29 YEARS AND A THRILLING SHOW SPORTS, 1C
L A W R E NC E
Journal-World
®
75 cents
LJWorld.com
WEDNESDAY • OCTOBER 1 • 2014
Kansas revenue $21M short
Pelicans pass through Lawrence
By John Hanna Associated Press
Mike Yoder/Journal-World Photo
TWO AMERICAN WHITE PELICANS PASS EACH OTHER while searching for fish in the northeast section of Clinton Lake. About two dozen pelicans were in the area Monday, making a stopover on their migration south. Earlier this month, a game warden in Jewell County, which is in northcentral Kansas, found seven pelicans that had been shot to death. A reward of $5,000 has been offered by the Humane Society of the United States and the Humane Society Wildlife Land Trust for information leading to a conviction. The birds are a federally protected species.
‘Monuments Woman’ to talk art at KU By Nadia Imafidon Twitter: @nadia_imafidon
For Kansas University alumna Corine Wegener, saving the arts has a literal application in her profession as a cultural heritage preservation officer. A modern-day “monuments woman,” Wegener travels to war-torn countries, and much like the Monuments Men who traveled to Europe to recover art stolen by the Nazis, she helps museum staff reclaim and protect cultural treasures. “Our cultural heritage is how we reach out to our past,” Wegener says. “It’s where people can find hope and resiliency after a terrible disaster.” Wegener is delivering a lecture titled “From Berlin to
Baghdad: When Art Historians Go to War” at 5:30 p.m. Thursday at the Spencer Museum of Art. She is the 2014 recipient of the Franklin D. Murphy Distinguished Alumni Award. Wegener was a curator at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts in 2003 when she was about to be deployed as a civil affairs officer to Afghanistan. Things quickly changed when she heard reports of massive looting at the National Museum of Iraq; an estimated 15,000 items from Iraq’s collection of Mesopotamian relics were stolen and the entire collection was damaged. She managed to change her assignment to serve in Baghdad instead. Wegener set to work for nine months with the Iraqi Ministry of
Culture and assisting museum staff and law enforcement to recover 40 to 50 percent of the collection, including the Lady of Warka sculpWegener ture, known as the “Mona Lisa of Mesopotamia,” a 5,000-yearold marble mask. After returning from Iraq, Wegener realized how much work needed to be done in training civil affairs officers on cultural heritage preservation. She founded the U.S. Committee of the Blue Shield — or the “Red Cross of culture” — to provide a network of contacts in places like Afghanistan, Iraq
and Africa. It was created to support the implementation of the 1954 Hague Convention, an international treaty that requires countries to prevent the destruction of cultural property during wartime. Her role as a cultural heritage preservation officer has taken her to Egypt, Mali and most recently Turkey, to facilitate training for curators in opposition-controlled areas in Syria. “The level of awareness is easily 10-fold what it was since the Bamiyan Buddhas were destroyed by the Taliban in 2001,” Wegener says. “However, we still have issues of sectarian violence, intentional destruction of cultural sites and, in that respect, we have a long way to go.”
Topeka — Kansas reported Tuesday that its tax collections fell $21 million short of expectations in September, a development likely to expand a predicted budget shortfall and intensify a debate over income tax cuts engineered by Republican Gov. Sam Brownback. The Department of Revenue said softer-than- Brownback anticipated personal income tax collections reported in its preliminary, monthly revenue figures could rebound in future months. The department also said corporate income tax collections exceeded expectations and said it suggested a good business climate. Even with the good news in corporate income taxes, the state collected $521 million in taxes for the month, or 4 percent less than the $542 million it had anticipated. Since the fiscal year Please see REVENUE, page 2A
House hopefuls debate education, Kansas economy, health care By Elliot Hughes Twitter: @ehughes12
Five candidates vying for three local seats in the Kansas House of Representatives assembled at Lawrence’s City Hall Tuesday for a chance to expound on various issues as November’s election day nears. Republican J. Douglas Robinson and Democrat Dennis
“Boog” Highberger, who are contending for the Lawrencedominant District 46, fielded nearly 20 audiencesubmitted questions in front of 30 people and a live local television broadcast. They were accompanied by District 10 incumbent and Democrat John Wilson and his Republican challenger, Nick Van-
ELECTION
2014
Business Classified Comics Crave
Low: 63
Today’s forecast, page 8A
dates touched on:
Education Nearly every candidate repeatedly emphasized education’s importance for the various ways it influences the economy, but there were plenty of disagreements between party members on how to improve schools statewide. The two Republicans, VanWyhe and Robinson, said they
INSIDE
Some storms
High: 82
Wyhe; as well as District 42 challenger Austin Harris, a Democrat. Harris’ opponent, incumbent Connie O’Brien, a Republican, was unable to attend. The event was organized by the Voter Education Coalition, which provides information regarding candidates’ policies to the public. Among the topics the candi-
2A 1E-10E 8B 1B-2B, 7B
Deaths Events listings Horoscope Opinion
2A Puzzles 6A, 2C Sports 9E Television 7A
9E 1C-4C 8A, 2C
oppose Common Core standards, framing them as an imposition into how classrooms are run. They also favor House Bill 2319, which frees some districts from state laws to pursue innovation. “I would support it, but my hopes are that we would fix the education system to where it would be less likely that they
Budget debate
Please see DEBATE, page 2A
Vol.156/No.274 58 pages
KU students heard contrasting viewpoints on the state’s fiscal situation during a Federalist Society program on campus Tuesday. Page 3A
Join us at Facebook.com/LJWorld and Twitter.com/LJWorld
A PLACE TO PLAY. A PLACE TO GATHER.
GRAND OPENING
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 5, 2014 | 2-4 P.M. | 100 ROCK CHALK LANE SPORTS AND FITNESS DEMONSTRATIONS LIVE MUSIC HEALTHY / NUTRITIOUS FOOD FACILITY TOURS FUN FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY