A judge said the Catholic Diocese and its bishop can go on trial. A school district had to wait for results of its board election. And the post-season finally ended for KU. Steve Bell revisits those and other top stories of the week on KCUR's Saturday News Review.
Kentucky bests the Jayhawks
Fans had no hard feelings over KU's 67-59 loss to Kentucky in the NCAA men's championship game in New Orleans. After all, this was a team that at the beginning of the season was never expected to even come close to the Final Four. Coach Bill Self's comment was: “We didn't lose, they just beat us. I'm really proud of this team.”
Weber out at Illinois, in at K-State
Meanwhile, freshly fired Bruce Weber, who was Self's replacement at Illinois, signed on to fill the vacancy left by Frank Martin as head coach at Kansas State
Green gets contract, write-ins slow election results
The Kansas City School Board gave Interim Superintendent Dr. Steve Green a four year contract just in time for the school board election.
Results of that election were still up in the air at week's end because all candidates in all races but one were write-ins. In the one race with candidates on the printed ballot, challenger John Hile defeated incumbent Arthur Benson.
Council says “no,” Peace Planters will be back
The Kansas City city council voted not to send the voters an initiative that would forbid future city involvement in plants that make nuclear weapons parts. The city attorney had deemed parts of it unconstitutional.
Committees had tried twice to rewrite the initiative so it would be legal, but decided in the end that any rewrite should come from the group that circulated the petitions. Peace Planters said they'll rewrite and collect signatures again.
Diocese and bishop to be tried
Judge John Torrence ruled that the law on reporting suspected child sex abuse is not unconstitutionally vague, as attorneys for the Kansas City-St.Joseph and Bishop Robert Finn had asserted. The ruling means prosecutors can bring the diocese and the bishop to trial for failure to report allegations involving priest Shawn Ratigan.
Sierra Club warns KCK utility board
Environmentalists threatened the Kansas City, Kansas Board of Public Utilities with a lawsuit over two coal-fired KCK power plants. Scott Allegrucci of the Sierra Club said the pollution control equipment at the two plants has been outdated for years. The Sierra Club warned the BPU: that it it did not order changes made within 60 days it will sue.
Hope for higher ed and blind in MO budget
Leaders in the Missouri Senate made progress on the budget, predicting that they won't cut funding for higher education or an assistance program for the blind. The Appropriations committee says the blind program is likely to be spared at the expense of cuts to other social services.
Kansas courts to close on Fridays
The Kansas Legislature's failure to produce a budget before they went on Spring Break caused the state's chief justice to announce that system employees will be furloughed every other Friday starting April 13th.