SUNFLOWER ELECTRIC

As the nation gears up for another general election in November, electric cooperatives across the heartland have launched their own campaign—an effort to promote civic engagement and voter participation in the communities they serve. The effort is designed to REV up the public: Register, Educate and Vote.

The nationwide campaign, called Co-ops Vote, was announced during the 74th annual meeting of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA) earlier this year. The objective of the campaign is to encourage participation in the political process by keeping members informed about how to get and stay involved in local, state and national elections.

“The level of interest in politics varies from person to person,” said Clare Gustin, vice president of member services and external affairs at Hays-based Sunflower Electric. “What everyone should care about is understanding the process. This campaign is designed to help people become aware of the political process, how to register, and when and where to vote.”

The Co-ops Vote initiative will focus on eight issues that are important to the health and prosperity of communities served by electric cooperatives:
• Rural Broadband Access
• Hiring and Honoring Veterans
• Low-Income Energy Assistance
• Cybersecurity
• Water Regulation
• Rural Health Care Access
• Affordable and Reliable Energy
• Renewable Energy

Electric cooperatives, like Sunflower and its six member cooperatives, which utilize a democratically-based business model, are perfectly designed to encourage civic engagement and to help address important issues that affect electric utility rates, the livelihood of Kansans, quality of life, and the rural economy.

Getting involved early in Kansas politics is essential. “Historically, races have been won in the primary election,” Gustin said. “Candidates for some positions in a heavily partisan district may only have opposition in the primary election as the voter registration tends to be very partisan.”

This year primaries will be held in Kansas on Aug. 2.

Prior to the primary election, citizens can do the following to learn about the candidates in their districts:
• Research candidates online. Both the Republican and Democrat parties have pages for each local candidate on their state websites. This will provide information about the candidates, including their experience and thoughts about main issues.
• When a candidate comes to your door, be prepared to ask about issues important to you. If he/she doesn’t visit you, call the candidate.
• Attend local candidate forums. A new website, www.vote.coop, offers co-op members information about the voter registration
process in their states, dates of elections, information about the candidates running in those elections, and explanations of the eight key issues the campaign aims to address. In keeping with its non-partisan goals, the initiative will not be endorsing specific candidates for office.

“We want to make sure our government knows that rural America matters,” said Mel Coleman, president of NRECA. ”Co-op Vote is not about divisive, partisan issues, but rather real people in real places facing real challenges. It’s about our co-ops living out the principles of our movement—concern for community and democratic control.”

To learn more about Kansas politics, visit these websites:
• https://www.politics1.com/ks.htm
• https://www.sos.ks.gov/elections/elections_upcoming_candidate_display.asp
• https://www.vote.coop/

Why has the cost of a public college and university education skyrocketed ahead of inflation for the last decade?

Just as national security is the prime responsibility of the federal government, education is the major responsibility of state. K–12 education takes up 51 cents of every tax dollar. Public higher education also gets a small portion of tax dollars. In the 1980s, Kansas paid about two dollars for every dollar a Kansas student paid in tuition in post-secondary education. Today, the most recent figure I have seen was 93 cents for every student dollar although with the recent 3 percent rescission, that will be a little lower.

Based on instructional costs, Kansas per student support is now about half of what it was in the 1980s. The reason is simple: the number of students attending tertiary institutions has nearly doubled. In the 1980s, slightly over 40 percent of Kansas high school graduates went to college. Today, it is nearly twice that rate.

The problem is not just state funding. Far too many non-college-able students are occupying college seats. Many Kansas high schools are guilty of inflating grades and shaming any student who does not go on to college. Too many schools drape their hallways with placards proclaiming how every student is college bound. Indeed, even the Kansas Department of Education’s new Kansas CAN initiative labels a student who intends to graduate from high school and work on his family’s farm as a failure.

Kansas needs farmers, auto mechanics, plumbers, etc. Some students would prefer these vocations. And in many cases, they will make more money than a college graduate.

But the inflation of expectations is not limited to Kansas. Nationwide, the high school graduation rate has gone from 70 percent to over 81 percent in just the last decade! This academic miracle fades away when we realize that student academic achievement measured on the NAEP, SAT, etc. has gone down, not up. Simply, at more and more high schools, it is becoming nearly impossible to flunk out as long as the student remains breathing. As a result, more marginal high school “graduates” are entering college.

Another major increased cost is technology. Blackboards, overhead and carousel projectors have been replaced with equipment that costs ten times more and becomes obsolescent in a very short time. Dismissed as a necessary cost, the “refreshing” of digital equipment every 3–4 years and continuous migration to new software involves huge costs in technical personnel, equipment and staff retraining.

Publishing companies engage in a legal racket that has driven up the costs of textbooks over the last decade. A textbook that should cost $40 in print has risen to over $200 to support all of the digital ancillaries and hired tutors that come as book services. Convince the professor to adopt it and the students have to buy it.

Most of the cost of education is in salaries. But over the last four decades, we have seen administrative glut. Much of this is driven by the need to generate useless paperwork to “prove” that the schools are meeting requirements of government and accrediting agencies. Most of this documentation fails to discern the quality programs from the diploma-mills. However, until statutory regulations mandating over-reporting are repealed, administrative glut will continue to grow.

Colleges are now viewing students as customers. “Marketing” is now “Job One.” Marketing diverts money away from providing education. Unfortunately, when a large number of students are more concerned with having ultra-modern dormitories and other facilities or they will go elsewhere, an administration has to put money into “looking good” that can erode “being good.”

The high cost of a public college education can be brought down: if public schools stop telling students that they are a failure if they don’t go on to college, if technology is driven by what teachers need rather than what administrators want to brag about, if publishers listen to students who say they overwhelmingly prefer printed text, if unnecessary regulations and paperwork are repealed and administration is reduced, if public colleges cut their marketing, and if students look for quality over pretty looks.

That would probably shrink our college population to 60 percent of current enrollments.

Editor’s note: I’m out of the office this week so I decided to dust off a story I wrote in May of ’95. I was on my way to a Rattlesnake Roundup outside of Sharon Springs. While taking the back roads where I grew up, I happened upon the inspiration for the following story. While Mr. Smith is dead and gone, hardy souls and stories like his are worth revisiting.

Perched atop the weathered wooden posts, the western boots stretched nearly one mile into the horizon. Brown, black, green, gray and blue were the colors. Torn and frayed their condition.

All the boot heels pointed toward the blue, spring sky. Some of the toes still held their shape – jutting out from the fence post. Others dropped toward the grass like the tongues of cutting ponies after a full morning of sorting cattle.

This boot fence can be found on John Smith’s Boot Hill Ranch. Located on K-25 about a mile and a half north of Russell Springs, nearly 500 boots dot the top of the five-strand, barbed wire fence that runs north and south.

“The number depends on how many have been stolen on any particular day,” Smith said with a glint in his eye. “Those boots don’t just jump off the posts and walk away.”

Locals will tell you a boot fence is one method a rancher uses to signify he is just that – a rancher and not a farmer. A few will tell you it’s just a “crazy” hobby and nothing to take too seriously.

Smith fitted his first pair of boots on the fence line 20 years ago. The boots were 1948 vintage and hand-made by Charles P. Shipley Saddlers & Mercantile, Co. of Kansas City, Mo.

“They were located down by the stockyards and they made boots for ole’ Jesse James,” Smith said, proud to have owned a pair of boots made by the same company that had fitted the famous outlaw. “I got married in mine back in ’51.”

After Smith put the first pair of boots on his fencerow, it seemed only natural to add more. Before long, friends and neighbors were helping him stock the line. They’d throw worn out pairs in the back of his pickup at auctions and cattle sales. Some dumped the boots next to the fence.

Smith never turned down a pair of boots and it didn’t matter what condition they were in. At one time, he figured there were close to 700 boots on the fence. He’d been known to wear a pair that may have still had a little life left in them.

“Boots keep the water off and the fence posts last longer,” Smith told me. “The boots shelter the post top so the moisture can’t get into the post and expand it and break it up.”

Yep, thanks to Smith, each post has its own leather garage. But not all the boots have stayed on the posts.
A few years back the Logan County rancher lost a pair of women’s boots that laced up the front.

“I guess they were old and somewhat of a collectible,” Smith said.

After this incident, he never fitted a pair of boots next to one another on the posts. Instead he’d put one boot in the corner of his land and stick the other in some random spot down the line.

To hear Smith talk about his fence and why he added boots to the post tops, it all goes back to western folklore.

“Cowboys that wear boots have a special attachment to them,” he said. “That way when a cowboy died they’d bury him and put his boots upside down on a stick by his grave. People knew each other by the boots they wore, and it was only natural to put a cowboy’s boots near his grave so those that happened by would know who was buried there.”

And there will be no doubt whose fence is capped with boots on the highway a couple miles north of Russell Springs. Tumbleweeds will continue to roll up next to the wire, stay for a while and keep the old leather boots company. Prairie dogs will peek out of their mound towns and scan the horizon and see the familiar landmark.

Oh, in case you’re wondering, I took a hard look at all the boots on John Smith’s fence, but I didn’t rob any off the posts. I did see a couple pairs that would have made a fine addition to my boot collection and could have been worn for a Saturday night of dancing.

Nope, I didn’t dare touch ‘em. It wouldn’t have been right. Those boots were located just where they belonged, on top of the fence posts – silent sentinels on the great High Plains.

John Schlageck, a Hoxie native, is a leading commentator on agriculture and rural Kansas.

In the same five-page order for a hearing on whether the Kansas Legislature has met its constitutional duty to provide equal support for public education, the court also has likely taken itself off the hook for its threat to close public schools on July 1.

Nope, it’s not right at the top of the order that sets a schedule for a hearing on whether the Legislature has, to the satisfaction of the high court, equitably funded capital outlay and supplemental state aid for school districts but down on the last page.

Down on page five, it says, “The briefs should address the remedial action to be ordered, and upon what date it should take effect, if the court were to conclude compliance has not been achieved.”

That’s the key: Did the Legislature’s internal shuffling of money within the school finance formula equalize the state’s aid to school districts—even with the inherently disequalizing “hold harmless” provision—meet the court’s order to deliver equal assistance to all districts, or not?

If the court finds that the moving around of existing funds—and giving districts their mathematically computed level of aid, and some a little more—meets constitutional muster, then the deal is done, and everything goes away. Maybe, except for that troublesome “hold harmless” provision that makes sure that in the reapportionment of state aid no district loses any state money.

If the court finds that the school spending bill that Gov. Sam Brownback signed into law last week doesn’t meet that equity standard, then it gets interesting.

The high court’s Feb. 11 order to the Legislature to fix that inequity or see the jurists shut down appropriations to public schools on July 1 becomes the thick black cloud hanging over the state.

The state’s position before the court is that the Legislature has fixed the problem spending no new money, just reshuffling it among districts—except for those that would lose money in the deal, and they are held harmless. Oh, and that financing public schools is the Legislature’s job and the court should stay out of that.

The school districts which are suing the state for not meeting its constitutional duty to equitably finance public education don’t think the shuffling of money around meets that goal. They have suggested that for about $38 million more or so, lawmakers could equitably finance that capital improvement and Local Option Budget assistance, and that small piece of the school finance issue could be cured.

But that hammer the court waved around—closing schools if the appropriation of that special assistance is unconstitutionally distributed, making the appropriations unlawful to disperse to districts—got smaller when the court asked the state and the schools to offer up their own plans for remedial action.

Key is that if the finance-fix is unconstitutional, we’re betting that neither the state nor the schools in the case want schools closed. The state, which includes the Legislature that passed the bill (32-5 in the Senate and 93-31 in the House) in this year in which all members stand for re-election, doesn’t want those voters to believe legislators closed schools, and the schools, well, we’re betting that they want to stay open.

Best guess is that if neither party to the lawsuit wants schools closed, they are going to come up with “remedial action” that is just short of closing down anything. And, because five members of the Kansas Supreme Court stand for retention election this year, we’re betting that the court will find at least one side’s remedial action fits the bill.

The lawsuit isn’t over by a long shot. But we’re betting that the threat of closing down schools is.

Syndicated by Hawver News Co. of Topeka, Martin Hawver is publisher of Hawver’s Capitol Report. To learn more about this nonpartisan statewide political news service, visit www.hawvernews.com.

Retirement can easily make a person lazy, and I had quite the argument with myself this morning over whether or not I really wanted to get up with the chickens to spy on a group of turkeys (whose routines I’m trying to figure out before hunting season opens.)

You can never lose by arguing with yourself, so I still don’t know whether I won or lost, but there I sat watching the sun come up. The river was just to my right, and about a quarter mile in front of me it wound around to my left, then right again and was gone.

Of course it is wooded all along the river and I sat overlooking a meadow. All the ground to my left was crop land, and a group of turkeys calls this whole area home most every year, always roosting somewhere in the trees along the river.

The morning was very calm and the sounds were nothing short of spectacular. A pair of great horned owls called back-and-forth to each other, their smooth cooing “hoots” serenely ushering in the day. To the far left end of the crop field a creek winds like ribbon candy through a small pasture, and from somewhere in the trees there, the sharp crisp call of a barred owl pierced the silence.

Its unmistakable pattern of “who cooks for you – who cooks for you too” is easily distinguished from the great horned owl call when heard together like this morning. Loud noises often compel tom turkeys to gobble near or after dark, helping reveal to the hunter where they are roosted, and aiding the hunter in pursuing that turkey. The loud shrill call of the barred owl is often mimicked by turkey call makers and is said to do just that, although it has never worked for me.

I sat in a small woodlot that teemed with songbirds of every description, their sweet melodies filling the gaps in time between owl calls. I recognized the “pretty pretty pretty pretty” song of several male cardinals, frequently punctuated by the sharp crisp cackle of a rooster pheasant or two. The time frame was very interesting, as the symphony began in earnest at the first hint of daylight, but the lighter it got, the quieter the symphony played.

Then there were the stars of this morning’s show, the wild turkeys. I was there trying to pin down just where they roosted, as their chosen nighttime perch high in the trees changes from year to year. This morning two or three toms were gobbling quite a ways ahead of me along the stretch of river running across the end of the crop field. After awhile their gibberish gobbles were a little fainter each time, telling me they had flown to the ground already and were heading in the opposite direction. I drove around the section, stopping at a couple spots to glass the fields with binoculars, but I never found them. Perhaps if I can quietly position myself nearer them some morning, I can entice one of the gobblers into range with a little calling and a decoy or two, making him think another lonely hen is available for his private harem.

Sitting there this morning watching and listening to nature awaken it was easy to say “I wouldn’t have missed this for the world.” But like I said, retirement can make a guy lazy. So tomorrow morning my argument with myself to stay there beneath the warm covers next to my warm wife will be just as strong as it was today. But I predict I’ll rise with the chickens again, and I still won’t know whether I won the argument or not…. Continue to Explore Kansas Outdoors.

Steve Gilliland, Inman, can be contacted by email at [email protected].

Last week, one of Kansas’ most visible and revered leaders, Kansas State University President Kirk Schulz, shook the state up by announcing he was leaving to take the helm at Washington State University. The move makes great sense for Schultz, who had established an excellent record at the helm of the state’s second-largest higher education institution. Washington State will pay Schulz nearly twice his salary, and while Schulz loves K-State there is only so much of a hometown discount anyone would be willing to extend to their paymaster.

That Washington State is paying Schultz so much more is unsurprising to anyone paying attention to states’ budget priorities. Kansas’s legislature has decided that education, whether K-12 or higher education, is a funding priority somewhere between paying dues to the Democratic National Committee and reserving a Tesla Model 3. Washington State, on the other hand, recently committed to increasing higher education support, making for not only a higher salary but a more supportive environment.

Schulz’s departure leaves a big pair of shoes to fill. A national search will be conducted and speculation has already begun as to who might replace him. Considering Kansas’ recent well-earned reputation for hostility to education combined with the relatively low salary will not encourage a strong applicant pool. Perhaps, then, the search committee should keep their focus inside the state.

Who may the Regents pursue? What makes a great university president? Some states have looked to former elected officials. Under former Senator David Boren, the University of Oklahoma has become one of the nation’s most respected pubic higher education institutions. Mitch Daniels, previously the Governor of Indiana, took the helm at Purdue last year and while his tenure has been more controversial than Boren’s his connections in the legislature and negotiation ability are skills greatly valued by higher education regulators.

So Kansas State may look 50 miles east, to the Governor’s mansion, for their next president. Brownback appointed every current Regent, so they are certainly comfortable with his leadership. The Governor is a Kansas State alumnus, and he will be out of a job in another two years. If he wanted to mimic his predecessor, he could even leave early as Kathleen Sebelius did to become U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary. Brownback could claim that the ‘sun is shining in Manhattan’ even on the rare occasions when the football team loses. To grow student enrollment, Brownback could use the same approach he took on taxes, slashing tuition to attract more students. If Governor Brownback’s vision is to be believed, then K-State will go from nearly 25,000 enrollment to 50,000 in a few years. If the promise isn’t delivered, he can point to being re-elected without the same level of job growth in the state as reason why he should keep the spot during his merit review with the Regents.

Furthermore, the legislature would never have to worry about providing Kansas State any regular funding, because it is sitting on a nearly $500 million endowment. Brownback and his allies in the legislature claim that K-12 school districts should accept their state funding cuts and use their reserve funds to make up the shortfall. Brownback could thus lead by example in allocating K-State’s endowment for faculty salaries and everyday operations.

Seriously, there may be an important reason to pursue Brownback as Kansas State University’s next president. After years of comfortably believing that education was a bloated money sink, a few years at the helm would show Brownback just how difficult a job higher education leadership can be. Just as the Ghost of Christmas Past showed Ebenezer Scrooge the error of his ways, taking the helm of K-State could provide the governor some much-needed empathy for the educational needs of his state.

Chapman Rackaway is a Professor of Political Science at Fort Hays State University.

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Time is a fickle thing. There’s never enough of it, and even when there is, finding the right time for the right thing can be like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole while being both asleep and at the gym working out. Such has certainly been my experience. I have been meaning to; and, in fact, have been trying to, write a little something like this for many months now.

For anyone who has read my movie reviews over the past couple of years, it should be no surprise that I am a fearless, tireless, and unwavering “Star Wars” fan. When “The Force Awakens” came out last December, it was easily one of the highlights of my year, of the past decade, really. I went to a marathon screening that lasted about 21 hours where they showed all six original “Star Wars” films leading up to the galactic premiere of “The Force Awakens.” It was a nearly indescribable experience. Including the marathon, I saw “The Force Awakens” seven times in theaters. I pre-ordered both the digital release, which came out last Friday, and the Blu-Ray release, which came out today. Meaning, I purchased the home video release of “The Force Awakens” twice, one because it was the earliest it was available anywhere and the other because it has more special features and has the physical disks.

All of which is a mighty preamble to this next sentence. I didn’t write, haven’t written and will not write a review of “The Force Awakens.” That begs the question, why wouldn’t I write a review of a movie that obviously meant as much to me as “Force Awakens” did? I’ve had a difficult time answering that question; below are the best answers I have come up with.

First, “Star Wars” is just too sacred to me. In both my darkest nights and brightest days, the trials and tribulations of that galaxy far, far away have been firmly seared in my heart and mind. “Star Wars,” at the absolute perfect age, taught me what it means to be a hero. Reviewing the film that answered the question, “What happens next?”after, for me, 18 years of waiting proved impossible. Believe me, I tried. The experience of again seeing Luke, Han and Leia, in addition to a new generation of heroes and villains, still brings a great many tears to my eyes – even at 2:00 AM, completely alone in my apartment. This is as much of a review as I could muster on the subject: “The Force Awakens” is everything I could have hoped it would be, everything I needed it to be. It truly is the movie experience of a generation, filled with small joys and simple wonders.

Secondly, I’ve decided that, after all of these years reviewing movies, it’s high time that I got off the bench. Let me clarify. I’m not typically a religious person. I have very great doubts about the cosmos and our infinitesimally small place in it. The place in my heart, that organized religion fills for so many people, is filled by the act and art of storytelling. My clear eyes and full heart come from a story well-told.

That act; the act of telling a story, is the one great difference between the human race and every other species in the known universe. The octopus genome contains more protein-coding genes than the human genome – in many respects, the DNA of an octopus is more complex than the DNA of a human. Horses recognize and physiologically respond to emotions displayed on still images of people. They recognize and feel emotion across the boundary of species. Animals are smart, complex and can feel the things we feel. The one colossal difference between them and us is this: we, all of us, can get caught up in a story. Humans can see, empathize with, love, hate and laugh with imaginary people on planets that don’t exist. To our current understanding, that is unique in the whole of creation.

That is my calling. That is what I chose my life to be about. To that end, I need to get in the game, and reviewing the work of others is a poor substitute to making my own.

I felt I owed both the Hays Daily News and HaysPost.com readerships an explanation as to my sudden absence, as both audiences have been so immensely kind to me over the nearly four years that I have reviewed movies for these publications. My eternal thanks to both the Hays Daily News and to Eagle Communications for allowing me to contribute to their platforms. My thanks are also due to the great many of you who have sent me kind words over the course of the years.

So, what’s next? I have a great many plans. Plans that are actively in production, in one stage or another. They include, but are not limited to, ending my time in Washington, D.C., saving some money, and returning to school to study film. To quote Theodore Roosevelt:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

What’s next is this: I plan to live my life telling stories or, if I fail, at least fail why daringly greatly.

For any who may be interested in following my journey, you may do so at the following places: TemporalCanvas.com, my personal blog, and BlizzardForge.com, a fan-site about Blizzard Entertainment, both websites I own and plan to operate. Also, please feel to email me at [email protected].

Once again, and lastly, thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for the years of kind words and support. It is my great hope that some future movie-reviewer for the city of Hays may one day review a film that I have created.

Yours very sincerely and respectfully,

James A. Gerstner

As the month of April gets underway, the Hays Beautification Committee (HBC) is making plans for the 2016 Arbor Day observation in Hays.

The Hays observation is scheduled at noon on Thursday, April 21st, at the Kiwanis Park, 17th Street and Harvest Rd. The community is encouraged to join in this observation where we will celebrate the continued importance of trees in our community.

The celebration will include the recognition of the 2016 Smokey Bear Poster Contest winners presented by the Prairie Garden Club. The City of Hays will be awarded the 2016 Tree City USA Award by Bryan Peterson, Kansas District Forester, which marks the 37th straight year of receiving this award. Mayor Eber Phelps will make a presentation to the Hays Kiwanis Club honoring them for their service to the community. In 2015, the Hays Kiwanis Club contributed $40,000 for a new restroom facility and new play unit for Kiwanis Park. The 2016 Arbor Day Celebration will conclude with Jeff Boyle, the Director of Parks for the city of Hays planting an Accolade Elm tree in Kiwanis Park.

Another project conducted by the HBC during April is the distribution of bare root Redbud trees to all of the 5th graders attending schools in Hays April 15 thru 21st. HBC members provide the 5th grade children, in the school setting, a short presentation on the value that trees provide to our communities as well as instructions on how to plant the trees which are then given to the students as they leave school.

Redbud trees are chosen for several reasons among those are that they are a lovely harbinger of spring having been called “a breath of fresh air after a long winter” and for the trees hardy adaptability. Although the Redbud tree is tolerant of drought and a variety of exposures and soil types, it will perform best in well drained soils, produce more flowers in full sun with winter chill, and grow larger with some supplemental irrigation once established. The Redbud tree, which usually grows no taller than 30 feet, has leaves that emerge with a reddish color giving way to a lustrous summer green and finally to a striking fall yellow. Even in winter the Redbud tree is pleasant to behold, with its arching limbs and rounded crown. Its size and adaptability make it as welcome in any setting.

The Hays Beautification Committee along with the Hays Parks Department is sponsoring a Water $mart Landscape Award program for 2016 with categories for both Residential and Commercial landscapes. A Water $mart Landscape is a sustainable and drought-tolerant landscape with low-water use plants and turf to maximize efficiency. More about this Award program will be detailed in a subsequent article.

HBC encourages all residential and commercial property owners to consider enhancing or replacing landscaping with drought tolerant plantings so that we can make better use of one of our most precious resources – water.

HBC meets monthly on the 3rd Thursday at noon at the Parks Dept. headquarters. All meetings are open to the public and you are invited to join us. If you have any questions or comments regarding this article please contact the Hays Parks Dept. at (785) 628-7375.

Janis Lee is a member of the Hays Beautification Committee.