Joplin School Board approves $121 million budget

JOPLIN, Mo. – The Joplin School Board Tuesday night approved the budget for the next fiscal year.

That budget includes about $121 million in expenses and $91.9 million dollars in revenue. The biggest increase in expenditures are the bonds for the new Dover Hill Elementary School and the additions at Kelsey Norman.

$26.4 million was approved by voters for the school projects, but only about two million of that was spent in the last fiscal year.

Kansas City board considers legal action on police funding

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) – The state-controlled board that oversees Kansas City’s police department has voted to initiate legal action over city leaders’ decision to change how some of the department’s budget gets spent.

Minutes posted on the Kansas City Board of Police Commissioners website said board members voted Monday in a closed meeting to authorize a potential lawsuit to enforce their authority over the police department. The vote was in response to two ordinances passed last week by the city council that would reallocate about $42 million of the department’s budget for social services to help address root causes of the city’s violent crime.

Opponents charge the change is a roundabout way to “defund” the police department.

Carthage Crisis Center to match donations up to $20,000

CARTHAGE, Mo. – The Carthage Crisis Center’s Board of Directors is making your donations stretch further.

The board announced it would do a matching gift challenge. The board will match every dollar donated to the Crisis Center up to a total of $20,000.

Crisis Center’s executive director Jim Benton says the money donated will provide comfort for families in a time of need.

“I’m just so glad that we can be here for people so they don’t fall through the cracks,” said Benton. “So they don’t have to sleep in there car, that’s what we’re here for.”

Crisis Center resident Brooke Ramirez said, “Very blessed to be here. This is a very good place, and you grow for the goodness of everything.”

The board will match donations for the next six weeks.