NEW YORK (AP) — Standard & Poor’s is paying about $1.38 billion to settle government allegations that it knowingly inflated its ratings of risky mortgage investments that helped trigger the financial crisis.

The McGraw Hill Financial subsidiary Standard & Poor’s Financial Services LLC reached a settlement with the Justice Department over ratings issued from 2004 through 2007.

The settlement also resolves lawsuits filed by the attorneys general of 19 States and the District of Columbia.

The Justice Department filed civil fraud charges against S&P two years ago this week. It accused the company of failing to warn investors that the housing market was collapsing in 2006 because doing so would hurt its ratings business.

S&P will also pay $125 million in a separate settlement with the California Public Employees’ Retirement System.

 

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) released the following statement on the president’s fiscal year 2016 budget proposal:

“At a time when our national debt exceeds $18 trillion, the United States desperately needs a serious, reform-oriented budget. The President asks Americans to accept a new rationale for the same stale policies that continue his long history of higher taxes and more spending. The proposal includes a staggering $2.1 trillion in new tax increases and would add $8.5 trillion to the national debt.

“I will examine and evaluate the provisions of the President’s proposal, and I will work with my Senate colleagues to shape a federal budget that funds the government’s liabilities while facilitating a pro-jobs environment through critical decisions to reduce our debt and deficits. Especially when resources are scarce in an increasingly dangerous world, we must better prioritize spending to make certain our economy is growing and our citizens are protected. American safety and prosperity calls for serious policy – unfortunately, the President’s plan falls well short.”

Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism

PRATT ­– Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism fisheries staff will be launching a new program to increase the amount of fish-attracting structures in Kansas lakes, including Cedar Bluff and Wilson.

Traditionally, biologists have used cut trees to create brush piles to attract and hold fish, providing angling hotspots. However, attaching concrete blocks to trees can be labor intensive and time consuming and the trees don’t last very long once submerged in the water.

The new specially-designed PVC structures are in the shape of a cubes three feet tall, four feet wide, and four feet deep. Cost-effective, easy to place and proven in other states, the new structures not only last more than three times longer than natural brush piles, but they also have been shown to hold as many fish as the natural counterpart without affecting water quality. Anglers can expect to see the implementation of these structures as soon as early February.

“Our goal is to produce 150-300 of these PVC cubes each year,” said Bryan Sowards, KDWPT fisheries programs specialist. “For 2015, structures will go in Milford, Wilson, Melvern, El Dorado, and Cedar Bluff, as well as a variety of other community and state fishing.” Sowards added the structures will immediately attract fish for angler harvest, but the overall goal is to accumulate enough structures to improve fish populations.

Known as “Georgia Cubes,” the structures were originally designed by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR). Stacking more than 50 feet of corrugated pipe on the PVC frame, Georgia DNR staff have been able to create optimum surface area to attract fish while still maintaining an open design. They have also found that the structures quickly accumulate periphyton, a complex mix of algae, fungi, and bacteria, which further attracts insects and fish – an ideal result for both fisheries staff and anglers.

Thanks to the involvement and commitment of Kansas B.A.S.S. Nation (KBN) clubs, KDWPT staff will have assistance in constructing and placing these cubes in select Kansas waters.

“These cubes will not only provide habitat for adult fish of all species, but also provide critical nursery habitat.” said Jeff Nolte, Conservation Director for KBN. “We at KBN are very excited and encouraged by the fisheries staff’s commitment to improving Kansas fisheries in general. We have had a great relationship with KDWPT in the past and this cooperative effort bodes well for a continued relationship that will benefit all fisheries, not just bass.”

By JIM MCLEAN

Groups representing nurses and doctors met several times over the summer and fall but couldn’t reach a compromise on legislation to allow nurses with advanced training to practice on their own.

The failed negotiations threw the dispute back into the laps of Kansas lawmakers, who don’t appear eager to settle it.

After asking a series of questions at last week’s hearing on the nurses’ bill, Sen. Jim Denning, an Overland Park Republican, pointedly told one of its supporters that legislators don’t have the experience “to do what you’re asking us to do.”

The chairwoman of the Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee, Mary Pilcher-Cook, a Shawnee Republican, also has reservations. She said the hearing did little more than “scratch the surface” on a topic that required a lot more study.

“I don’t plan on going forward with this at this time,” Pilcher-Cook said. “I think much more discussion needs to take place.”

Lobbyists for the nurses hope to have more luck with Rep. Dan Hawkins, the new chairman of the House Health and Human Services Committee. Hawkins, a Wichita Republican, has told lobbyists on both sides he’s open to addressing the issue.

But if a bill emerges from either committee, it may not be the one the nurses are pushing. It could be an alternative measure that the Kansas Medical Society and other physician groups plan to introduce next week. That bill would task the Kansas Board of Healing Arts, which regulates doctors, and the Kansas State Board of Nursing with updating the scope-of-practice rules for advanced practice registered nurses, or APRNs.

“We felt if we could establish a process that was fair and allowed us to incrementally start addressing some of these issues in a less combative way, everybody would benefit,” said Jerry Slaughter, executive director of the medical society. “We felt it was time to look at a new approach.”

Several APRNs who attended Thursday’s hearing said the law that requires them to have a signed collaborative agreement with a doctor is preventing them from delivering the primary care they’re trained to provide, especially in underserved rural areas.

“We’re not trying to change the scope of what we do. We’re just trying to remove the barrier that is created by having to find a physician to sign that agreement,” said Merilyn Douglas, an APRN from Garden City who leads the Kansas APRN Task Force.

To doctors, the collaborative agreement isn’t a barrier, it’s a safeguard. Dr. Mary Beth Miller said she had 10,000 hours of training before she set up her practice in the small northwest Kansas community of St. Francis.

“When I started practice, I had that 10,000 hours and I was still shaking in my boots,” Miller said.

Miller said she’s opposed to allowing APRNs to practice independently because they have significantly less clinical training than doctors.

“I just have some real concerns knowing how much I didn’t know, even after 10,000 hours,” she said.

Supporters of the independent practice bill say doctors have little evidence for their concerns. The evidence, they say, is on their side.

“Research published in the New England Journal of Medicine, Health Affairs, Nursing Economics and other well-respected scientific publications has firmly established a link between APRNs and cost-effective, high-quality care,” said Monica Scheibmeir, dean of the Washburn School of Nursing.

It’s that kind of back and forth that could tempt lawmakers caught in the middle to hand the issue off to the boards that oversee doctors and nurses.

Jim McLean is executive editor of KHI News Service in Topeka, a partner in the Heartland Health Monitor team.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The Kansas Historical Society has removed an 1860s illustration depicting an election in the state’s territorial period after receiving complaints that the image had been airbrushed to remove references to voter fraud.

The original illustration, “Voting in Kickapoo,” shows men waiting to vote and then lining up for whiskey afterward. But the word “whiskey” and a poster that reads “Down with the Abolitionists” have been removed in an altered version that appeared in the Capitol visitor’s center.

The image came down Monday. The move comes after Sen. Greg Smith, an Overland Park Republican, asked Friday on Twitter why it had been altered. The Topeka Capital-Journal then wrote about the flap.

Historical Society spokeswoman Lisa Hecker says the drawing was “busy” and was altered to put the focus on voting.

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas City high school’s purchase of an estimated $47,000 grand piano is striking some sour notes among critics.

The school board approved the purchase last month for Sumner Academy. District officials say the old piano is in poor condition due to use and age. It’s at least 40 years old.

The Wichita Eagle reports some, like former state Sen. Chris Steineger, wonder whether a public high school needs such a high-end instrument.

Rep. Steve Huebert is a member of the House Education Budget Committee and says such expenditures raise questions of stewardship of the public’s money.

The district’s director of purchasing says several students are preparing for careers in music performance and need a quality piano to prepare for scholarship auditions.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Jury selection resumes in the trial of the leader and self-proclaimed seer of a Kansas commune accused in the 2003 drowning of a woman whose death he had foretold weeks earlier.

Fifty-five-year-old Daniel U. Perez returns to court Tuesday for his trial for first-degree premeditated murder of Patricia Hughes at the group’s compound in the Wichita suburb of Valley Center. Prosecutors say the group lived off life insurance payouts from its dead members.

Witnesses have testified Perez called himself a seer and portrayed him as a domineering leader who kept a tight rein on his young, mostly female followers.

Perez also faces multiple counts of lying on life insurance applications, rape, sodomy, criminal threat, making false statements on auto credit applications and sexual exploitation of a child.