After the announcement last week by the FAA of furloughs for air traffic controllers and closures of air traffic control towers across the nation, U.S. Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) held a press conference Tuesday to discuss the issue. During the conference, Moran commented on the issue of the towers, but doesn’t see why it has come to this stage. “We have taken a significant effort to get some common sense into the Department of Transportation,” said Moran. “The closing of air traffic control towers and the furloughing of air traffic control tower controllers seems to me to make no sense. There is no…
Author: KMAN Staff
On Tuesday night two years of work from the Wildcat Creek Watershed Working Group came to the floor of the Manhattan city commission. City staff gave an initial briefing on the management plan which will be going forward in its final adjustments before possible adoption by city and county officials in July. The plan includes policy, and other preventative measures to help mitigate flood damage in the area. Some infrastructure changes have already been implemented such as three high tech gauges placed strategically across the watershed area that give experts a clear picture of water flows, and automated advanced…
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) The American Civil Liberties Union is demanding more information from a southwest Kansas school district about assemblies this week that featured a speaker from a creationist group. The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that the ACLU of Kansas and Western Missouri is requesting that the Hugoton district release emails between its staff and employees of the Oklahoma-based Creation Truth Foundation. The ACLU also wants copies of materials used at the assemblies and other documents. Hugoton Superintendent Mark Crawford said Tuesday that his district would fulfill the ACLU’s request. But he said the group tried to intimidate the district into…
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) A Kansas prosecutor says he’s planning to retry a capital murder suspect rather than ask the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate the man’s convictions for killing two women in Topeka. The Kansas Supreme Court overturned Phillip Cheatham Jr.’s convictions in January, finding that his lawyer did a poor job at his 2005 trial. The Topeka Capital-Journal reports Shawnee County District Attorney Chad Taylor announced Tuesday his conclusion that it would be “ill-advised” to appeal the state court’s ruling. Cheatham was sentenced to die for the 2003 shooting deaths of two women at a Topeka duplex. He was…
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) Cool spring temperatures in Kansas are squeezing drought-weary cattle producers even further by delaying the growth of pasture grasses and the first cutting of alfalfa fields. Steve Hessman, hay market reporter for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s office in Dodge City, says development of all forage grasses is running almost three weeks behind normal. That means the grass in pastures has not grown enough for ranchers to turn their cattle out to graze as usual. Some ranchers in western Kansas and eastern Colorado are running out of winter-stockpiled hay to feed their cattle and have begun selling…
LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) The Hall Family Foundation has donated $2.7 million to support research at the University of Kansas’ Hall Center of Humanities. The Kansas University Endowment Association announced the latest gift from the Hall family on Monday. It said the donation will fund a new distinguished professorship and create two new research fellowships at the center. The Lawrence Journal-World reports $500,000 of the donation will be used to attract a leading researcher to the new distinguished professorship. Another $1 million will create a postdoctoral fellowship for a researcher in digital humanities, and another $1 million will create a mid-career…
LEAVENWORTH, Kan. (AP) A Leavenworth woman whose conviction for involuntary manslaughter was overturned pleaded no contest to a lesser charge and was sentenced to time served. Monica F. Rivera, 31, spent 28 months in prison while appealing her conviction for involuntary manslaughter and endangering a child in the 2009 death of her 4-year-old son. The boy died of blunt force trauma while he was being cared for by Rivera’s boyfriend, Jason L. Jones. The Leavenworth Daily Times reports Rivera pleaded no contest Friday to aggravated endangering a child and was sentenced to time served. The Kansas Court of Appeals ordered…
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) A suspect in the death of an internationally known dog show handler and judge is being held on $1 million bond after making his first court appearance in the case. Darrell L. Broxton, 50, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Peter Belmont Jr, 69. Belmont was found dead at his Kansas City, Kan., home last December. The Kansas City Star reports Belmont was known internationally on the dog show circuit for his breeding of Afghan hounds under the kennel name of Elmo. He also taught art for years in Kansas City, Kan., schools.…
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) Wichita police say rain and speed contributed to an accident that left four emergency responders and a driver with minor injuries. Police say two firefighters and two paramedics were helping a driver up a hill after a car had gone into a ditch in front of Newman University late Monday. Police Lt. Mike Hennessey says the driver of a second car lost control at the same spot. The car spun around, hit a concrete wall and then hit the emergency crews and the first driver, knocking them all back down the hill. All five were taken to…
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) State officials and the son of a deceased investigator are awaiting a judge’s decision on whether the son can use his father’s files from the 1959 Kansas murders that inspired the book “In Cold Blood.” Tuesday morning’s hearing in Shawnee County District Court comes in a lawsuit by the Kansas attorney general’s office against Ronald Nye of Oklahoma City. Judge Larry Hendricks could rule on whether Nye can publish material from his father’s files. His father was a Kansas Bureau of Investigation agent who investigated the 1959 murders of the Clutter family in Holcomb. Richard Hickock and…