Per US Army Enterprise Alerts: 1st Division Road will be closed to traffic at the middle school from 8:
00 am to noon on July 16th in order to set the pedestrian bridge span across the road.
1st Division Road will be closed to thru traffic from Normandy Drive to Huebner Road. Please plan accordingly for alternate routes.
Traffic from Normandy Drive will be open to Thomas Ave.
Traffic from Huebner Road will be open to Bldg. 4010.
FORT RILEY, Kan. – A ceremony at 10 a.m. Friday at Fort Riley’s Cavalry Parade Field will honor the outgoing leaders of the 1st Infantry Division’s 2nd Armored Brigade Combat Team, welcome the “Dagger” brigade’s new
commander and senior noncommissioned officer and see the uncasing of the 2nd ABCT’s colors, officially signifying the brigade’s return home after a nine-month mission to Kuwait.
Col. Miles Brown, commander of the Dagger brigade, and Command Sgt. Maj. Larry Orvis Jr., the brigade’s senior noncommissioned officer, will transfer command of the brigade to Col. Dave Garner and Command Sgt. Maj. Craig A. Copridge at the ceremony.
Brown took command of the 2nd ABCT in June 2014. His next assignment is as
the chief of staff for the 4th Infantry Division at Fort Carson, Colorado.
Orvis became the 2nd ABCT’s senior noncommissioned officer in November 2014.
His next assignment is at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.
Garner’s previous assignment was at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where he
served on the faculty of the School of Advanced Military Studies. This is
his first assignment within the 1st Inf. Div. Copridge’s previous assignment
was as the senior noncommissioned officer for 6th Squadron, 8th Cavalry
Regiment, 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, at Fort
Stewart, Georgia.
While deployed, the Dagger brigade assumed responsibility of the theater
security cooperation and partnership mission within the Central Command area
of responsibility. Through bilateral exercises and training exchanges,
Dagger Soldiers displayed commitment in increasing partner capacity while
fostering professional and personal relationships in the region to reaffirm
support for long-term sustainment of security and stability in the region.
The brigade’s Soldiers began returning to Fort Riley in June.
Medical professions from across Kansas will be in attendance on Friday for the Delivering Change Geary County & Riley County Perinatal Education Conference. It is scheduled from 7:45 a.m. to 3 p.m. atthe Courtyard by Marriott Convention Center.
The schedule includes speakers on subjects ranging from preterm birth to father matters and human trafficking: know the signs and how to assist.
Delivering Change: Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies is a regional collaborative established in Geary County in 2011 to address health issues of infants and women of child-bearing age in order to reduce infant mortality and morbidity in Geary County. In 2015 the Riley County Perinatal coalition joined Geary County in becoming a Delivering Change Community.
Story by Monty Thompson
Fort Riley bid farewell to garrison commander Col. Andrew Cole Jr. and welcomed incoming commander Col. John Lawrence at a change of command ceremony at Riley’s Conference Center Wednesday morning.
Cole became the commander in July of 2013 and will be leaving Fort Riley to become the chief of staff of the Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning, Georgia.
“In order to be a great leader in the United State Army you’ve got to be a good person first, and I would tell you that Andrew Cole is a good person,” said Fort Riley commanding general Wayne Grigsby. “He set the example here for three years, and he really made Fort Riley and the 1st Infantry Division the best place to train, live, deploy from, and come come home to.”
Lawrence is taking command following an assignment as the garrison commander at Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan.
MARION COUNTY –A bald eagle treated for injuries in Marion County has died.
On Tuesday, a concerned citizen called county Game Warden Cody Morris about the bird that looked injured, according to a social media report.
It was spotted along a creek just North of Marion.
Warden Morris recovered the bird and transported it to the rehabilitation center at Milford Reservoir but it did not survive, according to Pat Silovsky with the Milford Nature Center.
“The bird was having a lot of seizures and that is usually an indication of lead poisoning. We will know for sure when test results are back by the end of the week,” she said.
There is lead all over from broken fishing lines, from firearms and large predatory birds are susceptible to this problem, according to Silovsky.
Update:
There was storm damage in Riley County during the Wednesday morning thunderstorm.
The Riley County Emergency Management Office confirmed there was a lot of tree damage in the town of Riley.
They also reported that a tree also went through the roof of a house in University Park. That area is located about half-way between Randolph and Manhattan.
There was some street flooding in Manhattan on Anderson Avenue and North Manhattan Avenue due to the storm. No injuries were reported.
The winds were calculated in the 40 to 45 mph range in Geary County with the severe thunderstorm that passed through Wednesday morning.
The National Weather Service has reported that 70 mph winds occurred five miles northwest of Wakefield and on the east side of Manhattan. Authorities also reported tree limb damage and power outages in the town of Riley, and 60 mph winds at Randolph.
The storm swept through the region moving at about 50-55 mph.
No major damage has been reported in Geary County.
Retention and recruitment of subsitute teachers in Geary USD 475 continues to be an issue.
As part of the strategic plan objectives and goals, one of the goals reads: Promote and practice shared responsibility among stakeholders for achieving district goals.
Brian Field, Board member, said, “It has to be a community effort,” when it comes to bringing new employees and keeping them in the district. “People have to want to live here, stay here – there has to be that quality of life.”
Superintendent Dr. Corbin Witt and the other Board members in attendance agreed with Field.
A Witt said that at this time, he and the Executive Director of Human Resources for the District, Bridget Seeman, are looking for other innovative ways to meet the need of recruiting and retention rather than hiring a new person/creating a new position.
Witt said his comments were in lieu of the $340,000 financial loss to the school district this year.
The Board members, whom were overwhelmingly leary of hiring a new person under a Recruitment and Retention Coordinator position, agreed.
Witt said that he still supports the idea to hire a new person to satisfy that need in the district but it willing to shelve the issue for another year.
“If we’re still struggling [with it] a year from now, we can revisit the idea,” said Witt.
As of March, William Clark, Chief Operations Officer of Business and Operations, said that new military families to the area are given a list of the available positions in the District.
One concern of the Board was that teachers would be forced to once again be burdened by the lack of subsitutes available.
Witt said that interestingly, “millenials” (aged 20 to 30) value self-exploration, travel, free time with family and friends much more than “baby boomers” did.
The mindset of “baby boomers” according to Witt, was that in your 20s and 30s it was about settling and becoming financially stable and solidified; but millenials spend much more time in self-exploration.
Witt said that understanding that concept helped him to understand that younger teachers are going to utilize their subsitutues much more than teachers from the “baby boomer” era did when they were young.
So rather than limiting teachers’ ability to take time off, the issue still remains on how to increase the number of subsitutes in the District.
The Special Board of Education Meeting on Tuesday, July 12th began at 4:00 pm with much conversation on the proposed five year strategic plan for the school district.
Dr. Corbin Witt, Superintendent, shared the five year “Strategic Objectives and Organization Goals”.
“The more consistency you have, the better; i
t allows us to focus more,” said Witt.
Witt expressed that the plan would be a collaborative set of goals for both the District and the Board.
The plan, which focus on six main categories with supplemental goals supporting each, was bookmarked for discussion at the Tuesday evening meeting. Witt suggested having time to review it and plan a motion for the next meeting.
The categories in the goals include:
A culture vs. climate battle ensued at the meeting, when trying to agree on the goals and the message being sent across the district.
“We hire staff that fit the culture of the district,” said Witt in response to the objection of the use of the word culture in the goal: Create an engaging and welcoming school district culture where our diverse students, stafff, parents, and cimmunity members feel valued, respected and included.
Witt went on to further state that [they] didn’t want to hire people who would potentially change the culture.
Tom Brungardt, Board member, objected to that stating, “New people can mold a culture…if you hire people to fit the culture there is no growth.”
Brungardt went on to say that creating a culture is like manipulating peope to make them feel like they’re comfortable; but climate is something that can’t be created.”
The specifics on the word usage in this goal and others were also bookmarked for the next meeting.
The Junction City Police Department has reported the arrest of Christopher A. Anderson, 35, Indianapolis, Indiana on I-70 in eastern Geary County.
The JCPD said Anderson was arrested on suspicion of Possession of Cocaine with Intent, No Drug Tax Stamp, Possession of Drug Paraphernalia, Driving While Suspended and Signal Violation.
The arrest occurred at 4:38 p.m. Monday. The site is about 11 miles east of Junction City.