Articles written by Mitchell Willetts


Sorted by date  Results 1 - 25 of 29

  • Enid hires assistant city manager, ending 3-year vacancy

    Mitchell Willetts|Aug 18, 2019

    ENID, Okla. (AP) — After a three-year vacancy, the city of Enid has a new assistant city manager. The role hasn't been filled since the spring 2016 departure of Joan Riley, who left to serve as city manager of Sapulpa, but now an internal hire has been selected. Scott Morris, a 10-year Enid public servant, started his first day in the position Aug. 5. "There's probably nobody better at the city with interpersonal relations than Scott, and that was pretty high on the list of what I'm looking for," city manager Jerald Gilbert said. "Good c...

  • Educator retires from Enid Public Schools after 4 decades

    MITCHELL WILLETTS, Enid News & Eagle|Jun 6, 2019

    ENID, Okla. (AP) — Retirement never held any appeal to Velda Rivenburg. The 86-year-old started working for Enid Public Schools in 1974, first as a volunteer, then as a crossing guard, then as a teacher's aide, and then as a paraprofessional in a special needs classroom for the last 12 years. May 23 marked her last day at Waller Middle School, and her last day with the district. "This is not what I planned," she told the Enid News & Eagle. Her body seems ready to retire, but she isn't, she said, never expected she'd have to. "Nor did I ever t...

  • Educator retires from Enid Public Schools after 4 decades

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Jun 2, 2019

    ENID, OKLA. (AP) — Retirement never held any appeal to Velda Rivenburg. The 86-year-old started working for Enid Public Schools in 1974, first as a volunteer, then as a crossing guard, then as a teacher's aide, and then as a paraprofessional in a special needs classroom for the last 12 years. May 23 marked her last day at Waller Middle School, and her last day with the district. "This is not what I planned," she told the Enid News & Eagle. Her body seems ready to retire, but she isn't, she said, never expected she'd have to. "Nor did I ever t...

  • Main Street Enid hosts poetry competition for downtown mural

    MITCHELL WILLETTS, Enid News & Eagle|May 2, 2019

    ENID, Okla. (AP) — Main Street Enid is organizing a poetry contest, with the winning words serving as inspiration for a downtown mural, plus a little cash and recognition for the poet who wrote them. "The arts are a major part of our downtown and Enid's quality of life," Main Street Enid director Kelly Tompkins told the Enid News and Eagle. "Combining literary art with visual art to create public art that can be enjoyed by everyone is an idea that came from the organization's Artists and Poets Committee." The contest is being headed up by P...

  • Enid women to travel to Europe, produce educational TV show

    MITCHELL WILLETTS, Enid News and Eagle|Apr 18, 2019

    ENID, Okla. (AP) — A pair of Enid natives are preparing for a five-week, nine-country expedition through Europe to create an educational and interactive TV series tailor-made for Enid Public Schools students. "The Ancillary Explorers: Enid Escapes to the EU," is a planned 10-part series following the upcoming travels of creators Abby Grey and April Morrow, as they dive into unfamiliar cultures and customs, and seek to answer the burning questions posed by K-12 students keeping tabs back home. "They can't physically be there with us, but b...

  • Enid Public Schools invests $54 million into its 17 schools

    MITCHELL WILLETTS, Enid News and Eagle|Feb 10, 2019

    ENID, Okla. (AP) — It's been nearly three years since Enid voters approved a $92.8 million school bond issue, and Enid Public Schools has been tirelessly putting that funding to work ever since, tackling dozens of projects big and small across the district. EPS is down to the last $3.7 million of that bond money, facility construction director Michael Shuck said, and there are plans in place for that final sum too. "It's crazy, you think of that money ($92. 8 million) and you think, boy there's a lot there, but then you see the needs of the sch...

  • Enid Public Schools invests $54 million into its 17 schools

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Feb 10, 2019

    ENID, Okla. (AP) — It's been nearly three years since Enid voters approved a $92.8 million school bond issue, and Enid Public Schools has been tirelessly putting that funding to work ever since, tackling dozens of projects big and small across the district. EPS is down to the last $3.7 million of that bond money, facility construction director Michael Shuck said, and there are plans in place for that final sum too. "It's crazy, you think of that money ($92. 8 million) and you think, boy there's a lot there, but then you see the needs of the sch...

  • Retired Army pilot to host film at Oklahoma History Center

    MITCHELL WILLETTS, Enid News & Eagle|Jan 13, 2019

    OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Retired Army helicopter pilot and Northwest Oklahoman Bob Ford flew more than 1,000 missions in Vietnam, and now in partnership with Oklahoma History Center, he will help continue to tell the stories of service and sacrifice made by so many in the war. Oklahoma History Center, in Oklahoma City, is presenting a Smithsonian Channel film, "Helicopter Missions: Vietnam Firefight," and Ford, who left the service as a captain, will be there to moderate the experience. The showing will be at the history center and is covered by t...

  • Oklahoma students learn about leadership at conference

    MITCHELL WILLETTS, Enid News & Eagle|Dec 26, 2018

    ENID, Okla. (AP) — OAMJHSC is a long acronym for an old organization that hasn't always meant much to many in Northwest Oklahoma. Though for some Enid students, it has quickly come to mean more than was likely intended, and has pushed them to accomplish more than was perhaps expected. Participation in the Oklahoma Association of Middle and Junior High Student Councils has brought all three EPS middle schools, Longfellow, Emerson, Waller, together to lead, compete, cooperate and achieve as a team for the first time. "This year we went, truly, a...

  • NOC instructor examines Bonnie and Clyde's Enid connection

    MITCHELL WILLETTS, Enid News & Eagle|Dec 16, 2018

    ENID, Okla. (AP) — Infamous outlaw lovers Bonnie and Clyde died 84 years ago, ambushed on a rural Louisiana road by law enforcement, but in Oklahoma, their crimes still are under investigation. A 2017 series by Joe Cummings for the Enid News & Eagle highlighted Enid's history as a noteworthy stop along the pair's trigger happy road trip, as the town played unwilling host to gun fights, car theft, robbery, much of the assorted violence that was their trademark. Ex-detective Troy Cochran read those articles, and it got his wheels turning. He w...

  • Kansas Democrats try to end losing streak with rural appeal

    JOHN HANNA and MITCHELL WILLETTS|Aug 5, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Democrats are riding an eight-year losing streak in statewide elections, and the pressure to break it has intensified a debate within the party over how to pull more votes from Republican-leaning rural areas to help win the governor's race this year. Democrats nationally are hoping that dissatisfaction with President Donald Trump fuels victories in congressional races. In Kansas, they're hoping to capitalize on ex-Republican Gov. Sam Brownback's unpopularity when he left office in January, the result of years of b...

  • New Kansas law mandates safe driving around garbage trucks

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Aug 5, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas has joined 18 other states in adopting a law requiring motorists to use caution around garbage trucks by making driver carelessness a fineable offense. A ticket for what is now known as "unlawful passing of a waste collection vehicle" will cost an offender $45 starting July 1, 2019. Until then, police will hand out warnings. The Kansas law took effect this month. Motorists are required to treat stopped garbage trucks with "due caution," meaning they must slow down when nearing the truck and give it space when p...

  • New Kansas law mandates safe driving around garbage trucks

    Mitchell Willetts|Aug 5, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas has joined 18 other states in adopting a law requiring motorists to use caution around garbage trucks by making driver carelessness a fineable offense. A ticket for what is now known as "unlawful passing of a waste collection vehicle" will cost an offender $45 starting July 1, 2019. Until then, police will hand out warnings. The Kansas law took effect this month. Motorists are required to treat stopped garbage trucks with "due caution," meaning they must slow down when nearing the truck and give it space when p...

  • New hiring rule for child protection workers faces push back

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Jul 5, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Ann Goodall's work with the Kansas Department of Children and Families is often traumatic, she said, and though she's been there for 16 years with no thought of quitting, many co-workers do. Child protection specialists such as Goodall spend their days knocking on doors that often open into an ugly problem to solve. It chips away at people, Goodall said, and many quit quickly or after a few years, leaving jobs the state has trouble filling. The department reported last month that it had 76 vacant child protection p...

  • Family of man killed by officers allege racism by police

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Jun 29, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The family and supporters of a black Topeka man killed last year by police are speaking out against the city, the department and what they called unjustified violence by law enforcement toward black men as they discuss a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city and the officers. The lawsuit filed Wednesday alleges that the two white officers, Michael Cruse and Justin Mackey, lacked legal justification when they fatally shot Dominique White, 30, after a struggle in September near a park in Topeka. The officers were r...

  • New Kansas law to compensate wrongfully convicted defendants

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|May 16, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — People wrongfully convicted in Kansas will qualify to collect $65,000 for each year they were incarcerated under a bill the governor signed into law Tuesday. At a signing ceremony at the Mount Zion Church of God in Christ in Kansas City, Gov. Jeff Colyer turned to Lamonte McIntyre and Floyd Bledsoe, two of the three Kansas men who were most recently released after being wrongfully convicted of killings. "I want to say to Lamont McIntyre, to Floyd Bledsoe, to Richard Jones, we believe in you, we apologize to you ... we will m...

  • Oklahoma lawmakers pass religious veto on same-sex adoptions

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|May 4, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Oklahoma legislators approved a measure Thursday to grant legal protections to faith-based adoption agencies that cite their religious beliefs for not placing children in LGBT homes and Republicans in Kansas were pushing a similar measure. The Oklahoma House's 56-21 vote sent its measure to Republican Gov. Mary Fallin, who has not said whether she would sign it. It's similar to laws in at least five other states. In Kansas, negotiators for the state House and Senate drafted a new version of a bill that would prevent the stat...

  • LGBT advocates express opposition to Kansas adoption bill

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Apr 27, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Gay rights advocates from across the country arrived at the Kansas Capitol on Thursday to oppose an adoption bill that they see as a civil rights setback. The bill, called the Adoption Protection Act, would prevent the state from withholding grants or contracts to faith-based agencies that refuse to place children into homes that violate their religious beliefs. It would also grant further protections from lawsuits brought against them for such actions. Critics of the bill argued that it will allow religious agencies to free...

  • Koch Industries seeks rule change lawyers doing charity work

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Apr 22, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Koch Industries is pushing for a change to a Kansas rule forbidding corporate in-house lawyers unlicensed in the state from providing free legal services to needy outside clients. Koch chief legal counsel Jennifer Adams said the Wichita-based company sees it as an issue of equity in a justice system that favors the wealthy and well connected. They fair better in court than their less privileged peers, Adams said, and providing good legal counsel for those who can't afford it may help narrow the gap. Currently in Kansas, b...

  • Kansas could spend $2.8M for free college admission tests

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Apr 11, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas could soon join a growing number of states nationwide in providing free college admission testing to high school students. A provision in the new school finance bill passed Sunday would set aside $2.8 million for one ACT test and three WorkKeys vocational assessments, per student statewide. When sifting through applications, universities look closely at the ACT scores of applicants, and those with no score to show stand at a disadvantage. With the cost of an ACT at $62.50, writing portion included, some Kansans can't...

  • Kansas lawmakers approve mental health program for students

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Apr 8, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas legislators have approved a pilot program to team up schools and community mental health centers to treat some of the state's most at-risk children. The measure would set aside $10 million to treat and track two pre-selected groups of children in six school districts across the state. The availability of mental health treatment across the county has come under scrutiny in the aftermath of mass school shootings, most recently the February attack in Parkland, Florida. Republican Rep. Barbara Landwehr, of Wichita, who s...

  • Attorney for schools says Kansas funding bill is inadequate

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Apr 8, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas legislators worked late hours through the weekend to pass a new school finance bill, but the effort may not be enough to please the state Supreme Court. The bill, which passed 21-19 in the Senate early Sunday, calls for an increase of $534 million in school funding to be phased in over a period of five years. It's too little, too slow, critics say. Alan Rupe, lead attorney for the school districts that sued the state over funding, said the bill doesn't meet the criteria laid out by the Supreme Court and that more f...

  • Kansas school safety bill to thwart gunmen passes House

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Mar 29, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Legislation designed to strengthen Kansas schools against gunmen passed in the House Wednesday, though some lawmakers argued the bill is more ploy than policy. The measure would set aside $5 million for schools to upgrade infrastructure to slow or thwart a potential school shooter. The bill passed on a 119-5 vote and heads next to the Senate for consideration. The bill won Democratic Rep. Jason Probst's vote, but not his support. "This is a nice way for the Republican party to try and control a conversation about school s...

  • Kansas considers making schools liable for not arming staff

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Mar 29, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas schools that refuse to allow teachers to carry guns could be held legally responsible in the event of a tragedy under a proposal drafted after last month's mass shooting at a Florida high school. Opponents of the measure, which got its first hearing Tuesday in front of the House Insurance Committee, expressed concern it could effectively mandate arming teachers rather than allowing it, as several states have done. "It would certainly open the door for that conversation," said Democratic Rep. Brett Parker, an O...

  • Kansas weighs protections for faith-based adoption agencies

    MITCHELL WILLETTS|Mar 22, 2018

    TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas lawmakers are considering legislation that would prevent the state from forcing faith-based adoption agencies to place children into homes that violate their religious beliefs. Critics predict the bill would lead to discrimination against would-be LGBT parents. Two identical bills, each dubbed the Adoption Protection Act , are under consideration in House and Senate committees, and each panel finished two days of hearings Wednesday. The bills would allow faith-based agencies contracting with the Department of C...

Page Down