Basketball: Allen teams lose to Independence See B1
THE IOLA REGISTER Tuesday, February 4, 2014
CREWS ANSWER THE CALL
Free screenings available for women By STEVEN SCHWARTZ The Iola Register
Local women can receive free breast and cervical cancer screenings at Iola’s Community Health Center, 1408 East St. The Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas is the newest facet of a regional program meant to offer preventative care and education to women who can’t afford it. Kelly York, regional outreach coordinator for the Early
Rachel Bowers works to clean the sidewalks in front of the Allen County Courthouse Tuesday morning. REGISTER/STEVEN SCHWARTZ
We need these women to come out of the woodwork.
Winter storm rolls into Allen County By BOB JOHNSON The Iola Register
Busting through a snow drift with a V-shaped plow on the front of a heavy dump truck is fun — for a while. “It gets old pretty fast,” said Bill King, director of Public Works for Allen County. “Tedium sets.” County and Iola crews were expected to be in the midst of keeping streets and roads open today, although snow that fell overnight was short of expectations. Advantage was that crews who anticipated being called out in the middle of the night were able to sleep later. “It would be better if we could wait until the snow stops, but that isn’t an option,” King said, allowing residents who want to get around wouldn’t understand. “When there’s snow, people don’t want to wait.” Dan Leslie, Streets and Alleys superintendent for Iola, has some of the same feelings. “We’d prefer to clear streets at night, when there
aren’t cars parked on the square and there isn’t any traffic,” he said. The county has six graders dedicated to rock roads and four trucks for hard-surfaced roads. Two smaller trucks are reserved for subdivisions and to make certain access is maintained to Allen County Regional Hospital in general, and its emergency room in particular. Iola and the county share responsibility to plow North Kentucky and Oregon Road, direct access routes to the hospital. HIGH TRAFFIC areas are the priority in and out of town. State Street, Madison Avenue and the downtown area are first on Leslie’s agenda. In-town thoroughfares — Lincoln, Jefferson, Washington, Broadway, Garfield, Cottonwood and Miller — also are high on the list, as well as streets near the schools. King doesn’t play favorites with snow-removal, other than concentrating on keeping heavily travSee STORM | Page A3
— Kelly York, Early Detection Works, on women who qualify for free breast and cervical screenings.
Detection Works program in Pittsburg, said the CHC has recently completed the training to offer breast and cervical cancer screenings to women 40 to 63 who do not have insurance and meet the program’s “very liberal” income guidelines. A single woman qualifies for the free screenings if she makes $23,925 or less. If she is from a household of four, annual income tops out at $48,375 to receive the free services. York said about 221 women in Allen County qualify for the screenings. “We need to get these women to come out of the woodwork,” she said. See SCREENINGS | Page A3
Sebelius pushes health exchange By ALEX SMITH KCUR
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius was here today urging the uninsured to enroll for coverage on the federal health exchange. She acknowledged the troubled start of the federal marketplace website, healthcare. gov, but said significant improvements have been made. She described a “surge” of enrollment since the end of November, after the website was fixed. “People, if they had an early experience, should come back to the site because we’re enrolling thousands of people every day,” Sebelius said. The former Kansas gover-
nor held a press conference at the Full Employment Council near 18th and Vine. She touted the benefits of the health exchange for both the uninsured and for the metro area. About 250,000 people in the Kansas City metro area lack health insurance and are eligible to enroll for coverage through the new insurance marketplace, she said. And about 80 percent of them would qualify for subsidies to help pay for insurance. She said people could enroll using a 24/7 phone hotline; by mail; or in-person with a local navigator, certified application counselor, agent or broker. The latest numbers from the Centers for Medicare and Medicare show that 7,475 peo-
Quote of the day Vol. 116, No. 69
Kansas City, Mo., Mayor Sly James and U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. ple in Kansas and 33,138 people in Missouri had enrolled in insurance plans on the exchange as of Dec. 28, 2013. Sebelius introduced to the crowd local business owner Lynn Gardner Hinkle, who had recently enrolled for in-
surance. Hinkle said she had twice undergone surgery to treat melanoma and had been ineligible for private insurance before the Affordable Care Act barred insurance companies from excluding from coverage those with pre-
“Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.” — Will Rogers 75 Cents
existing medical conditions. “I am basically so happy to shout from the rooftops, ‘If you are not insured, get on the website!’” Hinkle said. Sebelius was introduced by See SEBELIUS | Page A3
Hi: 29 Lo: 16 Iola, KS