The difference one teacher saw in her English classroom was “night and day” after a crackdown on cellphones midway through the 2022-23 school year.
A high school in midtown Kansas City says it found more time for learning when it locked up cellphones
Posted inEducation
Some Park Elementary neighbors oppose Wichita homeless shelter plan
Bobby Harlan gazed over the shuttered grounds of Park Elementary School, which he attended 32 years ago, and shared his disappointment about its future. “How can it be a homeless shelter?” he said. “This neighborhood needs a school.” First came the news in March that Wichita schools would be closing the school to save on […]
Posted inState Government
Missouri counties say they lose money housing people headed to state prison
The cost of holding someone in a Missouri county jail for those days and months before and after a conviction ultimately falls to the state. In 2024, the state spent about $50 million to reimburse counties for the cost. But it’s had trouble keeping up with that tab. That’s left counties stuck with most of […]
Posted inState Government
Missouri Amendment 4: What to know about the Kansas City Police funding ballot question
When you look at your Aug. 6 Missouri ballot and see the same question about funding for the Kansas City Police Department as two years ago, that’s not a mistake. In April, the Missouri Supreme Court ordered the state to run the vote again. Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas’s lawsuit challenging the police funding question prompted the court to throw out […]
Posted inHealth
Why Liberty Hospital could no longer go it alone and turned to Kansas for help
A hospital merger that caused a short-lived political storm tinged with Missouri-Kansas rivalries earlier this year kicks in with the start of July. Liberty Hospital, a 177-bed community hospital on the Missouri side of the metro, will be gobbled up by The University of Kansas Health System, a Kansas neighbor six times larger. The transaction, […]
Posted inLocal Government
Downtown parking changes leave Wichita businesses worried
Stewart’s Jewelry and the Hilton Garden Inn don’t compete for customers — just for parking. The Hilton, on the corner of South Topeka Street and Douglas Avenue, dwarfs the family-owned jewelry store next door. Customers of both businesses — and sometimes employees — compete for spaces in front of the two establishments. “If I don’t […]
Posted inKansas City
World Cups displace homeless people. What’s Kansas City’s plan for the event in 2026?
The 2026 World Cup will squeeze Kansas City’s already tight housing market in ways that could make shelter particularly scarce for homeless people. Many thousands of soccer fans flocking to the region will need places to stay. But some housing experts say that the World Cup’s short-term impact on the housing market could prod the […]
Posted inState Government
A Missouri woman could go free after 43 years. But wrongful imprisonment payments in the state are low
After serving 43 years in prison for a murder case hinged on things she said as a psychiatric patient, Sandra Hemme could be cleared of the killing and freed in less than three weeks, by July 14.
Posted inHealth
Plasma you sell in east Kansas City could end up in medicine an ocean away
Michael Mullen donates blood plasma every Tuesday and Thursday. He has for 12 years. The money it brings in — a little over $100 a week — augments what he makes as a chef. He’s come to rely on it. “It helps supplement bill paying,” he said recently, smoking a cigarette outside the Biomat USA […]
Posted inCivic Engagement
Sedgwick County regulators hold up giant solar farm on Wichita’s outskirts amid objections from neighbors
Sedgwick County appeared poised to follow its ban on wind farms with widely vetted regulations that would allow acre after acre of solar panels pumping renewable energy into the electrical grid. Instead, the county still has a moratorium on the construction of large-scale solar farms. “Boils down to a simple phrase: not in my backyard,” […]