Kansas Governor Slows Reopening; Limits to Go into Late June
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly has slowed down the reopening of Kansas’s economy. Kelly on Thursday ordered bars and bowling alleys to remain closed through the end of the month and plans to keep some coronavirus-inspired restrictions in place until near the end of June. Kelly’s new order takes effect Monday and is likely to stir strong opposition in the Republican-controlled Legislature. A limit on public gatherings of 10 or fewer people will remain in place, rather than being increased to 30 on Monday. Kelly is allowing barbershops and hair and nail salons to reopen as planned but limiting them to appointments only.
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Two Lansing Prison Employees, Three Inmates Have Died from COVID-19
TOPEKA, Kan. (KPR) — A second corrections officer working at the Lansing Correctional Center has died of medical complications related to COVID-19. Jeff Zmuda, secretary of the Kansas Department of Corrections, said the nearly 20-year veteran of the agency, who was a man in his 50s, died Tuesday. The Lansing prison's first staff fatality associated with the virus took place Monday. The prison has been at the epicenter of the state prison system’s cluster of coronavirus cases. At the Lansing facility, 88 employees and 728 inmates have tested positive for the virus. Three of Lansing’s prisoners have died of COVID-19. “This virus does not discriminate and has touched so many of us,” Zmuda said. “We are committed to doing everything we can to ensure the health and safety of both our employees and those in our custody.” Zmuda said four prison inmates and two corrections employees with COVID-19 remained hospitalized. All inmates at Lansing have been tested, but the secretary said the agency would start today (THUR) with a plan to test all employees at the Lansing and Wichita prison facilities. Zmuda said the first staff member to die was a man over the age of 60 with more than three decades of service in KDOC. The corrections department has reported infections of staff or inmates at prisons in El Dorado, Ellsworth, Norton, Topeka and the Wichita work release facility and the juvenile detention facility in Topeka.
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Sausage-Making Plant in Holton Shuts Down Amid COVID-19 Cases
TOPEKA Kan. (AP) — A Kansas plant that makes sausage has shut down after employees tested positive for the coronavirus, and an outbreak that has infected hundreds at the state’s largest prison has claimed the life of another worker. The shutdown at the Johnsonville plant in Holton, which employees about 230 workers, took effect Wednesday. Johnsonville didn’t announce when it plans to reopen the plant. Johnsonville said all employees will continue to get paid, and downtime will be used to implement even more aggressive safety protocols before reopening. Some new safety protocols include placing additional barriers between workstations where social distancing isn’t possible. The plant already had been requiring mandatory temperature checks.
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Kansas Reports Nearly 7,500 Cases of COVID-19, Including 164 Deaths
TOPEKA, Kan. (KPR) — As of Wednesday morning*, state health officials reported 7,468 cases of COVID-19, including 164 deaths. Cases have now been reported in 83 of the state's 105 counties. Four of the 10 hardest-hit Kansas counties (Ford, Finney, Seward and Lyon) have large meatpacking plants. ( Get the latest COVID-19 numbers in Kansas here.)
- Governor Laura Kelly's Plan to Reopen Kansas
- KPR's Coronavirus Information and Resources Guide
- Live Coverage: Coronavirus in the Kansas City Area
*KDHE has changed its updating schedule, and until further notice will only be updating these totals on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.
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Kansas Medicaid Director Resigns to Take New Job
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas's state Medicaid director, Dr. Adam Proffitt, has announced his resignation to take a new job in the private sector. The Kansas Department of Health and Environment announced Proffitt's resignation in a news release Wednesday night. Proffitt's resignation is effective June 5. Proffitt joined the department as the director of its healthcare finance division in December 2017. He was named the state's Medicaid director last May. The news release says the department will announce an interim director at a later date. Proffitt's resignation comes as the state grapples with trying to contain the new coronavirus outbreak.
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Spurred by Pandemic, Kansas ACLU Launches Clemency Project
BELLE PLAINE, Kan. (AP) — A civil rights group has launched “The Clemency Project” to try to secure the release of Kansas prisoners whose medical conditions make them vulnerable to the coronavirus. The American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas on Thursday filed the first round of what it anticipates will be dozens of individualized clemency petitions seeking relief for their clients from the parole board and governor. The petitions will be filed on a rolling basis. The move comes days after a Leavenworth judge threw out the group’s class action lawsuit seeking the release of seven inmates due to the pandemic.
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Inflammatory Disease Identified Among Young Missouri Patients in Kansas City, St. Louis
O'FALLON, Mo. (AP) — A rare inflammatory syndrome affecting some children with the coronavirus has appeared in a small number of cases at Missouri hospitals. A spokeswoman for St. Louis Children's Hospital said Wednesday that “a few” children with the coronavirus and symptoms similar to Kawasaki disease have been treated at the hospital. She didn't have information on the exact number, or other details. Children's Mercy Kansas City has treated one patient with the syndrome. The coronavirus is less common and less deadly in children than in adults. But two young children and a teenager with COVID-19 and symptoms of Kawasaki disease died in New York state.
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Kansas County Defends Data-Collection Rule Prompting Lawsuit
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — An eastern Kansas county is defending a policy that directs business owners to collect information about their customers. Attorneys for Linn County argued Thursday in a federal court filing that the rule is an effort to help trace the contacts of infected people during the the coronavirus pandemic. The county's attorneys said a May 1 order by the health director does not violate constitutional rights against unreasonable searches. The county's attorneys were responding to a federal lawsuit filed by a newspaper publisher and restaurant owner arguing that the requirement represents an improper warrantless search of their business records.
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Marshall Struggles to Unite GOP Establishment in Kansas Race
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Roger Marshall’s critics on the political right are working to hobble the western Kansas congressman’s bid for the U.S. Senate. Marshall is fighting in the final three months of a primary campaign to overcome conservative immigration hardliner Kris Kobach in a crowded field. Marshall is the alternative to Kobach that all but the hardest of hard-right Republicans are supposed to embrace to keep Kobach from winning he nomination and putting a normally safe seat into play in the fall. But Marshall hasn’t dissipated distrust some conservatives have harbored since he defeated tea party favorite Rep. Tim Huelskamp to win his seat in Congress in 2016.
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Manhattan Mayor Suspends Bid for Democratic Nod for US Senate
MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) — A northeast Kansas mayor has suspended her campaign for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate. Manhattan Mayor Usha Reddi said Thursday that responding to the coronavirus pandemic had become her most important work and would demand all of her focus for the foreseeable future. Reddi’s decision all but guarantees that state Sen. and Kansas City-area Dr. Barbara Bollier will be the Democratic nominee. Reddi raised less than $147,000 for her campaign through March, while Bollier raised nearly $3.5 million. Reddi has served on the Manhattan City Commission since 2013 and is serving a yearlong term as mayor.
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Agricultural Businesses in Kansas, Iowa Settle EPA Cases
LENEXA, Kan. (AP) — Federal regulators have reached settlements with two agricultural storage and supply businesses to resolve alleged violations of clean air regulations. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said in a news release Thursday that it inspected Midland Marketing Co-op Inc. and Troy Elevator Inc. in response to accidental releases of anhydrous ammonia that injured workers. Anhydrous ammonia is corrosive to the skin, eyes and lungs. Exposure may result in injury or death. Midland owns a facility in Palco, Kansas. Troy Elevator owns facilities in Bloomfield and Blakesburg, Iowa.
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Forecast: Kansas Farmers to Harvest Smaller Wheat Crop
MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) — Kansas farmers are expected to bring in a smaller winter wheat crop this year even though they will harvest about the same number of acres. The National Agricultural Statistics Service said Tuesday this year’s Kansas winter wheat crop is forecast at 306 million bushels, down 10% from a year ago. Average yield is forecast at 47 bushels per acre, down 5 bushels from last year. The agency said Kansas growers will cut wheat off 6.5 million acres, which is about 96% of the acres that they planted with wheat last fall.
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Top GOP Lawmakers Move to Take Control of Reopening Kansas
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Top Republican legislators have moved to take control of how Kansas reopens its coronavirus-battered economy from Democratic Governor Laura Kelly. On Wednesday, six GOP leaders rejected Kelly's request to have top lawmakers extend a disaster declaration she issued into mid-June. The Republicans instead extended the declaration only through May 25, Memorial Day. That would give the GOP-controlled Legislature a chance to pass a law governing the state’s coronavirus response. The full Legislature is scheduled to reconvene May 21 for a final day in session this year after beginning its spring break early on March 20 because of the pandemic.
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Kansas Lawmakers Look to Prevent Lawsuits over Coronavirus
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Republican lawmakers in Kansas are joining a larger national effort to shield doctors, hospitals and businesses from lawsuits stemming from the coronavirus. Business and medical groups are pushing them to act quickly, but the effort faces strong opposition from labor unions, trial lawyers and many Democrats. They fear measures will keep patients, consumers and employees from being able to turn to the courts to hold businesses and medical providers accountable for negligence or misconduct. Similar efforts are underway in Congress and other states, including Mississippi, North Carolina and Utah.
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Police Say Topeka High School Senior Killed in Shooting
TOPEKA, Kan. (WIBW-AM) — Topeka police say a high school student set to graduate this year has been shot to death. WIBW TV reports that 18-year-old Joheem Meredith was taken to a hospital Tuesday night with critical injuries. He later died from those injuries. Police say he had been shot in the parking lot of White Lakes Plaza Apartments. No arrests have been reported and police say detectives were still developing leads on a suspect. Meredith was a senior at Topeka West High School. His death was Topeka’s ninth homicide this year.
A GoFundMe account has been set up on behalf of the victim's mother. Organizers say donations will be used to help the family pay funeral and memorial expenses.
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2 Charged in Shooting that Injured 5-Year-Old Missouri Girl
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Prosecutors in Jackson County, Missouri, have charged two people in the shooting of a 5-year-old girl whose face was permanently damaged. Police said Wednesday that 36-year-old Andres Roldan and 41-year-old Teresa Ramirez-Martinez were charged in the March 31 shooting. The girl was in a car that was hit by several bullets from another vehicle. The girl's mother told police she had been in a dispute with the driver of the other vehicle. Ramirez-Martinez and Roldan were charged with aggravated assault and armed criminal action. Police said the girl will need several surgeries but is recovering well from the shooting.
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Kansas City Group Appointed to Study Continuing Violence
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas has appointed a group to study new ways the city can respond to continuing violence. The city council recently directed Lucas to form the Public Safety Study Group. The deaths of two men on Tuesday night were the city's 63rd and 64th homicides this year. Lucas noted Wednesday that many of the homicides have occurred during several weeks when the city was virtually shut down because of the coronavirus pandemic. The study group will examine such topics as local control of the police department, ideas for reducing homicides and gun violence and improving relations between police and the community.
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Haskell Indian Nations University Hires New President
LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence has hired a new president. The Lawrence Journal-World reports that Ronald Graham assumed the post this week. Graham is the former division dean of instruction at Victor Valley College in Victorville, California, and is a member of the Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma. The school has operated under interim presidents for more than a year after former Haskell University President Venida Chenault left the office to work on a special assignment just days after a federal report detailed allegations of misconduct at the university. Several months later, the school announced that Chenault had accepted another position and would not return as president.
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Attorneys General in 14 States to Trump: Let's Hold China Accountable for Coronavirus
Tallahassee, Fla. (AP) — Republican attorneys general in 14 states, including Kansas, are asking President Donald Trump to form a federal/state partnership to hold China accountable for the spread of coronavirus. The letter sent Wednesday calls for state and federal governments to seek legal remedies for the toll the virus has taken on economies and human life. The effort is being led by the Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody and South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson.
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County to Pay Wichita Woman $310,000 for 2017 Crash
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Sedgwick County will pay $310,000 to a Wichita woman injured when a county employee crashed into her in December 2017. The Wichita Eagle reports the settlement comes in a lawsuit filed by Matilda Pruitt after she suffered head, neck, back and other injuries in the crash. Pruitt sued Metropolitan Area Building and Construction Department employee Jarrod Truman and the county for negligence. Her lawsuit says she was stopped at a Wichita intersection waiting to turn when Truman crashed into the back of her vehicle. The impact pushed Pruitt's car into oncoming traffic, where she was hit by two other vehicles. Truman told police he was looking down on the floor of his vehicle when he hit Pruitt.
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Nebraska Man Driving ATV Dead After Colliding with Semi Driven by Dodge City Man
BEATRICE, Neb. (KWBE-AM) — A southeastern Nebraska man is dead following a crash involving his all-terrain vehicle and a semitrailer at a rural intersection in Pawnee County east of Beatrice. Beatrice radio station KWBE reports that the crash happened around 2:30 pm Tuesday, when an ATV driven by 85-year-old Chuck Thomas, of Liberty, on state Highway 8 turned at the intersection and hit the side of an eastbound semitrailer. Pawnee County Sheriff Braden Lang says Thomas died at the scene. The 33-year-old truck driver from Dodge City, Kansas, was not hurt.
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