KS - March 6 2025

Kansas Senators Push Amendment to Elect Supreme Court Justices

Topeka Lunch Rush Fades as State Workers Stay Home, Bill Would Force Them Into The Office

Kansas House Speaker Forms Government Oversight Committee, COGE

NYT: Vinyl Revival Thrives at Kansas’ Acoustic Sounds Factory

Royals Team Up with OK Joe’s BBQ for New Sandwich

GET THE CITIZEN JOURNAL APP - FREE!

1. Kansas Senators Push Amendment to Elect Supreme Court Justices

Kansas Senators advanced a constitutional amendment Wednesday that would change how state supreme court justices are selected. The amendment, which requires approval from two thirds of the Legislature and more than 50% of voters, would convert Kansas’ method for selecting state supreme court justices from a merit-based system to an elections system. Most Senate Democrats opposed the change saying it was equivalent to “hanging a for sale sign” on the state supreme courthouse. Republicans said the change gives a voice to the people.
Source: Kansas Reflector

2. Topeka Lunch Rush Fades as State Workers Stay Home, Bill Would Force Them Into The Office

The lunch rush in downtown Topeka’s restaurants and cafés hasn’t been the same since the COVID-19 pandemic, said Seth Wagoner, an investment executive. Thousands of state employees who once worked in office buildings in Kansas’ capital and frequented downtown businesses for lunch and happy hour now work from home all or part of the time. They could be called back to the office under proposed legislation. At a Thursday hearing in the Senate Committee on Government Efficiency, legislators considered Senate Bill 256, or the “back to work act.” Wagoner, the CEO of private equity firm AIM Strategies, said in testimony that at some lunch hotspots in downtown Topeka, business is still down by 10% from pre-pandemic times, accounting for inflation. He was the one proponent to speak, and five state employees, testifying as private citizens, spoke against the bill. One employee, Frances Dewell, who works in the protection report center within Kansas Department for Children and Families, which fields calls related to suspected abuse and neglect, said mandating state workers back to the office full time risks losing at least a quarter of their staff.
Source: Kansas Reflector

3. Kansas House Speaker Forms Government Oversight Committee, COGE

Kansas House Speaker Hawkins established the Select Committee on Government Oversight on Thursday, appointing 13 members of the House of Representatives. Unlike the state’s Committee on Government Efficiency or COGE, the Select Committee on Government Oversight will not run bills, Hawkins’ office said. The committee will have subpoena power and function similarly to the Government Oversight Committee on the federal level, investigating specific issues related to Kansas government agencies and programs.
Source: KWCH

4. NYT: Vinyl Revival Thrives at Kansas’ Acoustic Sounds Factory

Hydraulic machines whooshed in a sprawling Kansas factory as melted vinyl squeezed through molded stampers like pancake batter, turning out fresh new albums about once a minute. Workers inspected the grooves for imperfections, fed album jackets into a shrink-wrapper and stacked the finished products on tall dollies for shipping. Acoustic Sounds occupies a hodgepodge of squat industrial buildings in Salina, a city of about 50,000 near the geographic center of the 48 contiguous states, where grain elevators and a gigantic frozen pizza plant jut out from the flat plains landscape. Over the last 15 years, this unassuming complex has become a leading manufacturer of the music industry’s most surprising hot format: vinyl LPs. Introduced in 1948, vinyl LPs seemed destined for extinction by the early 2000s, if not before, as the music industry went digital. But over the last decade or so, the format has been reborn, embraced by fans as a physical totem in an age of digital ephemera, and by increasing ranks of analog loyalists who swear by its sound. Today, the symbol of the vinyl craze may be a rainbow of collectible LPs by pop stars like Taylor Swift or Billie Eilish, which young fans snap up by the millions (though many may never be played). But on a chilly recent afternoon, Acoustic Sounds’ assembly lines were humming with albums by the likes of John Coltrane, Steely Dan and Lightnin’ Hopkins, in deluxe packages that go for up to $150 apiece. Acoustic Sounds, founded in 1986, is Kassem’s umbrella for a group of interrelated businesses that form a nearly complete vinyl supply chain, including a mastering lab, a plating and pressing plant, a record label and a mail-order house. Almost entirely dedicated to reissues, the enterprise serves an affluent, global clientele that is constantly seeking out the newest, clearest-sounding, top-dollar reissue of a Muddy Waters or Dusty Springfield classic — and it has become a go-to partner for catalog-rich labels and artist estates.
Source: NYT

5. Royals Team Up with OK Joe’s BBQ for New Sandwich

Move aside, hot dogs, Cracker Jack and peanuts. Baseball teams are becoming more innovative and stepping up their food game in 2025. On Tuesday, the Kansas City Royals revealed that they'll be collaborating with famous barbeque restaurant Joe's Kansas City BBQ for a new item: the Z-Man sandwich.
Source: ESPN

SUBSCRIBE ONLINE TO GET THE HEARTLAND CITIZEN JOURNAL IN YOR INBOX - FREE!

Sponsors (click me!)

Sources

1. Kansas Reflector: https://kansasreflector.com/2025/03/05/voters-would-elect-kansas-supreme-court-justices-under-proposed-change/
2. Kansas Reflector: https://kansasreflector.com/2025/03/06/kansas-back-to-work-act-would-force-state-employees-to-return-to-offices/
3. KWCH: https://www.kwch.com/2025/03/06/kansas-establishes-government-oversight-committee-hold-entities-more-accountable-people/
4. NYT: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/05/arts/music/vinyl-albums-chad-kassem-acoustic-sounds.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
5. ESPN: https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/44111171/mlb-2025-new-ballpark-food