Friday, April 15, 2016
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THE GAZETTE, EMPORIA, KANSAS
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Page 3
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Like Us On
JOHN ROBINSON/GAZETTE
Steve Willis, community corrections director, briefs the
commission during an action session on Thursday.
COUNTY
From PAGE 1
KENDRA JOHNSON/GAZETTE
TRAIN
From PAGE 1
to 200 ties on the track.
Improvements were also
made to the elevation of
the tracks by adding dirt
and gravel.
“Hopefully, we’ve got
the track in better shape
than it’s been in decades,”
said Stapp.
Stapp credits Wes Matson with spearheading a
lot of the work done on
the railroad and finding
volunteers. Russell Beck
is in charge of maintenance and track and has
done a lot of work to repair the train and tracks.
Matson said Wednesday morning the train was
finished being painted and
they put the train on the
tracks for the first time
for the season. However,
there were some computer programing problems
with the train that need
to be resolved before the
train could run. Matson
said the problem is small
and will be resolved soon.
“The engine looks like
a new one,” said Matson.
“Should be a great summer at the Sertoma train.”
The Sertoma Club has
KENDRA JOHNSON/GAZETTE
a maintenance fund to
pay for repairs and offset
the business expenses
of businesses who have
volunteered labor hours.
Stapp said Emporia Construction has also helped
maintain the train.
One problem the club
faces is volunteer to run
the train during the summer.
It takes three people
to run the train. Between
setting up, running and
storing the train each volunteer shift lasts about
three hours to three and
a half hours, four times a
week. Overall, it takes 40
hours of volunteer work
to man the train.
The club bought the
train in 2001 from the
city for $1. While they
own the train, any maintenance changes to the
track must be approved
by the city because the
track is built on a flood
plain and federal dollars
are involved.
The Sertoma club has
45 to 50 members, some
active, some inactive. In
addition to managing the
train, the club also places
American and ESU flags
around downtown on special occasions and offers
a flag service to community members to deliver
temporary yard flags on
holidays and offers scholarship opportunities to
students. If interesting in
joining the club call 620412-3806.
shared their research and
concerns and we took action
on that. The second one, the
Allen Road, a group of citizens come in and share their
personal stories and we took
action. The Americus Road
is the same way, we want to
hear from the people and we
will probably respond when
we get information from the
people.”
Martin said the Highway
Department is currently
conducting a traffic count
on Americus Road and the
results of that should help inform any action the commission takes.
Commissioner Scott
Briggs said phone calls and
email are both effective ways
the public can make their
voice heard but coming in for
public comment is the most
effective.
“That’s my hope; is we
start to get people coming
in,” Briggs said.
Chip Woods, Lyon County
engineer, said the expenses
on rock are ahead of estimates, but 2016 is even to
2015 overall.
“We’re way ahead on rock
because of the open winter
we had,” Woods said. “But
we’re still running pretty
much even with where we
were last year.”
Woods also said the continued lower price of gas has
helped with keeping expenses down in 2016.
“I don’t expect that to continue but I’ll take advantage
of it while I can,” he said.
“The crystal ball don’t work
to good with gas and diesel.”
Steve Willis, community
corrections director, presented the comprehensive
plan for fiscal year 2017 and
provided an update for how
community corrections is
performing.
“One goal for your agency
each year is you obtain a 75
percent success rate of offenders moving through your programs,” Willis said. “Meaning they get arrested, they
get sentenced to community
corrections and 75 percent of
those offenders come through
successful.”
According to Willis, the
state average is around 65
percent, while the 5th Judicial District success rate was
84 percent in 2015.
The county commission meets every Thursday
morning at 8 a.m. The section for public comment is
as 9:45 a.m.
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SCHOLARS
From PAGE 1
prior to degree attainment.
Scholars included:
✦✦Christopher Alderman,
biochemistry and molecular biology
✦✦Jaide Allenbrand, biology
✦✦Elayna Coleman, English
✦✦Taylor Heins, health promotion
✦✦Kelly Holden, nursing
✦✦Raymond Horvat, music
✦✦Kandace Miller, mathematics
✦✦Eswin Rios, social sciences
✦✦Brandon Schrad W"