Month: February 2022

UG committees to meet Monday night

The Unified Government Public Works and Safety Committee will meet at 5 p.m. Monday, Feb. 28, with discussion of some grant programs on the agenda.

The meeting will be followed by the UG Administration and Human Services Committee, which will include an amendment to the Community Development annual action plan.

According to the agenda, the proposal for the CD plan is to reallocate $400,000 in funding from public facility projects in the Park Drive Neighborhood Revitalization Strategy Area to an unforeseen public facility project to address the safety and habitability of the county’s only domestic violence shelter. The remaining $170,000 budgeted for NRSA projects is anticipated to be used to install a new disc-golf course at City Park, according to the agenda.

Items on the Public Works and Safety Committee agenda include:

• Approval to submit Mid-America Regional Council grants for 2025-2026, submitted by the public works department. The deadline for the pre-application is April 1, 2022.

• Approval of a National Oceanic and Atmosphereic Administration grant application for environmental literacy and climate resiliency.

• Discussion of the Capital Maintenance Improvement Project weighting system, which is a scoring system for capital improvement projects.

• A resolution to purchase 21 debrifibrillators, 21 reusable sensors and 33 case review subscriiptions over four years for a total of $651,289.44.

• An update from the Kansas City, Kansas, Police Department.

Items on the Administration and Human Services Committee agenda include:

• A resolution to amend the Community Development annual action plan to reallocate $400,000 in funding from public facility projects in the Park Drive Neighborhood Revitalization Strategy Area to an unforeseen public facility project to address the safety and habitability of the county’s only domestic violence shelter.

• An update on the Human Services Department.

The meetings will be on Zoom, and are expected to be carried on the UGTV on cable television and on YouTube. The meetings also are expected to available for viewing in the lobby of City Hall.

For more information on how to participate in UG committee meetings, visit
https://www.wycokck.org/Departments/Clerks-Office/Engage-in-Public-Commission-Meeting.

UG agendas are at https://www.wycokck.org/Departments/Clerks-Office/Agendas-Minutes.

Sporting KC drops season opener to Atlanta United, 3-1

Sporting Kansas City (0-1-0, 0 points) opened the 2022 Major League Soccer season with a 3-1 loss at Atlanta United FC (1-0-0, 3 points) on Sunday.

Daniel Salloi struck for Sporting late in the second half, however goals from Luiz Araujo, Dom Dwyer and Caleb Wiley propelled the hosts to the week 1 win in front of 67,523 fans at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta – the largest crowd for an MLS match involving Sporting KC.

Sporting nearly opened the scoring in the 12th minute as offseason addition Logan Ndenbe won a free kick on the left flank and Remi Walter floated the set-piece service into the box.

Atlanta goalkeeper Brad Guzan came off his line to punch away the delivery but failed to significantly alter the flight of the ball, which fell to Andreu Fontas at the backpost. The Spanish centerback settled and sent a shot toward net, however Atlanta defender George Campbell recovered to clear the ball at the goalline.

In the 20th minute, Atlanta capitalized on a giveaway in Sporting’s own half to grab the 1-0 lead. Tyler Wolff, the 19-year-old son of Sporting Legend Josh Wolff, earned his first MLS assist as he played a pass to Josef Martinez, whose backheel set up Araujo for his fifth regular season goal since the Brazilian signed as a designated player last summer from Lille.

Araujo would exit with an injury minutes later as Dwyer entered the match to face the club which he played his first six professional seasons with from 2012-2017. Dwyer, who signed with Atlanta earlier in the week, would make the most of the opportunity, doubling the Five Stripes’ lead in first half stoppage time on another assist from Martinez.

Sporting – who had come close to leveling the match twice prior to conceding, first with a left-footed shot from Remi Walter in the 37th minute and again on a goalmouth scramble at the start of first half stoppage time – would be forced into a substitution in the 50th minute as Jose Mauri replaced Uri Rosell, who exited early due to injury in his first appearance for the club since 2014 after returning to the team this offseason.

Both sides would continue to create scoring chances in a back-and-forth second half. Atlanta threatened to find a third goal in the 54th minute if not for an important intervention by Nicolas Isimat-Mirin with a superb block to deflect Martinez’s first-time effort from 15 yards out over the bar. In the 67th minute, Salloi supplied Khiry Shelton with a well-weighted pass inside the penalty area, however Shelton’s shot was ultimately off target.

Dwyer, whose goal was his first in the MLS regular season since 2019, almost bagged a brace in the 77th minute, connecting with a cross from second-half substitute Brooks Lennon only to see his sliding shot roll wide of the net under pressure from Tim Melia. The Sporting goalkeeper was called into action again three minutes later to keep out a free kick taken by Marcelino Moreno.

Sporting cut the 2-0 deficit in half with five minutes remaining in regulation as Salloi hammered home a volley on a corner kick taken by fellow Sporting KC Academy product Felipe Hernandez.

Coming off a career-year as an MLS All-Star and MLS MVP finalist, it marks the second straight year Salloi has scored in the club’s season opener. Salloi now has 32 regular season goals to go along with 18 assists, making him only the 11th player in team history to contributed a combined 50 goals and assists for the club.

With the visitors pushing forward in pursuit of a last-gasp equalizer, it was Atlanta that struck instead as 17-year-old Caleb Wiley scored on his MLS debut.

The homegrown player raced onto a through ball from Moreno and put the game out of reach in the 89th minute. Atlanta would be denied a fourth goal in second half stoppage time as Melia made his third and final save of the day in a one-on-one situation with Brooks Lennon.

Sporting will now return to Kansas City for the club’s highly anticipated home opener against Houston Dynamo FC at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 5, at Children’s Mercy Park, Kansas City, Kansas.

Tickets are available online at SeatGeek.com and the Western Conference showdown will be nationally televised on Univision and TUDN with an English-language stream available on Twitter in addition to the club’s local broadcast airing on 38 The Spot.

  • Story from Sporting KC

Johnson County teachers push back against avalanche of K-12 education reform bills

Educators argue political intrusion undermines public schools

by Tim Carpenter, Kansas Reflector

Olathe — Prairie Trail Middle School teacher Kelly Ruiz despairs about the bundle of bills under consideration by the Kansas Legislature based on the premise of educational malfeasance in K-12 public schools.

Republican House and Senate members have demonstrated interest in shifting more public tax dollars to private schools, highlighting struggles of public school students during the COVID-19 pandemic, denouncing teachers for allegedly advancing critical race theory, raising the possibility to labeling as offensive or removing library materials, weakening student vaccination programs, imposing broad mandates on publication of curriculum materials to an online database and imposing a parental bill of rights.

“We have to stop the legislation,” Ruiz said during a forum Saturday in Olathe. “It undermines what we do in the classroom. It disrespects and disregards us as professionals. Trust us. We know what saves kids. We know what inspires kids.”

Rep. Kristey Williams, a Republican who chairs the House K-12 Education Budget Committee, and Sen. Molly Baumgardner, the Republican chairwoman of the Senate Education Committee, have been working on the bulk of bills some educators find objectionable. Much of that legislative agenda is expected to be considered by lawmakers during the second half of the annual session that starts Tuesday.

“There is one central question that I try to circle back to when considering importing policy as chair of the House’s K-12 Education Budget Committee: What is best for kids?” Williams said. “With that central theme of kids first, or kids before systems, our committee has heard four bills providing more school choice, both public and private choices.”

In the November school board elections in Johnson County, issues of critical race theory, mask mandates during the pandemic and transparency of school district officials were prominent themes raised by candidates and disgruntled parents.

Annie Goodson, a Blue Valley West High School teacher, said during the forum she was concerned about willingness of young teachers to stick with education careers given challenges posed by COVID-19 and eagerness of politicians to leave a heavy footprint on an education system in Kansas serving about 500,000 students.

“They’re entering a pretty hostile atmosphere right now,” Goodson said.

Olathe third-grade teacher Jeremie Tharp, who is in her 18th year as an educator, said assertions public school teachers were lazy, biased or in the profession to indoctrinate children were wrong.

She said she’d sacrificed parts of her own young family — a third-grade son and sixth-grade daughter — to place her in a better position to impact the lives of students at Pleasant Ridge Elementary. At times, she said, it’s not clear she has the stamina to push through to the next year.

Tharp keeps a “smile file” of notes from parents and students that document how she made a difference even when things didn’t go as planned.

“It is where Hudson told me I am his most favorite teacher of all, and Everly said that every day when she walks into class, the thing she likes most is me. It’s where Maggie wrote that in my classroom is the only place she feels like she is home and can rest, and Avery told me I was her best friend.”

Matthew Shulman, a social studies teacher at Blue Valley Northwest High School, said the quest of some politicians to be confrontational with public school educators would result in quality people turning away from the profession or prompting experienced teachers to resign.

“Instead of pushing people away,” he said, “we need to somehow find a way to support our teachers.”

Kansas Reflector stories, www.kansasreflector.com, may be republished online or in print under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
See more at https://kansasreflector.com/2022/02/27/johnson-county-teachers-push-back-against-avalanche-of-k-12-education-reform-bills/.