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WEDNESDAY • JANUARY 6 • 2016
City denies KTen shopping center
GOP to pursue ‘hostile’ overhaul of schools By John Hanna Associated Press
Richard Gwin/Journal-World File Photo
THIS AERIAL PHOTO FROM SEPT. 5, 2015, SHOWS THE INTERCHANGE of South Iowa Street and the South Lawrence Trafficway. On Tuesday, city commissioners voted 4-1 to deny zoning and planning changes to allow a shopping center project called KTen Crossing that would add about 250,000 square feet of new retail and commercial space at the southeast corner of the interchange.
Mayor says Lawrence not equipped to push boundaries farther south By Nikki Wentling Twitter: @nikkiwentling
In a 4-1 vote Tuesday night, the Lawrence City Commission denied zoning and planning changes that would have allowed for a new shopping center in south Lawrence, saying the city was not yet ready to open up land south
of Kansas Highway 10 for development. The project on the table was KTen Crossing, a nearly 250,000-square-foot shopping center proposed for the southeast corner of the South Lawrence Trafficway and South Iowa Street intersection. KTen Crossing would have been the city’s first
commercial development south of K-10, and it would have required the extension of sewer and water lines. In an opposition speech, Mayor Mike Amyx said Lawrence was not currently equipped to change the city’s long-range plans and push its boundaries farther south. “If we jump the (South
Lawrence Trafficway), I guarantee you, the property to the west, you may as well recommend it for (regional commercial) right now because we can hardly deny it,” Amyx said. “Once you take that waterline across, that will open up that entire area for development.
Topeka — Conservative Republican legislators are preparing to push for huge changes in Kansas’ education system, and more liberal lawmakers said Tuesday that some of their proposals are “hostile” to public K-12 schools. Ideas under consideration include junking current standardized testing for students, turning over some school services to private companies LEGISLATURE and forgoing federal dollars to avoid federal education requirements. A joint legislative committee set up last year to study what students should be learning and the best way to fund schools met briefly Tuesday to review a draft report from its chairman. The report calls for a “complete overhaul” of how the state distributes more than $4 billion in aid annually to its 286 local school districts.
Please see SHOPPING, page 5A
Please see SCHOOLS, page 8A
Lawmakers hopeful for Medicaid expansion debate By Peter Hancock
“
We can protect the state general fund, and we can provide health care to about ... about A former Republican 138,000 Kansans who don’t have that care topresident of the Kansas day.” Twitter: @LJWpqhancock
Senate said Tuesday that expanding the state’s Medicaid program, known as KanCare, as allowed under federal law would actually benefit the state general fund to the tune of more than $200 million a year. “We can protect the state general fund, and we can provide health care to about ... about 138,000 Kansans who don’t have that care
— Dave Kerr, former Kansas Senate president today,” said Dave Kerr, a Hutchinson businessman who served 20 years in the Legislature, including four years as Senate President from 2001 through 2004. Although the state would have to pay 5-10 percent of the cost of covering those
individuals under KanCare, Kerr said Kansas would save hundreds of millions of dollars more by reducing or eliminating other categories of health care expenses including prisoner health care costs and grants to community mental health centers.
Kerr was among several people who made presentations during a forum on KanCare expansion held Tuesday at Johnson County Community College in Overland Park. The forum was sponsored by the Kansas Hospital Association and several health care advocacy groups. But lawmakers from both sides of the aisle said getting an expansion bill through the Legislature will be an uphill battle, despite bipartisan support for some sort of expansion. And some said it will likely take more than one legislative session to craft a plan.
“I think this is a 16-month effort,” said Senate Vice President Jeff King, R-Independence. Sen. Jim Denning, R-Overland Park, agreed, saying, “We won’t have a final product at the end of this session.” But Sen. Laura Kelly, D- King Topeka, said it’s important for lawmakers at least to begin a discussion about Medicaid expansion. “I think it’s absolutely imperative that we have the debate this year, that we discuss it,” she said. Please see MEDICAID, page 5A
Kelly
Current, former KU students die in Wis. canoe accident By Sara Shepherd Twitter: @saramarieshep
A Kansas University student and a former KU student were among four young men who died over the weekend in a canoeing accident in Wisconsin. The body of Mori Weinstein, 21, was pulled from an icy lake Monday afternoon, according to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resourc-
es, which publicly identified him Tuesday morning in a news release. The accident hap- Weinstein pened at Mill Lake in East Troy, Wis., according to Recreational Safety Warden Jason Roberts of the Department of Natural Resources, which is investi-
Business Classified Comics Crave
Low: 35
Today’s forecast, page 8A
man Tuesday. Weinstein was a junior at KU, university officials confirmed. Sack previously attended KU and was last enrolled in fall 2014, KU officials said. East Troy is about 30 miles southwest of Milwaukee and about 90 miles north of Chicago. All four victims were Greg Moore/AP Photo from the Illinois villages of Winnetka and Wil- AUTHORITIES SEARCH for men who went missing at Mill mette, in the Chicago Lake in East Troy, Wis., Monday. A current and a former Kansas University student were among four men who died Please see CANOE, page 2A over the weekend in a canoeing accident at the lake.
INSIDE
Icy morning
High: 39
gating the incident. Authorities searched the lake after Weinstein and three friends were reported missing — their canoe overturned — Sunday morning, Roberts said. Authorities recovered the first two bodies on Sunday, those of Lanny Patrick Sack, 20, and Christopher J. McQuillen, 21, according to the Department of Natural Resources. Crews were still searching for the body of a yet-unnamed fourth
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Deaths Events listings Horoscope Opinion
2A Puzzles 8A, 2C Sports 6A Television 7A USA Today
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Dogs killed in fire 6A 1C-5C 6A, 8A, 2C 1B-6B
A man was forced to jump from a window to escape a fire, which also caused the deaths of about 10 dogs, at a rural home near Baldwin City. Page 3A
Vol.158/No.6 36 pages