LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — Prosecutors have dropped an assault charge against a former University of Kansas football player accused of threatening his girlfriend with a gun.

The charge against 20-year-old Maciah Long was dropped Tuesday after he agreed to plead no contest to marijuana possession.

The Lawrence Journal-World reports Long was sentenced to six months of probation and ordered to complete an anger management program.

Long was arrested in August after his then-girlfriend reported he threatened her with a gun during an argument. Prosecutors say the woman has moved out of state and didn’t want to participate in prosecuting the case.

Long, a sophomore, was dismissed from the team the day after he was arrested.

The native of Houston, Texas, played linebacker and tight end for the Jayhawks in 2016.

By CELIA LLOPIS-JEPSEN

Kansas lawmakers began groundwork Monday for their response to the Kansas Supreme Court’s order to fix school finance by this spring. The same day, a Hiawatha senator announced he will seek to curb the court’s powers through a constitutional amendment.

Republican Sen. Dennis Pyle issued a news release saying the judiciary should not be allowed to close schools — a possible outcome if the Legislature fails to comply with the high court’s October ruling.

“Decision-making is best left to locally elected officials who are closest to the people, not bureaucrats or judges in Topeka,” Pyle said. “Unilaterally closing all schools based upon a lawsuit brought by a handful of districts is an extreme measure and is a bullying tactic at least.”

Amending the state constitution would take a two-thirds vote in each chamber and a majority vote in a public election.

Sobering budget projections

Pyle’s news release came a few hours into the first meeting of a House-Senate panel tasked with mulling options in the wake of the court order. Pyle isn’t on the committee.

RELATED: 5 Reasons The Kansas Supreme Court Found The State’s School Funding Unconstitutional

The committee members received sobering state budget projections on their first day of work. Legislative staff presented estimates for the next several years that said the state would need to cut hundreds of millions of dollars in spending in 2020 and following years to make ends meet and curb the practice of diverting money from the state’s highway fund and pension liability.

The projections don’t factor in the effect of increased spending on K-12 schools, but lawmakers wouldn’t say whether more tax hikes are likely. Any increases would come on the heels of a $1.2 billion tax increase earlier this year.

“I don’t know,” Ottawa Republican Rep. Blaine Finch said. “That’s up to the Legislature as a whole, but it would seem from the opinion that the court is demanding some additional expenditure of funds.”

Rep. Ed Trimmer, a Winfield Democrat, said the budget projection presented Monday was a conservative one.

“I think there are some things that might improve the situation,” he said, “but we’ll have to wait and see.”

Senate Majority Leader Jim Denning, of Overland Park, expressed concern the projections only showed around $100 million in annual tax revenue growth. If lawmakers want to add $200 million or more to schools in the next budget year and years after that, he said, they’ll have to find a way to pay for it.

“Plus the rest of the state gets frozen — no (additional) money for Medicaid, no money for prisons,” he said. “Those are the kind of things that need to get fleshed out.”

Amendment appetite?

The October court ruling declared current state aid out of compliance with Kansas’ obligation to fund public schools. It set an April 30 deadline for lawmakers to address the situation and file written arguments showing they have done so. The ruling stems from a seven-year lawsuit sponsored by dozens of school districts.

Pyle was in the Senate in the summer of 2005, when lawmakers struggled to meet a similar court order during a special session.

Frustrated by the order then that Kansas add about $285 million for the coming school year, he and 13 other senators co-sponsored a resolution to bar the judiciary from interfering in school finance.

It was one of multiple proposals to rein in court powers that year by tweaking the constitution, but none made it to a public vote.

The committee may take a closer look at potential constitutional amendments later this month. Members signaled varying appetites for that Monday.

“I seriously doubt there are votes there to pass a constitutional amendment,” Trimmer said. “I don’t think it’s a realistic proposal. I think we just need to do what’s right, figure out a way to fund this.”

Denning indicated Attorney General Derek Schmidt is also working on constitutional amendment language for lawmakers.

“I think I’ve been very clear I would look at a constitutional amendment,” Denning said.

House Majority Leader Don Hineman, of Dighton, couldn’t point to a proposal that he would support but said “it’s worth having the conversation.”

“Whether we can reach agreement on language of what that amendment would say and how it would operate is a pretty large question,” he said, because securing a two-thirds majority in the House and Senate is “a pretty tall bar.”

Celia Llopis-Jepsen is a reporter for the Kansas News Service. You can reach her on Twitter @Celia_LJ.

SALINE COUNTY — There were no injuries after a fire destroyed a pickup Monday night in Saline County.

Just after 8p.m., a 1988 Ford F-150 driven by Riley Krueger, 20, rural Saline County, exited off Interstate 70 at Niles Road and traveled down Old Highway 40 to North Amos Road, according to Saline County Undersheriff Brent Melander.

At that time, Krueger said the vehicle began experiencing engine problems and flames started to come from the engine.

Krueger’s parents responded with several fire extinguishers but could not put out the blaze. The Solomon

Fire Department arrived on scene and extinguished the fire. The truck was completely destroyed.
Authorities believe a ruptured fuel or brake line ignited is responsible for the fire.

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SHAWNEE COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities reopened Interstate 70 just after 7 a.m. Tuesday following an investigation.

Just after 4 a.m. police and KDOT closed the Interstate in both directions from 4th to Gage in Topeka, according to the KHP.

The incident started as a routine traffic stop. Officers found a possible explosive devices, according to Shawnee County Communications.

Police have not released details on what they found.

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SHAWNEE COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are on the scene of a traffic stop that has closed  Interstate 70, according to Topeka Police.

The incident started as a routine traffic stop. Officers found possible explosive devices, according to Shawnee County Communications.

A traffic stop with suspicious devices has both east and westbound lanes of I-70 closed until safety is ensured.

— Topeka Police (@Topeka_Police) December 5, 2017

Both directions of the Interstate between 4th Street and Gage in Topeka, were shut down just after 4 a.m., according to the Kansas Highway Patrol.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump (all times local):

10:30 a.m.

A top immigration official says people living in the country illegally have good reason to be worried about getting deported under President Donald Trump.

Thomas Homan, deputy director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, spoke Tuesday in Washington as the federal government announced that Border Patrol arrests plunged to a 45-year-low in the last fiscal year while arrests by deportation officers soared.

Homan says the Trump administration has cast a wider net when picking up people for deportation.

Administration officials say the decline in Border Patrol arrests to the lowest level since 1971 doesn’t undercut justification for Trump’s proposed border wall with Mexico.

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6 a.m.

The federal government has provided the most complete statistical snapshot of immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump. Border Patrol arrests plunged to a 45-year low while arrests by deportation officers soared.

Numbers released Tuesday show the Border Patrol made nearly 311,000 arrests during the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, a decline of 25 percent from a year earlier and the lowest level since 1971. Despite the significant decline, arrests increased every month since May, largely families and unaccompanied children.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement, whose officers pick up people for deportation away from the border, made more than 140,000 arrests, an increase of 25 percent from a year earlier. After Trump took office, ICE arrests surged 40 percent from the same period a year earlier.