FORD COUNTY – Law enforcement authorities in Ford County are investigating a possible arson fire.
Investigators requested K-9 assistance as they work to determine the cause of Monday’s trailer home fire southwest of Dodge City, according to the Kansas State Fire Marshal’s office.
Ford County Fire Chief Rob Boyd refused to comment on the exact location of the fire until after the investigation is completed.
He did say there were no fatalities in the blaze.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Authorities are searching for an offender who escaped from a minimum-security prison in Kansas City.
The Missouri Department of Corrections announced Monday in a news release that Brian Deconink scaled the roof of the Kansas City Reentry Center’s main building Sunday during outside recreation. The release said he had help from another offender.
The center houses inmates nearing parole; Deconink was set to be paroled in March.
Authorities say Deconink was serving a five-year sentence for possession of a controlled substance in a correctional center from DeKalb County. He has past convictions for burglary, stealing, robbery and resisting arrest.
Authorities are investigating the escape from the center. It was a hallway house before it was converted last year to a minimum-security prison.
DETROIT (AP) — U.S. safety regulators are investigating whether a recall of Ford F-150 pickup trucks for brake failures should be expanded to more model years.
The probe covers about 282,000 pickups with 3.5-liter six-cylinder engines from 2015 and 2016. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says it has received 25 complaints alleging sudden brake loss in the trucks. No injuries were reported.
In May, Ford recalled about 271,000 six-cylinder F-150s from 2013 and 2014 because brake fluid could leak from the master cylinder and cause brake failure.
The safety agency says it received 10 complaints about 2015 brake failures and another 15 about the 2016 models.
Investigators will decide if the 2015 and 2016 models should be added to the recall. The F-series pickup is the top-selling vehicle in the U.S.
By ANDY MARSO
A nursing home chain’s lawsuit over the Kansas Medicaid application backlog hinges on whether state officials are doing enough to electronically verify applicants’ assets.
The Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society, a South Dakota-based nonprofit that operates 32 long-term care facilities in Kansas, filed the suit last week in federal court. The suit was filed on behalf of 21 nursing home residents waiting on eligibility determinations for Medicaid, which in Kansas is a managed care program known as KanCare.
The complaint alleges that the Kansas Department of Health and Environment violated federal law by failing to use an electronic asset verification program, or AVP, to quickly determine whether the residents were eligible for Medicaid.
“The defendant did not seek to obtain any of the Plaintiffs’ information electronically via AVP,” the complaints say. “Nor did the defendant try to obtain the Plaintiffs’ information from secondary sources. Instead the Defendant placed the burden of providing information entirely on the Plaintiffs.”
KHI News Service has requested information from the state about its asset verification program and is awaiting a response.
The suit cites a law Congress passed in 2008 requiring states to implement electronic asset verification for Medicaid applications, as well as a federal law that requires states to process applications within 45 days.
For about a year Kansas officials have been grappling with thousands of Medicaid applications that have passed the 45-day mark. The backlog started last summer with the rocky rollout of a new computer program for processing applications known as the Kansas Eligibility Enforcement System, or KEES.
The backlog burgeoned at the end of 2015 when the state funneled all applications — including some that were previously processed by the Department for Children and Families — through a single facility known as the KanCare Clearinghouse.
That change came just as the open enrollment period for the federal Affordable Care Act directed far more online applicants to Medicaid than expected.
By May the state had almost 11,000 applications waiting 45 days or more.
In Kansas, Medicaid primarily covers children, pregnant women, Kansans with disabilities or seniors who otherwise couldn’t afford nursing home care.
Complaints from groups that serve those populations spurred a state audit and led the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to request twice-monthly updates on the backlog and the state’s efforts to resolve it.
Leaders of nursing homes and groups that represent them have said that the backlog was hurting them financially because most Kansans rely on Medicaid to pay for long-term care after their personal assets run out.
In the lawsuit, the Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society said the 21 named plaintiffs have a variety of serious medical conditions and that Good Samaritan Society officials have provided a total of $838,555.18 in uncompensated care while they wait for the residents’ Medicaid applications to clear. According to its most recent available tax forms, the Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society, which operates nationwide, had about $750 million in net assets in 2014.
The suit requests that a federal judge order Kansas to “automatically approve the Plaintiffs’ Medicaid benefits.”
Rachel Monger, director of government affairs for LeadingAge Kansas, said the Good Samaritan Society homes are part of her organization, but LeadingAge Kansas had no knowledge of the lawsuit before it was filed.
Mark Dickerson, senior director of communications for the Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society, said the group filed suit because “Kansas’ failure to follow federal regulation and timelines in regard to the processing of Medicaid applications has jeopardized the reimbursement that some of our residents are entitled to receive.”
“In this action we are fighting for the rights of our residents while also attempting to receive payment for services already rendered,” Dickerson said.
Dickerson said he couldn’t recall his organization, which operates in 24 states, filing a similar lawsuit anywhere else.
Other nursing homes across Kansas reporting similar financial losses have succeeded in getting their residents Medicaid coverage after filing administrative appeals or taking their grievances to legislators or the media.
Amy Turgon, director of accounting for a Shawnee assisted living facility named Sharon Lane, said via email that the facility’s situation improved dramatically after her struggles to get Medicaid coverage for residents were publicized.
“We were able to get 17 Medicaid applications processed and approved in two weeks,” Turgon said. “That is unprecedented. We were given a supervisor at KDHE to manage our cases and ensure they were resolved.”
Molly Wood, a Lawrence attorney who specializes in elder care law, said she envisioned a similar resolution to the Good Samaritan Society’s lawsuit.
Wood said the suit’s plaintiff list was impressive, but it would be hard to prove harm to the plaintiffs because federal law prohibits assisted living facilities from involuntarily discharging residents for lack of Medicaid payments. And the state can make the whole case moot by pushing those 21 applications to the top of the stack and getting them processed.
State officials promised assisted living facilities a process to apply for half-payments for residents with pending Medicaid applications but never implemented it. Instead, they have used the requests to fast-track those residents’ applications.
The state also deployed extra staff at Maximus and KDHE to process applications and shifted about 30 DCF workers to process them.
Those efforts pushed the number of applications waiting 45 days or more down to 1,512 by the end of August.
State officials say they can eliminate the backlog before the next ACA open enrollment begins Nov. 1.
Andy Marso is a reporter for KHI News Service in Topeka, a partner in the Heartland Health Monitor team. You can reach him on Twitter @andymarso
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — The University of St. Mary is mourning the death of former basketball player Marcus Mondaine.
The Kansas City Star reports that Mondaine was found fatally shot Saturday in a Kansas City, Missouri, house. An arrest warrant has been issued for a person of interest.
Mondaine was finishing his final semester at the private liberal arts university in Leavenworth. Before his last season ended this spring, he was twice been named the Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference Men’s Basketball Defensive Player of the Week. He also played for State Fair Community College in Sedalia, Missouri, and Lincoln College Preparatory Academy in Kansas City, Missouri.
University President Diane Steele described Mondaine in a statement as a “humble, gentle soul.” A prayer service is planned for Tuesday night at the university’s Annunciation Chapel.
FORD COUNTY – Law enforcement authorities in Ford County are investigating reports of clowns.
There have been rumors of alleged clown sightings in the Dodge City area in the past couple days, according to a social media report.
On Tuesday afternoon, the Dodge City Police Department informed citizens that all alleged accounts have been investigated and followed up on.
None of the alleged sightings or rumors have been substantiated.
Police also reminded the pubic to please notify them if they receive any information on clown threats or any other suspicious activity.
On Monday, several school districts in south central Kansas increased security following online clown threats and one student was in USD 259 was arrested. Three students in Maize were also involved in a clown prank, photo that circulated on social media.
SEWARD COUNTY – A Kansas woman was injured in an accident just before 10a.m. on Tuesday in Seward County.
The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2015 Jeep Grand Cherokee driven by Maggie L. Marcellus, 26, Liberal, was northbound on U.S. 83 four miles north of Liberal.
The driver looked back to attend to the infant in the backseat.
The Jeep entered the southbound lane, hit the trailer of a southbound semi, entered the west ditch and rolled.
Marcellus was transported to Southwest Medical Center.
The semi driver Alfredo Tapia, 40, Liberal was not injured.
She and a 1-year-old boy in the Jeep were properly restrained at the time of the accident.
Topeka – The seven-member Consensus Revenue Estimating (CRE) Working Group on Tuesday issued its final recommendations to improve the CRE estimates that, per statute, are used as the base for developing the State’s budget, according to a media release.
The working group was created in June in response to a request from Governor Sam Brownback to conduct a comprehensive review of the CRE process.
Sam Williams, Chair of the working group, was joined by Budget Director Shawn Sullivan and Revenue Secretary Nick Jordan in unveiling the findings and recommendations. The group met four times to study the process and analyze data related to CRE estimates, fiscal notes and state tax policy.
“The inability of the consensus revenue estimating group, of which I am a part, to develop accurate forecasts makes it very difficult to develop and maintain a stable budget,” said Budget Director Shawn Sullivan. “We built our budget for fiscal year 2016 and 2017 on estimates completed after tax legislation passed in 2015. The actuals for fiscal year 2016 were $464.7 million, or 7.5 percent less, than those estimates.”
The working group also researched whether major tax policy passed in 2012 and adjusted in the 2013 and 2015 legislative sessions created an environment in which some businesses changed their tax filing status, making accurate revenue estimates more difficult. After analyzing the data, the working group determined there is no evidence of a large number of C-Corporations changing their filing status to LLCs, S-Corporations or Sole Proprietorships. A review of data from 2007 through 2014 shows the decline in C-Corporations remained consistent with the range of decline prior to the tax policy. Data also showed that the growth in the number of pass-through entities in Kansas is consistent with growth prior to state tax policy changes.
Key recommendations from the group include:
The members of the working group included: Chair, Sam Williams, retired managing partner/CFO of Sullivan, Higdon and Sink; ; Gary Allerheiligen, retired managing partner for Grant Thornton; Gerald Capps, senior vice president for state and local tax services and private equity team leader at Allen, Gibbs and Houlik (AGH); Gary Cloud, senior vice president and co-chief investment officer for FCI Advisors; DeAnn Hill, State of Kansas CFO and owner of a CPA firm; Kurt Knutson, founder and CEO of Freedom Bank, chairman of the Kansas State Banking Board; and Brad Palen, principal at KCOE ISOM.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A 43-year-old woman has been ordered to stand trial in the fatal 2007 shooting of her son’s teenage friend in Topeka.
A Shawnee County judge found sufficient evidence Monday for Michelle Antoinette Filby to be tried on a second-degree murder charge in the killing of 16-year-old Michael Torneden.
The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that Torneden’s death originally was reported as a possible suicide but was ruled a homicide after an autopsy.
Filby’s son, Lance Olsson, testified that his mother said the shooting was an accident. Olsson had talked to Torneden beforehand. Olsson said Torneden talked about wanting to resume high school. The pair planned to walk to school the next day.
Filby was arrested in May in Torrance, California. Her trial is scheduled to start in February.
WICHITA -Law enforcement authorities in southern Kansas are investigating a case involving a stolen handgun.
Just after 10 a.m. on Monday, K-9 Ruby and Kansas Game Warden/K-9 Handler Chris Stout were contacted by a police and asked to assist with the search for the handgun that had been burglarized from a residence on Sunday night, according to a social media report.
Ruby and Stout arrived on the scene at 2:45p.m.
Ruby started her search and five minutes later had located the stolen handgun and holster in chest high reeds.
“She is an amazing animal,” said KDWP&T Captain Larry Hastings. “That was very deep grass.”
The location and additional details were not released while the investigation
continues, according to Hastings.
BARTON COUNTY – Law enforcement and school authorities in Barton County are investigating an alleged social media threat.
Great Bend Police Department learned that a student at the High School had posted disturbing writings on a social media account, according to a media release.
The writings contained some violent references directed toward fellow students, as well as a reference to shooting responding police officers.
It was titled “Skool Shooter” and appeared to be written in the form of a song or poem.
Officers were able to locate the student and take him into custody prior to the start of the school day.
The preliminary information they obtained in their investigation led officers to believe that the student acted alone in producing the writings.
Due to this information and the fact that the student was in police custody, school was not cancelled.
However, out of an abundance of caution, extra officers were stationed at the High School to provide security as students came to school.
Officials from the School District and Police Department stayed in constant communication throughout the event in order to ensure that the safety of students was not compromised.
The student who allegedly produced the writings was taken into protective custody to be evaluated by mental health professionals. The name of the student was not released.
PAWNEE, Okla. (AP) — A 3.5-magnitude earthquake struck northern Oklahoma on Tuesday morning, hitting the same spot where a record-setting temblor that shook Kansas and 7 other states was centered a month ago
The U.S. Geological Survey says Tuesday’s earthquake hit shortly after 4 a.m. with an epicenter about 10 miles northwest of Pawnee, or about 75 miles northeast of Oklahoma City. There are no reports of damage or injury.
On Sept. 3, Oklahoma’s strongest earthquake on record struck Pawnee and was felt widely throughout the central United States. Scientists later said the 5.8-magnitude quake led to the discovery of a new fault line, leading to worries that oil and gas production could trigger more powerful earthquakes.
Scientists have linked Oklahoma’s sharp increase in earthquakes in recent years to the underground injection of wastewater during oil and gas production.
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — Authorities are investigating a killing outside a Kansas City, Kansas, apartment complex.
Police said in a news release that officers found the victim Monday afternoon while responding to a report that shots had been fired. The release said the man died from apparent gunshot wounds.
The name of the suspect wasn’t immediately released, pending notification of relatives.
Police say no suspect information is available. Anyone with information is urged to call a tips hotline.
