ATCHISON COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities are investigating a Kansas felon for an alleged violent crime.

On Tuesday, police arrested 22-year-old&nbsp;Savannah G. Martin of St. Joseph, on a District Court warrant on a requested charge of domestic battery, according to Police Chief Mike Wilson.

Martin had a previous drug conviction in 2018 for marijuana distribution, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections. She was released from prison in March of 2020. She is no longer in custody in Atchison County.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662561624544.png" alt="Martin had a previous drug distribution conviction in 2018, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections." />
 <figcaption>Martin had a previous drug distribution conviction in 2018, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections.</figcaption>
 </figure>ATCHISON COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities are investigating a Kansas felon for an alleged violent crime.On Tuesday, police arrested 22-year-old&nbsp;Savannah G. Martin of St. Joseph, on a District Court warrant on a requested charge of domestic battery, according to Police Chief Mike Wilson.Martin had a previous drug conviction in 2018 for marijuana distribution, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections. She was released from prison in March of 2020. She is no longer in custody in Atchison County.

Kansas felon jailed for alleged domestic battery

GEARY COUNTY—Law enforcement authorities are investigating two adults and five juveniles for an alleged burglary in rural Geary County.

Just after 11:30 a.m. Monday, sheriff’s deputies responded to 1729 N. Monroe Street in Geary County in reference to a burglary with damage to property, according to a media release.

Investigators learned that&nbsp; on September 4, several suspects entered the locked business property at the location.&nbsp; Once inside the business the suspects damaged and stole property. Through their investigation deputies were able to identify the suspects.

On Wednesday, deputies arrested 18-year-old Kody Nathaniel Duncan and 18-year-old Brianna Faith Spitzer both of Junction City on requested charges of Burglary, Damage to Property and Contributing to a Child’s Misconduct. They are being held on a $5,000 bond each.

Deputies also arrested/issued Notice to Appear to 17-year-old Tristin Nelson Ockomon-Trujillo; 17-year-old&nbsp;           James Thomas McCardle; 17-year-old Ayden James Johnson; 17-year-old Mackenzie Lee Kemp and 16-year-old Sydnee Abigail Stoner all of Junction City on requested charges of Burglary and Damage to Property:

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662577567629.png" alt="Duncan-photo Geary Co." />
 <figcaption>Duncan-photo Geary Co.</figcaption>
 </figure>GEARY COUNTY—Law enforcement authorities are investigating two adults and five juveniles for an alleged burglary in rural Geary County.Just after 11:30 a.m. Monday, sheriff’s deputies responded to 1729 N. Monroe Street in Geary County in reference to a burglary with damage to property, according to a media release.Investigators learned that&nbsp; on September 4, several suspects entered the locked business property at the location.&nbsp; Once inside the business the suspects damaged and stole property. Through their investigation deputies were able to identify the suspects.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662577907942.png" alt="Spitzer-photo Geary Co." />
 <figcaption>Spitzer-photo Geary Co.</figcaption>
 </figure>On Wednesday, deputies arrested 18-year-old Kody Nathaniel Duncan and 18-year-old Brianna Faith Spitzer both of Junction City on requested charges of Burglary, Damage to Property and Contributing to a Child’s Misconduct. They are being held on a $5,000 bond each.Deputies also arrested/issued Notice to Appear to 17-year-old Tristin Nelson Ockomon-Trujillo; 17-year-old&nbsp; James Thomas McCardle; 17-year-old Ayden James Johnson; 17-year-old Mackenzie Lee Kemp and 16-year-old Sydnee Abigail Stoner all of Junction City on requested charges of Burglary and Damage to Property:

2 adults, 5 juveniles accused of burglary at rural Kan. business

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle returned to the White House on Wednesday for the unveiling of&nbsp;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCnEBtru3dU">official portraits with a modern vibe</a>: him standing expressionless against a white background and her seated on a sofa in the Red Room wearing a formal light blue dress.

(Click below to watch the unveiling ceremony)

“Barack and Michelle, welcome home,” President Joe Biden said before he invited the Obamas to the stage to unveil the portraits. Some in the audience gasped, others applauded.

“It's great to be back,” Obama said when it was his turn to speak. He praised Biden — his vice president — as someone who became a “true partner and a true friend.”

The artist whom Barack Obama selected to paint his portrait says the “stripped down” style of his works helps create an “encounter” between the person in the painting and the person looking at it.

Robert McCurdy likes to present his subjects without any facial expression and standing against a white background, which is how America's 44th and first Black president will be seen here for posterity, in a black suit and gray tie.

Biden and first lady Jill Biden invited Obama and the former first lady back to their former home to unveil their official portraits. It was Mrs. Obama's first visit since her husband's presidency ended in January 2017. Obama himself visited in April to help celebrate the anniversary of the major health care law he signed.

The former first lady chose artist Sharon Sprung for her portrait.

The portraits do not look like any others in the collection to which they will be added, in terms of style and substance.

McCurdy told the White House Historical Association for the latest edition of its “1600 Sessions” podcast that his style is “stripped down for a reason." He's also done portraits of South Africa's Nelson Mandela, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and the Dalai Lama, among others.

“They have plain white backgrounds, nobody gestures, nobody — there are no props because we're not here to tell the story of the person that's sitting for them,” McCurdy said. "We're here to create an encounter between the viewer and the sitter.”

He compared the technique to a session with a psychiatrist in which the patient and doctor tell each other as little as possible about themselves “so that you can project onto them.”

“And we're doing the same thing with these paintings,” McCurdy said. “We're telling as little about the sitter as possible so that the viewer can project onto them.”

McCurdy works from a photograph of his subjects, selected from hundreds of images. He spends a year to 18 months on each portrait and said he knows he's done “when it stops irritating me.”

Sprung, who also was interviewed for the podcast, described feeling as though she was in a “comedy sketch” when she met with the Obamas in the Oval Office.

She kept sinking into the couch she sat on while they sat on sturdier chairs. Then the president “flicked” away the printed talking points she had handed out to everyone in the room. Then she just “went still" and had to "gasp for air a little bit” when someone else in the meeting asked her why she paints. Then she started to cry.

“So who knows what put the interview over the top, but that's how it went,” Sprung said.

She had planned on having Mrs. Obama stand in the portrait, “to give it a certain dignity,” but said the former first lady "has so much dignity that I decided to do it sitting just because ... it was too much looking up at her. I'm that much shorter than her."

Sprung worked on the portrait for eight months, day and night, the most time she's ever spent on a single painting. She worked entirely from photographs taken in various locations on the State Floor of the White House. Getting the dress just right was the hardest part, she said.

“The color was so beautiful and I really wanted to get the strength of the color and the light,” said Sprung, who has done portraits of the late Rep. Patsy Mink, D-Hawaii, and Jeannette Rankin of Montana, the first woman elected to Congress.

Recent tradition, no matter political affiliation, has had the current president genially hosting his immediate predecessor for the unveiling — as Bill Clinton did for George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush did for Clinton and Obama did for the younger Bush.

Donald Trump, who criticized almost everything about Obama and deviated from many presidential traditions, held no ceremony for Obama. So Biden, who was Obama's vice president, scheduled one for his former boss.

Obama's portrait is destined for display in the Grand Foyer of the White House, the traditional showcase for paintings of the two most recent presidents. Clinton's and George W. Bush's portraits currently hang there.

Mrs. Obama's portrait likely will be placed with her predecessors along the hallway on the Ground Floor of the White House, joining Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush.

Both McCurdy and Sprung said it was hard to keep their work on the portraits secret. McCurdy said it wouldn't have been a problem “if it had not gone on for so long.” Sprung said she had to turn the portrait to the wall whenever someone came into her studio in New York.

The White House Historical Association, a nonprofit organization that is funded through private donations and sales of books and an annual Christmas ornament, helps manage the portrait process and, since the 1960s, has paid for most of those in the collection.

Congress bought the first painting in the collection, of George Washington. Other portraits of early presidents and first ladies often came to the White House as gifts.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662583034690.png" alt="" />
 <figcaption></figcaption>
 </figure>WASHINGTON (AP) — Former President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle returned to the White House on Wednesday for the unveiling of&nbsp;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCnEBtru3dU">official portraits with a modern vibe</a>: him standing expressionless against a white background and her seated on a sofa in the Red Room wearing a formal light blue dress.(Click below to watch the unveiling ceremony)<div><iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UbAHHcq1f2A?start=912" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe></div>“Barack and Michelle, welcome home,” President Joe Biden said before he invited the Obamas to the stage to unveil the portraits. Some in the audience gasped, others applauded.“It's great to be back,” Obama said when it was his turn to speak. He praised Biden — his vice president — as someone who became a “true partner and a true friend.”The artist whom Barack Obama selected to paint his portrait says the “stripped down” style of his works helps create an “encounter” between the person in the painting and the person looking at it.Robert McCurdy likes to present his subjects without any facial expression and standing against a white background, which is how America's 44th and first Black president will be seen here for posterity, in a black suit and gray tie.Biden and first lady Jill Biden invited Obama and the former first lady back to their former home to unveil their official portraits. It was Mrs. Obama's first visit since her husband's presidency ended in January 2017. Obama himself visited in April to help celebrate the anniversary of the major health care law he signed.The former first lady chose artist Sharon Sprung for her portrait.The portraits do not look like any others in the collection to which they will be added, in terms of style and substance.McCurdy told the White House Historical Association for the latest edition of its “1600 Sessions” podcast that his style is “stripped down for a reason." He's also done portraits of South Africa's Nelson Mandela, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and the Dalai Lama, among others.“They have plain white backgrounds, nobody gestures, nobody — there are no props because we're not here to tell the story of the person that's sitting for them,” McCurdy said. "We're here to create an encounter between the viewer and the sitter.”He compared the technique to a session with a psychiatrist in which the patient and doctor tell each other as little as possible about themselves “so that you can project onto them.”“And we're doing the same thing with these paintings,” McCurdy said. “We're telling as little about the sitter as possible so that the viewer can project onto them.”McCurdy works from a photograph of his subjects, selected from hundreds of images. He spends a year to 18 months on each portrait and said he knows he's done “when it stops irritating me.”Sprung, who also was interviewed for the podcast, described feeling as though she was in a “comedy sketch” when she met with the Obamas in the Oval Office.She kept sinking into the couch she sat on while they sat on sturdier chairs. Then the president “flicked” away the printed talking points she had handed out to everyone in the room. Then she just “went still" and had to "gasp for air a little bit” when someone else in the meeting asked her why she paints. Then she started to cry.“So who knows what put the interview over the top, but that's how it went,” Sprung said.She had planned on having Mrs. Obama stand in the portrait, “to give it a certain dignity,” but said the former first lady "has so much dignity that I decided to do it sitting just because ... it was too much looking up at her. I'm that much shorter than her."Sprung worked on the portrait for eight months, day and night, the most time she's ever spent on a single painting. She worked entirely from photographs taken in various locations on the State Floor of the White House. Getting the dress just right was the hardest part, she said.“The color was so beautiful and I really wanted to get the strength of the color and the light,” said Sprung, who has done portraits of the late Rep. Patsy Mink, D-Hawaii, and Jeannette Rankin of Montana, the first woman elected to Congress.Recent tradition, no matter political affiliation, has had the current president genially hosting his immediate predecessor for the unveiling — as Bill Clinton did for George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush did for Clinton and Obama did for the younger Bush.Donald Trump, who criticized almost everything about Obama and deviated from many presidential traditions, held no ceremony for Obama. So Biden, who was Obama's vice president, scheduled one for his former boss.Obama's portrait is destined for display in the Grand Foyer of the White House, the traditional showcase for paintings of the two most recent presidents. Clinton's and George W. Bush's portraits currently hang there.Mrs. Obama's portrait likely will be placed with her predecessors along the hallway on the Ground Floor of the White House, joining Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush.Both McCurdy and Sprung said it was hard to keep their work on the portraits secret. McCurdy said it wouldn't have been a problem “if it had not gone on for so long.” Sprung said she had to turn the portrait to the wall whenever someone came into her studio in New York.The White House Historical Association, a nonprofit organization that is funded through private donations and sales of books and an annual Christmas ornament, helps manage the portrait process and, since the 1960s, has paid for most of those in the collection.Congress bought the first painting in the collection, of George Washington. Other portraits of early presidents and first ladies often came to the White House as gifts.

🎥Obamas return to White House: Official portraits unveiled

SEDGWICK COUNTY—Law enforcement authorities on Wednesday afternoon reported 39-year-old Amanda Crabtree has been found and is safe, according to a social media report from Wichita Police.

Crabtree's family reported her missing on August 24. Police released no additional details.

On Sept. 1, authorities reported they located her Black Hyundai Sonata abandoned with her personal belongings at the Interstate 135 rest stop near McPherson.

The Kansas Highway Patrol and the McPherson County Sheriff’s office searched the area, but did not locate her.

A woman, believed to be Amanda, was seen at the rest area with her cat. She may have dyed her hair blue. She is described as 5-foot-4, 200 pounds, with blue eyes. She may have been traveling with her cat. 

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662054202579.png" alt="Crabtree-photo Wichita Police" />
 <figcaption>Crabtree-photo Wichita Police</figcaption>
 </figure>SEDGWICK COUNTY—Law enforcement authorities on Wednesday afternoon reported 39-year-old Amanda Crabtree has been found and is safe, according to a social media report from Wichita Police.Crabtree's family reported her missing on August 24. Police released no additional details.On Sept. 1, authorities reported they located her Black Hyundai Sonata abandoned with her personal belongings at the Interstate 135 rest stop near McPherson.The Kansas Highway Patrol and the McPherson County Sheriff’s office searched the area, but did not locate her.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662054343012.png" alt="Crabtree-photo Wichita Police" />
 <figcaption>Crabtree-photo Wichita Police</figcaption>
 </figure>A woman, believed to be Amanda, was seen at the rest area with her cat. She may have dyed her hair blue. She is described as 5-foot-4, 200 pounds, with blue eyes. She may have been traveling with her cat.

Police: Kan. woman missing for 2-weeks has been found

By SHERMAN SMITH <a href="https://kansasreflector.com/2022/09/07/summoning-inspiration-from-solitary-kansas-native-wins-pen-america-prison-writing-award/">Kansas Reflector</a>

TOPEKA — Alex Tretbar scratched Lou Reed lyrics into the concrete 
“rhomboid exoskeleton” of an Oregon jail’s solitary confinement hole, 
then found the strength to write about it.

“Some people work very hard,” the song goes, “but still they never get it right.”

Tretbar, a Wichita native and University of Kansas graduate, 
references the experience in “Variations on an Undisclosed Location,” a 
poem he wrote while incarcerated for five years for his role in a 
drug-related shooting. PEN America announced Wednesday that Tretbar’s 
poem was a first-place winner in the organization’s annual prison 
writing contest.

The award is a testament to Tretbar’s ability to reconcile his battle
 with opioid addiction through the “self-psychotherapy” of writing. He 
now lives in Kansas City, Missouri, after being paroled in July.

“I was like, OK, there’s not really much left for me to do other than
 try to improve myself and get clean, and writing was just — it wasn’t 
really like a choice. It was just what I do,” Tretbar said.

He said the poem is about working out the effects of segregation on 
the personality, how time is perceived, and grappling with addiction and
 suffering and racism.

PEN America champions literary art and free expression through its <a target="_blank" href="https://pen.org/prison-writing/">Prison and Justice Writing program</a>.
 The organization’s annual awards spotlight writers “who are critically 
reshaping the conversation on mass incarceration, advocacy, and justice 
in the United States.”

Robert Pollock, manager of the Prison Writing Program, said this 
year’s anthology of winners takes its name from Tretbar’s poem because 
it “resonated with us so deeply.”

The way Tretbar sees it, prison saved his life.

Tretbar grew up in Wichita and graduated in 2012 from KU with degrees
 in English and journalism. He said he was involved in the Lawrence 
music scene, where he played bass guitar and managed the college radio 
station. He also developed an addiction to oxycodone and other opioids 
while in school.

“I wasn’t necessarily like this reclusive drug addict,” he said. “To a
 certain extent, I was a functional addict when I was in school. And 
that ended up not being tenable after I graduated.”

When it became difficult to find pharmaceuticals, Tretbar started 
using heroin. He moved to Los Angeles to pursue music and journalism — 
“just running and not really thinking straight” — and washed up in a 
hostel in Venice Beach, trying to get clean. Then it was on to Portland,
 Oregon, with a woman he met in L.A.

He worked at a law firm for a while, ghostwriting recommendation 
letters for immigrants who were trying to get green cards. He was on 
methadone and still chained to opioids. In 2016, he started using again 
and lived on the streets for Portland for about a year.

That’s when he made a “horrible mistake.”

Tretbar and a drug dealer went to settle a debt, which led to 
gunfire. Luckily, no one died. Tretbar fled the scene instead of calling
 911 or attending to the victim. He was charged with first-degree 
attempted robbery.

“Sometimes it doesn’t really seem like me, looking back on it, but it
 definitely was me,” Tretbar said. “I take responsibility for it.”

In the years that followed, “I’ve tried to live my life in a way that
 would honor not only the victim, but my family and friends who also 
suffered while I was in prison for my absence, and also to honor myself 
and honor the life that I should have been living all along.”

Tretbar said he worked as a librarian and GED tutor at Deer Ridge 
Correctional Institution, where he met several mentors from Oregon State
 University who helped him work on his writing. In 2021, he won 
second-place PEN awards for poetry and fiction writing.

This year’s award-winning poem evolved from a prompt with his mentors. It begins:

wasn’t. All of the other &amp; inward 
voices came out: my neighbor 
summoned summer with his absent eye

of a lost-in-basement cricket. I carved Lou 
Reed lyrics into my concrete rhomboid 
exoskeleton. I found a letter toothpasted 
to the ceiling claiming

The lyrics were from the Velvet Underground song “Beginning to See the Light.”

Tretbar said he draws inspiration from the music of the Velvet 
Underground, the Stooges and “krautrock” artists. His writing influences
 include Topeka natives Ben Lerner and Michael Robbins.

He is now working remotely for an old friend at a political 
consulting agency in Omaha and searching for post-November writing work.
 He hopes to attend graduate school and work as a GTA next year.

Tretbar said he never thought about prison or mass incarceration until he was arrested.

“Five years was the right amount of time to get sober and get my head
 straight, and so I have a complicated relationship with prison, because
 I’m grateful for it,” he said. “Sure, I hate and despite many aspects 
of incarceration — the mindless bureaucracy and the dehumanization and 
all of that. But for some people, it works.”

Tretbar said his first impressions about people “have almost always 
been wrong.” Similarly, other people have the wrong idea about prison.

“I struggle with coming up with a single sentence that says, ‘This is
 how you should feel about prison.’ But I would say don’t make up your 
mind too readily about the kind of person that goes to prison and the 
kind of person that gets out of prison, because every single one of them
 is different,” Tretbar said.

I seek — sought — asylum 
in silos, syringes, 
sickness for the sake 
of getting well again.

I am a word, of or relating to 
what tries to turn around but can’t 
stop turning, dizzy dervish.

I demand the panopticon crown 
my oatmeal with an orchid.

— from “Variations on an Undisclosed Location”

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662569568578.png" alt="Kansas native Alex Tretbar won the PEN America first-place award for poetry writing in this year’s prison writing contest for his “Variations on an Undisclosed Location.” (Submitted)" />
 <figcaption>Kansas native Alex Tretbar won the PEN America first-place award for poetry writing in this year’s prison writing contest for his “Variations on an Undisclosed Location.” (Submitted)</figcaption>
 </figure>By SHERMAN SMITH <a href="https://kansasreflector.com/2022/09/07/summoning-inspiration-from-solitary-kansas-native-wins-pen-america-prison-writing-award/">Kansas Reflector</a>TOPEKA — Alex Tretbar scratched Lou Reed lyrics into the concrete 
“rhomboid exoskeleton” of an Oregon jail’s solitary confinement hole, 
then found the strength to write about it.“Some people work very hard,” the song goes, “but still they never get it right.”Tretbar, a Wichita native and University of Kansas graduate, 
references the experience in “Variations on an Undisclosed Location,” a 
poem he wrote while incarcerated for five years for his role in a 
drug-related shooting. PEN America announced Wednesday that Tretbar’s 
poem was a first-place winner in the organization’s annual prison 
writing contest.The award is a testament to Tretbar’s ability to reconcile his battle
 with opioid addiction through the “self-psychotherapy” of writing. He 
now lives in Kansas City, Missouri, after being paroled in July.“I was like, OK, there’s not really much left for me to do other than
 try to improve myself and get clean, and writing was just — it wasn’t 
really like a choice. It was just what I do,” Tretbar said.He said the poem is about working out the effects of segregation on 
the personality, how time is perceived, and grappling with addiction and
 suffering and racism.“It kind of goes all over,” he said.PEN America champions literary art and free expression through its <a target="_blank" href="https://pen.org/prison-writing/">Prison and Justice Writing program</a>.
 The organization’s annual awards spotlight writers “who are critically 
reshaping the conversation on mass incarceration, advocacy, and justice 
in the United States.”Robert Pollock, manager of the Prison Writing Program, said this 
year’s anthology of winners takes its name from Tretbar’s poem because 
it “resonated with us so deeply.”The way Tretbar sees it, prison saved his life.Tretbar grew up in Wichita and graduated in 2012 from KU with degrees
 in English and journalism. He said he was involved in the Lawrence 
music scene, where he played bass guitar and managed the college radio 
station. He also developed an addiction to oxycodone and other opioids 
while in school.“I wasn’t necessarily like this reclusive drug addict,” he said. “To a
 certain extent, I was a functional addict when I was in school. And 
that ended up not being tenable after I graduated.”When it became difficult to find pharmaceuticals, Tretbar started 
using heroin. He moved to Los Angeles to pursue music and journalism — 
“just running and not really thinking straight” — and washed up in a 
hostel in Venice Beach, trying to get clean. Then it was on to Portland,
 Oregon, with a woman he met in L.A.He worked at a law firm for a while, ghostwriting recommendation 
letters for immigrants who were trying to get green cards. He was on 
methadone and still chained to opioids. In 2016, he started using again 
and lived on the streets for Portland for about a year.That’s when he made a “horrible mistake.”Tretbar and a drug dealer went to settle a debt, which led to 
gunfire. Luckily, no one died. Tretbar fled the scene instead of calling
 911 or attending to the victim. He was charged with first-degree 
attempted robbery.“Sometimes it doesn’t really seem like me, looking back on it, but it
 definitely was me,” Tretbar said. “I take responsibility for it.”In the years that followed, “I’ve tried to live my life in a way that
 would honor not only the victim, but my family and friends who also 
suffered while I was in prison for my absence, and also to honor myself 
and honor the life that I should have been living all along.”Tretbar said he worked as a librarian and GED tutor at Deer Ridge 
Correctional Institution, where he met several mentors from Oregon State
 University who helped him work on his writing. In 2021, he won 
second-place PEN awards for poetry and fiction writing.This year’s award-winning poem evolved from a prompt with his mentors. It begins:Solitarywasn’t. All of the other &amp; inward 
voices came out: my neighbor 
summoned summer with his absent eye-tooth: perfect mimicof a lost-in-basement cricket. I carved Lou 
Reed lyrics into my concrete rhomboid 
exoskeleton. I found a letter toothpasted 
to the ceiling claimingI had written it.The lyrics were from the Velvet Underground song “Beginning to See the Light.”Tretbar said he draws inspiration from the music of the Velvet 
Underground, the Stooges and “krautrock” artists. His writing influences
 include Topeka natives Ben Lerner and Michael Robbins.He is now working remotely for an old friend at a political 
consulting agency in Omaha and searching for post-November writing work.
 He hopes to attend graduate school and work as a GTA next year.Tretbar said he never thought about prison or mass incarceration until he was arrested.“Five years was the right amount of time to get sober and get my head
 straight, and so I have a complicated relationship with prison, because
 I’m grateful for it,” he said. “Sure, I hate and despite many aspects 
of incarceration — the mindless bureaucracy and the dehumanization and 
all of that. But for some people, it works.”Tretbar said his first impressions about people “have almost always 
been wrong.” Similarly, other people have the wrong idea about prison.“I struggle with coming up with a single sentence that says, ‘This is
 how you should feel about prison.’ But I would say don’t make up your 
mind too readily about the kind of person that goes to prison and the 
kind of person that gets out of prison, because every single one of them
 is different,” Tretbar said.I seek — sought — asylum 
in silos, syringes, 
sickness for the sake 
of getting well again.I am a word, of or relating to 
what tries to turn around but can’t 
stop turning, dizzy dervish.I demand the panopticon crown 
my oatmeal with an orchid.— from “Variations on an Undisclosed Location”

Inspiration from solitary: Kan. native wins prison writing award

By ARIANA FIGUEROA <a href="https://kansasreflector.com/2022/09/04/candidates-mostly-republican-skip-debates-bar-press-during-midterm-campaigns/">States Newsroom</a>

WASHINGTON — With two months left of 
the 2022 campaign season, a majority of Republican candidates are 
continuing to skirt away from not only talking to local and national 
media outlets about their policy issues, but their own constituents, 
leaving voters with little information on their policy positions.

“If we are to hold our elected officials accountable on their policy stance(s), we have to know what they are,” said Nicholas Valentino, a political science and research professor in the Center for Political Studies at the University of Michigan.&nbsp;

The relationship between the press 
and politicians has always had some amount of contention, throughout 
Republican and Democratic-controlled congressional terms and White House
 administrations.&nbsp;

The Obama administration more than any White House administration<a target="_blank" href="https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2014/jan/10/jake-tapper/cnns-tapper-obama-has-used-espionage-act-more-all-/"> used the Espionage Act </a>to
 go after whistleblowers who leaked to the press. For example, the 
government has used that act 11 times to go after federal workers who 
shared classified information with the press, and the Obama 
administration alone used the act seven of those times.

But the refusal to talk to 
journalists and barring them from covering political events that would 
inform voters of their policy positions, has gotten worse over the 
years, and it’s showing up in local elections.&nbsp;

“If you can undermine the credibility
 of the press, then you can also absolve yourself the responsibility to 
speak to the press, and we’ve seen a dramatic increase in the United 
States in that kind of behavior,” Valentino said.

He said it’s a trend that worries experts who study democratic stability not only in the United States, but across the world.

“One of the key indicators of 
democratic backsliding is our restriction of information to the free 
press and an unwillingness to speak to the press,” Valentino said.

It’s not just the media that 
Republican candidates are opting out of speaking to, it’s their own 
constituents. In Iowa, Republicans such as Gov. Kim Reynolds, U.S. Sen. 
Chuck Grassley and U.S. Reps. Randy Feenstra, Ashley Hinson and 
Mariannette Miller-Meeks <a target="_blank" href="https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2022/08/22/gop-candidates-who-snub-mainstream-media-are-turning-their-backs-on-voters/">skipped an Iowa State Fair tradition</a>
 – the Des Moines Register Political Soapbox where candidates talk to 
the public about where they stand on the issues. The only Republicans 
who spoke were those challenging Democratic incumbents.&nbsp;

A majority of Republican candidates are also refusing to debate their Democratic opponents. Republican Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine <a target="_blank" href="https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2022/03/11/gov-dewine-turns-down-debate-invitation-without-explanation/">refused to debate Republican challengers </a>in the primary and now has said he will not debate <a target="_blank" href="https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2022/08/29/dewine-ducks-whaleys-call-for-debate/">his Democratic challenger</a>, former Dayton mayor Nan Whaley.

In Nebraska, GOP governor candidate <a target="_blank" href="https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2022/08/17/gop-candidate-pillen-wont-debate-democrat-blood-in-governors-race/">Jim Pillen also refuses to debate his Democratic challenger</a>,
 State Sen. Carol Blood. If elected, Pillen would become Nebraska’s 
first governor since at least the 1970s to be elected without facing his
 opponents on a debate stage. (Nebraska U.S. Rep. Don Bacon, on the 
other hand, will <a target="_blank" href="https://nebraskaexaminer.com/briefs/bacon-and-vargas-to-debate-twice-in-october/">participate in two debates</a> and recently tweeted “I love debates.”)

And in a closely watched Georgia U.S. Senate race, Republican candidate Herschel Walker has yet to hold a public debate with Democratic
 Sen. Raphael Warnock, who became Georgia’s first Black U.S. senator 
after a special election in January of last year. Walker has challenged 
Warnock to several debates, which Warnock agreed to, but <a target="_blank" href="https://www.13wmaz.com/article/news/local/herschel-walker-declines-invitation-to-debate-senator-warnock-in-macon-georgia/93-fb884d87-4e85-4f6a-8a02-a1cf47948d9a?utm_campaign=snd-autopilot">Walker has backed out of those debates.</a>&nbsp;

Walker has agreed to an Oct. 14 debate hosted by Nexstar Media Group. Warnock has not agreed to the debate, and <a target="_blank" href="https://www.ledger-enquirer.com/news/local/article265070919.html">refused to answer the question when asked by a reporter from the Ledger-Enquirer.&nbsp;</a>

Warnock’s campaign responded to States Newsroom, but did not answer if he would attend the Oct. 14 debate.&nbsp; 

“How can we expect Herschel Walker to stand up for Georgians in the Senate if he refuses to debate on stage?” Warnock <a target="_blank" href="https://twitter.com/ReverendWarnock/status/1564667089138454531">wrote on Twitter</a> on Tuesday.&nbsp;

Walker has also frequently <a target="_blank" href="https://www.ajc.com/politics/politics-blog/the-jolt-herschel-walkers-campaign-bars-press-brings-in-reinforcements/E772YHRBJFCGNCPUEK42FWEWSA/">put restrictions on local press</a>, opting to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/herschel-walker-glad-anti-trump-gop-group-used-ex-wifes-graphic-comments-new-ad">release statements to conservative outlets like Fox News instead.</a>

Not all Republican candidates are declining debate invitations. For instance, Republican Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt, who is running for governor, has <a target="_blank" href="https://kansasreflector.com/2022/09/01/kelly-schmidt-agree-to-take-part-in-two-debates-one-forum-in-governors-race/">agreed to debate</a>
 Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly. Schmidt, however, waited three months 
after announcing his running mate before holding his first press 
conference.

And a few Democratic candidates have been criticized for turning down invitations.

In Pennsylvania, Democratic Senate candidate John Fetterman <a target="_blank" href="https://www.penncapital-star.com/election-2022/fetterman-still-recovering-from-stroke-declines-kdka-tvs-debate-invite/">has largely stayed away from interviews and accepting debate invitations</a> for weeks following a stroke in May. <a target="_blank" href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/could-john-fetterman-shitpost-his-way-to-the-senate">His campaign has largely run on memes</a>, attacking his GOP U.S. Senate nominee Mehmet Oz for being a New Jersey resident.&nbsp;

Oz has agreed to attend what would be the first televised debate for the race, hosted by Pittsburgh’s KDKA-TV, on Sept. 6.&nbsp;

And in Maryland, Democratic candidate Wes Moore and Republican candidate Dan Cox <a target="_blank" href="https://themsuspokesman.com/13881/special-coverage/cox-punches-ticket-moore-declines-spokesman-gubernatorial-forum/">were invited to a Sept. 27</a> gubernatorial forum by Morgan
 State University’s student-run news publication. Cox accepted, but 
Moore declined, with his spokesman saying Moore did not want to “elevate the dangerous views” of his challenger.&nbsp;

When political candidates refuse to 
step on the debate stage to either defend or explain their policy 
position, it makes it difficult for voters to be informed on what their 
representatives are doing, Valentino said.&nbsp;

“One of the major discoveries in 
political psychology over the last 50 or 60 years, which is that in 
fact, it is highly rare and difficult for constituencies to hold their 
elected officials accountable,” he said.&nbsp;

And when voters don’t have a clear 
idea of policy values a candidate holds, then their votes become more 
partisan, said Daniel Hopkins, a political science professor in the 
Department of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania.

“Voters, when they go to the polls, 
have a lot of information about national politics, and very little 
information about state and local politics,” he said. “There have been a
 whole set of very compelling studies in recent years, showing that when
 local newspapers go out of business, voters then tend to vote in more 
partisan ways.”&nbsp;

Voting based on party affiliation alone, is also a shift away from American democratic norms, Hopkins added.&nbsp;

“The reason that we ask voters to 
vote on all of these specific candidates, rather than just voting for a 
party, is because of the idea that the candidate matters, that 
candidates can take different positions, that these individuals are not 
just functionaries of their parties,” he said. “And so if voters are 
increasingly just joining the party line, that does pose a real tension 
with the way that we conduct our elections, which asks people to develop
 opinions about so many different political actors.”&nbsp;

And refusing to allow press into political rallies, also makes it difficult to inform voters, Hopkins added.&nbsp;

“They have less information, and so they’re going to stick with their partisanship,” Hopkins said.

Over the last several years, Hopkins 
said polarization has increased and certain Republican candidates have 
been “abandoning the idea that the news media can be a neutral outlet.”&nbsp;

He pointed to former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.npr.org/2011/11/17/142421000/by-attacking-the-media-gingrich-built-a-following">whose frequent attacks on the media helped him build a right-wing following ahead of the 2012 presidential primaries. </a>He
 lost the Republican presidential primary, but the norm of attacking the
 press as a biased institution, was quickly followed as a tactic for 
former Republican President Donald Trump.&nbsp;

The Trump administration also 
frequently attacked media outlets and barred them from press briefings 
and threatened to take away their White House press credentials. And in 
2017, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/24/greg-gianforte-bodyslams-reporter-ben-jacobs-montana">Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs was physically assaulted</a> by U.S. House Montana-at large Republican candidate Greg Gianforte, while asking him a question about health care.&nbsp;

Gianforte won the special election and is currently the governor of Montana.&nbsp;

The Republican National Committee this year <a target="_blank" href="https://gop.com/press-release/rnc-unanimously-votes-to-withdraw-from-commission-on-presidential-debates/">voted unanimously</a>
 to withdraw from the Commission on Presidential Debates ahead of the 
2024 presidential election, arguing that it would not be a fair debate. 
The commission is a nonpartisan organization that has sponsored 
president and vice president debates since the ’80s and has Republican 
and Democratic membership.&nbsp;&nbsp;

“The Commission on Presidential 
Debates is biased and has refused to enact simple and common sense 
reforms to help ensure fair debates including hosting debates before 
voting begins and selecting moderators who have never worked for 
candidates on the debate stage,” RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel said in a 
statement.&nbsp;

And in Florida, GOP elected officials only allowed conservative media outlets to attend Sunshine
 Summit, an event where Republicans in the state discuss their political
 agendas. Gov. Ron DeSantis’ press secretary, taunted non-conservative 
media outlets on Twitter who were barred from the event.&nbsp;

“It has come to my attention that some liberal media activists are mad because they aren’t allowed into<a target="_blank" href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SunshineSummit?src=hashtag_click"> #SunshineSummit</a>
 this weekend,” she wrote. “My message to them is to try crying about 
it. Then go to kickboxing and have a margarita. And write the same hit 
piece you were gonna write anyway.”

Republican Alaskan candidate Sarah Palin <a target="_blank" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2022/07/12/sarah-palin-reconsidered/">also avoided talking to the press</a> during the special election to finish the term of the state’s only member of Congress, Rep. Don Young, who died in March.&nbsp;

However, Palin <a target="_blank" href="https://alaskabeacon.com/briefs/qa-with-2022-alaska-u-s-house-candidate-sarah-palin/">did answer a survey response by the Alaskan Beacon</a>
 about her various policy stances such as abortion (she doesn’t believe 
in codifying Roe. v. Wade), the validity of the 2020 presidential 
election (she believes the falsehood that former President Donald Trump 
won the election) and marijuana legalization (she believes it should be 
legal), among other issues.&nbsp;

She lost against Democratic candidate Mary Peltola after <a target="_blank" href="https://alaskabeacon.com/2022/08/31/peltola-wins-u-s-house-race-first-woman-and-alaska-native-to-represent-alaska-in-house/">rank choice votes were announced Wednesday night</a>.
 Peltola will become the first woman to represent Alaska in the U.S. 
House of Representatives, and the first Alaska Native ever to serve in 
Congress.

But shutting the press out isn’t the 
only concern that a democratic country is backsliding, Valentino said. 
The passage of strict voting laws – a trend among Republican 
state-controlled legislatures since the 2020 presidential election – and
 the denying of valid elections are some of the more egregious trends of
 eroding democracy.

<a target="_blank" href="https://www.newsfromthestates.com/article/how-election-denying-gop-governors-could-tilt-2024-presidential-election">Many 2020 election deniers have been nominated</a> as GOP candidates for governor in four critical swing states – Arizona, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

Valentino said if election deniers 
started overturning elections, “that would ironically be one of the 
first major indications of election fraud occurring on behalf of the 
party that’s been accusing the other side of election fraud for years 
now.”

“That in some ways, most scholars 
would say, is far more serious than attacks on the press, because it 
would mean that you were actually taking votes that had been cast, and 
throwing them out,” he said. 

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662467393215.png" alt="Most Republican candidates for statewide and federal office skipped The Des Moines Register Political Soapbox at this year’s Iowa State Fair. (Jared Strong/Iowa Capital Dispatch)" />
 <figcaption>Most Republican candidates for statewide and federal office skipped The Des Moines Register Political Soapbox at this year’s Iowa State Fair. (Jared Strong/Iowa Capital Dispatch)</figcaption>
 </figure>By ARIANA FIGUEROA <a href="https://kansasreflector.com/2022/09/04/candidates-mostly-republican-skip-debates-bar-press-during-midterm-campaigns/">States Newsroom</a>WASHINGTON — With two months left of 
the 2022 campaign season, a majority of Republican candidates are 
continuing to skirt away from not only talking to local and national 
media outlets about their policy issues, but their own constituents, 
leaving voters with little information on their policy positions.“If we are to hold our elected officials accountable on their policy stance(s), we have to know what they are,” said Nicholas Valentino, a political science and research professor in the Center for Political Studies at the University of Michigan.&nbsp;The relationship between the press 
and politicians has always had some amount of contention, throughout 
Republican and Democratic-controlled congressional terms and White House
 administrations.&nbsp;The Obama administration more than any White House administration<a target="_blank" href="https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2014/jan/10/jake-tapper/cnns-tapper-obama-has-used-espionage-act-more-all-/"> used the Espionage Act </a>to
 go after whistleblowers who leaked to the press. For example, the 
government has used that act 11 times to go after federal workers who 
shared classified information with the press, and the Obama 
administration alone used the act seven of those times.But the refusal to talk to 
journalists and barring them from covering political events that would 
inform voters of their policy positions, has gotten worse over the 
years, and it’s showing up in local elections.&nbsp;“If you can undermine the credibility
 of the press, then you can also absolve yourself the responsibility to 
speak to the press, and we’ve seen a dramatic increase in the United 
States in that kind of behavior,” Valentino said.He said it’s a trend that worries experts who study democratic stability not only in the United States, but across the world.“One of the key indicators of 
democratic backsliding is our restriction of information to the free 
press and an unwillingness to speak to the press,” Valentino said.<h2>Debates are off the table too</h2>It’s not just the media that 
Republican candidates are opting out of speaking to, it’s their own 
constituents. In Iowa, Republicans such as Gov. Kim Reynolds, U.S. Sen. 
Chuck Grassley and U.S. Reps. Randy Feenstra, Ashley Hinson and 
Mariannette Miller-Meeks <a target="_blank" href="https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2022/08/22/gop-candidates-who-snub-mainstream-media-are-turning-their-backs-on-voters/">skipped an Iowa State Fair tradition</a>
 – the Des Moines Register Political Soapbox where candidates talk to 
the public about where they stand on the issues. The only Republicans 
who spoke were those challenging Democratic incumbents.&nbsp;A majority of Republican candidates are also refusing to debate their Democratic opponents. Republican Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine <a target="_blank" href="https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2022/03/11/gov-dewine-turns-down-debate-invitation-without-explanation/">refused to debate Republican challengers </a>in the primary and now has said he will not debate <a target="_blank" href="https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2022/08/29/dewine-ducks-whaleys-call-for-debate/">his Democratic challenger</a>, former Dayton mayor Nan Whaley.In Nebraska, GOP governor candidate <a target="_blank" href="https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2022/08/17/gop-candidate-pillen-wont-debate-democrat-blood-in-governors-race/">Jim Pillen also refuses to debate his Democratic challenger</a>,
 State Sen. Carol Blood. If elected, Pillen would become Nebraska’s 
first governor since at least the 1970s to be elected without facing his
 opponents on a debate stage. (Nebraska U.S. Rep. Don Bacon, on the 
other hand, will <a target="_blank" href="https://nebraskaexaminer.com/briefs/bacon-and-vargas-to-debate-twice-in-october/">participate in two debates</a> and recently tweeted “I love debates.”)And in a closely watched Georgia U.S. Senate race, Republican candidate Herschel Walker has yet to hold a public debate with Democratic
 Sen. Raphael Warnock, who became Georgia’s first Black U.S. senator 
after a special election in January of last year. Walker has challenged 
Warnock to several debates, which Warnock agreed to, but <a target="_blank" href="https://www.13wmaz.com/article/news/local/herschel-walker-declines-invitation-to-debate-senator-warnock-in-macon-georgia/93-fb884d87-4e85-4f6a-8a02-a1cf47948d9a?utm_campaign=snd-autopilot">Walker has backed out of those debates.</a>&nbsp;Walker has agreed to an Oct. 14 debate hosted by Nexstar Media Group. Warnock has not agreed to the debate, and <a target="_blank" href="https://www.ledger-enquirer.com/news/local/article265070919.html">refused to answer the question when asked by a reporter from the Ledger-Enquirer.&nbsp;</a>Warnock’s campaign responded to States Newsroom, but did not answer if he would attend the Oct. 14 debate.&nbsp; “How can we expect Herschel Walker to stand up for Georgians in the Senate if he refuses to debate on stage?” Warnock <a target="_blank" href="https://twitter.com/ReverendWarnock/status/1564667089138454531">wrote on Twitter</a> on Tuesday.&nbsp;Walker has also frequently <a target="_blank" href="https://www.ajc.com/politics/politics-blog/the-jolt-herschel-walkers-campaign-bars-press-brings-in-reinforcements/E772YHRBJFCGNCPUEK42FWEWSA/">put restrictions on local press</a>, opting to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/herschel-walker-glad-anti-trump-gop-group-used-ex-wifes-graphic-comments-new-ad">release statements to conservative outlets like Fox News instead.</a>Not all Republican candidates are declining debate invitations. For instance, Republican Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt, who is running for governor, has <a target="_blank" href="https://kansasreflector.com/2022/09/01/kelly-schmidt-agree-to-take-part-in-two-debates-one-forum-in-governors-race/">agreed to debate</a>
 Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly. Schmidt, however, waited three months 
after announcing his running mate before holding his first press 
conference.And a few Democratic candidates have been criticized for turning down invitations.In Pennsylvania, Democratic Senate candidate John Fetterman <a target="_blank" href="https://www.penncapital-star.com/election-2022/fetterman-still-recovering-from-stroke-declines-kdka-tvs-debate-invite/">has largely stayed away from interviews and accepting debate invitations</a> for weeks following a stroke in May. <a target="_blank" href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/could-john-fetterman-shitpost-his-way-to-the-senate">His campaign has largely run on memes</a>, attacking his GOP U.S. Senate nominee Mehmet Oz for being a New Jersey resident.&nbsp;Oz has agreed to attend what would be the first televised debate for the race, hosted by Pittsburgh’s KDKA-TV, on Sept. 6.&nbsp;And in Maryland, Democratic candidate Wes Moore and Republican candidate Dan Cox <a target="_blank" href="https://themsuspokesman.com/13881/special-coverage/cox-punches-ticket-moore-declines-spokesman-gubernatorial-forum/">were invited to a Sept. 27</a> gubernatorial forum by Morgan
 State University’s student-run news publication. Cox accepted, but 
Moore declined, with his spokesman saying Moore did not want to “elevate the dangerous views” of his challenger.&nbsp;<h2>The rise of partisanship voting</h2>When political candidates refuse to 
step on the debate stage to either defend or explain their policy 
position, it makes it difficult for voters to be informed on what their 
representatives are doing, Valentino said.&nbsp;“One of the major discoveries in 
political psychology over the last 50 or 60 years, which is that in 
fact, it is highly rare and difficult for constituencies to hold their 
elected officials accountable,” he said.&nbsp;And when voters don’t have a clear 
idea of policy values a candidate holds, then their votes become more 
partisan, said Daniel Hopkins, a political science professor in the 
Department of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania.“Voters, when they go to the polls, 
have a lot of information about national politics, and very little 
information about state and local politics,” he said. “There have been a
 whole set of very compelling studies in recent years, showing that when
 local newspapers go out of business, voters then tend to vote in more 
partisan ways.”&nbsp;Voting based on party affiliation alone, is also a shift away from American democratic norms, Hopkins added.&nbsp;“The reason that we ask voters to 
vote on all of these specific candidates, rather than just voting for a 
party, is because of the idea that the candidate matters, that 
candidates can take different positions, that these individuals are not 
just functionaries of their parties,” he said. “And so if voters are 
increasingly just joining the party line, that does pose a real tension 
with the way that we conduct our elections, which asks people to develop
 opinions about so many different political actors.”&nbsp;And refusing to allow press into political rallies, also makes it difficult to inform voters, Hopkins added.&nbsp;“They have less information, and so they’re going to stick with their partisanship,” Hopkins said.<h2>Attacks on the press as strategy&nbsp;</h2>Over the last several years, Hopkins 
said polarization has increased and certain Republican candidates have 
been “abandoning the idea that the news media can be a neutral outlet.”&nbsp;He pointed to former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.npr.org/2011/11/17/142421000/by-attacking-the-media-gingrich-built-a-following">whose frequent attacks on the media helped him build a right-wing following ahead of the 2012 presidential primaries. </a>He
 lost the Republican presidential primary, but the norm of attacking the
 press as a biased institution, was quickly followed as a tactic for 
former Republican President Donald Trump.&nbsp;The Trump administration also 
frequently attacked media outlets and barred them from press briefings 
and threatened to take away their White House press credentials. And in 
2017, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/24/greg-gianforte-bodyslams-reporter-ben-jacobs-montana">Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs was physically assaulted</a> by U.S. House Montana-at large Republican candidate Greg Gianforte, while asking him a question about health care.&nbsp;Gianforte won the special election and is currently the governor of Montana.&nbsp;The Republican National Committee this year <a target="_blank" href="https://gop.com/press-release/rnc-unanimously-votes-to-withdraw-from-commission-on-presidential-debates/">voted unanimously</a>
 to withdraw from the Commission on Presidential Debates ahead of the 
2024 presidential election, arguing that it would not be a fair debate. 
The commission is a nonpartisan organization that has sponsored 
president and vice president debates since the ’80s and has Republican 
and Democratic membership.&nbsp;&nbsp;“The Commission on Presidential 
Debates is biased and has refused to enact simple and common sense 
reforms to help ensure fair debates including hosting debates before 
voting begins and selecting moderators who have never worked for 
candidates on the debate stage,” RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel said in a 
statement.&nbsp;And in Florida, GOP elected officials only allowed conservative media outlets to attend Sunshine
 Summit, an event where Republicans in the state discuss their political
 agendas. Gov. Ron DeSantis’ press secretary, taunted non-conservative 
media outlets on Twitter who were barred from the event.&nbsp;“It has come to my attention that some liberal media activists are mad because they aren’t allowed into<a target="_blank" href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SunshineSummit?src=hashtag_click"> #SunshineSummit</a>
 this weekend,” she wrote. “My message to them is to try crying about 
it. Then go to kickboxing and have a margarita. And write the same hit 
piece you were gonna write anyway.”Republican Alaskan candidate Sarah Palin <a target="_blank" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2022/07/12/sarah-palin-reconsidered/">also avoided talking to the press</a> during the special election to finish the term of the state’s only member of Congress, Rep. Don Young, who died in March.&nbsp;However, Palin <a target="_blank" href="https://alaskabeacon.com/briefs/qa-with-2022-alaska-u-s-house-candidate-sarah-palin/">did answer a survey response by the Alaskan Beacon</a>
 about her various policy stances such as abortion (she doesn’t believe 
in codifying Roe. v. Wade), the validity of the 2020 presidential 
election (she believes the falsehood that former President Donald Trump 
won the election) and marijuana legalization (she believes it should be 
legal), among other issues.&nbsp;She lost against Democratic candidate Mary Peltola after <a target="_blank" href="https://alaskabeacon.com/2022/08/31/peltola-wins-u-s-house-race-first-woman-and-alaska-native-to-represent-alaska-in-house/">rank choice votes were announced Wednesday night</a>.
 Peltola will become the first woman to represent Alaska in the U.S. 
House of Representatives, and the first Alaska Native ever to serve in 
Congress.But shutting the press out isn’t the 
only concern that a democratic country is backsliding, Valentino said. 
The passage of strict voting laws – a trend among Republican 
state-controlled legislatures since the 2020 presidential election – and
 the denying of valid elections are some of the more egregious trends of
 eroding democracy.<a target="_blank" href="https://www.newsfromthestates.com/article/how-election-denying-gop-governors-could-tilt-2024-presidential-election">Many 2020 election deniers have been nominated</a> as GOP candidates for governor in four critical swing states – Arizona, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.Valentino said if election deniers 
started overturning elections, “that would ironically be one of the 
first major indications of election fraud occurring on behalf of the 
party that’s been accusing the other side of election fraud for years 
now.”“That in some ways, most scholars 
would say, is far more serious than attacks on the press, because it 
would mean that you were actually taking votes that had been cast, and 
throwing them out,” he said.

More candidates skip debates, bar press during midterms

WASHINGTON —The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center released a joint Cybersecurity Advisory Tuesday to disseminate&nbsp;tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and indicators of compromise (IOCs)  associated with Vice Society actors identified through FBI investigations as recently as this month, according to a statement from the agency.

 The FBI has recently observed Vice Society actors disproportionately targeting the education sector with ransomware attacks.

Over the Labor Day weekend, a ransomware attack targeting the huge Los Angeles school district prompted an unprecedented shutdown of its computer systems, according to a report by the Associated Press.

The attack on the Los Angeles Unified School District sounded alarms across the country, from urgent talks with the White House and the National Security Council after the first signs of ransomware were discovered late Saturday night to mandated password changes for 540,000 students and 70,000 district employees.

Though the attack used technology that encrypts data and won’t unlock it unless a ransom is paid, in this case the district’s superintendent said no immediate demand for money was made and schools in the nation’s second-largest district opened as scheduled on Tuesday.

Such attacks have become a growing threat to U.S. schools, with several high-profile incidents reported since last year as pandemic-forced reliance on technology increases the impact. And ransomware gangs have in the past planned major attacks on U.S. holiday weekends, when they know IT staffing will be thin and security experts relaxing.

While it was not immediately clear when the LA attack began — officials have only said when it was detected and a district spokesperson declined to answer additional questions — Saturday night's discovery reached the highest levels of the federal government's cybersecurity agencies.

According to a senior administration official, this pattern of support was consistent with the Biden administration’s efforts to provide maximum assistance to critical industries affected by such breaches.

The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the federal response, said the school district did not pay ransom, but would not get into detail on what potentially might have been stolen or damaged and what systems were affected by the breach.

The White House's response to the LA incursion reflects a growing national security concern: A Pew Research Center survey, published last month, found that 71% of Americans say cyberattacks from other countries are a major threat to the U.S.

Authorities believe the LA attack originated internationally and have identified three potential countries where it may have come from, though LA Superintendent Alberto Carvalho would not say which countries may be involved. Most ransomware criminals are Russian speakers who operate without interference from the Kremlin.

LA officials did not identify the ransomware used.

“This was an act of cowardice,” said Nick Melvoin, the school board vice president. “A criminal act against kids, against their teachers and against an education system.”

So far this year, 26 U.S. school districts — including Los Angeles — and 24 colleges and universities have been hit by so-called ransomware, according to Brett Callow, a ransomware analyst at the cybersecurity firm Emsisoft.

With victims increasingly refusing to pay to have their data unlocked, many cybercriminals instead use the same technology to steal sensitive information and demand extortion payments. If the victim doesn’t pay, the data gets dumped online.

Callow said at least 31 of the schools hit this year had data stolen and released online, and noted that eight of the school districts have been hit since Aug. 1. The upsurge on schools as summer vacations end is almost certainly not coincidental, he said.

“It is the No. 1 threat to our safety,” said Michel Moore, chief of the Los Angeles Police Department. “It is an invisible foe and it is tireless.”

Tireless — and expensive, even outside of any monetary demands. A ransomware extortion attack in Albuquerque’s biggest school district forced schools to close for two days in January, while Baltimore City's response to a 2019 hit on its computer servers cost upwards of $18 million.

The LA attack was discovered around 10:30 p.m. Saturday when staff first detected “unusual activity," Carvalho said. The perpetrators appear to have targeted the facilities systems, which involves information about private-sector contractor payments — which are publicly available through records requests — rather than confidential details like payroll, health and other data.

He said district IT officials detected the malware and stopped it from propagating but not until after it infected key network systems, necessitating the reset of passwords for all staff and students.

Authorities scrambled to trace the intruders and restrict potential damage.

“We basically shut down every one of our systems,” Carvalho said, noting that each one had been checked and all but one — the facilities system — restarted by late Monday night, when the district first notified the public of the hit.

On Tuesday, federal authorities separately warned of potential ransomware attacks by the criminal syndicate known as Vice Society, which has allegedly disproportionately targeted the education sector.

Authorities have not said whether they believe Vice Society is involved in the LA attack and the group did not respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.

“The fact that a joint cybersecurity advisory relating to Vice Society was issued within days of the attack on LAUSD being discovered may be telling, especially as this gang has frequently targeted the education sector in both the U.S. and the U.K.,” said Callow, the ransomware expert.

Vice Society first appeared in May 2021 and, rather than a unique variant, it has used ransomware widely available in the Russian-speaking underground, security researchers say. Among victims claimed by Vice Society are the Elmbrook School district in&nbsp;<a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/wisconsin">Wisconsin</a>&nbsp;and the Savannah College of Art and Design.

Ransomware gangs routinely dissolve after high-profile attacks such as last year’s Colonial Pipeline incident, which triggered runs on gas stations. Their members then reconstitute under new names.

While there was pressure to cancel school in Los Angeles on Tuesday, officials ultimately decided to stay open.

Had the activity not been discovered on Saturday night, Carvalho said there could have been “catastrophic” consequences.

“If we had lost the ability to run our school buses, over 40,000 of our students would not have been able to get to school, or it would have been a highly disrupted system,” he said.

The district plans to do a forensic audit of the attack to see what can be done to prevent future incursions.

“Every teacher, every employee, every student can be a weak point,” said Soheil Katal, the district's chief information officer.

WASHINGTON —The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center released a joint Cybersecurity Advisory Tuesday to disseminate&nbsp;tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and indicators of compromise (IOCs) associated with Vice Society actors identified through FBI investigations as recently as this month, according to a statement from the agency. The FBI has recently observed Vice Society actors disproportionately targeting the education sector with ransomware attacks.Over the Labor Day weekend, a ransomware attack targeting the huge Los Angeles school district prompted an unprecedented shutdown of its computer systems, according to a report by the Associated Press.The attack on the Los Angeles Unified School District sounded alarms across the country, from urgent talks with the White House and the National Security Council after the first signs of ransomware were discovered late Saturday night to mandated password changes for 540,000 students and 70,000 district employees.Though the attack used technology that encrypts data and won’t unlock it unless a ransom is paid, in this case the district’s superintendent said no immediate demand for money was made and schools in the nation’s second-largest district opened as scheduled on Tuesday.Such attacks have become a growing threat to U.S. schools, with several high-profile incidents reported since last year as pandemic-forced reliance on technology increases the impact. And ransomware gangs have in the past planned major attacks on U.S. holiday weekends, when they know IT staffing will be thin and security experts relaxing.While it was not immediately clear when the LA attack began — officials have only said when it was detected and a district spokesperson declined to answer additional questions — Saturday night's discovery reached the highest levels of the federal government's cybersecurity agencies.According to a senior administration official, this pattern of support was consistent with the Biden administration’s efforts to provide maximum assistance to critical industries affected by such breaches.The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the federal response, said the school district did not pay ransom, but would not get into detail on what potentially might have been stolen or damaged and what systems were affected by the breach.The White House's response to the LA incursion reflects a growing national security concern: A Pew Research Center survey, published last month, found that 71% of Americans say cyberattacks from other countries are a major threat to the U.S.Authorities believe the LA attack originated internationally and have identified three potential countries where it may have come from, though LA Superintendent Alberto Carvalho would not say which countries may be involved. Most ransomware criminals are Russian speakers who operate without interference from the Kremlin.LA officials did not identify the ransomware used.“This was an act of cowardice,” said Nick Melvoin, the school board vice president. “A criminal act against kids, against their teachers and against an education system.”So far this year, 26 U.S. school districts — including Los Angeles — and 24 colleges and universities have been hit by so-called ransomware, according to Brett Callow, a ransomware analyst at the cybersecurity firm Emsisoft.With victims increasingly refusing to pay to have their data unlocked, many cybercriminals instead use the same technology to steal sensitive information and demand extortion payments. If the victim doesn’t pay, the data gets dumped online.Callow said at least 31 of the schools hit this year had data stolen and released online, and noted that eight of the school districts have been hit since Aug. 1. The upsurge on schools as summer vacations end is almost certainly not coincidental, he said.“It is the No. 1 threat to our safety,” said Michel Moore, chief of the Los Angeles Police Department. “It is an invisible foe and it is tireless.”Tireless — and expensive, even outside of any monetary demands. A ransomware extortion attack in Albuquerque’s biggest school district forced schools to close for two days in January, while Baltimore City's response to a 2019 hit on its computer servers cost upwards of $18 million.The LA attack was discovered around 10:30 p.m. Saturday when staff first detected “unusual activity," Carvalho said. The perpetrators appear to have targeted the facilities systems, which involves information about private-sector contractor payments — which are publicly available through records requests — rather than confidential details like payroll, health and other data.He said district IT officials detected the malware and stopped it from propagating but not until after it infected key network systems, necessitating the reset of passwords for all staff and students.Authorities scrambled to trace the intruders and restrict potential damage.“We basically shut down every one of our systems,” Carvalho said, noting that each one had been checked and all but one — the facilities system — restarted by late Monday night, when the district first notified the public of the hit.On Tuesday, federal authorities separately warned of potential ransomware attacks by the criminal syndicate known as Vice Society, which has allegedly disproportionately targeted the education sector.Authorities have not said whether they believe Vice Society is involved in the LA attack and the group did not respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.“The fact that a joint cybersecurity advisory relating to Vice Society was issued within days of the attack on LAUSD being discovered may be telling, especially as this gang has frequently targeted the education sector in both the U.S. and the U.K.,” said Callow, the ransomware expert.Vice Society first appeared in May 2021 and, rather than a unique variant, it has used ransomware widely available in the Russian-speaking underground, security researchers say. Among victims claimed by Vice Society are the Elmbrook School district in&nbsp;<a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/wisconsin">Wisconsin</a>&nbsp;and the Savannah College of Art and Design.Ransomware gangs routinely dissolve after high-profile attacks such as last year’s Colonial Pipeline incident, which triggered runs on gas stations. Their members then reconstitute under new names.While there was pressure to cancel school in Los Angeles on Tuesday, officials ultimately decided to stay open.Had the activity not been discovered on Saturday night, Carvalho said there could have been “catastrophic” consequences.“If we had lost the ability to run our school buses, over 40,000 of our students would not have been able to get to school, or it would have been a highly disrupted system,” he said.The district plans to do a forensic audit of the attack to see what can be done to prevent future incursions.“Every teacher, every employee, every student can be a weak point,” said Soheil Katal, the district's chief information officer.-----

FBI issues cyber attack warning for schools nationwide

TOPEKA — The Kansas Department of&nbsp;<a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/160/COVID-19-in-Kansas">Health reported&nbsp;</a>&nbsp;4,550 new coronavirus cases in Kansas from Wednesday August 31, to Wednesday September 7, for a total of 868,911&nbsp; cases.&nbsp;&nbsp;

On Wednesday, th<a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1529/June-15-Case-Summary-PDF?bidId=">e state reported&nbsp;</a>&nbsp;8 COVID-19 deaths since August 31, for a total of 9,027.&nbsp;

<a href="https://www.kansasvaccine.gov/158/Data">Click here for Data</a>&nbsp;about the COVID-19 vaccine.

<a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/160/COVID-19-in-Kansas">Click here&nbsp;</a>for additional virus numbers from the KDHE.

Kansas is providing fewer updates of its data about COVID-19 now that Gov. Laura Kelly formally declared that the state is moving toward treating COVID-19 as a disease like the flu that spreads regularly and isn't considered a pandemic.&nbsp;The health department plans to update data about cases and vaccinations each Wednesday.

The state continues to support access to free COVID-19 testing, works to ensure that vulnerable populations can get vaccinated, see that providers serve a broad population and give “comprehensive guidance” about the virus. She called the new phase “endemic normalcy.”

The health department plans to update data about cases and vaccinations each Wednesday.

TOPEKA — The Kansas Department of&nbsp;<a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/160/COVID-19-in-Kansas">Health reported&nbsp;</a>&nbsp;4,550 new coronavirus cases in Kansas from Wednesday August 31, to Wednesday September 7, for a total of 868,911&nbsp; cases.&nbsp;&nbsp;On Wednesday, th<a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1529/June-15-Case-Summary-PDF?bidId=">e state reported&nbsp;</a>&nbsp;8 COVID-19 deaths since August 31, for a total of 9,027.&nbsp;<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662570129015.png" alt="" />
 <figcaption></figcaption>
 </figure><a href="https://www.kansasvaccine.gov/158/Data">Click here for Data</a>&nbsp;about the COVID-19 vaccine.<a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/160/COVID-19-in-Kansas">Click here&nbsp;</a>for additional virus numbers from the KDHE.Kansas is providing fewer updates of its data about COVID-19 now that Gov. Laura Kelly formally declared that the state is moving toward treating COVID-19 as a disease like the flu that spreads regularly and isn't considered a pandemic.&nbsp;The health department plans to update data about cases and vaccinations each Wednesday.The state continues to support access to free COVID-19 testing, works to ensure that vulnerable populations can get vaccinated, see that providers serve a broad population and give “comprehensive guidance” about the virus. She called the new phase “endemic normalcy.”The health department plans to update data about cases and vaccinations each Wednesday.

KDHE: COVID case numbers down over the past week

SEDGWICK COUNTY —A Kansas woman was sentenced to prison on Friday for the hit-and-run killing of&nbsp; a man riding a bicycle in March of 2021.

Charity Blackmon, 32, Wichita, was sentenced&nbsp; to more than 46 years in prison, according to the Sedgwick Co. District Attorney's office.&nbsp;

In March, she avoided a jury trial and pled guilty to 2nd degree intentional murder and criminal possession of a weapon by a convicted felon, according to the District Attorney's office.&nbsp;

On March 26, 2021 police were dispatched to 13th&nbsp;Street North and Oliver Avenue in Wichita for a shooting call, according to officer Paul Cruz. Upon arriving, they located&nbsp;54-year-old&nbsp;<a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/2blv6y22g0?qid=7f0e4807b16464f4303f8d95ed764ff1">Merrill Rabus of Wichita</a>&nbsp;unconscious and receiving life-saving measures.

Rabus had undetermined injuries, including what appeared to be a single gunshot wound. He was transported to an area hospital, where he later died from his injuries.

The investigation revealed Rabus was on his bicycle at the intersection of 13th&nbsp;Street North and Oliver Avenue when he was struck by a white Plymouth van driven by 31-year-old Charity Blackmon.

Blackmon then got out of her vehicle and fired a shot from a handgun, striking Rabus. Blackmon fled the scene and was followed by witnesses who provided her location. She was located and arrested at 14th&nbsp;Street North and Green Street by a Wichita State University police officer/

Blackmon and Rabus were not known to each other. Officers also recovered a handgun through their investigation.&nbsp;

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/3/1616855135199.png" alt="Blackmon-photo Sedgwick County" />
 <figcaption>Blackmon-photo Sedgwick County</figcaption>
 </figure>SEDGWICK COUNTY —A Kansas woman was sentenced to prison on Friday for the hit-and-run killing of&nbsp; a man riding a bicycle in March of 2021.Charity Blackmon, 32, Wichita, was sentenced&nbsp; to more than 46 years in prison, according to the Sedgwick Co. District Attorney's office.&nbsp;In March, she avoided a jury trial and pled guilty to 2nd degree intentional murder and criminal possession of a weapon by a convicted felon, according to the District Attorney's office.&nbsp;<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/3/1616871807743.png" alt="Police at the scene of the investigation on Friday -photo courtesy KWCH" />
 <figcaption>Police at the scene of the investigation on Friday -photo courtesy KWCH</figcaption>
 </figure>On March 26, 2021 police were dispatched to 13th&nbsp;Street North and Oliver Avenue in Wichita for a shooting call, according to officer Paul Cruz. Upon arriving, they located&nbsp;54-year-old&nbsp;<a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/2blv6y22g0?qid=7f0e4807b16464f4303f8d95ed764ff1">Merrill Rabus of Wichita</a>&nbsp;unconscious and receiving life-saving measures.Rabus had undetermined injuries, including what appeared to be a single gunshot wound. He was transported to an area hospital, where he later died from his injuries.The investigation revealed Rabus was on his bicycle at the intersection of 13th&nbsp;Street North and Oliver Avenue when he was struck by a white Plymouth van driven by 31-year-old Charity Blackmon.Blackmon then got out of her vehicle and fired a shot from a handgun, striking Rabus. Blackmon fled the scene and was followed by witnesses who provided her location. She was located and arrested at 14th&nbsp;Street North and Green Street by a Wichita State University police officer/Blackmon and Rabus were not known to each other. Officers also recovered a handgun through their investigation.&nbsp;

Kan. woman sentenced for running over, shooting bicyclist

By PAUL HAMMEL <a href="https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2022/09/07/massive-tire-pile-is-no-more-village-of-alvo-and-new-recycler-look-ahead/">Nebraska Examiner</a>

LINCOLN – A massive pile of scrap
 tires in a small Nebraska village, which had posed both a dangerous 
fire threat and a breeding ground for mosquitos, has been cleaned up.

Regulators with the Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy 
affirmed recently that the huge pile of scrap tires — as high as 20 feet
 tall and containing hundreds of thousands of tires — had been removed 
at a recycling facility in Alvo, a village of 130 people between Omaha 
and Lincoln.

“We spent an obscene amount of money, but we made a 
commitment to clean it up,” said Pete Langer, who took over the business
 from an ailing father a year ago.

He said that nearly 5,000 tons of scrap tires were shredded and 
removed over the past year, which was more than had been estimated to 
have piled up at the facility.

Jim Macy, director of the NDEE, said the case shows that when the 
agency uses its enforcement authority, in conjunction with “willing 
people who want to do the right thing,” you can get facilities cleaned 
up and back in compliance.

The Alvo recycling facility, operated by B-Rose Tire Recycling and 
its affiliate, LAL Enterprises, had been the subject of months of 
complaints, as well as orders from the NDEE and State Fire Marshall’s 
Office to clean it up.

At one point, the pile of scrap tires had grown to more than twice 
its allowable limit of 160,000 “passenger tire equivalents,” a 
calculation of the car, truck and tractor tires.

A year ago, the operation still hadn’t sufficiently reduced the size 
of the pile. Langer said that his father, Larry, the former owner, 
suffered from cancer, which was the main reason the process of shredding
 the tires and hauling them off to a landfill got so far behind.

Pete Langer, who owns a recycling/diesel truck repair business based 
in Scottsbluff, said he appreciated that the NDEE was willing to work 
with him after seeing that he was making progress in removing the tires.

Now, he said, scrap tires that the business collects are quickly shredded for transport to the landfill.

The NDEE, during a site visit in May, confirmed that all the waste tires “have been removed.”

“It’s cleaned up like you wouldn’t believe,” said Chris Juilfs, the chairman of the Alvo Village Board.

Langer said he’s still deciding how to use the site in the future as 
part of his Langer Industrial Services, which has operations in Lincoln,
 Scottsbluff, Colby and Hays, Kansas, and Torrington, Wyoming,

It’s possible that the scrap tires might be used to generate electricity in Wyoming, he said, where such use is permitted.

Alvo has been jolted by a series of problems. Alvo’s village clerk 
pleaded guilty four years ago to embezzling $105,000 in town funds. Two 
years ago, criminal charges were filed against the fire chief, accusing 
him of using $18,000 in fire department money for personal expenses.

Juilfs said that the village is making progress in climbing out of 
debt, and is expected to get some restitution soon for some of the 
stolen funds.

“We’re moving forward,” he said. “By next year, we will have money to make improvements to our roads and our water system.”

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2022/9/1662569813766.png" alt="A pile of scrap tires, pictured here in July 2021, once stretched over a large portion of a scrap yard in Alvo (courtesy Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy)" />
 <figcaption>A pile of scrap tires, pictured here in July 2021, once stretched over a large portion of a scrap yard in Alvo (courtesy Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy)</figcaption>
 </figure>By PAUL HAMMEL <a href="https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2022/09/07/massive-tire-pile-is-no-more-village-of-alvo-and-new-recycler-look-ahead/">Nebraska Examiner</a>LINCOLN – A massive pile of scrap
 tires in a small Nebraska village, which had posed both a dangerous 
fire threat and a breeding ground for mosquitos, has been cleaned up.Regulators with the Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy 
affirmed recently that the huge pile of scrap tires — as high as 20 feet
 tall and containing hundreds of thousands of tires — had been removed 
at a recycling facility in Alvo, a village of 130 people between Omaha 
and Lincoln.“We spent an obscene amount of money, but we made a 
commitment to clean it up,” said Pete Langer, who took over the business
 from an ailing father a year ago.<h2>5,000 tons removed</h2>He said that nearly 5,000 tons of scrap tires were shredded and 
removed over the past year, which was more than had been estimated to 
have piled up at the facility.Jim Macy, director of the NDEE, said the case shows that when the 
agency uses its enforcement authority, in conjunction with “willing 
people who want to do the right thing,” you can get facilities cleaned 
up and back in compliance.The Alvo recycling facility, operated by B-Rose Tire Recycling and 
its affiliate, LAL Enterprises, had been the subject of months of 
complaints, as well as orders from the NDEE and State Fire Marshall’s 
Office to clean it up.<h2>Twice allowable size</h2>At one point, the pile of scrap tires had grown to more than twice 
its allowable limit of 160,000 “passenger tire equivalents,” a 
calculation of the car, truck and tractor tires.A year ago, the operation still hadn’t sufficiently reduced the size 
of the pile. Langer said that his father, Larry, the former owner, 
suffered from cancer, which was the main reason the process of shredding
 the tires and hauling them off to a landfill got so far behind.Pete Langer, who owns a recycling/diesel truck repair business based 
in Scottsbluff, said he appreciated that the NDEE was willing to work 
with him after seeing that he was making progress in removing the tires.Now, he said, scrap tires that the business collects are quickly shredded for transport to the landfill.<h2>Site visit in May</h2>The NDEE, during a site visit in May, confirmed that all the waste tires “have been removed.”“It’s cleaned up like you wouldn’t believe,” said Chris Juilfs, the chairman of the Alvo Village Board.Langer said he’s still deciding how to use the site in the future as 
part of his Langer Industrial Services, which has operations in Lincoln,
 Scottsbluff, Colby and Hays, Kansas, and Torrington, Wyoming,<h2>Tires for energy</h2>It’s possible that the scrap tires might be used to generate electricity in Wyoming, he said, where such use is permitted.Alvo has been jolted by a series of problems. Alvo’s village clerk 
pleaded guilty four years ago to embezzling $105,000 in town funds. Two 
years ago, criminal charges were filed against the fire chief, accusing 
him of using $18,000 in fire department money for personal expenses.Juilfs said that the village is making progress in climbing out of 
debt, and is expected to get some restitution soon for some of the 
stolen funds.“We’re moving forward,” he said. “By next year, we will have money to make improvements to our roads and our water system.”The NDEE, which by law seeks to obtain voluntary compliance with 
regulations before seeking fines or sanctions, continues to work on a 
higher profile, clean-up project — to get contaminated waste removed 
from the site of the former AltEn ethanol plant near Mead. It has been 
working with an environmental firm hired by a group of seed corn 
companies to accomplish that.The facility, unlike other ethanol plants, had utilized expired seed 
corn coated in pesticides to produce ethanol, leaving behind a reeking 
byproduct and pesticide residues that have been found in nearby streams 
and at least one home.