(AP) — Police have recovered a stolen FedEx delivery truck after a low-speed pursuit that wound through Kansas City, Mo., and ended just over the state line in Prairie Village, Kan.

The truck was stolen around 8:45 a.m. Wednesday outside a Kansas City gas station, where the FedEx driver had left the keys inside while paying for fuel.

Police began pursuing the truck in eastern Kansas City at mid-afternoon. News helicopters followed the chase as police stayed well behind the truck, whose driver frequently signaled to change lanes or turn corners.

An officer with a gun drawn opened the truck’s door at an intersection, but the vehicle hopped a curb and drove off.

Officers finally disabled the truck wit

 (AP) – Missouri senators have passed legislation offering up to $1.7 billion of incentives over two decades for Boeing to assemble a commercial airplane in St. Louis.

Senators passed the bill 23-8 Wednesday while meeting in a special session called by Gov. Jay Nixon. It now goes to the House.

Missouri is one of more than a dozen locations invited by Boeing to bid on assembling the new 777X airplane.

Most other states are crafting their proposals privately. But Nixon called a special session because he wanted to offer more incentives than currently allowed under state law.

Under Missouri’s plan, the amount of incentives Boeing gets would depend on the number of jobs created.

Supporters say the Boeing project includes 2,000 to 8,000 company jobs, plus thousands of more at its suppliers.

AP) — Police say an accused peeping Tom faces a misdemeanor charge after a topless woman chased him through a northeast Kansas department store.

The 35-year-old Jeremy F. Bradley, 35, of Raytown, was charged Tuesday in Lenexa Municipal Court with breach of privacy. His home phone number is disconnected.

Police say the woman was trying on bras Monday afternoon in the dressing room of a Kohl’s store when she saw a hand holding a cell phone under the partition. Master Police Officer Dan Friesen says the woman “definitely got the attention of other shoppers” when she ran after the man.

Although the man made it out of the store, Lenexa police were able to arrest a suspect several blocks away. Friesen says witnesses later identified him.

(AP) A medical examiner has determined the death of a Missouri man in an Arrowhead Stadium parking lot during a Kansas City Chiefs game was a homicide.

The Jackson County medical examiner announced his ruling Wednesday.

Police spokesman Darin Snapp says detectives have been treating the case as a homicide from the beginning, so the investigation won’t change.

Van Winkle had gone to Sunday’s game in a vehicle similar to the Jeep in which he was found by the owner. Police say he was involved in a fight, but it’s not clear whether that contributed to his death.

(AP) – The University of Missouri has a new chancellor for its flagship campus in Columbia.

University system President Tim Wolfe plans to announce the new hire at a Thursday morning news conference. The campus leader will replace Brady Deaton, who retired in November after nine years as chancellor.

The university hired an executive search firm to help recruit candidates for the confidential search. An 18-member advisory committee representing faculty, staff, alumni and students interviewed an unspecified number of finalists.

(AP) – Clay County authorities say a woman has been charged in the stabbing death of a Smithville man in 1990.

Authorities announced Tuesday that Annette Davis of Kansas City was charged with second-degree murder in the slaying of 70-year-old Clifford McClanahan. She is being held on $500,000 bond.

McClanahan was found dead in his Smithville home in August 1990.

Sheriff Paul Vescovo, who originally investigated McClanahan’s death, reopened the case in January. Investigators said handprints on McClanahan’s bathroom sink were matched to Davis. Vescovo says Davis was never a suspect in the death until that evidence was found.

Court documents say Davis told detectives McClanahan caught her smoking crack and slapped her, and she stabbed him and ran out of the house. It wasn’t immediately clear if Davis has an attorney.

Four Kansas City-area school districts are partnering on a wellness clinic with the goal of making treatment more accessible to their employees while reducing worker absenteeism and health insurance costs.

The wellness center is at the Blue Springs School District’s Paul J. Consiglio Education Center

The other partner districts are Grain Valley, Lone Jack and Smithville. Combined enrollment of the four districts is about 20,500 students with Blue Springs accounting for about two-thirds.

The clinic is open six days a week, including some evening hours. It is free for most district employees. Walk-ins are welcomed and non-covered dependents are treated for a $40 fee.

Officials said the center has had more than 3,000 visits since it opened the third week of August. The staff includes two doctors and five nurse practitioners.

“I’d like to think we’re a readily accessible point of care for our patients,” said Dr. Douglas Kelling, the medical director and an experienced emergency room physician. “We like to get them seen quickly. We like to get folks back to work quickly.”

Most cases, he said, involved conditions such as sinus infections, bronchitis, the flu, and seasonal allergies. But the center also can treat minor emergencies, Kelling said, though serious cases are sent to a hospital emergency room.

In one of the center’s earliest cases, he said, staff told a diabetic with a seriously ulcerated foot that he needed immediate care. Doctors would have needed to amputate the foot had the patient waited any longer, Kelling said.

“Convenient care”

The center is a “convenient care” facility designed to avoid the waits patients might experience at their own doctors’ offices, said Shawn Roderick, director of employee benefits for the Blue Springs School District, but it is not intended to replace the workers’ relationships with their primary care doctors.

It will take at least six months to see if the cost-saving projections for the districts are realized, he said.

But here is an example of the multiple benefits, district officials anticipate:

A teacher brings her sick child to the center first thing in the morning, gets right in, and walks out ready to pick up a prescription at the pharmacy.

The teacher gets to her classroom by mid-morning unburdened by worries about her child. The health plan, meanwhile, has avoided a potentially costly claim by treating a sinus infection before it developed into pneumonia, which in turn might cause the teacher an extended absence from work.

The starting point for the collaboration among the school districts, Roderick said, was their participation in a self-insurance pool established by the Cooperating School Districts of Greater Kansas City, a 30-district co-op.

As a way to gain greater control of health-care costs, self-insured organizations take on some of the functions of a health insurance company, including tasks such as collecting premiums and paying claims.

Self-insured groups typically assume greater risk because they lack the financial resources of a large insurance company and are less able to handle expensive claim or costly years with a lot of demands for service.

Roderick said the wellness center was part of the innovation spurred by federal health care reform.

“You have to find ways to not just play on the margins anymore,” he said. “You have to really get some real savings and mitigate real costs and this is one of the ways we thought we could do that.”

The wellness center could be cost effective, Roderick said, in part because Blue Springs already owns the building. The health plan spent about $95,000 in startup costs for the clinic.
“I’m sure I would not have been able to get into to see my (regular) doctor until tomorrow,” she said.

Don Tatman is a Leawood-based health care consultant who works with self-insured school districts in Missouri.

He said the wellness center was a “cutting edge move” that stood apart from the efforts of other districts he has worked with.

“I have seen a lot of school districts kind of burying their head in the sand over health care reform and doing nothing,” Tatman said. “You Four Kansas City-area school districts are partnering on a wellness clinic with the goal of making treatment more accessible to their employees while reducing worker absenteeism and health insurance costs.

The wellness center is at the Blue Springs School District’s Paul J. Consiglio Education Center, 1501 N.W. Jefferson St.

The other partner districts are Grain Valley, Lone Jack and Smithville. Combined enrollment of the four districts is about 20,500 students with Blue Springs accounting for about two-thirds.

The clinic is open six days a week, including some evening hours. It is free for most district employees. Walk-ins are welcomed and non-covered dependents are treated for a $40 fee.

Officials said the center has had more than 3,000 visits since it opened the third week of August. The staff includes two doctors and five nurse practitioners.

“I’d like to think we’re a readily accessible point of care for our patients,” said Dr. Douglas Kelling, the medical director and an experienced emergency room physician. “We like to get them seen quickly. We like to get folks back to work quickly.”

Most cases, he said, involved conditions such as sinus infections, bronchitis, the flu, and seasonal allergies. But the center also can treat minor emergencies, Kelling said, though serious cases are sent to a hospital emergency room.

In one of the center’s earliest cases, he said, staff told a diabetic with a seriously ulcerated foot that he needed immediate care. Doctors would have needed to amputate the foot had the patient waited any longer, Kelling said.

The center is a “convenient care” facility designed to avoid the waits patients might experience at their own doctors’ offices, said Shawn Roderick, director of employee benefits for the Blue Springs School District, but it is not intended to replace the workers’ relationships with their primary care doctors.

It will take at least six months to see if the cost-saving projections for the districts are realized, he said.

But here is an example of the multiple benefits, district officials anticipate:

A teacher brings her sick child to the center first thing in the morning, gets right in, and walks out ready to pick up a prescription at the pharmacy.

The teacher gets to her classroom by mid-morning unburdened by worries about her child. The health plan, meanwhile, has avoided a potentially costly claim by treating a sinus infection before it developed into pneumonia, which in turn might cause the teacher an extended absence from work.

The starting point for the collaboration among the school districts, Roderick said, was their participation in a self-insurance pool established by the Cooperating School Districts of Greater Kansas City, a 30-district co-op.

As a way to gain greater control of health-care costs, self-insured organizations take on some of the functions of a health insurance company, including tasks such as collecting premiums and paying claims.

Self-insured groups typically assume greater risk because they lack the financial resources of a large insurance company and are less able to handle expensive claim or costly years with a lot of demands for service.

Roderick said the wellness center was part of the innovation spurred by federal health care reform.

“You have to find ways to not just play on the margins anymore,” he said. “You have to really get some real savings and mitigate real costs and this is one of the ways we thought we could do that.”

The wellness center could be cost effective, Roderick said, in part because Blue Springs already owns the building. The health plan spent about $95,000 in startup costs for the clinic.

Usage has been strong so far, he said, noting it will take about 500 visits per month to justify the center’s costs.

Monday morning before Thanksgiving, Heather Sallee was at the clinic to get treated for a cold.

A third-grade teacher in the Blue Springs district, Sallee said she set up her classroom at about 8:30 a.m., ran over to the clinic, and expected to be back at school no later than 10:30 a.m.

Justifying the cost

Usage has been strong so far, he said, noting it will take about 500 visits per month to justify the center’s costs.

Monday morning before Thanksgiving, Heather Sallee was at the clinic to get treated for a cold.

A third-grade teacher in the Blue Springs district, Sallee said she set up her classroom at about 8:30 a.m., ran over to the clinic, and expected to be back at school no later than 10:30 a.m.

“I’m sure I would not have been able to get into to see my (regular) doctor until tomorrow,” she said.

Don Tatman is a Leawood-based health care consultant who works with self-insured school districts in Missouri.

He said the wellness center was a “cutting edge move” that stood apart from the efforts of other districts he has worked with.

“I have seen a lot of school districts kind of burying their head in the sand over health care reform and doing nothing,” Tatman said. “You see a lot of struggle to comply.  – Mike Sherry, KHI NEWS

(AP) – A Missouri House interim education committee is recommending changes to student transfers, more funding for early childhood education and increased learning time for students.

The panel held 11 public meetings throughout the state this fall and released its report Tuesday to the House speaker.

One of its major topics was Missouri’s law allowing students in unaccredited districts to transfer to neighboring districts.

The committee recommended setting a fixed rate of tuition that schools receiving transfer students could charge. It also suggested prescribing the scope of receiving districts’ control over the numbers and conditions of transfers they accept.

The panel also recommended that the Legislature look at providing more money for early childhood education, and longer school days for students, especially those who struggle academically or attend troubled districts.

(AP) — Federal health regulators are warning the public not to use certain defibrillators recalled by Philips Healthcare because the heart-shocking devices may fail to operate in emergency situations.

Philips recalled three models of its HeartStart devices in September due to an electrical malfunction. The recall affects about 700,000 defibrillators sold between 2005 and 2012.

The defibrillators are used by emergency responders and others to restore normal heart function in people suffering a heart attack. The FDA says the electrical problem with the devices could cause them to fail to deliver a life-saving shock.

Customers who have received the devices can contact Philips to receive a new replacement at 1-800-263-3342.

(AP) A pedestrian trying to cross Interstate 35 in Kansas City during the evening rush hour was struck and killed by a metro bus.

Police and the Kansas City Area Transportation Authority say the accident happened just after 5 p.m. Tuesday on northbound Interstate 35, near the spot where the highway splits with Interstate 29.

Authorities have not identified the pedestrian. The bus was heading from downtown Kansas City to Liberty. No one aboard was hurt.