Topeka

• A financial forecast presented to Topeka City Council projects structural deficits reaching $13.3M in 2028 and nearly $23M by 2031. →
• The Topeka City Council voted unanimously to exceed the revenue neutral rate for the 2027 budget, setting a max rate of 37.126 mills. →
• The City of Topeka eliminated 49 positions to save $3.4 million and balance its 2027 budget without increasing property taxes. →
• Topeka officials debated a proposal to reduce the city workforce by 100 employees over five years through natural attrition. →
• Topeka City Manager Robert Perez proposed a 0.1-cent sales tax on the March 2027 ballot to generate $4M annually for housing. →
• The Topeka Metropolitan Transit Authority is testing four new electric buses while resolving battery and cold-weather challenges. →
• The Topeka Metropolitan Transit Authority ended its MOD on-demand micro-transit service due to high costs exceeding $100 per trip. →
• After some early patchy fog burns off, expect mostly sunny skies today with a high near 91°F.

🌾 Kansas

• The U.S. Department of Education reached a resolution agreement with Topeka Public Schools over parents' access to student records, while Olathe and Shawnee Mission schools rejected similar deals and could face court action or lost federal funding. →

• Newton residents challenged the city's 11 newly deployed Flock Safety license plate readers at an Aug. 25 public forum, citing concerns over out-of-state searches, data breaches and insufficient public input. →

• The Pittsburg City Commission voted unanimously Aug. 25 to reject a $42,420-a-year contract for AI-assisted downtown parking enforcement after residents and students objected on privacy and accuracy grounds. →

• A husband, wife and their 2-year-old son died early Aug. 24 in a house fire near Galesburg in rural Neosho County, and the state fire marshal is investigating the cause. →

• Kansas National Guard members arrived Aug. 25 to help clear storm debris in Kansas City, Kansas, after severe storms with near-70 mph winds left about 9,000 customers without power days later. →

🇺🇸 US

• Canada announced retaliatory tariffs Aug. 25 on about $20 billion in U.S. exports, some as high as 50%, after U.S. tariffs on Canadian goods took effect and the USMCA renewal talks collapsed. →

• Fifteen New York county sheriffs sued Aug. 25 to challenge the state's Local Cops, Local Crimes Act, which bans local law enforcement partnerships with ICE. →

• SpaceX and Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry announced Aug. 25 plans for a up to $100 billion Starship launch campus, dubbed Starbase Louisiana, on roughly 125,000 to 130,000 acres of former Exxon marshland in Vermilion Parish. →

• Iranian missile and drone strikes have caused billions of dollars in damage to U.S. intelligence posts and surveillance equipment across the Middle East, unnamed officials told NBC News in a report published Aug. 25. →

• Dolly Parton died Aug. 25 at age 80 at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center in Nashville after a brief battle with cancer. →

Weather

AUGUST 26, 1939: FIRST MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL GAME IS TELEVISED

On this day, experimental TV station W2XBS in New York broadcast a Brooklyn Dodgers–Cincinnati Reds doubleheader from Ebbets Field, with Red Barber calling the action. Though only about 400 New York-area homes had television sets and the pictures were crude, the broadcast helped spark the growth of televised sports into a major industry.

This article was written using our proprietary AI system, Cronkite. The final decision to publish this article was made by a human. For more info, read our AI policy.