Lawrence

• Employees at Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center in Lawrence will soon vote on whether to unionize to address caseload safety. →
• The Douglas County Rural Preservation Association will host a candidate forum for the upcoming Douglas County Commission elections. →
• High winds damaged an Unmistakable Public Art Exhibition banner at Lawrence City Hall, prompting plans for a reinstallation. →
• The Lawrence Cultural Arts Commission will host its second free Unmistakable Public Art Exhibition walking tour downtown on June 26. →
• Wearable public art designed for Lawrence's Unmistakable Public Art Exhibition is seeing strong sales at downtown retailers. →
• The Lawrence USD 497 Board of Education recognized the retirement of Mike Hill, head baseball coach at Free State High School since 1997. →
• Lawrence community members gathered for a street party on Tuesday to cheer on Team Algeria in their first World Cup soccer match. →
• Grab your sunglasses and hold onto your hat today, Lawrence, because we're looking at a sunny but very windy day with a high near 95°F and gusts reaching up to 50 mph.

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🌾 Kansas

• The U.S. Department of Education gave four Kansas school districts — Olathe, Shawnee Mission, Topeka and Kansas City, Kansas — until roughly June 21 to comply with Title IX gender policy requirements or risk losing federal funding. →

• Wichita State University's National Institute for Aviation Research opened its 170,000-square-foot Hub for Advanced Manufacturing and Research on June 11, housing more than 500 student intern positions and drawing representatives from Boeing, Northrop Grumman and the U.S. military. →

• Kansas's winter wheat harvest reached 28% completion for the week ending June 14, well ahead of last year's pace, though drought pushed yields to generally 30 to 40 bushels per acre. →

• California-based Deep Fission launched a public stock offering of about 2.5 million shares to raise more than $40 million for its underground nuclear reactor pilot in Parsons, Kansas, with a Nasdaq listing planned under the ticker FISN. →

• Lionel Messi scored a hat trick in Argentina's 3-0 win over Algeria at Arrowhead Stadium on June 16, tying Miroslav Klose's record of 16 men's World Cup goals and becoming the oldest player to record a hat trick in the tournament at age 38. →

🇺🇸 US

• The IEA forecast a potential oil glut emerging next year if the Middle East peace deal holds, as a projected surge to 110 million barrels per day in production would far outpace a 2 million barrel-per-day rise in global demand. →

• Southern Republicans moved to redraw congressional maps in multiple states following a late-April Supreme Court ruling that narrowed the Voting Rights Act, targeting Democratic-held House seats by splitting districts where Black voters hold majorities. →

• Yum Brands announced June 16 it would sell Pizza Hut for $2.7 billion in two deals — $1.5 billion to private-equity firm LongRange Capital for international operations and $1.2 billion to Yum China Holdings — with both transactions expected to close in the third quarter. →

• SpaceX surpassed Amazon in market value June 16 to become the world's fifth-largest public company after signing an all-stock deal to acquire AI developer-tools startup Anysphere, maker of Cursor, in a record $60 billion merger. →

• President Trump pledged at the G7 summit in Évian, France, on June 16 to release the text of his Iran agreement within days, as G7 leaders endorsed the deal opening a 60-day window for negotiations on Iran's enriched uranium stockpile and sanctions relief. →

Weather

JUNE 17, 1976: NBA MERGES WITH ABA

The NBA officially absorbed four ABA franchises—the Denver Nuggets, Indiana Pacers, New York (now Brooklyn) Nets and San Antonio Spurs—marking the end of the upstart rival league and a major reshaping of pro basketball. The merger brought the ABA’s up-tempo style, three-point shot and marketable stars into the NBA, helping modernize the game for a wider audience.