Category: COVID-19

UG Commission extends state of local health emergency

The Unified Government Commission unanimously extended the state of local health emergency through April 1 at the Thursday, Dec. 3, meeting.

Mayor David Alvey said the reason for the commission to consider this was to allow the UG to access federal money.

Jeff Conway, assistant UG counsel, said the UG is aligning itself with the federal government’s dates in this action.

Federal funds can flow to local communities as long as the local communities have a state of emergency in effect, he said.

The resolution that passed stated, “Coordinated vaccination efforts will be necessary to address the spread of variants and to implement the administration of vaccine boosters, and the Unified Government continues to incur significant costs associated with those vaccination efforts.”

Case numbers reported

Wyandotte County reported a cumulative 25,793 cases on Friday, Dec. 3, according to the Unified Government Health Department’s COVID-19 webpage. There were a cumulative total of 388 deaths on Friday.


The Mid-America Regional Council reported 239,177 cumulative cases on Friday in Greater Kansas City, a nine-county area. There was a cumulative total of 3,268 deaths. The daily average of new hospitalizations was 109.

Kansas reported 474,479 cumulative COVID cases with 6,730 deaths on Friday, an increase of 4,712 cases and 25 deaths since Wednesday, according to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.

For information about how to get a vaccine, visit the UG Health Department’s COVID webpage at https://www.wycokck.org/Departments/Health/Communicable-Disease/Coronavirus-COVID-19-Information or call 311.

Vaccine information also is available at www.vaccines.gov.

$9 million available to Kansas residents to restore drinking water service

Kansas households adversely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic may benefit from a new program to help restore or prevent disconnection of drinking water and wastewater services.

The Kansas Department for Children and Families (DCF) is the administrating agency for the Emergency Water Assistance Program (EWAP), a new temporary federal program authorized by the American Rescue Plan of 2021 and the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021.

“The program’s sole focus is to restore or prevent disconnection of water to Kansas households,” DCF Secretary Laura Howard said in a news release. “Kansas was awarded $9 million to support hardworking Kansas households who have gotten behind on their water bills because of the pandemic.”

Once the funding is exhausted, the program will end. Households may apply only one for the program and it is separate from other DCF assistance programs such as the Low-Income Energy Assistance Program (LIEAP).

Applications for EWAP will be available Dec. 1. Kansans are encouraged to visit www.dcf.ks.gov/EWAP for information about qualifying and applying for the program. They may also contact their local DCF Service Center, Office Locator Map – Services (ks.gov).

An EWAP qualifying Kansas household:
• Currently disconnected from drinking water or wastewater services or have received a disconnection notice.
• At least one adult household member must be responsible for drinking water or wastewater costs incurred at the primary residence payable to either the landlord or to the water utility vendor.
• At least one household member must be a U.S. citizen or meet the lawful residency requirements.
• Combined gross income equal to or less than 150% of Federal Poverty Level (FPL).

An important partner for the successful distribution of the funding are water utilities companies in Kansas.

“Public water utility partnership is vital to the success of the water assistance program,” Howard said. “DCF is required to pay the public water utility provider, not the household. The sooner the utility company is in the system, the faster payment will be made on behalf of the household by DCF.”

Water partners are asked to submit a signed water vendor agreement and tax documents that can be found on www.dcf.ks.gov/EWAP.

Federal vaccine mandate for health care workers in 10 states, including Kansas, blocked by judge

by Laura Olson, Kansas Reflector

Washington — Enforcement of the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate for millions of health care workers was blocked in 10 states on Monday, after a ruling by a federal judge in Missouri.

The ruling by U.S. District Judge Matthew Schelp affects the states involved in the lawsuit, which include Kansas, Missouri, Iowa and New Hampshire.

The others are North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Arkansas, Wyoming and Alaska.

At issue is President Joe Biden’s campaign to ensure that workers throughout the country are vaccinated against COVID-19.

Many private sector employees will be required to get vaccinated or undergo weekly tests, while some 17 million health care providers at facilities participating in the federal Medicare and Medicaid health insurance programs must be vaccinated — with no option to choose weekly testing instead.

Under the requirement, health care workers were to be vaccinated by Jan. 4, 2022.

“I continue to encourage Kansans to be vaccinated, but that personal health care decision should be made by each individual and not mandated by any federal government agency,” Schmidt said. “This overreaching, one-size-fits-all mandate would further disrupt and impede the efforts of health care facilities and their employees all across Kansas to provide the care Kansans expect and deserve.”

In his 32-page opinion granting a preliminary injunction while the lawsuit proceeds, Schelp wrote that the state attorneys general challenging the mandate appear likely to succeed in their argument that federal health officials lack the authority to implement the requirement.

He also agreed with claims from the plaintiffs that health care facilities will suffer staffing shortages due to the requirement.

“The public has an interest in stopping the spread of COVID. No one disputes that,” wrote Schelp, who was nominated by President Donald Trump in 2019, in the 32-page opinion. “But the court concludes that the public would suffer little, if any, harm from maintaining the ‘status quo’ through the litigation of this case.”

In a statement after the ruling, Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt said he encouraged vaccination for Kansans, but “that personal health care decision should be made by each individual and not mandated by any federal government agency.”

“This overreaching, one-size-fits-all mandate would further disrupt and impede the efforts of health care facilities and their employees all across Kansas to provide the care Kansans expect and deserve,” Schmidt added.

Several other lawsuits from states are pending in federal courts, challenging both the mandate on health care workers and the broader mandate on most private sector employees.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters Monday that the administration is “obviously going to abide by the law and fight any efforts in courts or otherwise” to prevent health care facilities from protecting their work forces.

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/2021/11/29/federal-vaccine-mandate-for-health-care-workers-in-10-states-including-kansas-blocked-by-judge/