TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A recent audit of Kansas’ rural telephone service program has found that it is generally well-run and efficient, but it also suggests that lawmakers consider the types of services taxpayers are now subsidizing.
The Lawrence Journal-World reports that the audit was conducted of the Kansas Universal Service Fund which was established in 1995. The audit notes that taxpayers currently subsidize broadband data and other unregulated services.
Sen. Marci Francisco, a Lawrence Democrat, says broadband service today can include services similar to cable TV delivered through a phone line.
The Kansas Legislature’s Telecommunications Study Committee hired the private firm QSI Consulting Inc. to conduct the audit, and make recommendations to lawmakers.
STEWARTSVILLE- One person was injured in an accident just before 11 a.m. on Friday in DeKalb County.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported a 1989 Dodge pickup driven by George D. Danger, 72, Alden, IA., was traveling on U.S. 36, one mile east of Stewartsville. The vehicle traveled off the south side of the road and struck a ditch.
Danger was transported to Mosaic Life Care in St. Joseph.
The MSHP reported he was not wearing a seat belt.
KANSAS CITY (AP) – New data shows teachers in Missouri’s poorest and most rural schools are less experienced and earn lower salaries than elsewhere in the state.
The data is part of a draft report that Missouri is submitting to the U.S. Education Department amid a federal push to ensure that the least experienced people aren’t disproportionately teaching the neediest students.
Assistant commissioner Paul Katnik says the state’s next step is to work with educators and administrators in the field to analyze the data and come up with strategies for addressing the situation.
He says the challenge is recruiting teachers to the places where they are most needed and retaining them.
The Education Department is asking states to develop plans to make sure every student has an effective teacher.
COLUMBIA- A Missouri man died in an accident just after 11:30 a.m. on Friday in Boone County.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported Gregory A. Anderson, 29, Columbia, walked into the southbound lanes of U.S. 63 at Highway 763.
A 2003 Dodge Caravan driven by Royalin S. Carlson, 33, Moberly, hit him.
Anderson was pronounced dead at the scene and transported to the Boone County Medical Examiner’s office. Carlson was not injured.
The accident remains under investigation.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) – Charitable groups in Kansas City, Missouri, are being asked not to feed the homeless near parks or schools, over concerns that doing so could violate a state law restricting where sex offenders are allowed to be.
The Kansas City Star reports that police discovered a homeless camp in November on the city’s West Side. City spokesman Chris Hernandez says five registered sex offenders were living in a wooded area within 500 feet of a park and 1,000 feet of two elementary schools. State law aimed at protecting children prohibits sex offenders in those areas.
Police found that food was being delivered within the restricted area. State law that addresses the issue of knowingly aiding a sex offender means that those who provide the meals could be cited.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri is the first state in more than five years to have a statewide average gas price of below $2 a gallon, and Oklahoma was expected to get there by the weekend.
AAA spokesman Michael Green says the national average price of gas is $2.32 per gallon, the lowest since May 2009. Missouri’s average fell below $2 per gallon Friday morning and stood at $1.98 midday.
Green says Oklahoma’s average Friday morning was $2.01, while Kansas had the third-lowest average at $2.06.
Green called the steady decline in gas prices unlike anything AAA has previously tracked. He says the national average has dropped for 92 days in a row — the longest streak on record.
He says gas prices could go down another 5 to 10 cents by year’s end.
Scott Lakin, director of the Mid-America Regional Coalition’s Regional Health Care Initiative.-photo by Alex Smith
By MIKE SHERRY, Heartland Health Monitor
During the past eight years, the philanthropic community has spent about $8 million on a wide-ranging program aimed at improving health services for low-income individuals in the Kansas City area.
The REACH Healthcare Foundation and the Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City (HCF) have provided nearly three quarters of the total funding. But now, the collaboration and the various efforts it has spawned are taking on a more targeted approach heading into 2015.
“We are really looking at this as an opportunity to let those projects and ideas take shape on their own,” said HCF’s chief executive, Dr. Bridget McCandless. “We welcome them to come back to us to kind of do Chapter 2 of this work.”
The upshot, according to officials with both organizations, is that the foundations will entertain funding requests for specific projects through the program and direct dollars to particular areas of interest. Those include efforts to secure subsidized health coverage for area residents under the Affordable Care Act.
The Mid-America Regional Council (MARC) administers the program, which has a variety of committees operating under an umbrella known as the Regional Health Care Initiative.
For MARC, the revamped funding structure means it will enter the New Year without enough funds to retain the program director, Scott Lakin, or to fill a vacant health planner position.
Besides the Safety Net Collaborative, a body that brings together top executives of the various providers, work groups cover topics that include oral and behavioral health.
The program also includes a project that helps safety-net clinics connect their electronic medical records systems to computer networks. Known as health information exchanges (HIE), they allow for the safe and secure sharing of patient data.
REACH is particularly interested in continuing to fund that project as well as work through the mental health group, said REACH spokeswoman Pattie Mansur. She also said REACH has earmarked $45,000 next year to update a regional health data report.
“We are not walking away from MARC or from regional health improvement,” Mansur said.
According to figures provided by HCF, the two regional health foundations have spent $2.4 million combined since 2006 on core operating expenses for the regional health initiative. The money covered administrative expenses and other support for the committees, including paying for conferences and forums put on by the groups.
The foundations have also spent about $2.9 million to help safety-net clinics provide evening and weekend hours for patients.
At MARC, the regional health initiative falls under the organization’s Community Development division, which is headed by Marlene Nagel.
MARC was not surprised by the foundations’ change in funding strategy, she said.
The change in focus accords with an evaluation of the health care commission that the two foundations released earlier this year.
“We have been working toward this for a while and recognized that we needed to be more project-focused in our work,” Nagel said. “Not only is a lot of work underway, but the community has benefited from the work that has been accomplished.”
She said MARC is working to identify areas where it can incorporate portions of the regional health initiative into other parts of the organization, such as work involving homelessness and early childhood education.
The co-chair of the mental health stakeholders group, Susan Crain Lewis, said the prospect of less administrative support from MARC will have definite repercussions.
“Can we still function? Can we still do good stuff? Yes,” said Lewis, who is CEO of Mental Health America of the Heartland in Kansas City, Kan. “Will it be harder? Will it take longer? Probably.”
On the positive side, Lewis said, the foundations’ change in funding strategy has caused the group to narrow its focus to high-priority areas, including helping to establish a mental health crisis-stabilization center in Kansas City, Mo.
Note: Heartland Health Monitor is funded in part by the Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City.
Mike Sherry is a reporter for Heartland Health Monitor, a news collaboration focusing on health issues and their impact in Missouri and Kansas.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith will miss Sunday’s game against the San Diego Chargers because of a lacerated spleen. Chase Daniel will start in his place.
Team trainer Rick Burkholder said Friday that Smith was likely hurt on a hit during the third quarter of last weekend’s loss to the Steelers, but the quarterback didn’t have significant symptoms.
The lacerated spleen was diagnosed by a scan Thursday when Smith continued to experience mild discomfort after practicing all week. He will not need surgery and a full recovery is expected.
If the Chargers beat Kansas City, they make the playoffs. The Chiefs would need to win and have Baltimore and Houston lose to earn a postseason berth.
FERGUSON, Mo. (AP) — A makeshift memorial to Michael Brown has been restored by his supporters, after it was apparently hit by a car.
Social media reports about damage to the memorial started early Friday. Supporters were out before dawn rebuilding the memorial.
It is not known who struck the memorial, which went up Aug. 9, soon after the black 18-year-old was shot and killed by a white police officer. The shooting spurred massive protests, as did a grand jury decision not to file charges against the officer.
This week, a white police officer in nearby Berkeley, Missouri, killed a black 18-year-old who police said pointed a gun at him.
A small group of demonstrators staged a brief die-in Friday at Lambert-St Louis International Airport. An airport spokesman says it didn’t cause any disruptions.
Georgia Walker photo-Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A woman is planning to defy the Roman Catholic Church and become a priest — the first to do so in Kansas City, Missouri.
The Kansas City Star reports that 67-year-old Georgia Walker knows that once she takes the step, she will be excommunicated from the church, but it doesn’t faze her because she doesn’t accept the legitimacy of the excommunication.
The church in turn will not accept her ordination, scheduled for Jan. 3. Under canon law, only men can be priests.
Walker is part of a movement called the Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests. Instead of leaving the church, they hope to change it from within. There are nearly 200 women priests, all but about 50 of them in the U.S.
