From the Lawrence Daily Journal-World for Mar. 25, 1986:

• Some drivers and passengers on Kansas roads had a long-standing tradition of looking at passing cars and trying to guess which counties were represented by the abbreviations CQ, OB, PL, CA, KE, and SV, for example. County abbreviations had been appearing on the left side of Kansas license plates for about 30 years, but in 1984, the state legislature had voted to get rid of them beginning in 1988. However, in a recent overwhelming vote, the Kansas House had moved to throw out their previous vote calling for their elimination, electing instead to replace the raised letters with special stickers that would be affixed to the license plates. Local geography teachers were delighted that the abbreviations were staying, because they offered a fun guessing game for traveling Kansans. (Still stumped? The counties abbreviated above were Chautauqua, Osborne, Phillips, Clark, Kearny and Stevens.)
• Kansas legislators were in a heated debate today over a resolution that would submit to November voters a proposed constitutional amendment creating a state-run lottery. Opponents were arguing that a lottery would “coerce poor people into gambling money they do not have,” while proponents pointed out that lottery revenue could help the state pay for various projects, including prison expansion and economic development proposals.