News

The Kansas Department of Labor says the number of job vacancies increased during the second quarter of 2012 when compared with a year earlier.

The report released Wednesday found an estimated 36,000 vacancies from April to June, a 17.3 percent increase over the second quarter of 2011.

During the quarter, Kansas averaged a little over 88,700 unemployed workers. That meant about 2.5 workers for every job vacancy, which was an improvement from 2011, when there were 3.2 unemployed workers for every job opening.

During a speech at the University of Kansas Monday, Governor Sam Brownback touted a tax-cutting bill he signed into law earlier this year. 

The plan will cut personal income tax rates and eliminate income taxes for nearly 200,000 businesses.  Brownback said that could help attract people and jobs to the state. 

The president of a tea party group in Wichita yesterday questioned whether a former Democratic legislator who’s running again for the Kansas House lives at the address he lists as his home, a concern the ex-lawmaker dismissed as “crazy.”

Craig Gabel, president of Kansans for Liberty, said interviews with neighbors and other information gathered by the group suggest that no one lives at the address listed by former Representative Tom Sawyer when he filed for office in June.

Although Martin Amis’s new novel, Lionel Asbo: State of England, has received mixed reviews, it would be hard to argue that it lacks vividly drawn characters, a compelling storyline, or distinctive prose. Perhaps the legitimate complaint is that the title character, Lionel Asbo, falls a bit short on charm.

A Kansas lawmaker says there’s no need to talk about new home schooling requirements, despite plans made last month by the state Board of Education to have that discussion.

House-Senate Legislative Educational Planning Committee chair Steve Huebert says several board members have heard of children being kept at home to baby-sit younger siblings.

But he said that current state law is adequate to investigate such claims without having to consider new laws to address the issue.

Some advocates hope allegations of misdeeds at a state women’s prison will prompt improvements at the facility.

In a letter last week, the U.S. Justice Department alleged sexual abuse by staff and other misconduct at the Topeka Correctional Facility.

Audra Fullerton, with the Kansas Coalition Against Sexual and Domestic Violence, says the group works with officials at the prison. She says there have been improvements at the facility, but there are other steps she’d like them to take.

Governor Sam Brownback’s administration is refuting a federal report criticizing management and conduct at a Topeka women’s prison.

A letter from the U.S. Justice Department alleges there are serious problems at the Topeka Correctional Facility, including sexual misconduct by staff and prisoner abuse. Secretary of Corrections Ray Roberts says the letter doesn’t take into account improvements made at the facility.

More than 60 percent of Kansans are classified as overweight or obese, and summit in Topeka Thursday was aimed at finding ways to tackle that problem.

Governor Sam Brownback told the gathering about the steps he’s had to take to control his weight - specifically, watching his eating.

Brownback has a simple message for people fighting obesity: don’t give up.

“Most of America struggles with weight at one time or another,” he said. “This is not an unusual situation that you are in or that anybody else is in. We all have, just don’t give up.”

Want to step into a time machine? I know how. Go to Doc’s Steakhouse on North Broadway and hold onto your hat. Doc’s is retro all the way, from cobbled exterior to entirely brown interior. This is old-school Wichita.

Doc’s is a real experience, in every sense of the word. It is located on North Broadway, between a couple of Mexican restaurants, a Vietnamese market, and a pawn shop. It is a part of Wichita history, where our Mad Men would drink and eat meat and drink martinis, and deals of all kinds were brokered. Nothing about it is modern in any way, except for the televisions.

Kansas Insurance Commissioner Sandy Praeger says the state needs to decide soon what health benefits it would offer under federal health care reform.

During a meeting with health care officials Wednesday, Praeger said if Kansas doesn’t pick its own plan for a health insurance exchange, the federal government will make the decision for the state.

Under the federal Affordable Care Act, states have until September 30th to decide what benefits will be included in a health insurance exchange.