The victim in a shooting incident early Thursday morning at 235 East 12th Street in Junction City has been identified by police.

Police Detective Lieutenant Jeff Childs identified the shooting victim as a Fort Riley soldier, Landis Johnson, 25.  Johnson was transported to Stormont Vail Hospital in Topeka after he was located in the 200 block of East 14th Steet early Thursday.  Childs reported that Johnson was stable after surgery, and that Johnson had been shot multiple times in the incident.

A 32-year old Junction City man, Connell A. Davis, was arrested in the case on suspicion of Attempted First Degree Murder, Aggravated Battery and Aggravated Burglary.

Childs confirmed the shooting stemmed from a domestic issue.

 

The head of the Republic of Palau is visiting Junction City.

On the reason for his  visit President Tommy Remengesau noted that many people from Palau, which is an island country in the western Pacific Ocean, serve in the U.S. military. He said a sizeable number of them are stationed at Fort Riley. He also has a nephew, who is a former military member, that resides in Junction City with his family.

Remengesau plans to conduct a meet-and-greet with residents of his country from this area including Kansas City and neighboring areas of the United States on Friday evening at 6 p.m. at the Geary County 4-H / Senior Center. They will have an opportunity to address their issues. He is also seeking re-election this fall. “There will be a meet-and-greet and an opportunity for them to ask questions.”

Preceding that, the President noted that there will be a Palaun feast featuring such ocean foods as sashimi ( raw fish ), fried fish,  and fish burgers.

Remengesau confirmed he hopes to do some touring of Fort Riley during his visit. As far as his first impression of Junction City is concerned, “It’s very green, it’s very environmentally clean, people here are  friendly.”

Palau has served as president in this term since 2013. Prior to that he served in that role for eightyears, before stepping down for a period of time due to constitutional limitations. He was then re-elected in 2013 and is now seeking re-election to another four-year term.

Remengesau said the population of Palau totals about 20,000 people, which support a population of approximately 117,000 tourists from other countries each year. “People come because of the pristine waters that we have, so scuba diving is really a main attraction there.” Palau includes about 300 islands, and has an exclusive economic zone area of ocean that covers approximately 600,000 square kilometers.

Remengesau arrived in Junction City with a Secret Service and Kansas Highway Patrol escort. He was greeted by Junction City officials including Mayor Mick McCallister, Junction City Commissioner Phyllis Fitzgerald, City Manager Allen Dinkel, and Interim Police Chief Dan Breci, as well as family members. He was in the United States at an event in New York City, and his stopover in Junction City comes on his way home to Palau.

 

 

 

A contingent of Vietnam veterans were welcomed home at Fort Riley on Wednesday.

Some of the veterans wiped away tears as they received a thank you and recognition for their service.

Major General Wayne Grigsby Jr., commanding general of the 1st Infantry Division and Fort Riley, told the veterans the burdens they bore in Vietnam were being honored during the ceremony, “fully knowing they were not embraced as they should have been when they came home. ”

Grigsby said the failure of the nation to care for the Vietnam veterans did not keep them from caring for one another and all the veterans, and their buddies. “Vietnam veterans have gone above and beyond to make sure that our current generation of soldiers, sailors, marines and coast guardsmen do not have the same experience they did.”

Grigsby told the audience that the soldiers being honored showed their devotion to this nation in Vietnam.

One of the veterans, Jackie McDonald, Junction City, said he appreciated the respect that was shown. “It made me feel like I did something for my country. I just want to thank the American people for giving me this opportunity, exposing this to me, and making me a veteran….feel like a real veteran now.”

McDonald served in the infantry during his time in Vietnam. He also saw duty in Cambodia, Laos and with special forces near the DMZ. “I just thank God I’m back here in one piece and happy to be here.”

Wiley Morris Sr., Junction City noted the ceremony brought back a lot of memories of what he has been through. He said it was a good ceremony. “It was, it was really good, I enjoyed it.”  Morris served in the Marines during World War II and in the Army in Korea and Vietnam.

Vietnam veteran John Seitz, Junction City, said it’s nice to see the veterans receive the recognition for their service, and General Grigsby did a great job of doing that. “And we should all be grateful that somebody still cares.” Seitz served in the artillery in the 1st Infantry Division during one tour in Vietnam.

The soldiers marched into a hangar at Marshall Army Airfield with patriotic music playing and to the cheers of family, friends, and current soldiers at Fort Riley. It was the second welcome home ceremony for Vietnam Veterans at the post in recent months. The first one was held last November.

 

The Junction City Area Chamber of Commerce Military Affairs Council and the Manhattan Ara Chamber of Commerce Military Relations Council put together a joint effort in hosting the 2016 Victory Week Breakfast for the 1st Infantry Division’s Victory Week celebrations on June 8 at Riley’s Conference Center.

This year’s guest speaker, Command Sergeant Major Joseph Cornelison spoke on the importance of the Non-Commissioned Officers and more specifically the role of the Sergeant

Major.

“The NCO core of the US Army gives our army flexibility and strength that no other army has,” said Cornelison.

Cornelison says that currently there are 480,000 soldiers in the US Army and less than 6,000 are at the E9 level of Sergeant Major.

“As a Command Sergeant Major [you] are charged with discipline, health, welfare off all [your] enlisted [soldiers].”

Cornelison shared his own personal experiences as CSM in the 1st Infantry Division and that with a strong NCO core in every level is essential in a strong army.

“Victory week is the birthday week of our great 1st Infantry Division – 99 years old – and we have a storied history  over the last 99 years of our Non-Commissioned Officer core inside the Big Red One, contributing to the victories that this Division has attained. It’s just a great legacy/history and it’s a pleasure and honor to be at the top of the NCO core in this division, especially during this historic week.”

 

 

 

 

TOPEKA, KAN. – Bernard “Chris” Schroeder has been a firefighter in Junction City for 20 years. He has been a player of Kansas Lottery games even longer than that. “I’ve been buying lottery tickets since right after high school,” said the 47-year-old. “My wife and I like to stop in the morning and pick up a few instant scratch tickets. Then I scratch mine over my lunch hour.”

Although he has won some $200 prizes, it’s Schroeder’s wife who has really been lucky. “I’m here today claiming a $10,000 prize on one of my wife’s $2 10X The Cash tickets. That’s the only game she plays,” said Schroeder. “She had to work today, so she asked me to come to Topeka to claim the prize.”

Schroder said he was happy to make the trip, especially since some of the prize money will be spent on another trip he and his wife have planned for later this summer. “We’re going to Las Vegas!” said Schroeder. In the meantime, Schroeder said he and his wife will continue to play Kansas Lottery instant scratch tickets every day. The Schroeders always purchase their tickets at Handy’s Express, located at 1734 W. Ash Street in Junction City.

State Representative Lonnie Clark says he’s glad to hear that Governor Sam Brownback has decided to call a special session of the Kansas Legislature.

The session will deal with education funding issues.

Clark stated he had been on the telephone Tuesday with some of his colleagues trying to prepare forms to demand a special session. “I think this is probably one of the most rational, intelligent things that the Governor has done in awhile. I’m glad to see it.”

Clark said from what he’s heard there will be a lot of the Republican leadership colleagues on that side ( very conservative side ) that will take different positions on school funding, now that they’ve seen the feelings of the constitutents of their districts. “I think you’ll see a different vote coming from the very conservative Republican side, at least that’s my hope.”

The Governor said he would call a special session but hasn’t set a date. In a statement Brownback said he is calling the session to “keep Kansas schools open” in response to a state Supreme Court order last month.

The court rejected some changes in school finance laws made by Republican lawmakers earlier this year to improve funding for poor districts.

The justices said poor schools still wouldn’t get their fair share of the state’s more than $4 billion in annual aid to its 286 districts.

The court has warned that schools won’t be able to open after June 30 if lawmakers don’t approve further fixes.

The Board of Education met on Monday night at the Mary E. Devin Center with a stacked agenda and the hopes to carry out the district mission: Preparing today’s students for tomorrow’s world.

Much of the first half of the meeting was spent approving existing budgets/contracts that will carry over in to the 2016-2017 school year.

Early Childhood Education Princiapl Stephanie Bogenhangen and Junction City High School Principal Melissa Sharp dialogued with the Board about their day to day and past school year strengths and weaknesses in their respective schools.

An emotional Sharp says that one thing the high school needed were “targeted at-risk strategic plans/interventions for students.”

Sharp and Bogenhangen both agreed on a shared a passison for the children.

High School Athletic Director Matt Westerhaus propsed an idea that could affect students in our community that don’t attend schools in the school district.

USD 475 Junction City High School has cooperative agreements with schools in various sports to allow athletes from different schools to compete under the JCHS umbrella.

The proposal was to include a fee for the students who chose not to attend schools in the district yet compete in sports with the high school.

Board members ultimately didn’t like the idea of charging a fee to community members – specifically, the students at Saint Xavier Catholic School.

“The Board of Education – what they want to do is the right thing; this is a very solid Board [that] thinks through things,” said USD 475 Superintendent Dr. Corbin Witt.

Witt did say that with each student that doesn’t attend our schools, the district ends up paying those costs.

“It all adds up because as [you all] know we are not getting extra money from the state – the state has flat-funded us for several years in a row, so there are alot of things we can do that continue to drain our funds so we’re looking at all different aspects,” said Witt.

For every athlete in a sport, the district gets a “kickback” sum that isn’t accounted for with students whom are not enrolled in district schools.

One area working in a very postive direction for the district is the energy conservation initiative.

In a partnership with Cenergistic, the school district netted $274,016 in an overall reduction in energy consumption of 18.2%.  Seventy-six percent of the energy usage in the district is electric and with the partnership with Cenergistic there were total avoided costs of over $440,000.

Amongst the big issues, the Board took an assesment of the subsitute teacher shortage and heard ways to counteract the problem.

With the current shortage teachers are often covering for each other and the subsitutes that are present are sometimes in the building on break – not working, although they’re being paid for a full days work.

Bridget Seeman, Executive Director of Human Resources at USD 475, proposed hiring a person specifically for recruiting and retention with an assistant/secretary as well.

USD 475 Superintendent, Dr. Corbin Witt agreed:  “If we’re doing things to shoot ourselves in the foot we need to address those and try to rectify those. If a substitute is there for one day and they have an 80 minute planning period and we have a teacher that has to be gone during that 80 minutes it makes much more sense to put that subsitute in that space than pull another teacher out of the classroom.”

In the comments from the public portion of the meeting, Robert Foreman addressed the Board on the grading scale that exists in the middle schools.

Foreman argued that the current scale that doesn’t allow below a 50% failing grade no matter the situation isn’t giving students a realistic idea of the way the high school, college and the workforce works.

Dr. Witt argued that the scale is reasonable.

“There’s that hope,” Witt began, “If you miss one assignment you don’t want to say well this class I’m going to flunk, or I’m not going to be able to make it because I missed one assignment – there’s gotta be that hope.”

And that’s exactly what the meeting adjourned with – “hope”.

With the dark cloud of the Kansas Supreme Court hanging over everyone’s brain the sentiment was definetely optimistic for the new school year and that the correct measures would take place before June 30th in order to keep USD 475 in tact. 

Amongst the talk of possible school closures in the Kansas Legislature and Supreme Court, there is another issue that is quietly garnering some attention of its own.

Transgender students in public schools across the country celebrated after President Obama’s  mandate forcing schools and public venues across the country to allow transgende
red persons the right to use the [restroom] facilities of their gender identity rather than their gender at birth, even if it is contrary to their current anatomy.

States quickly began to show their displeasure with the law and disregarded the President’s action for the LBGTQ community. North Carolina, Mississippi and Texas are amongst the eleven states suing the federal government.

How does this affect Kansans?

Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt announced last week the intent to legally challenge the U.S. Departments of Justice and Education on the directive.

Schmidt has not yet decided to challenge the directive with the eleven other states that have filed suit, or to file separately.

Scmidt says, “In our federal system of government, not every decision needs to be handed down from Washington, and this is a matter best left to state or local authorities, including school boards, as it traditionally has been – and as the law requires.”

In a media release from Governor Sam Brownback shortly after the Obama administration’s order, he said the following:  “The recent guidance letter sent from President Obama’s administration is an unprecedented example of executive over-reach.  This attempt to federalize local school board decisions by threatening legal action or denial of federal funding is wrong.”

Brownback goes on to say that “states, not the federal government have the primary responsibility for directing education policy.

What is the policy in our community?

Dr. Corbin Witt, Superintendent for USD 475 said, “We’re prepared to follow whatever guidelines are out there, right now we just try to meet the needs of every student and what their needs are and we have transgender students in our district and right now we have enough restroom facilities that they can use whatever restroom they feel comfortable [with].”

“Comfortable” is the operative word here. For the many who view the LGBTQ causes as near and dear to their heart, there are just as many whom do not feel comfortable with being exposed to, having their children exposed to or plainly put – sharing a restroom with someone whom is anatomically not their same gender.

Witt says that issues like these have not arisen yet in the district, but the goal is to make everyone feel comfortable.

“What we try to do is have enough individual restrooms to try to meet the needs of [the students] and giving them the ability to go to the individual restroom if they need to.  We really haven’t had any issues at the high school level with sports and locker rooms,” says Witt.

If an issue were to arise in our district, with the threat of school closures looming overhead Witt says there isn’t much that can be done.

“Whatever guidelines come out is what we will have to follow because in our district if they threaten to take away federal funding [it would be very bad], especially in our district with Fort Riley that is a large part of our funding so we do have to follow federal mandates and we’ll find a way to make it work,” says Witt.

With President Obama’s “executive overreach” as Brownback puts it, there is the potential for some backlash in Kansas. If the state chooses to ignore the order and leave this sensitive decision up to the “local school boards” there is a possibility of Kansas feeling a financial pinch by protestors.

In states like North Carolina, revenues by way of concerts, and performances and special events have been cancelled due to the state’s views on transgender restroom rights.

Could this happen to Kansas if the state chooses not to follow suit?

 

In late May senators voted 30-8 for a non-binding resolution condemning the federal mandate.

Should states be forced to follow the mandate? Do we need gender neutral restrooms in USD 475 schools?

What side of the debate are you on?

 

 

 

Contact me: dee.mcdougald@eagleradio.net

 

The Chapman FFA Chapter is organizing clean up efforts for local farmers after an EF4 tornado caused major damage in the rural area near that city.

FFA volunteers are encouraged to meet on Wednesday, June 8 at 8:30 a.m. in the Chapman district gym parking lot.

Farmers around Chapman are preparing for harvest, but the culmination of a year’s worth of work can only happen if debris in fields is gone. Volunteers are encouraged to wear hard soled shoes, gloves, jeans, sunscreen and bug spray. With help from local producers and the Chapman FFA Alumni Chapter, volunteers will walk the fields to do the cleanup.

A call for all volunteers willbe posted on the Chapman High School FFA Facebook page on Tuesday June 7 if room is available for more volunteers. If interested in helping potential volunteers shuld check that page for frequent updates.

 

Members of the public and pilots from across the country turned out in strong numbers for the sixth annual National Biplane Fly-in at Freeman Field in Junction City.

One of the coordinators Marvin Hornbostel, felt the Fly-In went well, and may have been the best one in the six-year history of this event in Junction City.

Speaking on Saturday Hornbostel said, “Biplanes have come in good. We had probably 50 or 60 early this morning.” He also estimated another 50 to 60 monoplanes were flown in for the event as well. ” I think we’ve done real good. The support from the local community here has just been fabulous.”

There were opportunities for plane rides, a chance to view the planes on the tarmac and visit with the pilots, enjoy breakfast or lunch, and purchase merchandise. There were also carriage rides.

( Gallery pictures courtesy of Nita Miller )