Progress continues as the Americus City Council gets ready to end the city’s police department operations. Mayor Dustin Wright tells KVOE News the inventory process is complete, thanks to the work of former police chief Jody Meyers. Evidence processing is next, and Wright says the goal is to have that work done by the next City Council meeting in May. Once the evidence processing is handled, Wright says the final steps towards disbanding the police department are an inventory and equipment sale and an evidence transfer to the Lyon County Attorney’s Office. Wright believes the process could be done within the [...]

Johnson County leaders are looking decades ahead as development continues to spread to rural areas, especially near the Panasonic site in De Soto. The county board recently adopted a road network plan that could reshape how people move through the rural parts of the county. The plan is a recommendation, not a construction schedule, but it identifies which rural roads could need to be expanded to keep up with development pushing to the west. This means some roads might go from two lanes to four in the future, and other roads may open for the first time ever. Read more: KSHB [...]

City commissioners unanimously voted to allow people to use UTVs on city roads with a new registration process.  The move follows that of nearby communities like Baldwin, Tonganoxie and De Soto. The ordinance will go into effect on June 1. Police Chief Wes Lovett said they reviewed these regulations when crafting Eudora’s.  The ordinance regulates the use of work-site utility vehicles. UTV or micro truck owners can drive in city limits if the owner resides in the 66025 zip code and registers their vehicle annually with the Police Department. The registration process requires a valid driver’s license, proof of liability insurance, [...]

“These things have to run 100 percent 100 percent of the time,” are the words that Hutchinson Fire Department mechanic Rick Spitler lives by when it comes to taking care of the department’s equipment. Spitler has been turning a wrench since he was 14 years old and broke a tooth when a driveshaft fell on him while he was changing it. For the past four years, he’s been the mechanic responsible for keeping all of HFD’s fire engines rolling. “When I got into high school, I was in shop class, and I figured out I could take stuff apart, put it [...]

Before they adjourned from their meeting on April 14, members of the Hutchinson Planning Commission spoke about the need for better data center zoning regulations. Commissioner Denice Gilliland was the first to bring up the subject, mentioning the joint Reno County, Hutchinson and South Hutchinson task force and saying that it should be on everyone’s agenda. No member of the Hutchinson Planning Commission was asked to be a part of the task force. Commission Chair Elaine Carter asked Associate Planner Paul Schiffelbein if the city had been working on tightening its zoning regulations around data centers and battery energy storage systems [...]

As part of its efforts to reduce its reliance on bonds for city projects, the City of Hutchinson is implementing a new program to fund smaller projects in the upcoming fiscal year. At the April 7 Hutchinson City Council meeting, city finance director Angela Richard outlined the new hybrid program, which is called PayGo. “PayGo is short for Pay-as-you-Go, which is what it sounds like-paying for projects/maintenance/equipment as you have the cash,” Richard said. “Hybrid would incorporate trying to pay for those projects we can cash finance, while still bonding for certain projects that meet certain requirements.” Because PayGo is new [...]

Allen County will likely institute a nominal motor vehicle transaction fee to help cover operational costs within the Allen County treasurer’s office. A new state law allowing counties to add motor vehicle transaction fees could bring additional revenue to Allen County. County Treasurer Darolyn Maley told commissioners Tuesday morning that she plans to take a modest approach in implementing the change locally. Maley said the legislation comes after years of work by the County Treasurer’s Association to address funding gaps in motor vehicle departments across Kansas. “This is something that the state has finally passed to get a little bit more [...]

Marysville Police Chief Anthony Escalante recently returned from the FBI National Academy, where he became the third consecutive Marysville police chief to graduate from the prestigious program on the U.S. Marine Corps Base in Quantico, Va. He was among 253 law enforcement officers who graduated in the 297th session of the academy, which consisted of men and women from 48 states and the District of Columbia. The 12-week class also included 26 members of law enforcement agencies from 24 countries, four military organizations and four federal civilian organizations. Read more: www.marysvilleonline.net

Fast-rising floodwaters on Corndodger Creek about 6 a.m. Saturday washed one person downstream among about 32 campers who awoke to water rising in their tents. A man caught inside his tent and unable to escape was aided by two fellow campers who cut him out after he became entangled and was overtaken beneath the rushing water. The other man, who was swept away, was soon rescued by two men as he clung to a nearby county bridge, said Lee Tebbutt, St. George, president of the Kaw Valley Muzzleloaders that regularly camp on his family’s land there. Blue Rapids and Frankfort firefighters [...]

Marysville City Council took another step toward an animal shelter Monday night, when it decided to seek information on stamped plans from an engineer or architect for a roughly 24x40-foot building. The city’s Unified Land Development Code regulations require plans stamped by an engineer or architect for the zoning category for the proposed location at 1701 Spring St., directly behind the water plant. The site was chosen because the city owns the property and the current plans for the building were scaled back to fit on that site. The city has purchased 14 kennels, but the exact number of kennels to [...]