Sports: Indians play at tournament See B1
THE IOLA REGISTER Locally owned since 1867
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Monday, June 13, 2016
Workshop shows link to poverty and health By ANDY MARSO KHI News Service
Scott Criqui opened a “Poverty Simulation” workshop Thursday in Lawrence with a personal story that showed the connec- Scott Criqui tions between health and financial struggle. Criqui, a 35-year-old human resources specialist who lives in Lawrence, said his parents were solidly middle class when they married. Then they started having children. Four died in childbirth and two others were born with developmental disabilities. The other was Criqui. The family’s medical bills piled up. His mom had to stay home to care for his two brothers. Then his father’s manufacturing job was sent overseas, and the family’s health insurance went with it. By the time his uninsured father, a smoker, finally got his lung cancer diagnosed it was too late to treat it. He died when Criqui was 12. Criqui said his mother hid it well, but they were poor. “It can happen to any of us,” Criqui told a crowd of about 200 participants and volunteers who gathered at See WORKSHOP | Page A2
Judge Thomas Saxton is retiring after serving the past 27 years on the bench. REGISTER/RICHARD LUKEN
Judge ready to hang up gavel, ties By RICHARD LUKEN The Iola Register
One marker is in sight for Thomas Saxton. The judge bangs the gavel for the final time June 30, marking the end of a 27½year career behind the bench. He’s down, more or less, to 17 days, 6 hours and 25 minutes: “Not that I’m counting or anything,” he joked. Saxton has served as a magistrate judge since January 1989 for Kansas’ 31st Judicial District, focusing primarily on Allen and Wilson counties. He’s also served the past 25 years as Iola Municipal Court judge.
Legislators mull constitutional changes TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Republican legislators who want to limit the courts’ power to force changes in how Kansas funds its public schools could revive several long-standing proposals for revising the state constitution. Lawmakers convene Thursday for a special session called by Gov. Sam Brownback to respond to a state Supreme Court order last month declaring that the state’s school funding system remains unfair to poor school districts. The court warned that public schools will not be able to reopen after June 30 unless legislators rewrite school education funding laws. Senate Vice President Jeff King, an Independence Republican, said he’s drafting a proposed constitutional amendment to prevent courts from threatening to close schools in the future. GOP legislators have talk-
ed about such a change for more than a decade, and two major alternatives also have been discussed as long. Here are some of the legal issues involving school funding and proposals to amend the Kansas Constitution: ONGOING LITIGATION
Kansas has been in and out of legal disputes over school funding for nearly 30 years. The latest round began with a lawsuit filed in 2010 by the Dodge City, Hutchinson, Wichita and Kansas City, Kan., school districts. The Kansas Constitution See STATE | Page A2
Quote of the day Vol. 118, No. 160
It’s an extensive career for a judge who, prior to being named to the bench in 1989, had never officially studied law. “I guess it’s rare,” said Saxton, an Iola native whose wide-ranging background includes degrees in psychology, math and natural science along with three technical degrees relating to electricity. Saxton’s varied work history took him from mental health and as a steelworker to the coal industry. Actually, it started as a child in his father’s store. His father, Tom, ran the Otasco store in Iola for more
than 33 years. “As soon as you were old enough to hold a screwdriver, you were putting together bicycles, wagons, helping with the store,” he said. After high school, Saxton attended Allen Community College followed by Pittsburg State University. Saxton worked briefly for Poli-Tron, a livestock feeding manufacturer. (As an aside, Poli-Tron was acquired years later by B&W Trailer Hitches of Humboldt, and continues to manufacture livestock feeders.) He then worked at a mental health center in Pittsburg, and then as a grants writer
and equal opportunity officer for SEK-CAP, the community action program for southeast Kansas. He moved from there to the coal industry, as a vice president for Atkinson Industries in Pittsburg. In the mid-1980s the coal industry began to founder. Atkinson was bought out by a conglomerate, “and jobs were going by the wayside.” Unsure of where to go, Saxton sought a job in his native Iola as a probation officer in 1986. Over the next few years Saxton took such an interest See JUDGE | Page A4
SEARCHING FOR ANSWERS By JASON DEAREN The Associated Press
ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — The last of the bodies were slowly removed late Sunday from a popular Orlando gay club after a gunman sprayed the helpless crowd with bullets, killing 49 people and devastating a city famous for family-friendly theme parks. When the attacker opened fire in the early hours of Sunday morning, it interrupted an evening of drinking, dancing and drag shows at a club known for tolerance for all people. Authorities say suspect Omar Mateen emerged, carrying an AR-15 and fired relentlessly — 20 rounds, 40, then 50 and more. In such tight quarters, the bullets could hardly miss. He shot at police. He took hostages. When the gunfire at the Pulse Orlando club finally stopped, 50 people — including Mateen — were dead and dozens critically wounded in the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.
Brett Morian, from Daytona Beach, hugs an attendee during the candlelight vigil at Ember in Orlando, Fla., Sunday. ORLANDO
SENTINEL/JOSHUA LIM/TNS
Mateen, who authorities said had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State in a 911 around the time of the attack, died in a gun battle with SWAT team members. “I’ve always felt so safe here for my family, kids. And now, I don’t know,” said Marlon Massey, who lives across the street from the club. Authorities are wondering if it was an act of terrorism and are probing the back-
“Adventure is worthwhile in itself.” — Amelia Earhart 75 Cents
ground of Mateen, a 29-yearold American citizen from Fort Pierce, Florida, who had worked as a security guard. The gunman’s father recalled that his son recently got angry when he saw two men kissing in Miami and said that might be related to the assault. The Islamic State’s radio called Mateen “one of the soldiers of the caliphate in See SHOOTING | Page A4
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