When you dial 911, every second counts. Be prepared to give your address, the nature of your emergency and — your language to the 911 dispatchers. If you don’t speak English, be ready to wait. The Sedgwick County emergency response system relies on third-party translation services to handle foreign language calls. Connecting a call to […]
Sedgwick County
Posted inAccountability, DIY Democracy, Elections
Automatic mailing of mail-in ballot applications cut from Sedgwick County’s $3.5 million 2024 election budget
Heading into a presidential election year that includes the first Kansas presidential primaries since 1992, the Sedgwick County Election Office will spend more than it has in at least 10 years. The election office will get $3.5 million in 2024 under a budget recently adopted by the Sedgwick County Commission. But a request to send […]
Posted inLocal Government
Language barriers shut some Wichitans from local government services
Roughly one in 14 people in Wichita say they speak English — the primary language used to access taxpayer funded services — less than “very well.” Ask Ana Lopez. She is the Spanish-speaking community services representative for City Council District 6 that covers the heavily Hispanic North End neighborhood in North Wichita along Arkansas Avenue. […]
Posted inWichitans You Should Know
Meet Sister Ursula, a glamorous nun advocating for gay and trans youth
By his own account, Scott Sullivan leads a boring life. He’s a 58-year-old white male who works at the local tag office, as he has for 25 years. He’s married. He grew up mostly in the Midwest, one of two children in an upper-middle class, two-parent “white-bread” family. He knew little trauma as a child, […]
Posted inLocal Government, Watchdog
Highlights, progress, stagnation: A one year check-in on the CJ Lofton task force
After 17-year-old Cedric “CJ” Lofton died in law enforcement custody in September 2021, the community wanted answers. How did this happen? What went wrong? What could be changed to prevent such a thing from happening again? A community task force of 23 members was convened to find those answers and make recommendations for systemic change. […]
Posted inAccountability, Education, Health
A surge in fake pain pills is fueling a deadly epidemic among Wichita’s teens
What does youth fentanyl overdose look like? In Sedgwick County it often looks like parents finding their teenager dead in bed — or a toddler dead on the floor, fentanyl pills scattered next to him. That’s not supposed to happen. Parents expect kids at home to be safe, not at risk of the No. 1 […]
Posted inEnvironment, Kansas State Government
Study finds higher rates of liver cancer, low birth weights near toxic site in northeast Wichita
Rates of liver cancer and low birth weights are higher among people living above a toxic groundwater site northeast of downtown Wichita, a new health study by the state of Kansas finds. The source of the contamination is the Union Pacific rail yard at 29th and Grove, which has a chemical in its soil and […]
Posted inHealth
FDA has approved over-the-counter Narcan. What does that mean for Wichita?
Wichita harm-reduction activists are hopeful the Food and Drug Administration’s recent decision to sell Narcan, a brand of nasal spray naloxone, without a prescription over-the-counter will make the drug more accessible to people who need it – but when and how it might be available is not yet clear. The activists routinely distribute thousands of Narcan kits a year, and demand keeps rising.
Posted inHousing, Local Government
Why Wichita’s work on homelessness means redefining who is impacted
Wichita’s homelessness task force is looking to learn from the past. At the March 22 task force meeting, Sedgwick County Deputy Manager Tim Kaufman reviewed the work of the previous task force that formed in 2006 to help homelessness in Wichita. Specifically, Kaufman discussed which recommendations were successfully implemented and which were not and why. […]
Posted inLocal Government
Wichita LGBTQ+ advocate Jackie Carter: Parents are ‘just terrified’ for their children
Jackie Carter is a longtime Wichita resident and LGBTQ advocate. She is the senior pastor at Table of Hope, formerly known as the First Metropolitan Community Church of Kansas. It is affiliated with the Metropolitan Community Church group, which was designed and created as the first religious community that would ordain, marry and include gay […]