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The Community Foundation of Southeast Kansas (CFSEK) is pleased to announce the recipients of its second round of Making a Difference in Childcare grants. Through a competitive grant process, five daycares in Bourbon County were selected as recipients.
“In virtually every community across Southeast Kansas, the need for childcare services remains a prominent topic,” stated Devin Gorman, Executive Director of CFSEK. “Our Board of Directors sought avenues through which CFSEK could offer assistance to our current childcare providers, ensuring the continuity of their crucial services and, ideally, facilitating their ability to accommodate additional children if they have the capacity to do so.”
The importance of having quality daycare is paramount to the well-being of a community. The CFSEK Marketing and Asset Development Committee evaluated data from the State of Kansas and Child Care Aware to determine the most critical areas of need. As a result, Bourbon County was selected for the second round of grants.
Applicants were asked to identify the areas of greatest need for their children. These daycares want to not only care for their current children but also to expand their reach and capabilities if they are not yet at full license capacity.
The following daycares were awarded funds from the Making a Difference in Childcare in Bourbon County grant process:
The CFSEK Board of Trustees and staff are proud to help support childcare efforts in Southeast Kansas. For additional information about CFSEK and its grant opportunities, please visit www.SoutheastKansas.org or call 620-231-8897.
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CORRECTED: Child Support Services Impacted by Kansas Court’s Network Security Issue
TOPEKA – Due to the network security issue announced by the Kansas Judicial Branch last week, the Kansas Department for Children and Families (DCF) is informing Kansans of delays that will occur to those working with the agency’s Child Support Services.
DCF works daily with Kansas courts to process child support court orders and payments on behalf of Kansas families. With the efiling and electronic court records system offline, Kansans should expect delays on returned filings, court hearings and orders being entered. Child support payments that are awaiting court orders or direction from DCF, Court Trustees, and county clerks will be delayed. Any orders filed prior to the week of Oct. 9 should continue to process properly.
DCF and its contracted partners of YoungWilliams and Maximus will continue to provide full-service operations through paper and fax filings. Johnson County is not impacted by this as the county operates on an efiling and case management system used only by the county.
Individuals with cases in process should consult the Child Support Services customer hotline at 1-888-757-2445 with questions or status information. Updates will be provided at the Kansas Payment Center website www.KSPayCenter.com.
This is part of a series featuring young people who have started selling a product or service. If you know of a young business person, send their email or phone number to [email protected]
Luke and Natalie Lehman are twins. Both are young entrepreneurs.
Luke Lehman,15, started a horseshoe-inspired gifts business in August because of the availability of materials.
“I sell small trinkets, made out of horseshoes, such as pumpkins, napkin holders, and Christmas ornaments,” he said. “I chose this to sell because my grandpa had a lot of horseshoes from auctions, and needed something to do with them. My dad had also made a few things out of them before.”
He calls his business Farmhouse Metalworks.
“I attended the Children’s Business Fair classes and learned about things like marketing, pricing, and target customers,” he said.
Natalie Lehman, 15, is an artist by passion.
This is part of a series featuring young people who have started selling a product or service. If you know of a young business person, send their email or phone number to [email protected]
He sells homemade treats: such as rock candy, brownies, rice krispy treats, peanut butter fudge, trail mix, etc.
Third Street Park is ready for the community to enjoy.
New children’s play equipment with mulching and new stairs leading to the ballpark on Third Street was recently completed.
“This is a $92,000 project that was funded by the Patterson Family Foundation, Blue Cross and Blue Shield Pathways to a Healthy Kansas, and a contribution from The City of Fort Scott,” Rachel Carpenter, director of the Healthy Bourbon Action Team (HBCAT), who is spearheading the project, said.
“The playground is open to the public!” she said.
The need for Third Street Park’s improvement project was identified by the community through public forums, surveys, and a steering committee, according to Carpenter, in a prior press release.
A Building Up Our Neighborhoods Placemaking project has already repaired the bathrooms and existing structures, including the basketball goal. Last month stairs were made from the upper level of the park to the lower level.
Community members were able to develop priorities that they wanted to see happen at the park, Carpenter said in a prior press release. Those priorities:
“Fort Scott Kiwanis provided volunteers to fix the existing structures, the basketball goals, and paint the bathrooms,” she said. “The City of Fort Scott provided an additional $10,000 that will go towards fixing up the bathrooms, fixing the pavilion floor, and surfacing for the existing structures.”
‘We are still collaborating with the City of Fort Scott to update the fixtures of the bathroom and fix the pavilion floor,” Carpenter said.
Last week, Playscapes, Yates Center, installed the new playground structures and put down the rubber mulch surfacing.
The playground structures include a Temple Trolley, a Swizzler, and two bouncers.
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The Fort Scott Farmers Market showcased some young business people on September 30.
The subscriber who had been reading the Young Entrepreneur Series on fortscott.biz this summer was touched by the efforts of the children and wanted to support each young entrepreneur’s business.
This is what he wrote:
“I always stop at the local kids’ lemonade stands. When I was growing up in Fort Scott, I remember the postman buying a cup of lemonade from me. For some reason that stayed with me.
“Selling Grit Magazine door to door, making birdhouses and selling them door to door, having a Tribune newspaper route back when you paid for your batch of papers up front, delivered them, and then collected monthly. If anyone stiffed you, you were out the dough. All of those things were great life lessons for me growing up in Fort Scott. That’s why I really like your program of highlighting young entrepreneurs”
The Young Entrepreneur Series features youth under 18 years old who have a business in product or services.
To recommend a young entrepreneur in our community, please send contact info, email, or phone number to [email protected]
The following are the recipient’s comments about how the grant was spent:
“I’m purchasing more supplies for my leather crafts, Devlin Cole said. “I’m very appreciative for the money. Thankfully there is someone wanting to do that for kids wanting to make a name for themselves.”
“I bought different things for my jewelry business,” Malachi Whitson, age 10, said. “It was a big boost. I’m so glad he did it, it helped a lot.”
“The funds went directly to Answers in Genesis 2024 Vacation Bible School Program Kit,” Melanie Lamb, Camren’s mom said. “It will be used over and over. Camren’s first priority is to do it at youth homes and places with children in need. But he also plans to collaborate with kids near his age to do the program here in Fort Scott.”
Camren, 10, also purchased four Samaritan’s Purse and Bible Workbook Kits, his mom said.
Asher Whitson, whose business is Art by Asher, spent his grant money “to help a single mom and the rest towards buying new items for his business,” Maria Whitson, his mom said.
“Judah gave a little to help the single mom (his brother Asher also did this) and he saved the rest to buy a cow,” Maria Whitson, his mom said.
The board’s annual report analyzed the deaths of Kansas children (birth through 17years old) that occurred in calendar year 2021, the most recent year for which data is available.
“Within the three decades that the State Child Death Review Board has been in in existence, more than 12,000 deaths of Kansas children have been examined. The data provided in this report is critical to our understanding of why children are dying,” said Sara Hortenstine, the board’s executive director. “We know that behind each of these statistics are the stories of children who lost their lives too soon, families who are still grieving, and communities that will be impacted forever. We must learn from these difficult circumstances and take action to prevent future deaths of Kansas children.”
Overall, the report showed Kansas had 349 child fatalities in 2021, compared with 365 in 2020. The overall child death rate in 2021 was 49.6 deaths per 100,000 population, both the lowest number and rate of death since the board was created in 1994.
The rate of deaths due to natural causes declined in the last five years, the report revealed. In 2021, 100-plus fewer children died of natural causes compared to 2018. Despite the overall decreasing number of child deaths in Kansas, homicides, weapon-related deaths, and drug-related deaths in children has shown an alarming increase.
Thirty-two children died from homicide in 2021 compared to only 22 child homicides in 2020, a 45% increase. The report also indicates drug-related deaths increased significantly in the past two years. While no children died in 2017, 2018, and 2019 from fentanyl, 20 kids died from fentanyl overdoses in 2020 and 2021.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported nearly 500,000 people of all ages died from overdoses involving both illicit and prescribed use of opioids from 1999-2019. In recent years, both nationally and in Kansas, the data has shown an increase in the use of synthetic opioids like fentanyl. While fentanyl is a prescription drug, it is also manufactured illegally. Frequently it is incorporated into illicitly manufactured pressed pills and mixed with other substances without the knowledge of the end user.
“My office is committed to preventing every preventable death of a child. This report shows a dramatic increase in fentanyl deaths in 2020 and 2021 as compared with previous years. We are using every tool at our disposal to deal with this threat,” Kobach said.
In addition to policy recommendations, the report includes prevention points that families can use to decrease the likelihood of a child’s death.
The board is a multi-disciplinary, multi-agency volunteer board organized by law within the attorney general’s office to examine trends and patterns that identify risk factors in the deaths of children, from birth through 17 years of age. The report is available on the attorney general’s website at https://ag.ks.gov/scdrb.