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Author: Hays Post

HPD Activity Log Sept. 10-12

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The Hays Police Department responded to 9 animal calls and conducted 18 traffic stops Mon., Sept. 10, 2018, according to the HPD Activity Log.

Traffic/Driving Complaint–2200 block Downing Ave, Hays; 12:56 AM
Water Use Violation–2500 block Marjorie Dr, Hays; 4:16 AM
Criminal Trespass–2300 block E 13th St, Hays; 7:50 AM; 7:55 AM
Shoplifting–4300 block Vine St, Hays; 8:24 AM
Animal At Large–2700 block Barclay Dr, Hays; 9:39 AM
Animal At Large–400 block E 18th St, Hays; 9:43 AM
Animal At Large–2000 block Vine St, Hays; 10:46 AM
MV Accident-City Street/Alley–200 block E 27th St, Hays; 12:19 PM
Shoplifting–4300 block Vine St, Hays; 12:01 PM; 12:38 AM
Burglary/vehicle–100 block E 7th St, Hays; 9/8 9 PM; 9/10 11:15 AM
Bicycle – Lost,Found,Stolen–100 block E 5th St, Hays; 12:01 PM; 1:01 PM
Welfare Check–700 block W 12th St, Hays; 1:34 PM
MV Accident-Hit and Run–500 block W 21st St, Hays; 2:13 PM
MV Accident-City Street/Alley–700 block E 6th St, Hays; 2:57 PM
Criminal Trespass–4300 block Vine St, Hays; 8/31 9 PM 9:06 PM
Civil Dispute–500 block Vine St, Hays; 3:23 PM
Phone/Mail Scam–200 block W 29th St, Hays; 9/2 12:23 PM; 9/10 3:37 PM
Drug Offenses–3400 block Vine St, Hays; 3:43 PM
Abandoned Vehicle–1200 block Motz St, Hays; 4:34 PM
MV Accident-Co Road/St Hwy–800 block Commerce Pkwy, Hays; 5:20 PM
MV Accident-City Street/Alley–43rd and Roth Ave, Hays; 6:20 PM
Animal At Large–2700 block Hickory St, Hays; 8:09 PM

The Hays Police Department responded to 8 animal calls and conducted 10 traffic stops Tue., Sept. 11, 2018, according to the HPD Activity Log.

Water Use Violation–3100 block Hall St, Hays; 12:42 AM; 12:45 AM
Assist – Other (not MV)–100 block E 14th St, Hays; 8:34 AM
MV Accident-City Street/Alley–500 block W 17th St, Hays; 8:51 AM
Unattended Death–300 block W 38th St, Hays; 9:20 AM
Criminal Damage to Property–500 block Walnut St, Hays; 11:49 AM
Domestic Disturbance–1000 block Reservation Rd, Hays; 9/10 12 AM; 9/11 12:26 PM
Civil Dispute–100 block W 12th St, Hays; 1:47 PM
Animal At Large–700 block Vine St, Hays; 1:50 PM
Theft (general)–500 block E 8th St, Hays; 12 PM; 3:15 PM
Theft (general)–1600 block E 27th St, Hays; 4:53 PM
Lost Animals ONLY–100 block W 14th St, Hays; 8:01 PM
Suspicious Activity–1000 block Reservation Rd, Hays; 9:05 PM

The Hays Police Department responded to 6 animal calls and conducted 14 traffic stops Wed., Sept. 12, 2018, according to the HPD Activity Log.

Drug Offenses–3700 block Vine St, Hays; 2:39 AM
Water Use Violation–2500 block Marjorie Dr, Hays; 4:17 AM
Welfare Check–300 block E 6th St, Hays; 5:58 AM
MV Accident-Hit and Run–200 block E 12th St, Hays; 6:50 AM; 6:59 AM
Animal At Large–400 block W 13th St, Hays; 7:37 AM
Animal At Large–200 block E 4th St, Hays; 9:09 AM
Drug Offenses–2700 block Colonial St, Hays; 10:49 AM; 11:15 AM
Aggravated Assault–1700 block Pine St, Hays; 12:15 PM; 12:22 PM
MV Accident-Private Property-Hit and Run–100 block E 18th St, Hays; 12:01 AM; 11 AM
Found/Lost Property–600 block Park St, Hays; 12:29 PM
MV Accident-City Street/Alley–2600 block Vine St, Hays; 12:30 PM
Identity Theft–4300 block Vine St, Hays; 12:49 PM
Theft (general)–6th and Elm St, Hays; 1:27 PM
Burglary/vehicle–1600 block E 22nd St, Hays; 9/11 1:30 PM; 9/12 5:30 AM
Found/Lost Property–Vine St, Hays; 3:29 PM
Phone/Mail Scam–100 block W 18th St, Hays; 8/17 3:42 PM; 8/27 3:42 PM
Sex Offense–100 block W 12th St, Hays; 3:49 PM
Drug Offenses–1700 block Pine St, Hays; 4:14 PM; 4:45 PM
Wildlife Incident–1300 block Douglas Dr, Hays; 4:46 PM
Domestic Disturbance–100 block W 17th St, Hays; 6:43 PM
Harassment, Telephone/FAX–1700 block Sunset Trl, Hays; 7:35 PM
Lost Animals ONLY–1700 block Golden Belt Dr, Hays; 7:58 PM
MV Accident-Private Property–3500 block Vine St, Hays; 8:41 PM
Found/Lost Property–1500 block US 183 Alt Hwy, Hays; 9:46 PM

Webcams: Watch hurricane Florence make landfall

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Myrtle Beach South Carolina just after 7a.m. EDT Friday

WILMINGTON, N.C. (AP) — The National Hurricane Center said early Friday that Florence was about to make landfall in North Carolina bringing with it life-threatening storm surge and hurricane strength winds.

Coral Beach: Web cam

Myrtle Beach: web cam 

Ocean Isle Beach: web cam

Corolla Light Beach North Carolina: web cam

The powerful storm already has inundated coastal streets with ocean water and left tens of thousands without power, and forecasters say that “catastrophic” freshwater flooding is expected over portions of the Carolinas as Hurricane Florence inches closer to the U.S. East Coast.

The National Hurricane Center said early Friday that Florence’s eyewall is beginning to approach the North Carolina coast bringing with it life-threatening storm surge.

The center said that a gauge in Emerald Isle, North Carolina, recently reported 6.3 feet (1.92 meters) of inundation. Emerald Isle is about 84 miles (135 kilometers) north of Wilmington.

And about 46 miles north of Emerald Isle in New Bern about 150 people were waiting to be rescued from rising flood waters, WXII-TV reported. The city said early Friday that two out-of-state FEMA teams were working on swift-water rescues and more teams were on the way.

Screaming winds bent trees toward the ground and raindrops flew sideways as Florence’s leading edge whipped the Carolina coast Thursday to begin an onslaught that could last for days, leaving a wide area under water from both heavy downpours and rising seas.

The storm’s intensity diminished as it neared land, with winds dropping to around 90 mph (144 kph) by nightfall. But that, combined with the storm’s slowing forward movement and heavy rains, had Gov. Roy Cooper warning of an impending disaster.

“The worst of the storm is not yet here but these are early warnings of the days to come,” he said. “Surviving this storm will be a test of endurance, teamwork, common sense and patience.”

Cooper requested additional federal disaster assistance in anticipation of what his office called “historic major damage” across the state.

More than 80,000 people were already without power as the storm began buffeting the coast, and more than 12,000 were in shelters. Another 400 people were in shelters in Virginia, where forecasts were less dire.

Prisoners were affected, too. North Carolina corrections officials said more than 3,000 people were relocated from adult prisons and juvenile centers in the path of Florence, and more than 300 county prisoners were transferred to state facilities.

Officials said some 1.7 million people in the Carolinas and Virginia were warned to evacuate, but it’s unclear how many did. The homes of about 10 million were under watches or warnings for the hurricane or tropical storm conditions.

Spanish moss waved in the trees as the winds picked up in Wilmington, and floating docks bounced atop swells at Morehead City. Ocean water flowed between homes and on to streets on the Outer Banks; waves crashed against wooden fishing piers.

Coastal towns in the Carolinas were largely empty, and schools and businesses closed as far south as Georgia.

As of 5 a.m., Florence was centered about 25 miles (35 kilometers) east of Wilmington, North Carolina. Its forward movement increased slightly to 6 mph (9 kph). Hurricane-force winds extended 90 miles (150 kilometers) from its center, and tropical-storm-force winds up to 195 miles (315 kilometers).

A buoy off the North Carolina coast recorded waves nearly 30 feet (9 meters) high as Florence churned toward shore.

Forecasters said conditions will deteriorate as the storm pushes ashore early Friday near the North Carolina-South Carolina line and makes its way slowly inland. Its surge could cover all but a sliver of the Carolina coast under as much as 11 feet (3.4 meters) of ocean water, and days of downpours could unload more than 3 feet (0.9 meters) of rain, touching off severe flooding.

Once a Category 4 hurricane with winds of 140 mph (225 kph), the hurricane was downgraded to a Category 1 on Thursday night.

Forecasters said that given the storm’s size and sluggish track, it could cause epic damage akin to what the Houston area saw during Hurricane Harvey just over a year ago, with floodwaters swamping homes and businesses and washing over industrial waste sites and hog-manure ponds.

The hurricane was seen as a major test for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which was heavily criticized as slow and unprepared for Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico last year.

As Florence drew near, President Donald Trump tweeted that FEMA and first responders are “supplied and ready,” and he disputed the official conclusion that nearly 3,000 people died in Puerto Rico, claiming the figure was a Democratic plot to make him look bad.

Not everyone was taking Florence too seriously: About two dozen locals gathered Thursday night behind the boarded-up windows of The Barbary Coast bar as Florence blew into Wilmington.

“We’ll operate without power; we have candles. And you don’t need power to sling booze,” said owner Eli Ellsworth.

Others were at home hoping for the best.

“This is our only home. We have two boats and all our worldly possessions,” said Susan Patchkofsky, who refused her family’s pleas to evacuate and stayed at Emerald Isle with her husband. “We have a safe basement and generator that comes on automatically. We chose to hunker down.”

___

University of Kansas Health System given $66 million gift

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KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — The University of Kansas Health System has received a $66 million donation to be used for an inpatient care unit.

Health System officials said Thursday the donation from the Sunderland Foundation is the largest gift ever received by the system. The gift completes a $100 million fundraising campaign for the new unit, which will allow its Blood and Marrow Transplant Program and its Divison of Hematologic Malignancies and Cellular Therapy to come together for patient care and research.

The Sutherland Foundation helped start the campaign in 2014 with a $2 million gift.

Charlie Sunderland has served on the Hospital Authority Board for many years and also chairs the Quality and Safety Committee.

Kansas armed robbery suspect had knee brace, gun

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SHAWNEE COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating an armed robbery suspect and have released a description and security camera images of the suspect.  On Thursday morning, police responded to report of a robbery at the Walgreens at 37th and SW Topeka Boulevard, according to Lt. Chris Heaven.

photo courtesy Topeka Police

A suspect described as a Hispanic male 20-30’s, 5-foot-6, slender build, wearing a grey short sleeved shirt and a knee brace on his right knee entered the business. and took money from the till.

The suspect had a handgun tucked in his waistband and was last seen getting into a dark grey 2000’s Nissan Maxima leaving south from the business. No injuries were reported.

Hot, windy Friday

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Today Sunny, with a high near 91. Breezy, with a south wind 9 to 14 mph increasing to 16 to 21 mph in the afternoon. Winds could gust as high as 31 mph.

Tonight Clear, with a low around 67. South southeast wind 8 to 13 mph.

Saturday Sunny, with a high near 88. South wind 7 to 14 mph.

Saturday Night Mostly clear, with a low around 66. South southeast wind 8 to 11 mph.

SundayMostly sunny, with a high near 87. South wind 7 to 14 mph.

Sunday NightMostly clear, with a low around 66.

Inauguration celebration at FHSU includes weekend service event to fight hunger

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Dr. Tisa Mason

By DIANE GASPER-O’BRIEN
FHSU University Relations and Marketing

The Global Leadership Project, an initiative of The Center for Civic Leadership and the Department of Leadership Studies at Fort Hays State University, tries to schedule one of its major service projects for the year around a significant weekend in October.

This year might just top them all.

The seventh annual Swipe Out Hunger food packaging event is set for a two-hour period on Saturday, Sept. 15, in Forsyth Library.

The event was moved to September this year to coincide with the inauguration of FHSU’s new president, Dr. Tisa Mason. It also happens to be the same weekend as Family Day, where families come to campus to visit their students.

Click HERE for a schedule of inauguration weekend activities.

Fresh off her Friday morning inauguration ceremony, Mason and her husband, Bill, plan to participate in Swipe Out Hunger, a fun, hands-on event for a worthy cause.

In yet another collaborative effort between Fort Hays State and the Hays community, entire families and teams of students alike come to package the beans, soy, rice and vitamins into bags and prepare them for shipping.

“It’s great because it’s for all ages,” said Alex Kultgen, one of the student coordinators of the event. “Anyone can be a part of it.”

Kultgen, a junior from Waco, Texas, and Reilly Franek, a senior from Elbert, Colo., planned this year’s project, for a third consecutive year, as part of their job duties working for Global Leadership Project. FHSU partners with Numana Inc., a non-profit public charity in El Dorado, formed as an international hunger relief organization.

Numana allows higher education institutions to engage in fighting global hunger by packaging bulk food products that are brought to campus by a team from Numana. Last year, Fort Hays State packaged 30,000 meals that were sent to Haiti following Hurricane Matthew.

This year’s goal is to package 30,000 meals to be sent to El Salvador. The assembly line will begin at 10:30 a.m.

“I’m super excited,” Kultgen said. “It’s a great way to get people involved and a great way to have more people come and find out about the Global Leadership Project and to honor President Mason.”

Forsyth Library also will the site of the Dr. Mason Inauguration Exhibit, which will include letters and certificates of congratulations. That display opens Wednesday, Sept. 12, and will remain open through Homecoming Weekend, Sept. 27-29.

A worship service will kick off Friday’s inauguration day activites at 7:30 a.m at Celebration Community Church.

FHSU faculty and staff will begin gathering for the ceremony line of march at 9:15 a.m. in Cunningham Hall, and the inauguration ceremony is set to begin at 10 a.m. in adjacent Gross Memorial Coliseum.

Following the Swipe Out Hunger event, the inauguration weekend will conclude with Saturday’s football game vs. in-state rival Washburn University at 7 p.m. at Lewis Field Stadium.

Hays High volleyball falls in Garden City

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By JEREMY McGUIRE
Hays Post

GARDEN CITY, Kan.-The Hays High Lady Indians could not climb over hump on Thursday in Garden City losing to Pratt, Ulysses and the host team Garden City. Hays opened with the Pratt Greenbacks and lost 20-25, 20-25. Both sets were close throughout but Pratt was victorious in the end.

Ulysses was the next opponent for the Lady Indians and it was another straight set defeat. Hays High had leads in both sets but could not close the door late and lost both sets 22-25, 20-25. In the nightcap against the host Lady Buffaloes it was the same song, different verse. Hays held leads in both sets but fell 17-25, 20-25.

Tasiah Nunnery led the way with 33 kills. Hannah McGuire finished with a season high 40 assists on the night and Kallie Leiker finished with 29 digs. The Lady Indians fall to 4-6 on the season and will be off until September 22nd when they travel to Wamego for tournament play.

Illegal alien admits skimming bank information from Kan. ATMs

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KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A 23-year-old Romanian man in the United States illegally pleaded guilty to placing skimming devices on  ATMs in Kansas and Missouri.

Pinhole camera discovered on ATM-file photo

The devices are used to illegally obtain PINS and debit card numbers from people who use the machines. They then transfer the numbers into gift cards.

David Velcu pleaded guilty Thursday to possession of counterfeit or unauthorized access devices.

He was arrested in April after police discovered the devices on ATMs at QuikTrips in Olathe, Kansas, and Riverside, Missouri.

Federal prosecutors said investigators recovered 15 unauthorized access devices, and 78 “re-encoded” magnetic strip gift cards, when Velcu was arrested.

Authorities said Velcu entered the U.S. from Mexico last year.

Hoxie native, NASA astronaut Nick Hague will launch to International Space Station

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NASA Astronaut Nick Hague is a Hoxie native.

NASA

NASA astronaut Nick Hague currently is at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia, with his crewmate Alexey Ovchinin of the Russian space agency Roscosmos. They will launch from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, on the Russian Soyuz MS-10 spacecraft at 4:39 a.m. (2:39 p.m. Baikonur time) Oct. 11. They are scheduled to return to Earth in April.

The launch to the International Space Station will be the first spaceflight for Hague.
in October.

Hague is a native of Hoxie, Kansas, and a colonel in the U.S. Air Force. He is part of the 2013 NASA astronaut class and will be the first of his class to go to space. Prior to his selection, he was part of the Air Force Fellows program in Washington, where he worked as an adviser to the U.S. Senate on matters of national defense and foreign policy.

Hague earned a bachelor’s degree in astronautical engineering from the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and a master’s degree in aeronautical and astronautical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston.

After a six-hour journey to orbit, Hague and Ovchinin will arrive at the station and join fellow NASA astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor, Expedition 57 Commander Alexander Gerst of ESA (European Space Agency), and Sergey Prokopyev of Roscosmos, bringing the station’s crew complement to five.

During a planned six-month mission, station crew members will take part in about 250 research investigations and technology demonstrations not possible on Earth to advance scientific knowledge of Earth, space, physical and biological sciences. Science conducted on the space station continues to yield benefits for humanity and will enable future long-duration human and robotic exploration into deep space, including the Moon and Mars.

They’re also expected to be onboard the space station during the first uncrewed test flights of the SpaceX Crew Dragon and Boeing CST-100 Starliner as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, which will return astronaut launches to U.S. soil.

Follow Hague on social media at:

Report: Kansas to spend $4.6M on election security

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WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A new report shows Kansas plans to spend more than $4.6 million in election grants to tighten cyber-security, modernize voting equipment, audit elections and safeguard voter rolls.

FILE PHOTO
KANSAS NEWS SERVICE

The U.S. Election Assistance Commission released on Thursday the Kansas plan for its share of the $380 million allocated by Congress to strengthen voting systems amid ongoing threats from Russia and others.

Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach told the commission that about half of its grant would be spent on cyber-security efforts at all levels of election administration. He said the state will supplement existing staff with outside experts.

Nearly $1.07 million is slated to ensure every voting machine in Kansas has a paper audit trail.

The remaining funds would be used to better secure the voter registration system and audit elections.

Man sentenced for rural Ottawa County burglary, murder

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MINNEAPOLIS –  A  man was sentenced Thursday to life in prison after being convicted by a jury of first degree murder and related crimes, according to Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt.

Colson

Robert Willard Colson, 35, of Bucksport, Maine, was sentenced by Judge Rene Young to life in prison without the possibility of parole for 25 years.

In June, an Ottawa County jury found Colson guilty of one count of first-degree felony murder, two counts of felony theft and one count of burglary. The charges stemmed from the 2017 death of Matthew Miles Schoshke in rural Ottawa County.

The case was investigated by the Kansas Bureau of Investigation and the Ottawa County Sheriff’s Office with assistance from the Kansas Highway Patrol and law enforcement agencies in Maine, Colorado and California. Assistant Attorney General Jessica Domme of Schmidt’s office prosecuted the case with assistance from Ottawa County Attorney Richard Buck.

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