TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback wants to hear what the public thinks about how schools are funded.

Brownback told WIBW-AM  that the old system had “a lot of problems,” and it’s time to talk about a new one. He said Tuesday that his office plans to announce a system for collecting public feedback in the next couple of weeks. He says people should also discuss the issue with Legislative candidates.

Last year, the state’s per-pupil funding formula was junked in favor of predictable grants to districts that allowed lawmakers to better control state spending. The plan is to replace the grants with a new funding system.

An ongoing legal fight clouds the discussions. The state Supreme Court could rule by the year’s end on whether lawmakers are underfunding schools.

ROXANA HEGEMAN, Associated Press

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A Topeka man faces sentencing for his role in a wannabe Islamic State jihadist’s foiled plan to detonate a bomb at the Fort Riley military post to kill and maim as many U.S. service members as possible.

Alexander Blair has told the judge he made a big mistake and blames a genetic disorder for allowing others to take advantage of him.

U.S. District Judge Daniel Crabtree will weigh such factors Wednesday as he calculates how much prison time, if any, the 29-year-old Blair should serve.

Blair pleaded guilty in May to a conspiracy count that carries up to five years’ imprisonment. He admitted loaning John T. Booker $100, knowing it would be used to pay for storage of a bomb Booker planned to detonate in April 2015 at Fort Riley.

Update:

Junction City Police notified JC Post at 10:05 p.m. Tuesday that the missing juvenile, a 7-year old girl, has been located. They informed us she is fine.

——

The Junction City Police Department was searching Tuesday evening for a missing 7-year old juvenile, Christel Sambrana.

She was last seen at 8:30 p.m. wearing blue jeans and a white t-shirt north of the Riverbend entrance on Grant Avenue. She has shoulder length light brown hair.

The Junction City Police Department has ended the search for 59-year old Kathy Marie Jackson of Junction City. She had been reported missing after last being heard from by a family member on August 19.

The JCPD confirms Jackson was located by the Topeka Police Department Tuesday evening and the Topeka PD  reported that she is fine. Authorities in Topeka are still investigating the case, but the search for Jackson has been brought to a close.

The issue of controlling or eradicating the blue green algae problem at Milford Lake was the focus of a meeting this week in Wakefield. Approximately 25 people attended the session, including area community members and officials with the Kansas Department of Health & Environment.

State Representative Lonnie Clark said there’s no solution at this point, but there was dialogue about possible solutions ranging from allum drops to vegetation rafts. “All of them take money, which we know the state doesn’t have, so that was one of the big deterrents. There was a lot of discussion about trying to control the nutrients from runoff from the agricultural land into the river basin that feeds the lake.”

An end result was to push KDHE to take action, but specifically what action was not determined.

 

 

 

Update:

At 7:25 a.m. Tuesday, the Manhattan Fire Department was dispatched to the Dairy Queen located at 3116 Anderson for a report of smoke in the building.  Upon arrival, crews found a one-story restaurant building with moderate smoke and a fire located in the rear of the structure.  The fire reached a second alarm before it was contained within approximately 20 minutes.  At the height of the fire, 6 fire apparatus and 22 firefighters responded, with units still on scene at the time of the release.  One westbound lane of Anderson Avenue was closed for approximately one hour and crews are still on scene working at the time of this release.

The building is a one-story fast food restaurant that was closed at the time of incident.  The building suffered extensive smoke damage and the restaurant will be closed for an unknown amount of time.  The owner of the building is listed as the Elaine D Harder Trust of Junction City, Kansas. 

Fire investigators are still working on determining the exact cause, but believe that the fire is accidental originating near the storage and laundry facilities. The loss to the structure is estimated at $200,000 and another $200,000 for the contents including equipment, supplies, and food.

—–

At 7:25 a.m. Tuesday, the Manhattan Fire Department was dispatched to the Dairy Queen located at 3116 Anderson for a report of smoke in the building.  Upon arrival, crews found a one-story restaurant building with moderate smoke and a fire located in the rear of the structure.  The fire reached a second alarm before it was contained within approximately 20 minutes.  At the height of the fire, 6 fire apparatus and 22 firefighters responded, with units still on scene at the time of the release.  One westbound lane of Anderson Avenue was closed for approximately one hour.

The building is a one-story fast food restaurant that was closed at the time of incident.  The building suffered extensive smoke damage and the restaurant will be closed for an unknown amount of time.  The owner of the building is listed as the Elaine D Harder Trust of Junction City, Kansas.  The fire cause is under investigation at this time.

Patrick Birch, Fort Riley Anti-Terrorism Officer, was a guest on the Tuesday morning show ‘JC Now’ on 1420 AM – The Talk of JC.

Birch said that the US Army designated August as Anti-Terrorism Awareness month, and explained the goals of bringing awareness in the month of August.

“We’re trying to increase the community’s knowledge about how to report suspicious activity, the importance of maintaining vigilance when you’re at home or traveling and basically throughout your day to day activities; it’s all about trying to help us prevent any type of act of terrorism,” said Birch.

Birch said that if you see activity that isn’t consistent with what you’d normally see in that area, then you should report that to authorities – no matter how insignificant it may seem.

“One of the examples I use is, say if you’re out in a public space and you see people walk in to a food court area and they don’t get anything to eat, they don’t get anything to drink, they just kind of sit off by themselves and are not really engaged with what you would normally expect to see going on in that area – that’s something we’d want to see,” said Birch. “The other things we like to have folks pay attention to is how technology may be used; for example, everybody has a camera on their phone, so if you’re sitting down as you’re eating your face may down looking at your camera, or phone…so if that camera is tilted upward and that person has not been engaged in activity, they might actually be taking photographs or video of what might be going on in that area because they intend to target that area.”

The important thing, according to Birch, is to be aware of your surroundings and if you happen to “spot an odd” moment or activity to report it.

Birch said that when they receive information on suspicious activity, they sometimes work with state and federal agencies to ensure the public’s safety.

“We can take a look at it, and if it’s something that belongs or we need to share with them, we can do that and that helps increase that security bubble,” said Birch.

Fort Riley has an iWATCH system that falls along the lines of the Department of Security’s ‘See Something, Say Something’ Campaign which acts as a neighborhood watch where people can feel safe reporting suspicious activity.

More information on that system can be accessed here.

Birch says that reporting anything that seems out of the ordinary is essential to staying safe; “Most people think these things are very insignificant when they could be very significant.”

Good news from the Monday Geary County Commission meeting – the approval of a bond refinancing of the Martha K. Hoover Women’s Health Center area of Geary Community Hospital.

JC Post received the information from County Commission Chair Florence Whitebread.

“We made the final approval on the refinancing on the one bond issue on the hospital’s Women’s Center and so forth, it was a 6 million and some odd dollar bond issue and we refinanced at net cash savings of $605,263 so I felt really good about that,” said Whitebread.

Whitebread added that the savings will be spread out over approximately three years for Geary Community Hospital.

“That’s a considerable savings for them,” said Whitebread.