Progress 2014 -Civic

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View from above gives perspectiveBy TIM HORAN

[email protected]

Later this month and early nextmonth, area residents may be reen-acting part of a superman movie.

Look! Up in the sky! Its a bird!Its a plane! Well, it will be a

plane ying around the county asPictometry begins updating theDickinson County photos for GIS.

GIS Coordinator Sherry Masseysaid the new photos would bethree dimensional and more ac-curate than what the system cur-rently has.

We do a ton with our GIS andalways in the background is aerialphotography because thats whathelps us as people understandwhat we are looking at, Masseysaid.

GIS is short for Geographic In-formation Services, which has

been around since 2007.Im using GIS a dozen times aday. Some days Ill have it on allday, said County Engineer JohnGough.

The aerial photograph is justone aspect of GIS and is not eventhe most useful one in terms ofhelping fuel decisions, Masseysaid. What the aerial photogra-phy does is helps give us a senseof prospective as we look atthings. It helps us explain to thepublic because they can see what Photo by Pictomerty

This three-dimensional look at the courthouse in Lawrence is similar to the aerial photographs which will be provided to Dickinson County by Pictometry.See: GIS, Page 2

Progress 2014Civic

February 2014


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we are talking about. It al-lows us to see remote areasof the county quickly when

we are trying to work onthem rather than drive allthe way out.

Dickinson County covers852 square miles and new-er technology will allowfor more accurate picturesof the county landscape.

You have two typesof aerials, Massey said.You have orthophotog-raphy shot straight down.That will be available tothe public.

Appraisals, the pur-chase and trade and sale of

land, all the way across theboard, she said. We havefee appraisers and real es-tate agents that make prettyrobust use of the site. Theygo on there to check housesthat they are consideringpurchasing and things likethat.

The new photos from Pic-tometry will be obliquesshot from every direction,north, south, east and west,she said. At least for nowonly government entitieswill have those photosavailable.

The company that doesthese pictures will giveus tools that will allow usto measure off these pic-tures accurately enough toconrm our appraisals,Massey said. Well beable to measure every as-pect of the buildings thatwe can see. When you getinto the country we will beable to measure buildings,silos and things like that.

Currently, GIS allows auser to look back at previ-ous photos as well. County

Administrator Brad Hom-man gave the example ofthe farm pond that wasadded to a stream whichaffected water ow down-stream. GIS was able toshow the new pond whencompared with past aerialpictures.

Massey said that the newGIS will have a footprintfor every building and theability to see if the size orshape of a building chang-es in future photos.

That is something that is

measureable and the com-

puter knows exactly howbig it is, she said. On thenext ight they will com-pare the two and tell uswhere there is a difference,whether the building isgone, bigger, smaller, new;any of those things. All ofwhich impacts appraisal.

The current photos allowfor a ve-foot margin. Thenew photos will be muchmore accurate.

Thats why you cant useour aerial photography tosay Look the property lineis right along my property.That fence is mine, not my

neighbors. There is a littlebit of distortion.

For example, we havea 10 x 10 building in our

system that we are taxingthem. Is this building thatI am seeing really 10 x 10?We cant do that withoutgoing out into the eldbecause it is not accurateenough. What we are get-ting from Pictomerty willbe. And that is because ofthe oblique shots.

County residents can ex-pect to see the planes docu-menting the county withaerial photographs at the

end of February, dependingon weather conditions. Thephotos should be availableearly summer.

Massey said that withDickinson County teamingup with Geary County andSaline County to contractwith Pictomery, the cost ofthe oblique photographywas about the same price asstandard orthophotographyfrom another company.

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GISContinued from Page 1

Photo by Pictomerty

Planes will be ying over Dickinson County at the end of February to update the countys aerialphotos.

Little fsh has big impact on bridge projectsBy TIM HORAN

[email protected]

No county ofcial has ever seen the To-peka Shiner, a small sh that resembles

a minnow. But for the trouble it causedDickinson County three years ago, it mightas well have been a Great White shark.

The sh, whose habitat extends toany body of water that ows into LyonCreek, is located in the southern quarterof Dickinson County. The sh was listedas Endangered on Dec. 15, 1998 and wasupgraded to critical on July 27, 2004. Be-cause of the ofcial listing with the U.S.Fish and Wildlife, Dickinson County mustabide by a long list of rules and regula-tions to provide a safe habitat for the sh.

The rst confrontation between the coun-ty and federal ofcials was three yearsago on 500 Avenue near Quail Road. The

county put in a new bridge, paved over thetop but had to replace it to meet specica-tions to accommodate the sh.

The stream that runs under 500 Avenueextents northwest into farmland ownedby Kirk Sly. Sly said in the 52 years heslived at that location, he has never seen aTopeka Shiner.

County Engineer John Gough said re-gardless, according to U.S. Fish and Wild-life regulations, the sh has to be ableswim upstream to spawn and downstreamto go back to its habitat to feed and grow.

Lets say we put in a low water dam,Gough said. That means that sh has gotto jump the height of that dam to go up-

stream. Thats impossible. Thats why wehave to provide sh passage. That is themagic word, sh passage, so those sh canswim upstream.

In addition to sh passage the shhabitat is also not to be disturbed betweenMay 1 and July 31 each year, thus bridgework on those waterways comes to a com-plete halt during those months.

When we turn in our permit requests, itgoes to the division of water resources,Gough said. They, in turn, submit that to11 different review agencies. They will allcomment on our bridges. In addition to

that, we have to submit it to the Corps ofEngineers. Now there is a long, long list ofendangered species.

Another thing that comes to mind thatwe have to regularly check for is Indianburial locations, said County Administra-tor Brad Homman. Several times we havehad to pay someone to do the research tomake sure we are not doing constructionin an Indian burial ground.

County crews did come upon an Indianburial site close to one of its constructionlocations.

But it was 100 yards from the bridgesite, so we were not impacting it in anyway, Homman said. But it was that

close. I remember that we were told thatif we found any artifacts, we were to ceaseconstruction and contact them immedi-ately. We did not nd any artifacts, by theway.

When working on a bridge in the TopekaShiner habitat, county ofcials cannot re-route the stream, dam up the stream, andmust keep the water owing. Also the dam,in most cases corrugated drainage culvert,must be installed so at least 14 inches ofthe pipe is below the stream channel.

Lets say it wasnt a minnow tube thatI was putting in, Tannihill said. I wouldtake a backhoe and reroute the water sothat I am not working in the water and theslop to put my tube in.

However, in the southern part of thecounty, you cannot channel the water orsend it anther way, he said.

Which, if it wasnt an endangered spe-cies area, we could, he said. The waterwould go around our working location

2 Progress Civic www.abilene-rc.com

Courtesy photos

Before and after views of a bridge improvement along 500 Avenue.See: Shiner, Page 3


3/6

so the guys didnt have toinstall something in knee-deep or waist-deep water.You have to work in thewater with the existingchannel.

The sh also will notswim across the corrugatedtubes so at least a foot of

natural silt or soil must bein the in the bottom of thetube.

So when that sh swims,it comes right up to thestream bottom and goesright on through just likeit was a normal, naturalstream, Gough said.

Most of the silt and soil ishand carried into the tubes.

Our guys carry buck-ets of materials in thereand put it on the bottom,said Martin Tannihill, su-perintendent of Roads and

Bridges.Three years ago the coun-ty replaced a bridge on 500Ave. which proved to benot only a headache but amajor expense. However,the county is now reapingthe benets of the TopekaShiner in 2014 and beyond.

We were putting anoverlay of pavement down500 Ave., Homman said.It was at the same timewe needed to replace thebridge. We did not wantto put the overlay and thencome back, tear it up and

put it (bridge) in. We ap-plied for the permits to getit down and the permitstake a long time. We went

ahead and put the tubes inand thought we were suf-cient. They came out andsaid, no, no no, that is notsufcient. We tore it backout.

Inspectors from the U.S.Fish and Wildlife can re-view a project at any time.

No notice would be giv-

en, Tannihill said. Every time we turned

around, we were told to dosomething different , thatwe were not abiding bythis regulation, Hommansaid. It was ridiculous. Wewere just trying to keep theroads in good shape andthe bridges in good shapeand every time we turnedaround, it was costing us todeal with another agency.

In the other three quar-ters of the county, every-thing was ne, Gough

said.The end result is that

Martins crew went in.They cut the pavement up,

pulled the tube up, loweredit another 12 inches andlowered it back in, overlaidit, Homman said, addingthe county t the bill forthe added expense.

The ironic thing is thatsomewhere downstream,on private property, theland owner, has a low

water crossing that had adrive crossing that doesntlet the sh pass anyhow,Homman said.

But that did not matter,Tannihill said.

Even as much we buttedheads, agreed to disagree,John started going to someof these meetings, Hom-man. We kept that ghtalive. He nally ran intothe right person.

That led to the application

of a federal grant to replacefour bridges in southernDickinson County. Goughsaid the grant covers ma-terials and equipment andthe county is paying forlabor and engineering fees.About 75 percent of thecost is covered in the fed-eral grant.

The county is applyingfor more grant money toreplace three more bridg-es in southern DickinsonCounty, thanks to a sh noone in the county as evenseen.

According to the U.S.Fish and Wildlife Servic-es, the Topeka Shiner is asmall minnow, normallyless than three inches long.It is silvery-green with adistinct dark stripe pre-

ceding the dorsal n anda dusky stripe along theentire length of the sh.The scales above this lineare outlined with darkpigment, appearing cross-hatched, while the scalesbelow this line have nopigment, appearing sil-very-white in color.

The Topeka Shiners his-toric range includes parts

of Iowa, Kansas, Minne-sota, Missouri, Nebraskaand South Dakota. It is stillpresent in these states, butexists only in small, isolat-ed populations in a signi-cant portion of its currentrange.

Topeka Shiners live insmall to mid-size prairiestreams in the central Unit-ed States where they areusually found in pool andrun areas. Suitable streamstend to have good waterquality and cool to moder-ate temperatures. Many ofthese streams have year-

round ow, although somemay become dry duringsummer or periods of pro-longed drought. Occasion-ally, Topeka Shiners arefound in larger streamsthat are downstream oflarge populations. In Iowa,Minnesota, and portionsof South Dakota, TopekaShiners also live in oxbowsand off-channel pools.

The Topeka Shinerwas once a common shthroughout its range but itspresence has declined byabout 70 percent at knowncollection sites during thelast 40 to 50 years. Habi-tat destruction, sedimenta-tion, and changes in waterquality are thought to havecaused the population de-cline. Also, the creation ofimpoundments on smallprairie streams that werestocked with predaceoussh like the largemouthbass reduced Topeka Shin-er numbers.

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ShinerContinued from Page 1

Courtesy photo

The Topeka Shiner must be able to swim upstream to spawn and downstream to feed.

Well No. 22 will provide cushion to AbileneBy GREG DOERING

[email protected]

In the late spring Abileneswater system will begin ben-

efitting from a little extra ca-pacity.

When Well No. 22 comesonline the citys first newsource of water in more than adecade Abilene will have anextra 65 million gallons of wa-ter at its disposal each year.

The boost in pumping capac-ity is more than 12 percent ofthe citys output in 2012 andsignificantly higher than theamount pumped in drought-stricken 2013.

Though the increased capacityis welcome, its just one step in

the long term search for waterin Abilene.

It gives us a little more cush-ion when we have dry years,City Manager David Dillnersaid. We dont want to havepeople thinking well the citygot another 65 million gallonwell, we can use water as wewish.

Dillner said that conservationmeasures will still be needed,especially if the spring andsummer are as dry as the pastwinter.

Last year, we got to the pointwhere if one well were to breakdown, which has happened

from time to time, we wouldhave been in a water emergen-

cy at the beginning of summer,Dillner said. It gives us a littlebit insurance if we have a me-chanical malfunction.

In addition to guarding againstmechanical failure, Well No. 22also takes the pressure off theexisting well beds, allowingmore time for them to recharge.

Even with the newfound ca-pacity, conservation effortswill be crucial to extendingAbilenes water supply movingforward.

Were actually reviewing ourwater conservation plan based

upon recommendations fromthe state, Dillner said. They

liked our water conservationplan emergency level, but theythought that we needed to havemore conservation efforts forcitizens in earlier stages of the

water conservation plan.Dillner said that review

should be completed sometimein March and the new plan willbe similar to the steps taken lastyear just accelerated.

The other thing that werelooking at is proposing a wa-ter conservation rate, he said.Basically, what were look-ing at right now is it would bebased upon your average usageand there would be an allow-ance above that.

The average and allowance

would be billed at a standardrate. Usage above that first tier

would be billed at a conserva-tion rate. A third tier would bebilled a t an emergency rate.

While no numbers are yetavailable, Dillner said the main

purpose of the billing structurewould be to discourage unnec-essary water use.

The best way to promote orincentivize water conservation,arguably, is through economics,which is pricing, Dillner said.

The new structure would be apermanent change in water bill-ing.

Water conservation is notsomething you should neces-sarily flip a switch on and off,Dillner said. It should be moreof a mind set.

A portion of any additionalSee: Well, Page 5

Water conservation is not something you should necessarily flip

a switch on and off. It should be more of a mind set.

David Dillner


4/6

By TIM HORAN

[email protected]

While still in thetweaking process of

Phase I, Phase II of theMemorial Health Systemhospital project shiftedinto high gear this month.

Phase I of the $24 mil-lion project was the con-struction of a new 25-bedhospital. That projectfinished up last May anda ribbon cutting was heldin June.

Phase II of the projectis the renovation of theold hospital facility tohouse the doctors clinic,administration and otherfacilities. The demoli-tion process of the oldfacility was completed inJanuary and in Februarythe remodel began. Whencomplete, the HeartlandHealth Care Clinic will

be moved into the reno-vated hospital facilities.

The demoing whenpret ty smoothly, saidMark Miller, Memo-rial Health System CEO,adding the goal is to havethe doctors moved some-time in September.

They are all in one

place now but it is subop-timal, the space that theyhave, Miller said of theHeartland Health Clinicon Brady Street. Theyare making it.

That facility currentlyhas two exam rooms perdoctor but some have to

be shared on days offduring the week.

In the new facilityeach one of them willhave three exam roomsthat they can make use,he said. They will be

roomer and properlyequipped. We will alsobring in the specialis ts.They use various spacesthroughout the hospital.The orthopedic surgeonuses rehab. We have

people stil l in the An-nex, which is scheduledfor demolition. We havesome that are able to fitin over at the HeartlandHealth Care Clinic. Weare going to bring all ofthose over into the newclinic, too.

There will be a nicebig wait ing room witha kids waiting area, hesaid.

Miller said there wasa delay with in gettingPhase II started.

As it turns out thetime the physicians will

be moving in will not bemuch different than whatwe projected, Millersaid.

The first bids for thenew remodel in Phase IIcame in higher projected,Miller said in explaining

the delay. The construc-tion company, Albericithought that if the de-molition was done firstthe subcontractors couldsee what was behind thewalls they would not

buil t as much cushioninto the bids.

Miller said surprisinglyfew skeletons were foundduring the demolition

process.

We did find some oldnewspapers that werestuffed in between a walland brick that were kindsof interesting. From 62,he added.

The change in scheduleworked as bids did come

down significantly, hesaid.

Local workers camein and did the demo andthen we went back out for

bids again and wait ing onthose bids to come backin, Miller said. Weregoing to be getting goinghere very shortly.

Miller said there arebe some major differ-ences between Phase I

and Phase II. Phase I wasnew construction whilePhase II is remodelingthe hospital.

In Phase I no onemoved in until it was to-tally done and then ev-erybody moved in, hesaid. Here we will be

phasing so somebody hasto get out of areas. It hasto be finished to someone

can move into that area,freeing up another area.

There is a phasingschedule and we movedthe physicians up to thefront of that as possible.

Along with Phase Iof the hospitals, threelong-time Abilene phy-sicians retired and twonew physicians moved toAbilene.

I dont know if we

have felt the completeimpact of the doctors (re-tiring), Miller said. Alot of the patients thatwere going to see Drs.(Dennis) Biggs, (Steve)Schwarting and (Gary)Coleman have been see-ing them for a long time.Its tough to give up thatrelationship. A new doc-tor, well any person, is

going to do somethingdifferent. There are ad-

justments to be made andfrom what I understand ithas gone really well. Ev-eryones getting use to it.

Heres a doctor youhave been seeing for25 years and when youcall them, they alreadyknow who you are andwhat your problems have

been, he added . You

can read it but readingit and having that estab-lished face-to-face rela-tionship are two differentthings.

Millers expects somedisruptions during the

transitions.Parking for patients

shouldnt be a problem,he said. During therenovation we will havesome challenges withstaff parking. We mighthave to have staff park

behind the Nichols build-

ing. The Annex, again,is going to be torn downand that will be a parkinglot. That is the very lastthing that happens.

Podiatry physician Dr.Rebecca Johnson andHome Health and Hos-

pice will move into thebuilding on Brady.

Well have to do somerenovation over there

before they move in butwe cant do that until thedoctors move out, hesaid.

As the renovation ofPhase II continues thereare a few issues that popup with Phase I.

Were still tweakingsome things, Millersaid. In talking to otherCEOs this is nothing un-usual. We did not have a

bad construct ion by anystretch of the imagina-tion.

One of the things thatcame up is, someoneasked about putting

benches in the hallwaybetween the lobby andmed/surg in case some-one wanted to sit downand take a break.

Fire code wont let usdo that, he said. We

put a wait ing room inthe highway and we putup some extra signs that

people could go in thereif they need to take a

break. Well cont inue todiscover things.

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Construction continues at Memorial Hospital

Tim Horan

Refector-Chronicle

Demolition of the old AbileneMemorial Hospital is mostlycomplete and renovationstarted this month.

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revenue the new fee structure would bring in wouldgo back to the search for more water for Abilene resi-dents.

If the City of Abilene grows or if we have an in-dustry come in that requires a lot of water, were go-ing to need a new well, Dillner said, noting the city

has been searching for a new well site since 1996before locating Well No. 22.

Were taking a two-fold approach for future plan-ning, Dillner said. That is No. 1, how do we get

people to conserve as much as they possibly can? Be-cause every gallon we conserve is a gallon we donthave to find somewhere else. The second piece ishow do we position ourselves for our water needs 20,30 50 years from now?

WellContinued from Page 3Sales tax will hit streets in 2014

By GREG DOERING

[email protected]

The fruits of a voter-ap-proved dedicated sales taxwill begin showing up on

Abilene streets in 2014.With sufcient funds

generated from a 0.25percent sales tax approvedby voters in 2012, thecity will begin dispers-ing those funds for repair

projects around the city,notably a mill and overlayon NW Third Street.

Depending on howmuch that costs, we may

be able to do somethingelse, Abilene City Man-ager David Dillner said.

The 10-year tax is ex-

pected to generate about$3 million for road im-

provements in the city,which will be woefullyshort of the money need-ed for all the work neededon area roads.

We have approximately60 linear miles of street intown, Dillner said, not-ing that Buckeye Avenuecan be subtracted fromthat total because its main-tenance costs are shared

with the Kansas Depart-ment of Transportation.Mill and overlays life isabout 10 years. With thatunderstanding, we need todo about 10 percent of the60 miles a year.

This mill and over-lay program wont comeclose to that, Dillnersaid.

The project on NW.Third Street will cover

about four blocks fromWashington Street west toVan Buren Street.

Street maintenance isvastly underfunded butits vastly underfundedin every town that yougo to, Dillner said. Thereality is that a lot of ourstreets are to the point thatmill and overlay isnt the

project thats necessary.

Dillner said severalstreets need to be takendown to their base and re-

built, similar to the proj-ect done on First Street.

Waters getting into thebase and it percolates upand then you get a crack,he said.

The intersection of FirstStreet and Buckeye Ave-nue will be completed thisyear, with KDOT pickingup the lions share of thetab. For the rest of the

project, Abilene citizenswill continue paying foryears to come.

After we did FirstStreet people were likeWhen are you goingto do the next big proj-ect? Dillner said. Thenext big project is 14thStreet, and we cant get tothat until the First Street

bonds are paid for or thepublic agrees to a tax in-crease.

While the sales tax willbe used to fund specicstreet projects, its notthe only money Abilenewill spend on street repairover the next decade.

We do crack sealing.We do pothole patching.We do some large patch-es, Dillner said.

Still, the dedicated fund-ing source will allow citystaff to identify about a

project each year for im-provements.

Some of our yearswell actually have sev-eral smaller stretches,Dillner said.

Street mainte-nance is vastly

underfunded but

its vastlyunderfundedin every townthat you go to.

The reality is thata lot of our streets

are to the pointthat mill and

overlay isnt theproject thats

necessary.David Dillner


6/6

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PHysiCiansWillBeMovingintoneW

offiCesinsePteMBer2014

511 NE 10th Abilene785-263-2100

515 NE 10th St. Abilene785-263-6630

418 N. Broadway Abilene785-263-3888

1003 N. Brady Abilene785-263-6645

1111 N. Brady Abilene785-263-4131

Heartland Surgery

1111 N. Brady Abilene785-263-0505

1111 N. Brady Abilene785-263-0505

Village Manor705 N. Brady Abilene

705 N. Brady Abilene785-263-1431

Memorial Health System

Rehabilitation & Sports Medicine511 NE 10th Abilene

511 NE 10th Abilene785-263-6664

511 NE 10th Abilene

511 NE 10th Abilene785-263-6684

Frontier Estates

601 N. Buckeye Abilene

785-263-1080

610 N. Buckeye Abilene785-263-1080


Documents

Progress 2014 -Civic