Monday, April 27, 2020
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Governor, churches reach deal on gatherings By ROXANA HEGEMAN The Associated Press
BELLE PLAINE, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly said she has reached a deal that could resolve a lawsuit brought by Laura Kelly two churches challenging her order banning religious gatherings of
Chiefs well-equipped for run at repeat
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Doctor urges more social distancing PAGE A2
Pandemic won’t affect property tax deadline LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — The coronavirus pandemic does not appear to be delaying the quickly approaching May 10 deadline for Kansas property taxes. Kansas believes delaying property tax deadlines is more of a local government decision, said Zach Fletcher, a spokesman for the Kansas Department of Revenue. “Property taxes collected at the local and county level help fund critical functions like public safety and schools,” Fletcher told the Lawrence Journal-World. “The governor cannot unilaterally change property tax structures or payments in general, and would not be inclined to cut critical funding sources during a prolonged public health emergency.” Some property owners questioned why the state pushed back its state income tax deadline, but not for property taxes Judy Paley, who owns several Lawrence buildings that See TAXES | Page A4
more than 10 people to help slow the spread of the coronavirus. Under the deal, the two churches and the Democratic governor agreed to the extension of a temporary restraining order that allows the churches to disregard the 10-person limit. The court’s initial order let the two churches to gather in-person until May 2 as long as they complied with social-distancing measures, including keeping worship-
pers a safe distance from each other. The new proposal would extend that court order to May 16. The agreement, which a judge must still approve, essentially allows the churches to continue in-person services while the governor finalizes plans for her less restrictive statewide reopening orders that would take effect on May 4. “While I am confident that See DEAL | Page B2
Official: State may be at peak
By HEATHER HOLLINGSWORTH The Associated Press
MISSION, Kan. (AP) — State officials said Friday Kansas may be nearing or has already reached its peak in COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths, leaving the state to focus on the economic fallout of closing businesses to stem the spread.
Kansas saw the number of deaths drop Friday from 112 to 111 after an investigation determined one of the previously counted fatalities was not related to the coronavirus. Positive cases increased by 295 to 2,777. But the increase comes as the state, whose testing rate had been among the lowest in the naSee PEAK | Page B2
Le Roy, Gridley students on the move LE ROY — Elementary classes within the Southern Coffey County school district will be consolidated and middle school students moved. Le Roy-Gridley USD 245 Board of Education members voted unanimously at a special April 16 meeting to move all elementary school students within the district to Gridley, while the middle school students will be taught in Le Roy. The moves could save the district between $150,000 and $200,000 annually for a district that has experienced drops in enrollment in recent years, Superintendent of Schools Russ Millward told
Southern Coffey County Middle School in Gridley will close its doors while its students will be moved to Le Roy. GOOGLE MAPS the Coffey County Republican. Currently, elementary school students are taught
separately in Le Roy and Gridley. Under the plan approved by board members, those
students — pre-kindergarten through fifth grade — will now be taught at Gridley Elementary School. Meanwhile, students in grades 6 through 8 will be moved to what up to now has been Le Roy Elementary School. Those students had been taught in Gridley. The existing middle school building in Gridley will be closed, pending a May 11 public hearing at the USD 245 district office. Southern Coffey County High School students will remain in their current building in Le Roy, although board See SCC | Page A4
Feeling the icy wind at Belmont The sky was cloudless, passing from silver at the horizon to soft blue at the apex of the dome of the world.
Trevor Hoag Just Prairie I was sitting next to the grave of Doyle “Bud” Neimeyer in Belmont Cemetery, near the “new” Yates Center reservoir, watching the small orange and brown butterflies flit about in tiny eccentric circles. Someone had placed a chipped red brick nearby, seemingly as a gift, that read: Standard Coffeyville Block. And adorning Neimeyer’s final resting place, a quote from naturalist philosopher Aldo Leopold: “A Thing is Right when it tends to preserve the integrity, the stability, and the beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” It’s an insight of immeasurable depth and caring, one that speaks to an ethics beyond anything white men have yet devised. An ethics where all touches all, where nothing stands
Luke Heller scans the Big Sandy creekbed for arrowheads near the site of Fort Belmont. REGIS-
TER/TREVOR HOAG
alone. Where nothing survives in isolation and without others. An ethics wherein everything needs everything. I only knew “Bud” as a child when I was a Boy Scout, with my pressed navy shirts and yellow patterned scarves, when he showed us such profound sites as the Native American petroglyphs at Dry Creek Cave. He kneeled in the dirt
pointing, and somehow I can still see him there, excitement effervescing out beneath his signature cap. It can be no accident, then, as to why he is interred here, at what is perhaps the place of greatest historic significance in all Woodson County, at what was once the intersection of wagon trails leading from Humboldt to Eureka, Neosho Falls to Coyville. X marks the spot.
JUST down Kanza Road at 70th is the Belmont Corner, once home to upwards of 600 pioneers and 20 cabins, a tavern and post office, blacksmith and hotel, and an agency where native women retrieved meagre government rations. In a letter written by E.T. Wickersham in 1934, he reSee BELMONT | Page A4
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