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The Weekender Saturday, March 29, 2014
USD 257 proposes bond issue By KAYLA BANZET The Iola Register
At a special board meeting Thursday night the USD 257 board members proposed a bond issue for $35 million, including approximately $10 million for renovations to the high school and middle school and a suggested new pre-K through sixth grade facility on a new property. Currently sixth grade is the middle school.
The motion was made by board member Mark Burris and seconded by Don Snavely. The motion passed five to two with Darrel Catron and Doug Dunlap voting against. For months board members have carefully evaluated the plans of building a new facility in the district. The high school being the oldest building in the district was a top priority for some members but the price of two buildings was a problem.
“We need to live within our means,” school board president Tony Leavitt said. Scott Stanley, director of operations, and Kirk Horner, an architect with Hollis and Miller, Overland Park, were asked to give rough estimates of what it would take to keep the high school running for a few more years. “We’re chewing up all our money instead of using it where our students need it,” Stanley said. “I know it’s a
huge undertaking, but it’s going to give you the ability to progress in schools.” A new high school is projected to cost $23.8 million. To build an all new campus on new land comes with a price tag of $60 million which all board members agreed was not doable. Burris said if they weren’t going to construct a new building he wanted to see the problems be fixed at the current facility.
“I want to make sure this old shoe looks new,” Burris said. “What can we get done with the financial stability that this district can handle?” An estimate of about $10 million for the high school and middle school was given by Horner. The resolution to build a new elementary facilty was adopted and George K. Baum and Co., will handle the bond issue. A special election for the bond issue will be June 24.
Coming full circle Poverty program shows results By STEVEN SCHWARTZ The Iola Register
Marilyn Colgin has worked behind the counter at Brown’s Store in Mildred for years. The store will close for good at 6 p.m. REGISTER/BOB JOHNSON
Charlie Brown’s bids adieu Mildred store has final hurrah today By BOB JOHNSON The Iola Register
MILDRED — This tiny town in northeast Allen County will slip one step closer to oblivion before the sun sets today. Charlie Brown’s Store, the last business in Mildred, will close at 6 p.m. The store opened in 1912 selling hardware and as an auto repair shop. After World War II, when Charles Brown and brother Carl took over from their father and uncle, groceries became more of a staple, along with appliances and hardware. They also repaired what appliances they
sold. In more recent years the store has been better known for its trademark sandwiches, heaped high with meat. Business, however, has not been steady enough to keep the doors open. Charlie’s grandson, Michael Becker, assumed management in 2002, with Charlie’s’ death. Poor health has kept Becker at bay in recent years. In his stead has been Marilyn Colgin, who turns 87 Monday, and now worries how she’ll occupy her days. “I HATE to see this place go,” said Jason Beckman, a frequent customer who dropped in Wednesday morning for a sandwich. It’s an easy dash from the field, said Beckman, who farms outside of town.
“I usually come in four, maybe five times a week,” he said. “I was hoping someone would buy the place and keep it open.” No mention has been made of any such plans, Marilyn said. Thrive Allen County, which has economic development in its portfolio, once looked at ways to keep the store open. Eric Bruyninckx had never been in the store before when he ambled in. “I heard about the sandwiches from others on the crew,” said Bruyninckx, an environmental inspector working Enbridge’s Flanagan South Pipeline project. He ordered ham, turkey and pepper jack cheese. The store’s 1950s decor had
Georgia Masterson’s expectations were realistic when she started the Circles program last year. “If Circles could make a difference in one person’s life, it would be well worth it,” she said Thursday afternoon. It seems that goal has been successful, and much more. Every person who began the program — meant to help bring people out of poverty and learn skills to further their professional lives — has a job, and is starting a fresh life. Jonathan Lushbough and Bobbie Nunnery are two of the success stories in the program. Lushbough is working for David Toland, renovating buildings around town and writing for Thrive Allen County. Nunnery is working for TLC Garden Center.
“MY WORLD just circled around me and that was it,” Nunnery said. She was at work at TLC Thursday afternoon, preparing to plant some ferns in the greenhouse and arrange plants. She is originally from Iola, and was working at Orschlen’s before she quit on an impulse — in retrospect, it may not have been the best idea. “Finding a job was like pulling teeth,” she said. No one would accept her applications or even give her an interview. When a friend brought her to the Circles program, it was a step in the right direction. Lushbough’s situation was similar. A friend bought him, admittedly against his will, but it was time for a change. He is a seven-time felon and was recently released from prison in 2012. Getting a full-time job was something that didn’t even seem possible for him. His struggles were something he bore for his entire life, alone. “It was something I See CIRCLES | Page A4
See CHARLIE| Page A4
Report ranks counties for health By JIM MCLEAN KHI News Service
TOPEKA — Wyandotte County and a cluster of counties in the southeast corner of the state continue to rank among the least healthy places to live in Kansas, according to a report released Wednesday by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Six of the 10 counties at the bottom of the rankings are in southeast Kansas: Woodson,
Elk, Chautauqua, Cherokee, Montgomery and Labette. “That really comes as no surprise,” said Gianfranco Pezzino, a physician who oversees public health research at the Kansas Health Institute, which coordinates the release of the Kansas rankings. The health rankings are evidence of the extent to which social and environmental factors — known as social determinants — affect health. All of the southeast Kansas counties that rank among the bot-
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tom 10 have child poverty and unemployment rates that are significantly higher than the state average. They also generally have higher rates of of people without health insurance and higher rates of teen pregnancy. Wyandotte County is another example of the power of social determinants, Pezzino said. It consistently occupies a spot near the bottom of the health rankings while Johnson County, its neighbor See HEALTH | Page A4
Jonathan Lushbough has been working with David Toland, doing renovation work around the square and writing for Thrive Allen County. REGISTER/STEVEN SCHWARTZ
“If you do not tell the truth about yourself you cannot tell it about other people.” — Virginia Woolf, writer 75 Cents
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