Topeka News (BETA)

Most out-of-town bands that perform at the Topeka Fiesta Mexicana travel north to get here. Not so with this year’s featured mariachi. Mariachi Luna y Sol brought the traditional music of Mexico to the fiesta from Omaha, Neb. That isn’t so strange, said group founder and leader Marcos Mora. read more

Ever since an inmate threw him over a second-floor railing in the Shawnee County Jail on Jan. 23, corrections officer Thomas Dorsett has been “extremely hypervigilant.” “Everything that comes into his peripheral vision, he’s extra jumpy,” Cherie Dorsett said of her husband. Sudden loud noises startle him. “It’s changed me drastically,” Dorsett said. read more

The firefighters’ union won and didn’t even know it. Topeka Fire Department Deputy Chief Jeff Davis has resigned, effective at the end of this year, city spokesman David Bevens disclosed Friday afternoon. Davis submitted his resignation at the end of June. read more

Like other metropolitan areas in the state, Topeka's unemployment rate continues to rise above the state's average. That is because manufacturing and construction account for the bulk of those unemployment numbers, and those sectors are centered heavily in big cities. Topeka's rate climbed to 7.7 percent in June, above the state's 7 percent rate, according to a jobs report issued by the Kans ...

Fundraising money in the Republican primary for the 1st Congressional District has been spread thin as five of the seven candidates pulled in significant sums of cash as reported in this week’s campaign finance reports. The field has some relatively prominent names in Kansas politics and some more obscure, but if campaign money is any indication, no one has emerged as the knock-out favorite. ...

Fiesta Mexicana continues tonight.

A celebration dinner and silent auction was held tonight for the Let's Help organization.

A spokesman for state regulators says operators of racetracks in three Kansas cities are getting more time to save their licenses.

Topeka police are asking for your help to find out who robbed a Topeka auto shop on July 3 at Alamo Automotive on SW 21st and Buchanan.

Police aren't saying how a man whose body was found along the Kansas River Thursday evening died, but Chief Ron Miller says they are treating the case as a homicide.

A concrete pavement repair project will begin in north Topeka forcing traffic to single lanes and temporarily causing lane closures.

A boy was home playing video games when two men came in and pointed a pistol at him.

The Kansas Public Employees Retirement System has a record unfunded actuarial liability of $8.3 billion and needs a long-term plan to rebound, officials said Friday.

The council approved money for a Bikeway Master Plan consultant. The mayor vetoed it. What's next?

A human body was found in the Kansas River by Topeka Police after an anonymous tip.

27 News is the first to bring you the identity of the body found Thursday by the Kansas River

27 News was the first to learn the name of the man found dead by the Kansas River near the Sardou Bridge.

Cox Cable customers can watch the 36th annual Kansas Shrine Bowl on Saturday, July 25 exclusively on Cox Kansas 22.

Click here to view Friday morning's top headlines.

Thirty Topeka 501 elementary school teachers are back in the classroom. This week, though - they're the students.

The Kansas Public Employees Retirement System has a record unfunded actuarial liability of $8.3 billion and needs a long-term plan to rebound, officials said Friday.

Concerns about providing emergency-response services in North Lawrence are delaying the start of a $2.63 million project to rebuild the intersection of North Second and Locust streets.

Leaders with the Bowersock Mills and Power Company have filed for a federal permit to build a new $13 million hydro-electric power plant on the north bank of the Kansas River.

The local color and eccentricities that are Lawrence were out in full force at the Downtown Lawrence Sidewalk Sale.

A McDonald’s restaurant in northwest Lawrence is getting a new look, while its owners plan to rebuild their oldest location in town.

WICHITA — The unemployment rate in the Wichita area climbed to 8.5 percent in June, according to numbers released today by the Kansas Department of Labor.

A 30-year-old woman was critically wounded in a shooting at a convenience store in south Wichita Thu

WICHITA - Sure, the calendar says mid-July. But the weather today and this weekend in Wichita is goi

A Wichita scientist told the Kansas Corporation Commission on Thursday that consolidating Westar Energy rates would be fair only if customers in the southern part of the state are credited for 17 years of overpayment.

Wichitans wanting to watch everything from aerial acrobatics to a jet-powered outhouse at next month's Wichita Flight Festival will be able to do so for free, city officials announced Thursday.

By FRAZIER MOORE The Associated Press NEW YORK — Walter Cronkite, the premier TV anchorman of the networks’ golden age who reported a tumultuous time with reassuring authority and came to be called “the most trusted man in America,” died Friday. He was 92.

7/17/2009 MICHAEL STRAND For the past few years, utility companies have tried to encourage customers to become more energy-efficient, in ways ranging from caulk and compact fluorescent lamps to replacing old furnaces and air-conditioners.

7/17/2009 MICHAEL STRAND McPHERSON — Two Reno County residents have been charged with seven crimes each in connection with a home invasion robbery Wednesday morning in McPherson.

Phyllis Thull, of Cawker City, will celebrate her 80th birthday with a 2 to 4 p.m. open house Saturday, July 18, at Cawker City Senior Citizen Center.

Dorothy Shipp, of Salina, will celebrate her 100th birthday with a 2 to 4 p.m. open house Saturday, July 18, at Presbyterian Manor, 2601 E. Crawford. She requests no gifts.

Downtown Overland Park is experiencing a flurry of businesses moving into the area.

The Kansas City area had 2,671 home sales in June, up 16 percent from 2,299 in May and down 1 percent from 2,711 in June 2008, the Kansas City Regional Association of Realtors said Friday.

Housing values in the Kansas City area rose 46.48 percent from the first quarter of 1999 to the first quarter of 2009, according to a study by bizjournals, the online division of American City Business Journals Inc.

About a quarter of Kansas City-area business leaders reported signs of life in the local economy in survey results the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce released Friday.

Hunt Midwest Real Estate Development sold 2.5 acres in the Hunt Midwest Commerce Center for the development of new extended-stay hotel in the Northland, Candlewood Suites.

Westar Energy Co. improved its standing in J.D. Power and Associates’ 2009 Electric Utility Residential Customer Satisfaction Study.

Google Inc. on Thursday reported second-quarter net income of $1.48 billion, or $4.66 a share, compared to net income in the same period last year of $1.25 billion, or $3.92 a share.

Despite growing loan losses and deteriorating credit quality, Bank of America Corp. managed a $2.42 billion second-quarter profit, the bank reported Friday. (BAC)

Galichia Heart Hospital has expanded its cardiology practice with the addition on Dr. Christos Mandanis.

Susan Castile is the new executive director of Inter-Faith Ministries, effective Sept. 1, the organization announced Friday.

Kansas regulators are giving three shuttered racetracks more time to save their licenses, but one track owner says legislators will have to intervene for dogs and horses to run again.

Pittsburg State University has seen many changes over the years — in name, in the various buildings and in attitudes regarding minorities.

One after another, the Four States Farm Show attendees hopped in line for the North Central Kansas Technical College booth.

The Morning Sun's staff photographer Sean Steffen provides sights from Friday's Four States Farm Show. The show continues today.

Strewn across the expansive grounds at the Four States Farm Show is a variety of heavy equipment and farm tools that draw more than 30,000 to the exhibition each year.