After weeks of uncertainty, #Kansas released full #SNAP benefits to residents on Friday, while #Missouri plans to release benefits — either full or partial payments — later this week. thebeaconnews.org/stories/2025...

In Kansas, a 60-year-old couple with $85,000 in income would see annual ACA costs jump 373% to $34,148 without enhanced tax credits, compared to $7,226 with them.

Kansas City Public Schools, which regained full accreditation through a special process in early 2022, once again kept its composite and annual scores in the accredited range.

Prairie Village voters turned out in record-breaking numbers on Nov. 4 to reject all six candidates backed by Prairie Village United in a decisive victory for allies of the incumbent City Council.

Voters in Wyandotte County cast their ballots for a new mayor and four commissioners on Nov. 4. Here’s what happened.

🗳️ It's here! We've put together candidate Q&As, explainers and a few other stories to help you prepare for Election Day in Wyandotte County and Johnson County.

Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly is suing state Attorney General Kris Kobach for his “failure to defend Kansans against the Trump administration’s unlawful federal overreach.”

The Trump administration has proposed slashing future funding to the National Science Foundation by 56% and cutting funding to the National Institutes of Health, which includes the National Cancer Institute, by nearly 40%.

Kansas Republicans are getting closer to redrawing the state’s congressional map hoping to kick out U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids, the only Democrat in the state’s federal delegation.

More than 40,000 workers in Kansas City work in the 10 largest occupations most susceptible to AI automation, according to a recent analysis from Jasmine Escalera at MyPerfectResume.

🗳️ Kansans will head to the polls on Nov. 4 for the 2025 general election. We've put together candidate Q&As, explainers and a few other stories to help you prepare for Election Day in Wyandotte County and Johnson County.

In #Kansas, millionaires will save 83.6 times more than their non-millionaire neighbors, estimates a new report from @itep.org.

Nearly every Missouri county has been designated a health professional shortage area when it comes to primary care and mental health care.

“Shall the City of Prairie Village, Kansas abandon the mayor-council form of government?” The question itself is short, but the tension around it has been brewing for years.

After years of considering options to improve its municipal complex, the city of Prairie Village landed on the $30 million project now at the heart of the election fight.

Partisan disagreements mean 188,000 Kansans and 667,000 Missourians could temporarily lose food assistance benefits. The program costs around $400 million annually in Kansas and $1.5 billion in Missouri.

The Postal Service handled over 112 billion pieces of mail in 2024, down from 154 billion in 2015. In fiscal year 2024, the Postal Service’s total operating expenses were $89.5 billion, while the agency had a net loss of $9.5 billion.

Missouri ranked 35th in cost and affordability, 32nd in access to care, and 29th in quality of care, according to The Commonwealth Fund’s #Medicare scorecard. About 1.3 million Missourians — 21.5% of the state’s population — have Medicare.

Phil LeVota was appointed Jackson County executive after a nomination process that was criticized by some as “smoke and mirrors.” Once he’s sworn in, he’ll face the daunting task of fixing the property assessment process.

The warrantless arrests of 11 immigrant restaurant workers in Liberty earlier this year violated a 2022 consent decree, a federal judge ruled. The arrests of the workers at El Potro Mexican Café in February were among the first in the KC area to draw widespread media attention.

Mike Burns' insurance plan, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas, paid $15,300 to a PBM’s contracted specialty pharmacy. But the medicine would have cost just $2,300 had he been able to fill it at his own AuBurn Pharmacy. What's going on with drug prices?

A recent audit of the Kansas foster care system found that only 66% of the children got mental health services. That audit also noted that children are moving around to too many different homes, and some parts of the state are worse than others — like Sedgwick County.

Six candidates for the school board in De Soto, #Kansas, answered questions about their priorities and their positions on issues facing schools.

Two major grocery closures are creating expanded food deserts affecting thousands of Kansas City area residents. Current food desert patterns mirror 1930s redlining maps, with formerly redlined areas 107% to 149% more likely to be food deserts today.

Shawn’s relationship ended messy and she filed a protection order to prevent her ex, Christopher L. Koch, from contacting her. But Christopher ignored the court ruling. “I’m saying to you there will be damage done today,” Christopher said in an email.

#Raytown Quality Schools is seeking public feedback on two draft proposals, one of which would reconfigure the district’s middle schools. The other would affect fewer students.

Frank White was voted out of office yesterday by just 16% of Jackson County voters — compared to the 48% that turned out in the 2022 general election where White won reelection. In Kansas City specifically, turnout for the Frank White recall was even lower at 11%.

“I was an elementary building-level counselor for probably six years, and we just kept having all these suicides.” a Missouri school counselor said. “I was like, ‘Why is nobody doing anything about this?’ And nobody seemed to know what to do.”

📣 It's here! Special election day: Jackson County voters could make history later this month with the outcome of a rare vote on whether to recall County Executive Frank White Jr.

Missouri Gov. Mike #Kehoe signed into law a new congressional map that is widely expected to unseat U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a Kansas City Democrat.

Renters of houses were being told what their share of a utility bill would be without proof of the actual charges. Bills weren’t in the renter’s name, but in the name of a landlord who often lived out of town. People didn’t have formal leases. They relied on verbal agreements.

🗳️ As voters cast ballots in the special Sept. 30 election to recall Jackson County Executive Frank White Jr., a question that’s rarely been openly discussed lingers: If White is removed from office, who will be selected to replace him?

“Our fellow Kansans are being drugged out, soaked for every dollar they have. … We have to take that seriously,” said Rep. Francis Awerkamp, a St. Marys Republican. “The data is being used to find ways to keep squeezing money out of these people.” buff.ly/1T0PH0Q

The federal government is trying to withhold funds from Kansas. But there is a way the state can keep the money. buff.ly/cnOtrxo

As Republican lawmakers move to make it harder to amend the Missouri constitution, another coalition is pushing to make it harder for lawmakers to amend or repeal voters’ decisions.

“Shaun Brady was more than just a friend to me — he was family,” wrote chef Jasper Mirabile in the recently published Shaun & Seamus Brady Cookbook, produced as part of ongoing community efforts to support the Brady family.

In 2020, people aged 65+ comprised 16.8% of the population, according to the U.S. Census Bureau... compared with 9.2% in 1960. In raw numbers, the population of seniors had risen during that period from 16.6 million to 55.8 million. buff.ly/WKmITPN

UPDATE: The federal government has asked Kansas for the personal data for people on food assistance. Kansas hasn't turned over the information, and Republicans warned the state would lose $10.4M today. The money hasn't been clawed back & a state judge said didn't force KS to comply w/ the deadline.

Health insurance premiums are expected to jump in 2026, and many businesses say they’ll be forced to pass some of the increase on to employees.

The federal government asked for Social Security numbers, addresses and other personal information from food assistance recipients in Kansas. Gov. Laura Kelly won’t hand it over.

“What we’ve seen is, of course, Democrats drew lines that tended to favor Democrats and Republicans drew lines that favored Republicans,” said Peverill Squire, a political science professor at the University of Missouri in Columbia.

“I fear for Kansas City a year from now,” said Jenn Tosatto. “We’ve worked really hard to show that we aren’t just a flyover city and that we have things to offer in our food and beverage scene. But we’re not at our strongest right now.”

Some of the deep geothermal wells from the Raytown schools’ heating and cooling system allowed methane to accumulate below a parking lot. And while students are back at school, they’ll have natural gas detectors in their buildings. buff.ly/BJAifQh

59% of republicans say they will "definitely not get" the COVID-19 vaccine this fall

Under the map proposed by Gov. Mike Kehoe and carried by Rep. Dirk Deaton, Jackson County voters would be split between districts stretching into eastern, southern and northern #Missouri.

Christopher, a 35-year-old with cerebral palsy, died Aug. 19, 2025, from cardiac arrest in the nursing facility where he lived the last several years of his life. He weighed 94 pounds. The Beacon spoke with Twila on Aug. 6, before Christopher’s death. buff.ly/eOrXtaQ

“If my kids had any other disease,” an anonymous parent said in the report looking at substance use disorder in #Kansas, “there would have been prayer chains and meals brought in and people doing fundraisers for us … But because we had addiction, we were the throwaways.”

Latrice Thomas was removed from her position on the Raytown Board of Aldermen after an investigation into her taxes. Two months later, the city still has not publicly addressed her removal.

Since #Trump moved back into the White House, he has stopped new refugees coming into the country, delayed and eliminated funding to #refugee resettlement agencies and made cracking down on #immigration a keystone of his agenda.

The average student loan borrower on SAVE can expect monthly increases of $210 to $370 a month in Kansas and $270 to $380 a month in Missouri, according to @americanprogress.bsky.social.