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High: 97
City lags in future planning
‘They’ve gone all out’
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Coupon value in today’s paper Nick Krug/Journal-World Photos
VIEWED THROUGH A HOLE CUT INTO A WALL, VOLUNTEER BILL CROWLEY SURVEYS some of the work being done on an extension to the home of Geoff and Angie Wampler-Cooper on Tuesday. The organization Professionals Helping Children, which performs building and renovation work to the homes of families with special-needs children, has adopted the Wampler-Cooper family for its yearly makeover project. The extension to the home is being constructed with a wheelchair-accessible bathroom for Chance Wampler-Cooper, who has a spinal cord birth defect.
Kickball league not short on passion Lawrence’s Kaw Valley Kickball League is a culture of epic games, underdog victories, colorful uniforms, inappropriate team names and fairy-tale weddings. Oh, and lots of beer. An effort is under way this season to document all the shenanigans and why players and fans of the league love it so much. Page 1C
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QUOTABLE
Skateboarding is amazingly popular in Lawrence. We have found that out because we have had kids skating all over town while the parks have been closed.” — Mark Hecker, the city’s superintendent for parks and maintenance. After renovations, parks and recreation leaders have opened both new skate parks, and have set a formal ribbon cutting for Monday at Centennial Skate Park. Page 3A
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INDEX Arts&Entertainment 1C-8C Books 4C Classified 1D-6D Deaths 2A Garden 8C Events listings 10A, 2B Horoscope 7D Movies 4A Opinion 9A Puzzles 5C, 7D Sports 1B-10B Television 4A, 2B, 7D Vol.154/No.183 58 pages
LJWorld.com
Volunteers make family’s home more accessible By Shaun Hittle sdhittle@ljworld.com
OTTAWA — Members of an Ottawa family were to get their first look today at their renovated home, complete with a new bedroom, expanded kitchen and wheelchairaccessible bathroom. “We’re so excited,” said Angie Wampler-Cooper, who, along with her husband and two sons, were selected for the project by area nonprofit Professionals Helping Children. “They’ve gone all out.” The project is one of several home renovations completed by the organization during the past three years. The group, founded by Franklin County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Brian Ferguson, selects one local family a year that has a child with a disability and fixes up the home to better accommodate the family. Ferguson showed off the
PROFESSIONALS HELPING CHILDREN VOLUNTEER Carlie Marquis sweeps up the kitchen area of the Wampler-Cooper home Tuesday in Ottawa. renovations volunteers were making to the home, which focused on making it more wheelchair accessible for Chance, 14, who has a spinal cord birth defect that affects his ability to walk. Above the whir of saws
and the smack of hammers, Ferguson pointed out that the new bedroom added on to the back of the house includes a handicap-accessible bathroom. Please see HOME, page 2A
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Officials assessing big-picture needs of community By Chad Lawhorn clawhorn@ljworld.com
If the mindset of one voter is any indication, many voters didn’t know much about the need for a $30 million police headquarters facility when they approved an $18 million expansion of the Lawrence Public Library in November 2010. The one voter? Mayor Bob Schumm. Schumm wasn’t yet on the City Commission — he took office in April 2011 — but he certainly paid more attention than most to city issues. But he said recently the amount of need at the Lawrence Schumm Police Department caught him by surprise. “I’m not going to second guess the need for the library at all,” Schumm said. “There is certainly a need there, but I didn’t know before I got elected that we were that far behind at the Police Department.” In June, city commissioners received a report estimating it would take $30 million to build a new headquarters building for the Lawrence Police Department. When commissioners asked for a more detailed plan related to staffing the new facility, commissioners were presented with a plan that totaled $42 million. Commissioners recently were told the city’s existing debt policies won’t allow the city to fully finance a $30 million police Please see PLANNING, page 8A
Police chief: Help needed to fight financial crime Khatib discusses issues department faces going forward By George Diepenbrock gdiepenbrock@ljworld.com
Lawrence Police Chief Tarik Khatib calls it losing the middle ground. “To me the trend in financial crimes and forgery has become the new petty crime in Lawrence as opposed to theft,” he said. “There’s a lot of abuse of credit cards and financial instruments.” Khatib said it could be driven by the prevalence of more people using debit and credit cards now as
opposed to cash and by more purchases made over the Internet, all resulting in more op- Khatib portunities for criminals. As part of his current request to city officials for more positions, equipment upgrades and a new police facility, Khatib has drawn attention to the city’s crime rate when compared with a group
of 27 other similar cities across the country, including Overland Park, Olathe, Norman, Okla., and Lincoln, Neb. In the 2010 survey, Lawrence had the highest rate of property, financial and nuisance crime cases at 12.5 per 1,000 residents. The average among all the cities was 4.3 crimes per 1,000 residents. And Lawrence’s clearance rate in those areas was only 14.9 percent compared with the 21 percent average among all cities. “I’m basically saying
the police department doesn’t really have the capacity to take on investigation of those crimes without doing one of two things: either getting more resources to apply to it or cutting something else to try to get back to it,” he said. Khatib said the situation is a product of the department’s workload. The same survey found the Lawrence department was handling 370 calls per officer compared with an average of 323 calls per officer. He believes the
department is effective in solving high-profile and major cases such as homicides and shootings, and also managing the 50 to 70 events, such as parades, athletic and cultural events, in the city each year. But that also comes at a price in solving certain types of crimes that don’t often get headlines. Still, the fraud and forgery crimes that might involve the Internet or a suspect from far away are much more complex than thefts reported years ago, he said. The department’s Please see POLICE, page 8A