TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas school efficiency commission has recommended studying ways that districts can share administrative operations.

The study recommended Friday by the K-12 Student Performance and Efficiency Commission comes as the issue of consolidation has become an issue in the governor’s race. Gov. Brownback has accused Democratic gubernatorial candidate Paul Davis of nominating a pro-consolidation appointee to the commission. Davis and appointee John Vratil insist that’s not true.

In recommending the study, commissioners took off the table a proposal to realign district geographical boundaries. The commissioners also decided that offering districts incentives to combine or cooperate would be part of the study.

Commissioners also recommended that an efficiency audit be performed on the Kansas Department of Education and the creation of a taskforce to establish efficiency standards for school district operations.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – This week, the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report detailing ongoing problems with the security of the Obamacare website – HealthCare.gov. More than a year since its launch, GAO raises concerns that HealthCare.gov users continue to face a serious risk of having their personal information – including Social Security numbers, income and employment records, and tax returns stored by the system – stolen by fraudsters and identity thieves. U.S. Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kan.), Ranking Member of the Senate Appropriations Health Subcommittee, shares GAO’s concerns and believes the Administration has consistently kept Congress and the public in the dark about the serious security concerns with the Obamacare website.

“This GAO report makes it clear that, more than a year later, the Administration refuses to provide a true account of how the website is performing and whether it is safe for Americans to use,” Sen. Moran said. “Given the Administration’s history of misrepresentations regarding the readiness of the Obamacare exchanges, I am extremely concerned about the security of Americans’ personal information. I am a sponsor of two commonsense bills to increase transparency surrounding Obamacare’s implementation and help address the serious privacy and data security concerns associated with the law. This is not about politics, this is about personal security and privacy.”

 The GAO report finds that the federal enrollment website still has not undergone rigorous end-to-end testing to check for vulnerabilities. Additionally, it accuses the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Service (CMS) of accepting significant security risks when it allowed the website to launch on Oct. 1, 2013. This report came on the heels of a hack of HealthCare.gov in July 2014 in which malicious software was installed within the website’s network and went undetected for more than a month.

According to GAO’s review:

 “CMS has not fully addressed security and privacy management weaknesses, including having incomplete security plans and privacy documentation, conducting incomplete security tests, and not establishing an alternate processing site to avoid major service disruptions. In addition, we identified weaknesses in the technical controls protecting the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the data maintained in the [federally facilitated marketplace]. … Until these weaknesses are addressed, increased and unnecessary risks remain of unauthorized access, disclosure, or modification of the information collected and maintained by HealthCare.gov and related systems or the disruption of service provided by the systems.”

In January 2014, Sen. Moran sponsored two bills to protect American individuals and families from the consequences of Obamacare’s implementation. The Exchange Information Disclosure Act (S. 1590) requires the Obama Administration to disclose detailed information about the performance of the Obamacare health insurance Exchange website, HealthCare.gov. The other bill, the Health Exchange Security and Transparency Act (S. 1902), would increase the Administration’s responsibility for safeguarding personal information of Exchange users in response to growing security concerns about the website. The House of Representatives passed its own version of both bills with broad, bipartisan support, yet the Senate Majority Leader has yet to bring the bills up for a vote in the Senate.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Court documents show a 30-year-old Kansas man accused of fatally shooting a Topeka police officer earlier this month told investigators he had used methamphetamine two hours before the incident.

Ross Preston Lane is charged with capital murder in the Sept. 7 shooting death of 40-year-old police Cpl. Jason Harwood during a routine traffic stop in Topeka.

According to affidavits filed Sept. 8 and obtained Friday through an open-records request, Lane told a passenger in the car that he didn’t want to go back to prison, before pulling a gun from between the front seats and shooting Harwood.

Lane was taken into custody several hours later after calling a Topeka television station and saying he wanted to give up. He is being held without bond.

KANSAS CITY (AP) – A Kansas man who investigators say made comments about a bomb at Kansas City International Airport is facing federal charges.

The U.S. Attorney’s office says 33-year-old David James Cain, of Kansas City, Kansas, was indicted Friday by a federal grand jury in Kansas City, Missouri.

The incident prompted evacuation of a main airport terminal while arriving flights were rerouted to another terminal the evening of Aug. 31.

Cain is charged with one count each of making a bomb hoax and conveying false information. Prosecutors said he told two people at an airline ticket counter there was a bomb in a truck he had parked in front of the terminal.

Cain does not have a listed phone number. Court records did not show an attorney for him Friday.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Statewide data presented to a Kansas commission studying school efficiency shows districts are hanging onto more cash.

Several members of the K-12 Student Performance and Efficiency Commission expressed concerns Friday about a $152 million increase in unspent balances from 2008 to 2014. But there weren’t enough votes to request a study of how money is carried over for use in future years.

Commission member Mike O’Neal noted that a 2011 state law was designed to make it easier to transfer unspent money into a fund where it can be spent on general expenses such as salaries. But data shows the size of those transfers dropped from $18.1 million in the 2011-12 school year to $6.3 million this year.

School officials say funding uncertainty is one reason for saving money.