There was lots of good news this past week. Our Butler Community College Grizzlies won the final football game of the season and are now National Champions for the 5th time since 1981. Congratulations to Coach Morrell, his staff, and the players for bringing this honor back home.
The game was played in some of the worse conditions possible, deep snow, cold and on the road in Utah. There were times when the field was obscured by the blizzard conditions, which the TV cameras and their crews were working hard to bring the show to us here in our warm living rooms and dens. Thanks again!
The AT&T Foundation will officially announce a grant from the corporate philanthropy organization to support the Sunlight Children’s Advocacy and Rights Foundation. Located at 110 S Gordy El Dorado, 313-4107, this non-profit organization will use the grant to upgrade their computer technology to allow for efficient case management for abused children.
According to Randy Coffman, the board president, “we’ll be better suited to provide critical services to abused and neglected children and ensure they are referred to the appropriate supportive agencies and resources”. I see this as a way for AT&T to reinvest in our community and give back to its customers.
Rep. Dave Crum and myself met with members from the Butler County Association for Retarded Citizens, (ARC). This organization is a support group for those parents with special needs children. The group is over a 100 strong and is active with many projects that include, special needs training, training for life skills, organizing for the Special Olympics, and being advocates for families with special needs.
We met at the Stadium Grounds Coffee House in Andover right next to the Cottonwood Elementary School on Andover Road. This facility is part of the Andover Skill Development Center, which provides education with real world applications. Jacque Clifton from Rose Hill is President, 316-461-3201 or jacque@advocatecare.org, Dave Matthews of El Dorado is the Vice president, Dmatthews7@cox.net; Gloria Canady is the Secretary Gloria@flinthills.kscoxmail.com.
Current board members include Neil Benson, Kerri Loucks from El Dorado and Steve Pazzie Augusta, and Sandi Simkulet from Andover. For more information contact http://butlercountyarc.org.
Representative Crum and I discussed their needs and their many program successes. We all owe it to ourselves to get to know more about this organization. They are the primary support group for parents with special needs children and advocate for the cause of creating opportunities for some of our often times neglected and ostracized citizens. The “Circle of Friends” program in our area high schools brings “normal” kids into daily contact with our special needs students and improved behavior and grades are reported within both groups. Ask your children about this program.
Several people have told me that without Neil Benson the Butler County Special education program would not exist. Through her perseverance and leadership since the early 70’s this program has been nurtured and grown. She is another example of great volunteerism from our citizens.
Carbon dioxide, CO2, is one of the gasses in our atmosphere, being uniformly distributed over the earth’s surface at a concentration of about 0.033% or 330 parts per million (PPM). Commercially CO2 finds uses as a refrigerant (dry ice is solid CO2), in beverage carbonation, and in fire extinguishers. In the U.S. 10.89 billion pounds of carbon dioxide were produced by the chemical industry in 1995, ranking it 22d on the list of top chemicals produced.
Because the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is low, it is not practical to obtain the gas by extracting it from the air. Most commercial carbon dioxide is recovered as a by-product of other processes, such as the production of ethanol by fermentation and the manufacture of ammonia. Some is obtained from the combustion of coke and other carbon-containing fuels.
A new use for liquid carbon dioxide currently under development is as a dry-cleaning solvent. Currently, most laundries use chlorinated hydrocarbons as dry cleaning solvents. These chlorinated hydrocarbons are probable human carcinogens, so the search is on for replacements. www.CO2science.org.
I attended a conference of the National Conference of State Legislators, (NCSL) as I have told you before I serve on both the Committee on Transportation and Executive committee. This three-day conference helps us network with legislators from other state to discuss issues of mutual interest. Do you want an identity card issued by the Federal government? Uncle Sam and others think you need it and it should be the same for every state in the union.
For driver’s license there are some states that do not require proof of legal residence, legal US citizenship, and are not wanting to change. Some say this ID is necessary because your driver’s license soon will not be approved for I.D. and security purposes. You know, getting on an airline, access to federal buildings and the like. Without this National I.D. we may not believe you are who you say you are.
In reality you already need a passport to cross the U.S. border and since less than 15 percent of our population fly commercially or intend to cross the border anyway, why do we need the Federal Government to issue us an I.D.? This sounds like the beginnings of Socialism to me.
Many of the legislators in attendance want to see what the final rules on “Real ID” are going to look like. Oh, yea, I forgot to tell you the Feds have told us we have until May 08 to comply or we lose Federal funding on many projects to include the highway programs. Since the rules have not yet been written I can see a problem with compliance. I think this is why 8 states have told the boys in Washington to not bother they are not going to comply anyway. We in Kansas are still waiting.
I consider it an honor and privilege to be your Representative in Topeka and I want to know what you think. Contact me in person, or at home 1115 Rim Rock Road, El Dorado 67043, 316-321-2087, or the Internet at johng@carlisleinc.net, grange@house.state.ks.us, www.johngrange.net, Thanks again, John.
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