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Residents said they felt a sense of victory over snatching an NFL team and had concerns about game day traffic and noise. Read more: KC Star

After two years of negotiations under a nondisclosure agreement, Olathe residents are learning about the Kansas City Chiefs’ move to town. Read more: KC Star

An armed city employee shot and killed an alleged intruder Monday at Lawrence City Hall, according to police. Details provided were vague, but Lawrence Police Chief Rich Lockhart said the man had gone up a stairwell to the fourth floor and broken a window. City employees “encountered” the man, a fight ensued, and an armed city employee shot and killed the man. Read more: The Lawrence Times

It’s the biggest Kansas City professional sports franchise move in more than five decades. The Chiefs are moving to Kansas. The team and state made the major announcement Monday in Topeka, and on SportsBeat KC, the sports podcast of The Star and KCUR, columnist Sam McDowell breaks down why the decision to relocate was made and what it means to the team and metropolitan area. Read more: Kansas City Star

Groundwater in western Kansas is a precious commodity. Hays and Russell are back in court to defend a plan to transfer water from a ranch in another county. Western Kansas towns see the writing on the walls. Water is growing more scarce in the region, and for some of the people who live and work there, it’s a problem that needs to be addressed today. Communities are already pouring resources into it, like water transfer projects, water recycling and aquifer recharge attempts. But, as some towns have learned, water is a hard thing to share in the semi-arid area, and courts [...]

When Matt Rehder arrived in Iola in 2021, he inherited a daunting to-do list and nearly five years later, the city administrator is steadily checking it off. Matt Rehder likely doesn’t need a crystal ball when it comes to 2026. That’s because when Rehder began as Iola city administrator in 2021, the position came with a to-do list. Develop more housing. Rebuild U.S. 54. Replace aging infrastructure. Bring in more business. Rehder laughs. Kind of. After all, that’s a pretty tall order. But in his almost five years in the position, he’s earned some notches in his belt. Read more: The [...]

Governor Laura Kelly today announced that $6.7 million has been awarded to five Internet Service Providers through the latest round of the Broadband Acceleration Grant program. These awards will be matched with an additional $6.7 million in private and local investment, resulting in $13.4 million to expand high-speed internet access across eight rural Kansas counties. Together, these projects will deliver reliable service to approximately 1,068 households and businesses, many located in some of the state’s most underserved and hardest-to-reach areas.   Read more: Press Releases Archives - Kansas Department of Commerce

Lieutenant Governor and Secretary of Commerce David Toland today announced the Office of Rural Prosperity at the Department of Commerce has awarded $337,833 in Strategic Economic Expansion and Development (SEED) grants, supporting 15 quality-of-life projects across Kansas. The awards leveraged more than $744,186 in local contributions, bringing the total investment available for the projects to almost $1.1 million. “Our small towns in Kansas are the heart of this state — they have character, history and most importantly, they have passion for growth,” Lieutenant Governor and Secretary of Commerce David Toland said. “Investing in these projects provides opportunities for smaller, rural communities [...]

Gov. Laura Kelly and the Kansas City Chiefs today announced that an agreement has been reached to build a domed stadium and a mixed-use entertainment district, as well as a new team headquarters, training facility and mixed-use development in Kansas. The project will be a massive economic win for the state, with the construction phase alone creating over 20,000 jobs and $4.4 billion in economic impact for Kansas. From there, the stadium will bring over $1 billion in annual impact. The agreement includes two distinct parts: (1) a $3 billion stadium in Wyandotte County, which will open at the start of [...]

This past March, a wildfire caused by high winds and a smoldering brush pile tore through 130 acres in Yates Center, consuming the Yates Center Health and Rehabilitation Center, a senior living facility, and causing nearly $5 million in damage. All residents were safely evacuated, but their home burned to the ground. Dense stands of eastern red cedar trees near the building provided ample kindling for the blaze. “The fire jumped the road and got into the cedars,” Yates Center Fire Chief Brandon Gaulding told KOAM News. “It went through the cedars so fast that by the time we got to [...]