COWLEY COUNTY—Law enforcement authorities are investigating an armed robbery and have released security camera images of the suspect.

On Monday, police were dispatched to Check Into Cash in the 100 block of west 13th&nbsp;Avenue in Winfield for a report of an armed robbery, according to a media release.

Officers responded and information was developed that a man entered the store, displayed a weapon, demanded money from the employees and fled the store with an undisclosed amount of cash.

Witnesses in the area reported the suspect left the scene in a silver Sport Utility Vehicle and was last seen northbound on Manning Street. 

During the investigation officers located clothing along side Country Club Road in Winfield that are believed to have been worn by the suspect during the robbery.

The suspect was described as a white male approximately six feet tall wearing blue University of Kansas sweatshirt, black sweatpants, a hat, glasses, and a surgical type mask.

Anyone with information regarding this incident are encouraged to call the Winfield Police Department (620) 221-5556, the Cowley County Dispatch Center (after hours) (620) 221-5555. Anyone wishing to provide information and remain anonymous can also submit information through Cowley County Crime stoppers at (620) 221-7777.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606251922746.png" alt="Photos Winfield Police" />
 <figcaption>Photos Winfield Police</figcaption>
 </figure>COWLEY COUNTY—Law enforcement authorities are investigating an armed robbery and have released security camera images of the suspect.On Monday, police were dispatched to Check Into Cash in the 100 block of west 13th&nbsp;Avenue in Winfield for a report of an armed robbery, according to a media release.Officers responded and information was developed that a man entered the store, displayed a weapon, demanded money from the employees and fled the store with an undisclosed amount of cash.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606251984409.png" alt="" />
 <figcaption></figcaption>
 </figure>Witnesses in the area reported the suspect left the scene in a silver Sport Utility Vehicle and was last seen northbound on Manning Street. During the investigation officers located clothing along side Country Club Road in Winfield that are believed to have been worn by the suspect during the robbery.The suspect was described as a white male approximately six feet tall wearing blue University of Kansas sweatshirt, black sweatpants, a hat, glasses, and a surgical type mask.Anyone with information regarding this incident are encouraged to call the Winfield Police Department (620) 221-5556, the Cowley County Dispatch Center (after hours) (620) 221-5555. Anyone wishing to provide information and remain anonymous can also submit information through Cowley County Crime stoppers at (620) 221-7777.

Police work to ID suspect in Kan. loan store armed robbery

TOPEKA —&nbsp;Kansas Governor Laura Kelly welcomed the stage coach delivering the Christmas Tree to Cedar Crest Tuesday morning.

On social media, the Governor wrote, " This holiday season is a little different, but we’re still carrying on the tradition of receiving the Cedar Crest Christmas tree and wreath."

"Thanks to <a href="https://twitter.com/KSForestService">@KSForestService</a> and Kansas Christmas Tree Growers Association, and to <a href="https://twitter.com/Trees4Troops">@Trees4Troops</a> for your donations."

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606245468089.png" alt="Gov. Laura Kelly wore a mask to welcome the tree and wreath -photos courtesy office of Kansas governor." />
 <figcaption>Gov. Laura Kelly wore a mask to welcome the tree and wreath -photos courtesy office of Kansas governor.</figcaption>
 </figure>TOPEKA —&nbsp;Kansas Governor Laura Kelly welcomed the stage coach delivering the Christmas Tree to Cedar Crest Tuesday morning.On social media, the Governor wrote, " This holiday season is a little different, but we’re still carrying on the tradition of receiving the Cedar Crest Christmas tree and wreath."<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606245436240.png" alt="Santa wore a mask to help deliver the tree on Tuesday." />
 <figcaption>Santa wore a mask to help deliver the tree on Tuesday.</figcaption>
 </figure>"Thanks to <a href="https://twitter.com/KSForestService">@KSForestService</a> and Kansas Christmas Tree Growers Association, and to <a href="https://twitter.com/Trees4Troops">@Trees4Troops</a> for your donations."

Governor welcomes Christmas tree to Cedar Crest

By BRIAN GRIMMETT <a href="https://www.kmuw.org/post/three-kansans-share-heartbreaking-pain-lost-thanksgiving">Kansas News Service</a>

WICHITA&nbsp;— Coronavirus cases are at record levels. Just in time to pretty much ruin Thanksgiving.

In
 Kansas, those cases have hospitals worried about having enough space or
 staff. That’s prompted local, state and federal officials to urge 
people to just stay home.

We spoke with three Kansans about their decisions to cancel trips to see family — and the loss that represents.

We edited the interviews for clarity and length.

Sara
 Simpson is a veterinarian who lives in Basehor, Kansas. She’s 
originally from New Jersey, but has lived in Kansas since about 2013.

Kansas News Service: Do you go back and see family for Thanksgiving every year?

You know, we would plan to see all of our friends and different family members.

So,
 every day we were doing something family-oriented or friend-oriented. 
We would always make sure we had a date night in New York city where we 
could go have a nice dinner with friends.

SS: This
 year was supposed to be my family in New Jersey. And, of course, we 
were looking forward to it. But with everything that’s going on with 
COVID, we’ve been having this conversation for a couple months now, you 
know, is it safe to go, both for us and for everyone else?

KNS: What were the discussions with your family like?

SS: It was a lot of back and forth, both inside my head and those actual conversations.

And
 there were some tears and, you know, from me and from my parents and I 
think the biggest consideration was, can we do this safely?

We’re
 just not able to quarantine for two weeks before we go anywhere. And 
even if we do now, we either have to fly, so, we're going to the 
airport, coming in contact with all those people, or we would be driving
 and having to stay at a hotel and stop for gas.

To me, the risk 
of, obviously, I worry about myself, but the risk of exposing my family 
and potentially, you know, you don't know how sick someone's going to 
get. So that was the biggest consideration for us was can we keep 
everybody safe and do this in a safe and responsible way?

KNS: How did it make you feel to have to make this kind of sacrifice?

SS:
 I’m really sad. There are intermittent tears when I start thinking 
about it. You see those cheesy Hallmark Thanksgiving movies and all that
 on TV and I have to quickly turn it off because you start thinking 
about all the things you’re going to miss, but I think it's a small 
sacrifice.

My parents haven't seen my son since last Thanksgiving, other than like Skyping and things like that.

So
 it's sad to think that they're missing out on this time. But I would 
rather have to miss this and make that sacrifice, that small sacrifice 
now, compared to what some other people (have) sacrificed during all of 
this, and then get to see everybody healthy and happy.

KNS: Do you have any negative feelings for people who choose to go ahead with large family Thanksgiving celebrations?

SS:
 It feels a little selfish. I don’t want to judge people for making the 
decisions that they make. But, unfortunately with something like COVID, 
those decisions don’t only affect them and the people they’re seeing in 
their homes.

If they pick up COVID and they don’t know it and 
then they’re out and about or traveling and stopping at various places 
and what have you, it then becomes an issue for everyone they come in 
contact with.

All I want to do is give my family a hug. You know,
 and we can’t do that right now. But I keep telling myself that if we 
keep doing what we’re supposed to be doing, follow public health 
guidelines, it won’t be too long before we can hug them again.

Christopher “Chip” Redmond lives in St. George, Kansas.

KNS: What do you typically do for Thanksgiving?

Christopher Redmond: We either travel to one side of the family or the other. We are never at home, we are never in Kansas for the holidays.

CR:
 You know, it was a difficult choice and we've been kind of going back 
and forth with it. The plan was we were going to make the 12-hour trek 
this year, but it's not worth it.

Neither our families have had recent exposures or anyone's sick, which is good. And we'd like to keep it that way.

KNS:
 So, what kind of deliberations went into your decision? It is tempting 
to think, well, it will only just be a few of us, it won’t be that big 
of a deal.

CR: It was stressful. More than I ever thought it would be. It put a lot of weight on us.

(My
 parents) were open if we wanted to come and I think that made it more 
difficult for us, because it put more weight on our shoulders to make 
that decision.

But as cases have risen in the last few weeks, I 
think it’s started to become easier for everyone. It’s obvious that this
 is spinning out of control.

KNS: Were there any hard feelings from your parents?

CR:&nbsp;They
 are more at ease, like, OK, let's find a way to make this fun. It's 
more of, we can have a good time and we can make this not necessarily a 
new tradition, but we could find, we could still carry on a lot of the 
old traditions.

KNS: Are there any positives that are coming out of this?

CR:
 It’s easy to focus on negatives, but there are some big positives. 
We’re helping out the local economy. We drove away every year. Manhattan
 and the area is a college town, a military town, and so now all those 
people that would typically be leaving town are now buying stuff and 
staying in town.

You also don’t have to worry about traveling for
 12 hours and all the other people on the road. And I think in the long 
run we’ll end up having better discussions with family because you’re 
not sick and tired of being with them for 24 hours, 48 hours. You get 
trapped with them.

KNS: Do you have any thoughts about people who are deciding to gather anyway?

CR: I understand it. We’re all human. But, for the love of Pete, just be smart about it.

Maybe
 don’t go anywhere for a couple of weeks after that. Take a safety 
protocol after that and lock yourself down. If it’s really that 
important to you, then don’t do anything the next two weeks.

Sarah Bunn is a Kansas transplant from northern Illinois. She’s lived in Kansas for about 11 years.

Kansas News Service: So if you’re a transplant, does that mean you have family still in other states?

Sarah Bunn: My entire family, basically, is in Northern Illinois and some of them are in southern Wisconsin.

KNS: Are you traveling to see them this year? And how did you decide?

SB:
 My mother works in health care. My aunt works in health care. There was
 just a general consensus among us that traveling is probably not the 
best idea.

We’ll do something, but all physically being in the same place is just not feasible this year.

KNS: How hard was it to just say, “we can’t get together this year?”

SB: It’s heartbreaking for me. I told my husband I 
think the hardest thing about this whole period for me is that I can 
talk to my mom, and we FaceTime a lot. But if I‘m not physically in the 
same room with my mother at least like once every three months, I suffer
 for that.

It’s heartbreaking, too, because I have an almost 
2-year-old, and my sister has one who just turned one and that age is so
 hard because they go so fast. So, by the time I see my niece again in 
person, or my mom sees her granddaughter again in person, it’s a 
completely different baby.

KNS: Have you come up with any alternatives to gathering in person?

SB: We
 talked about doing a Zoom. I think that would be fun, but we tried to 
do a Zoom happy hour in the beginning (of the pandemic) and in the end I
 think two of my cousins hung up so mad at people were talking over each
 other and my mom and my aunt in the same room joining the call from two
 different devices and it’s just like, ‘Hang up and just go walk over 
there.’

KNS: How much is this impacting you and your children? Do they notice how crazy it all is?

SB:&nbsp;“So,
 my 8-year-old will say, ‘When, can we go to Grandma's? When the virus 
is better, can we go to Grandma's?’ And that’s heartbreaking, you know?

That's
 what I worry about the most when it comes to doing the holidays in this
 new normal is that I feel like I try to make it so much for them. And 
there's so much of the tradition that we're just not going to do this 
year because it's just not safe.

My daughter is doing full remote
 school and she’s in third grade and she had to write a paper about 
traditions and she had to pick a family tradition and she was trying to 
kind of think of one. And it was like everything we came up with was 
like, ‘Oh, we're not doing that this year.’

That, for me, is the 
hardest part. How do I make this special for them without what we would 
normally consider to be a tradition. I’m not sure yet how I’m going to 
do that. I haven’t really had time to sit down and plan what we’re going
 to do instead.

KNS: Why do you think these sacrifices are worth it?

SB: For
 me, it's just a cost-benefit analysis. As much as I would really, 
really love to see my mom. And like I said, I need to be in the same 
room with her every once in a while. My husband even said, you know, if 
you want her to come and she takes a test before and she wears all of 
this stuff and wears an N95 (mask) on the plane and all of that. But for
 me, it's just not worth the risk. Right?

I just don’t feel like I
 could ever forgive myself if we were to bend the rules a little bit and
 go travel or something and something bad happened. You know, maybe 
everything would be fine, but what if it wasn’t, you know how do we live
 with that?

Brian Grimmett reports on the environment, energy
 and natural resources for KMUW in Wichita and the Kansas News Service. 
You can follow him on Twitter @briangrimmett or email him at grimmett@kmuw.org.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606162058430.png" alt=" Thanksgiving turkey just out of the oven. Brian Grimmett / Kansas News Service" />
 <figcaption> Thanksgiving turkey just out of the oven. Brian Grimmett / Kansas News Service</figcaption>
 </figure>By BRIAN GRIMMETT <a href="https://www.kmuw.org/post/three-kansans-share-heartbreaking-pain-lost-thanksgiving">Kansas News Service</a>WICHITA&nbsp;— Coronavirus cases are at record levels. Just in time to pretty much ruin Thanksgiving.In
 Kansas, those cases have hospitals worried about having enough space or
 staff. That’s prompted local, state and federal officials to urge 
people to just stay home.We spoke with three Kansans about their decisions to cancel trips to see family — and the loss that represents.We edited the interviews for clarity and length.<h2>Sara Simpson</h2>Sara
 Simpson is a veterinarian who lives in Basehor, Kansas. She’s 
originally from New Jersey, but has lived in Kansas since about 2013.Kansas News Service: Do you go back and see family for Thanksgiving every year?<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606162137722.png" alt=" Sara Simpson with her father during a holiday visit last year. Credit Sara Simpson" />
 <figcaption> Sara Simpson with her father during a holiday visit last year. Credit Sara Simpson</figcaption>
 </figure>SS: It was always like a big thing.You know, we would plan to see all of our friends and different family members.So,
 every day we were doing something family-oriented or friend-oriented. 
We would always make sure we had a date night in New York city where we 
could go have a nice dinner with friends.KNS: What does this year look like?SS: This
 year was supposed to be my family in New Jersey. And, of course, we 
were looking forward to it. But with everything that’s going on with 
COVID, we’ve been having this conversation for a couple months now, you 
know, is it safe to go, both for us and for everyone else?KNS: What were the discussions with your family like?SS: It was a lot of back and forth, both inside my head and those actual conversations.And
 there were some tears and, you know, from me and from my parents and I 
think the biggest consideration was, can we do this safely?We’re
 just not able to quarantine for two weeks before we go anywhere. And 
even if we do now, we either have to fly, so, we're going to the 
airport, coming in contact with all those people, or we would be driving
 and having to stay at a hotel and stop for gas.To me, the risk 
of, obviously, I worry about myself, but the risk of exposing my family 
and potentially, you know, you don't know how sick someone's going to 
get. So that was the biggest consideration for us was can we keep 
everybody safe and do this in a safe and responsible way?KNS: How did it make you feel to have to make this kind of sacrifice?SS:
 I’m really sad. There are intermittent tears when I start thinking 
about it. You see those cheesy Hallmark Thanksgiving movies and all that
 on TV and I have to quickly turn it off because you start thinking 
about all the things you’re going to miss, but I think it's a small 
sacrifice.My parents haven't seen my son since last Thanksgiving, other than like Skyping and things like that.So
 it's sad to think that they're missing out on this time. But I would 
rather have to miss this and make that sacrifice, that small sacrifice 
now, compared to what some other people (have) sacrificed during all of 
this, and then get to see everybody healthy and happy.KNS: Do you have any negative feelings for people who choose to go ahead with large family Thanksgiving celebrations?SS:
 It feels a little selfish. I don’t want to judge people for making the 
decisions that they make. But, unfortunately with something like COVID, 
those decisions don’t only affect them and the people they’re seeing in 
their homes.If they pick up COVID and they don’t know it and 
then they’re out and about or traveling and stopping at various places 
and what have you, it then becomes an issue for everyone they come in 
contact with.All I want to do is give my family a hug. You know,
 and we can’t do that right now. But I keep telling myself that if we 
keep doing what we’re supposed to be doing, follow public health 
guidelines, it won’t be too long before we can hug them again.<h2>Christopher Redmond</h2>Christopher “Chip” Redmond lives in St. George, Kansas.KNS: What do you typically do for Thanksgiving?Christopher Redmond: We either travel to one side of the family or the other. We are never at home, we are never in Kansas for the holidays.KNS: What’s the plan for this year?CR:
 You know, it was a difficult choice and we've been kind of going back 
and forth with it. The plan was we were going to make the 12-hour trek 
this year, but it's not worth it.Neither our families have had recent exposures or anyone's sick, which is good. And we'd like to keep it that way.KNS:
 So, what kind of deliberations went into your decision? It is tempting 
to think, well, it will only just be a few of us, it won’t be that big 
of a deal.CR: It was stressful. More than I ever thought it would be. It put a lot of weight on us.(My
 parents) were open if we wanted to come and I think that made it more 
difficult for us, because it put more weight on our shoulders to make 
that decision.But as cases have risen in the last few weeks, I 
think it’s started to become easier for everyone. It’s obvious that this
 is spinning out of control.KNS: Were there any hard feelings from your parents?CR:&nbsp;They
 are more at ease, like, OK, let's find a way to make this fun. It's 
more of, we can have a good time and we can make this not necessarily a 
new tradition, but we could find, we could still carry on a lot of the 
old traditions.KNS: Are there any positives that are coming out of this?CR:
 It’s easy to focus on negatives, but there are some big positives. 
We’re helping out the local economy. We drove away every year. Manhattan
 and the area is a college town, a military town, and so now all those 
people that would typically be leaving town are now buying stuff and 
staying in town.You also don’t have to worry about traveling for
 12 hours and all the other people on the road. And I think in the long 
run we’ll end up having better discussions with family because you’re 
not sick and tired of being with them for 24 hours, 48 hours. You get 
trapped with them.KNS: Do you have any thoughts about people who are deciding to gather anyway?CR: I understand it. We’re all human. But, for the love of Pete, just be smart about it.Maybe
 don’t go anywhere for a couple of weeks after that. Take a safety 
protocol after that and lock yourself down. If it’s really that 
important to you, then don’t do anything the next two weeks.<h2>Sarah Bunn</h2>Sarah Bunn is a Kansas transplant from northern Illinois. She’s lived in Kansas for about 11 years.Kansas News Service: So if you’re a transplant, does that mean you have family still in other states?Sarah Bunn: My entire family, basically, is in Northern Illinois and some of them are in southern Wisconsin.KNS: Are you traveling to see them this year? And how did you decide?SB:
 My mother works in health care. My aunt works in health care. There was
 just a general consensus among us that traveling is probably not the 
best idea.We’ll do something, but all physically being in the same place is just not feasible this year.KNS: How hard was it to just say, “we can’t get together this year?”<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606162183904.png" alt="Credit Sarah Bunn" />
 <figcaption>Credit Sarah Bunn</figcaption>
 </figure>SB: It’s heartbreaking for me. I told my husband I 
think the hardest thing about this whole period for me is that I can 
talk to my mom, and we FaceTime a lot. But if I‘m not physically in the 
same room with my mother at least like once every three months, I suffer
 for that.It’s heartbreaking, too, because I have an almost 
2-year-old, and my sister has one who just turned one and that age is so
 hard because they go so fast. So, by the time I see my niece again in 
person, or my mom sees her granddaughter again in person, it’s a 
completely different baby.KNS: Have you come up with any alternatives to gathering in person?SB: We
 talked about doing a Zoom. I think that would be fun, but we tried to 
do a Zoom happy hour in the beginning (of the pandemic) and in the end I
 think two of my cousins hung up so mad at people were talking over each
 other and my mom and my aunt in the same room joining the call from two
 different devices and it’s just like, ‘Hang up and just go walk over 
there.’KNS: How much is this impacting you and your children? Do they notice how crazy it all is?SB:&nbsp;“So,
 my 8-year-old will say, ‘When, can we go to Grandma's? When the virus 
is better, can we go to Grandma's?’ And that’s heartbreaking, you know?That's
 what I worry about the most when it comes to doing the holidays in this
 new normal is that I feel like I try to make it so much for them. And 
there's so much of the tradition that we're just not going to do this 
year because it's just not safe.My daughter is doing full remote
 school and she’s in third grade and she had to write a paper about 
traditions and she had to pick a family tradition and she was trying to 
kind of think of one. And it was like everything we came up with was 
like, ‘Oh, we're not doing that this year.’That, for me, is the 
hardest part. How do I make this special for them without what we would 
normally consider to be a tradition. I’m not sure yet how I’m going to 
do that. I haven’t really had time to sit down and plan what we’re going
 to do instead.KNS: Why do you think these sacrifices are worth it?SB: For
 me, it's just a cost-benefit analysis. As much as I would really, 
really love to see my mom. And like I said, I need to be in the same 
room with her every once in a while. My husband even said, you know, if 
you want her to come and she takes a test before and she wears all of 
this stuff and wears an N95 (mask) on the plane and all of that. But for
 me, it's just not worth the risk. Right?I just don’t feel like I
 could ever forgive myself if we were to bend the rules a little bit and
 go travel or something and something bad happened. You know, maybe 
everything would be fine, but what if it wasn’t, you know how do we live
 with that?Brian Grimmett reports on the environment, energy
 and natural resources for KMUW in Wichita and the Kansas News Service. 
You can follow him on Twitter @briangrimmett or email him at grimmett@kmuw.org.

Kansans share the 'heartbreaking' pain of a lost Thanksgiving 

SEDGWICK COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities are investigating a criminal homicide and asking the public for help with information.

On Nov. 18, an individual identified as 29-year-old Jeremy Cook of Wichita was reported missing by his mother, according to Wichita Police Captain Jason Stephens. The case was assigned to the homicide division of the police department, which is typical of all missing person cases, according to Stephens.

Through interviews and follow up investigation, police learned Cook was last seen on Nov. 19 in a 2006 Jeep Grand Cherokee. 

After police communicated information of Cook's disappearance to the public, someone came forward and reported finding the vehicle in the area of Bayley and Armor in Wichita, according to Stephens. When police recovered the vehicle late Monday afternoon, they found Cook dead of a gunshot wound.

Police continue to conduct interviews and are attempting to locate anyone with information about the murder.

SEDGWICK COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating an attempt to locate case involving 29-year-old Jeremy Cook of Wichita and asking for help with information on Cook’s whereabouts, according to officer Charley Davidson.

At approximately 5:30 p.m. on November 19, officers responded to a call in the 800 block of North Belmont in Wichita and spoke to Cook’s family, who reported not being able to contact him.&nbsp;

Cook was last seen at approximately 6a.m. on November 18 and may be traveling in a 2006 white Jeep Grand Cherokee.&nbsp; The Jeep has a broken out sunroof and tape around the passenger side tail light.

Cook is described as 5-foot-9, 185 pounds, blonde hair, blue eyes, glasses, and last seen wearing a blue Nike t-shirt, blue jeans, and brown Nike tennis shoes.

&nbsp;Investigators believe Cook may be in danger.&nbsp; If you know the whereabouts of Cook, the white Jeep, or see them, please call 911 immediately.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606149133035.png" alt="Cook photo Wichita Police" />
 <figcaption>Cook photo Wichita Police</figcaption>
 </figure>SEDGWICK COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities are investigating a criminal homicide and asking the public for help with information.On Nov. 18, an individual identified as 29-year-old Jeremy Cook of Wichita was reported missing by his mother, according to Wichita Police Captain Jason Stephens. The case was assigned to the homicide division of the police department, which is typical of all missing person cases, according to Stephens.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606149202592.png" alt="Cook's jeep photo courtesy Wichita Police" />
 <figcaption>Cook's jeep photo courtesy Wichita Police</figcaption>
 </figure>Through interviews and follow up investigation, police learned Cook was last seen on Nov. 19 in a 2006 Jeep Grand Cherokee. After police communicated information of Cook's disappearance to the public, someone came forward and reported finding the vehicle in the area of Bayley and Armor in Wichita, according to Stephens. When police recovered the vehicle late Monday afternoon, they found Cook dead of a gunshot wound.Police continue to conduct interviews and are attempting to locate anyone with information about the murder.---------SEDGWICK COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating an attempt to locate case involving 29-year-old Jeremy Cook of Wichita and asking for help with information on Cook’s whereabouts, according to officer Charley Davidson.At approximately 5:30 p.m. on November 19, officers responded to a call in the 800 block of North Belmont in Wichita and spoke to Cook’s family, who reported not being able to contact him.&nbsp;Cook was last seen at approximately 6a.m. on November 18 and may be traveling in a 2006 white Jeep Grand Cherokee.&nbsp; The Jeep has a broken out sunroof and tape around the passenger side tail light.Cook is described as 5-foot-9, 185 pounds, blonde hair, blue eyes, glasses, and last seen wearing a blue Nike t-shirt, blue jeans, and brown Nike tennis shoes.&nbsp;Investigators believe Cook may be in danger.&nbsp; If you know the whereabouts of Cook, the white Jeep, or see them, please call 911 immediately.

Homicide: Police find missing Kan. man in his Jeep

By NOMIN UJIYEDIIN <a href="https://www.kcur.org/news/2020-11-23/black-babies-in-kansas-are-twice-as-likely-as-white-kids-to-die-before-their-first-birthday">Kansas News Service</a>

Black and Native American babies in Kansas die at almost twice the rate as white infants in their first year of life.

Out of every 1,000 live births, 11.8 Black and
 10.4 Native American babies die before their first birthdays in Kansas.
 Meanwhile, only 5.6 out of every 1,000 white babies die in that period.

The data from 2013 to 2017 — originally gathered and published by the <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/index.htm" target="_blank">Centers for Disease Control and Prevention</a>, and newly collected in a report from the N<a href="https://www.hopeinitiative.org/" target="_blank">ational Collaborative for Health Equity</a> — suggests that race can be a major factor in a community’s health.

The
 report collects and publishes numerous health measures gathered by 
government surveys over the past decade. It shows Black people and other
 people of color in Kansas are also more likely to live in areas with a 
high density of liquor stores and a greater frequency of robberies and 
homicides.

Those factors can cause stress that can damage the 
health of mothers and their babies, said Gail Christopher, executive 
director of the National Collaborative for Health Equity.

“Safety 
is a very important factor in terms of the perception of health and 
well-being,” Christopher said. “Fear translates into a physiological, 
biochemical stress reaction.”

Black mothers may also have trouble 
getting to doctor’s appointments because they live too far from 
hospitals and other medical providers and because they don’t have 
reliable access to transportation or can’t take time off of work. 
People’s income, education level or neighborhood can also impact whether
 they can even choose healthier behaviors, she said.

“Behavior is 
driven by environment. It’s driven by context,” she said. “If there are 
no grocery stores within your vicinity that sell produce, how are you 
going to make sure that you’re getting in five servings of vegetables a 
day?”

Those factors may also have affected COVID-19’s <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/covid-data/investigations-discovery/hospitalization-death-by-race-ethnicity.html" target="_blank">disproportionate impact</a> on Black, Latino, Asian and Native American communities across the U.S.

In Kansas, <a href="https://www.kcur.org/news/2020-04-23/black-kansans-at-least-7-times-more-likely-to-die-from-coronavirus-than-white-kansans" target="_blank">Black people were more likely to die</a>
 of coronavirus-related causes in the early days of the pandemic, when 
most cases were in urban parts of the state. Now that cases have risen 
in rural counties, the <a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/160/COVID-19-in-Kansas" target="_blank">death rate among Black Kansans</a> lags slightly behind that of white Kansans.

The
 pandemic has especially highlighted the impact that housing and food 
insecurity have on health, Christopher said. Black Kansans are about 
half as likely to own their homes when compared to white Kansans, and 
more likely to spend a large portion of their incomes on housing 
expenses.

Higher rates of illnesses and death can also be the result of racism in medicine, Christopher said.

“Everyone
 in our society carries biases,” she said. “How do we create ways of 
delivering care that help to mitigate the possibility that those biases 
are actually driving our decisions and our outcomes?”

A legacy of 
racism exists not only in society as a whole, but also among medical 
providers who may treat Black patients differently, said Dr. Michelle 
Ogunwole, a physician and health disparities researcher at Johns Hopkins
 University. <a href="https://www.aamc.org/news-insights/how-we-fail-black-patients-pain" target="_blank">Studies show</a> that doctors are less likely to take Black patients’ pain seriously.

“If you feel like something’s wrong, but that people don’t listen to you,” Ogunwole said, “that has implications for outcomes.”

Hospitals that mostly treat Black patients tend to have fewer resources, Ogunwole said. That also leads to<a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22816447/" target="_blank"> poorer health outcomes</a> for <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4698019/" target="_blank">patients at those hospitals</a>, regardless of race.

One possible solution: increasing the number of Black physicians. A 2020 study found that the increase in <a href="https://www.pnas.org/content/117/35/21194" target="_blank">mortality rates for Black babies dropped by half </a>when the children were cared for by Black physicians.

Black
 physicians can also be more effective at educating Black patients about
 their health, Ogunwole said. She said she sometimes uses her own 
experiences as a Black person to relate to her patients.

“I will definitely lean into that identity,” she said. “It ends up being way more effective.”

But medical schools at historically Black colleges and universities have been <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3739050/" target="_blank">less well funded</a>
 than medical schools at historically white colleges. And Black medical 
students can be affected by the same racism and lack of access to care 
that have impacted their patients’ lives.

“Those people have to be supported in a different way,” Ogunwole said, “so they can make it through the pipeline.”

Ultimately,
 Ogunwole said, Black mothers and patients don’t necessarily need to be 
treated by Black doctors, but by people who respect and value them, 
regardless of race.

“(Women) just want to be cared for and for 
people to value them and their children,” she said. “They just want what
 everybody wants, which is to live healthy and full lives.”

Nomin
 Ujiyediin reports on criminal justice and social welfare for the Kansas
 News Service. You can email her at nomin@kcur.org and follow
 her on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/nominuj" target="_blank">@NominUJ</a>.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606170442903.png" alt="About 1% of Black babies in Kansas die before their first birthday. Chris Neal / For the Kansas News Service" />
 <figcaption>About 1% of Black babies in Kansas die before their first birthday. Chris Neal / For the Kansas News Service</figcaption>
 </figure>By NOMIN UJIYEDIIN <a href="https://www.kcur.org/news/2020-11-23/black-babies-in-kansas-are-twice-as-likely-as-white-kids-to-die-before-their-first-birthday">Kansas News Service</a>Black and Native American babies in Kansas die at almost twice the rate as white infants in their first year of life.Out of every 1,000 live births, 11.8 Black and
 10.4 Native American babies die before their first birthdays in Kansas.
 Meanwhile, only 5.6 out of every 1,000 white babies die in that period.The data from 2013 to 2017 — originally gathered and published by the <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/index.htm" target="_blank">Centers for Disease Control and Prevention</a>, and newly collected in a report from the N<a href="https://www.hopeinitiative.org/" target="_blank">ational Collaborative for Health Equity</a> — suggests that race can be a major factor in a community’s health.The
 report collects and publishes numerous health measures gathered by 
government surveys over the past decade. It shows Black people and other
 people of color in Kansas are also more likely to live in areas with a 
high density of liquor stores and a greater frequency of robberies and 
homicides.Those factors can cause stress that can damage the 
health of mothers and their babies, said Gail Christopher, executive 
director of the National Collaborative for Health Equity.“Safety 
is a very important factor in terms of the perception of health and 
well-being,” Christopher said. “Fear translates into a physiological, 
biochemical stress reaction.”Black mothers may also have trouble 
getting to doctor’s appointments because they live too far from 
hospitals and other medical providers and because they don’t have 
reliable access to transportation or can’t take time off of work. 
People’s income, education level or neighborhood can also impact whether
 they can even choose healthier behaviors, she said.“Behavior is 
driven by environment. It’s driven by context,” she said. “If there are 
no grocery stores within your vicinity that sell produce, how are you 
going to make sure that you’re getting in five servings of vegetables a 
day?”Those factors may also have affected COVID-19’s <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/covid-data/investigations-discovery/hospitalization-death-by-race-ethnicity.html" target="_blank">disproportionate impact</a> on Black, Latino, Asian and Native American communities across the U.S.In Kansas, <a href="https://www.kcur.org/news/2020-04-23/black-kansans-at-least-7-times-more-likely-to-die-from-coronavirus-than-white-kansans" target="_blank">Black people were more likely to die</a>
 of coronavirus-related causes in the early days of the pandemic, when 
most cases were in urban parts of the state. Now that cases have risen 
in rural counties, the <a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/160/COVID-19-in-Kansas" target="_blank">death rate among Black Kansans</a> lags slightly behind that of white Kansans.The
 pandemic has especially highlighted the impact that housing and food 
insecurity have on health, Christopher said. Black Kansans are about 
half as likely to own their homes when compared to white Kansans, and 
more likely to spend a large portion of their incomes on housing 
expenses.<h2>Interpersonal and structural racism</h2>Higher rates of illnesses and death can also be the result of racism in medicine, Christopher said.“Everyone
 in our society carries biases,” she said. “How do we create ways of 
delivering care that help to mitigate the possibility that those biases 
are actually driving our decisions and our outcomes?”A legacy of 
racism exists not only in society as a whole, but also among medical 
providers who may treat Black patients differently, said Dr. Michelle 
Ogunwole, a physician and health disparities researcher at Johns Hopkins
 University. <a href="https://www.aamc.org/news-insights/how-we-fail-black-patients-pain" target="_blank">Studies show</a> that doctors are less likely to take Black patients’ pain seriously.“If you feel like something’s wrong, but that people don’t listen to you,” Ogunwole said, “that has implications for outcomes.”Hospitals that mostly treat Black patients tend to have fewer resources, Ogunwole said. That also leads to<a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22816447/" target="_blank"> poorer health outcomes</a> for <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4698019/" target="_blank">patients at those hospitals</a>, regardless of race.One possible solution: increasing the number of Black physicians. A 2020 study found that the increase in <a href="https://www.pnas.org/content/117/35/21194" target="_blank">mortality rates for Black babies dropped by half </a>when the children were cared for by Black physicians.Black
 physicians can also be more effective at educating Black patients about
 their health, Ogunwole said. She said she sometimes uses her own 
experiences as a Black person to relate to her patients.“I will definitely lean into that identity,” she said. “It ends up being way more effective.”But medical schools at historically Black colleges and universities have been <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3739050/" target="_blank">less well funded</a>
 than medical schools at historically white colleges. And Black medical 
students can be affected by the same racism and lack of access to care 
that have impacted their patients’ lives.“Those people have to be supported in a different way,” Ogunwole said, “so they can make it through the pipeline.”Ultimately,
 Ogunwole said, Black mothers and patients don’t necessarily need to be 
treated by Black doctors, but by people who respect and value them, 
regardless of race.“(Women) just want to be cared for and for 
people to value them and their children,” she said. “They just want what
 everybody wants, which is to live healthy and full lives.”Nomin
 Ujiyediin reports on criminal justice and social welfare for the Kansas
 News Service. You can email her at nomin@kcur.org and follow
 her on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/nominuj" target="_blank">@NominUJ</a>.

Black babies in Kan. twice as likely as white kids to die before age 1

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government now plans to execute the first female inmate in almost six decades just days before President-elect Joe Biden, an opponent of the death penalty, takes office.

Attorneys for Lisa Montgomery said Monday that the Justice Department rescheduled her execution for Jan. 12. Biden's inauguration comes Jan. 20.

A federal judge in Washington had delayed the December execution of Montgomery, 49, because her lawyers tested positive for the novel coronavirus after visiting her behind bars. The delay was meant to allow her attorneys to recover from the virus and file a clemency petition on her behalf.

Montgomery’s attorneys, Kelley Henry and Amy Harwell, said&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/executions-coronavirus-pandemic-prisons-4588869e0aeee78374ece4e3ddf320fb">they both tested positive</a>&nbsp;for COVID-19 after they flew from Nashville, Tennessee, to visit her at the federal prison in Texas where she is serving her sentence. In court papers, they said each roundtrip visit from Nashville involved two flights, hotel stays and interaction with airline and hotel staff, as well as prison employees.

With the new execution date, Montgomery would be one of three federal inmates scheduled to die that week. Cory Johnson and Dustin Higgs are scheduled to be put to death on Jan. 14 and 15 while two other executions are scheduled for December.

The Justice Department resumed federal executions this year after a 17-year hiatus. Eight people have been executed since July, more than during the previous half-century, despite waning public support from both Democrats and Republicans for its use.

Biden spokesman TJ Ducklo has&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-prisons-inaugurations-coronavirus-pandemic-executions-365258989e6be8d7077b2f67d8c3e190">said the president-elect&nbsp;</a>“opposes the death penalty now and in the future” and would work as president to end its use. But Ducklo did not say whether executions would be paused immediately once Biden takes office.

Montgomery was convicted of killing 23-year-old Bobbie Jo Stinnett in the northwest Missouri town of Skidmore in December 2004. She used a rope to strangle Stinnett, who was eight months pregnant, and then cut the baby girl from the womb with a kitchen knife, authorities said. Montgomery took the child with her and attempted to pass the girl off as her own, prosecutors said.

Montgomery’s lawyers have argued that their client suffers from serious mental illnesses.

“It is difficult to grasp the extremity of the horrors Lisa suffered from her earliest childhood, including being raped by her stepfather, handed off to his friends for their use, sold to groups of adult men by her own mother and repeatedly gang raped, and relentlessly beaten and neglected. No one intervened to help Lisa, though many knew what was happening to her,” attorney Sandra Babcock said in a statement.

“No other woman has been executed for a similar crime, because most prosecutors have recognized that it is inevitably the product of trauma and mental illness,” Babcock said. "Executing Lisa Montgomery would be yet another injustice inflicted on a woman who has known a lifetime of mistreatment.”

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/10/1602895377835.png" alt="Montgomery is being held at the Federal Medical Center, Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas, according to online jail records." />
 <figcaption>Montgomery is being held at the Federal Medical Center, Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas, according to online jail records.</figcaption>
 </figure>WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government now plans to execute the first female inmate in almost six decades just days before President-elect Joe Biden, an opponent of the death penalty, takes office.Attorneys for Lisa Montgomery said Monday that the Justice Department rescheduled her execution for Jan. 12. Biden's inauguration comes Jan. 20.A federal judge in Washington had delayed the December execution of Montgomery, 49, because her lawyers tested positive for the novel coronavirus after visiting her behind bars. The delay was meant to allow her attorneys to recover from the virus and file a clemency petition on her behalf.Montgomery’s attorneys, Kelley Henry and Amy Harwell, said&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/executions-coronavirus-pandemic-prisons-4588869e0aeee78374ece4e3ddf320fb">they both tested positive</a>&nbsp;for COVID-19 after they flew from Nashville, Tennessee, to visit her at the federal prison in Texas where she is serving her sentence. In court papers, they said each roundtrip visit from Nashville involved two flights, hotel stays and interaction with airline and hotel staff, as well as prison employees.With the new execution date, Montgomery would be one of three federal inmates scheduled to die that week. Cory Johnson and Dustin Higgs are scheduled to be put to death on Jan. 14 and 15 while two other executions are scheduled for December.The Justice Department resumed federal executions this year after a 17-year hiatus. Eight people have been executed since July, more than during the previous half-century, despite waning public support from both Democrats and Republicans for its use.Biden spokesman TJ Ducklo has&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-prisons-inaugurations-coronavirus-pandemic-executions-365258989e6be8d7077b2f67d8c3e190">said the president-elect&nbsp;</a>“opposes the death penalty now and in the future” and would work as president to end its use. But Ducklo did not say whether executions would be paused immediately once Biden takes office.Montgomery was convicted of killing 23-year-old Bobbie Jo Stinnett in the northwest Missouri town of Skidmore in December 2004. She used a rope to strangle Stinnett, who was eight months pregnant, and then cut the baby girl from the womb with a kitchen knife, authorities said. Montgomery took the child with her and attempted to pass the girl off as her own, prosecutors said.Montgomery’s lawyers have argued that their client suffers from serious mental illnesses.“It is difficult to grasp the extremity of the horrors Lisa suffered from her earliest childhood, including being raped by her stepfather, handed off to his friends for their use, sold to groups of adult men by her own mother and repeatedly gang raped, and relentlessly beaten and neglected. No one intervened to help Lisa, though many knew what was happening to her,” attorney Sandra Babcock said in a statement.“No other woman has been executed for a similar crime, because most prosecutors have recognized that it is inevitably the product of trauma and mental illness,” Babcock said. "Executing Lisa Montgomery would be yet another injustice inflicted on a woman who has known a lifetime of mistreatment.”

New execution date for Kan. woman due to COVID-19

By NOAH TABORDA <a href="https://kansasreflector.com/2020/11/22/kansas-schools-seek-balance-between-best-practices-for-education-safety/">Kansas Reflector</a>

TOPEKA — As
 Thanksgiving approaches and COVID-19 case numbers rise, Kansas school 
officials are contemplating how to best alter plans to protect students 
and faculty.

School
 boards and districts across the state are instituting new safety 
precautions as concerns grow over how long schools can remain open for 
face-to-face learning. Teacher staffing in Kansas is also bottoming out 
as a growing number of educators are in quarantine.

At
 Wichita Public Schools, students and staff will now have an additional 
two days of Thanksgiving vacation, providing a full week off from the 
classroom. They also decided Nov. 9 to keep middle and high school 
students remote until the end of the second semester.

The
 decision was made after the district faced a shortage of teachers and 
substitutes as many were forced to quarantine after contact with someone
 carrying the virus, said Susan Arensman, a spokeswoman for the Wichita 
Public Schools.

While
 the district is hopeful the extended break will allow time for everyone
 to recuperate physically and emotionally, she said, administrators are 
advising families to be prepared should Sedgwick County case numbers 
continue to trend in the wrong direction.

“Wichita
 Public Schools is a reflection of our community, which is a reflection 
of the state, and as cases keep rising, so are cases of COVID among our 
staff,” Arensman said. “We had sent a message last week to elementary 
families asking them to have a plan in place in case we have to pivot in
 schools, and students who were going in person now need to learn 
remotely.”

As
 cases rise, districts and educators fear a similar crisis to the 
beginning of the pandemic may be mounting. Statewide staffing shortages 
are forcing several schools to revisit academic and safety plans.

The
 Shawnee Mission school district announced middle and high school 
students in the district would return to remote learning in an effort to
 maintain in-person learning for elementary students. The school 
district recently reported it was becoming increasingly difficult to 
adequately staff classrooms.

As of last week, more than 800 students and staff within the district were isolating or in quarantine. Students will begin remote learning from Nov. 30 through Jan. 22, 2021.

In Blue Valley,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bluevalleyk12.org/Page/35656" target="_blank">district administrators took similar steps</a>, returning middle and high school students to remote-only learning between Thanksgiving and winter break.&nbsp;

“The
 change in learning modes from Nov. 30 to Dec. 22 will allow us to focus
 limited resources, including substitutes, on the youngest students and 
students with disabilities, who are least able to benefit from distance 
learning,” said Tonya Merrigan, superintendent of Blue Valley Schools, 
adding “additional school closures are possible if the district cannot 
staff buildings with qualified substitutes.”

<a href="https://www.kshb.com/news/coronavirus/staff-shortages-hitting-kansas-city-area-school-districts" target="_blank">Reports from substitute staffing agencies</a>&nbsp;indicate
 finding qualified teachers is growing increasingly difficult. Mark 
Tallman, associate executive director for advocacy and communications at
 the Kansas Association of School Boards, said districts now face a 
difficult decision about how to handle these shortages.

“Districts
 are faced with this terrible dilemma, which is do you do you back away 
from in-person learning, knowing that creates great difficulties for 
students, for families and for learning, or do you try to keep going in 
the situation where you literally may not have the staff to do it,” 
Tallman said. “The more you press ahead, it may cost you more staff in 
the future if people continue to get sick.”

The
 rise in cases and staff needing to quarantine is increasing anxiety 
among Kansas educators, said Marcus Baltzell, a spokesman for the Kansas
 National Education Association. Baltzell said educators want to keep 
education in-person, but not if current conditions persist.

“We
 say this over and over again, but things are becoming unsustainable,” 
he said. “Really, what this all boils down to is that there are a lot of
 moving standards out there about what’s safe and what isn’t. I think 
that’s really increasing the anxiety in educators.”

To
 provide insight into the day-to-day concerns of educators, KNEA is 
producing a series of testimonies submitted by teachers across the 
state.&nbsp;

In
 one video, Megan Epperson, an elementary teacher, likened the 
experience to that of Apollo 13 — a mission to the moon that was aborted
 after an oxygen tank ruptured.

“We
 are facing life and death options,” Epperson said. “We are trying to 
look at the duct tape we have in front of us and saying how can we make 
this into something that is least harmful and most beneficial knowing 
that no solution is ideal. It’s never a good idea to get a space shuttle
 through space with duct tape.”

Concerns
 over teacher shortages and rising COVID-19 cases are not just impacting
 more urban areas. In Scott City, where case numbers are still 
relatively low, the school has been able to maintain in-person learning 
so far. While it would like to remain that way, district superintendent 
Jamie Rumford said, school leaders are taking it every few weeks at a 
time.

South
 of Scott City, case numbers are spiking in Finney County. Garden City 
Public Schools were all in-person until Nov. 6, but the district has 
pivoted to a hybrid model with some schools dealing with staffing issues
 and shifting to remote learning.

If
 current data trends do not improve by Nov. 20, the district will move 
all students and schools to remote learning, said Roy Cessna, a 
spokesman for Garden City Public Schools.

“Because
 of the higher cases of COVID amongst our staff, we just can’t 
effectively and safely instruct students in those schools,” Cessna said.
 “As the cases start to move down in the community, and those gating 
triggers are not being hit, we would move back in our operational level,
 back down to face to face instruction.”

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606141702301.png" alt="Students and Faculty at Wichita Public Schools will have two extra days of rest and recovery over Thanksgiving break as the district, like much of the state, faces a teacher shortage. (Submitted to Kansas Reflector)" />
 <figcaption>Students and Faculty at Wichita Public Schools will have two extra days of rest and recovery over Thanksgiving break as the district, like much of the state, faces a teacher shortage. (Submitted to Kansas Reflector)</figcaption>
 </figure>By NOAH TABORDA <a href="https://kansasreflector.com/2020/11/22/kansas-schools-seek-balance-between-best-practices-for-education-safety/">Kansas Reflector</a>TOPEKA — As
 Thanksgiving approaches and COVID-19 case numbers rise, Kansas school 
officials are contemplating how to best alter plans to protect students 
and faculty.School
 boards and districts across the state are instituting new safety 
precautions as concerns grow over how long schools can remain open for 
face-to-face learning. Teacher staffing in Kansas is also bottoming out 
as a growing number of educators are in quarantine.At
 Wichita Public Schools, students and staff will now have an additional 
two days of Thanksgiving vacation, providing a full week off from the 
classroom. They also decided Nov. 9 to keep middle and high school 
students remote until the end of the second semester.The
 decision was made after the district faced a shortage of teachers and 
substitutes as many were forced to quarantine after contact with someone
 carrying the virus, said Susan Arensman, a spokeswoman for the Wichita 
Public Schools.While
 the district is hopeful the extended break will allow time for everyone
 to recuperate physically and emotionally, she said, administrators are 
advising families to be prepared should Sedgwick County case numbers 
continue to trend in the wrong direction.“Wichita
 Public Schools is a reflection of our community, which is a reflection 
of the state, and as cases keep rising, so are cases of COVID among our 
staff,” Arensman said. “We had sent a message last week to elementary 
families asking them to have a plan in place in case we have to pivot in
 schools, and students who were going in person now need to learn 
remotely.”As
 cases rise, districts and educators fear a similar crisis to the 
beginning of the pandemic may be mounting. Statewide staffing shortages 
are forcing several schools to revisit academic and safety plans.The
 Shawnee Mission school district announced middle and high school 
students in the district would return to remote learning in an effort to
 maintain in-person learning for elementary students. The school 
district recently reported it was becoming increasingly difficult to 
adequately staff classrooms.As of last week, more than 800 students and staff within the district were isolating or in quarantine. Students will begin remote learning from Nov. 30 through Jan. 22, 2021.In Blue Valley,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bluevalleyk12.org/Page/35656" target="_blank">district administrators took similar steps</a>, returning middle and high school students to remote-only learning between Thanksgiving and winter break.&nbsp;“The
 change in learning modes from Nov. 30 to Dec. 22 will allow us to focus
 limited resources, including substitutes, on the youngest students and 
students with disabilities, who are least able to benefit from distance 
learning,” said Tonya Merrigan, superintendent of Blue Valley Schools, 
adding “additional school closures are possible if the district cannot 
staff buildings with qualified substitutes.”<a href="https://www.kshb.com/news/coronavirus/staff-shortages-hitting-kansas-city-area-school-districts" target="_blank">Reports from substitute staffing agencies</a>&nbsp;indicate
 finding qualified teachers is growing increasingly difficult. Mark 
Tallman, associate executive director for advocacy and communications at
 the Kansas Association of School Boards, said districts now face a 
difficult decision about how to handle these shortages.“Districts
 are faced with this terrible dilemma, which is do you do you back away 
from in-person learning, knowing that creates great difficulties for 
students, for families and for learning, or do you try to keep going in 
the situation where you literally may not have the staff to do it,” 
Tallman said. “The more you press ahead, it may cost you more staff in 
the future if people continue to get sick.”The
 rise in cases and staff needing to quarantine is increasing anxiety 
among Kansas educators, said Marcus Baltzell, a spokesman for the Kansas
 National Education Association. Baltzell said educators want to keep 
education in-person, but not if current conditions persist.“We
 say this over and over again, but things are becoming unsustainable,” 
he said. “Really, what this all boils down to is that there are a lot of
 moving standards out there about what’s safe and what isn’t. I think 
that’s really increasing the anxiety in educators.”To
 provide insight into the day-to-day concerns of educators, KNEA is 
producing a series of testimonies submitted by teachers across the 
state.&nbsp;In
 one video, Megan Epperson, an elementary teacher, likened the 
experience to that of Apollo 13 — a mission to the moon that was aborted
 after an oxygen tank ruptured.“We
 are facing life and death options,” Epperson said. “We are trying to 
look at the duct tape we have in front of us and saying how can we make 
this into something that is least harmful and most beneficial knowing 
that no solution is ideal. It’s never a good idea to get a space shuttle
 through space with duct tape.”Concerns
 over teacher shortages and rising COVID-19 cases are not just impacting
 more urban areas. In Scott City, where case numbers are still 
relatively low, the school has been able to maintain in-person learning 
so far. While it would like to remain that way, district superintendent 
Jamie Rumford said, school leaders are taking it every few weeks at a 
time.South
 of Scott City, case numbers are spiking in Finney County. Garden City 
Public Schools were all in-person until Nov. 6, but the district has 
pivoted to a hybrid model with some schools dealing with staffing issues
 and shifting to remote learning.If
 current data trends do not improve by Nov. 20, the district will move 
all students and schools to remote learning, said Roy Cessna, a 
spokesman for Garden City Public Schools.“Because
 of the higher cases of COVID amongst our staff, we just can’t 
effectively and safely instruct students in those schools,” Cessna said.
 “As the cases start to move down in the community, and those gating 
triggers are not being hit, we would move back in our operational level,
 back down to face to face instruction.”

Kan. schools seek balance between best practices for education, safety

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Surging pandemic numbers are straining hospitals across Kansas just days before Thanksgiving gatherings that public health officials fear could worsen the outbreak.

The Kansas Department of Health and Environment reported on Monday 95 new hospitalizations, bringing the total of hospitalizations to 4,777 since the start of the pandemic. The state’s COVID-19 dashboard showed 240 coronavirus patients were in ICU units, with 36% of ICU capacity remaining in Kansas.

State health officials added 7,526 cases to the state’s pandemic tally since Friday, bringing the total to 142,059. The data showed that Kansas averaged 2,760 new confirmed and probable coronavirus a day for the seven days ending Monday. That is just slightly below the record average of 2,766 cases.

The number of COVID-19 related deaths also rose by 46 to 1,456.

Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly requested on Monday an extension of federal authority allowing the use of Kansas National Guard to combat the spread of COVID-19 in the state. The letter requests extension of 100% of funding for up to 500 National Guard members through the end of March.

“With the President’s approval, this extension will enable Kansas to maintain community-based testing, continue distributing medical and testing supplies, and ensure Kansas businesses can stay open,” Kelly said in a news release.

Chuck Welch, vice president of the Hutchinson Regional Healthcare System, said his hospital has averaged about 30 COVID-19 patients since October, compared to about four in the months before -- an increase of more than 600%. Nurses have had to take about 10 shifts in a row, with less time off, Welch said.

“And not just the nurses, the physicians, we have four pulmonologists that are working around the clock, our respiratory therapists, our lab people, our imaging people. Everybody is just stretched,” Welch said, “our housekeeping, they have to go in and clean those rooms thoroughly before we can put anybody else in them.”

The University of Kansas Hospital broke records on Monday for the total number of hospitalized coronavirus patients, those in the ICU and the number of virus patients on ventilators, the Kansas City Star&nbsp;<a href="https://www.kansascity.com/site-services/newsletters/coronavirus-latest-nl/article247369879.html" target="_blank">reported</a>.

The hospital had 139 COVID-19 patients, said Dana Hawkinson, medical director of infection prevention and control at The University of Kansas Health System.

Of the 100 patients deemed active coronavirus cases, 46 are in the intensive care unit, and 26 of those in the ICU are on a ventilator, he said. In addition to those active cases, 39 other patients are in recovery at the hospital.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/10/1603360957118.png" alt="Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly requested on Monday an extension of federal authority allowing the use of Kansas National Guard to combat the spread of COVID-19 in the state." />
 <figcaption>Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly requested on Monday an extension of federal authority allowing the use of Kansas National Guard to combat the spread of COVID-19 in the state.</figcaption>
 </figure>TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Surging pandemic numbers are straining hospitals across Kansas just days before Thanksgiving gatherings that public health officials fear could worsen the outbreak.The Kansas Department of Health and Environment reported on Monday 95 new hospitalizations, bringing the total of hospitalizations to 4,777 since the start of the pandemic. The state’s COVID-19 dashboard showed 240 coronavirus patients were in ICU units, with 36% of ICU capacity remaining in Kansas.State health officials added 7,526 cases to the state’s pandemic tally since Friday, bringing the total to 142,059. The data showed that Kansas averaged 2,760 new confirmed and probable coronavirus a day for the seven days ending Monday. That is just slightly below the record average of 2,766 cases.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1606154907887.png" alt="Monday Nov. 23, 2020 KDHE image" />
 <figcaption>Monday Nov. 23, 2020 KDHE image</figcaption>
 </figure>The number of COVID-19 related deaths also rose by 46 to 1,456.Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly requested on Monday an extension of federal authority allowing the use of Kansas National Guard to combat the spread of COVID-19 in the state. The letter requests extension of 100% of funding for up to 500 National Guard members through the end of March.“With the President’s approval, this extension will enable Kansas to maintain community-based testing, continue distributing medical and testing supplies, and ensure Kansas businesses can stay open,” Kelly said in a news release.Chuck Welch, vice president of the Hutchinson Regional Healthcare System, said his hospital has averaged about 30 COVID-19 patients since October, compared to about four in the months before -- an increase of more than 600%. Nurses have had to take about 10 shifts in a row, with less time off, Welch said.“And not just the nurses, the physicians, we have four pulmonologists that are working around the clock, our respiratory therapists, our lab people, our imaging people. Everybody is just stretched,” Welch said, “our housekeeping, they have to go in and clean those rooms thoroughly before we can put anybody else in them.”The University of Kansas Hospital broke records on Monday for the total number of hospitalized coronavirus patients, those in the ICU and the number of virus patients on ventilators, the Kansas City Star&nbsp;<a href="https://www.kansascity.com/site-services/newsletters/coronavirus-latest-nl/article247369879.html" target="_blank">reported</a>.The hospital had 139 COVID-19 patients, said Dana Hawkinson, medical director of infection prevention and control at The University of Kansas Health System.Of the 100 patients deemed active coronavirus cases, 46 are in the intensive care unit, and 26 of those in the ICU are on a ventilator, he said. In addition to those active cases, 39 other patients are in recovery at the hospital.

Pandemic straining Kansas hospitals days before Thanksgiving

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — A northwestern Oklahoma man was sentenced Monday to more than seven years in prison for trying to have the boyfriend of a former employee killed in Oklahoma City, according to court documents.

Vernon Wayne Brock, 71, of Alva, was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Oklahoma City to 87 months in prison.

Brock&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/9a5d31e377a24b2ea56a961b041a0cf8">admitted</a>&nbsp;in a signed plea agreement in November 2019 that he offered $5,000 to a former business partner in Maize, Kansas, to have the unidentified man killed after the former employee ended a sexual relationship with Brock.

Brock was&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/dd35481a45694ab1b46ef4356fbceca2">arrested and charged</a>&nbsp;in April 2019 after giving the business partner a $5,000 check during a meeting at a cafe in Harper, Kansas.

Court documents say the female employee, who is not identified, had worked for Brock, who owned vape shops in Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri, and a cattle ranch.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2019/11/1573166344160.png" alt="Brock is the co-owner of&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bigesvaporshop.com/locations/">Big E Vapor Shops</a>, which has 13 locations in Kansas, seven of them in Wichita, three locations in Oklahoma and one in Belton, Missouri-photo Logan Co. Jail" />
 <figcaption>Brock is the co-owner of&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bigesvaporshop.com/locations/">Big E Vapor Shops</a>, which has 13 locations in Kansas, seven of them in Wichita, three locations in Oklahoma and one in Belton, Missouri-photo Logan Co. Jail</figcaption>
 </figure>OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — A northwestern Oklahoma man was sentenced Monday to more than seven years in prison for trying to have the boyfriend of a former employee killed in Oklahoma City, according to court documents.Vernon Wayne Brock, 71, of Alva, was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Oklahoma City to 87 months in prison.Brock&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/9a5d31e377a24b2ea56a961b041a0cf8">admitted</a>&nbsp;in a signed plea agreement in November 2019 that he offered $5,000 to a former business partner in Maize, Kansas, to have the unidentified man killed after the former employee ended a sexual relationship with Brock.Brock was&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/dd35481a45694ab1b46ef4356fbceca2">arrested and charged</a>&nbsp;in April 2019 after giving the business partner a $5,000 check during a meeting at a cafe in Harper, Kansas.Court documents say the female employee, who is not identified, had worked for Brock, who owned vape shops in Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri, and a cattle ranch.

Kan. vape shop owner sentenced in murder-for-hire plot

TOPEKA- The U.S. Department of Labor (USDOL) notified the state that Kansas has officially “triggered off” of the unemployment insurance Extended Benefits (EB) program, bringing the program to its end, according to a media release.

The federal agency’s announcement means that Kansans’ last payable week on the EB program will be the week ending December 12, 2020. Additionally, the Kansas Department of Labor (KDOL) is prohibited from making any additional payments, regardless of any remaining balance of EB entitlement. 

Kansans who are no longer eligible for the EB program may be eligible to receive Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) if they qualify under all of the program’s federally mandated criteria.

In response to USDOL’s EB notification, KDOL will be reaching out to impacted claimants to inform them of the program’s suspension and to notify them that they are no longer eligible for payments. 

KDOL will also advise the impacted claimants that they may be eligible to receive benefits under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) program.

Since March 15, KDOL has paid out more than 3.1 million weekly claims totaling over $2.3 billion between regular unemployment and the federal pandemic programs. 

<a href="https://www.getkansasbenefits.gov/Home.aspx">Click here for more</a> information, or to apply for unemployment benefits.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/6/1593457222137.png" alt="" />
 <figcaption></figcaption>
 </figure>TOPEKA- The U.S. Department of Labor (USDOL) notified the state that Kansas has officially “triggered off” of the unemployment insurance Extended Benefits (EB) program, bringing the program to its end, according to a media release.The federal agency’s announcement means that Kansans’ last payable week on the EB program will be the week ending December 12, 2020. Additionally, the Kansas Department of Labor (KDOL) is prohibited from making any additional payments, regardless of any remaining balance of EB entitlement. Kansans who are no longer eligible for the EB program may be eligible to receive Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) if they qualify under all of the program’s federally mandated criteria.In response to USDOL’s EB notification, KDOL will be reaching out to impacted claimants to inform them of the program’s suspension and to notify them that they are no longer eligible for payments. KDOL will also advise the impacted claimants that they may be eligible to receive benefits under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) program.Since March 15, KDOL has paid out more than 3.1 million weekly claims totaling over $2.3 billion between regular unemployment and the federal pandemic programs. <a href="https://www.getkansasbenefits.gov/Home.aspx">Click here for more</a> information, or to apply for unemployment benefits.

Extended unemployment benefits ending in Kansas

PAWNEE COUNTY– Following a five-hour preliminary hearing&nbsp; November 20, Justin W. Hammond, 36 of Larned, Kansas, was bound over on nine counts of felony sex crimes, according to County Attorney Doug McNett.

In July, the Pawnee County Attorney’s Office charged Hammond with Five (5) counts of Aggravated Indecent Liberty with a Child or sexual intercourse with a child 14 or 15 years of age; and Three (3) counts of Indecent Liberties with a Child including lewd fondling of child 14 or 15 years of age. 

The crimes are alleged to have occurred in Pawnee County between July 8, 2018 and December 15, 2018. The Kansas Bureau of Investigation handled the investigation following a referral by the Pawnee County Sheriff.

Following the presentation of evidence, Magistrate Judge Julie Cowell found the State presented sufficient evidence to support the original charges plus an additional charge of Oral Sodomy alleged to have occurred on or about July 18, 2018, according to McNett.

If convicted, under the Kansas Sentencing Guidelines the Hammond faces a presumptive prison sentence between 59 months and 247 months in the custody of the Department of Corrections depending on his criminal history. He would also be subject to registration as a sex offender under the Kansas Offender Registration Act.

Hammond turned himself in on July 10, 2020, to the Pawnee County Sheriff and later released from custody the same day after posting a $75,000 surety bond. Arraignment has not yet been scheduled.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/8/1598462828879.png" alt="Hammond photo Pawnee Co." />
 <figcaption>Hammond photo Pawnee Co.</figcaption>
 </figure>PAWNEE COUNTY– Following a five-hour preliminary hearing&nbsp; November 20, Justin W. Hammond, 36 of Larned, Kansas, was bound over on nine counts of felony sex crimes, according to County Attorney Doug McNett.In July, the Pawnee County Attorney’s Office charged Hammond with Five (5) counts of Aggravated Indecent Liberty with a Child or sexual intercourse with a child 14 or 15 years of age; and Three (3) counts of Indecent Liberties with a Child including lewd fondling of child 14 or 15 years of age. The crimes are alleged to have occurred in Pawnee County between July 8, 2018 and December 15, 2018. The Kansas Bureau of Investigation handled the investigation following a referral by the Pawnee County Sheriff.Following the presentation of evidence, Magistrate Judge Julie Cowell found the State presented sufficient evidence to support the original charges plus an additional charge of Oral Sodomy alleged to have occurred on or about July 18, 2018, according to McNett.If convicted, under the Kansas Sentencing Guidelines the Hammond faces a presumptive prison sentence between 59 months and 247 months in the custody of the Department of Corrections depending on his criminal history. He would also be subject to registration as a sex offender under the Kansas Offender Registration Act.Hammond turned himself in on July 10, 2020, to the Pawnee County Sheriff and later released from custody the same day after posting a $75,000 surety bond. Arraignment has not yet been scheduled.

Judge adds additional charge in Kan. child sex crimes case

WASHINGTON (AP) — After weeks of fraught delay, the federal government recognized President-elect Joe Biden as the “apparent winner” of the Nov. 3 election on Monday and gave the green light for cooperation on a transition of power. The move came after President Donald Trump suffered yet more legal and procedural defeats in his seemingly futile effort to overturn the election with baseless claims of fraud.

General Services Administrator Emily Murphy cleared the way for Biden to coordinate with federal agencies ahead of his Jan. 20 inauguration after Trump’s efforts to subvert the vote failed across multiple battleground states.

Trump, who has still refused to concede the election — and may never — followed up with a tweet that he was directing his team to cooperate on the transition. The president had grown increasingly frustrated with the flailing tactics of his legal team.

Murphy, explaining her decision, cited “recent developments involving legal challenges and certifications of election results.”

She acted after Michigan on Monday certified Biden’s victory in the battleground state, and a federal judge in Pennsylvania tossed a Trump campaign lawsuit on Saturday seeking to prevent certification in that state.

It also comes as an increasing number of Republicans were publicly acknowledging Biden’s victory, after weeks of tolerating Trump’s baseless claims of fraud.

“With Michigan’s certifying (its) results, Joe Biden has over 270 electoral college votes,” tweeted Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy. “President Trump’s legal team has not presented evidence of the massive fraud which would have had to be present to overturn the election. I voted for President Trump but Joe Biden won.”

Yohannes Abraham, executive director of the Biden transition, said in a statement that the decision “is a needed step to begin tackling the challenges facing our nation, including getting the pandemic under control and our economy back on track.”

He added: “In the days ahead, transition officials will begin meeting with federal officials to discuss the pandemic response, have a full accounting of our national security interests, and gain complete understanding of the Trump administration’s efforts to hollow out government agencies.”

Murphy, a Trump appointee, has faced bipartisan criticism for failing to begin the transition process sooner, preventing Biden’s team from working with career agency officials on plans for his administration. The delay denied Biden access to receive highly classified national security briefings and hindered his team’s ability to begin drawing up its own plans to respond to the raging coronavirus pandemic.

“Please know that I came to my decision independently, based on the law and available facts. I was never directly or indirectly pressured by any Executive Branch official—including those who work at the White House or GSA—with regard to the substance or timing of my decision,” she wrote in a letter to Biden.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/11/1604799896568.png" alt="President-elect Joe Biden" />
 <figcaption>President-elect Joe Biden</figcaption>
 </figure>WASHINGTON (AP) — After weeks of fraught delay, the federal government recognized President-elect Joe Biden as the “apparent winner” of the Nov. 3 election on Monday and gave the green light for cooperation on a transition of power. The move came after President Donald Trump suffered yet more legal and procedural defeats in his seemingly futile effort to overturn the election with baseless claims of fraud.General Services Administrator Emily Murphy cleared the way for Biden to coordinate with federal agencies ahead of his Jan. 20 inauguration after Trump’s efforts to subvert the vote failed across multiple battleground states.<div><blockquote class="twitter-tweet">I want to thank Emily Murphy at GSA for her steadfast dedication and loyalty to our Country. She has been harassed, threatened, and abused – and I do not want to see this happen to her, her family, or employees of GSA. Our case STRONGLY continues, we will keep up the good...&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1331013907859845121?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 23, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script></div>Trump, who has still refused to concede the election — and may never — followed up with a tweet that he was directing his team to cooperate on the transition. The president had grown increasingly frustrated with the flailing tactics of his legal team.Murphy, explaining her decision, cited “recent developments involving legal challenges and certifications of election results.”She acted after Michigan on Monday certified Biden’s victory in the battleground state, and a federal judge in Pennsylvania tossed a Trump campaign lawsuit on Saturday seeking to prevent certification in that state.It also comes as an increasing number of Republicans were publicly acknowledging Biden’s victory, after weeks of tolerating Trump’s baseless claims of fraud.“With Michigan’s certifying (its) results, Joe Biden has over 270 electoral college votes,” tweeted Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy. “President Trump’s legal team has not presented evidence of the massive fraud which would have had to be present to overturn the election. I voted for President Trump but Joe Biden won.”Yohannes Abraham, executive director of the Biden transition, said in a statement that the decision “is a needed step to begin tackling the challenges facing our nation, including getting the pandemic under control and our economy back on track.”He added: “In the days ahead, transition officials will begin meeting with federal officials to discuss the pandemic response, have a full accounting of our national security interests, and gain complete understanding of the Trump administration’s efforts to hollow out government agencies.”Murphy, a Trump appointee, has faced bipartisan criticism for failing to begin the transition process sooner, preventing Biden’s team from working with career agency officials on plans for his administration. The delay denied Biden access to receive highly classified national security briefings and hindered his team’s ability to begin drawing up its own plans to respond to the raging coronavirus pandemic.Murphy insisted she acted on her own.“Please know that I came to my decision independently, based on the law and available facts. I was never directly or indirectly pressured by any Executive Branch official—including those who work at the White House or GSA—with regard to the substance or timing of my decision,” she wrote in a letter to Biden.Trump tweeted moments after Murphy’s decision: “We will keep up the good fight and I believe we will prevail! Nevertheless, in the best interest of our Country, I am recommending that Emily and her team do what needs to be done with regard to initial protocols, and have told my team to do the same.”Max Stier, president and CEO of the nonpartisan Partnership for Public Service, criticized the delay, but said Biden’s team would be able to overcome it.“Unfortunately, every day lost to the delayed ascertainment was a missed opportunity for the outgoing administration to help President-elect Joe Biden prepare to meet our country’s greatest challenges,” he said. “The good news is that the president-elect and his team are the most prepared and best equipped of any incoming administration in recent memory.”Murphy’s action came just 90 minutes after Michigan election officials on Monday certified Democrat Joe Biden’s 154,000-vote victory in the state. The Board of State Canvassers, which has two Republicans and two Democrats, confirmed the results on a 3-0 vote with one GOP abstention. Trump and his allies had hoped to block the vote to allow time for an audit of ballots in Wayne County, where Trump has claimed without evidence that he was the victim of fraud. Biden crushed the president by more than 330,000 votes there.Under Michigan law, Biden claims all 16 electoral votes. Biden won by 2.8 percentage points — a larger margin than in other states where Trump is contesting the results like Georgia, Arizona, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.Some Trump allies had expressed hope that state lawmakers could intervene in selecting Republican electors in states that do not certify. That longshot bid is no longer possible in Michigan.“The people of Michigan have spoken. President-elect Biden won the State of Michigan by more than 154,000 votes, and he will be our next president on January 20th,” Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, said in a statement, saying it’s “time to put this election behind us.”The Trump legal team dismissed the certification as “simply a procedural step” and insisted it would continue to mount legal challenges.Trump’s efforts to stave off the inevitable — formal recognition of his defeat — have faced increasingly stiff resistance from the courts and fellow Republicans with just three weeks to go until the Electoral College meets to certify Biden’s victory. Time and again, Trump’s challenges and baseless allegations of widespread conspiracy and fraud have been met with rejection as states move forward with confirming their results.In Pennsylvania, a conservative Republican judge shot down the Trump campaign’s biggest legal effort in Pennsylvania with a scathing ruling that questioned why he was supposed to disenfranchise 7 million voters with no evidence to back their claims and an inept legal argument at best.But the lawyers still hope to block the state’s certification, quickly appealing to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia, which ordered lawyers to file a brief Monday but did not agree to hear oral arguments.The campaign, in its filings, asked for urgent consideration so they could challenge the state election results before they are certified next month. If not, they will seek to decertify them, the filings said.Biden won Pennsylvania by more than 80,000 votes.Pennsylvania county election boards were voting on Monday, the state deadline, about whether to certify election results to the Department of State. The boards in two populous counties split along party lines, with majority Democrats in both places voting to certify. After all counties have sent certified results to Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar, she must then tabulate, compute and canvass votes for all races. The law requires her to perform that task quickly but does not set a specific deadline.In Wisconsin, a recount in the state’s two largest liberal counties moved into its fourth day at a slow pace, with election officials in Milwaukee County complaining that Trump observers were hanging up the process with frequent challenges. Trump’s hope of reversing Biden’s victory there depends on disqualifying thousands of absentee ballots -- including the in-person absentee ballot cast by one of Trump’s own campaign attorneys in Dane County.----------WASHINGTON (AP) — The General Services Administration ascertained Monday that President-elect Joe Biden is the “apparent winner” of the Nov. 3 election, clearing the way for the start of the transition from President Donald Trump’s administration and allowing Biden to coordinate with federal agencies on plans for taking over on Jan. 20.<div><blockquote class="twitter-tweet">I want to thank Emily Murphy at GSA for her steadfast dedication and loyalty to our Country. She has been harassed, threatened, and abused – and I do not want to see this happen to her, her family, or employees of GSA. Our case STRONGLY continues, we will keep up the good...&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1331013907859845121?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 23, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script></div>Trump, who had refused to concede the election, said in a tweet that he is directing his team to cooperate on the transition but is vowing to keep up the fight.Administrator Emily Murphy made the determination after Trump efforts to subvert the vote failed across battleground states, citing, “recent developments involving legal challenges and certifications of election results.” Michigan certified Biden’s victory Monday, and a federal judge in Pennsylvania tossed a Trump campaign lawsuit on Saturday seeking to prevent certification in that state.Yohannes Abraham, the executive director of the Biden transition, said in a statement that the decision “is a needed step to begin tackling the challenges facing our nation, including getting the pandemic under control and our economy back on track.”He added: “In the days ahead, transition officials will begin meeting with federal officials to discuss the pandemic response, have a full accounting of our national security interests, and gain complete understanding of the Trump administration’s efforts to hollow out government agencies.”Murphy, a Trump appointee, had faced bipartisan criticism for failing to begin the transition process sooner, preventing Biden’s team from working with career agency officials on plans for his administration, including in critical national security and public health areas.“Please know that I came to my decision independently, based on the law and available facts. I was never directly or indirectly pressured by any Executive Branch official—including those who work at the White House or GSA—with regard to the substance or timing of my decision,” Murphy wrote in a letter to Biden.Trump tweeted shortly after her letter was made public: “We will keep up the good fight and I believe we will prevail! Nevertheless, in the best interest of our Country, I am recommending that Emily and her team do what needs to be done with regard to initial protocols, and have told my team to do the same.”Pressure had been mounting on Murphy as an increasing number of Republicans, national security experts and business leaders said it was time for that process to move forward.Retiring Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander, who has repeatedly called for the transition to begin, released a new statement Monday saying that Trump should “put the country first” and help Biden’s administration succeed.“When you are in public life, people remember the last thing you do,” Alexander said.Republican Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio on Monday called for Murphy to release money and staffing needed for the transition. Portman, a senior member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, also said Biden should receive high-level briefings on national security and the coronavirus vaccine distribution plan.Alexander and Portman, who have both aligned themselves with Trump, joined a growing number of Republican officials who in recent days have urged Trump to begin the transition immediately. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., also urged a smooth transition, saying in a statement Monday that “at some point, the 2020 election must end.”Meanwhile, more than 160 business leaders asked Murphy to immediately acknowledge Biden as president-elect and begin the transition to a new administration. “Withholding resources and vital information from an incoming administration puts the public and economic health and security of America at risk,″ the business letters said in an open letter to Murphy.Separately, more than 100 Republican former national security officials — including former Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge, former CIA Director Michael Hayden and former Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte — said in a statement that Trump’s refusal to concede and allow for an orderly transition “constitutes a serious threat” to America’s democratic process. The officials signing the letter worked under four Republican presidents, including Trump.The statement called on “Republican leaders — especially those in Congress — to publicly demand that President Trump cease his anti-democratic assault on the integrity of the presidential election.”Trump had publicly refused to accept defeat and launched a series of losing court battles across the country making baseless claims of widespread voter fraud and seeking to overturn the election results.Murphy missed a deadline on Monday set by House Democrats to brief lawmakers about the delay in beginning the transition, which is usually a routine step between the election and the inauguration. A spokeswoman for the GSA said that a deputy administrator would instead hold two separate briefings for House and Senate committees on Nov. 30.In response, the Democratic chairs of four committees and subcommittees said they could reschedule the meeting for Tuesday, but no later.“We cannot wait yet another week to obtain basic information about your refusal to make the ascertainment determination,” the Democrats said in a letter to Murphy. “Every additional day that is wasted is a day that the safety, health, and well-being of the American people is imperiled as the incoming Biden-Harris administration is blocked from fully preparing for the coronavirus pandemic, our nation’s dire economic crisis, and our national security.”Portman said it was “only prudent” for GSA to begin the transition process immediately.“Donald Trump is our president until Jan. 20, 2021, but in the likely event that Joe Biden becomes our next president, it is in the national interest that the transition is seamless and that America is ready on Day One of a new administration for the challenges we face,″ Portman wrote in an op-ed calling for the transition to begin.Murphy’s ascertainment will free up money for the transition and clear the way for Biden’s team to begin placing transition personnel at federal agencies. Trump administration officials had said they would not give Biden the classified presidential daily briefing on intelligence matters until the GSA makes the ascertainment official.“Now that GSA Administrator Emily Murphy has fulfilled her duty and ascertained the election results, the formal presidential transition can begin in full force,” said Max Stier, president and CEO of the nonpartisan Partnership for Public Service. “Unfortunately, every day lost to the delayed ascertainment was a missed opportunity for the outgoing administration to help President-elect Joe Biden prepare to meet our country’s greatest challenges. The good news is that the president-elect and his team are the most prepared and best equipped of any incoming administration in recent memory.”Among those signing the letter from business leaders were Jon Gray, president of the Blackstone private equity firm; Robert Bakish, president and CEO of ViacomCBS Inc.; Henry Kravis, the co-chief executive of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts &amp; Co., another private equity giant; David Solomon, CEO at Goldman Sachs; and George H. Walker, CEO of the investment firm Neuberger Berman and a second cousin to former President George W. Bush.