Longtime Goodland, KS, resident Elmer Matthew Jacobs, 81, passed away on Monday, March 4, 2019 at the Good Samaritan Society-Sherman County in Goodland, KS.
Elmer was born on April 16, 1937 in Dresden, Kansas to Raymond Matthew and Rose Magdaline (Ritter) Jacobs. He was one of 10 children. Elmer grew up and attended school in Leoville, KS, graduating from Leoville High School in 1955. He then went on and attended one year of Electrical Training at Parks University in Denver, Colorado.
On May 25, 1957, Elmer married Viola Leona Brungardt. To this union, six children were born; Jeanne, Delilah, Debra, Jennifer, Viola and Leona.
Elmer owned and operated Jacobs Appliance, Inc. in Goodland, KS until he retired in 1986 and started ostrich ranching. His favorite pastime was fishing with anybody he could talk into going with him. He was a member of Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church and the Goodland Knights of Columbus as a 4th Degree Knight; he served as State President of Jaycee’s, and was a member of the Kiwanis, Elks and Rotary.
Preceding him in death were his parents, his wife Viola, an AFS Son Fabio Pissaro, two twin daughters Viola and Leona; three sisters and 4 brothers.
He is survived by his children; Jeanne Jacobs of Centennial, CO, Delilah (Don) Leiker of Goodland, KS, Debra (Doug) Garber of Sabetha, KS, Jennifer (Scott) Sievers of Centennial, CO, and an AFS daughter Carolina (Mark) Sievers of Missouri City, TX, one brother Paul (Ann) Jacobs of Lakewood, CO and a sister Alverda (Bob) Moellering or Hoxie, KS. He is also survived by his seven grandchildren; Karen Leiker, Kelsy (Mike) Maoudj, Julie (John) Donaldson, Mackenzie Garber, Sarah Sievers, Luke Sievers and Jacob Garber.
Visitation will be held on Thursday, March 7, 2019 from 6:00 to 8:00 PM MT at Koons-Russell Funeral Home in Goodland. With a Roasry at 8PM. Cremation will follow. A Celebration of Life Memorial Service for Elmer will be held at a later date.
Memorials may be designated to the Knights of Columbus or to Hospice Services of Sherman County and may be left at visitation or mailed to Koons-Russell Funeral Home, 211 N. Main Ave., Goodland, KS 67735.
Online condolences for the family may be left at www.koonsrussellfuneralhome.com.
Service arrangements have been entrusted to Koons-Russell Funeral Home in Goodland.
Karen Rae (Wilhelm) Brungardt, age 73, of Hays, Kansas passed away Tuesday, March 5, 2019 at Hays Medical Center. She was born August 25, 1945 in Russell, Kansas to Ed and Gertie (Huff) Wilhelm. She married Roy Brungardt on June 25, 1966 in Russell. He preceded her in death August 30, 2018.
Karen was a homemaker. She was a member of St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, Smoky Hill Country Club where she was very active in ladies golf. She enjoyed crafts especially silk floral arrangements and jewelry making . Karen was also a very active supporter of TMP-Marian, ARC and the Mary Elizabeth Maternity Home.
She is survived by two sons, Jeff Brungardt and wife Suzanne of Kansas City, Kansas and Kirk Brungardt of Dallas, Texas; three sisters, her twin, Sharon Strecker of Kansas City, Janice Schmidt of Kansas City and Donna Howard of Hawaii; a granddaughter, Katelyn Brungardt in Chicago and a grandson, John Brungardt in KC.
She was preceded in death by her parents and a sister, Doris Burris.
Funeral services will be 10:30 AM Saturday, March 9, 2019 at Brock’s-Keithley Funeral Chapel and crematory 2509 Vine Hays, KS 67637. Burial will follow in St. Joseph’s Cemetery, Hays.
Visitation will be Friday 5 PM – 7 PM at the funeral chapel.
In lieu of flowers, the family suggests memorials to Hays Med Hospice Center
Condolences may be left by guest book at www.keithleyfuneralchapels.com or by email at [email protected]
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The Latest on the debate in Kansas over increasing funding for public schools (all times local):
photo courtesy office of Kansas Governor
Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly’s plan for increasing public education funding has cleared its first hurdle in the Legislature despite unexpected resistance from some local school districts.
A Senate committee on school funding approved Kelly’s proposed increase of roughly $90 million a year on a voice vote Wednesday. The support for the Democratic governor’s bill came from the committee’s Republican majority and sent it to the full Senate for debate.
Kelly views her proposal as a simple way to comply with a Kansas Supreme Court mandate to boost education funding.
But fellow Democrats on the committee didn’t support her plan after a coalition of 48 school districts withdrew its support. Those districts said a second look convinced them that the plan would not provide enough money to satisfy the court.
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TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas’ new Democratic governor is meeting unexpected resistance to her plan for boosting public education funding from local school districts that believe her proposal wouldn’t supply enough new money.
Gov. Laura Kelly touts her proposed increase of roughly $90 million a year as a simple way to comply with a Kansas Supreme Court mandate for an increase in education funding. She initially won over Schools for Fair Funding, a coalition of 48 school districts backing an ongoing lawsuit against the state, including the four districts that sued in 2010.
But the group withdrew its support ahead of a Senate committee hearing Wednesday. One of its attorneys said a further review of Kelly’s proposal showed it would fall tens of millions of dollars short each year of satisfying the Supreme Court.
The change of heart is complicating Kelly’s efforts to push a funding increase through the Republican-controlled Legislature and could prolong the lawsuit just when an end seemed in sight. It also threatens to divide supporters of more funding in the face of many Republicans’ misgivings about higher spending and their frustrations with what they see as an activist court.
“This kind of moves us away from, ‘Well, there’s one clear, simple answer that everyone agrees on,'” said Mark Tallman, a longtime Kansas Association of School Boards lobbyist.
The Supreme Court has issued six rulings in the past five years mandating increases in education funding, citing a duty under the state constitution for lawmakers to provide a suitable education for every child.
A 2018 law phased in a $548 million increase in the state’s $4 billion in annual funding by the 2022-23 school year. The court said it was inadequate because it did not account for inflation, and the state must tell the court by April 15 how it addressed the problem.
John Robb, an attorney for Schools for Fair Funding and the districts suing the state, said lawmakers face “an arithmetic problem.”
He contends the arithmetic requires phasing in another $364 million increase in education funding by the 2022-23 school year. The state’s spending would then be more than $900 million higher than it was from 2017-18.
That’s not how Kelly sees the math.
She argues the state can meet the court’s mandate by increasing its annual spending by roughly $90 million a year — or $364 million spread over four years. Under her plan, the state’s spending for 2022-23 would be about $640 million higher than it was in 2017-18.
That’s roughly $270 million short of Schools for Fair Funding’s mark.
But the governor has said she is relying on recommendations from the independently elected and GOP-led State Board of Education last year.
“The goal of this bill is to address inflation, end the litigation and meet the needs of our students and schools,” said Kelly spokeswoman Ashley All.
Schools for Fair Funding endorsed Kelly’s plan during a Feb. 6 hearing . Lobbyist Bill Brady sent an email the next day to the Senate committee’s members saying, “I do not know how to make our position any more clear.”
Then, Brady sent a follow-up email Feb. 26, saying that Schools for Fair Funding had “examined the numbers” and concluded Kelly’s plan was not sufficient.
The committee’s chairwoman, Sen. Molly Baumgardner, a conservative Republican from eastern Kansas, called it “a flip-flop.”
“For them to take such an about-face — there is no explanation for it,” she said.
Robb said Schools for Fair Funding initially believed Kelly’s plan was in line with its stance. He said the group later saw that the State Department of Education simply made mistakes in calculating how to adjust the state’s formula for distributing dollars to local school districts and passed those mistakes on to Kelly.
Longtime Deputy Education Commissioner Dale Dennis, in charge of the calculations, rejected Robb’s explanation: “There’s no error involved.”
The disagreement is an unwelcome development for supporters of higher education funding as they deal with a Legislature that grew more conservative after last year’s elections. GOP conservatives have long wanted to check the Supreme Court and argue that schools are not accountable enough.
And some Republicans doubt the state could sustain even Kelly’s smaller plan without raising taxes within a few years. She pledged during last year’s campaign not to pursue tax hikes, with GOP lawmakers already adamantly opposed.
“It will never happen,” said Senate Majority Leader Jim Denning, a conservative Kansas City-area Republican.
Kelly and her allies face having a plan that can win lawmakers’ approval being challenged before the Supreme Court as insufficient — repeating a pattern under her GOP predecessors that she promised to break.
Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, a Topeka Democrat, is siding with Schools for Fair Funding, arguing that lawmakers should approve its proposed increases for the 2019-20 and 2020-21 school years.
“It’s important now that we try to get everybody on the same page,” he said.
The fifth annual Love, Chloe Superhero Strong Family Fun Run is Saturday, March 23.
Races are scheduled to start at 9 a.m. at Bill Burke Park. The event is open for individuals and teams to register now and until March 20. The registration fee is $30 for adults and $15 for children 12 and under.
All participants get an event shirt, food and more. This is a 5K and 1 mile walk/run honoring local children who have or have had cancer. All proceeds from this event benefit childhood cancer through the Love, Chloe Foundation.
The Thomas More Prep-Marian FFA Chapter recently competed in an agricultural mechanics contest in Goodland.
There were five possible contests for the students to participate: Farm Power and Machinery, Carpentry, Electrical Power, Ag Welding and Surveying.
There were 20 schools and over 100 students participating in all. Students could do all five events or any combination of the fives.
TMP-M had students competing in Farm Power and Machinery, Carpentry and Electric Power. As a team, TMP-M finished third overall for the teams that only competed in three events.
Jacob Schmeidler was third overall, Connor Staab 18th overall, Weston Pfeifer 21st overall, Jacob Sack 23rd overall, Jacob Pfeifer 28th overall and Matthew Gottschalk 29th overall.
Make plans to attend the first Stock Growers Field Day on Tuesday, March 26.
The Stock Growers Field Day will be highlighted by a market outlook from CattleFax and by a presentation on increasing production efficiency from the well-known reproductive physiologist, Dr. Rick Funston. The field day, held in Beloit, will be a collaboration from K-State Research and Extension, the Kansas Livestock Association, and the Kansas Bull Test.
“This will give producers a better chance to not only hear from industry leaders, but to also take part in conversation with one another,” says Barrett Simon, Livestock Agent for K-State Research and Extension. “The field day is an effort to bring industry experts right to North Central Kansas. Often times events of this caliber are held in places like Wichita, Manhattan or Dodge City.”
In addition to the speakers, the program will offer breakout sessions where attendees can pick and choose which topics apply to them. Topics discussed may include a producer panel on cover crop grazing, a session on livestock watering considerations for the upcoming summer grazing season and more. More than 30 agricultural businesses will be on hand in the trade show and bulls from the Kansas Bull Test will be available for viewing throughout the afternoon.
The cost to attend the meeting is $15, which includes an evening meal and a copy of the field day proceedings. This event has been generously sponsored by Merck Animal Health, Anipro / Xtraformance Feeds, Guaranty State Bank, and Rawhide Portable Corral.
Questions can be directed to Barrett Simon at 785-378-3174 or [email protected].
Reserve your spot today! Registrations can be mailed to: Post Rock Extension District, 307 N Commercial, Mankato, KS 66956. Please write “Stock Growers Field Day – Registration” in the memo line.
Alicia Boor is an Agriculture and Natural Resources agent in the Cottonwood District (which includes Barton and Ellis counties) for K-State Research and Extension. You can contact her by e-mail at [email protected] or calling 620-793-1910
If one is in a twilight zone, that means a person is somewhere between reality and fantasy. I contend our government in part, all of our politics from the left, and most of media that camps out in D.C’s Disneyland, are no longer even in the twilight zone. It’s all a make believe world.
This letter to the editor is a follow up to one a few weeks ago. In my last writing titled “Disneyland on the Potomac” where our Washington D.C. government is located on a river, we have a political world that seems to be from Mars. Reality doesn’t seem to exist. Hollywood is in second place when we look at who creates the most fiction.
In my last letter I mentioned how out of touch the left is with the climate change issue and open borders for illegals. I also touched on the Trump Russia collusion story that has dominated the news daily for over two years with no evidence whatsoever that collusion occurred or that somehow Russia hacked into our election. I also hit on the fake news coming from media which I intend to address even more.
How about the following for another leftist liberal and progressive whopper! Call it science fiction. Even though real scientists have concluded life begins at conception and an unborn baby can feel pain within 8 weeks of a typical 40 week pregnancy, there are Democrats who want to make it legal to kill a baby after he or she is born and out of the mother’s womb. The epitome of insanity and – and immorality! The Senate Democrats actually killed a bill that would have made it illegal to murder.
You can’t make this stuff up, but it is happening. Call it a bad dream that Dems don’t even value the lives of newborn babies.
Most of the Democrat Party presidential hopefuls are campaigning on the replacement of capitalism in this country with socialism, and that’s at a time America has the strongest economy in the world thanks to capitalism. Socialism has never worked in the many countries that have gone that route, but “so what” is the mindset from Democrats. Did you or I ever think we would see the day when there would be a socialist proposal telling Americans that if you don’t want to work, no problems, you’ll be guaranteed an income equal to those that do work? God help us.
I bring up the fake news issue again because news by mainstream media (known as MSM) permeates all of our lives daily like none other. It is delusional for anybody to think our media is objective and non partisan when 95% of journalists and others employed in media vote Democrat. A recent poll shows that the majority of Americans believe most media purposefully presents false news for the sole purpose of misleading readers and viewers.
The hosts and contributors of political news coming from CNN, MSNBC, the big three networks of ABC, CBS, NBC are making Hollywood actors and actresses look like amateurs. Take note of this scenario. Every morning or the late evening before, there is collaboration by MSM to “manufacture” (make up) talking points for the sole purpose of misleading viewers into falsely thinking Trump is going to be in prison any day now following impeachment.
Surely readers have noticed on TV that if one person on mainstream media has a negative talking point about what Trump does, they all say the same thing. Free press? Not even in our dreams. For example, if the order of the day is to call Trump a racist they all say the same thing hundreds of times throughout the day.
What takes place in liberal mainstream media 24/7 is nothing but an act that all have rehearsed. It’s fake news. It’s spin. The American public is being duped by MSM, which is an arm of the Democrat Party. Call it brainwashing and indoctrination. In fact, one could call it “dumbing down” the public. For example, a recent report by a two year Senate Intelligence Committee of no evidence Trump colluded with Russia media continued claiming there was for some 2,040 minutes with zero minutes spent on the report saying otherwise.
Only the gullible thinks the Mueller Special Council Report, when forthcoming, will nail Trump for collusion. I guarantee you all that if witch hunter Mueller had a bombshell smoking gun he would have said something long ago to distract from the attempted coup to destroy Trump by Mueller’s friends in the FBI and DOJ. It turns out the cops and robbers are one and the same. Trump will get hammered for other things, but not collusion, even though the SC is supposed to be about collusion.
With all the successes Trump has in making America great again, how is it even possible for media to claim they are fair and balanced with wall to wall negative coverage throughout the day? One need not be a rocket scientist to figure out that does not compute logically, but then the left isn’t logical about anything.
Frances D. Weibert, beloved mother and grandmother, passed away on Monday, March 4, 2019 at the Park Lane Nursing Home in Scott City, Kansas at the age of 102.
Born on July 16, 1916, in Everton, Missouri, she was the second oldest of six children born to Wilson “Ovid” and Zella Drisdel McMillen.
On March 7, 1949, she married Alex Weibert in Wichita, Kansas where she worked at Cessna, and he worked for Boeing. Moving from Wichita, Kansas, they remained residents of Scott City, Kansas, where he was a farmer and custom harvester and she retired as Assistant Scott County Treasurer.
Frances was beautiful inside and out and will be remembered for her gentle and kind spirit, keen sense of humor, and a fierce love of her family.
She was preceded in death by her parents, husband – Alex, who passed away on August 18, 1984, son – Gary Weibert, four brothers – Dale, Berl, David, and Clarence “Bull” McMillen, and one sister – Alma Morris.
Survivors include: one daughter, Mary Ann Gaylord of Honolulu, Hawaii, one grandson Ross Gaylord of St. Petersburg, Florida, and one granddaughter, Carlie Weibert of Houston, Texas.
Funeral services will be held at 10:30 a.m. on Friday, March 8, 2019, at Price & Sons Funeral Home in Scott City, Kansas, with Rev. Kyle Evans presiding.
Memorials In Lieu Of Flowers may be made to the Scott County Hospital in care of Price & Sons Funeral Homes.
There will be no calling times. Internment will be in the Scott County Cemetery in Scott City, Kansas.
Thursday Patchy fog between 8am and 9am. Areas of freezing fog between 7am and 8am. Otherwise, mostly cloudy, with a high near 31. East northeast wind around 9 mph becoming north northwest in the morning.
Thursday Night Mostly cloudy, with a low around 16. North wind 5 to 9 mph.
FridayPartly sunny, with a high near 38. Light and variable wind becoming southeast 5 to 10 mph in the morning.
Friday NightA chance of rain before 9pm, then a chance of freezing rain. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 31. East southeast wind 10 to 15 mph becoming southwest after midnight. Chance of precipitation is 40%.
SHAWNEE COUNTY – Law enforcement authorities are investigating a Kansas felon on new charges after an arrest.
Barnes -photo Shawnee Co.
Just before midnight Tuesday, police were dispatched to 2619 SW 21st in Topeka on a report of unwanted subjects intoxicated in the parking lot, according to Lt. Manuel Munoz.
Officers made contact with Sylvan Alexa Barnes, 26, who was attempting to drive away.
Further investigation by the officers revealed that Barnes was intoxicated and subsequently arrested for DUI.
Officers also located a firearm and narcotics in the vehicle. Barnes was transported to Shawnee County Department of Corrections and booked on requested charges of Felon in Possession of a Firearm, Possession of Marijuana and DUI, according to Munoz.
She has previous convictions for aggravated burglary, aggravated assault, violation of a protection order from abuse, criminal possession of a firearm, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections.
This is the 25th case in 2019 with a charge involving a felon in possession of a firearm reported by the Topeka Police Department.
Longtime Goodland, KS, resident Elmer Matthew Jacobs, 81, passed away on Monday, March 4, 2019 at the Good Samaritan Society-Sherman County in Goodland, KS.
