BILL DRAPER, Associated Press

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The biggest wildfire in Kansas history has a silver lining despite scorching nearly 600 square miles of land in Kansas and Oklahoma.

Conservation experts say it would have taken decades to clear out the number of eastern red cedars consumed by the Anderson Creek fire in March.

Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks agent Ken Brunson called the blaze an “ecological cleansing for the environment” because it killed so many cedars, also known as junipers.

Red cedars are drought-resistant trees that crowd out native grasses, suck up moisture from the soil and reduce the amount of forage for wildlife and livestock.

Aron Flanders with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimates it would have cost Kansas landowners $56 million to remove the same number of trees killed in the fire.

REPUBLIC COUNTY – A Kansas man died and two others were injured in an accident just before 3p.m. on Monday in Republic County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 1989 GMC pickup driven by Aaron M. Fischer, 88, Belleville, was attempting to cross U.S. 81 at Lincoln Road.

The pickup collided with a 2005 Dodge Ram 1500 driven by Randy D. Sheppard, 52, Lyons, that was southbound on U.S. 81.

Fischer’s vehicle rolled into the ditch. He was pronounced dead at the scene and transported to Tibbett’s Funeral Home.

Sheppard and a passenger Dustin Sheppard 21, Hutchinson, were transported to Republic County Hospital.

Fischer was not wearing a seat belt, according to the KHP.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — The producer of a 1970s movie about a gorilla trained in kung fu that fights its way across Wichita says the film might have been one big-name actor away from being a hit. Watch it online here.

Bob Walterscheid says “King Kung Fu” was intended to be a widely distributed comedy but instead became a movie that “most people look at in the evening so they can drink.”

The Wichita Eagle reports this year marks the 40th anniversary of the film about a gorilla that stops in Wichita “to let the rednecks gawk at him.”

“King Kung Fu” played in only 11 U.S. theaters and lost most of the money sunk into the film. Still, Walterscheid and director Lance Hayes say they feel they accomplished something by making a movie in Wichita.

SALINA – Law enforcement authorities have arrested a suspect in connection with a stabbing on Sunday in Salina.

On Monday a SWAT team arrested, John James Brown at a home in southeast Saline County, according to a social media report from Salina Police.

Saline County Sheriff’s Department and the KHP Air Unit assisted with the investigation to locate Brown.

Brown faces charges of aggravated battery and attempted first-degree murder, according to police.

 

 

SALINA – Law enforcement authorities in Saline County are searching for a suspect in an early Sunday morning stabbing.

Just before 3:30 a.m., officers were dispatched to the Salina Regional Health Center’s emergency room reference for two men that were attacked with a knife during a disturbance at a northeast Salina residence, according to a media release.

One victim sustained a cut to the hand; the other was stabbed in the torso and is listed in serious condition.

A Saline County warrant has been issued for a John James Brown for charges of aggravated battery and attempted first degree murder. He is a white male, 34 years old, 6’, 195 pounds, brown hair and gray eyes. Brown’s hair may be significantly shorter than pictured.

Brown is considered armed and dangerous and if you have information of his whereabouts to immediately call the Salina Police Department at 785-826-7210 or Crimestoppers at 785-825-TIPS. Please do not approach or attempt apprehension of this person on your own.

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — A farm aid nonprofit in the Northern Plains is expanding its services again this year, with an eye toward spreading geographically in a year or two.

North Dakota-based Farm Rescue does physical labor for farmers in need in both Dakotas, Minnesota, Iowa and eastern Montana. It started out planting crops, then expanded to harvesting crops, and then into haying.

The organization this year also is offering hay bale-hauling and grain-hauling services.

Founder Bill Gross says Farm Rescue needs to boost its annual budget from about $750,000 to $1 million to expand to more states. It’s finding new ways to raise money, including selling downloads and CDs of a country music tune sung by North Dakota farmer Joe Schmidt. “My Field of Dreams” was written by Billy Ray Cyrus’ cousin, Bobby.

WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Senator Pat Roberts  said that the administration’s proposed Medicare Part B drug demonstration could disrupt care for some of Medicare’s most vulnerable patients and lead to government rationing of healthcare.

Speaking at a Senate Finance Committee hearing on the demonstration, Roberts said, “I remain gravely concerned about how this demonstration, or “test” as the administration calls it, will impact patients’ access to care, particularly in rural areas like Kansas. I would like to reaffirm my request that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) withdraw this proposal.”

“When this committee was debating the Affordable Care Act, I was concerned about several provisions that I believed would decrease individual choice and open the door to government rationing of health care. CMMI was one of those creations and this proposal confirms my fears. We have before us a proposed demonstration that could disrupt care for some of Medicare’s most vulnerable patients.”

Earlier this year, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) proposed changes to how the government pays for prescription drugs under Medicare Part B. The proposal would reduce reimbursements on new medications and could limit access to others that the administration does not deem “high value.” This could result in patients being switched to products that are less effective or have more side effects. Over 300 organizations are asking that this rule be withdrawn. In addition, all Republican members of the Senate Finance Committee sent a letter to CMS in April requesting the agency withdraw this proposal.

In 2014, Roberts spoke on the Senate floor warning of the dangers of the government’s expanded authorities over healthcare as a result of Obamacare. He said, “CMMI gives the government new powers to cut payments to Medicare beneficiaries with the goal to reduce program expenditures. However, the reality is they will reduce patients’ ability to access the care they want and need. All hidden under the cloak of ‘innovation.’”

Senator Roberts has introduced legislation in response to this called the Four Rationers Repeal Act (S. 1718), which would repeal CMMI, and three other rationing bodies.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A man convicted of fatally shooting bank employees during a robbery in Nebraska more than 50 years ago was transferred from a Kansas federal prison back to Nebraska on Friday.

Deuel County Attorney Joel Jay applied for the transfer order on June 24.

Duane Earl Pope, 73, was released from the Leavenworth, Kansas, prison Friday and transferred to the Diagnostic and Evaluation Center in Lincoln to serve out three life sentences he received after authorities say he robbed a bank in Big Springs. Three people died and one person was paralyzed in the June 1965 incident.

Authorities say Pope drove from his Kansas home to the bank, where he demanded money and ordered four bank employees to lie on the floor before shooting each of them.

By MEGAN HART

One year after Osawatomie State Hospital temporarily stopped admitting patients for the first time in its history, the number of people waiting for mental health treatment is up.

And an increasing number of them are waiting in hospital emergency rooms.  Osawatomie State Hospital — one of two state-run inpatient facilities for adults with severe mental health issues — halted admissions in late June 2015 after it reduced its capacity from 206 to 146 so that it could complete renovations ordered by federal officials.

The hospital is now admitting new patients but only when its population falls below 146.

The reduction in usable beds has resulted in longer wait times for patients who need the intensive inpatient treatment. Federal officials ordered the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services to renovate areas of Osawatomie State Hospital because of concerns about patient safety.

The hospital closed a 60-bed unit in April 2015 to start renovations, but it has yet to reopen. In December, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services cut federal payments to the hospital — about $1 million a month — after finding additional safety concerns.

KDADS has focused on meeting requirements to receive those payments again.

Waiting up to four days

The longer wait times have forced an increasing number of Kansans to seek mental health treatment in hospital emergency rooms. Officials at Wichita-based Via Christi Health say the demand for mental health services has climbed steadily since last year.

“We have, I think, consistently seen a rise recently,” said Chris West, the administrator for Via Christi’s behaviorial health programs.

“We did see it last year, but not at the level we’re seeing it this year.” Increasing wait times for beds at Osawatomie is one of the reasons for the spike in ER visits, West said, noting that some Via Christi paitients have had to wait more than four days. Cindy Samuelson, spokeswoman for the Kansas Hospital Association, said wait times for beds at Osawatomie are an increasing concern among the association’s members. Representatives on its behavioral health task force have reported patient waits ranging from 20 hours to 96 hours, she said. West said four people were waiting in Via Christi’s emergency room for admission to Osawatomie as of Thursday morning, including one person who had been waiting for three days.

Statewide, 18 people were waiting for treatment at Osawatomie State Hospital as of Thursday morning, said Angela de Rocha, KDADS spokeswoman. Five of them were in a correctional facility or had failed to comply with court-ordered outpatient treatment, she said. John Worley, superintendent of Osawatomie State Hospital, said fewer than 10 people were waiting for beds statewide for most of the period between July 1 and Nov. 10, 2015, though the waiting list did hit 14 a few times. Since Nov. 11, 2015, the waiting list typically has been in the double digits, and it isn’t clear why, Worley said.

It hit a high of 27 on June 15 but has fallen to as low as three at times, he said. “Having 18 on the list would be a bit high against the averages, but not unusually so,” he said in an email.

Growing demand for services

It isn’t just the state hospitals that are running out of room. West said Via Christi’s behavioral health center, which has 60 beds for adults, can take patients waiting for admission to Osawatomie. But he said its beds also often have been full in recent months. Part of the issue, West said, is that an increasing number of the people seeking treatment for behavioral health problems at Via Christi have had more significant needs. “That higher level of treatment often takes longer,” he said. “Oftentimes they do these extended boarding times in the ED (emergency department).” Via Christi has five beds in a designated psychiatric assessment center in its emergency department, West said, but sometimes patients in mental health crisis have to be placed in other safe rooms when those five are full. Via Christi’s emergency department has nurses trained to work with psychiatric patients, along with a clinical social worker and a “protection worker” whose job is to calm patients. Even so, he said, it’s not an ideal treatment setting for people with behavioral health needs.  “It’s not the right level of care to have these people waiting (for a state hospital bed),” he said. Susan Burchill, spokeswoman for Wesley Medical Center in Wichita, said Wesley hasn’t seen an increase in the number of people waiting in its emergency department for a space at Osawatomie State Hospital. However, she said, it is a challenge for physicians to find private or public facilities that have space for inpatient psychiatric patients. That has increased wait times for inpatient psychiatric care, Burchill said. –

RENO COUNTY – Two people were injured in an accident just before 9p.m. on Sunday in Reno County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2008 Harley Davidson motorcycle driven by Don W. Butler, 56, Burrton, was eastbound on U.S. 50 four miles east of Hutchinson.

The motorcycle hit a deer in the roadway and slid on its side into the south ditch.

Butler and a passenger William W. Lytle, 4, Burrton, were transported to Hutchinson Regional Medical Center.

Both were wearing helmets, according to the KHP.

PRATT, Kan. (AP) — A south-central Kansas sheriff says a man who fell 120 feet while working on a wind turbine is expected to survive.

Pratt County Sheriff Vernon Chinn says the worker was seriously injured during the tumble onto muddy terrain Sunday morning while he was repairing a blade on a wind generator near Pratt. Chinn says emergency responders found the man coherent, able to talk and “doing amazingly well for the fall he just had.”

Another worker was found hanging from his safety harness 120 feet in the air and eventually was lowered to safety in a construction basket.

General Electric says it is investigating the accident.

The workers’ names were not released.

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PRATT COUNTY- Law enforcement authorities in Pratt County are investigating a Sunday morning accident.

Just before 9:30 a.m. on Sunday, the Pratt County Sheriff’s Office, Pratt County Emergency Services, and Pratt County Rescue were called to a construction site approximately 6 miles south and 4 miles east of Pratt, to the scene of a construction worker who had fallen while doing repairs on a wind generator, according to a media release.

Pratt County Sheriff’s Office was told the worker had fallen approximately 126 feet and had landed on his back in the mud. The worker was conscious and talking with rescue personnel.

Another worker was trapped for a brief period of time, hanging from his safety harness at approximately the same height. After several minutes the second worker was able to free and lower himself into the construction basket and then on down to the ground.

The injured worker was transported from the scene to a hospital in Wichita.

The men were repairing one of the blades on the wind generator and were employed by General Electric, according to the sheriff’s office.

The names of the employees were not released.

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — A 40-year-old woman has been sentenced to about 25 years in prison for killing a Lawrence woman in 2014.

Angelica Kulp pleaded guilty last month to second-degree murder and aggravated burglary in the stabbing death of 56-year-old Christine Kaplan. Kulp was sentenced Friday in Douglas County court.

Kaplan, who was known to take in people in need of help, allowed Kulp to stay in her home. She later asked Kulp to leave because Kulp was running up the water bill and was being disrespectful.

The Lawrence Journal World reports (https://j.mp/29bobVW) that before she was sentenced, Kulp addressed Kaplan’s family and apologized.

Prosecutors say when she’s released from prison Kulp will have to register as a violent offender for 15 years.

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — Bookstores serving students at the two largest universities in Kansas are closing, largely because of dwindling textbook sales.

The Levin family owns the Jayhawk Bookstore in Lawrence near the University of Kansas and Varney’s Book Store in Manhattan, where Kansas State is located. The family has announced the closure of both bookstores.

Jeff Levin says Jayhawk Bookstore’s “bread and butter” was textbooks. He says the owners had predicted a significant loss for January, but it was even deeper than anticipated. He cites a rise in online open-access material and more students ordering books online.

And he says if people aren’t coming in the door to buy books, they don’t buy many supplies either.

The Lawrence Journal-World reports the Jayhawk Bookstore closed last week. Varney’s closed last month.