Weather Service said three to six inches of rain fell during the weekend, and up to four inches more is expected through Monday.
___
7:25 a.m.
Officials in Birmingham, Alabama, say more than 70 structures sustained some type of damage after a tornado touched down on Christmas.
City spokesman April Odom said a preliminary assessment found the storm damaged 72 structures in the Jefferson Avenue area, ranging from minor damage to full destruction.
Other parts of the city saw damage, too, and assessments will be completed this week.
Forecasters more storms are in the forecast for most of Alabama on Monday, and a tornado watch is in effect until noon CST for more than 30 counties.
___
8 a.m.
Officials in Mississippi are reporting downed trees across a highway and a roof blown off a house from a storm about 20 miles northwest of Hattiesburg.
Covington County Emergency Manager Greg Sanford says the damage happened before dawn Monday near the town of Seminary. The area was under a tornado warning at the time, but no tornado has been confirmed.
Warnings were posted as a squall line moved west to east across Mississippi.
Statewide, more than 6,800 power customers lacked electricity at 6 a.m. Monday.
Northern Mississippi residents are still cleaning up from a tornado that struck Wednesday and killed 10 people in the state.
___
6:50 a.m.
Oklahoma highway officials say many roads are impassable because of wintry weather, downed power lines or flooding.
Parts of western and central Oklahoma are under a winter storm warning until midday Monday, while flooding is a major concern in the southern and eastern part of the state.
The Oklahoma Department of Transportation says roads in northwest Oklahoma and Interstate 35 in central Oklahoma are slick and hazardous.
The National Weather Service says “disastrous” flooding will occur in eastern Oklahoma, where some areas received up to a foot of rain over the weekend. The state DOT says high water has caused the closure of some roads in counties in the southern and eastern part of the state.
___
6:30 a.m.
Parts of 11 states in the middle of the country are under a winter storm warning as the weather system that spawned tornadoes in Texas and flooding in Missouri moves on.
Meanwhile, the National Weather Service has issued a flash flood warning for southern and eastern parts of Missouri, including St. Louis, and a small section of northern Arkansas. Most of Arkansas, eastern Oklahoma, central Missouri and central Illinois are under a flood warning.
Forecasters say Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan and parts of Minnesota, Illinois, Missouri, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas will see winter weather conditions ranging from heavy snow to ice, accompanied by gusty winds.
Parts of the Southeast will see rain, while severe weather is possible in Mississippi.
___
2:30 a.m.
Blizzard-like conditions have led to the closure of most of Interstate 40 from Albuquerque east across the Texas Panhandle.
New Mexico State Police spokeswoman Sgt. Elizabeth Armijo said Sunday night that the stretch of interstate from Albuquerque to the Texas border would be closed through at least Monday afternoon. She urged travelers passing through New Mexico to use Interstate 10 instead.
In Texas, the Texas Department of Public Safety says only a small section of the highway around Amarillo remains open. Texas State Trooper Cindy Barkley says deteriorating conditions forced authorities to indefinitely close the highway for about 100 miles east of Amarillo to Oklahoma.
I-40 is the main east-west highway through the state’s Panhandle.
The National Weather Service has issued a blizzard warning until 9 a.m. Monday for the Panhandle and several counties in New Mexico. Authorities say that even in areas where the warning has expired, residual blowing and drifting is expected and will make conditions dangerous.
Round one of the “who’s in charge” bout between the Kansas Legislature and the Kansas Judiciary went to the Judiciary on a 7-0 vote last week when justices decided that lawmakers stepped across the constitutional “separation of powers” boundary by telling the court who will select chief judges of the state’s 31 judicial districts.
It was meddling in the operation of a unified judicial department that the constitution clearly doesn’t allow. So, that legislative plan to allow district court judges to vote among themselves to select their district leaders
Martin Hawver
is out the window, though it did have some relatively nice-sounding “local control” aspects.
For most Kansans, the decision on who is the chief judge of their district court is not only not a big deal, but next time you’re after a bet you think you can win, ask your neighbor whom the chief judge is…and we’re betting that you’ll get no answer. Unless you are a lawyer, or another judge, or maybe the guy at the courthouse who assigns parking spaces, you have no reason to know who the chief is.
Which makes it an excellent proposition for a little Legislature-Judiciary boxing match to see who really runs things. The Legislature believed, and the governor signed into law, a bill back in 2014 that allows local judges to select their chief, with the public concept that local selections mean local control and that sounds nice, although that local control by legislative order taints the concept a bit, doesn’t it?
But we’ve just seen the first round of this Legislature-Judiciary scrap.
As big as that decision which lawmakers lost is the Legislature’s order that if it didn’t win on selection of chief judges, the appropriation to finance the court evaporates. That’s more than $100 million a year and the scrap over whether the Legislature can actually do that is Round 2.
The second round of the Legislature-Judiciary battle is just simmering now.
That second round is a provision in last year’s judicial budget bill that says if the provision for local selection of chief judges is for any reason knocked down, the judicial branch gets no budget. Hmmm…yes that non-severability clause provision sounds like a knockout punch, but if the court can knock down the first punch, can it also knock down that budget-killing second swing?
So things are getting interesting. This budget-killer of a provision means that essentially, if it is constitutional, the Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals and all those local district courts are out of business. No, the Legislature can’t kill the pay for those judges, but the provision could eliminate every dime spent on salaries of the aides and clerks and the people who actually make the courts work. It’s the folks who track cases and organize virtually everything that is done save for hammering the gavel down or telling jurors when the lunch break is.
Attorney General Derek Schmidt got a judge to delay that budget-elimination business until March 15, but we gotta wonder whether the Legislature, seeing what happened to the chief judge selection issue, is ready to give up and repeal that non-severability/budget provision.
Or…whether the legislators who want to make the Supreme Court heel when they whistle are going to wait for a court decision on that case, too.
The upside for waiting is the Supreme Court is likely to look a little over-protective of its power, and that isn’t a good attribute for those justices who stand who stand for retention votes next fall.
The downside? Makes you wonder whether those legislators who want to meddle in court business just can’t take a lesson, and after the court, what do they meddle in next?
This might—or if you work for the court might not—be interesting to watch…
Syndicated by Hawver News Company LLC of Topeka; Martin Hawver is publisher of Hawver’s Capitol Report—to learn more about this nonpartisan statewide political news service, visit the website at www.hawvernews.com
Carl Dean Chaney, 85, of Natoma, Kansas resident, died on Saturday, December 26, 2015, at the Bramlage House at Meadow Hills Care Center in Manhattan, Kansas.
Carl was born on August 04, 1930, in Garnett, Kansas, the son of Roy and Hazel (Carmin) Chaney. He grew up in the Saline River Valley and Codell, Kansas, areas and graduated from Codell High School. He met, fell in love and was united in marriage to Elizabeth Ann Arnold on February 22, 1950, in Stockton, Kansas. From this union Carl and Elizabeth were blessed with 4 children; Carla, Coleen, Brian and Todd. Carl worked 42 years as an oil field pumper for Okmar Oil Company. In their later years Carl and Elizabeth settled down in Natoma. He attended Natoma Methodist Church. He was a former Boy Scout Master and a member of the Masonic Lodge in Codell, Plainville and Russell, Kansas. As a Mason, Carl achieved the highest degree in Freemasonry as a the Third Degree Master Mason as well as a 32nd degree mason. He enjoyed reading about Kansas history, digging snake root, using his metal detector, playing the slot machines and playing KENO scratch tickets. Most of all he enjoyed spending time with his family.
Surviving family include his daughters Carla Kriley of Walker, Kansas and Coleen Deschner and husband Mike of Scott City, Kansas; sons Brian Chaney and wife Sarah of Sandwich, Massachusetts and Todd Chaney of Hays, Kansas; brother Lowell Chaney of Hobert, Oklahoma and Doris Falk of Dallas, Texas; 5 grandchildren Ronnie, Dale, Brandon, Krystal and Megan and 3 great grandchildren Carlie, Colette and Ari.
He was preceded in death by his parents, wife Elizabeth on December 13, 2010 and a grandson Dale Hopkins.
A celebration of Carl’s life will be held at 10:30 A.M. on Wednesday, December 30, 2015, at the Natoma Methodist Church in Natoma, Kansas, with Michael Deschner officiating. Burial will follow at the Natoma City Cemetery. A Masonic service will be presented by Darrell Rubottom. Visitation will be from 9 A.M. to 8 P.M. on Tuesday, December 29, 2015, at the Pohlman-Varner-Peeler Mortuary in Russell. Memorials can be given to the Association of Retarded Citizens and sent in care of the mortuary. Pohlman-Varner-Peeler Mortuary of Russell and Natoma is in charge of the funeral service arrangements.
Last week’s inspection results from the Kansas Department of Agriculture:
Pheasant Run 3201 Vine St. Hays – Dec. 23
A routine inspection found six violations:
A cook in the kitchen was not wearing hair protection.
The atmospheric pressure breaker on the garbage disposal is missing the cap.
The employee restroom does not have a covered waste receptacle.
The wall around the drain board for the dish machine is water damaged and has mold growing on the surface.
Container used for wiping cloth storage in sanitizer was not labeled. Pump bottle at employee restroom sink identified as soap was not labeled.
The chlorine sanitizer used for storage of wiping cloths was over 200ppm.
Smoky Hill County Club 3303 N. Hall St. Hays – Dec. 23
A routine inspection found two violations:
Two bottles of liquor in the bar were contaminated with flying insects. A pan of vacuumed packed fish was found in the under counter reach in cooler thawing with vacuum intact.
Vegetable Soup was cooling in large 2 gallon container.
Taco Shop 333 W. 8th St. Hays – Dec. 23
A routine inspection found two violations:
The drive through fountain machine does not have a vented backflow preventer on the mixer pump.
The fan cover on the condenser in the walk in cooler have an accumulation of dust.
Sweet Zoo 115 W 8th St. Hays – Dec. 21
A licensing inspection found two violations:
A covered waste receptacle is not provided in restroom.
Just when I thought the confusing Kansas deer hunting regulations had been
streamlined to help end most confusion, I looked at the dates for the upcoming
extended antlerless-only season to find there are three different sets of dates
depending on the deer management unit in which you live. I’m not complaining
though because I feel like the varied deer populations in the state were seriously
considered this year when setting these dates.
As in years past, there is an extended deer firearms season across the state for
antlerless whitetail deer only, where any unfilled deer permit from a regular
season is valid. An antlerless deer is defined in the regulations as “a deer without
a visible antler plainly protruding from the skull.” Before you read any further, I
suggest you go to the Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism website,
or open a copy of the printed Kansas Hunting regulations and become familiar
with the nineteen deer management units around the state, and where they are.
The boundaries for all these units are major highways across the state, NOT
county lines, so different parts of different counties are in different management
units. All extended antlerless only seasons begin on January 1, but run for
different lengths of time, ending on different dates.
In deer management units 6, 8, 9, 10, 16 and 17, the extended antlerless season
runs for 3 days, from January 1 thru January 3.
In management units 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 11, 12, 13 and 14 the extended antlerless
season runs for 10 days, January 1 thru January 10.
Finally, in an effort to thin the deer herd in the Topeka to Kansas City corridor, the
extended antlerless season in units 10A, 15 and 19 runs for 17 days, from January
1 thru January 17. Unit 10A is Fort Leavenworth and is open only to active and
retired military personnel. Unit 19 is the metropolitan area from Topeka to Kansas
City and takes in Topeka, Lawrence, Olathe and Kansas City. Management unit 15
is in south central Kansas.
Deer management unit 18 in extreme south western Kansas has no extended antlerless season this year.
Unfilled deer permits are valid statewide, so if you have not yet filled your tag for
this year, you can hunt in the upcoming Kansas extended antlerless deer season
anywhere in Kansas except in unit 18 which has no extended season this year; just
be aware of which management unit you are hunting in and know the dates for
that unit. And remember, only antlerless whitetails can be taken. My wife
harvested a nice buck the second day of firearms season, but I have yet to fill my
tag, so I’m excited and ready to get a nice doe. As our second deer this year, it will
be the one I get to make a little jerky and summer sausage from…Continue to Explore Kansas Outdoors.
Steve Gilliland, Inman, can be contacted by email at [email protected].
Dennis Allen Rodgers, age 41, of Hays passed away Sunday, December 20, 2015 at the Wheatland Nursing Center in Russell. He was born March 10, 1974 in Orange County, Florida to Dan and Mary Lou (Meier) Rodgers.
He graduated from Hays High and had worked in construction building homes and concrete work.
He is survived by a son, Shawn Meyer of Hays and a sister, Dayna Rodgers of Hays.
He was preceded in death by his parents and a sister, Danette Rodgers.
Cremation has taken place with no services to be held.
Condolences may be left by guest book at www.keithleyfuneralchapels.com or emailed to [email protected]
HUTCHINSON– Fire officials in Reno County are investigating the cause of a fire just after 9p.m. on Sunday in an apartment in the 500 Block of East First Street in Hutchinson.
When firefighters arrived, they found heavy smoke coming from the rear of the structure.
Initial crews were also confronted by one of the occupants who could not account for his wife, according to a media release from the Hutchinson Fire Department.
Crews entered the structure and were met with heavy fire.
A search of the apartment was done and no occupants were found. They were then notified later that the occupant was found safe at another location.
The fire took one hour to control.
High winds at the time caused the fire to spread through the attic area. The apartment sustained major damage to three rooms and the roof.
Damage is estimated at $30,000, with the cause undetermined.
No injuries were reported with crews on scene for three hours.
