Roundabout centerpiece?

Seems like something attractive should go in the center of the roundabout? Here's a poll of choices that come to mind

a) Landscaping - flowers/plants
b) Gary Kahle sculpture (He does the shiny metal pieces you see around town)
c) Bull dog statue
d) Fountain
e) Other

Round we go ....

The new, big traffic circle at Kansas Avenue and Bypass opens tomorrow. I personally like roundabouts, but you here a lot of criticism and uncertainty about them. Basically, everybody goes slow enough, kind of like a parking to avoid wrecks or make wrecks minor fender benders.

Property taxes

This story in the Eagle showed the Sedgwick County property owners don't have that high of a tax burden compare to the rest of the country, and even the rest of Kansas. You hear a lot of complaints about property taxes in Kansas, and Cowley County, especially as it compare to Oklahoma. Unfortunately this study did not include counties with populations under 60,000. It did show that Kansas ranks 26 in terms of property tax burden, which is right in the middle, which doesn't sound too out of line.

Public Plan Debate

Liberal Democrats are pushing for the public insurance plan. This seems a bit fruittless considering there aren't enough Democrats, much less Republican, Senators to vote for it. Hopefully the debate will highlight the problem of costs, which are burying small businesses and workers.

Health care watch

Another year, another 20 percent hike in health insurance cost. Our newspaper company's insurance rep. says they want 20 percent increases for the same coverage. A public health insurance option, similar to Medicare, to compete with these monopolies sounds pretty good right now.

More smoking ban benefits

Public smoking bans apparently reduce heart attacks, study shows. The reasons to ban smoking keep mounting. It's only a matter of time before the state bans public smoking. It would be nice, though, if Ark City were ahead of the curve...eh em, City Commission.

Bill heart Obama

Conservative bloviator Bill O'Reilly, like most Americans (according to scientific opinion polls) would like to see a public insurance option.

Health reform watch

A new studysays 35-44,000 Americans die each year from lack of health insurance.

Obama derrangment syndrome

Sanity from the right.

Racist undertow?

Jimmy Carter says Joe Wilson's outburst, and some of the harsher attacks on Obama, are fueled by people disdainful of a black man in the white house. Seems pretty obvious that racism is an element of the opposition, but how much is hard to say.

Ren-again?

Heather Ferguson outlined the upsides of the Renaissance Festival last month, which lost a lot of money but had good crowds and was, speaking as an attendee, pretty neat and kid friendly. With tax money scarce, though, I'm sure elected officials would question continued support for this event.

Ark City Industries

Union State Bank owner Bill Docking was nominated to the board of AC Industries earlier this month. This is a significant development because of the perception that AC Industries is arm of Home National Bank and works for the interest of its board members. Bill's presence gives ACI more legitimacy when it claims to advocate and pursue projects for the good of the overall community — aka home improvement stores and TIFF bonds.

Sensible on speech

Winfield schools met to discuss the speech controvery and decided to let teachers show it, if it fit into their schedule and allow parents to take students out of they wanted.

Andrew Lawson blog

City reporter Andrew Lawson has started a blog. It provides some good info on stuff that doesn't quite make the paper, such as the rumor that the Kansas Ave. railroad underpass project was scraped. View it here.

School sanity

Finally some sense of reason on the right on this school speech flap.

Stimulus effect

Editors of the Wall Street Journal approved this story on the success of the stimulus plan. Socialism, or sincere attempt to boost economic activity?

School dazed

Some people are raising a stink about Obama making an address about the importance of education to school children. With the birthers and communist conspiracy theories out there, it does seem a noticeable sliver of the American public has broken from reasonable society and lost any sense of diplomacy. I suppose these are the folks who circulated the Obama is a Muslim and baby killer lies during the campaign. They were chastened by defeat, but now are full throated since the shine has worn off the new President.

Too bad

A second downtown institution falls this year, Bryant's Hardware being the first. In this economy, people aren't buying high dollar stuff like cars and furniture much, although we don't know the reason yet Bob is closing. I do know he is a true gentlemen and a solid KU fan! :)

Elections change?

I like Steve Archer's point in this story" about primary elections generating more interest among voters. The $1,000 cost doesn't seem too great for stirring public involvement.