In prairielands like Kansas, if there's a lot of smoke in the air, there's a good chance that a fire has started, but one organization wants the public to know that not all of these fires are wild. The Smoky Hills Prescribed Burn Association (PBA) has grown to around 45 members in its three years of existence in north central Kansas. Its main purpose is the promotion, assistance and education on the safe and responsible use of fire as a management tool and to be a resource to assist landowners and land managers with the necessary means to organize and conduct [...]

Leaders with the National League of Cities on Thursday were in the city where their organization was founded to celebrate a century of connecting and providing services to municipal officials across the U.S. .... a delegation from the NLC is in Lawrence this week as part of a cross-country roadshow celebrating the organization’s centennial. Lawrence, the first stop on the tour, is where the NLC was founded in 1924 on the University of Kansas campus. Clarence Anthony, the CEO and executive director of the NLC, is one of the leaders with the visiting delegation, and he presented a commemorative plaque to [...]

Mahbub Rashid sees cities differently than most people. And you might say the dean of the University of Kansas School of Architecture & Design ought to do that. But Rashid has taken spatial analysis of urban development to the cutting edge of technology — and this view of small-town Kansas suggests to him that much more can be done to promote the health of people who live there. Rashid’s new book, “Built Environment and Population Health in Small-Town America: Learning from Small Cities of Kansas” (Johns Hopkins University Press), looks at how lifestyle behaviors and health indicators are associated with spatial [...]