Author: Brandon Peoples

Retired Manhattan Area Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Lyle Butler has been tapped by Governor Laura Kelly to chair the state’s economic recovery team. In a release from the governor’s office Wednesday, Butler was announced as the governor’s choice along with Cheryl Harrison-Lee who will serve as executive director. Kelly said Butler is a “proven coalition builder who will be a strong contributor as we move forward in the recovery from COVID-19.” The governor went on to say the state will need Butler’s expertise as the state moves into the recovery phase of the pandemic. Butler was President of…

No injuries were reported after a house fire in Leonardville Wednesday. Riley County Fire Chief Pat Collins says firefighters were called out to 216 South Erpelding shortly before noon, for a small fire in the home’s living room. Collins says it was started after the resident dropped a cigarette onto an oxygen tank. Firefighters were on scene within about five minutes and extinguished the fire before it could spread further. The home sustained minimal damage, estimated around $1,000 and the resident. The homeowner is listed as Jeri Hollar. About 13 firefighters from Riley County, Leonardville, Riley and Keats responded to…

Some local veterans have submitted open letters to the Riley County Commission demanding the meetings be streamed online. The letters were made public Wednesday by Manhattan Alliance for Peace and Justice. (They are attached below.) The group of active and retired veterans argue that due to the ongoing health crisis, activity conducted during the two weekly meetings is being done in secret, heightened by the fact that the county commission also acts as the Board of Health, in charge of the health department and essentially public health policy. They argue the meetings are poorly publicized, never televised and held during…

Boomtown will be silenced on the 4th of July. The Wamego City Commission unanimously adopted a motion Tuesday to postpone the annual freedom celebration, carnival, parade and fireworks show, which typically draws in over 50,000 people. A makeup date has not been determined. A chief concern was the uncertainty of when Kansas and county health officials will be able to lift the ban on large group gatherings. Phase 4 of Governor Laura Kelly’s reopening is set to begin around June 15, but would only raise the limit on public gatherings to 90 people. Nothing has been stated beyond late June…

One of the larger retail operations in Manhattan will reopen Wednesday. Manhattan Town Center shifted its hours in mid-March only to shut down when stay-at-home orders went into place. Marketing Manager Jeff Sutton says reopening will happen with a cautious approach. “We’re taking a definitely good, phased approach which we’re currently working on,” he told News Radio KMAN Tuesday morning, when the mall was still working out final details of its reopening plans. The mall will be open 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday beginning Wednesday. Sunday hours will be noon to 6 p.m. Hand sanitizer stations have…

No new cases of coronavirus were presented in Riley County Monday as two more people were moved from active to recovered. In total, 23 of the 55 positive testing patients are active and 32 people have recovered. Perhaps the most significant statistic of the day Monday, was 43 test results coming back negative. The Riley County Health Department now has 28 pending test results and 523 negative tests. The newest to test positive were a 38-year-old male, a 28-year-old male and a 41-year-old female, all who tested positive over the weekend. Ascension Via Christi currently has one positive patient and…

From the Little Apple to the Big Apple, a local doctor answered the call recently to help fill a need on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic. Dr. Steve Short left his practice at Inspire ENT & Pulmonology for two weeks in April to join a team of specialists at Woodhull Hospital in Brooklyn. From the time he arrived, Short says he saw the unthinkable. “It was just constant code blue, people were dying left and right. The hardest part was seeing how many people died and how many died without any way to make it different. We had…

Photo courtesy Kansas Highway PatrolThe Flint Hills region experienced some of its first tastes of severe weather Monday. Storms packed quite a punch, knocking down power lines along parts of I-70 from the Manhattan to Wamego exits, closing down that chunk of interstate for several hours as motorists had to find alternate routes through the state. K-177 also saw some downed power lines south of Manhattan. Evergy reported some of the repairs likely would not be completed until Tuesday. One lane of traffic was reopened late Monday. Both lanes are now completely open. Elsewhere, street flooding was an issue in…

A body emergency crews pulled from from the water at Tuttle Creek ORV Park Saturday night has been identified as 21-year-old Jose Francisco Ramos of Fort Riley. The Riley County Police Department emergency dispatch center received a call around 2 p.m. after Ramos went missing from a group of kayakers. Around 9:30 p.m. a body was recovered, believed to be the missing man. RCPD, the Kansas Highway Patrol, the Pottawatomie County Water Rescue Team, the Manhattan Fire Department, Riley County Rural Fire District, Kansas Wildlife and Parks and the Army Corps of Engineers Rangers responded to the scene.

Five new cases of coronavirus were reported over the weekend in Riley and Pottawatomie County. Two of them were in Riley County. The health department is reporting 25 active cases among the 55 total coronavirus patients that have tested positive since mid-March. Updated numbers will be presented to the Riley County Commission on Monday. Pottawatomie County saw three more cases over the weekend and currently has seven active cases and 15 total positives. Geary County had four active cases and 11 total confirmed cases as of Saturday. The Kansas Department of Health and Environment reported Sunday 13 total cases. Positive…