WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House says the United States on Monday will meet President Barack Obama’s goal of admitting 10,000 Syrian refugees into the country during the current fiscal year.

Obama directed a sixfold increase in the number of Syrian refugees provided safe haven into the United States.

After a slow start, the administration was able to hit the goal about a month early and just a few weeks before Obama convenes a summit on refugees during the 71st session of the United Nations General Assembly.

National Security Adviser Susan Rice says Obama understood the important message that expanding Syrian refugee admissions would send, not just to the Syrian people but to the broader international community. Millions have been forced to flee Syria to escape the country’s civil war and persecution.

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas City man has been sentenced to eight years and four months in prison for trying to kill a Kansas homeless shelter employee by slashing his throat.

The Lawrence Journal-World  reports that 23-year-old Christopher McCay was sentenced in Douglas County after pleading guilty in January to attempted first-degree murder.

He admitted that in March 2014 he used a steak knife from the Lawrence Community Shelter’s kitchen and stabbed Robert Shaner. The then 46-year-old underwent emergency surgery for injuries to his neck and left hand.

McCay was working as a volunteer cook in the shelter’s kitchen and also had been a guest there. Under the sentence, McCay also must register as a violent offender for 15 years after his eventual release and complete 36 months of post-release supervision.

BALTIMORE (AP) — A Michael Phelps fan who has autism has become an inspiration on his own after sharing his dream of competing in the Olympics one day on the swimmer’s Facebook page.

Austin Levingston’s Aug. 16 post has received more than 3,000 likes. In it, the 21-year-old man, from Great Bend says he’s attending college and hopes to be the first person in his family to get a degree. He also tells Phelps, “I’m hoping to swim in the Olympics just like you someday.”

Levingston also is a doppelganger for Phelps, who grew up outside Baltimore. Levingston included a few pictures of himself which show a strong resemblance to the 23-time gold medalist.

Levingston tells The Baltimore Sun he doesn’t know if Phelps saw his post.

HUTCHINSON – A Kansas man failed to get his bond lowered after he allegedly led Reno County Sheriff Deputies on a chase early Sunday morning.

Christopher Ford, 30, Hutchinson, faces possible charges of felony flee and elude, with five or more moving violations, and driving while suspended.

A Reno County Sheriff Deputy tried to initiate a traffic stop in the 3100 block of East Blanchard, on the frontage road after Ford allegedly crossed the centerline.

As the deputy tried to stop the vehicle, Ford allegedly drove down into the ditch, then accelerated out of it.

He continued traveling east on Blanchard and ran a stop sign at Yoder Road.

During the pursuit, he was driving beyond the speed limit and ran an additional seven stop signs.

The vehicle was eventually abandoned near the intersection of Acres Street and South Elm in Hutchinson.

After a search of who owned the vehicle, deputies were able to find and arrested Ford.

In court, he asked for a bond reduction, which the state opposed. Judge Cheryl Allen decided the bond should stay where it is at $1,750.

Ford is scheduled to return to court on September 6.

ST. JOSEPH, Mo. (AP) — Authorities say a body found last week in the Missouri River was that of a 24-year-old Missouri man.

Officials have identified the man as James Ford, 24, St. Joseph.

Police say he went missing early Wednesday after going swimming with a woman. His body was found Thursday morning in the river near Atchison, Kansas.

A preliminary autopsy listed the cause of death as drowning.

The Associated Press

Gene Wilder, the star of such comedy classics as “Young Frankenstein” and “Blazing Saddles,” has died. He was 83.

Wilder’s nephew said Monday that the actor and writer died late Sunday in Stamford, Connecticut from complications from Alzheimer’s disease.

The frizzy-haired actor was a master at playing panicked characters caught up in schemes that only a madman such as Mel Brooks could devise, whether reviving a monster in “Young Frankenstein” or bilking Broadway in “The Producers.”

But he also knew how to keep it cool as the boozy sheriff in “Blazing Saddles” and as the charming candy man in the children’s favorite “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory.”

FINNEY COUNTY – A Kansas man was injured in an accident just before 11 a.m. on Monday in Finney County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a GMC CMV driven by Brian E. OKeefe, 40, Garden City, was southbound on U83 twelve miles south of U.S. 50.

The driver lost control of the vehicle. It crossed the centerline of northbound traffic, traveled into the east ditch went into a passenger side skid and rolled.

O’Keefe and a passenger Alberto A. Anguiano, 37, Garden City, were transported to St. Catherine’s Hospital.

O’Keefe was not injured.

Both were properly restrained at the time of the accident, according to the KHP.

By ANDY MARSO

The second-in-command at the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services told mental health advocates that Osawatomie State Hospital is well-prepared going into a high-stakes federal inspection on Tuesday.

The Osawatomie hospital is one of two inpatient state facilities for Kansans with severe mental illness. KDADS Secretary Tim Keck visited the other facility in Larned on Wednesday.

That left Kelli Ludlum, assistant KDADS secretary, to update the Kansas Mental Health Coalition on Osawatomie, which is seeking to regain millions of dollars in federal payments lost when the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services decertified the facility last year.

“We are ready,” Ludlum said during the coalition’s Wednesday morning meeting in Topeka.

She said the facility was nearly ready when it submitted its recertification application earlier this month, but it was waiting on the installation of new baseboards.

“Special plastic, infection-resistant, antibacterial rubber baseboard that is apparently extremely rare and extremely scarce,” Ludlum said. “That is now installed and we are ready to go.”

KDADS is seeking federal recertification for only 60 of the hospital’s 206 beds. The 60 are in an area that has been under heavy remodeling.

Ludlum reiterated comments Keck made last month about the department wanting to make sure federal inspectors look favorably on the current remodeling work before embarking on an expensive revamp of the rest of the hospital.

Ludlum said the agency fears federal officials won’t approach the upcoming inspection with an open mind given the facility’s recent history.

“It’s hard to know what will happen when CMS shows up,” Ludlum said. “Our request is basically just a clean slate.”

After the inspection, KDADS plans to gradually restore the 60 beds to service.

Amy Campbell, the mental health coalition’s lobbyist, said the beds are much-needed.

She distributed a chart that showed the average wait time for a bed at OSH growing steadily in the past year, from less than one day to more than two days.

She emphasized that all those waiting for a bed have been deemed a danger to themselves or others.

“Please remember these are individuals who have actually been screened for involuntary commitment,” Campbell said. “We are not having any voluntary commitments at Osawatomie at this time.”

She said those Kansans often are held in jails or secured spaces within hospitals until a bed comes free and the law enforcement community “is emphatic that this has got to change.”

Campbell said she was “fascinated” that KDADS decided to initially seek recertification for only 60 beds, calling it “almost like a test run at recertification.”

Ludlum said that the differences between the units seeking recertification and those that aren’t would be only facilities-related and largely cosmetic. Staffing levels and treatment quality would be the same.

To that end, Ludlum said Osawatomie has made significant progress in beefing up staff and reducing forced overtime — to the point that she recently received an email from an employee complaining about a lack of overtime.

“In my mind that’s a pretty good problem to have,” Ludlum said, but she added that the state still is looking to fill some slots at Osawatomie and Larned.

Keck has made recruiting and retaining staff a priority since taking over last year — even successfully lobbying the Legislature for more money to raise nursing salaries despite a tight state budget.

Campbell said the successes in that area seem to have Keck more confident about the state’s ability to run the hospitals, while in the beginning he seemed more bullish on privatizing them.

But she said some appetite for privatization remains within the administration, especially if it’s contingent on the new contractor replacing the “extremely outdated” electronic medical records systems at both hospitals.

“That’s a huge part of the discussion,” Campbell said.

Legislators from both parties have said they oppose privatizing the state hospitals and passed a bill last year requiring the Brownback administration to get their permission before pursuing it.

Andy Marso is a reporter for KHI News Service in Topeka, a partner in the Heartland Health Monitor team. You can reach him on Twitter @andymarso