Alex Smith

A Shawnee County District Court judge has temporarily blocked an ordinance that raises the tobacco-buying age in Topeka to 21.

The ruling comes after two Topeka businesses, with the assistance of the Kansas Vapers Association, filed a lawsuit this week challenging the regulation. The ordinance was scheduled to go into effect Thursday. The businesses claim the mandate conflicts with state law, which allows the sale of tobacco to people 18 and older.

A few years ago, Kansas City restaurateur Anton Kotar surveyed the local and national restaurant scenes and concluded his town’s reputation as a steakhouse paradise had slipped.

The problem, he says, is the way conventional beef is raised – bulked up with grain on feedlots, making it cheap and plentiful and changing what Americans expect to taste.

“I think some of our best steakhouses chased the quality of the beef to the bottom,” Kotar says.

More people signed up for Obamacare in Kansas this year than last, even though the open enrollment period was cut in half.

In the enrollment period that ended last week, 98,919 people selected plans in Kansas compared with 98,780 last year.

While the increase is slight, it’s a surprise, given the reduced time period and the Trump administration’s reduced promotion efforts.

Twenty-four-year-old Kalee Woody says that when she was growing up in Bronaugh, Missouri, she saw the small town slowly fading. Businesses closed, growth stagnated and residents had to drive to other places to see a doctor.

It is a town that, like many towns in rural areas of Missouri and other Midwest and Great Plains states, is recognized by the federal government as having a shortage of health care providers.

Pretty Prairie, Kansas, population 680, had a moment in the spotlight during the confirmation hearings for new Environmental Protection Agency head Scott Pruitt.

Kansas Sen. Jerry Moran mentioned Pretty Prairie as an example of a community that’s struggling because of EPA regulations that Pruitt could ease.

But residents of the tiny south-central Kansas town are also concerned about how federal budget cuts might affect their ability to pay for a new water treatment system.

Last week’s election results stunned a lot of people who get health insurance coverage through the Affordable Care Act.

President-elect Donald Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress say they want to scrap the law, but what might replace it remains unknown.

That has left many Kansas and Missouri families in limbo, unsure what will become of their medical care.

For many people who’ve lived through oppression or violence in foreign countries, Kansas City is the promised land. Every year, hundreds of refugees resettle in the area and start new lives. But starting over has become increasingly difficult for many of these newcomers, as well as for the organizations that help them. Alex Smith, reporting for Heartland Health Monitor, has the story.