Manhattan

• The Riley County Commission accepted a $248,000 USDA grant to fund ongoing water and sewer infrastructure improvements in Keats. →
• Riley County officials expect new state laws to increase detention days and expenses at the county jail and juvenile detention center. →
• A local criminal nuisance abatement trial is awaiting a verdict from Judge John McNish, while officials warn the state law enabling such actions is set to expire next year. →
• The Riley County Commission will lobby the Kansas Legislature to extend a criminal nuisance abatement law used for property enforcement. →
• The Riley County Commission received an update that interior work is progressing on the new Fire and Emergency Management building. →
• The Kansas Supreme Court affirmed Tremelle Montgomery’s first-degree murder conviction for the 2022 killing of Joshua Wardi in Manhattan. →
• Riley County Police Department Reports 3 Arrests April 26-27 →
• Manhattan Mayor Susan E. Adamchak proclaimed May as Museum Month to encourage residents to visit local historical and cultural sites. →
• K-State Research and Extension is offering neutral facilitation services to help Riley County community groups navigate complex discussions. →
• Keep an umbrella handy today for some scattered showers between 9 and 3, but otherwise expect a cloudy day with a high near 58 and a light breeze.

🌾 Kansas

• Gov. Laura Kelly vetoed Republican-backed House Bill 2043, which would have allowed citizens to block local budgets growing property tax revenue faster than Midwest CPI or 3%, along with two other tax-related bills. →

• Kelly vetoed a bill mandating daily elementary school recess and a measure exempting agritourism operations from local building codes, citing legislative overreach into local authority. →

• Kelly signed Senate Bill 82, a bipartisan tax credit package allowing businesses to claim 75% of child care expenditures, a $0.05-per-gallon ethanol blend credit and a credit for gun storage device purchases. →

• Kelly signed Senate Bill 430 adding kratom's active compound mitragynine to Schedule I of Kansas controlled substances law, effectively banning its sale and possession statewide. →

• Kansas legal and government leaders convened in Topeka to address a growing access-to-justice crisis, with officials noting that roughly 75% of state court cases involve at least one unrepresented party. →

🇺🇸 US

• Iran offered regional mediators a deal that would halt its Strait of Hormuz attacks and shelve nuclear talks in exchange for an end to the war and lifting of the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports, but Trump expressed skepticism about Iranian good faith. →

• About 30% of car trade-in borrowers carried negative equity in the first quarter, owing an average of $7,200 before financing a new loan — a 42% jump from five years earlier — as pandemic-era vehicles purchased at inflated prices flood the market. →

• Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis proposed a congressional redistricting map Monday that could eliminate four Democratic-held seats, potentially leaving Democrats with as few as four of the state's 28 congressional seats. →

• The White House accused China-based groups of running large-scale operations using tens of thousands of fake accounts to repeatedly query U.S. AI models and use the responses to train rival systems, with official Michael Kratsios warning of coordinated campaigns to steal American AI breakthroughs. →

• A trade group representing low-cost carriers asked the Trump administration for $2.5 billion to offset jet fuel costs that have surged roughly 88% over the past few months due to the war with Iran, while Spirit Airlines separately negotiates a government loan of up to $500 million that could result in 90% federal ownership of the carrier. →

Weather

April 28, 2004: U.S. Media Release Graphic Photos of American Soldiers Abusing Iraqi Prisoners at Abu Ghraib

The broadcast of graphic photographs on 60 Minutes II exposed systematic torture and humiliation of Iraqi detainees by U.S. personnel at the Abu Ghraib prison. The revelations shocked the American public, damaged the Bush administration’s justification for the Iraq War, and sparked global outrage over U.S. adherence to the Geneva Conventions.

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