Submitted photo. Pechone Stepps coaches the Fort Scott High School Lady Tigers Basketball Team.
Pechone Stepps is a Credit Recovery Teacher Aide at
Fort Scott High School and also a girls basketball coach.
This week, Coach Stepps was named the Southeast Kansas Girls Basketball Coach of the Year for the 21-22 season.
“The seven head coaches in the league vote for who they think deserves the award for that season,” Fort Scott High School Activities Director Jeff DeLatorre said. “The coach with the most votes is named Coach of the Year.”
FSHS Activities Director Jeff DeLaTorre.
With Stepps as a coach, the Lady Tigers finished the season with a record of 17-5 and finished as SEK League champions.
“There is a coach of the year selected for each sport in the SEK League each season,” DeLaTorre said.
“Through the years, Fort Scott High School has had several recipients of this award including Tracey Bogina for Boys Cross Country in the fall last year,” he said. “Last school year (20-21) we had Bo Graham, football coach Tracey Bogina, girls cross country coach, Clint Heffern, boys basketball coach, and Josh Regan, baseball coach were recipients.
Tracy Bogina from the USD234 Online Staff Directory.Bo Graham from the USD234 Online Staff Directory.Clint Heffern.Josh Regan.
Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas (CHC/SEK) will continue to test and vaccinate under-insured, or patients without insurance for COVID-19 even though the federal program that reimburses hospitals, clinics, doctors and other service providers for COVID-19 care for uninsured people is coming to a close.
“COVID-19 is still with us,” said Jason Wesco, President & Chief Strategy Officer at CHC/SEK. “If uninsured individuals in our communities hesitate to get care because of the cost, we’ll likely see more cases, and the consequences those cases might cause.”
With lack of additional funding, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) announced this week that the program that reimburses hospitals, clinics, doctors and other service providers for COVID-19 care for uninsured people is ending. “The lack of funding for COVID-19 needs is having real consequences,” Martin Kramer, a spokesman for the Health Resources and Services Administration, said in a statement. “We have begun an orderly shutdown of the program.”
COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths are down dramatically across most parts of the country, however with another Omicron variant surging in Europe, some scientists are concerned that another US surge could be on its way.
Wesco says CHC/SEK wants anyone who thinks they might be ill to be tested and treated.
“It’s important not only for your health, but for the health of your family, friends and neighbors,” he said. “Continued testing and vaccination are the right thing to do, and the key to putting this pandemic behind us.”
The Healthy Bourbon County Action Team staff are looking for up to 12 participants to give information to a community health and wellness assessment in eight separate sectors in the community, according to Jody Hoener, President and CEO of the HBCAT.
“Please take a look below and consider providing your input either online or in person,” she said. “Eight different dates with 24 time slots!! We are hoping you can find a time that fits your schedule!”
HBCAT is located at 104 N. National Avenue, Fort Scott.
The Fort Scott City Commission and the Bourbon County Commission will hold a work session on Wednesday, March 30th, 2022 at the Empress Event Center, 7 North Main Street, Fort Scott, Kansas at 12:00 p.m. Even though a majority of City Commissioners will be present, no City business will be conducted.
The Airport Advisory Board will meet on Wednesday, March 30, 2022 at 12:00 p.m. at the City Commission meeting room at City Hall, 123 S. Main Street, Fort Scott, Kansas. This meeting is open to the public.
This meeting will be made available via the City’s you tube channel at City of Fort Scott.
Coffee will be held in the event room that is located downstairs.
Enter through the door on E. 2nd St.
History of the Library
In 1891, Eugene Ware established the Ware Public Library in Fort Scott. After Mr. Ware donated his library collection to the City of Fort Scott in 1894, the citizens voted to establish a free Fort Scott Public Library to be maintained by the taxpayers.
In 1902, Andrew Carnegie donated $18,000 for the construction of a library building. Fort Scott Public Library opened in its present location in 1904.
In the mid-1980s, the library automated and began using computers instead of a card catalog.
In 2013, Fort Scott Public Library joined the SEKnFind consortium, a group of over 40 Southeast Kansas libraries. We have access to the catalogs and collections of all these libraries.
In 2014, Fort Scott Public Library joined the Sunflower eLibrary consortium, giving our patrons access to ebooks, audiobooks, and videos.
In August of 2016, the library temporarily moved into the old City Hall offices in Memorial Hall, so that the library building could undergo a major renovation. In April of 2017, the library reopened in the newly remodeled original Carnegie building. Improvements included an up-to-date electrical system, new heating/air, new lighting, new flooring, new furniture, a new event room (for library events and available to the public), improved WiFi services, and an improved public computer area.
Visit the Fort Scott Public Library’s website HERE!
Like the Fort Scott Public Library’s Facebook page HERE!
The Knights of Columbus Fish Fry March 2022. Submitted by Calvin Barr.
The Knights of Columbus Fish Fry continues for two more weeks, with no drive-through orders. The sit-down meals will be inside Kennedy Gym at St. Mary’s Catholic Church.
Serving is from 5 to 7 p.m.
The dates for the last two fish fries are March 25 and April 1.
Bertha Mary Golden, age 90, joined her Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ on March 22, 2022. She was born to Harry Wilson and Bertha Amanda (Thrush) Bisel on October 14, 1931 in Wakefield, KS. She married Raymond Theodore Golden on December 18, 1950 in Topeka, KS.
Bertha graduated from the 8th grade at Benham District #31 grade school in Wakefield where she assisted in the family business at Broadview Dairy. After marrying, she and her family lived in the Kansas City area until relocating to Leavenworth, then to Prescott, Kansas, and finally to Fort Scott, KS. She earned her GED (high school diploma) in 1972 while raising 7 children. She then worked as a nurses’ aid at Cushing Memorial and the VA Hospital in Leavenworth. After moving to Prescott, she served at Mercy Hospital in Fort Scott for 22 years, before retiring in 2000. She kept busy with gardening, canning and travelling for many years. She also baked and provided pies for Flanner’s Owl Roost until its’ closing in 1996. At the Leavenworth Wesleyan Church, she served as pianist until her family relocated to Fort Scott in 1974, where she became a faithful member of Parkway Church of God (Holiness). After some health struggles, Bertha resided at Medicalodge where she was well-loved. She was a devoted mother, sister and grandmother.
Bertha leaves behind her grateful children, Charlotte and John Jones of Denver, Colorado, Catherine Golden, Mary Woellhof and Joyce Flanner of Fort Scott, Janice Wallace of Mound City, KS and Paul and Deborah Golden of Ottawa, KS. She is also survived by her brother, David Bisel of Dade City, FL. Also left behind are 18 grandchildren, 23 great grandchildren and a host of nieces and nephews.
Awaiting her in Heaven are: her husband of 57 years, Raymond; her eldest son, Stephen Ray Golden; grandsons, Kyle Flanner and Aaron Alexander; her parents, Harry and Bertha Bisel; along with her five sisters and five brothers two sons-in-law, Karl Flanner and Wes Woellhof and many friends and family members.
Funeral services will be held at 10:30 A.M. Friday, March 25th at the Parkway Church of God (Holiness). Burial will follow in the Memory Gardens Cemetery. The family will receive friends from 5:30 to 7:30 Thursday evening at the Parkway Church of God (Holiness). Memorials are suggested to Integrity Hospice or the Fort Scott Christian Heights Building Fund and may be left in care of the Cheney Witt Chapel, 201 S. Main, P.O. Box 347, Ft. Scott, KS 66701. Words of remembrance may be submitted to the online guestbook at cheneywitt.com.
The closing of Mercy Hospital Fort Scott in 2018, left the community lacking emergency care. The community was apprehensive about the closure because the nearest emergency care facilities are in hospitals in Pittsburg, which is 30 miles south or Iola, which is 47 miles west.
History
In 2018, leaders in Bourbon County approached Ascension Via Christi Hospital leaders in Pittsburg to provide continued access to emergency care in the former Mercy Hospital Emergency Room.
After careful deliberation, Ascension determined they would play a role, President Drew Talbot of Ascension Via Christi Hospital said.
Mercy Hospital kept the ER open after the hospital closed on Dec. 31, 2018, until the Ascension Via Christi Fort Scott Emergency Department could get the approval to operate under the Pittsburg hospital licensure. Then Ascension filled the hole in services and saw its first patient on Feb. 28, 2019.
Ascension Via Christi Hospital has imaging and laboratory services at 401 Woodland Hills, Fort Scott.
Services
Since that date, the emergency department has seen more than 16,000 emergency room patients, performed more than 20,000 imaging studies, and processed more than 54,000 lab tests, according to Talbot in an interview.
And they have expanded services.
109 S.Main is the location of Ascension Via Christi’s Medical Clinic in downtown Fort Scott. The photo was taken in January 2020.
“We subsequently opened a primary care and prenatal clinic with a local provider and later added a second provider to meet the community need,” Talbot said. “When our hospital in Pittsburg successfully recruited David Robbins, MD, and Justin Ogden, MD, we further expanded the services offered at our Fort Scott clinic to include cardiology and orthopedics.”
“We utilize the same laboratory used by our Ascension Via Christi hospitals throughout Kansas,” Talbot said. “We have on-site diagnostic imaging capabilities, including CT, digital X-ray, ultrasound, and most recently-cardiac echo ultrasound. As part of Ascension Via Christi, these images are read by a Kansas group of 30 board-certified radiologists with advanced training in a variety of areas, providing our Fort Scott ER and Pittsburg hospital with diagnostic capabilities on par with those of a large metro-area hospital.”
They currently have 35 associates serving in Fort Scott, he said.
Future
“We have an agreement with Bourbon County (Commissioners)that will take us to February 2023 and we hope to continue to offer our services in Fort Scott for as long as there is an unmet need,” Talbot said.
“We are proud of the sustainable model of care that we have established,” Talbot said.
“While we understand Bourbon County leaders’ desire to explore the viability of returning to a community hospital model, (see: Noble Health Announces Reopening a Hospital in Fort Scott) our lived experience as the community’s emergency care provider indicates that the volumes are too low to do so without federal or local taxpayer funding,” he said.
“However, as a department of our hospital in Pittsburg, we have demonstrated that we can operate an ER and supporting services in a financially sustainable manner,” he said. “We have an essentially self-supporting model of care and we are proud of our caregivers’ contribution to patients and families and to Fort Scott’s growth and development.”
Via Christi is working on securing a facility to continue to expand its services once the Feb. 2023 agreement is completed.
“We recognize and appreciate the need for patients and families to receive close-to-home care whenever there is sufficient demand to support services,” he said. “That’s what led us to respond to the community’s needs when Mercy closed its doors. Our clinics have received tremendous community support. We are already looking to expand the availability and types of services being offered. With that in mind, we are working on securing a long-term home where we can offer these and potentially other needed services under one roof.”
Precedent
“We accepted the community’s invitation to serve because ensuring Kansans’ access to care is in keeping with our mission as a non-profit Catholic healthcare system,” Talbot said. “It also has historical precedent, given that Ascension Via Christi Hospital in Pittsburg was founded by the Sisters of St. Joseph nearly 120 years ago at the request of Mt. Carmel Coal Mining Co. founder CharlesDevlin, who recognized miners’ need for close-to-home care.”
