Kansas Senate Committee Endorses GOP Tax Relief Proposal
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Republican legislators in Kansas have advanced a proposal aimed at preventing corporations and individuals from paying more state income taxes because of changes in federal tax laws. A GOP-controlled Senate committee endorsed a tax relief bill Thursday on a voice vote. The measure is the brainchild of Senate President Susan Wagle and has the backing of big businesses and business groups. The Senate is expected to debate the bill next week. Republican leaders have made tax relief a top priority. Changes in federal tax laws at the end of 2017 will have some Kansas residents and businesses paying more to the state and many GOP lawmakers say the state should return what they call a windfall. But Democratic Governor Laura Kelly has said lawmakers should avoid tax changes this year.
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Kelly Aide: Kansas GOP Tax Bill 'Irresponsible'
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Democratic Governor Laura Kelly's chief spokeswoman is calling a Republican tax relief bill "irresponsible." Kelly spokeswoman Ashley All said Thursday that the bill endorsed by a Senate committee would undo the state's progress toward getting its finances in order. But she stopped short of saying the governor would veto the measure if it passes. The committee advanced the bill on a voice vote Thursday. The full Senate expects to debate it next week. The measure is designed to prevent Kansas residents and businesses from paying more in income taxes to the state because of changes in federal tax laws at the end of 2017. Legislators in both parties acknowledged that they don't have a good idea of how much revenue the state will lose if the bill becomes law.
Kansas GOP's Fiscal Moves Would Thwart Democratic Governor
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Republican lawmakers in Kansas have advanced tax relief and pension proposals that would thwart Democratic Governor Laura Kelly's plans for boosting spending on public schools, quickly setting up a test of whether she can build bipartisan coalitions in the GOP-dominated Legislature. A Senate committee Thursday endorsed a bill designed to prevent Kansas residents and businesses from paying more income taxes to the state because of changes in federal tax laws at the end of 2017. Republican leaders have made eliminating the revenue "windfall" a top priority. The tax committee's voice vote came a day after the Senate budget committee backed a bill to make a $115 million payment before July to the state's pension system for teachers and government workers. It i's money the state shorted the pension system in 2016 — with added interest, but the measure runs counter to Kelly's budget plans. The Senate expects to debate both bills next week. Meanwhile, Kelly has called on legislators to pass a bill in February to phase in a $364 million increase in aid to public schools funding over four years in hopes of ending an education funding lawsuit filed in 2010. Projections this week from legislative researchers suggest that the state can't enact the Republicans' tax relief plan while also boosting education funding as much as Kelly wants without facing a small budget shortfall by 2022. Adding the pension payment to the mix would widen the gap. Kelly has little choice but to work with moderate Republicans to get her initiatives passed. But moderates will have to break with their conservative GOP leaders on tax relief, an issue that has broad appeal with the party's right-leaning base. The federal tax changes championed by President Donald Trump cut rates and are designed to stimulate the economy. But they included provisions that inadvertently raise extra revenue for Kansas because of how its income tax code is tied to the federal code. Kansas doesn't allow filers to claim itemized deductions on their state forms if they don't itemize on their federal returns. Changes in federal law discourage itemized deductions. Republican legislators also worry that the state will start taxing foreign income earned by individuals and corporations that it hasn't touched previously. The tax committee heard testimony that the coming change will hurt the state's business climate. The Kansas Department of Revenue estimates that the tax relief bill would cost the state — and save taxpayers — $192 million during the budget year beginning in July. But its officials acknowledge that it's been difficult to pin down the size of any windfall and the GOP tax bill's effects.
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4 Die in Kansas House Fire; Cause Under Investigation
OGDEN, Kan. (AP) — Four people have died in a fire near Manhattan in a former business that was renovated into living space. Riley County Fire Department Chief Pat Collins said the blaze started early Thursday in Ogden, which is about 5 miles (8 kilometers) southwest of the Manhattan Regional Airport. Crews found one person on the first floor of the building and three more upstairs. All four were pronounced dead at the scene. Collins said the fire started near the victim on the first floor. He said the damage was so extensive that the fire's cause might not be determined. The victims were not identified by late Thursday afternoon. Two firefighters were injured after falling on ice and a paramedic suffered smoke inhalation. Collins said the temperature was 5 degrees at the time, which quickly froze water and complicated the firefight.
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Kansas Official: Transfers, Double-Bunking Factors in Riots
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The new head of Kansas' prison system is telling legislators that more frequent inmate transfers and housing offenders two to a cell helped contribute to several riots during the past two years. Interim Corrections Secretary Roger Werholtz's assessment of the factors behind inmate disturbances led lawmakers to say Wednesday that they previously did not have the full picture of what happened. Werholtz has painted a picture of a prison system in crisis in briefings for lawmakers this week. He has suggested that understaffing is compromising safety and said several prisons sustained serious damage from riots in 2017 and 2018. The department's officials previously had acknowledged that some inmates were upset by being moved but rejected the idea that increasing the number housed two to a cell was a factor.
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Deep Freeze Expected to Ease, but Disruptions Persist
CHICAGO (AP) — The painfully cold weather system that put much of the Midwest into a historic deep freeze is expected to ease Thursday, though temperatures could still tumble to record lows in some places before the region begins to thaw out. Disruptions caused by the cold will persist, too, including power outages and canceled flights and trains. Before the worst of the cold begins to lift, the National Weather Service says Chicago could hit lows early Thursday that break the city's record of minus 27 set on Jan. 20, 1985. Temperatures should bounce back into the single digits later Thursday and into the comparative balmy 20s by Friday. More people are expected to return to work in Chicago, which resembled a ghost town Wednesday after most offices told employees to stay home.
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Schools Use Quirky Methods to Announce Weather Closures
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — Some school districts are bringing a little levity to this week's life-threatening cold in the Midwest with unorthodox school closure announcements. The deadly arctic blast has prompted hundreds of school closures. Most districts announced them in typical fashion, via a website or the local airwaves. But in Swartz Creek, Michigan, Superintendent Ben Mainka and Principal Jim Kitchen created a video in which they don sunglasses and sing their closure announcement to the classic tune of "Hallelujah." The Lee's Summit, Missouri, school district used Kansas City Royals baseball broadcaster Ryan Lefebvre to make their announcement. In South Dakota, a video of a talking hot dog announced the Wednesday closure of the Parker School District. Superintendent Donavan DeBoer says he has several more ideas, but he's hoping for no more snow days.
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Kansas Pharmacy to Pay $9.5 Million Settlement in Fraud Case
OVERLAND PARK, Kan. (AP) — A small pharmacy based in Overland Park will pay $9.5 million to settle a federal health care fraud lawsuit. The Kansas City Star reports $1.5 million of that will go to Emily Barnes, of Lenexa, who filed a whistleblower lawsuit against Stark Pharmacy in 2015. She alleged she saw several types of health care fraud, including changing prescriptions without a doctor's authorization and charging full price for prescriptions that weren't totally full. The federal government intervened in that lawsuit, which named Stark Pharmacy and its three pharmacists. Barnes' attorney, Graves Garrett, said Stark reached the settlement in December. The lawsuit said Stark's routinely automatically refilled prescriptions for a pain cream that had an average profit of $2,000 per prescription when billed to Medicaid, whether the patient wanted it or not.
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Lab Owner Told to Pay $544,000 for Environmental Violation
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — The owner of a defunct laboratory in Lenexa has been ordered to pay $544,287 for storing hazardous waste without a license. U.S. Attorney Stephen McAllister announced Tuesday that 63-year-old Ahmed El-Sherif was found guilty of storing the waste at Beta Chem Laboratory. Kansas health officials took control of the laboratory in 2013. Environmental Protection Agency agents found numerous containers of hazardous wastes and radiation contamination during a search in January 2014. During a bench trial, U.S. District Court Judge Julie Robinson found that Beta Chem was a defunct operation by 2012 and hazardous chemicals were being stored rather than performing decommissioning and decontamination at the facility. El-Sherif was found not guilty of obstructing a federal investigation. He will serve two years of probation.
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Kansas Measure Would End Election Chief's Power to Prosecute
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A proposal to strip the Kansas secretary of state's office of its power to prosecute voter fraud cases has cleared its first major hurdle in the Legislature. The bill endorsed Wednesday by a House committee would dismantle a key piece of former Secretary of State Kris Kobach's political legacy. The Corrections and Juvenile Justice Committee's unanimous voice vote sends the bill to the House for debate. Kobach received prosecution power in 2015 after arguing that his office needed the power to pursue cases on its own because local prosecutors often don't have time. He is an attorney but new Secretary of State Scott Schwab is not. Schwab and Attorney General Derek Schmidt backed the bill. Kobach left office earlier this month after losing the governor's race last year.
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Kansas Drops Kris Kobach's Appeal of Contempt Ruling
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The Kansas attorney general says the state has dropped former Secretary of State Kris Kobach's appeal of a contempt order arising from a lawsuit over a proof-of-citizenship law. Attorney General Derek Schmidt announced Tuesday that the state dropped the appeal after the American Civil Liberties Union accepted $20,000 for attorney fees and expenses. The Topeka Capital-Journal reports the state's obligation was $26,200 before the deal was reached. U.S. District Court Judge Julie Robinson found Kobach in contempt of court last year for failing to follow her instructions in ACLU's lawsuit challenging a statue requiring Kansans to show proof of citizenship when registering to vote. The settlement doesn't affect the state's appeal of Robinson's ruling that the proof-of-citizenship law is unconstitutional.
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Democrats Gain in Statehouses as Some GOP Lawmakers Defect
TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — Democrats continue to add to the gains they made in state legislatures during November's election thanks to defections from Republican lawmakers. Since then, a handful of Republicans in California, Kansas and New Jersey have switched their party affiliations to become Democrats. They cited various reasons, but the party-switchers have one thing in common: They say the GOP under President Donald Trump has become too extreme. One of the switchers, Kansas state Sen. Barbara Bollier, says: "The Republican Party, for all of its statements of having a big tent, continues to limit the tent." She adds: "Those of us who were moderates are clearly not welcome." The latest party-flip came this week in New Jersey, when state Sen. Dawn Marie Addiego left the GOP.
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Man Found with Dismembered Wife, 2 Kids Guilty of 3 Felonies
OLATHE, Kan. (AP) — A man arrested at a Kansas storage unit with two of his children and his dismembered wife's remains has been convicted of three felony counts of sexual exploitation of a child. Jurors deliberated until around 12:30 a.m. Thursday before finding 36-year-old Justin Rey guilty of the felonies, as well as misdemeanor counts of child endangerment and contributing to a child's misconduct. Rey said he cut up his wife, Jessica Monteiro Rey, after she died in October 2017 after giving birth at a Kansas City, Missouri, hotel. He was arrested with the couple's newborn and 2-year-old at a storage unit in nearby Lenexa, Kansas. Authorities say they found child porn images after Rey asked them to look at his phone for evidence he thought would help him at trial. Sentencing is set for March 27. Rey also is charged with abandonment of corpse in Missouri and with killing a California man. He isn't charged with killing his wife.
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Wichita Man Sentenced to About 51 Years for Child Sex Abuse
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A 35-year-old Wichita man who was already a registered sex offender has been sentenced to about 51 years in prison for sexually assaulting three children. Anthony Kramer was sentenced Tuesday for three counts of aggravated indecent liberties with a child and four counts of sexual exploitation of a child. The Sedgwick County District Attorney's Office says Kramer assaulted two boys and a girl ranging in age from 1 to 6 over two days in August of 2017. Kramer was a registered sex offender at the time. Detectives from the Exploited and Missing Child Unit also discovered sexually explicit images of other children on Kramer's cellphone dating back to April of 2016.
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Larned State Hospital Patient Convicted of Sexual Battery
LARNED, Kan. (AP) — A 65-year-old patient at the Larned State Hospital has been convicted of aggravated sexual battery involving a staff member at the hospital. Pawnee County Attorney Douglas McNett reports Russell McFarland was convicted Wednesday. Testimony during his trial indicated that in May 2018, he followed a 19-year-old female staff member into a staff-only area of the hospital, forced her into a corner and tried to kiss her. He was a patient in the hospital's sexual predator treatment program at the time. Another patient intervened and the staff member was able to get free. The Hays Post reports additional testimony showed other patients were aware McFarland was infatuated with the staff member and were watching out for her. McFarland was returned to the hospital pending sentencing, which is scheduled for March 18.
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Kansas Man Sentenced to 71 Years in Prison for Rape
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A 33-year-old Haysville man with a long record of criminal offenses has been sentenced to 71 years in prison for raping a 68-year-old woman. Garon Spencer was sentenced Wednesday for rape, aggravated criminal sodomy and aggravated sexual battery. Prosecutors say Spencer attacked the woman in her home on Nov. 10, 2017. The Sedgwick County District Attorney said in a news release that during sentencing, the judge noted Spencer's criminal history included a juvenile conviction of aggravated criminal sodomy, and adult charges of aggravated assault, criminal threat and misdemeanor sexual battery.
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Man Convicted in 2015 Dodge City Homicide
DODGE CITY, Kan. (AP) — A 31-year-old Dodge City man has been found guilty of first-degree murder in a 2015 shooting death. Julio Fraire was convicted Tuesday after a five-day trial. Prosecutors say 32-year-old Ramiro Nicolas Bernal was shot to death on July 25, 2015 in the parking lot of the Dodge City Daily Globe. Fraire was arrested and charged in October 2016. Besides the murder charge, Fraire also was convicted of criminal possession of a weapon by a felon. The newspaper's parking lot was being used as overflow parking for a concert Bernal attended. Prosecutors say Fraire shot Bernal six times before fleeing the scene. A sentencing date has not been scheduled.
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Panel: Chiefs Owe Nearly $1 Million in Back Taxes for Renovation
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) _ A state panel in Missouri has ruled that the Kansas City Chiefs owe $930,000 in back tax plus interest on the decade-old Arrowhead Stadium renovation. The Kansas City Star reports the NFL team argued that it didn't owe taxes on hundreds of items it bought to outfit the new stadium. But that argument was dismissed Tuesday in a ruling by the Administrative Hearing Commission. The Chiefs' lead attorney says the team will likely appeal. The case stems from a 2014 audit in which the Missouri Department of Revenue challenged sales tax exemptions on $23 million in purchases. The state auditor found that items such as leotards for cheerleaders and weight-lifting equipment didn't fall under the public purpose of fixing the stadium.
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