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THE IOLA REGISTER Locally owned since 1867
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Wednesday, December 23, 2015
County gets $3M Enbridge boost
Medical arts building in focus
By BOB JOHNSON The Iola Register
Allen County got a welcome Christmas present in the form of $3.18 million for the first half of property taxes owed by Enbridge for its pipeline and mammoth pumping station southeast of Humboldt, County Treasurer Darolyn Maley told county commissioners Tuesday. Maley reported 53.03 percent of ad valorem taxes assessed Allen Countians for 2015 had been collected as of Monday. Altogether, property owners paid $11,469,011.11. Enbridge provided an assessed valuation windfall of about $39 million for Allen County this year, which pushed the county’s total to nearly $137 million, a historical high. RON BOREN of Boren Roofing, Iola, told commissioners roofing costs will increase a tad locally. Boren said he had been told by the Kansas Department of Health and Department See COUNTY | Page A4
By RICK DANLEY The Iola Register
Season of lights
Don Knavel Jr.’s home in the 900 block of South Harrison Street in LaHarpe was judged this week as the best decorated home in town by the LaHarpe PRIDE Committee. The elaborate Christmas dipslay features several lighted reindeer surrounding a large tree filled with reflective globes. REGISTER/RICHARD LUKEN
Iola makes do without transfers By RICHARD LUKEN The Iola Register
Iola looks as if it will be able to avoid having to transfer additional funds from its utility reserves into the general fund this year, City Administrator Carl Slaugh told the Register Tuesday. The year-end transfers are normally a routine event to ensure no line items in the city’s budget contain negative balances. Typically, those transfers involve replenishing the city’s general fund.
However, City Council members — at Slaugh’s urging — declined to do any such transfers because of low reserve levels. For example, Iola had about $1 million in its electric fund, much lower than Slaugh’s comfort level. For years utility funds have been used to supplement the city’s general fund as a means to keep Iola’s property taxes lower than they otherwise would be. This year included some big-ticket transfers out of the electric fund already, to
pay for EPA-mandated upgrades to control systems in the city’s electric plant, plus another $200,000 to improve electric service to accommodate a yet-to-occur expansion at Gates Coproration. Since October, Slaugh has directed Iola’s department superintendents to curb their spending, approving only “emergency” expenditures. “It’s not a formal thing,” he said. “It was just a way of allowing me to control See IOLA | Page A3
In a sequel to last month’s discussion, which proposed the construction of a new medical arts building on hospital grounds, the Allen County Regional Hospital board of trustees has configured a steering committee toward that end, naming board member Patty Boyd its chair. During Tuesday night’s meeting, Boyd identified three questions of concern around which the trustees should frame their preliminary discussions: 1) What is the building going to look like? 2) Who’s going to be in this building and what are they going to be doing? 3) How are we going to pay for this? The first step in pursuit of their goal of a new building, explained Boyd, is determining the general scope of the project. With that in mind, Boyd and her colleagues on the steerSee HOSPITAL | Page A4
Companies test unlimited vacations By STEVE TWEDT Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Uninsured rate drops By KHI NEWS SERVICE
The Kansas Health Institute has released an issue brief entitled Uninsured Rate Drops Significantly After First Year of ACA Marketplace. The brief analyzes recently released health insurance coverage data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS). The data reflect changes in insurance coverage for 2014, which was the first full year of implementation of the major health insurance expansion provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Key findings include: • In 2014, the uninsured rates dropped significantly in both Kansas (12.3 percent in 2013 vs. 10.2 percent in 2014) and the U.S. (14.5 percent in 2013 vs. 11.7 percent in 2014). • The increase in insurance coverage can be attributed
to small increases in directpurchase (likely through the health insurance marketplace), employment-based and public insurance. • Kansas no longer fares better than the nation as a whole for certain groups. Children and young adults in Kansas are no longer less likely to be uninsured than nationally. The gap between the uninsured rates of White, non-Hispanics and Black/African Americans in Kansas is higher than in any other state (7.6 percent compared to 17.4 percent, respectively). In January 2014, the ACA expanded the availability of insurance coverage nationally through state and federal health insurance marketplaces. At that time, Americans with incomes between 100 See ACA | Page A3
Quote of the day Vol. 118, No. 40
Unlimited vacation time sounds like a pretty good job perk. Social media site LinkedIn this year joined the stillsmall-but-growing roster of companies offering employees as much time off as they’d like, with the understanding that the coupon is good only if they get their work done. Estimates about how many companies offer open-ended vacations run in the 2 to 4 percent range, mostly small startups but including none other than General Electric, which earlier this year began offering unlimited vacation time to many of its executives. What’s in it for the companies? Besides being a strong
In a survey of 400 advertising and marketing executives and 400 office workers commissioned by The Creative Group earlier this year, 39 percent of executives said they believed productivity would increase if employees had unlimited time off. FOTOLIA/TNS recruitment and retention tool, such policies can free companies from any unused vacation pay liability if they currently allow vacation days to accrue. Proponents say the policies also bestow a sense of “ownership” among employees that cultivates a more committed workforce.
“This flexible scheduling has really come into play in the last six months to a year,” said Ginger Kochmer, the Philadelphia-based vice president of The Creative Group, a division of Robert Half International. See VACATIONS | Page A3
Kansas company gets $1 million penalty WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas chemical manufacturing has been fined $1 million after admitting it unlawfully dumped hazardous wastes down a saltwater disposal well. JACAM Manufacturing LLC of Sterling, pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court in Wichita to one count of violating the feder-
al Safe Water Drinking Act and one count of violating the Resource Conservation Recovery Act. Its president, Jason West, entered the plea on his company’s behalf under a deal with prosecutors that spared shareholders, employees and contractors from charges. West declined comment
“Character develops itself in the stream of life.”
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 75 Cents
after the hearing, saying the company would issue a news release later. The company was charged last month with injecting hazardous chemicals down a well in Rice County without a permit. JACAM makes and sells specialty chemicals used in the oil and gas production and industrial markets.
Hi: 57 Lo: 33 Iola, KS