SALINA — Only minor injuries were reported after a head-on collision late Saturday morning near the intersection of Ninth and Crawford in Salina.
A Salina Police Department accident report indicates that just after 11 a.m., Cameron May, 44, Salina, was southbound in a sport-utility vehicle when he took his eyes off the road to reach down for a pack of cigarettes. The SUV drifted left of center and struck a northbound car driven by 60-year-old Claudia Marshall, Salina. The impact spun the SUV around into the curb where it rolled onto its top and struck a car parked in a drivewa.
May refused medical treatment at the scene, but later went to the emergency room. Marshall was taken to Salina Regional Health Center, where she was treated and released.
3:40 p.m. Two days after she was reported missing, authorities say the missing Missouri teenager has been located and is safe in Daviess County.
In a press release, the Daviess County Sheriff’s office said 14-year-old Megan Taylor Guffey and her boyfriend 17-year-old Jeramy Sanders were found Monday afternoon. He was taken into custody.
GALLATIN, Mo. (AP) — An endangered person advisory has been issued for a northeast Missouri teenager who might have run away with a 17-year-old boy.
The issued the alert late Sunday for 14-year-old Megan Taylor Guffey. She is believed to be with a boy after they did not return to Daviess County as expected on Sunday.
Authorities believe the two might be headed to Wichita.
Megan is described as white, about 5-feet-3 inches, 113 pounds with red hair, hazel eyes and a light complexion. Her hair is shaved near her right ear.
The boy was described as Hispanic, about 5-feet-6, and 160 pounds with black hair and brown eyes.
They were in a light blue, late 1990s Ford Taurus with Kansas registration.
TOPEKA (AP) — A Kansas House committee is considering legislation to lift restrictions on investments by the state pension fund in Sudan but impose new limits concerning Iran.
The Pensions and Benefits Committee reviewed two separate bills Monday but took no action.
One bill repeals the 2007 law blocking Kansas Public Employees Retirement System investments in companies doing business in Sudan. It was a response to violence in the Darfur region.
Committee Chairman Steve Johnson said the committee is considering whether the policy remains appropriate, given the creation of South Sudan in 2011.
The other bill would limit KPERS investments in companies doing business in Iran.
Its leading advocate is state Rep. and Olathe Republican Scott Schwab. He said Kansas should do what it can to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons.
TOPEKA – Today, Gov. Sam Brownback named a state task force to study and develop a State Action Plan for Induced Seismicity related to oil and gas activities in Kansas. Induced seismicity refers to minor earthquakes resulting from human activity.
“This is a matter of public safety,” Brownback said in a news release. “Recent seismic activity in south-central Kansas has raised concerns that fluid injection might be related. I have asked the task force to study the issue and report back with a State Action Plan.”
The task force members include:
Rex Buchanan, Interim Director, Kansas Geological Survey
Kim Christiansen, Executive Director, Kansas Corporation Commission
Mike Tate, Chief, Bureau of Water, Kansas Department of Health and Environment
“There is data that point to a possible correlation between fluid injection and seismic activity,” Buchanan said. “We need to assess that data, get more information through seismic monitoring, and understand why the area has experienced increased seismic activity recently.”
Oil and gas is a cornerstone industry in Kansas generating nearly $4.3 billion each year, and employing 118,000 Kansans each day.
The task force will hold a meeting with invited industry and stakeholders on April 16 at the Eugene M. Hughes Metropolitan Complex, Wichita State University, 5015 E. 29th Street N., in Wichita, Kansas. For more information, contact the Kansas Corporation Commission at (785) 271-3140.
The Pratt County Sheriff’s Office is investigating the theft of 12 head of black and black/white faced cows. The cows weigh between 1,300 and 1,500 pounds. They are bred and could calve any day.
They have a “WF” brand on the right hip, with a red ear tag in the right ear with the initials “DW” on the front of the tag and a phone number on the back. The theft occurred sometime during the night of Feb. 11 from a pasture in the northwest part of Pratt County.
Anyone with information on this theft is asked to call the Pratt County Sheriff’s Office at (620) 672-4133. Tips also can be made to the Kansas Bureau of Investigation at (785) 296-8200 or by going to the KBI website.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The University of Missouri-Kansas City and the University of Kansas are competing for law school students.
Missouri-Kansas City’s law school has provided in-state undergraduate tuition for most Kansas residents for four years. Now, the KU School of Law is responding.
The Kansas school will use a new scholarship program to allow residents of 11 Missouri counties to pay the equivalent of in-state tuition — $19,623 a year instead of $33,067 for out-of-state students.
Missouri-Kansas City’s law school does not formally waive out-of-state tuition but nearly all of those students get in-state tuition rates.
The competition is partly because fewer students are enrolling in law schools. The Kansas City Star reported 68 percent of schools accredited by the American Bar Association reported lower first-year enrollment in 2013.
JUNCTION CITY — Jill Docking, candidate for lieutenant governor, candidate Democrat said her concern for Kansas is the “experiment” implemented by Gov. Sam Brownback that drastically changed the tax structure in Kansas.
Jill Docking
During a Junction City visit Saturday, she said Kansas had a three-legged stool form of balanced tax structure — property, income and sales taxes, but the governor has pushed the reduction of income taxes.
“We have a three-legged stool that has traditionally, over the last 80 years, been a very balanced tax structure that has allowed us to be fair to Kansas, in addition to fund things that we all think are so important like educating our children and roads and quality of life in the state of Kansas,” Docking said.
Docking added she fears the current experiment, which she said has essentially eliminated one source of funding, will be dangerous to the state over the next decade.
Docking is the running mate for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Paul Davis.
TOPEKA — House Speaker Ray Merrick on Friday said there’s been progress in behind-the-scenes negotiations over a bill that would require insurance companies to cover autism diagnosis and treatment for many Kansas children that have the disorder.
House Speaker Ray Merrick, R-Stilwell. Photo by Phil Cauthon, KHI
“We’re finally to the point where I think we’re seeing some agreement between the two parties,” he said, referring to insurance company lobbyists and the legislative sponsors of House Bill 2531.
“I think (autism advocates) will get something. They should be happy,” Merrick said. “They’re not going to get everything they wanted, and neither is the other side. That’s the way the system works. But from what I’ve seen, it’s going to be a good bill.”
Merrick, a Republican from Stilwell, said he has let both sides know that he wants a bill to pass the House this year.
HB 2531 would require state-regulated insurance plans sold before enactment of the Affordable Care Act to cover the diagnosis and treatment of autism for beneficiaries ages 18 and younger.
Insurance companies have opposed the bill and earlier versions introduced in previous sessions, characterizing the proposed requirement as a government-imposed mandate that would increase costs and force them to raise premiums.
Rep. John Rubin, a Shawnee Republican and the bill’s primary sponsor, said he shared Merrick’s optimism.
“We’re close — no, make that very close,” he said. “There are a couple sticking points remaining, but I’m confident they can be worked out.”
The insurance companies, he said, have agreed to a Jan. 1, 2015, start-up date for the coverage, which is one of the elements in the proposed legislation.
Rubin said there are still differences to settle on how to define coverage limits. Also, he said, the companies want coverage limited to beneficiaries ages 8 and under; the bill’s supporters want ages 18 and under covered.
The bill’s backers say with the upper age limit, about 750 of 8,400 known autistic children in the state could gain benefits. It wasn’t immediately known how many would get benefits if the limit was lowered to age 8.
“I think we’re going to get this done this year,” Rubin said. “That’s short of a guarantee, but it’s close.”
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — The suspect in the death of a 25-year-old Steckline Communications employee has been moved from a hospital and booked into the Sedgwick county jail.
The Wichita Eagle reports a 31-year-old identified in a police report as the suspect in Daniel Flores’ death was booked into jail Friday night on suspicion of first-degree murder and aggravated burglary.
Flores’ body was found around 8 a.m. Monday in a basement area of the Steckline offices. Preliminary autopsy reports indicate he died of blunt-force injuries.
Police arrested the suspect late Wednesday during a traffic stop, when an officer found him with a knife stuck in his stomach. Officers had been watching the suspect’s home before the traffic stop.
Officials said Friday that police plan to present their case to prosecutors next week.
MARQUETTE (AP) — Officials of a central Kansas school district say they had no choice but to close a small town’s last remaining school, but that’s little comfort to residents who believe their community is losing a way of life.
The Salina Journal reports more than 200 unhappy residents of Marquette packed a recent meeting where the Smoky Valley School Board voted to close Marquette Elementary School at the end of the academic year.
The school has 67 pupils in kindergarten through third grade and grades five and six. Its fourth-graders were moved to a school in Lindsborg at the start of the year.
Smoky Valley officials expect to save $400,000 by sending Marquette’s pupils elsewhere in the district. But many unhappy parents say they’ll send their children to a different district altogether.
TOPEKA (AP) — Kansas State Board of Education officials are considering making changes to how teachers in Kansas are licensed in effort to meet a growing demand for technical education courses at high schools.
The Topeka Capital-Journal reported the board discussed the changes during a meeting Thursday in response to a growing demand for courses resulting from new programs and funding for technical and career education enacted since 2011.
A representative of the Kansas National Education Association raised concerns during the meeting that the licensing changes could lead to teachers who lack the necessary instructional skills to adequately educate students.
Board members say they have wanted to review the licensing process for years and the increased scarcity of technical and career education teachers is prompting a closer look.
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A cash-strapped therapeutic horse riding center in Wichita plans to close next month,
The Wichita Eagle reports that the Flint Hills Therapeutic Riding Center has been unable to replace funding lost when its main corporate sponsor, Boeing, left town. It has also now lost its Medicaid insurance.
The 14-year-old horse therapy center in southeast Wichita says it is about $50,000 a year short of the money needed to stay open.
It says fundraising efforts launched in September brought in some small donors and a lot of volunteers.
Each therapy session costs the center an estimated $125. The center says it can’t charge families more than $35 per session because many of them already face huge medical bills.
Anna Purduski, a Topeka High School junior, worries that she won’t be able to graduate. She has been working with her high school counselor but not to improve her grades. Instead, she’s trying to obtain her records from freshman and sophomore year.
If the Kansas City, Kan., private school Purduski transferred from doesn’t release her records, her senior year would look substantially different. She could be forced to retake freshmen-level classes while her peers are taking college-prep courses.
“It’s really affecting my life because I really want to go to college,” Purduski said.
A bill introduced to the Senate Education Committee on Thursday could solve that problem for Purduski and other transfer students.
Purduski’s story prompted Senator Vicki Schmidt (R-Topeka) to introduce SB373, which would extend a law mandating public schools release records upon a student or parent’s request to all Kansas schools, including private and charter schools.
Schmidt emphasized that school records are the property of the student when transferring from a public school, but the state law does not cover private schools.
Greg Fallon, Purduski’s counselor at Topeka High, spoke in favor of the bill at Thursday’s hearing. He said although this issue is uncommon in his experience, it is a serious issue for students who are unable to obtain records.
According to Purduski, her former high school is withholding records because of tuition owed.
“I support a private school’s efforts to collect fees owed by parents, however a student’s education and future should not be held hostage as a negotiating tool,” Fallon said in his written testimony.
Schmidt compared it to a patient transferring to another doctor whose medical records would be transferred regardless of whether the patient owed money or not.
Mark Tallman, associate executive director of the Kansas Associate of School Boards, also spoke in favor of the bill.
“Prompt transfer of student records is important to providing placement and services to a student when transferring to the new school,” Tallman said in his written testimony.
The committee will address the bill again this week.
