KANSAS FINDS ITS FLOW, TROUNCES TOWSON 88-58 Page 1B
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Nixon wants Brownback to drop study ————
Kansas officials say diversion is necessary for water supply By Scott Rothschild srothschild@ljworld.com
Rchard Gwin/Journal-World Photo
MIKALAH CLARK, 8, FRONT LEFT, AND HER SISTER ALEXIS, 11, hold a sign together for a family picture as they were adopted by Shannon and Tonya Clark, of Lawrence, on Friday.
Big day brings sisters into family fold By Sara Shepherd sshepherd@ljworld.com
Ask Shannon and Tonya Clark how they came to have 11 children, and their short answer is: “Because every kid deserves a home.” The latest installment in their longer story happened Friday, when two little girls the Lawrence couple had been fostering more than a year formally became their daughters. In Douglas County District Court on the eve of National Adoption Day, Alexis Clark, 11, stated her new name for the judge and then her little sister’s, because Mikalah Clark, 8, was too shy to do it herself. After all, there were a lot of people watching. Timothy, Justin, Courtney, Alex, Alexzandria, Joseph and Shelby — seven of the girls’ nine siblings, who range in age from 8 to 25 — were all there. There were grandparents, case workers and
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They’ve always been part of our family. It was always sort of a package deal — when one would come, both would come.”
— Tonya Clark of Lawrence, who with husband Shannon adopted Alexis, 11, and Mikalah, 8, on Friday other loved ones, too, bringing the audience to almost 20. Before Friday’s adoption finalization hearing, Tonya said she and Shannon talked to Alexis and Mikalah about what the milestone meant. “We’re not just doing it until they turn 18 — there’s a door, get out,” Tonya said. “We want to be their forever family.”
Family from start Shannon and Tonya married four years ago. He has three biological children from a previous relationship and she has six — three biological and three adopted. Tonya once thought her first three children
would be her last, but that wasn’t the case. “I kept saying yes,” she said. The first two of her adopted children, from a family she knew, showed up on her doorstep, she said. She took in their sister as an infant right out of the hospital and formally adopted the three siblings in 2006. She and Shannon also knew Alexis and Mikalah. The girls, friends of the Clarks’ other children, came over often. They were living with a grandparent before moving into the Clarks’ home as foster children. “They’ve always been part of our family,” Tonya said. “It was always sort of a packaged deal — when
one would come, both would come.” “They just sort of fit right in.” National Adoption Day caps National Adoption Week, aimed at raising awareness of children in foster care waiting to find permanent families.
State of need In Kansas, more than 5,800 children are currently in foster care and more than 950 are available for adoption, according to KVC Kansas. The organization is a subsidiary of KVC Health Systems Inc., a nonprofit group devoted to health care, social services and education for children and families. KVC Kansas says the greatest adoption needs are for children older than 9, members of a sibling group of three or more and children of any age with physical, medical or emotional special needs. Many families temPlease see ADOPTION, page 2A
TOPEKA — Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon wants Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback to back off of a feasibility study of Kansas taking water from the Missouri River to divert to western Kansas. “The Missouri River is a resource that is vital to Missouri’s way of life and our economy,” Nixon said in a letter to Brownback. Describing the Missouri River as the “lifeblood” of numerous communities, Nixon said the river provides drinking water and is used to ship goods to markets. “We have worked for
many years, and fought many legal battles, to ensure the River is managed properly,” N i x o n w r o t e . “Thoughtful and reasoned discussion and cooperation, Nixon rather than unilateral plans for massive diversions, must be the guiding forces in planning for the River’s use,” he urged. Nixon’s letter to Brownback was in response to the Kansas Water Office’s plan to commission Please see WATER, page 2A
KU celebrates spirit of entrepreneurship with panel, contest By Ben Unglesbee bunglesbee@ljworld.com
Just Food CEO Jeremy Farmer can explain as well as anyone what exactly “social entrepreneurship” means. Speaking at a panel at the Lied Center Pavilion on Friday, Farmer said his Douglas County organization’s food bank helped put food on the plates of hundreds of people. But he realized Just Food’s successes meant little if the same number of people had the same problems acquiring food every year. He saw hunger was an ongoing
problem in need of an innovative solution. Rather than giving someone a fish, or even teaching them to fish, as the biblical aphorism goes, FarmKANSAS UNIVERSITY er and his team “really found that we needed to revolutionize the fishing industry,” so to speak. Farmer and his team taught lower income folks to garden and cook, to turn their Please see BUSINESS, page 2A
Army makes staff changes after email about pretty women in ads By John Milburn Associated Press
TOPEKA — Pentagon officials said Friday that an Army colonel who wrote an internal email suggesting photos of attractive women should be avoided in promotional materials has stepped down from her duties involving a gender study. Army spokesman George Wright said Col. Lynnette Arnhart had agreed to step aside, and Gen. Robert Cone, commander of the Army’s Training and Doctrine
Command at Fort Eustis, Va., had accepted the gender integration study’s leadership change “in order to protect the integrity of the ongoing work on gender integration in the Army.” The content of the email was first reported by Politico this week. In the email, Arnhart stated that “average-looking women” should be used in Army materials used to attract women for combat roles, Politico reported. In addition, Wright said that Col. Christian Kubik, a public affairs officer also
Business Classified Comics Deaths
High: 31
Please see ARMY, page 2A
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MISS KANSAS THERESA VAIL DISPLAYS HER SHOE during the Miss America Shoe Parade in September at the Atlantic City boardwalk in Atlantic City, N.J. Vail, an Army National Guard soldier, took exception on Friday to an internal Army email from Col. Lynnette Arnhart suggesting photos of attractive women should be avoided as the military works to attract women to combat roles.
Counseling director resigns
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with the Army’s Training and Doctrine Command, was suspended for his involvement in the email pending an investigation. According to the email chain obtained by Politico, Kubik forwarded Arnhart’s email to other public affairs officers, cautioning that the use of photos “that glamourize women” would undermine the Army’s gender integration efforts. Wright confirmed that the email existed but didn’t provide copies to
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The longtime director of Headquarters Counseling has left as the organization is struggling with major funding cuts and the temporary reduction in the hours of its suicide prevention hotline. Page 3A