Kansas Municipal News
Glasco nursing home residents let lose on ATVs, taking in beautiful Kansas day
About 20 residents at the Nichol Home enjoyed a cooler summer day by riding ATVs around town, showing us that age is just a number. Residents waved at people around town and enjoyed the breeze while riding on the back of the four-wheeler.
Source: KSNT News
Check out this adorable boat racing video from 1930s Wichita
A rare opportunity to observe the excitement and life of Wichita in the mid-1930s made the rounds on local social media this week. With a slight blueish tint, images of men in life preservers racing atop the Little Arkansas River in speedboats play over lively trumpet-infused jazz. Men and women in hats and the dress of the mid-1930s gather on the banks, perching on lawn chairs as they watch the speedboat race excitement. Jeff Roth, who edited the video, shared it on a private Facebook page called “Wichita history from my perspective.”
Source: Local News | Wichita Eagle
Old Abilene Town bringing history to life with ‘Chisholm Trail Days’ starting Friday
Old Abilene Town is honoring its history with “Chisholm Trail Days” Friday and Saturday. The two-day festival will include gunfighters, can-can dancers, and a historic reenactment of the shooting of Wild Bill Hickok. Development Coordinator Michael Hook said the festival takes a look at what it was like long before Abilene was known as the hometown of former President Dwight D. Eisenhower. “We want to go back to the time before Eisenhower and really get into what we really started as,” Hook said. “I think a lot of the chronology of this town has a lot to thank for the cowboys for that. If cowboys hadn’t come, we wouldn’t be the town we are today.”
Source: KSNT News
Bringing broadband to the country
By partnering with the Kansas Department of Transportation and a couple of soil health organizations, the Kansas Department of Agriculture can help farmers succeed. Many locations throughout the state are broadband dead zones. For farmers and truckers to utilize new technology, they need internet connectivity, but bringing that technology to rural areas with low population centers is not economically feasible for many companies. That is where KDA and KDOT come in. The two organizations got together with two soil health organizations to make an incentive plan to bring broadband to central Kansas.
Source: Hutch News
Municipal Bond Trends for September 2, 2021
The interest rate table above illustrates recent changes in a sample of MBIS “investment grade” yields. Every issuer’s credit is different. For rates that may be applicable to your municipality, contact our Municipal Bond Advisors, Larry Kleeman and Beth Warren.
Governor updates drought emergency, warnings and watches for Kansas counties
Gov. Laura Kelly approved the updated Drought Declarations for Kansas counties with executive order 21-26. The declaration includes 87 out of 105 counties either in a warning or watch status. The drought declaration placed 14 counties into a warning status and 73 into a watch status. The action was recommended by Connie Owen, director of the Kansas Water Office and Chair of the Governor’s Drought Response Team.
Source: KSN-TV
Labette County changes vacation rules to retain workers
Labette County commissioners on Tuesday agreed to accommodate hobbled county departments by paying employees for some unused vacation and allowing them to carry over any remaining after that. The accommodation is for this year only, commissioners said. The current policy is that county employees can carry 72 hours of unused vacation into the next year. The problem this year is that employees are leaving county jobs for other work and county departments are struggling to get enough applicants to fill vacancies, in part because of the lower wage offered for county work.
Source: Parsons Sun
Rail project near Haysville among 10 receiving funds
Gov. Laura Kelly and Kansas Transportation Secretary Julie Lorenz announced 10 projects, totaling more than $5.2 million, were awarded as part of the Kansas Department of Transportation’s Short Line Rail Improvement Fund Program. The announcement took place Monday at the Gavilon grain elevator in southwest Wichita, one of the recipients of program funding.
Source: Times-Sentinel Newspapers » Feed
Erie saved its grocery story by buying it and running it themselves
Erie city clerk, began the process by noting the building currently housing Erie Market was “relatively new,” since it had been rebuilt by the previous owners following a flood. “There were not many options on selling it, because it was a newer store,” Lero said. “It would take more money to purchase it,” and buyers weren’t coming forward. The owners therefore approached the City of Erie, because they had heard of other cities successfully operating stores of this kind. The city was receptive, but didn’t want to move forward without doing their due diligence, especially because “running it as a mom-and-pop is a lot different from running it from a city standpoint.”
Source: The Iola Register
Municipal Bond Trends for September 1, 2021
The interest rate table above illustrates recent changes in a sample of MBIS “investment grade” yields. Every issuer’s credit is different. For rates that may be applicable to your municipality, contact our Municipal Bond Advisors, Larry Kleeman and Beth Warren.
Destination Kansas: Playing and exploring in the high plains
The high plains of Kansas have a lot to offer tourists. This region makes up the western third of the state. In the town of Liberal, follow the yellow brick road to meet Dorothy. While “The Wizard of Oz” never specified where Dorothy Gale started her trip to Oz, Liberal claims it. Visit Dorothy’s House and the Land of Oz, 567 E. Cedar Street, and skip down the yellow brick road. A few blocks from Dorothy’s house, take flight at the Mid-America Air Museum, 2000 W. 2nd Street, Liberal. More than a third of all B-24 command pilots in World War II were trained at the former Liberal Army Airfield. You’ll find more than 100 aircraft. The oldest is from 1932.
Source: KSN-TV
Hesston Community Foundation awards grant to Hesston Fire/EMS
The Hesston Fire/EMS department recently received a grant from the Hesston Community Foundation for the purchase of two Technimount Systems. The Technimount System is a safe and secure mounting system for the EKG monitor/defibrillator to the EMS cot in a way that is functional for technicians and is out of the way of the patient. The system replaces an equipment platform that is flimsy, extremely unsecure, difficult to mount and remove and it reduces access to the patient as it covers their lower legs, according to Hesston Fire/EMS Chief Russ Buller. The previous equipment platform was far less secure and significantly less safe. Because the new systems provide a secure mounting for the heavy device, they prevent the monitor/defibrillator from causing severe injury to the patient or technicians in the event of an accident or hard stop.
Source: Harvey County Now
New legislation is shaking up how local governments set property taxes
New legislation going into effect this year could play a big role in how much you pay in property taxes in Kansas. In March, Kansas Governor Laura Kelley signed SB13, a bill that adds a public hearing requirement for taxing subdivisions that want to collect property taxes beyond a revenue neutral rate. A revenue neutral rate (RNR) is a tax rate that would generate the same amount of property tax dollars for the city as the previous tax year, using the current tax year’s total assessment valuation. A RNR is expressed in mills. A mill represents one one-thousandth of a dollar. That comes out to about $1 of taxes for every $1,000 a property is valued.
Source: fox4kc.com | FOX 4 – WDAF
Gov. Laura Kelly announces new school safety workforce
Governor Laura Kelly announced a new initiative on Wednesday during her tour at Wesley’s Children’s Hospital. Kelly says the ‘Safer Classrooms Workgroup’ was created to protect Kansas students, teachers, and staff from the threat of the Delta variant of COVID-19. The Safer Classrooms Workgroup will be composed of pediatricians, family physicians, school nurses, pharmacists, school psychologists, and other health professionals. They will meet weekly to highlight the spread of COVID with educators, parents, and advocates about their experiences as schools work to mitigate the spread of COVID-19.
Source: KSN-TV
New program introduced by Wichita police aims to reduce violence among teens and young adults
Reducing violence among teenagers and young adults, that’s the goal of a new initiative called SERV (Strategic Engagement to Reduce Violence) from Wichita police. Police will work with violent offenders, educating them on consequences if they continue breaking the law. The community policing initiative comes from a Department of Justice partnership with the police. The chief of police says a lot of violent crime is related to what he calls habitual offenders. “This program really aims to get on early and pull people out of the lifestyle and get them on a trajectory that will be better for themselves as well as others in the community,” said Chief Gordon Ramsay.
Source: KSN-TV
Labette bike share community program up and running
A new community program is up and running in Parsons — more appropriately, biking. Bike Share Labette is underway. The free program was started as a part of the Labette Leadership program, and is designed to promote the exploration of city parks and trails. Organizers hope to make it bigger, and have started a fundraising campaign to expand it throughout the county. “Right now we’re trying to establish an endowment where we can be hands off for any kind of repairs or expansions and with that we’re hoping to raise 20 thousand dollars for that endowment and we’re currently at nine thousand,” said Hailey Barnett, Bike Share Labette Project Coordinator
Source: KSNF/KODE
Parsons getting new soccer field with help from former NFL Quarterback Shaun Hill
Former NFL Quarterback, Shaun Hill, is helping to give his hometown of Parsons its own field of dreams. Construction is nearly complete on the new athletic and practice fields for the Parsons School District. The project began about four-years ago with a donation from the Shaun Hill Pass Fund. it then grew to include sponsorships from members of the community and local businesses. “It means the world to Parsons and definitely to our youth, he’s a great example of giving back and being generous. He’s supported P-R-C for many years, 503 for many years and many other things in Parsons as well,” said Gary Crissman, Project Manager.
Source: KSNF/KODE
Water Conference brings in hundreds to Capital City
People from all over Kansas are in Topeka to learn about new innovations in the wastewater and water treatment industry. The 12th annual conference is put on by the Kansas Water Environment Association and the Kansas Section of the American Water Works Association. Attendees brush up on their skills by taking classes, hearing presentations, watching demonstrations of new technology, and participating in contests. Organizers said the end goal of the conference is to get workers educated on new technology so that the people of Kansas can get and dispose of their water efficiently. “Infrastructure is failing across the board, we’ve got a lot of old infrastructure and I think it’s really important for the community to understand that we need to make those repairs,” said Jason Patty, president of the Kansas Water Environment Association. “We’ve put those off for 50 or 60 years, and it’s time.”
Source: KSNT News
Goessel, Burns, Marion buck census trend
Goessel, Burns, and Marion seem to have bucked the trend for declining population in Marion County. The Census Bureau has not yet listed 2020 population figures by municipality for communities of less than 5,000 people. However, it has released data arranged by geo-location and geographic boundary that state partner organizations have used to calculate what can be regarded as authoritative, if not final, census data for municipalities of fewer than 5,000 residents.
Source: Marion County RECORD
Population growth a benefit for McPherson County
McPherson County experienced growth according to the recently released 2020 Census data. In fact, the population of McPherson County rose from 29,180 in 2010 to 30,223 for the 2020 census. This equals a 3.57 percent increase in residents over the last 10 years. City Administrator Nick Gregory says making sure every resident was counted became a group effort of city and county officials. “We met with the colleges, we reached out to areas that we thought would have a harder time completing the census, we worked with engineering to make sure census had all current addresses, we launched a social media campaign and worked with the public library to make sure people had access to computers to complete the census,” Gregory said. “It was an effort on the part of many to make sure every resident was counted.”
Source: McPherson Weekly News