Year: 2019
🎥 Wild West Fest Parade 2019
News From the Oil Patch, July 8
By JOHN P. TRETBAR
For the first time, monthly U.S. crude oil production figures topped 12 million barrels per day, while Texas and Oklahoma also set records. According to the Petroleum Supply Monthly report from the Energy Information Administration, U.S. operators tapped nearly 12.2 million barrels per day in April, the latest monthly figures available. Oil production in the Gulf of Mexico, Texas and Oklahoma all hit record highs. Texas reached 4.97 million barrels per day, while Oklahoma notched 617,000 barrels per day. Kansas production in April was 95,000 barrels per day.
The U.S. Energy Information Administration reported a big decline in domestic crude oil inventories to 468.5 million barrels for the week ending June 28. That’s down more than one million barrels for the week. The government reported weekly U.S. production increased slightly to more than 12.2 million barrels per day. Average production over the last four weeks is up nearly 12% over the same four-week period a year ago. Imports increased nearly one million barrels to 7.6 million barrels per day. Imports over the last four weeks averaged about 7.3 million barrels per day, which is 13% less than the same four-week period last year.
Operators reported continuing problems with high water across the area causing delays in drilling activity. Independent Oil & Gas Service reports drilling was underway on one lease in Ellis County, but said flooding delayed work at four other sites. Across Western Kansas there are 24 active rigs, up two. There are seven seven active drilling rigs in eastern Kansas, which is up one over last week.
Baker Hughes reported a big drop in its weekly rig count, with 963 active rigs, a drop of five oil rigs and one seeking natural gas. The count in Oklahoma was down five rigs, Louisiana was down four. New Mexico was up three rigs. The count in Canada was down four at 120 active rigs.
Regulators report 25 new Kansas drilling permits for the week, 480 so far this year, with 15 permits in eastern Kansas and ten west of Wichita. There’s one new permit on file in Ellis County.
Independent Oil & Gas Service reports 27 newly completed wells last week across Kansas, 777 so far this year. There were twenty completions east of Wichita, and seven in Western Kansas, including one dry hole in Stafford County.
One of the world’s largest oil-field service companies, Weatherford International filed for bankruptcy protection on last week. The Wall Street Journal reports bondholders approved a restructuring agreement that will reduce Weatherford’s total debt by 70% or almost $6 billion. Five years ago, the company was worth more than $12 billion, but the Journal reports equity shareholders would be left virtually empty-handed under the agreement.
An Oklahoma company bogged down by earthquakes, disposal limits and lawsuits will face an involuntary bankruptcy case in federal court in Oklahoma. White Star Petroleum tried to get the case dismissed in favor of a voluntary Chapter 11 filing in Delaware. But The Daily Oklahoman reports the hearings will be held locally. The company’s hopes for crude production from the Mississippian Lime play were doused by the huge amounts of water those wells produced, the earthquakes that followed disposal of that water, and the lawsuits that followed one of those earthquakes.
Texas man pleads guilty to two counts of first-degree murder
GREAT BEND (AP) — A Texas man has pleaded guilty in the deaths of a couple who were killed at a Kansas fair after one suspect ordered the killings as part of a “carnival mafia” initiation.
Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt’s office said in a news release that 36-year-old Rusty Lee Frasier of Aransas Pass, Texas pleaded guilty Monday to two counts of first-degree premediated murder the 2018 deaths of Alfred “Sonny” Carpenter and Pauline Carpenter at the Barton County Fair, where they were vendors. The bodies of the Wichita couple were discovered in a national forest near Van Buren, Arkansas.
Prosecutors said 32-year-old Thomas Donald Drake of Van Buren, Arkansas, also pleaded guilty Monday to one count of obstructing apprehension.
Their sentencing has not been scheduled.
Investigators say there is no “carnival mafia.”
Michael Alan Robben
Michael Alan Robben, age 60, of Ellis, Kansas (formerly of Oakley, KS) passed away Thursday July 4, 2019 at the Good Samaritan Nursing Home, Ellis.
He was born February 18, 1959 in Oakley, KS to Francis and LaVerna (Lintel) Robben. He attended Oakley High School and later attended Industrial Technical Trade School in Goodland, majoring in Diesel Mechanics. He moved to Burlington, CO working different jobs there. He married Margaret Meyer in Burlington, CO and later were divorced, to this union three children were born: Brent Michael Robben, George Alan Robben, and Amiee Ann Robben, all of Colorado.
Survivors include his children, together with two sisters: Lana Sue (Steve) Wilson; Linda (John) Howard; and one brother: Dan (Chris) Robben. He was preceded in death by his parents and brother, Larry Robben.
A private family inurnment in St Joseph Cemetery in Oakley, KS is planned for July 16, 2019.
Memorials are suggested to the Michael Robben Memorial Fund – C/O Keithley Funeral Homes and Crematory, 2509 Vine, Hays, KS 67601.
Condolences may be left by guest book at www.keithleyfuneralchapels.com or by email at [email protected]
🎥 Green & Growing 2019: Day lilies
Listen to some of the great reasons why daylilies should find a place in your garden.
Nebraska county roads still struggling months after floods
By the Associated Press
Transportation problems persist on Nebraska county roads following massive floods this spring, officials said.
Interstates and state roads have been cleared for use. But traffic issues continue to plague damaged bridges and unending repairs still obstruct traffic outside major metropolitan areas, the Omaha World-Herald reported.
Heavy rain is to blame for the delay in repairs as that makes it difficult for machinery to access flood-damaged areas. County officials said they are struggling to find contractors, equipment, fill dirt, gravel and money.
“I haven’t even put a dent into fixing a lot of this stuff,” said Scott Huppert, highway superintendent for Dodge County. “It’s a lot of damage up there. It got spread all over Dodge County.”
It’s the same story across a vast swath of the state. Eighty-one of 93 counties have disaster declarations.
Heavy rain and snow melt crippled levees , causing the Missouri River and its tributaries to overflow in Iowa, Nebraska, Missouri and Kansas. Repairs to roads have been hindered by the extent of the damage and lingering floodwaters.
Three of the four bridges on a 48-mile (77-kilometer) stretch of the Niobrara River between Holt and Boyd Counties are closed, causing significant hardships for residents in the area and forcing traffic onto one road. That road now sees 700 cars a day at peak when it usually served an average of 70, according to Gary Connot, Holt County highway superintendent.
Continued heavy rain has only made the situation harder to overcome.
Officials have struggled to get heavy equipment in when roads are damaged. Richard Cook, Logan County superintendent, said heavy rain caused a gravel truck to get stuck on a road he thought was repaired.
“The rain isn’t giving us a chance to get one completely repaired before it washes them out again,” he said.
Total repair costs haven’t been finalized yet because damage is still being assessed. Federal aid is expected to cover 75% of costs while the state is responsible for 12.5%. Counties must come up with the rest, and contractors want to be paid now.
Huppert said he took out a $5 million loan to pay contractors after he spent the department’s $4 million emergency fund. He’s estimating that it will cost $17 million to $18 million to repair the entire road and bridge damage in his county.
He said he realizes people are frustrated but that they need to understand it’s a long process.
“It’s coming, but very, very slow,” he said. “We’ll probably still be doing work two years from now.”
Cimarron native picked to oversee KHP’s western region
Colonel Herman T. Jones, Superintendent of the Kansas Highway Patrol, announced that Captain Eric Sauer has been promoted to major, and will now oversee the west region, which includes Troops C, D, E, F, and emergency operations.
Sauer joined the patrol in March 1994 and was assigned to field duties in Goodland. In 1998, he was assigned to the governor’s protection detail, Troop L, in Topeka, and was promoted to second lieutenant in 1999. In 2003, Sauer was promoted to lieutenant and later that same year to captain, assuming the duties of operations commander of Troop L. In 2011, Sauer transferred and took command of Troop N and the KHP aircraft wing, Troop T, until 2015. In 2015, Sauer assumed command of the Homeland Security/Emergency Operations unit in addition to Troop N.
Sauer began his law enforcement career in 1991 with the Riley County Police Department as a police officer after graduating from the Kansas Law Enforcement Training Center. Sauer is a native of Cimarron and a 1987 graduate of Cimarron High School. He later received an associate degree in criminal justice from Seward County Community College in 1989 and his Bachelor of Science degree in criminal justice from Washburn University in 1991. Sauer is a 2011 graduate of the FBI National Academy Class #247 in Quantico, Va.
Poll: 1 in 4 don’t plan to retire despite aging realities
By ANDREW SOERGEL
For The Associated Press
CHICAGO — Nearly one-quarter of Americans say they never plan to retire, according to a poll that suggests a disconnection between individuals’ retirement plans and the realities of aging in the workforce.
Experts say illness, injury, layoffs and caregiving responsibilities often force older workers to leave their jobs sooner than they’d like.
According to the poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, 23% of workers, including nearly 2 in 10 of those over 50, don’t expect to stop working. Roughly another quarter of Americans say they will continue working beyond their 65th birthday.
According to government data, about 1 in 5 people 65 and older was working or actively looking for a job in June.
For many, money has a lot to do with the decision to keep working.
“The average retirement age that we see in the data has gone up a little bit, but it hasn’t gone up that much,” says Anqi Chen, assistant director of savings research at the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. “So people have to live in retirement much longer, and they may not have enough assets to support themselves in retirement.”
When asked how financially comfortable they feel about retirement, 14% of Americans under the age of 50 and 29% over 50 say they feel extremely or very prepared, according to the poll. About another 4 in 10 older adults say they do feel somewhat prepared, while just about one-third feel unprepared. By comparison, 56% of younger adults say they don’t feel prepared for retirement.
Among those who are fully retired, 38% said they felt very or extremely prepared when they retired, while 25% said they felt not very or not at all prepared.
“One of the things about thinking about never retiring is that you didn’t save a whole lot of money,” says Ronni Bennett, 78, who was pushed out of her job as a New York City-based website editor at 63.
She searched for work in the immediate aftermath of her layoff, a process she describes as akin to “banging my head against a wall.” Finding Manhattan too expensive without a steady stream of income, she eventually moved to Portland, Maine. A few years later, she moved again, to Lake Oswego, Oregon.
“Sometimes I fantasize that if I win the lottery, I’d go back to New York,” says Bennett, who has a blog called Time Goes By that chronicles her experiences aging, relocating and, during the past two years, living with a pancreatic cancer diagnosis.
Meanwhile, Americans have mixed assessments of how the aging workforce affects workers: 39% think people staying in the workforce longer is mostly a good thing for American workers, while 29% think it’s more a bad thing and 30% say it makes no difference.
A somewhat higher share, 45%, thinks it has a positive effect on the U.S. economy.
Working Americans who are 50 and older think the trend is more positive than negative for their own careers — 42% to 15%. Those younger than 50 are about as likely to say it’s good for their careers as to say it’s bad.
Just 6% of fully retired AP-NORC poll respondents said they left the labor market before turning 50.
But remaining in the workforce may be unrealistic for people dealing with unexpected illness or injuries. For them, high medical bills and a lack of savings loom large over day-to-day expenditures.
“People like me, who are average, everyday working people, can have something catastrophic happen, and we lose everything because of medical bills,” says Larry Zarzecki, a former Maryland police officer who stopped working in his 40s after developing a resting tremor in his right hand and a series of cognitive and physical symptoms he at times found difficult to articulate.
At 47, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. Now 57 and living in Baltimore, Zarzecki says he has learned “to take from Peter and give to Paul, per se, to help make ends meet.”
Zarzecki has since helped found Movement Disorder Education and Exercise, a nonprofit organization that offers support and treatment programs to those with similar diseases and certain traumatic brain injuries. He has also helped lobby state and national lawmakers to address rising prescription drug prices.
He receives a pension and health insurance through the state, but he spends more than $3,000 each year out of pocket on medications.
“I can’t afford, nor will my insurance cover, the most modern medication there is for Parkinson’s,” he says. “Eat, heat or treat. These are decisions that people in my position have to make. When it’s cold out, or if it’s real hot out, do you eat, heat (your home) or treat (your ailment)?”
EDITOR’S NOTE — Andrew Soergel is studying aging and workforce issues as part of a 10-month fellowship at The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, which joins NORC’s independent research and AP journalism. The fellowship is funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
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The AP-NORC Center survey of 1,423 adults was conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research with funding from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. It was conducted Feb. 14 to 18 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 3.7 percentage points.
Respondents were first selected randomly using address-based sampling methods and later were interviewed online or by phone.
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Online: AP-NORC Center: https://www.apnorc.org
Independence teen arrested after high-speed chase from Salina to Republic County
SALINA — An attempt to stop a vehicle in Salina for not having a working headlight early Saturday morning ended with spikes being deployed and the vehicle finally stopping in Republic County.
Saline County Sheriff Roger Soldan said Monday that a deputy on saturation patrol in the 200 block of North Broadway Blvd. at approximately 12:20 a.m. Saturday noticed a northbound 2005 Chevrolet Cavalier that had one headlight out. The deputy attempted to stop the vehicle, but when both pulled into the carwash at State Street and Broadway Blvd., the Cavalier took off north on Broadway Blvd. and took the following route, Soldan said.
- North on Broadway Blvd. to Ninth Street
- North on Ninth Street to Interstate 70 (I-70)
- East on I-70 to the Niles exit
- Back on to I-70 to Solomon Road
- North on Solomon Road to Kansas Highway 18 (K-18)
- West on K-18 to a gravel road in Ottawa County
- From the gravel road to Old 81 Highway
- From Old 81 northbound on U.S. Highway 81 through Cloud County, where spikes were deployed
Soldan said that despite losing its tires, the car continued into Republic County, where it finally stopped. The car reached up to 90 mph on I-70 and was driving at 60 mph after the spikes removed the tires, Soldan said.
Cameron Hanson, 18, of Independence, Kan., was taken into custody, Soldan said. Hanson was driving a car that was stolen out of Abilene, however, he had a bill of sale for the car, Soldan said. It is believed that Hanson purchased the car, which turned out to be stolen, Soldan added.
During the arrest, drug paraphernalia with methamphetamine on it was found in the car, Soldan said. Hanson was arrested on suspicion of the following, Soldan said.
- Flee and elude
- Possession of methamphetamine
- Possession of drug paraphernalia
- Driving while license is suspended
- Speeding
- Improper turn
- Improper driving
- Failure to stop at a stop sign
- Driving with a defective headlight
Soldan said personnel from the Kansas Highway Patrol, the Ottawa County Sheriff’s Department, and the Cloud County Sheriff’s Department assisted in the pursuit.
Marion Bradley ‘Brad’ Bartlett
Marion Bradley “Brad” Bartlett, 87, passed away July 3, 2019 at Mount Carmel St. Ann’s Hospital, Westerville, Ohio.
Brad was born Oct. 3, 1931 in Stafford, Kansas; the son of Addison Albert and Clara Belle Titus Bartlett. He was the eighth of ten children. All of his siblings preceded him in death.
After graduating from Stafford High School in 1949 where he played football and ran track, he went to work as a telegrapher for ATS&F. After serving with the Army in Japan during the Korean War, Brad returned to his job with the railroad.
It was during this stint at the railroad in Great Bend where Brad met “the best thing that ever happened to me”, his wife, LaVonne Marie Quincy. The pair married in 1955 and lived in Great Bend before moving to Hutchison in 1957. Brad attended Hutchison Junior College and moved to Topeka in 1959 to attend Washburn University where he graduated with a degree in Business.
Brad spent most of his life in Topeka where he was the Chief Financial Officer for Duffens Optical. Brad retired from Duffens with over 30 years of service.
Brad was a life long sports fan and enjoyed following the local high school and college sports teams in Northeast Kansas. He enjoyed traveling to support his favorite basketball teams.
Brad loved traveling and was particularly proud that a farm boy from Stafford saw so much of the world: Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Ireland, Spain, Algeria, Canada, and most of the U.S. including train trips through Alaska and the Southwest.
When not traveling, Brad enjoyed practicing his woodworking skills. He was known for his expertise in rebuilding and refinishing furniture and restoring and revitalizing houses.
Brad was of the Christian faith and a member of the Disciples of Christ Church. He was a Mason and a member of the American Legion.
Brad is survived by his wife of 64 years, LaVonne. Other survivors include; a daughter Shannon Bartlett and wife Lisa Smith, Columbus, Ohio and many nieces and nephews.
Graveside service will be 10:00 a.m. Friday, July 12th, with Robert Sallee presiding. Visitation will be 9:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Thursday at Beckwith Mortuary, Larned, Kansas. The family will be present 6-8p.m. Burial will be in Larned Cemetery, Larned, Kansas.
Memorials may be given to Washburn University in care of Beckwith Mortuary, P.O. Box 477, Larned, KS 67550. Personal condolences may be left at www.beckwithmortuary.com
Mildred Virginia Biby
Mildred Virginia Biby, 93, passed away Saturday, July 6, 2019, at Woodhaven Care Center in Ellinwood. She was born January 18, 1926, in Barton County, the daughter of Ben and Lydia (Ochs) Steinert.
Mildred was a resident of Ellinwood since 1958, coming from Council Bluffs, IA. She was united in marriage to Virgil Biby on October 17, 1958, in Great Bend. He passed away May 14, 1996. She worked for the Ellinwood Schools as a cook. She was a member of the Immanuel United Church of Christ in Ellinwood and the VFW Auxillary and the American Legion Auxillary. She enjoyed knitting, crocheting, and working in her garden.
Survivors include, one son, Larry Teager and wife Elaine “Amy” of Spring Hill; one daughter, Karen Reigier of Hays; one brother, Don Steinert of N.C.; five grandchildren, Dion Wolfe, Seberna, Trent, Bradley, and Ian Teager; nine great grandchildren; and one great-great grandchild. She was preceded in death by one son, Robert Teager; one brother, Clarence; four sisters, Alverta, Ruth, Lenora, and Evelyn.
Visitation will be held 12 to 5:00 p.m., Thursday, July 11, 2019. The family present will be present from 9:30 a.m. to service time at 10:30 a.m., Friday, July 12, 2019, at Bryant Funeral Home, with Pastor Adam Wutka officiating. Burial will follow at Lakin- Commanche Cemetery in Ellinwood.
Memorial has been established with the Woodhaven Care Center, in care of Bryant Funeral Home.
Bat from Shawnee County tests positive for rabies
TOPEKA (AP) — A bat found in northeastern Kansas has tested positive for rabies.
Topeka television station KSNT reports that the bat was found in Shawnee County. The Shawnee County Health Department is urging residents to be aware of the signs and symptoms of rabies and the steps to take if exposed.
Rabies is a fatal but preventable viral disease that is typically transmitted by raccoons, bats, skunks and foxes.
Health officials those who suspect they’ve been exposed to the disease should seek immediate medical treatment. Once a person begins to exhibit signs of disease, survival is rare. Symptoms include general weakness or discomfort, fever or headache and progress to confusion, agitation and delirium.
Cover photo courtesy
(c) Can Stock Photo / Kyslynskyy