News
Johnson County Year-in-Review 2019: September-December
Today we will take a final look back at Johnson County’s top stories during the last year as we focus on September through December of 2019.
The City of Buffalo’s Dump Draw Detention Pond Project had some minor projects to finish but was essentially complete in September.
The reservoir project is for flood control, and will capture the runoff from those storms to prevent flood damage in the future.
An urgent care clinic was planned for Buffalo’s near future, according to Johnson County Healthcare CEO Sean McCallister, who spoke to the hospital board about the proposed clinic in October.
A local nurse practitioner planned to open the clinic as early as November, and
McCallister said the practitioner’s thoughts on the clinic would be to give some relief to the healthcare center’s Emergency Room by taking basic cases like nosebleeds, sore throats, and earaches that tend to inundate the ER at times.
The clinic did open in November.
A guilty plea was entered in November in a case involving illegal activities concerning the taking of elk in Johnson County.
Fourth Judicial Circuit Court Judge Shelley Cundiff approved the conditions of a plea agreement between the Johnson County Attorney’s Office and Mark Miller of Bloomfield, Nebraska who pleaded guilty to accessory to take a big game animal without a license and two counts of accessory to transfer of a big game license.
Miller agreed to pay $21,000 in fines and lost his hunting and fishing privileges in Wyoming, Nebraska and 46 other states for two years.
The Buffalo City Council decided to opt out of participation in the certified Main Street Program in December.
Buffalo had been a Main Street program for a number of years, with the local efforts of the program managed by the Buffalo Downtown Association.
Since the BDA was disbanded earlier in the year, the city had been looking at possibilities to continue participation in the program, but reached the conclusion that it just wasn’t feasible for the city to take on the program.
The Johnson County Commission discussed the dispute with Carbon Creek Energy and Powder River Midstream during a meeting in December.
The issue stems from tax assessment disputes on minerals extracted in the county, with the company saying they owed less in taxes than the county assessor claimed.
At their meeting December 3rd the commissioners, acting as the County Board of Equalization, voted to lift stays in the legal fight and set a date to convene a final hearing to try to resolve the issue.
Johnson County Healthcare Center CEO Sean McCallister informed the board of trustees in December that they would be moving forward with the purchase of a new 3D Mammography machine after discussions with the Healthcare Center Foundation.
The plan is to order the new machine in January, with the hope they will see it operational by the end of March.
Board Chairman Dr. Mark Schueler announced to the hospital board in December that new Chief of Staff Dr. Ryan Ludwig would be taking over the position, and begin attending board meetings in January.
Dr. Ludwig practices Family Medicine at the Family Medical Center in Buffalo, and enjoys pediatric medicine and caring for families.
And that’s a look at the top stories in Johnson County from September through December of 2019.
