Lawrence Journal-World 03-20-13

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LJWorld.com

Pro-business PAC stirs up City Commission race By Chad Lawhorn clawhorn@ljworld.com

For years, the world of Lawrence City Commission campaigning has run on $50, $100 or sometimes even $500 donations from supporters. A $5,000 donation hasn’t been the norm. But it is reality in the 2013 Lawrence City Commission race. A new pro-business political action committee — Lawrence United — entered the campaign scene over

Chestnut

the weekend with a mass mailing supporting candidates Rob Chestnut, Jeremy Farmer and Terry Riordan. Campaign finance records show the group received its support from a host of Lawrence business interests, led

1st day of spring

High: 45

Farmer

by a $5,000 donation from longtime Lawrence business Penny’s Concrete. “I was Riordan asked to contribute to the group, and I did because I feel like it really is about the importance of promoting the need for jobs,� said Bill Penny, an owner of Penny’s Concrete. “I’m absolutely not ashamed to help people have jobs.

It makes people feel good about themselves and feel productive in their society.� Lawrence attorney Casey Meek serves as the chairman and treasurer of the new group. He said the organization plans to create a board of directors in the near future that will keep the PAC active for future local elections. He said the group will work to register new voters, attract “young and enthusiastic� candidates for local office and promote a better business

environment in Lawrence. “We’re trying to make Lawrence as attractive as possible to outside businesses and make it as easy as possible for local businesses to stay up and running,� Meek said.

Fundraising boon Political action committees aren’t entirely new in local Lawrence political races. In the 1990s, a group called Progressive Lawrence

MORE ON ELECTION Advance voting continues through noon April 1 at the Douglas County Courthouse. For more City Commission election coverage go to http:// bit.ly/10eY4UF.

Please see PAC, page 2A

City’s longest-serving firefighter retires

Low: 23

Today’s forecast, page 8A

INSIDE

Rape, incest no grounds for late abortion ——

House approves sweeping new restrictions Oread sous chef carves edible art Michael Davis, sous chef at the Oread hotel, has been carving fruit for five and a half years. He usually carves flowers into honeydew, cantaloupe and watermelon, but he can create different designs on most fruits or vegetables. Page 8B

“

QUOTABLE

We are, again, back in a period of austerity, much like the 1950s after World War II. A memorial that is so grandiose and so large in scale sort of misses the point of what his story can offer the American public.� — Susan Eisenhower, arguing against a planned memorial for her grandfather, President Dwight Eisenhower. Page 5A

INDEX Business Classified Comics Deaths Events listings Food Horoscope Movies Opinion Puzzles Sports Television Vol.155/No.79

By Scott Rothschild srothschild@ljworld.com

Richard Gwin/Journal-World Photo

CAPT. ALLEN JOHNSON HAS RETIRED after more than 38 years as a Lawrence firefighter. A reception was Tuesday at the Lawrence-Douglas County Fire Medical station at 1911 Stewart Ave. BELOW is a family photo of Johnson taken early in his career.

Blazes have reshaped city landscape, firefighter protocol during long career By Ian Cummings icummings@ljworld.com

It’s been a long time since the Royal College shoe store, 835 Massachusetts St., caught fire, but Allen Johnson remembers it well. He was a young firefighter then, on a warm Saturday night, climbing a ladder to the roof of the burning store with a fire hose. Several fire crews gathered below, where flames filled the building’s basement. This was Johnson’s first big fire, in his third year with Lawrence’s fire department, and the last thing he remembers is the firefighter next to him falling down. Then

6A 1C-6C 8C 2A 8A, 2B 6B-8B 7C 4A 7A By Ian Cummings 7C icummings@ljworld.com 1B-5B A 20-year-old Kansas Univer8A, 2B, 7C sity student has filed a lawsuit 24 pages against the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity, accusing the local chapter and its national organization of permitting underage drinking that allegedly contributed to a severe head injury the student suffered at the KU chapter’s house in March 2011.

Johnson was out, and he woke up later in the hospital. He was just 20 years old. When Johnson’s father, thenSheriff Rex Johnson, arrived on the scene of the fire, he found his son at an ambulance being treated for smoke inhalation. This was 1977, the first Royal College fire, years before the store burned again in 1982 and owner Thomas H. Black was unsuccessfully prosecuted for arson. It was also years before firefighters started wearing air packs regularly. More than 35 years of firefighting later, Capt. Allen Johnson Please see FIREFIGHTER, page 5A

TOPEKA — The Kansas House on Tuesday rejected a provision that would allow a victim of rape, incest or child sexual abuse to get late-term abortions. In proposing his amendment to an abortion bill, state Rep. John Wilson, D-Lawrence, LEGISLATURE said women and girls in those “horrible, life-changing� situations shouldn’t be prevented from ending their pregnancy. Current law bans abortions after 22 weeks unless a woman’s life is in danger or she faces a major, irreversible harm to her physical health. Wilson’s measure also would have applied the exemption to laws restricting private health insurance for Please see ABORTION, page 2A

House advances budget

with cuts to higher education. Page 3A

Bill banning union pay deductions sent to governor. Page 4A

Fraternity lawsuit alleges drinking led to head injury Andrew Charles Johnson, Salina, filed the suit in Douglas County District Court on March 6, naming these defendants: the fraternity’s KU chapter; the chapter’s alumni board, which owns the Sig Ep house at 1645 Tennessee St.; the fraternity’s national corporate organization; and two fraternity members. One of the fraternity members named in the suit remains unknown, identified only as “John

Doe No. 1.� The other is Kansas University student Rashid Franklin “Scooter� Mebarek. According to Johnson’s version of events, as outlined in court documents, he was 18 years old and had been living at the Sig Ep house for about seven months on March 11, 2011, when he attended an off-site fraternity party called “Heaven and Hell.� At the party, he says, he and other underage fraternity members

were provided unlimited access to alcohol and encouraged to drink. After Johnson and other fraternity members left the party and returned to the house, Johnson went to bed. He was startled awake by Mebarek and another fraternity member “messing with� him, he says. According to Johnson’s account, he emerged Please see FRATERNITY, page 2A

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Lawrence Journal-World 03-20-13 by Lawrence Journal-World - Issuu