Stories from Saturday, January 1, 2011

The Nevada City Council held a special meeting at 7:15 a.m. Friday, Dec. 31, for the first reading of the 2011 Municipal Budget. The council packet, which contains the 2011 budget, is available on the city's Web site: http://www. nevadamo.org. Anyone looking at the budget needs to be aware that the 2011 budget was figured differently than the 2010 budget and the figures are intended to show the actual cost of operating each department. ...

Fort Scott, Kan. -- Organizers of a local driver safety course are bringing the class back next month following the success of the first class offered this fall. Buck Run Community Center, in conjunction with the American Association of Retired Persons , will host the state-approved AARP Driver Safety Program, which is currently scheduled to take place from 12:30 to 4:30 p.m., Monday, Jan. 10, and Tuesday, Jan. 11, 2011, at BRCC, 735 Scott Ave...

According to a recent poll by USA Today, aside from weight loss, adults are focusing on self-improvement when making resolutions. However, a majority of Americans don't make a resolution at all. The poll shows that 66 percent of Americans do not make a resolution, while 19 percent resolve to be more adventurous in their lives. ...

Through a matching grant from the Giving Resources to Our World Healthy Kansas Initiative (Grow II), proceeds from this year's Community Gala will total $20,000. At a Dec. 16 Fort Scott Area Chamber of Commerce Coffee, Carla Bryant Farmer, who co-chaired the event with Ken Lunt, presented a check for $13,089 to Janet Braun, Fort Scott Area Community Foundation chairwoman. The coffee was hosted by the foundation at the River Room at the Buffalo Grill restaurant...

Both lanes of U.S. Highway 54 were closed down just west of Nevada Thursday at about 2:15 p.m., when a truck towing two tanks containing an unknown amount of anhydrous ammonia in the eastbound lane lost control of the tanks, causing both to overturn and one of them to rupture. ...

Nevada, Mo. -- Convening Wednesday in Jefferson City, Missouri's 96th General Assembly will quickly be embroiled in the state's $500 million budget deficit and statewide political redistricting, State Sen. David Pearce said Wednesday. Meeting constituents at Vernon County Courthouse, Pearce said there are so many hot topics that an equally big bugaboo, the right-to-work question, is unlikely to get much attention...

Leah Rae (Bloesser) Stubblefield, loving mother, grandmother and great-grandmother, of Houston, Texas, passed away on Tuesday, Dec. 28, 2010 in Dallas, Texas, at 66 years of age. She loved life, travel and vacation, and most of all to spend time with her family and friends. She was preceded in death by her parents, C.J. (Charles James) and Nellie I. Bloesser and sister, Glenda Mae Bloesser...

Vincel "Vince" Lee Emery, 89, of Oak Grove, Mo., passed away on Wednesday, Dec. 29, 2010, at Lee's Summit Medical Center. Vince was born Jan. 24, 1921, to Harvey and Harriet (Shaver) Emery in Vernon County, Mo. He attended school at Milo and Nevada, Mo., graduating in 1939 from Nevada High School. ...

August "Gus" Kovacic, age 89, a resident of Fort Scott, Kan., died Wednesday, Dec. 29, 2010, at the Prairie Mission Retirement Village in St. Paul, Kan. He was born Aug. 23, 1921, in Girard, Kan., the son of John and Katie Kovacic. Gus graduated from the Arma High School and attended Pittsburg State University. ...

As 2010 wound down, most anglers' thoughts were about the good spring fishing they would be finding next year. However, there are many who never quit, including a growing number of crappie fishermen like Robert Simms, Marshfield. Instead of shopping for the holidays like he said "I should have been doing," he was on Stockton lake pulling out slab crappie. ...

Nevada High School athletic director Kevin McKinley has accomplished his first goal in the long process of finally getting Nevada into a conference. On Dec. 1, McKinley went to Columbia, Mo., along with Nevada R-5 assistant superintendent Tyson Beshore and McDonald County school district officials to attempt to make their case for placing both Nevada and McDonald County high schools into a conference...