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THURSDAY • JULY 7 • 2011
Fraternity housing plan likely runs afoul of city code By Andy Hyland ahyland@ljworld.com
A new housing arrangement for members of Phi Kappa Tau fraternity’s Kansas University chapter could place them in violation of city occupancy codes. After the Alpha Gamma Delta sorority’s international organization bought the fraternity’s house
Thundershower
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at 1100 Ind. earlier this summer, members of Phi Kappa Tau decided to move into two six-bedroom homes that are side-by-side at 1732 and 1736 La., fraternity leaders said. Riley Dunn, who served as president of the fraternity last year, initially said that the fraternity planned to have six people occupying each house.
In a subsequent phone conversation later in the day, Dunn said that he misspoke earlier and said that no more than three people would be living in the houses to ensure compliance with the law. The owner of the properties, Serina Hearn and her company Rainbow Works LLC did not return phone calls for comment on this story.
She has told the Journal-World in the past that the property at 1736 La. should have grandfathered status because its two kitchens have made it a duplex in a single-family zoning district. The city disagrees. “Our position has always been that these are single-family Please see FRATERNITY, page 7A 1732 La., left, and 1736 La.
Brownback says Lawrence’s location key to SRS shutdown
KU to confer honorary degrees ——
Honor could also include opportunity to speak at graduation By Andy Hyland
Shuttle-flight veteran discusses last launch
ahyland@ljworld.com
As NASA prepares for its final launch Friday, astronaut and Kansas University professor of physics and astronomy Steve Hawley says he’ll miss the shuttle program. Page 3A BIG 12 PREVIEW
What to expect this year in football A conference realignment last summer left the Big 12 with just 10 schools. Take a look at our league rankings and analysis heading into the 2011 season. Page 1B
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He’s the leader of the free world. He decides how short his answers will be.”
GOV. SAM BROWNBACK PROVIDES a progress report on his first six months in office Wednesday at the Statehouse in Topeka. Brownback was joined by Cabinet secretaries and executive directors of state agencies and programs.
HIS FIRST SIX MONTHS
— Presidential spokesman Jay Carney. President Barack Obama was the first president to host a Twitter town hall at the White House, and he had trouble keeping his replies to online questions within the 140-character limitations of a tweet. Page 3A
COMING FRIDAY Young athletes are using the summer to stay in shape.
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Gov. claims his focus is economy; others say it’s his ‘extreme’ agenda By Scott Rothschild srothschild@ljworld.com
ONLINE: See the video at LJWorld.com
TOPEKA — Gov. Sam Brownback on Wednesday said Lawrence’s location was a key factor in his administration’s decision to shut down the Lawrence off ice of the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services. “Lawrence, in particular, has a proximity to several major SRS offices on four-lane roads,” Brownback said. House Democratic Leader Paul Davis of Lawrence said Brownback’s reasoning was off-base. “I’m not sure he has a very good understanding of the kind of clientele the local SRS office has,” Davis said. “Not a lot of them have access to transportation that can go to
Topeka, Ottawa or Kansas City.” SRS Secretary Robert Siedlecki Jr. added that another major reason was that closing the Lawrence SRS office would produce signif icant Davis savings — $300,000 — in the agency’s attempt to cut $1 million in administrative costs that was ordered by the Legislature. “We definitely had to make some tough choices,” Siedlecki said. Again, Davis disagreed with Siedlecki. Davis said he believes the closure of the Lawrence office wasn’t “data driven.” And while Siedlecki says the cuts were needed to satisfy a legislative mandate, Davis said, “I didn’t see SRS vigorously opposing potential cuts in front of the Legisla-
ture. I generally viewed their posture as being accepting of additional cuts.”
SRS changes On Friday, SRS announced it was restructuring its offices by merging six regions into four and closing nine offices, in an effort to comply with a legislative mandate to cut costs. The Lawrence office was by far the largest on the closure list. Public outcry over the decision has been intense from social service advocates and law enforcement officials who say it will diminish access to needed SRS services. A meeting is being set up by local leaders for next week in Lawrence on the issue. SRS provides a variety of services for low-income children and families and people with disabilities. SRS officials have said that the office’s 87 Please see BROWNBACK, page 2A
After getting the go-ahead from the Kansas Board of Regents, Kansas University is beginning a process that would award honorary degrees for what’s believed to be the first time in the school’s history. Any recipients would be honored as part of the university’s commencement ceremony and could give speeches there, said Susan Kemper, a KU distinguished professor of psychology who is leading the committee to award the degrees. “In some years, the chancellor might invite one of the honorary degree recipients to address the graduates,” Kemper said. She said that could replace the chancellor’s Three to five traditional address to grad- candidates will uates in some be recommended years, or it to Chancellor could be in Bernadette addition to it. Gray-Little, who “That process is still will forward her being resolved,” selections to the she said. Kansas Board of Jack Martin, a Regents, which KU spokesman, said exactly has the final say. who gives speeches at commencement would be determined on a caseby-case basis. Some years, he said, KU may elect not to award any honorary degrees at all. Many other universities and colleges, Kemper said, invite recipients of honorary degrees to give commencement speeches. They come from diverse backgrounds, including politicians, musicians and comedians. At KU, though, think more along the lines of a distinguished politician than a rapper or a comedian, Kemper said. The university will have the capability to award four
Please see HONORARY, page 7A
With rubber stamp, NRC and industry rewrite nuclear history By Jeff Donn Associated Press Writer
R O C K V I L L E , M D . — When commercial nuclear power was getting its start in the 1960s and 1970s, industry and regulators stated unequivocally that reactors were designed only to operate for 40 years. Now they tell another story — insisting that the units were built with no inherent life span, and can run for up to a century, an Associated Press investigation shows. By rewriting history, plant owners are making it easier to extend the lives of dozens
This series This is the last in a four-part series looking at the aging nuclear facilities in the United States. To see the first three parts, please go to LJWorld.com. of reactors in a relicensing process that resembles nothing more than an elaborate rubber stamp. As part of a yearlong investigation of aging issues at the nation’s nuclear power plants,
the AP found that the relicensing process often lacks fully independent safety reviews. Records show that paperwork of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission sometimes matches wordfor-word the language used in a plant operator’s application. Also, the relicensing process relies heavily on such paperwork, with very little onsite inspection and verification. And under relicensing rules, tighter standards are not required to compensate for decades of wear and tear. Please see NUCLEAR, page 7A
AP File Photo
THIS JULY 12, 1979, FILE PHOTO shows the Pilgrim nuclear power plant in Plymouth, Mass. In 2007, as Entergy Nuclear Operations sought a license extension for the Pilgrim reactor, it wrote: “The original 40-year license term was selected on the basis of economic and antitrust considerations rather than on technical limitations.”