For decades, Lawrence’s mayor has been elected by the five members of the Lawrence City Commission. Some community leaders are questioning whether simply allowing Lawrence residents to vote for a mayor – perhaps once every four years – might be a better way. Read more: LJWorld

The city of Derby says it is aware of some of the social media posts about people going down really fast. They are looking at what they can do, but there’s one thing they can’t control. Read more: KWCH

City commissioners will consider opposing a petition for incorporating the city of Green Valley in Pottawatomie County. On March 26, the Pott County clerk received a petition to incorporate Green Valley. On June 11, the Pottawatomie Board of County Commissioners will hold a public hearing on the petition. Manhattan city commissioners on Tuesday will vote on a resolution that labels the incorporation as inadvisable under state law. The commission will also vote on an agreement with the state of Kansas for $300,000 in grant funding to develop an operational technology master plan for improving cybersecurity. Read more: News Radio KMAN

Concerns about the proposed Flint Hills Digital Campus dominated Wednesday's Emporia City Commission meeting as a large crowd of residents voiced opposition to the project and the annexation of land associated with the proposed development. Read more: www.emporiagazette.com

Emporia is a city known for several different things: gravel cycling, drinking water, and now walkability. In a list published by the website walkscore.com, Emporia was named the most walkable city in Kansas with a walk score of 45 out of 100. That score places Emporia at the top of a list of 24 cities in the Sunflower State, ahead of cities including Lawrence, Manhattan and Wichita. The website uses the distance of walking routes to popular amenities, pedestrian friendliness, population density and certain road measurements to determine a score measuring the walkability of cities across the U.S. and Canada. Read [...]

Heading into its second year, the Hesston Farmer’s Market looks to expand on the overwhelming success of the first year. With the first installment happening on June 3, the endeavor helps fill a hole left by the lack of a grocery store in Hesston, and this year, a study will be conducted to see if a farm-fresh market using ideas from the farmer’s market could be feasible. This study is being done by the Healthy Harvey Coalition and the United Way, with an idea if the market could be sustainable in a brick-and-mortar location both during the season and off-season. Read [...]

An incident involving a Holton resident and a representative of a telecommunications company at­tempting to sell services to the resi­dent was the focus of discus­sion at a recent Holton City Com­misssion meeting. During the commission’s Tues­day, May 19 meeting — held a day later than usual due to severe storms that moved through the area the previous day — commissioners met with Holton resident Jim Rick­etts about a recent incident involv­ing a representative of Brightspeed whom Ricketts said got aggressive with him when he asked the em­ployee for a copy of a solicitor’s permit. Door-to-door salespersons visit­ing Holton are required to [...]

A motion to put a six-month pause on data centers in Gardner died Monday night, despite support from residents and the backing of one city councilmember. The discussion comes as multiple Johnson County cities, including Gardner, have been weighing data center proposals in recent months. Earlier this spring, a data center application was withdrawn in Spring Hill. Then, a California-based company withdrew its data center application in Gardner, following community pushback. And Edgerton currently has a data center application on the table, even as De Soto also moves forward with another. Ono Monday night, the Gardner City Council discussed a measure [...]

As a girl, Dawn Buehler loved floating the Kansas River as it passed her family’s farm. As an adult, she’s floated all the major rivers of the Ozarks. Last summer she floated and camped along rivers in Washington and Montana. She hopes to keep floating new rivers. Some of the rivers she’d most like to float are just an hour or two from her home in rural Douglas County, and include the Elk, Marais des Cygnes and Verdigris. All begin amid the grand grasslands of the Flint Hills and eventually flow through prime forests near the Kansas border. But those rivers, [...]

Deep Fission announced Tuesday a partnership with Day and Zimmermann for the construction of a nuclear reactor in Parsons. Deep Fission is a company that makes small advanced nuclear reactors and chose Parsons, Kansas, to build a test version of its new underground reactor. The site will be in the Great Plains Industrial Park. Read more: www.koamnewsnow.com