WRITER: Chad Lawhorn

Businesses don't have to notify employees when a co-worker tests positive for COVID-19; system relies on 'civic duty'

Here is a fact you may want to take notice of in today’s COVID-19 world: In Douglas County, there is no guarantee you will ever know when one of your co-workers tests positive for the virus. As the Journal-World did reporting this week to confirm a positive case at Lawrence manufacturer Berry Global, it became clear that most area workers basically are at the mercy of their employers to voluntarily disclose ...

Want to follow the march of COVID-19 in Kansas? Here are some ways to look at the statistics

Numbers can make you dizzy if you look at them long enough. (If you watch them while standing around a roulette wheel, you can have the fun of being both dizzy and broke.) If you are feeling that way now, I probably can’t fix those conditions, but I can provide you some new ways to look at the state’s COVID-19 numbers.   The big number The figure most focused on is the number of new cases ...

What you need to know about getting unemployment payments from the state of Kansas

Perhaps you’ve never been unemployed before. If you are now — or fear you soon will be — you’re about to enter a government world of applications, weekly paperwork and a whole lot of rules. That’s the price for getting an unemployment check from the state of Kansas. I reached out to the Kansas Department of Labor to try to learn more about the process so that I can pass along some tips for people who ...

Kansas unemployment hotline had more than 200K calls in one day; state leaders urging online use

Kansas’ unemployment hotline had a staggering 233,000 phone calls during a nine-hour shift on Thursday, Kansas Secretary of Labor Delía García told me today. “Well, we had 233,000 attempted calls,” she said. “Not all of them got through.” For those who did get through, wait times were several hours, in some instances. That’s why Kansas Department of Labor officials — the state agency that ...

A look at how many people are hospitalized in Kansas due to the COVID-19 virus

Maybe you have numbers overload (eight hours of working a TV remote control to find there is still nothing on will do that to you.) But I know some of you feel like a key number has been lacking in all the reporting that has happened on the COVID-19 virus in Kansas. How many people are hospitalized in the state due to the virus? several of you have asked. The answer, at least on Wednesday, was four people. ...

A note about grocery store inserts in today’s Journal-World

A note to our readers: We have been getting a large number of calls this morning about the reduced number of grocery store advertisements listing weekly specials and deals in today’s print edition of the Journal-World. Please know that we understand how much you value that information from local grocery stores as you plan your week. While two of our regular grocery customers — Checkers and Aldi — did run ...