KSMU

A few weeks after the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced that an invasive pathogen had been introduced into Missouri on nursery stock, the Missouri Department of Conservation and other organizations are being extra vigilant.

Ozarks Technical Community College will open its doors on all of its campuses Saturday, August 10 to help students prepare for the fall semester. Staff members will be available from 9 AM to noon to help with enrollment, advising, and payment details. The OTC book store will also be open from 10 to 2 Saturday.

Classes for the fall semester start Monday, August 19. Register at otc.edu/starthere.

A local Disaster Recovery Center will open later this week in Rogersville.  The Federal Emergency Management Agency along with the Small Business Administration and other groups are opening the center to help residents in Greene County who were impacted by storms between April 29 and July 5.

This week on Making Democracy Work, host Hue-Ping Chin speaks with Paul Costigan, Missouri State Refugee Coordinator at International Institute of St. Louis, Missouri Office of Refugee Administration.

Today’s discussion explores the program’s century-long mission of immigrant and refugee support in Missouri, and talks about upcoming festival in St; Louis that honors this legacy.  

Click here for link to Springfield satellite office.

Governor Mike Parson signed an executive order earlier this summer creating a task force to look into something that could bring big changes to how Missourians get—and pay for—their health care. 

The Little Acorns program, “Turtlemania,” will be held Friday morning (8/2) at 10 and 11:15 and Saturday morning (8/3) at 11:15 for kids three to six-years-old at the Springfield Conservation Nature Center.  Registration is required. 

The Ozark Empire Fair continues through Saturday (8/3) at the Ozark Empire Fairgrounds in Springfield. 

The Missouri Attorney General’s office says it has launched an investigation into Missouri State University’s safety department for allegedly enforcing a parking ticket quota.

The AG’s office says whistleblowers contacted the state office with information it described as “credible,” saying MSU safety officers had allegedly been encouraged to meet quotas of parking tickets to increase funding for the university.

If true, that could be a violation of state law, which protects Missourians against taxation by citation.

In this month's segment of our series These Ozarks Hills, master storyteller Marideth Sisco evaluates her own family history and subliminal psychology behind hoarding food--and what she refers to as "Depression Thinking."

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It is now well known that planets orbit nearly every star we can see.  Astronomers are constantly working to fill in the details and understand the development of solar systems from the wide array of candidates visible to us.  This work is done initially by space-based satellites, as finding the exoplanets requires large telescopes and is best done outside the earth’s distorting atmosphere.  However, to lock down the characteristics of the detected bodies requires extensive follow-up work, some of

It is now well known that planets orbit nearly every star we can see.  Astronomers are constantly working to fill in the details and understand the development of solar systems from the wide array of candidates visible to us.  This work is done initially by space-based satellites, as finding the exoplanets requires large telescopes and is best done outside the earth’s distorting atmosphere.  However, to lock down the characteristics of the detected bodies requires extensive follow-up work, some of

Governor Mike Parson signed an executive order earlier this summer creating a taskforce to look into applying for a waiver from the federal government on the Affordable Care Act, or "Obamacare."   These waivers allow states to bypass some federal rules and instead use their own creative ways to use the federal money.  

In Springfield Wednesday, Parson spoke with KSMU's Jennifer Moore about what this could mean for how Missourians get their health care.

You can hear the interview here:

Governor Mike Parson told local business leaders Wednesday they need to do a better job of marketing Springfield to the rest of the state, since the city is up against some stiff competition.

The governor addressed a sold-out luncheon at the White River Conference Center in Springfield. The Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce hosts the annual event. Parson stressed that he’s doing his part to promote Missouri nationally and internationally, and that local leaders should do the same for Springfield. He spoke to reporters shortly after the event.

The Missouri Department of Transportation begins the final phase of the Highway 65 rebuild Sunday. This will lead to periodic road and lane closures until November. 

The City Council approved a bill on Monday that would give $3,424.40 in grant funding to the Dish to Dirt Home Composting Program for the purchase of educational materials.

The grant comes from landfill tipping fees from the Ozark Headwater Recycling and Materials Management District, which includes five counties: Dallas, Polk, Greene, Webster and Christian.

The City of Springfield has approved a resolution adopting its 2019 priorities.  According to the city, those will guide and empower elected officials and staff as they work on the city’s behalf.

The priorities are Quality of Place, Legislative Engagement, Fiscal Sustainability and Accountability, Economic Vitality and Public Safety.

When you think “gothic,” you think about dark, foreboding, mysterious. In literature, it is all of those things. Dr. Heidi Backes says it is often constructed to tell a tale about the underlying sociopolitical environment or economy.

Backes, assistant professor in the modern and classical languages department at Missouri State University, shares about what you can see between the lines of these gothic tales.

A new report by the Better Business Bureau looked at more than 28,000 business complaints and 5,000 scam reports submitted to the organization in 2018 by military consumers.

It compared that data to complaints submitted by the general public.

Stephanie Garland, the BBB Springfield Regional director, said the study finds that military consumers face unique challenges that can result in higher median losses to scammers and other marketplace fraud.

Friday afternoon at Missouri State University, two officers from the Springfield Police K9 Unit showcased their police dogs and discussed how they are used to sniff out drugs and track down suspects.

Police officer Laura Kitta and police Cpl. William Hill, held a presentation for prospective criminal justice students and members of the community.  

The two officers showed how their dogs, K9 Zeda and K9 Dutch, use their heightened sense of smell to detect narcotics, using a small bag of marijuana in a cardboard box as an example.

With the recent purchase of a new building, the Ozark Public School District will be able to expand its high school. The purchase is part of a long-term plan for the school district.

The Ozark Empire Fair continues through August 3 in Springfield.  Michael Ray and Neal McCoy will be in concert at the Grandstand Friday night (7/26) at 7:30, the 2019 O’Reilly Auto Parts Outlaw Nationals Monster Truck Show is Saturday night at 7, and For King & Country and Stars Go Dim will take the stage at the Grandstand Sunday night (7/28) at 7:30.   

A newly-installed mural at the Library Center will look familiar to some.  The 27’ X 9’ portrait once hung on the north wall of the space occupied by the Mudhouse Café at the library on S. Campbell.

The mural, titled “The Gathering Feast,” is now overlooking the library’s atrium after being gone for a few years.

Regina Greer Cooper is the executive director of the Springfield-Greene County Library.

Recommendations for the future of the Galloway area have been presented to Springfield City Council by Springfield’s Planning and Development staff.  The recommendations were made after six stakeholder committee meetings, three public input meetings and two surveys.

Nearly one in two kids in Springfield’s public schools is on free or reduced lunch. Where do these students find food in the summer, when school is out?

The number of students on free and reduced lunch in Springfield’s public schools rose seven percent since 2009, to 53 percent of the district. When school gets out for the summer, it can be hard for kids in need to find food.