The Post Podcast

Hays housing report to be released soon, discussed at Grow Hays Quarterly Luncheon

On this episode of the Post Podcast Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams shares information about a Hays housing report.
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
James Bell 
A housing study completed earlier this summer in Hays is about to be released and an upcoming Grow Hays quarterly luncheon will share some of those results. Executive Director Doug Williams stops by to give us a preview on this episode of the Post Podcast.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
We're gonna have our quarterly luncheon it's gonna the topic is going to be this housing study will be on September 6, September the sixth the day after Labor Day.
 
James Bell 
Okay, very good. A lot of interesting stuff in here. And I don't think we're gonna get to even a fraction of it. But maybe I think maybe a good way to start is what's uh, what's the overview? Is it good news, bad news. So how we look at?
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Well, I think it tells us what we already know that we have housing shortage in Ellis County or in Hayes. This is specific to Hayes, but it extends beyond Hayes and Ellis County. And it just kind of verifies that it talks about how we compare to other communities. We're certainly not alone with the our housing woes in Ellis County. But it also tells us why we have housing prices like they are which are higher than they maybe should be. But also, more importantly, looking forward, it tells us that what i The biggest thing I glean out of it is it tells us what we need to be building per year, at certain growth levels in our community. And the fact that we have put ourselves in a deficit of the number of housing units that we have, and how many we need to build on an ongoing basis.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, that was one of the things that I was under is trying to find it in here. Because it's you know, it's a 50 page document. But I was trying to find the numbers, that it really it did seem like if we don't get on it now, and I know a lot of people are working on this, but we're going to be it's going to be a growing problem. If you don't take action now, which we've talked about over and over and over again in the segment, the actions come and it's just slower than we want,
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
why it's slower than it than we can afford it to be, is the problem at 1% growth. The city of Hays needs 88 new units per year. We haven't built 88 units in a year, we got close, I believe in back in 2013. Since then, we've been in the 25 to 40 range per year, which has created this deficit that we have, which I talk about from time to time, you know, we've got a three to 400 unit deficit in this community in terms of housing units, and that's single family residences, apartments and that kind of thing. And I have people all the time to me, Doug, you're crazy, there's no way that we're three to 400 units short, but the reality is we are. And what's that's resulted in is missed opportunity. We've had people that maybe wanted to move to this community or would move to this community, but haven't because we don't have sufficient housing. And then we have people living in substandard housing, that they really shouldn't be living in. And if they had alternatives, they would choose not to live in that housing. So you couple those two things together the missed opportunity, as well as the people living where they maybe shouldn't, as well as housing be more expensive than it should be. All of that is a function of supply and demand. And we don't have enough supply. And we have the demand for it. So we put ourselves in a tough spot. And we've chosen the worst time in the history of construction to try and work our way out of this problem. So it's a challenge, but we just have to figure out how to overcome it.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, you know, one of the conversations I hear pretty regularly and this taken us out of the survey a little bit, but over and Victoria, about the right size, they've had a lot of seniors in big houses for five bedroom houses that would love to be in a smaller setting. But they don't have anywhere to go and they don't want to leave Victoria. So they're stuck in these houses. And then the families don't have the opportunity to move in and no constructions really going on in a large scale anywhere over there.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Right that that real problem in smaller communities. And appropriate housing is another thing that this this housing study tells us that retiree friendly housing, more affordable housing on the lower end, both are in strong demand. And we've got to figure out ways to meet that. Now fortunately, the one opportunity exists the state of Kansas has come out with some programs that are focused on communities 8000 And under, where they have some grants and that type of thing. And we're going to we're working on trying to figure out how we take advantage of those. But the other challenge is is builders and subcontractors that can can meet the demand. We these guys are as busy as they can be. They're They're backed up for months. And so the thought process of going in and starting new construction, when a framer may not be available or the electricians are backed up and that kind of thing. Make it a challenging building environment as well, whether it's in Hayes or Ellis or Victoria, or wherever, but we just we just got to figure out a way. You know,
 
James Bell 
one of the other things that I thought was interesting in this is the the financial bet. And I mean that by household income to housing. And I wonder if you can speak to that a little bit? Or are we out of whack in that department as well? Or are we okay, here, no one's counting for that.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Now, we're housing is too expensive here relative to median family income. And so that's a problem. We don't have enough housing that is priced appropriately for the level of income that we have, and in many cases, so that's a struggle, that's also a function of supply and demand. You know, you can go back to that. And, you know, you I, I chuckled, when I sometimes read in social media that, you know, the realtors have driven the price up on houses, that's the most ridiculous thing you could ever think because they don't, they don't set the
 
James Bell 
price to say yeah, like, well, they don't have any control over that, really, it's what people are going to pay. It's
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
the marketplace and supply and demand. And while we would like to think that that's not the case, it is. And until we add more supply to the market, this demand is going to drive prices up. Now, we've had another outside factor that's affecting our market as well. And that's interest rates have risen considerably over the last six months to a year. And that's making affordability more difficult as well, making new construction more difficult. And so just one more thing we have to deal with and try and overcome.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, you know, you mentioned the interest rates. And that is something else I wanted to get into today, we heard a little bit on the news this morning. And our news breaks, there was a study come out or story by the New York Times, and they were highlighting the drop in the sales because of the interest rate. And it looks like I've got the number here. 5.9%. Last month, home sales dropped. And that's a national number. But I wonder how much of that is actually impacting local sales and real estate.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
What is and talking to local realtors, you know, last February, I think we had as low as maybe 10 homes on the market. Now it's more in the 40 to 50 range, I think. So that's a function of interest rates, certain people get priced out of the market, the challenge is they have to live someplace. And so they're just priced out of maybe buying a home. But that puts additional pressure on the rental market. And we have not added many new units to the rental market. We do have a project there St. Joseph school, you know, that's going on. And Michael Graham is putting in 36 units down behind the old Washington School, those will be rental units added to the market, we have a duplex here, a duplex there that are being added. And so that helps somewhat, but we haven't had anybody build a complex in our community for a long, long time, like what Michael Graham is doing, or even, we are talking to a couple of developers outside the community that are considering larger complexes, 80 to 200 units, which would be great. But they face the same challenges, they've got to find people to build them. And then they have to be able to build them at a price point where they can make it work. And unfortunately, that with construction costs where they are, that's difficult to do too. So there are no magic bullets. And there's no silver bullets in this situation. It's a challenge.
 
James Bell 
You know, I'm curious, why don't we have more of those in Hayes hour and Ellis County, I would think, you know, I can think of two or three of those larger apartment units. But how can we have just built those over the years, like you see in some other especially I think college towns,
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
I think it's a function of the willingness for local developers, local builders to take on that level of a project, you know, a couple 100 units, you're talking, it's costing 150,000 plus per unit to build right now, some big muscle, if you're gonna build 100 units, that's $15 million, you're gonna build 200 units, that's $30 million at $150 per doors, that is the terminology they use in the industry. And there just aren't many local developers investors willing to take on that level of, of risk and that level of a project. And outside investors typically are leery of communities our size, we think we're larger community, college town, that kind of thing. But they're looking at Wichita, Kansas City and that type, you know, Lawrence, Manhattan, even for those type of projects, we have a hard time attracting outside investment. And so that combination makes it the fact that we just don't see many of them in our community. We don't see any of them in the last long period of time.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, so I you know, I'm curious, we get it. We talked about the problems. Wait, how do we how do we move forward? How do we use the data that's in this the survey to push us into where we need to be?
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Well, we have to have an organization, you know, part of our responsibility that I view is is driving Housing, Construction, driving things and understanding the programs that exist that the city, the county, the school district can offer like RH IDs, and some of these moderate income housing grant programs, and utilizing those tools, towards the construction of property and finding land, and property owners that are willing to sell at a price that will make these things feasible. We're working on as I said, we've got probably three or four different projects, I guess, I wouldn't even call them projects, I call them concepts, that at various locations around the community that that really, we would like to make happen. We're working with potential developers. But you know, of those three or four we're working on, if we get one to happen, it would be a great because they're challenging, they're, they're expensive, and they're hard to make work financially. Also working with not for profits, like heart of America and what they did at Easter, the technical college, that's that's a win win the the ultimate winner in that scenario are the people that are living out there, the homeowner, and we need to utilize not for profits, if we can for maybe apartment construction, where the ultimate winner is the tenant? You know, that's the type of construction we need to focus on. And we are it's just, it's just complicated.
 
James Bell 
Sure. You know, we talked a little bit about the nonprofit's before we want to honor on air as well helping out with them. I wonder if you want to share the What's that? What's the role in those organizations? Like we've talked about a heart of America with your 22nd, Wheatland development, you know, how much are they going to be able to drive this in the coming years,
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
they need to be a part of it, they can't be the total solution, but they need to be part of it. You know, those organizations that are dedicated to community good, and are not necessarily profit motivated? You know, I look at, we've got an opportunity here, we've got outside investors who come in, and they're pretty much their motivation is profit. They want to make money, I get that that's, that's great. Well, I wouldn't be in business for long if you didn't, right. But the profits they do make, where do they go, they leave the community, the long term profits that they make, when they sell or whatever, they leave the community. And then you've got local investors, who they're, they're out this, they're in this to make a profit as well, again, that's good. And the good news there is the the operating profits and the long term profits that they make, they stay in the community, they buy cars, they buy furniture, they spend their money locally, that's great. And then you got the not for profits, who are not in this to make money, they're in this for community good. And if we can figure out ways to assist them with some of these programs, and if they're willing to take on some risk and projects, that can be a part of the solution as well. And we're absolutely working with those organizations like Heart of America, and trying to make some of these things happen.
 
James Bell 
When I think it would be true as well, that those local developers, those local nonprofits, they're going to have a lot more interest in hiring local contractors, people locally, they can actually make the project come off the ground.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Sure. I mean, they're focused on the community, they're focused on community good, and, and that's great for the community, they can't be that they can't be the only solution. They just need to be part of it. And so that's what we're trying to do.
 
James Bell 
You know, how much of this also is, is just finding that help finding those people to do that
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
work? Well, that's a big part of it right? Now. We hope we work our way out of that. And, you know,
 
James Bell 
we build the houses, then we get more workers, then we can build the houses,
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
right? I mean, it's one of those kinds of deals, but we're gonna fight that for a few years here. I think I don't think there's any quick fixes to that. You know, everybody always says, we'll just get somebody come out of town to do that, you know, framing company from out of town. It's not that simple, because they're all busy where they're at, too. And there's, there's there's a lot of demand. But bit by bit, I think we can work ourselves out of this situation. We can add units to the marketplace. But it has to be a proactive thing. We do we did. It clearly has not happened on its own, just with the marketplace supplying this. We've got to be more forthright in our efforts to make this happen. Because just waiting for the market to correct itself has not worked yet. So we've got to we've got to force some things to happen.
 
James Bell 
Okay. Well, Dave, we've got just about a minute left. Before we got to get over the news. But you can hear more about this at the quarterly luncheon. I wonder if you want to share with everybody like what do they need to do if they want to get involved and hear more about this at that event? Well, we're
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
going to post this study on our website at grow hayes.com For one thing, so they can go out there and read it and we'll put it out on our Facebook page. And then the quarterly luncheons, they're open to the public, we just ask that you call our office and And RSVP. So we know how many people to get food for. We can handle about 40 to 45 people. So once we fill up, we do fill up, but we ask that you do RSVP, you know, call our office to reserve a spot and, and we'd love to have a good cross section call and Belzer assistant city manager is going to be doing part of the presentation. I'm going to pitch in on some of the things that we're doing. So it should be pretty interesting, and we'd love to get feedback from it.
 
James Bell 
Do you still do the online portion of that as well?
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
We will we will do a zoom deal that we'll put out there and our website and Facebook page if some people want to attend the Zoom

Return to school marks good opportunity to check fire prevention equipment

On this episode of the Post Podcast Ellis County Fire Chief and County Administrator, Darin Myers shares tips for keeping safe through preventative measures.
 
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
 
James Bell 
As Fort State University students move back into Hays for the upcoming semester, it's a good time to check those fire prevention measures. Fire Chief and County Administrator Darin Meyers stops by to share with us some safety tips on this episode of the Post Podcast.
 
Darin Myers 
October 9 through the 15th is fire prevention this week, and state fire marshal starting to send out information in regards to what is going to catch capsulate this year, but I think time fire prevention week and just general fire safety topics is kind of a good thing to bring in, we got a lot of people moving back into the area for Fort Hays. And I thought it'd be good just to kind of mention is, you know, some of the new freshmen are moving into a new apartment new dorm, new fraternity sorority is just make yourself familiar with the place that you're living. Now, where the fire alarm panels are at how to activate the fire alarm, and one of the biggest savers lifesavers is smoke detectors. So if you're in an apartment, make sure you have them, they should be in every bedroom, in your in the residence, and then they should be outside of every living area, as well as on every floor. So make sure you have them. And then the second step is make sure they actually work. You know, if you can't reach them, you know, get you a broom handle or something and push the test button on there and make sure that they work and make sure the batteries are in there. And if not contact your landlord and get the batteries replaced. And it's the best thing that can happen in the middle of night. And the best way and the fastest way to detect a fire in the residence is having the smoke detectors in there.
 
James Bell 
Absolutely. And what a simple and small measure. I mean, I'll give you an example in my home. Last time I moved in or not, I think it was the place before but I never tested them. They were there. They looked good. And I thought oh, okay, I finally after like three or four months oh my gosh, should hit that button. I did and it didn't do anything. There was no battery yet. There was no battery in it.
 
Darin Myers 
Don't Don't don't assume that just because someone else isn't there before you that they didn't pull out the detectors or the batteries. Like you said. One thing to also consider nowadays, they always used to teach or we always used to teach as you change your batteries in your smoke alarms twice a year, every time you change your clock for spring and fall you replace your batteries. Smoke detectors nowadays, we're coming out with a lithium ion batteries that last you know, they're saying 10 years, we never have to replace them. But don't take that for granted that they are still working. If they you know their batteries do become faulty and they don't last always as long as you expect them to so you still want to test them. And you know, testing them drains the battery and it'll start chirping at you if it's not a full full alarm, but it will just do little chirps. And I'll let you know that the batteries are dead on. And to get the to get it either replace the battery or replace the smoke detector as well. And in the other piece to that is not just your smoke alarms, but your co detectors detecting the carbon monoxide, we get a lot of calls starting the city in the county, but throughout the nation about this time of year, not quite yet. But once it starts cooling down, everybody starts turning their furnaces on. And a faulty furnace or a hot water heater or stove can emit carbon monoxide in your home. And so it's nice to have a carbon monoxide detector as well. And make sure that those were actually working, some of them actually plug in down on the floor. But those those are are typically placed as was Frequenters. As often in your home as a smoke detector. Those are supposed to be just one on every floor. don't necessarily want them close to your kitchen or your furnace room though you want them separated more likely in your living area and sleeping area. But you don't want them close to those areas because when it is common to have carbon dioxide actually in your home at all times. But if they're too close to those servers like the the furnace, the sensors can actually become saturated. And then they can give you false readings and maybe not go off as when they're supposed to or go off too quickly because they're saturated. So make sure you have your smoke detectors and make sure you have your carbon monoxide alarms in your home.
 
James Bell 
You don't want those carbon monoxide alarms to I wonder what's the best placement Do you want them high up near the ceiling Do you want to towards the floor I and I've seen it kind of everywhere in the in all the years that I've moved around.
 
Darin Myers 
You're testing me on that one because I don't remember what the the vapor did stupid the the relation of carbon dioxide is to air if it's heavier or lighter. You always have smoke detectors up top because smoke rises so you just fold detectors up low. However, I've always seen carbon monoxide detectors, usually about a foot two off the floor and plugged into your your power outlets. And so it may be that it's best to have but you caught me on that one. I can't. I might be able to Google that while we continue to
 
James Bell 
talk about you I think probably the most important thing is just have them in the house. Yeah, right. If it gets to a point where you're in danger, I would think no matter where it's at, it's gonna be beeping at you in one way or another. Yep. Very good. And you know, another question I had and when it comes to the fire safety in the home fire extinguishers, I've lived in places that have the little tiny ones I've lived in you don't they have the big full on ones, what's the what's the best recommendation there for you
 
Darin Myers 
definitely have one just like.
 
James Bell 
Again, the most important thing is have one Walmart and Home Depot may
 
Darin Myers 
like us after this, everybody's gonna be running into the store and pick up some more. Yes, definitely have one one of the best place to always keep it to good places, but the best and the most common place to put it underneath your kitchen, sink your your base cabinet there. But an ABC fire extinguisher. And what an ABC fire extinguisher is it is acceptable use for three different types of fires a type A fire, which is natural, so woods and trees, and then Class B is liquids and Class C would be electricity. So you have that ABC that will lay this electrical fire grease fire. Or if you just light your fire on a stove, your pizza in the stove on fire, you can use it. So definitely have that. They usually make him there, they're about biggest size you'd probably need is they're about four inches in diameter. They make home versions at the at the store, you can buy as big as you want. Because it just depends on how much space you want to take up. But they also make an extinguisher specifically for kitchens, which is a class que so it's more designed for your kitchen fires. If you want to buy one of those there, they are a little bit more expensive than a regular ABC extinguisher though.
 
James Bell 
Alright, for safety, what's the what's a few dollars for safety? Exactly. I always I always love to be more prepared. My my wife teases me all the time, because I'm always like about that stuff. But anyway, that maybe that's just me. Well, before we run out of time, we've got our shift gears here. You've got a Fire School coming up from what I understand, right?
 
Darin Myers 
Yeah. So each year, well, every month actually. So the Kansas State Firefighters Association has host different fire schools around the state. Not every single month because we have a conference in April, which we actually just hosted the annual State Conference here this year. But here in September, the 10th and 11th. We're hosting the regional Fire School. And so I guess it's somewhat of an invite if there's any fire departments for firefighters that are listed in this morning. We welcome everybody to come out on September 10 and 11th. And we'll be hosting it again this year at the high school. While vehicle extrication class, we'll have some chief officer classes, some skills training, we'll have a live burn trailer. Then we're also we'll be cooking up the day before a couple of pork butts to be able to feed everybody for lunch. So we'll have some free food for everybody for the lunch period. But one of the neat things this year's our fire school that we got approved for is on September 10 and 11th. But you know, it's been over 20 years now since 911 happened and last year was the first year that Fort Hays started it but they started a memorial stair climb out of Lewis field. And we're partnering up with Fort Hays this year. So it won't be on the 11th just because it's a Sunday, but on September 10 That morning, registration will start out at the Fort Hays lose field. And for registration of the stair climb, because everybody registered and at 747 which is our time for when the first tower was hit. We'll start the stair climb. And if you just want to do a walk around the track or he can actually climb the stairs and they'll have it all set up on the on the bleachers that you'll be able to climb 110 flights of stairs in honor and remembrance of those who sacrifice their lives back on 911 of 2001.
 
James Bell 
But are good you know what a powerful way to help remember all of those victims?
 
Darin Myers 
They are they are I've never actually attended one, we usually send our firefighters because I believe it's good to let them go out and promote that and experience that and fire departments from around the state to around the nation that happens that weekend every year. And we usually send several most we've ever sent was about seven down to a one time down to the one in which top but hopefully we'll have quite a few area firefighters joining us this year and come out to Lucasfilm It's a free event. It's just a you got to put some blood sweat and tears into climbing, climbing the stairs and walking the track to to complete it.
 
James Bell 
Sure. Do they need to sign up at all? Or is it just kind of a show up and be
 
Darin Myers 
there just show up. You don't have to for the stair climb. We actually don't even have to be on the fire department if you just want to come out and take part of the event. It's just registrations at seven and we'll give it about 30 minutes. Everybody lined up ready to go.
 
James Bell 
Very good. We've got about a minute or so left. I want to hit on this. I saw you guys driving around. I think you're probably heading to a fire. He got some new vehicles in the fleet, right?
 
Darin Myers 
Yeah. Not too long ago since well, it's been a while since we've actually Been in near to visit but we did get a new fire truck. We ordered it actually last January so about a year and a half ago but with the production delays and everything it took to get the actual the chassis up to South Dakota where they built the truck. We finally got it and the fire department, the members of company five here in Hayes spent about a month training on it they had to go out and do driver training and pump training, draft training and a lot of drills driving it around and etc. To make sure that they were fluent with the truck driving it safely and then operating it during a fire so got it in it's nice it's a very nice truck. I appreciate the County Commission support letting us purchase it it was well needed it replaced a truck that was about 27 years old. And got it and service. It's out and about it's it's a neat truck the let the firefighters have a lot of input on it and it's kind of a new color scheme that will have county fire departments black over red so the top of the cab and everything is black and the bottom half is red and looks pretty sharp and like said I'm appreciate appreciative that we got it. The firefighters are liking it, enjoying it. And it's kind of neat because it's it's a 27 year newer truck, but it's simpler to operate and kind of stopped us a few times because we thought it would be more complicated. It was simpler than it was. So that's I guess that's good news.

Fajitas, red wine and ice cream pie combine into one tasty day

On this episode of the Post Podcast Fort Hays State University's Glen McNeil share some tasty facts about some of these favorite menu items.
 
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
 
James Bell 
What do fajitas red wine and ice cream pie have in common? They're celebrated on the same day here in the US. For our nutrition, health and wellness segment Fort State University's Glenn McNeil stops by to share with us some of the nutritional implications of those menu items. On this episode of the Post Podcast.
 
Glen McNeil 
National Ice Cream Pie,
 
James Bell 
ice cream pie love ice cream ice cream pie.
 
Glen McNeil 
And you know a lot of people when you say ice cream pie, think about you know, an Ice Cream Sandwich type thing. Okay, well, this is ice cream pie today, which basically means take a pie crust and fill it with your favorite type of ice cream, and then refreeze it and slice it up and eat it. Or you can do what has become popular over the years as you you can take a pie shell and you soften your ice cream. And then you can add things like Cool Whip and cream cheese to your ice cream and blend it real well put a little fruit in it and then put it back put it into a pie shell and make you a ice cream dessert item. Okay, but you know so it's it's just a different way to to bring a refreshing dessert. Okay in and a dessert most of us like is ice cream. So we have national soft serve ice cream day. We have National Ice Cream Pie Day we have national hard dip ice cream, they so make yourself an ice cream pie today. And the most popular crust from ice cream pie is what
 
James Bell 
I would imagine like the Oreo crust.
 
Glen McNeil 
Well, you're you're close it's the old style graham cracker crust. Okay, were you just crushed up graham crackers and mix it with a little bit of butter and then pack it into a form it into a pie tin or glass pie dish. You can use that or you can do the simpler thing today is just go buy them.
 
James Bell 
That's That's my MO I just, well let's be real, I don't buy the I don't buy any of the shells or the ingredients I just buy pies.
 
Glen McNeil 
And you know, it's it's a different way to sample into dry ice cream. Is that's that's all it is. But it's an opportunity to to celebrate it in an ice cream has some calcium. Unfortunately, real ice cream has more sugar and fat to it. You know, that's what makes it rich and smooth and creamy when you put it in the mouth is that that fat that's in that particular product. So just have to kind of one of those things that you work into your diet. And you go back to that occasionally. It's good moderation. It's good. So
 
James Bell 
absolutely. You know, honestly, I can't remember the last time I had ice cream. It's been a while.
 
Glen McNeil 
I would say probably last week for me. I had some oh gosh, oh, we stopped at a chocolate factory. And we're looking at all that I don't know how people could work in a chocolate factory, right? I really don't but at least we stopped at the Chocolate Factory. And they had we're just bringing out some mint chocolate chip ice cream and that's one of my favorites. So I had some mint chocolate chip ice cream had a small dip though. Instead of the large dip or instead of the two dip. You know I'm trying to be conservative a little bit and what I do in terms that process but enjoy it, you know, that's all part of what we do what we eat. It's different things that you want to enjoy and an ice cream has some value, you know to it that like I said it's got some calcium in it. And so we do get a small benefit from it. In terms of that process, I think I just dropped something. Okay,
 
James Bell 
the headphones, the headphones fall down all day long, they get knocked over. No worries.
 
Glen McNeil 
We go back you know we go back to here today and you talked a little bit about him this morning. And and basically it's it is a it's a Tex Mex dish is what we call it in and it's normally made with stripped peppers, and stripped meat and in in terms of that process or grilled stripped meat. So they do some people make it with ground beef, ground beef, but it's then it's more like a taco than it is here. And the thing about fajitas are they are a great way to add flavor, texture and color to the diet. Now the color comes from using red peppers and I like to use red peppers, green peppers, yellow and purple onions. Okay, and then I've also when I make the heat isn't home, I dress them a little differently because I like to use Squash. Squash him just for different flavor. You can use anything you want. Okay, traditionally there they were made from a kind of meat called the skirt and it's on the lower portion of the belly more towards the front. It is a well it's on. It's called a plate if you're, you know, in carving meat, which is the lower portion of the belly in towards the front, and it's a it's not very tender. You can cook it by stripping it and and treating it with seasonings and sometimes marinating it you can make it more tender, but it's one of the more flavor Over four pieces of meat on on a beef cow. Okay, so and you can buy a lot of that's what fajita meat is when you go to the store and buy it, but you can make it with chicken you can make it with shrimp, you can make it with fish, you can make it with any kind of meat protein source that that goes with that and it's just a great way to to do to serve a blended anywhere from a mild to a highly seasoned product and introduce some new flavors to people. Okay, it's you know, so it's kind of a nice cultural thing brings different food cultural items into what we do and what we eat.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, you know what I like about fajitas kid friendly, because then you don't ache you can just kind of put a little bit a little bit a little veggies, a little meat on the plate and they can just fingerfood it and and what used to my house, the kids have always fajitas are a staple at my house. And they always enjoy just because of that it's easy for them,
 
Glen McNeil 
it's very easy to to eat and fajitas to me is one of those things if you decide to go out and buy for us at a meal they are generally served on a large platter. Okay, and there's there's plenty of meat and vegetables there for most time. And then usually, you get a secondary platter that's got lettuce, maybe some pickled Guile, or diced tomatoes, then it's cheese, some sour cream that you can use to dress them up, I can usually get three meals out of a big heated platter. Okay, back in the younger days, I can get one meal out of them. Okay, nowadays, it's kind of one of those meals where I can go order fajitas. And at the same time, I get my meal, I asked for a take home box, and I take it and I just kind of cut everything in half and put it in and then I get my lunches out of it the next day. But it's a it's a great way to alter taste, you don't have to use just one form of protein source and someone's popular day or simply just vegetable fajitas no meat. And yet some you know some people just have to have that meat product in there. Okay, but I like just plain vegetable fajitas with with guacamole and different flavorings on them, because it's, it's a great way to bring those colored vegetables in, you know, to bring that mix of from my standpoint to bring that mix of water soluble vitamins and fiber into your diet. Okay, so they are good contributors to that process. So I would say go out and get some they're easy to make at home. You can buy fajita meat in the store already. Or you can buy some people use a flat iron steak to do it. Some people will take leftover roast, and strip the roast, cooked roast and then just cook their vegetables and blend the media in with that. So you can use leftovers in the product and it does impart and make things taste really good. So I would say you know, go get you some tortillas and just mix up a bunch of fajita meat vegetables tonight, and it's gonna be beautiful sit out on the deck and
 
James Bell 
I need some Yeah, and nobody especially if you got one of those Blackstone's you got and cook, cook outside just do the whole thing outdoors?
 
Glen McNeil 
I don't have one of those.
 
James Bell 
I don't either. I have some friends that have one. They love them. Yes, I
 
Glen McNeil 
know quite a few people that have them. And I really liked the outdoor kitchen style. Now along with the fajitas you could have a glass of red wine. Today is National. Okay, so if I get this right here,
 
 
nor day, is that right? I have no idea. Which is it is a red
 
Glen McNeil 
wine. Okay. And red wine contains small amounts of vitamins and minerals. We know red wine today more towards the product, the antioxidants and the flavonoid compounds that are in red wine, a group of compounds you know that the health benefits when we look at helping control blood pressure, and what we see the alcohol and the rest of aerosol in the wine, okay, which is one of these antioxidant compounds that gives us these, these health benefits. There's information out there that regular consumption of moderate amounts of red wine gets you these these particular antioxidant compounds in them. And that can help lower your risk of colon cancer that can in for men, it can cause a slight reduction in chances for prostate cancer. You know it, there's some tie into consumption of red wine and type two diabetes these days, saying that a moderate alcohol intake can help to lower the risk of diabetes doesn't go curity factors or anything, but lower the risk. Now that doesn't mean if you go out and start drinking red wine today that you're gonna get all these benefits. These are long term benefits that come from consuming red wine. On the negative side, about 10% of the population has an allergy to wine and most of the wine allergies are a reaction to yeast or mold that may be in the product during the process or sulfites okay which which are naturally occurring compounds in red wine. So, you know we see some differences that that go on there. Other things that go with wine, it's got alcohol in it health benefits because the heart knows was relaxed, but can also cause some liver damage. Okay, when you consume any type of alcohol, you'll find changes in the liver. Okay, and the idea is to keep it moderate. And that helps to moderate those and then gives the body a chance to, to deal with those. So I mean, there's there's some good things and then you know, when you think of everything else that's going on with, with fajitas, and red wine and, and ice cream, we're back to school. Okay, our kids are back in school. So parents, grandparents, now's the time to think about if the kids come home after school, they're going to be hungry. Right, that's this sort of tradition, let school lunches are, are only designed to provide about a third of what's needed. You know, each meal is designed on that, well, you got these growing and active kids. So their chances are, they're going to become hungry during the afternoon and hungry when they come home. So have some snacks, look at things like healthy choice, not healthy choice, but a healthy choice style granola bar, the single serve yogurt packets about, they're about 75 calories, good rich sources of calcium, you can get low fat ones with Reser. Even better than that, you can get some that have fruit in them. And there are single serve packs that can be put in the refrigerator, you know, so you can do that. Apples, oranges, bananas, fresh fruits that can be put on the counter. Research shows that if those things are made available to children, as a choice, when they come home, they are likely to take them over less healthy snacks. So the idea is keep the fruit basket out there rotate the fruit in it. So there's different things, put some fresh fruit and you know, in the refrigerator, so they're gonna get into the refrigerator for that have some of those things around that? That are those healthy alternatives to a bag of potato chips, a bag of pretzels, you know that that type of thing. Now, those occasionally are not bad. But they have some of those things around. So there's lots of things to think about today. Especially as the weather is beautiful. You know, today in that process,
 
James Bell 
yeah. And getting into the routines back to school, this i That's my house right now we're, we're kind of in that mode. One of our children went back the other one starting next week. And it's yeah, it's fun all of a sudden together, and we're recognizing like, hey, let's create these good habits while we're in that transitional period.
 
Glen McNeil 
Let me let me remind you that it doesn't. It doesn't work, to have your children get out, get up and have you say, Okay, you need to eat breakfast, when you're not. Okay, children are more likely to eat breakfast and grow into eating breakfast on a regular basis. If their parents do. It's one of those follow example types of things. And then the choices, you know, if all you're going to have for breakfast as a cup of coffee, until they're maybe they're just going to want a beverage or something like that. Have a small bowl of cereal, eat a piece of fruit, no, toasted bagel, split a bagel with your kids, you know, a lot of different things that you can do to encourage them to eat good, good, healthy items.
 
James Bell 
Should you eat breakfast? I don't I never eat breakfast.
 
Glen McNeil 
Well, you know, the, there's a lot of discussion going on about about that. Probably the best answer, as best answer is what the term breakfast means. And that is to break the fast that you have had for an extended period of time. I think the majority of the information is going to come out and say it's a healthy alternative. It's the healthy choice a small amount of fuel to defeat fuel food to fuel you in the morning to bring your blood sugar levels back up from the lower portion that they become to put a small amount of protein in the gastrointestinal system that in the bloodstream will stave off hunger later in the day. People who tend to eat breakfast, a small breakfast, tend to snack less during the morning tend to feel better two to three hours after their app because they have fuel their body. So the answer is yes, you should eat something for breakfast, but I mean, it can be a cool piece of pizza is one of my favorite drives my wife nuts, cold pizza with mustard on it for breakfast.
 
James Bell 
Oh yeah, had me tell the mustard. Oh, it's really good. And I love mustard, but
 
Glen McNeil 
with yellow mustard. I mean, something we you know, it's like there's nothing wrong with having pancakes and eggs for supper. Okay, so it's just the it's just the idea of fueling your body. So yes, it's it is, you know, at least my opinion in many health professional opinions. It is a very good idea to eat breakfast. A lot of times it's called the most important meal of the day. And you think about it, it's that's a pretty long period of time from the last time you ate in the evening. Through the morning it forces the body to tap into all those stores well. It can help you stay more consistent with your blood sugar with By eating meals on a regular basis, including breakfast, which in turn helps to keep you from overeating later in the day. And for children, very important, because their blood sugar levels are low in the morning. And if they go to school with those blood sugar levels, an hour or so maybe hour and a half after they get to get to school, they have trouble concentrating, they have trouble being active, because of those low blood sugars and low protein levels in the bloodstream. So they should have something for breakfast.
 
James Bell 
My children do. Okay, I'm gonna try. I'm gonna I'm going to incorporate in my diet and I'll let you know how it goes. Next time you hear
 
Glen McNeil 
even, you know, like I said, You could do a cup of yogurt. You could do the pie like sourdough toast, with a little bit of olive oil on it for breakfast. That's good, but my favorite breakfast is take frosted Mini Wheats and layer the bottom of the bowl, one layer frosted Mini Wheats in the bottom of the bowl. And then on top of that about half inch of Raisin Bran. And then on top of that, I sprinkled some Grape Nuts or crunchy nut cereal, and then just enough to kind of fill in the gaps. And right on top of that he put some granola and then 1% milk on it. I put whole milk on it but my wife won't let me have anymore. Okay, and that's why my breakfast it's high in fiber. It's high in B vitamins. It's got good sources of protein in it and you know when I don't eat breakfast, that mid morning, I get a little grumpy. So it's good for me to eat breakfast now. I also like a bagel with some cream cheese on it or locks bagels you know smoked salmon on it. English buff and toasted English muffin with a little bit of either cream cheese or butter. And I'm a butter not margarine user and it's just because of taste. It's nothing health wise in terms of that. Or waffles with peanut butter and syrup. Have you put peanut butter on your waffles?
 
James Bell 
I did and you know I think I think maybe you'd mentioned it to me a while back and I tried it is it wasn't my favorite but it's definitely good.
 
Glen McNeil 
Yeah, you know, so there's lots of things that you can do for breakfast that that are there. Okay, and a lot of times we'll go we'll just buy a bunch of fresh fruit chop up fresh food big bold, fresh fruit in the refrigerator and a bowl that for breakfast is fine. So my breakfast you know rotates around but my favorite is that bowl of cereal. For that nets I grew up eating oatmeal for breakfast that I still like oatmeal I tend to like it more as a cold cereal that hot cereal these days but I still like oatmeal for that process. So a lot of good things we can do today especially garden fresh items that are coming out now we've been eating tomatoes we've been eating zucchini we've been eating not much to Keaney here but Sam lots of cucumbers love sliced cucumbers and he just keeps a big bowl of sliced cucumbers in the refrigerator and vinegar and water. Like that tartness that comes with the with the vinegar and just chop up put them in salads and put them in stir fry the other night so I liked it. My wife didn't but that's okay. You know we have different tastes. So there's a lot of things that you could do to to enhance the nutritional value of the food shooting. Very good. One last thing. You're a music guy. I am your music guy. What is important about August 18 in the music business in the 1960s
 
James Bell 
You're gonna stump me.
 
Glen McNeil 
You've always got all these cool trivia things. 1962
 
James Bell 
I got nothing. I have no idea. Okay.
 
Glen McNeil 
You know who Pete Best was?
 
James Bell 
Pete bet you know the name. Sounds familiar, but I'm drawing a blank. Okay, you're stuck with me on how to he was the
 
Glen McNeil 
first drummer The Beatles?
 
James Bell 
Ah, yeah, there you go.
 
Glen McNeil 
1862 on August 18 are right around that. August 18 is when Ringo Starr replaced Pete Best as a drummer. Very cool. Do I win the pizza?
 
James Bell 
I can get Jackie. You'd have Dini called with mustard though.
 
 
Oh, well, I just put it in the refrigerator and the next day.
 
Glen McNeil 
You know, on days like this. Just go out. Have a good day makes some healthy food choices and enjoy the weather.

Forward Ever: Simpson Farm Enterprises manager Jed Simpson

On this episode of Forward Ever: Leading in Challenging Times host Gary Shorman speaks with Simpson Farm Enterprises manager Jed Simpson.

Ellis County Historical Society to establish satellite museum in Victoria

On this episode of the Post Podcast, Ellis County Historical Society executive director Amanda Rupp and Museum Space Committee chair and trustee Mary Kay Shippers discuss recent developments in the creation of a satellite museum in Victoria.

Hays Chamber Education Appreciation Dinner set for August 30

On this episode of the Post Podcast Hays Chamber president and CEO Sarah Wasinger along with Rose Garden Banquet Hall owner Kim Barnes discuss the upcoming Education Appreciation Dinner.
 
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
 
James Bell 
The Hayes chambers educators Appreciation Day is scheduled for the end of this month from the Hayes chamber president and CEO Sarah wall singer along with owner and operator of the Rose Garden banquet hall and catering Kim Barnes stopped by to share some of the details on this episode of the post podcast.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
We are so excited. Obviously, our Ellis County educators are a great group of men and women who do such important work to educate our youth in our county. And you know, the byproduct of their hard work is people being able to join our workforce. So we can't think of a better reason to celebrate at the end of this month. So it'll be August 30. And that's going to be at the Rose Garden, banquet hall and catering, the event will kick off at five o'clock and we will wrap up around 7am. But we would be remiss to not share all of the businesses that support this event. Without them this wouldn't even be possible. So I'd like to just give a thank you to M price bank and enter ces as well as Golden belt bank, Midwest energy, of course, Rose Garden banquet hall and catering, sunflower bank, thirsties, brew, Pub and Grill and Walmart. They are our premier sponsors. So they really kind of make sure that this event is wonderful for for our educators. And we also have a few other sponsors, Glassman Corporation, golden plains credit union, the Hays Convention and Visitor's Bureau and our wonderful women link, they actually contribute different things to their backs that we give away that night.
 
James Bell 
Very cool, very cool. Some really good community partners, and I love to hear that so many are willing to help and step up and recognize our area educators. Yes.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
And we would be remiss to not include our chamber ambassadors. They also help plan that event and will be there to greet our guests that evening, as well as our chamber staff.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, absolutely. Love it. But you know, the highlight of the night I think is the teachers. Well, I guess the teachers, obviously.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
But I know you're gonna say because I'm hungry, and I haven't eaten yet. Exactly what I was thinking. So we have Kim Barnes here she is the owner and operator at Rose Garden, banquet hall and catering. And Kim, I'm gonna let you tell us about the delicious meal but the educators can expect to enjoy that night.
 
Kim Barnes 
Well, Sarah, we're happy to have the educators back again this year. Of course, we're going to feature 100 Pecan chicken. If you're not a fan of the sweet chicken, we'll have the country gravy on the side. So you can have your chicken fried chicken, or delicious loaded potatoes, vegetable rolls, salad, and of course, our delicious desserts.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
And you guys work really hard to make that an extra special event. And I think you told us this year, there's going to be a dessert assortment, is that right?
 
Kim Barnes 
That's right, we'll have all different kinds of desserts to choose from.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
And I believe that we are also offering a cash bar at this event. Obviously, you know, it's the start of a school year, maybe it would be a great opportunity to have, you know, a nice beverage. Um, so we'll even have a bartender on hand to make some cold drinks. Of course, coffee, tea and water will also be available of course.
 
James Bell 
Coffee, tea and water. That's okay, I guess but cash bar why? Well,
 
Sarah Wasinger 
I mean, it's almost Kenny. So
 
James Bell 
that's what I mean, like, not even sure why you'd mess with anything other beer in Ellis County, truly. But maybe that's just me. I suppose there's there's some wine drinkers out there got some beautiful wineries here in the area?
 
Sarah Wasinger 
We do we do? Absolutely. Well, one thing that we love is working with our area administrators, of course, we could not put this event together without their help. And we appreciate the opportunity to bring our, you know, people who have been in the educational system for quite a while. It's great to, you know, see faces that you're already familiar with and reacquaint yourself with them. But also it's a nice way for us to introduce our new educator. So we work with each of the schools and Ellis County and they provide us with a list of names of people who will be in attendance who are new. And it's just a nice way for the new folks to kind of feel, you know, welcomed into the educational community for Ellis County, but also kind of meet some of their colleagues that they'll be working with throughout the year.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, absolutely. You know, I was kind of surprised I was at an event for for the school. I've got kids in school here in the in the Hayes district and kind of surprised by how many new teachers they had. There was a lot of them there. And that's, I think it's excellent. We're bringing in that young talent. And even my daughter, her teacher last year was brand new out of college local, she'd been here at Hayes I've known her for a while but stepped into the role went through school and and that's awesome that they get to not only do that have those opportunities here, but then you guys putting on an event like this and exactly they get to meet each other and have that interaction outside of the school building, which I think is just so vital for the kind of the I don't know, what's the right word? Good feelings. Yeah. That's not it, but it will goodwill of the school. Well, no, not that either. But
 
Sarah Wasinger 
I don't. Well, we'll keep going.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, exactly. I'll be quiet. Let's talk more about food. Well,
 
Sarah Wasinger 
I want we're gonna talk a little bit about rose garden here in a few minutes. But I did want to share we are doing swag bags again this year. And so those puppies are going to be full of a lot of wonderful merchandise and that our sponsors have provided. And the first 150 People who come that evening will actually get a swag bag. So if you want to make sure you get one of those bags, make sure you come, you know, right around the five o'clock time. And we also have some large cash prizes. And by large, I mean $500.03 of them. So that's a good way to start school year. And then chamber checks and school supplies. Of course, you can't have an education appreciation event without giving away some school supplies. We know our educators spend a lot of their own money to prepare their classrooms, and even get their extra time over this summer to make things right. So, um, hopefully we'll have a few folks who can win some of those goodies and utilize some of their classroom. Absolutely. Now, Kim, I want you to talk a little bit about the photo booth.
 
Kim Barnes 
Oh, thanks, Sarah. Yeah, we have what's called the magic mirror photo booth. It's a five foot tall touch screen, photo booth, you can do digital prints, you can actually print off like a regular photo booth you see in a mall, we are going to have that setup for this particular event. There's lots of props take all kinds of fun pictures.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
So we are going to our sponsors, of course are going to pay for the print. So they can even walk away with a nice photo with their friends that night if they want to.
 
James Bell 
That's so cool. I love that, you know, I've been to a few weddings where they've done that, and they just love it. It's such a neat idea to commemorate the event to remember the event. And I don't know people get in that photo booth and they let loose a little bit slowly to have a little bit of fun. Well,
 
Sarah Wasinger 
one thing I wanted to share with Kim, and just with the listeners at home, we work with Kim throughout the year, whether it be some of our ambassador lunches or a membership lunches, of course, this event, she really does go out of her way with her staff to take excellent care of us. And everything is set up so nice when we get there, um, for our events, and we just want to say thank you for the partnership that we have built together. And I think that might be a good segue to talk about all the different things that you offer at Rose Garden.
 
Kim Barnes 
Well, at the Rose Garden, you know, we're a 14,000 square foot banquet hall, I've got the large banquet room and the smaller room, which is great for your big German weddings and anniversaries. But we also do smaller things, you know, birthday parties meetings, we can accommodate groups of any size, got a large dance floor. And of course, lots of lots of decor items, you know, for all those special events,
 
Sarah Wasinger 
and you even done funeral dinners, I think and you host events throughout the week as well as that right. I think sometimes people forget about those events that happen in the evening during the week,
 
Kim Barnes 
right. And we've even had a lot of options out there. It's just a great space for whatever event you have going on.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
And I think she's even had toy collectors.
 
James Bell 
I was gonna say that's my favorite. The one that sticks out to me is the toy show that's out there. And and from my understanding, they're there. they've outgrown the space because they're doing so well. But I love going down there for the toy show. It's a perfect venue for
 
Kim Barnes 
that. Right. I think we'll have them here one more year. And then they've had to move on to a bigger space, but it's always fun to have them come out.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
Well, Kim, I know that there are a lot of special occasions that happen in the fall. Do you want to talk a little bit maybe about Christmas parties or different things? And are you taking, you know, appointments first scheduling those out in advance.
 
Kim Barnes 
I do have limited spots available for this fall. But there still are a few dates out there if you've got a wedding or a special event coming up. My phone's been ringing in quite a bit trying to get those Christmas parties booked. So give me a call as soon as you can. If you're looking to book a Christmas party, of course we'll have our Thanksgiving Day buffet again this year. We're looking forward to having everyone come out for that as well. And not only do we cater at our place, but we can we can travel and caterer at your place as well.
 
James Bell 
Just out of curiosity cam How far do you go out? Is it just haze or can you go Ellis County
 
Kim Barnes 
we've been the great Ben Ross center, Ross wall Keaney. We've been out to Shiloh vineyard. So usually about an hour is a good distance for us to
 
James Bell 
So most likely anybody listening if you need a gator rose garden banquet, all they're there for you
 
 
will take care of you love it.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
So Kim, before we wrap up, you are on Facebook. So where do people go to pay attention to what you have going on? Um, because I know that you still serve dinners every once in a while on certain evenings throughout the month as well.
 
Kim Barnes 
Right? We'll do takeout meals you can call and order your takeout meal. I do post that on Facebook first and it's Rose Garden event center on the Facebook and or you can always give me a call. We also posted on their size. If you're traveling down the highway, you'll see our sign and we'll post event sets coming up. Very cool.
 
James Bell 
Love it. Love it. Yeah. One of those one of those things, one of those businesses in Hays I think everybody has little connection to everybody's had, you know, been to an event either at the building or had the food catered. And Kim, thanks so much for what you do for the community. Thank you, Sara. We've got we've got just a couple minutes left, we've got to talk calendar because you've got all kinds of cool events coming up.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
We do so today at noon we have our H yp connection lunch, it will be at Thursday's brew pub and grill on their venue side. And Brandon Heinz is going to be our guest speaker. He is the director of the haze Public Library. And this men's lunch is sponsored by Glassman Corporation. And we also have the third Thursday social for the hazing professionals that will be held at the Paisley para wine bar bistro and market on August 18. So Thursday at 5:15pm. We're excited to have our Of course, our chamber chats on Friday at 9am. And we will be with the fhsu athletic auction at the Schmidt bagel indoor training facility. So they have a lot of great items up for grabs. And it'll be a great way to kind of get a sneak peek at those. And then last but not least, our ambassador lunch will be at Rose Garden banquet hall and catering at noon. Want to give a quick plug our deadline for folks to apply for chamber blue of Kansas, that survey window closest this Thursday. A couple days. If you don't participate in that now, you won't be eligible to join the plan at least starting off right away. We have over 23,000 people who are in the pool right now. And that represents over 1500 Different businesses across the state of Kansas. Wow, that's awesome.
 
James Bell 
Huge, but no commitment right now signing up just kind of gets you the information. And it's
 
Sarah Wasinger 
just a business employer surveys so it's a very quick process. Um, so if you're even just curious to see what the prices will come back as now's the time to get that survey taken and that is available on our website as chamber.com as chamber.com

Hays Catholic schools kick off year with Back 2 School Bash

On this episode of the Post Podcast Thomas More Prep-Marian's Kim Stoecklein and Joe Roth Share details of the upcoming Back 2 School Bash.
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
 
James Bell 
Hays Catholic schools we'll be kicking off their year with a Back to School Bash from the Development Office Kim Stoecklein along with Joe Roth stopped by to share some of the details now on this episode of the Post Podcast.
 
Joe Roth 
The Back to School Bash presented by Astra bank and five was started about three years ago and it's just our way to celebrate the beginning of a new school year and help the faculty staff students and parents get it Scott excited for the upcoming school year. There's going to be activities for all ages, including a hot dog feed that's presented by Astra bank laser tag presented by Hermann physical therapy, there's going to be multiple bouncy houses for all ages, but sponsored by Jeff Pinkney, CPA and Danny Dinkle and Associates. There's a giant rock climbing wall that's presented by Diamond Jewelers and DW home improvement. the dunk tank once again is back and that is sponsored by the TMP StuCo. And the first 200 People at the Back to School Bash are going to receive a free snow cone, courtesy of sunrise agribusiness.
 
James Bell 
Nice so many good community sponsors. You know this one of the things I love about the Catholic schools here in Hays is it's not you know, it's inclusive. It's everybody in and is supported. And I think even the folks over USD 49 help support it. And I love to hear that there's so many community sponsors helping you out to get the school year started off right down there. I love that. So again, I don't know if you want to share some of the details when when is this event.
 
Kim Stoecklein 
It's coming this Friday, August 19. And we're starting it off at 545 Father Andy hammock, he is actually coming out and going to do a great blessing for our sports teams and for the grotto just started out and then we're actually ending it at 9pm with a phone dance party. So that's new to the bash this year. We have a big foam machine coming. So we're super excited about the dance party. Yeah, and it's dark. So it's gonna be on the phone goes in the dark glows in the dark, and the people will have glow sticks for everybody. So I'm hoping it'll be a lot of fun.
 
James Bell 
It's gonna make some good pictures. I bet I
 
Kim Stoecklein 
so yeah, I hope it'll be dark enough. And everybody will glow. So that's yeah, we're looking forward to that for sure. We still are looking for volunteers. So if anybody wants to get involved, please contact our office at anytime. And you get a free T shirt from God logo. So that's exciting.
 
James Bell 
That's why I volunteer for things. Yeah. Volunteer, you get the t shirt. But that's very cool. If people are interested in volunteering, what's the easiest way for them to get a hold you guys?
 
Kim Stoecklein 
They can call the advancement office and just ask for camera tmp.
 
James Bell 
Okay, easy enough. Yeah, very cool. And then, you know, again, you know, like, with the Catholic schools, I say this and I already said this, but it's not inclusive. Correct? Yeah. Or it's all inclusive. Yes, everybody,
 
Kim Stoecklein 
everyone to come enjoy this event. You know, it's free, thanks to our amazing sponsors and our support. So we don't want just our schools, we want everybody to come enjoy this, this great event. We're having some new bouncy houses coming from a different company this year, so it's not gonna be the same bouncy houses that you see all over. So we're super excited. Yeah. Very cool.
 
James Bell 
Kids love those bouncy houses. Yeah, I drive by and it'll be like a birthday party. my four year old. He's always in the car. And he's like, pull over and I'm like, no, man that's on our bouncy house. So it's nice private party. Sure. But yeah, it's gonna be a lot of fun having those kiddos there? Yes. Um, and maybe for the high school kids high school kids can can they do bouncy houses, there's that tool? Well, we've
 
Kim Stoecklein 
tried to kind of cater to all ages. So that's where the rock climbing wall comes in. I mean, this thing is huge. And they bring it in on a truck. So we're super, super excited about that. There'll be some Foursquare volleyball setup for them. So we try to have activities for all ages. So it's not just the little kids. So yeah, we're super excited.
 
James Bell 
Very cool. Very cool. Well, you know, as this kicks off the year it was the school year started yet or are you guys going to class next? I don't really I don't remember the dates. I know USD 49. Starting soon, but I don't even know when and that's embarrassing to have.
 
Kim Stoecklein 
So our Holy Family, the little kids, they started this morning, they have a half day today. We have some first students, our new student orientation for our high school today and then tomorrow will be their first official day with everybody in the school. So it's an exciting time. We love when the students come back and the faculty come back. It's just Yeah, it's a really great time. We're excited to start it off with a big bash.
 
James Bell 
Absolutely. Love it. Love it again. This is coming up this Friday. 545 All right, phone dance party kicking it
 
Kim Stoecklein 
off. prayer service kicking off we can do the phone dance party till the end because it's got to glow.
 
James Bell 
Well, that's fair enough. Yeah. Alrighty, guys, well, anything else the public needs to know or that we want to talk about before we go.
 
Kim Stoecklein 
I think that's it. We just want to thank all our sponsors. And again, the support from the community has been amazing. We couldn't do this without you. So thank you so much to everyone who's helped me

FHSU selects next Chief of Police

On this episode of the Post Podcast, Fort Hays State University's newest Chief of Police Terrance Pierce shares his story and how he landed in Hays, along with Hays Chief of Police Don Scheibler and Chief Communication Officer Scott Cason.

Grow Hays plans third Think Like an Entrepreneur series

On this episode of the Post Podcast, Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams shares details about the upcoming Think Like an Entrepreneur series.

Community Cruise strengthens FHSU, Hays connection

On this episode of the Post Podcast, Fort Hays State University Alumni Association engagement specialist Carolyn Tatro and Hays Convention and Visitors Bureau executive director Melissa Dixon share information about the Community Cruise.
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
James Bell 
The Fort Hays State University Alumni Association recently partnered with the Hays Convention and Visitor's Bureau for a community cruise on campus from the CVB Melissa Dixon, as well as from the Alumni Association, Carolyn Tatro joins us to talk about that and more on this episode of the Post Podcast.
 
Carolyn Tatro 
We had an outstanding opportunity just a few weeks ago to bring together community leaders and community members on to the Fort Hays State campus. So we partnered with the Convention Visitors Bureau with the chamber and grow Hayes for the first community cruise and think it was maybe three years right, Melissa, is I sound right? Correct. Yeah. So it was a it was yeah, it was a great opportunity. We probably had I mean, we had a couple dozen, there were a lot of people
 
Melissa Dixon 
think, yes, this event started, way before I worked for the city as an opportunity to educate our newly elected officials on what our organizations are, what they do, how we're funded, and what our big projects are. And, you know, after COVID, we had to not get on a bus together and do that. So we would start out with a presentation of, you know, I'm the CVB. I'm funded by transient guests tax, and here's my mission. And each organization would go through that and just let those officials know what they do. And then we would all jump on a bus together, and we would drive around town and say, What's going on over here? What's that empty lot? What are your plans for this? And we usually would have somebody on that bus ticket, answer the question. And we would have a lunch at the Welcome Center, and then COVID. And so we hadn't done it in in years.
 
Carolyn Tatro 
But I think it was awesome having them on campus. There were a lot of familiar faces that I knew that I had recognized, but a lot of people that I got to meet and really kind of here. You know, a lot of people had not been on campus in a while. And so it was definitely a different event than what kind of community cruises had taken place before.
 
Melissa Dixon 
Absolutely. There's so many new buildings on campus in the past few years that I know, I know, our city department heads hadn't been in. So the guest list kind of looks like school board members, city department heads, county department heads. And that includes Police Department educators. So everybody got together and got some fantastic personal tours of the three newest buildings on campus. So we went to the officially wills Center for Student Success, which is gorgeous, so many little spaces to meet and engage. And then the new art building, and then the new Center for Applied Technology.
 
Carolyn Tatro 
Yep, Applied Technology. Yes, got it.
 
James Bell 
Nothing greatest, really, we'll need to get to get a cool name for that building.
 
Carolyn Tatro 
It's a cool building, though it is a cool building. They're
 
James Bell 
all they're all great. And what I love about this, and what I think probably everybody took away from this, correct me if I'm wrong, but a lot of the ways that we kind of teach our students especially that college age, are shifting, it's a little different. And it's more community spaces and collaborative rooms and things like that, that especially that fishery will center really helps, you know, happen.
 
Carolyn Tatro 
Yeah, so much more collaboration, so much more hands on. And it really was important to us to make sure that our community was able to see that not just the facilities themselves, but what's going on in some of those facilities. And so I think for us, it was just really important because we, you know, we want everybody to feel welcome on our campus, not just students and faculty and staff. But you know, people who and first of all, I cannot tell you how many alums were in this group, what I asked at the very beginning, hands shot up all over the room. I mean, people were cool. Yeah, it was great. There were 4k State alums all over the place. And a lot of them really had not been back to campus in a while. And so being able to connect them back to the spaces, allowing them to just sort of explore what their campus looks like now. And we want everybody to be able to feel welcome on our campus so that they can come see all the really special things that we're doing.
 
Melissa Dixon 
And now those people will be more comfortable. They'll say, Oh, I know where this is. And I know where I can park Exactly. And I know who to talk to. And what I love is sometimes you'll walk into space, and have an idea or an opportunity and say what if we work together on something like this? Because with my job, people call us all the time looking for meeting spaces. And when I walked into the officially Will's Senator, I said, Look at all these meetings. What if we could work together and so I think that's the ultimate goal is to find opportunities that we might not have thought of, for city and university county to work together.
 
James Bell 
But there are really strong connections already in place between the university and I think some of the events and things that I've been involved with and one of the first calls that I always hear is well, let's See if we can get some students down here. Because they are a great resource workwise ideal wise, and engaging them in the community then helps keep them here.
 
Melissa Dixon 
Yes, absolutely, thank you know, I
 
Carolyn Tatro 
get on the soapbox all the time, when I was a student, I wish that I had taken more advantage of the things that this community offers. And I tell people now do not wait until it's too late. Whether or not you plan to stay in Hays, you will want to be engaged with this community, because we want you to feel like you're part of it. And I know how many people stay in Hays because of those community connections. And so it just really benefits everybody to have this relationship. And so this, I mean, and the city of Hayes gives back in so many different ways, you know, whether it's support or student scholarships, you know, there's so many different ways that we can really just build this relationship. And it's so important to the university as well. And, you know, it's, it's a very tight knit community, and everybody, you know, everybody knows everybody sometimes. But we're really just, you know, everything is kind of intertwined. Everything is interconnected. And so it's just important for us to be able to do things like this.
 
Melissa Dixon 
And our goals are so similar. We all want Hayes to be the best it can be. We want people, alumni, students, employees, to fall in love with Hayes and stay here forever. So I feel like in the CVB, yes, our mission is to take care of visitors and market hates to visitors. But our long game is that those visitors will decide to live here. And so I feel like that's something that we work on together every day.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, and I gotta believe, too, that, you know, the university helps. And especially, although the Alumni Association events and activities help bring those visitors to Hayes, and maybe even not alumni, but somebody's curious about the school and they say, Hey, I saw this, these new nice, neat buildings down on campus. And maybe you should check this out when they're talking to their youth, which then helps recruit for the university as well.
 
Melissa Dixon 
Absolutely. That relationship is so important. With that, we have a committee, yeah, dedicated to it. It's called the town and gown committee. So town is the city gown is like what you wear when you graduate. And we're, we're a member of the International Town and Gown Association, because there's so many college towns that have the same challenges. And every year, we go to a conference, and we get together and hear how everybody else is, is solving their problems and, and we take notes on their things that are working. And we've actually presented on some projects there before. It's a great organization.
 
James Bell 
Very cool. Very cool. You know, I wonder if you want to talk a little bit about, you know, after these events, what happens next, you know, what are we gonna do you get to build all that goodwill? And that, you know, like, Oh, that's cool. That's neat. But then what?
 
Carolyn Tatro 
No, well, I laugh because there's just, there's so many different opportunities. Um, you know, we bring our graduates to the community, they, you know, they might find jobs around here, there's lots of different ways that they can benefit afterward. And then they bring those there kind of stories back to the university to help the current students and the other alums to kind of understand, like, here's where I have come full circle. So and I know, throughout the year, you know, there's lots of other opportunities to do this as well and other opportunities, not just for, you know, our elected officials like what we were doing for this community cruise, but my first of many pitches to come for homecoming, you know, it's an opportunity for anybody to be part of what we're doing on campus. We open it up to the entire community, people come from all over the place to see Oktoberfest and homecoming. And we have a lot of different ways for people to get involved for that entire weekend. So absolutely lots of ways that we can do this.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, you mentioned homecoming, and Oktoberfest is one of those things. I think they're so intertwined that most people don't realize they are separate activities and events, you know, different people are planning different things, but it all happens kind of at the same time and together and works perfectly. Oh, always has it as long as I've been here. Don't want to curse it this year, but
 
Carolyn Tatro 
Well, I will. Yeah, both both. People who have their hand in both big events really do a great job of putting it together.
 
Melissa Dixon 
And this year is actually the 50th October so I think everything's going to be bigger and better. There's plans for they're going to try to break the world record for the world's largest beer rock. So don't miss that.
 
James Bell 
You know, what's bummer about that? Cuz I had to talk to some of the organizers. All the spaces to eat the beer rock are full. They're done. Like I want to eat the beer rock I don't want to see it I mean seeing some school but it tastes good. Well, I'm sure it's gonna taste good. But anyway, we got about a minute left guys last thoughts or anything else we want to hit on? Before we go?
 
Melissa Dixon 
I'll say something we're working on right now back to school picnic, which is They're really big town and gown collaboration effort where students are invited to come out to the quad and get to know student organizations that they can be involved in, and local businesses come out to meet them. And CVB is really excited to actually get the the ability to sponsor the meal this year. So we're excited to get down there and see their students too.
 
Carolyn Tatro 
That's great. Yeah, one of the first opportunities for students to see the community is to see all the opportunities during the back to school picnic, it's one of my favorite events of the year, so I'll for sure be there. And then of course, like I said, we've got homecoming coming up. I'll be talking a little bit about this. You're in the next a lot about this in the next few months, but just some some more really great ways for people to come check out what's going on both in at Fort Hays State and pretty much looking forward to all of that.

Forward Ever: Radio show host Mike Cooper

On this episode of Forward Ever: Leading in Challenging Times host Gary Shorman speaks with radio show host Mike Cooper.

Ellis County’s largest employers continue to help drive local economy

On this episode of the Post Podcast, Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams shares insights from recent tours of Ellis County's largest employers.
 
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
 
James Bell 
Few of the largest enterprises in Ellis County have a significant impact on the area economy. Grow Hays, Executive Director Doug Williams stops by to share some of those insights on this episode of the Post Podcast.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Fort Hays State is the crown jewel of western Kansas, we got to tour the three new buildings to three, three newest buildings on campus. I was just blown away by what all they have down there, and how nice and just effective and what a wonderful resource those buildings are. To the art department, the technology department and the Center for Student Success and just amazing buildings. You just go in and you don't feel like you're in hate, you know, you feel like gosh, I shouldn't be in a metropolitan area, or huge university someplace, but it's right here and it's impressive. Yeah,
 
James Bell 
yeah, I really like about all of the construction they've done because I was I was on campus there when they started with the with Hammond Hall, and kind of that whole process. I love that the new buildings the the the consensus, the goal is to make them look like they're part of the old campus. You know, there's an aesthetic there that I just I can't think of another college and I've ever been on to that really does that.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Well they've done a terrific job of maintaining the limestone construction, you know, the same building materials and and the look and feel with with some modernization. And of course, the art area, they use the old power plant and being a lifer here in Hayes. I remember that powerplant, my granddad used to work there. And I used to go down there when I was a kid, and walk through there with him. And that was longer ago than I'd like to think. But they, they were able to restore that building, at least the exterior structure and things keep the bill brick and that kind of thing is really cool how they did that. So it they have done an amazing job. And we can be very proud of, of what we have there. And what a wonderful asset it is to western Kansas and to Ellis County in particular, to have that type of an institution there. It's it's just tremendous.
 
James Bell 
Absolutely. You know, I love then it's and I know, it's not a haze, exclusive thing, but there seems to be just such an undercurrent here of people wanting to reutilize those historic structures, those old buildings and I love that we do that in Fort Hays is done that I think is in modern history, at least has absolutely much as they can.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
They have, you know, as I said, the old power plant they use for that the library's the next project with the grant that they recently received a $17 million grant, I believe it was, and they're going to be renovating the library, but I don't think they're going to be changing a whole lot on the exterior. I say that they probably aren't going to do a fair amount to it, but but they're going to maintain the spot they're going to maintain some of the the structure and things and so they'll continue that look and feel and and you know, really the only other a couple buildings on campus that aren't of the limestone, I think domanick Hall is, is maybe non limestone and things but I tell people this all the time I would I would compare our campus to any other anywhere really, in terms of the look and quality of a campus is is just really second to none. And I mean even big schools and, and division one schools and it's just an amazing place.
 
James Bell 
Absolutely. And I love talking for hates, everybody knows I went for Hayes and big champion of everything they do down there. Well, I
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
went there to just not the whole ride. I got sidetracked along the way college algebra. As I told the group the other day, college algebra ended my college career. And however I told them in the Center for Student Success, they have an area for tutoring, and they bring in tutors. And it's a great spot where kids can come in and get the help they need. I'm sure something like that was probably available when I was there, but I didn't find it. And if I were to go back, I might have gotten through college algebra and continued my college career path. But that didn't happen. So kids have a much better opportunity today to utilize those resources.
 
James Bell 
Absolutely. Hey, and I'll share this with you Doug. If you keep it between you and me. College Algebra. I took it six times six before I finally got
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
through sixth time's the charm.
 
James Bell 
Everybody knows to I was in college forever. I was there for dang decade. It was amazing. Probably why I love it so much. Why
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
ever leave? Yeah, exactly.
 
James Bell 
But, you know, four days, you know, and that's it. That's a showcase piece. And it's easy to point to that but you had some opportunity here in the last week to go through some of the large employers here in Hays and, and really kind of see what they do as well, right? We did
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
yesterday, Scott, the plant manager at EnerSys was good enough to give us a tour of intercepts and I had never been in there. That's one of the really cool things about this job I have is that I get to go in some places that I've never been. You know, I mentioned I've lived here all my life. I remember very well when it was traveling all and you know it was our Our largest employer at that point in time, but I was never in the physical plant. I've been in the front offices. So yesterday, we got to take a tour of the entire place. And wow, it's it's an impressive place as well in a different kind of way. Because it's hardcore manufacturing going on in there, you know, plant floor and Fire, fire deals, melting lead, and pouring lead into forms and then turning it into batteries, ultimately, big batteries and things. But what an impressive place and just shows we've got a lot going on here. I've had tours of brands, I've had tours of Glassman, we have some really impressive has. We had some really impressive businesses here that are doing some amazing things right under our noses. And I don't think we realize it sometimes just how impressive these things are.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, absolutely. I was even I had a conversation with my wife not too long ago. And matter of fact, we were talking to nurses, we knew they make batteries, but like what they actually do, we don't know. And it is it's so easy to overlook those those major employers Hays med is another one here in Ellis County that really helped drive our economy, but they're kind of you know, you don't think about a lot of them frequently, maybe his med is a bad example. Because you do. Most people out there though
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
maybe higher profile in the community. But you know, in our system, we talked about this yesterday, they're kind of on the edge of town. And so you drive by that building all the time, but you don't really think about what goes on in there unless you have some reason to either know, somebody that works there or having worked there before. But it's an impressive operation. And they, they produce some amazing products to get used all over the world. I mean, these batteries, these are not your car batteries. These are industrial type batteries that are used for backups of telecom systems and computer data centers and that type of thing. Even utility companies use them nuclear power plants use them for their backup, because they want to have backup power if they have to shut down the plant for some reason or another. So these products are used everywhere. And they're made some I mean, they have multiple plants but least these are made right here in Hays America.
 
James Bell 
I love that are we're literally, you know, building the things that are driving the world.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Well, at some level we are, you know, I know tronics makes parts for the the auto industry and for General Motors and the big car manufacturers and cross Of course, I'm not sure exactly what all they make products for, but their products are used all over I know. And RANS my gosh, he's, he's got airplanes all over the world. And he's been at it a long time out there, Randy and his crew and they do a terrific job as well. So pretty special stuff goes on here.
 
James Bell 
Yeah. You know, from a truly economic standpoint, I wonder, you know, how much of our economy is driven by those large employers? And I don't know where you draw the line on large. But, you know, those are the ones who are most talking about
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
the end. You're right. The definition of large is always interesting. When I was back into computer business and working with IBM, they called small businesses, anything under 1000 employees. Those were small businesses. Well, they're not small to us. But those employers are critically important to our local economy, and they contribute a lot. You know, Fort Hays, state Hays med EnerSys has Glassman RANS, all of those cross, they all contribute a lot of dollars in employment to our community. Unfortunately, they're all facing the same problem right now is finding people. That's that's the real challenge. The biggest challenge that they face, you know, I'm talking with the Scott at an intercessor. He also talked about supply chain issues, you know, they have been challenged with supply chain issues and trying to get products and, and it's a process. So when you lose one piece of the chain of manufacturing something, it gums up the whole work. So it is some challenges, some challenges, but I think employer employees are their biggest challenge to find good qualified employees.
 
James Bell 
You know, and that's something we talk about quite a bit. And one of the driving factors on that is housing here in the area. And from what I understand there was a reason how recent housing study done by the city of Hayes, I wonder if you want to share some of the insights from that? Well,
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
there was the city page recently completed a housing study. The document Institute did a housing study forum and in a company called rd G did a supplemental study. And it showed us basically kind of what we already know that we have a shortage that we have under built for quite some time. And it's put us in the hole in terms of available housing and thus our ability to recruit the workforce is challenging, because we don't have any place for him to live, whether it be a very white collar person that's looking at our community health care provider or a college professor, school team. Teacher, or somebody that's got a skilled laborer that's looking to go to work for one of these manufacturers that we're talking about, they have to live someplace. And we have not built enough homes over the last 10 years to meet the need. And then if we want to take advantage of this urban migration that's taking place over the next five to 10 years, we're gonna have to really ramp it up. So we have some real challenges ahead of us if we expect to continue to have any growth and do better than we have done.
 
James Bell 
On that same note, though, there are some positive actions going on here in Ellis County that are designed to alleviate some of those shortages, right?
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Well, we're obviously the heart of America development out and Tallgrass is 36 homes that will be added to the market. The Ellis Estates is adding 42 units to the market out there. And there's other projects that are in at least a conceptual stage. So absolutely, we're looking at solutions and trying to get new housing going. We couldn't have picked a worse time to try and build things. Because the construction industry has labor shortages as well, costs are higher than they've ever been escalating interest rates mean, we could talk all day about the challenges really doesn't matter. We've got to figure out solutions, because we've got to provide housing for people that might want to move into this area. So we're just going to have to do
 
James Bell 
You know, as we heard earlier from again, from the city leaders here on our City Commission recap on the show. There's another IRH ID that they approved to hear. But I guess yesterday
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
last night, yes, I didn't mention that in terms of stuff under construction. But Mike Graham is going to build 33 or 36 units at the corner of fourth and fort. That will add obviously 36 units, by my estimation, we're probably four to 500 units short, in our current housing supply. I say that because our vacancy rate is virtually non existent right now. And, you know, we've got about 9000 units in our community, a healthy vacancy rate would be five or more. So if you do the math, you come up with, you know, anywhere from three to 500 units that we could use. And it also would help other landlords be a little bit more motivated to upgrade what they have. Because there's no motivation to fix things, or to upgrade properties, or even to possibly knock down properties and put something new up, so long as you have a rental market where everything rents. And so if we can add properties to the market, we'll see some of that kind of thing take place. And that's a good thing that's healthy for a community to to go through that process. It's not healthy, to not have places for people to live when people want to move here. That's not a good situation. We need to resolve that.
 
James Bell 
You know, we've talked about this so much. But I wonder if you want to put kind of a timeline on it. And I know that we we both frequently say this, it never moves as fast as you want. But I'm wondering at what point do you see that here in Ellis County, we might get past that kind of crisis point in the housing and move into that place where we're in a, at least a stable and positive looking outcome.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
I think even if all the projects we have on the board would occur, we're still two or three years away from getting to the point where we have adequate inventory maybe longer simply because it takes to a couple of years to take a project from concept to reality or longer to get things built. So we're still two or three years away from having any hope of resolving some housing issues. So it's going to be an ongoing thing for quite some time. Oh, we're gonna get there. We absolutely are.

Help keep school age children safe with these tips

On this episode of the Post Podcast Hays Fire Department Deputy Chief Shane Preston stops by to share safety tips for the school year.
 
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
 
James Bell 
Keeping children safe as they go back to school this August is up to the entire community his Fire Department Deputy Chief Shane Preston stops by to share some safety tips on this episode of the post podcast
 
Shane Preston 
are some parents are excited for school to start back up just in a matter of time of their hair and get back to the activities maybe it'll slow down a little bit. But, you know, school is coming just right around the corner. So some of the things we want to kind of talk about today some school stuff remember, you know, the school zones and you know, with increased traffic in those areas, obey the traffic, flashing signals and, and speed limits in those areas. And in those areas, just remember the kids are gonna be walking, riding their bikes or skateboards or, you know, whatever it may be, may not always be in the car with the parents. And just make sure you plan ahead all that extra time. You know, plan for it to be crazy. I know it is and I'm not a big fan of doing the whole drop off and pickup thing myself but if I can do it everybody else can do so just remember when you are picking up your child or dropping them off parking in the emergency vehicle areas Please do not do that that is that is for us if there is an issue there usually there'll be a sign there that says you know no parking emergency vehicles or it'll be a curb will be painted red in that area. So you know, there are designated pickup pickup drop off areas at the schools. But we also have kind of our own little spot where you know, if something bad did happen, we have a place to go.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, and you might think well I'm only going to be there for a minute but in an emergency holy smokes that minute might be life and death for somebody and you don't want to be the one that's in
 
Shane Preston 
the way and then you know everybody else trying to get out of the you know out of the way it just if you if you've ever done this school pickup stuff you know the traffic is kind of insane it's something you know everybody wants to get going and everything and then you throw an emergency in there and it just you know raises the stress levels up a little bit more and then people are trying to you know, get their kid but yeah, get out of the way and it's it it gets a little cumbersome. So just park where you should Yes. Remember we have crossing guards signals remember there's crossing guards that that do that the just like over here to a Laughlin we do have crossing guards there and and make sure you allow enough time you see them stop ahead you know let's get his kids moving so phones in the school zones you know if you don't need to be on it don't and if you do you know there's so many options now going hands free with your cell phone and you know things like that use those options if you need to be on it you know in the vehicle just good general practice to do that.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, I think I'd heard and correct me if I'm wrong I mean we may know may not but someone somewhere I'd seen that distracted driving so cell phone usage is now the number one killer or the number one cause of traffic acts fatal traffic accidents over drunk driving.
 
Shane Preston 
I don't I haven't seen that but it couldn't be wrong no I think I think it's right up there with it if it's not you know if it hasn't been taken over that that stat yet but you know the whole texting and driving and it's just even you know if you're talking on and you got it up to your you know your ear you're you're involved in the conversation and you're just going through the motions of driving instead of you know I need to be driving and be defensive and looking for things and all that so it really does take take take you away from where you need to be when you're driving
 
James Bell 
and when you got little kiddos running around I mean it's they just pop up out and they do I ended up my my daughter almost got hit coming out school not not in haste This was back in when our previous location but thank goodness that driver was paying attention because she caught it like, right just this kid was popping under our wheels. I didn't know what she was doing. But she immediately took her back to our house and said you guys should have a talk with your daughter. And we did we did but you know had she been on a cell phone or been distracted at all it may have been a very different
 
Shane Preston 
and also remember to we have young teenage drivers out there for high school who are going to be you know now driving, talk with them. If you have a teenager in the home, you know just work with them and you know make sure hey put the Phone down when you're driving, it's not that important. If it's not important and pull over Park, then use the phone you don't, you know, it's one of those. Because, you know, as a young driver, you don't want to be involved in an accident and might hurt another small child too. So but anyway, school buses. Now remember, you know, the school bus has its flashing lights on and the stop signs out. That means traffic stops both sides, both
 
James Bell 
sides. Oh, so that's something that I learned recently, and probably you that taught me this. The segment's but yeah, both ways, you can't just stop if you're behind it, it should be a complete stop. That's
 
Shane Preston 
correct. And, and the reason is, is because when the kids get off, they get out the passenger side of the of the bus, now they may need to go to cross the street. Well, that stop sign the flashing lights provides basically, you know, a school crossing guard type thing provides a safe zone for them to be able to get off the bus and go, you know, walk around in front of the bus and go across the street and get on the sidewalk and meet their parents or go home from there. Now, a lot of times, the kids just get off the bus, and they just go they don't pay attention to the, you know, the cars, traffic, they get snacks, a TV, video game, they want to go play or you know, whatever it may be. And so yeah, just be aware of that. And we do have, you know, not just school buses out in the rural communities, but we have school buses here in town in Hays that do drop offs, pickups and drop offs. So just remember, if you do have a school bus, stop in your area, make sure you plan around that to know where those are at. But teach the kid teacher if you have a kid that does ride the school bus teach him to play it safe. Stay five steps away from the curb. Always wait until the bus comes to complete stop and the bus driver signals for you to board the bus. So, you know, you know there's, the kids want to hurry up, jump on well, you know, the driver doesn't even have the door open and they're trying to get on you know, so wait wait for the vehicle to come to complete stop. And then face forward, you know, after finding the seat sit in your seat, you know, when I was in school, the school buses did not have seat belts. So you know, we were just we just wrote along. But we still had the same rules you sit down you face for you know you don't jump up over the seat to talk to your friend that's behind you or anything like that. So and then when exiting the bus, wait till it stops. Make sure you look in make sure you talk to your child about looking both ways across the street even though the bus may have its lights on the stop sign out and there may be some a drivers that stopped each year we do have an incident with a driver not yielding to the stop sign of a school bus. And you know, sometimes people get hurt and sometimes they don't. But let's just be aware of that and, and help help everybody be safe. And just reminder, the kids to be courteous to this to the bus driver and listen to their directions and and because the drivers there, they just want to we want to make sure the kids get home safely get to school safely. So that's that's their big push there. And lastly, I know we usually talk about it every time but we still have our smoke detector program. So if you do have any questions about a smoke detector or even a carbon monoxide detector, let us know and we will assist you in any way we can.
 
James Bell 
Very good. Well, all righty, Shane, any other last thoughts or anything you want to touch on before we go? No, I
 
Shane Preston 
just want to say it's a beautiful day out. I know it's a little cloudy or foggy but the temperature is great.
 
James Bell 
It looks like 70 degrees, the little chart saying here and yeah,
 
Shane Preston 
usually that's around you know, like two o'clock in the morning. 830 in the morning so everybody's going to enjoy the nice little weather we have here.

Extension district wheat test plot results released

On this episode of the Post Podcast, Cottonwood Extension District agent Stacy Campbell shares updates from the district. 
 
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
 
James Bell 
We plot test results from the Cottonwood Extension District have been released agent Stacy Campbell stops by to share with us the details on this episode of the Post Podcast.
 
Stacy Campbell 
Monique Koerner just started yesterday as our new family community wellness agent here in haste. And she just started yesterday. So yeah, you know, you want to invite people to swing in and meet her or give her a call. But yeah, Monique Kerner is our new family community wellness agents that started just yesterday here in the Hayes office for the cottonwood district. And then there's, you know, a search on for two more agents for four H Youth Development agent and horticulture agents. So stay tuned.
 
James Bell 
Very cool. Very cool. Yeah. When she gets settled in you tell her to swing on by. Okay. We'll do Yeah, we could still hit it. Oh, good. Great, great. We get some important things we're gonna talk about today. You, we just had the harvest got over. And then the fair, you had some results from the wheat, right?
 
Stacy Campbell 
Yeah, yeah, we cut our you know, little little, I can say little, our wheat demonstration test plot that was south and west of town. And we've got those results up on our website. So if you just go to triple w.cottonwood.ksu.edu, click onto the crops and livestock tab, there's kind of some tabs over to the left, if you click onto that. And then under hot topics, I believe is where that's at. And that's a lot to remember. So one of the things I just kind of tell people anymore, if I'm if you just type in Cottonwood extension, and put comma KSU should be able to get our website to pull up and then just click on to the crops and livestock section. And you'll see should see the local wheat demonstration plot results there and also have some other decision aid tools there. There's a publication that extension, you know, updates annually, puts quite a bit of time and effort into it. Called they renamed it now. But in the past, it's been called the wheat variety, disease and insect publication and I forget what they renamed it. But that's that's useful to look at different ratings of wheat varieties for disease resistance, insect resistance. So that's always been updated, it's on there on the website as well. And then one other kind of cool tool that is out there that actually Colorado State University has, and I've got the link to it under the hot topics on the website is a decision tool to where you can do head to head comparisons of two different varieties of wheat. You can look at different locations. And and they basically have compiled all of the different Experiment Station results of wheat variety plots in the Great Plains that includes Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Nebraska, Colorado, they've got all that data in there. And then they've got just a real simple decision tool, or like I say, you can do a head to head comparison of two different varieties and see which one, you know and it'll say, like variety X, you know, out yield a variety Why 55% of the time in 12 different trials. So it's a pretty cool little tool put out by Colorado State University. And the link is on the website there to look at that. And then you know, of course, we're We're hot and we're dry. We're probably in a drought. So was talking to our veterinarian, one of our veterinarians last week at the fair and he said yeah, cool cows are coming into the sale barn. So you know, guys are getting rid of some some cows, probably going to be some early weaning. And then I would encourage guys to also do preg checking, you know, early when they take them off of pasture here in the fall and get rid of those opens. And then one other thing just to throw out there. If they when they do cut their hay and I know the hay is not growing a lot because of the drought, but if they do swath and put it down, the tendency is to put that cutting bar pretty low two inches off the ground give or take a little bit, or nitrates accumulate in that lower stem of the plant. Because of stress and drought stress is often how we get nitrates. So if you can raise that cutter cutting bar up from say two inches to six inches that can really help Keith harmony, the range scientist at the experiment station one year and drop in a dry year went out there and did some hand clipping of you know, sorghum Sudan and and He clipped at two inches versus six inches. And I believe I'm just kind of going from memory that there was almost a 50% reduction in nitrates from two to six inches cutting height. So that's that's an impact. It's pretty significant. So and you know, this year, I think he's going to be short. So every bits going to count. So I know your tendency is to lower that to keep that cutting bar low. You're gonna pick up probably not pick up that much more tonnage, if you raise it up, you know, two to four inches and could sure reduce the amount of nitrates significantly.
 
James Bell 
You know, and for us lay people that are out in the fields. Like what what benefit does that give you know long term I know we hear about nitrates quite a bit especially in water supplies and then right your drainage ponds, things like that.
 
Stacy Campbell 
So high nitrates and forages can can actually kill lactating cattle. So it just just causes kind of a, it basically, gosh, hadn't thought about this for a while, but it kind of reduces the amount of of oxygen in the blood. So it can kill your lactating cows, if it doesn't kill them, sometimes it'll cause them to abort. So just trying to reduce those nitrates in our, in our feed is is very important. And like I say, nitrates accumulate in the lower part in the stem of plants, when there's a stress and oftentimes in our part of the world, it's because of drought stress, they're just the plants just really kind of shutting down if you will, and it's not really metabolized and what nitrates and has an in pushing them up for growth because there's not enough moisture there. It's hot, it's dry, they're just trying to survive. So they just kind of in a matter of speaking almost, you know, kind of kick into a hibernation mode if you will, and they're just not metabolizing those nitrates and utilizing them and so they're accumulating in that lower stem. So anything we can do to raise that cutting height on those drought stress plants can help reduce those those nitrates, you know, and, and cause cause fewer headaches down the road. I mean, you know, you lose a cow or two because of that that can pretty much you know, definitely dips into the profit or maybe wipes out any potential profit there was for the year. Thanks. Yeah, yeah, so and then one other little kicker our always mentioned soil sampling, you know, before you plant your next wheat crop, it'd be beneficial to go out and take a soil sample we sampled where we're going to put our wheat plant back in again this year and need quite a bit of nitrogen you know, we've we were able to fortunately have some good yields this year again. And so wheat definitely uses nitrogen. It's a it's a user a consumer of nitrogen. So if you've had some good yields, probably be beneficial to go out there and take two foot if you can get down there, profile soil sample for your nitrogen and see how much you're gonna need for the next for the next crop, whether it be wheat or grain sorghum, if it's grain sorghum, you can wait till you know next spring to sample for that. I guess that's the other thing is whatever its buys to sample kind of consistently at the same time of year. So for wheat, you know, you may be tight pulling samples in August 1 part of September, and then for your summer crops, maybe sample those in the in the spring. You kind of do that consistently. When you do take samples, you know the same time of year for those particular props. It's advisable

Hays to host full-scale tornado strike exercise

On this episode of the Post Podcast, Ellis County Emergency Manager Lyle Pantle shares information about an upcoming training exercise in Hays.

Area leaders tour FHSU campus

On this episode of the Post Podcast, Hays Chamber president and CEO Sarah Wasinger, shares details of the 2022 Community Cruise.
 
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
 
James Bell 
Area officials will tour Fort Hays State University campus this week from the Hays Chamber president and CEO Sarah Wasinger stops by to share the details on this episode of the Post Podcast.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
So for many people, they may not know what the community cruises and we're calling this one community cruise for today's edition, because we're doing it a little bit different format. So the community Cruise is usually when the downtown Hays Development Corporation grow haze, the haze Convention and Visitor's Bureau and the chamber and haze, of course, get together to take our elected officials and community leaders across town. And we show them all the different projects and things going on. Because there's been so much growth and development on the Fort Hays State University campus over the past several years, we thought how cool would it be to kind of re think that I did just a little bit this year. So we're inviting those folks onto campus today. And we'll have some presentations from our partnering agency directors that I just named, and talk about what things are going on within our organizations and some of the projects we've been working on. And then we'll also give folks an opportunity to just kind of visit with one another but such a neat event.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, I love that. You know, and we were kind of joking. Some of us here in the office the other day about about these events, because it's kind of it seems like on the surface, you know, Hayes's let's be real. It's not the smallest of towns, but it's a small town. And like, what else could there be deceived? But then you think about and you actually get in on these things, and you get driving around. And absolutely, there's so much going on that you don't even recognize and you're absolutely right for his campus, holy smokes, talk about some work that they've done. It's like that's like a whole new campus from when I went
 
Sarah Wasinger 
there. I know, I don't barely recognize that myself anymore. I'm like, this would have been really cool when I was going to school. So. But I'm so excited that our students in our community and those who come to visit us from out of state, really have such a wonderful campus to enjoy. So they do a great job, just highlighting everything. And Jason Willoughby has been wonderful to work with. And a big shout out to Melissa Dixon. She's kind of taken the reins for organizing this year's cruise with him. Lunch will be provided by the Fort Hays State University Foundation, so people will be treated to that. It is kind of an invitation event. So we do have I believe media invited as well to cover that. So I'm not sure if there will be a Post story about that. I do believe there will be well, there'll be a guy named James Bell.
 
James Bell 
No, it's not me. I'm going to be here. I wish I could. I love going to those things. But you guys, you planned it too early. So next year, keep that in mind. early afternoon works better for me. Okay. Duly noted. That's the most important thing. It's can James go, can James. No. But there will be a haze poster story up there. Christina Janie, who's doing news for us this morning here on the eagle morning show. I'm sure we'll be getting that up maybe tomorrow or Thursday. So it'd be great to see
 
Sarah Wasinger 
Perfect. Well, we look forward to seeing her. One thing I do enjoy. And what people should know is, you know, our elected officials work really hard to do a good job representing us. This gives them an opportunity to kind of be in the same room together. And there's something to be said about breaking bread with your fellow community leaders and elected officials and just making sure that everybody has a good idea of what things are going on in Hayes, I think when we can all be on the same page, and we can kind of get our gears turning in the same direction we can achieve more together.
 
James Bell 
Absolutely. And you know, I think there's something to be said too, about the informal events. You know, when you're when you're only interact in these settings where you know, you've got business to do there's something on the agenda. You don't get to, you know, have fun and enjoy those people. And once you make those connections, and you have that ability, I think it you know, it serves the community better when those leaders are and maybe not friends but friendly.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
Yes, absolutely. Well, ironically enough, I've been with the Chamber now full time since July of 2019. We were we usually do this event in April. And so I've not had a community cruise in my capacity yet. So this is my first one. Oh, I'm Melissa Dixon and I were both talking. She's like this might be the first one I remember. She said maybe I was a part of one. And I just don't remember, it was just so long ago. And I think this thing could be said for Doug Williams too. So we're definitely excited. So to our community leaders if we, you know, put our feet or miles or do something differently than what you're accustomed to give us just a little bit of grace as this is our first time putting this together.
 
James Bell 
Well, and maybe maybe it's time for a little change, do a little different. Get some new ideas in
 
Sarah Wasinger 
there. Maybe next year, we'll bring the best back and get the band back together and go tour.
 
James Bell 
There you go. There you go. Well, Sara, before we run out of time, we got to talk about some of the events because you got a lot going on this week. As always, you always busy down at the chamber but there's some really cool stuff going on this week. Yes, this
 
Sarah Wasinger 
week is jam packed with a wonderful selection of events for people to participate in should they choose Wednesday, July 27 at 4:30pm are hazy and professionals member development committee will be meeting at defiance this downtown location so definitely come and check that out. Thursday, July 28 at 1pm. We talked about this last week in greater detail but higher pass On the LS county educators roundtable we'll be going on. That's just a great way for educators to learn about higher pas and how they might be able to utilize that programming in their classroom. But event is free to attend. And it will be at brief space in the basement conference room. So if you plan on attending that, please be sure to park in front of the brief space location. And then we're going to be doing the same type of event at 3pm. That same day, July 28. But that will be a higher pass Ellis County Business Roundtable. So business owners can figure out how they can utilize higher pass to attract workforce, which obviously is something that everybody is struggling with right now. And it may not provide immediate relief, but it's definitely something that people can add to their toolkit to help them be successful. Yeah.
 
James Bell 
And I would think anything you can get in that toolkit right now is helpful.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
Absolutely. Any visibility is usually good visibility, as they say, in marketing. And then Friday, July 29, at 9am. We'll be having our ribbon cutting and chamber chat with the fhsu inaugural TGIF, so Tiger year on Friday Partner of the Year, and we will be hosting that at the sunflower bank North location. So please be sure to join us for that. And then since it is last week of the month, we'll of course be having our membership lunch on Friday, July 29, as well, that will be held at noon at Smoky Hill Country Club that will be sponsored by sunflower bank. And um to kind of round the week out for folks who maybe can't attend those roundtables. Kristin Brighton, who will be our featured guest speaker at those roundtable, higher pass discussions will actually be talking about hire pas in general and kind of sharing some videos with those in attendance. And they're really cool. They're called those Colker videos that we talked about last week. So be sure to register for that. Yesterday was technically the deadline, but I'm sure if you treat the staff really nicely today and call in before noon, they'd be able to get you in, um, RSVP.
 
James Bell 
Very cool. Yeah. And that's, um, if you're interested, don't miss it. Because what it what a powerful and helpful tool for the community.
 
Sarah Wasinger 
Absolutely. Well, all right, sir.
 
James Bell 
Anything else before we go,
 
Sarah Wasinger 
you know, just want to remind folks that that chamber blew up Kansas, we still have that survey window open. And this week is the last week for the survey for the childcare business survey that we have going on. So if you have not already participated in those and are interested in doing so, we would encourage you to visit our website to check those out.
 
James Bell 
Absolutely no cost associated with either of those now, correct, right. Correct. But the chamber thing we've talked about this so many times, so I like talking about it, because it's what a cool benefit for the community. And but you need the people that have the interest, even if you're just maybe like, I don't know, get signed up for one of these sessions and do the survey and all that now, right? Yes, so
 
Sarah Wasinger 
a little foreshadowing into next week. So next week, Friday, our chamber chat will be at the Welcome Center. We'll be talking about chamber blue of Kansas. So if you weren't able to check out the breakfast or lunch that we had to learn more about that. Come check that out and join us to learn more next Friday. Next Friday.
 
James Bell 
Okay, good. 90 calendars. Interesting. Yep. Yep. And plus the Welcome Center. You go down there, it's a you know, every time I go in there, it's very welcoming, which I suppose is the point but everybody is always so happy when you walk in that building. I love it. Well, we're
 
Sarah Wasinger 
going to have cathedral holding roast coffee there for folks as well as McDonald's breakfast burritos and sausage McMuffins. So even if you don't, per se feel like you want to learn more about insurance or you're good there. You should just come for a good meal and good conversation because we have a lot of interesting people that attend them.

Hays Community Theatre Presents ‘Wizard of Oz’ this weekend

On this episode of the Post Podcast, From the Hays Community Theatre, The Wizard of Oz director Wendy Richmeier shares information about the upcoming show.

Low area unemployment continues to impact economies

On this episode of the Post Podcast, Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams shares information about the impact of continued low unemployment rates across northwest Kansas.
 
Transcript:
EDITORS NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and are not verified for accuracy.
 
James Bell 
Low unemployment rates across Northwestern Kansas continue to be a significant factor in area economies from Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams stops by to talk about that and more on this episode of the Post Podcast.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
workforce, it's probably our primary challenge that we face, because of the low numbers. Any business that wants to come here or wants to grow, or even continuing to operate struggling, finding employees?
 
James Bell 
Yeah, and this has been, since I think, you know, we came back from the pandemic, we've seen these low numbers continue. But even before that, that the situation the unemployment numbers here, the rates were still under what we'd really like to see Weren't they
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
they were with or any number of years, and well, before the pandemic, all right, levels were below 3%, which is kind of when you have 3%, unemployment, the experts, that's that's low. You don't ever want anything less than that. Our number in May was 1.7. The month before that was 1.3%. And so very, very low numbers. And they were a little lower now than they were pre pandemic, but not appreciably.
 
James Bell 
So I guess my first question is, what's causing it the follow up? How do we fix it? Well,
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
two great questions. And I wish I had the answers. It reminds me of a quote I heard the other day. Guy says, For every complex problem, there is a solution that is clear, simple and wrong. And that's what we see so much of today, I guess. I call it political speak. Everybody's got this easy answer. They say that, Oh, well, it's it's because the government gave out all this money. And people are sitting home and drawing all this money from the government. But that that's simply not what we see locally at all. It's a combination of things. So I think it's the pandemic did cause lots of people to say, Well, now's maybe a good time to retire. So we lost a lot of people out of the workforce to retirement more than normal. In our local situation, you know, we have 40, students have always provided a percentage of our workforce, the on campus students. And since the pandemic and even a little bit before, we've had a steady decline in on campus enrollment, so fewer kids on campus, and so fewer kids to work, because in spite of what many people think most students do work in one job or another. Childcare is a is a significant issue. We don't have enough childcare in our community. We've talked about that before. And I know you and Sarah watching her talk about that. And, and they they did a survey and they identified I believe 180 or something like that people who indicated if they had affordable and readily available childcare, they would reenter the workforce, or they would enter the workforce. So that's a challenge that we have. Our our lack of housing has caused us to not be able to have people move here, which could potentially enter the workforce. And, you know, when you take all that, and take the fact that now, the many workers who were doing maybe a primary level job or something like that have had opportunities to move up, it leaves a lot of openings in entry level jobs. And so as as the quote I gave said, this is complex, and there are no easy and simple solutions to it. It's multifaceted, and we have to kind of address all of them as best we can.
 
James Bell 
Yeah, and it sounds like to me, you know, all these things you mentioned, the Sarah and the childcare Task Force. You know, we've talked about the housing quite a bit here, you know, all of these problems, I think, are on the radar and kind of everybody's working on the individual aspects of it to move that forward and kind of fix up the road
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
that we are there's there's a lot of people working in a lot of these areas. The challenge is none of these have quick and easy fixes. You know, it takes time to build housing. You don't do that overnight. It's a process of, at a minimum months and most likely years to deal with housing shortages. Same with childcare, you know, to find providers, and that's, that's a business that, you know, the business model is really broken, particularly with the wage increases that were that are occurring, and what people can charge for childcare. And at the end of the day, what people can pay for childcare, they don't match up. You know, somebody who's trying to operate a daycare center, if they've had to take their employees from whatever it is $10 $11 An hour or 214 15 $16 an hour. It was barely working before and it doesn't work at that. So that's a challenge. So lots of lots of challenges. Are all of them taking a fair amount of time to resolve? You know, we'd love to get more students on campus. But that isn't quickly resolved either. So it's just going to take some time to work through some of this.
 
James Bell 
You know, I wonder if you want to speak to you in not so much maybe in Hays, but in kind of the greater Northwest Kansas region, the average age seems to be going up as well. And I think that's you mentioned, you know, pandemic, a lot of folks, they took that opportunity to go ahead and move out of the workforce retire, and, and they're not going to come back. But I wonder how much that plays into it and, and what we can do to help bring in that younger workforce that can, you know, contribute 20 3040 years still into the economic pool? Well, we
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
certainly have an aging population in Northwest Kansas, not quite as much in Ellis County, but in Northwest Kansas, we absolutely do. And yes, those people are leaving the workforce there, in some cases, leaving the area. And so we have to address that part of how we hope to address that is provide some retiree friendly type housing, that would cause them to move here and have Hayes as a potential destination. But that doesn't help the rural areas out in Northwest Kansas. And you know that one of the things I was going to mention on the unemployment rates, I've had people tell me, well, we you know, we just need people to, to drive into Hayes to work, lots of people do. But the unemployment rates in other areas in Northwest Kansas are just as low as they are here. And so it's not like there's a workforce out there someplace close, that's just waiting to go to work and wants to drive in. And then if you look at the cost of transportation today, you're not going to drive from 60 miles away, to take a nine or $10 an hour job, that doesn't make any sense, economically. And that's the same situation with childcare, you can't go to work for $10 An hour and pay $210 A week or $200 a week or whatever it is to have your child looked after, it just makes more sense to stay home. So more and more families, I think, have made that choice that one of us will stay home. And we'll just have to sacrifice some things. But we can't afford any other way. So it's not an easy situation.
 
James Bell 
You know, one of the other things that you've talked about with us here on the show is the number of the opportunity, I guess I should say that we have here in Hays and Ellis County with remote work, people can now choose in a lot of ways wherever they want to live and still do their job. How much do you think impact is that having on the local economy, people that have found, you know, I don't want to say better. But maybe the higher paying jobs are something that works better with their schedule online, and are just not in the local workforce, because of
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
that absolutely has made a difference. And we benefit from that some to from the standpoint that some people are relocating here that work remotely. But it doesn't really help our job force, you know, our workforce. They're here, they're spending money, they're buying houses, they're buying cars, groceries, but they're not a part of our actual workforce locally. So yes, there are people who have, in addition to who have left the workforce because of retirement, they have left the workforce because of opportunities that exist to work remotely for companies that that they don't have to go into the office every day. So again, another another contributing factor to this hugely complex problem.
 
James Bell 
You know, and the other thing that I wonder about this is, is is there a way that we can spend our way out of this, you know, can I've spoken to a number of especially restaurant owners and managers in the area that have had the by default had to raise those rates to do and get staff in there? Can we continue to raise that and work out of this problem? Or is that just going to in the long run make it worse?
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
Well, I think the the power, if you will, that has always been in the hands of the employer has shifted a great deal to the employee. And I don't know that that's going to change anytime soon. If somebody says they can't find a job right now, they're not trying very hard. There's plenty of jobs available and good jobs. Yes, some of them take some skills, if you're going to be a nurse, you don't just walk in and you're not a nurse or a health care provider, day one, but there's good jobs available. And it is going to it is going to be an ongoing challenge, particularly at the entry level. There just got to pay more. And, you know, when, when somebody can, I've seen all kinds of signs around, you know, like Walmart to somebody who wants to stock shelves and that kind of thing. $16 an hour. That makes it difficult for that restaurant owner or somebody who's traditionally hired people that if not minimum wage, someplace close to it. That's just that opportunity doesn't exist anymore. So their business model does change quite a bit.
 
James Bell 
You know, and I think about those folks, too, that are you Maybe not, you know, a highly lucrative career. You know, I can think of several examples where money isn't the factor that people would go into the job for other reasons. But when you see numbers like that, I wonder if if people are actively disengaging, and they're saying, Well, I don't want to do my job, because I could go flip burgers for the same pay rate. Do you see any of that going on?
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
I think there's some of that going on. Sure. I think, today more than ever, you know, and money as you say, money isn't always the only factor. It's never the only factor in a job, but it's a big factor. But employers are going to have to have a, a workplace where people enjoy been, and, and treat them well. And you know, the, as I say, the the power of the, the whole situation has shifted to the worker. And so they're gonna have to be treated better. And I think people who treat their employees well and give them a good work environment and a situation where people enjoy going to work are going to have a whole lot easier time attracting personnel than then people who don't. And so that has to be part of any business strategy is that we've got to figure out how we make this a good work environment and take care of these people, because they really are the greatest asset these businesses have.
 
James Bell 
Absolutely. You know, and I wonder, too, do you see that? It's the same kind of impact, or the same thinking from the hometown, the local owned businesses and the big box retailers and restaurant chains? Or are they tackling the problems separately, or differently, I
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
think it's the same problem, I just think the larger organizations may have some advantages, because they have more resources, and can make these changes, and not have the impact, the dramatic impact that it has on a small business person. By the same token, I think most people would prefer to work for a local organization and have a little bit more flexibility, maybe a little bit better workforce, not all the the rules and those type of things that maybe sometimes come with a large organization.
 
James Bell 
You know, in my experience, it's been about half and half as Yeah, some people really enjoy the structure of like a large chain, anything that comes from my background, everybody knows, I think I spent a good chunk of my adult years in restaurant management. And that's, that was interesting to me, because that's how I always felt, you know, like I'd much rather work for, you know, a guy, right in some major Fortune 500 company, and I've done both,
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
right, just to kind of depends on the individual, but certainly, larger organizations have more resources and can, in many cases offer better benefits and more money, in some cases, at least if they need to. Whereas the small business owner, many times, every two weeks, when they make payroll, they're they're sweating, whether they've got the cash flow this month to make payroll, and that's so if you increase your, your largest expense, which is always your people cost, when you increase that 1015 20 30% It creates some strain on the small business person.
 
James Bell 
For sure. Uh, you know, we've got just about a minute or so Doug left, I wonder if you want to talk about before we go is there is are we getting close to a breaking point where things are gonna get worse? Or does it look like you know, in the next, man, again, I know and recognize it's not a quick solution, but things are gonna get better over the next year or two.
 
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams 
You know, that's, that's a hard question to answer. They say the first step to solving a problem is admitting that there is a problem. And we definitely have done that we definitely have a lot of good people that are working on solutions. So I'm going to say it's going to get better. I'm an optimist by nature. So I believe we are going to see an easing of some of this. I think we do have a new normal, you know, the new normal is going to be that business owners have to treat employees much differently or in some cases they expect to keep up. But I think I think at the end of the day, we're gonna some of this is going to ease a little bit and find new ways to do things innovate. Overcome

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