MANHATTAN —Business owners are looking for answers after two recent shooting incidents in the Aggieville district of Manhattan, including one last weekend where a Fort Riley man died and another Fort Riley man was transported to a Topeka hospital.
Dennis Cook, Executive Director of the Aggieville Business Association, said there have been discussions with the leadership including the commanding general of Fort Riley and the acting director of the Riley County Police Department. "I think the consensus so far is, number one, we don't look at this as a Fort Riley situation at all. They've got 15,000 soldiers and these are two incidents of somebody from Fort Riley, yes, but that's a pretty broad stroke to paint."
Cook said the Aggieville Business Association is supportive of Fort Riley and the service men and women who defend the country. He noted that the feedback he has received from them is that Aggieville wasn't the spark that caused the incidents. "This is a couple people who made some really poor decisions but that doesn't mean we don't take a look at what we can proactively do. " Cook added officials are still trying to figure that out.
Cook said there have been discussions about having a sit-down meeting with Aggieville business leaders, city and police, "to all talk about it together. The thing we hit on most is being more visible and being more open, and out there in a more protect and serve attitude so that people can feel safe down here."
Cook noted that they are talking about bringing back the courtesy patrol where there would be uniformed officers from Fort Riley in Aggieville. In the past with the courtesy patrol those officers would walk with Riley County police to be visible so soldiers knew that they were dealing with not just local officers, but military officers were nearby as well.