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THE IOLA REGISTER Locally owned since 1867
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Tuesday, July 21, 2015
Learning from afar
USD 257, Greenbush team up to offer virtual ed courses By KAYLA BANZET The Iola Register
Iola High School students will be able to learn through a new educational avenue starting in August. USD 257 has teamed up with Greenbush, an Educa- Jack Koehn tion Service Center, to offer a virtual learning program for students in grades 9-12 and adults within its district for the 2015-16 school year. Superintendent of schools, Jack Koehn said students and families seeking online educational opportunities often have turned to outside programs because few school districts have been able to offer their
own. The availability of virtual programs through Greenbush makes them easier to offer for any grades 9 through 12 or adult students in pursuit of a high school diploma. Some students perform better in an online environment with more flexibility than in a traditional classroom, Koehn said. The program will be a blended option. In past years students at Crossroads Learning Center did work online but had to be present at the Crossroads facility between certain hours. The new virtual program allows students to complete their work on their own time with help available on site a couple of days throughout the week. “We believe that blending the flexibility of an See 257 | Page A6
Monarch Cement Company officials in Humboldt are proposing developing a rural area north of Humboldt for a new quarry. REGISTER FILE PHOTO
Monarch eyes new quarry site By BOB JOHNSON The Iola Register
HUMBOLDT — In a search for new dirt to be used for cement manufacture, Monarch Cement Co. has a new proposal to mine ground it owns about four miles north of Humboldt. Allen County’s Planning Commission will decide Thurs-
day evening — starting at 7 o’clock in the assembly room — whether to recommend a conditional use permit for Monarch to remove clay and shale, but no limestone, from the half section (320 acres) it has acquired over the past few years. About 16 months ago Monarch sought to quarry lime-
stone, as well as clay and shale, on the land north of town. That proposal was to carry the material by truck along 1300 Street, a rock-surfaced artery maintained by the county, to K-224 and on to Monarch’s plant at the south edge of Humboldt. See MONARCH | Page A6
Dispatch radio upgrades leave listeners in the dark By RICHARD LUKEN The Iola Register
GARNETT — An upgrade of communications systems for law enforcement personnel in Garnett and Anderson County should bring those agencies up to date, Anderson County Sheriff Vernon Valentine said.
H o w e v e r, radio broadcasts from both the Anderson County Sheriff ’s Department and Garnett Police Vernon D e p a r t m e n t Valentine will no longer be heard on most scanner ra-
dios, Valentine said. That’s because the communications upgrades will include converting those radio systems from analog to digital, Valentine explained. “We have been slowly upgrading to a newly mandated 911 communication center, better known as ‘New Gen’ over the past 2½ years,” Val-
entine said in a press release. The plan was for the conversion to be complete sometime in 2016 or 2017. But after researching Anderson County’s antiquated equipment, the state encouraged the county to convert to the new system earlier. “They bumped us to this year,” Valentine said.
The new system will greatly enhance the county’s ability to send and receive greater amounts of information, Valentine said. But there’s a significant tradeoff for the general public. While the new ACSD and See RADIOS | Page A3
Wichitan sues for voting machine audits WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A mathematician at Wichita State University who wanted to check the accuracy of some Kansas voting machines after finding odd patterns in election returns is finding out how difficult it can be to get government officials to turn over public documents. Beth Clarkson, a certified quality engineer with a doctorate in statistics, said her calculations from the November election showed enough patterns to suspect that “some voting systems were being sabotaged,” The Lawrence Journal-World reported. Sedgwick County election officials refused to allow the computer records to be part of a recount and told her that to get paper recordings of votes, she would have to go to court and fight for them, said Clarkson, who is
also the chief statistician for Wichita State’s National Institute for Aviation Research. She filed a lawsuit against the Sedgwick County Election Office and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach earlier this year, asking for access to the paper records that voting machines record each time someone votes. The record does not identify the voter. The voting machines that Sedgwick County uses have a paper record of the votes, known as Real Time Voting Machine Paper Tapes, which similar machines in Kansas and around the country do not have. Since the software is proprietary, even elections officials can’t examine it and postelection audits can’t be done, according to Pamela Smith, president of Verified Voting Foundation, a nonprofit agency whose mission
Quote of the day Vol. 117, No. 179
is to safeguard elections in the digital age. Clarkson asked Sedgwick County to do a recount in 2013 but the time to file had expired. She then filed an open records request, but officials refused to provide the requested documents. She filed a lawsuit but the judge said the paper records were ballots, even though they didn’t identify the voter, and thus were not subject to the state’s open records law. Clarkson filed for a recount after the November election, but Sedgwick County officials again refused, saying only a judge could release the records. A lawsuit she filed in February against Kansas’ attorney general — and later amended to add the Sedgwick County election commissioner and Kobach See AUDITS | Page A6
Pageantry on display
Brandi Gonzalez, 13, Humboldt, competed in the National American Miss contest in Wichita over the weekend. She won an outstanding program participant award and a state finalist trophy. During the contest she modeled a ballgown, had a job interview and gave a personal speech. REGISTER/KAYLA BANZET
“Never fight an inanimate object.” — P.J. O’Rourke, comedian 75 Cents
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