Franchise Opportunities in Wichita, KS

It’s less than a week until Christmas and Wichitans are about to get a bitter cold taste of winter.

A cold front is making its way to Wichita Wednesday night, with wind chills as low as minus 40 Thursday morning. People should expect dangerous wind chills, strong wind gusts and snowfall, and avoid going out as much as possible.

For those who are staying inside to avoid the frigid cold, we’ve gathered easy tips and tricks from Kansas Gas Service and Black Hills Energy to prepare your house and reduce the cost of electricity.

Window coverings can help keep warmth inside and reduce energy usage. Keeping your windows covered when it’s dark and only uncovering the window that’s facing the sun when it’s out can help, according to the Kansas Gas Service’s website.

Covering windows can save up 30% of energy, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Using a covering can be an easy and affordable way to bundle up in the cold.

Applying weather-stripping or caulk is another way to stay warm and save on energy usage. Sealing gaps around windows and doors prevents warm air from leaking out and cold air coming in.

It’s easy to know if you’re letting air in. Black Hills Energy recommends holding a one dollar bill next to a door or window. If it moves by a breeze, you know there are gaps in your doors or windows that can be sealed.

According to Black Hills Energy, it only takes one hour for kitchen, bath and other ventilating fans to blow away warm air. Use these fans only when necessary in order to preserve as much warm air as possible.

There are multiple other ways to stay warm and save money. Keeping your house’s humidity well-adjusted, insulating your attic or top floor and keeping your fireplace damper closed tightly are three other easy ways to do so.

It’s just as important to stay safe while staying warm. Always keep filters clean and never use grills, ovens or gas ranges to heat your home. You should also install a carbon monoxide detector and pick up on scents if you start smelling gas.

Faneuil, a Virginia-based business services outsourcing firm, left Union Station in downtown Wichita during the pandemic and now is trying to sublease its 65,000 square feet there.

When the call center was announced in 2017 as the central piece to Occidental Management’s renovation of the former train station, Faneuil said it could bring as many as 500 jobs. Later, that number jumped to almost 800, though it’s not clear how many people the company still employs remotely here.

No one with Faneuil returned multiple requests for comment, but Occidental president Chad Stafford confirmed that during the pandemic, the company “had to embrace the remote model.”

Now, potential new users could take between 15,000 and 65,000 square feet of the former terminal at 701 E. Douglas.

During Occidental’s renovation of the almost 200,000-square-foot complex, the company made a deal with the call center instead of creating a mixed-used space with shops, restaurants and other businesses as some had hoped for.

“We thought a larger user would allow us to do more with . . . the terminal building,” Occidental chairman and CEO Gary Oborny said at the time.

He explained that he probably could not have renovated the 1914 building as extensively without the big lease.

When it was originally built, Union Station was known as “the daylight station of America,” as one visiting Mississippi reporter put it before the opening, with an east bank of windows that flooded the area with light.

However, during reconfiguration of the building through the years, a lot of those windows were blocked with a mezzanine level and lots of smaller offices.

Oborny removed the mezzanine, but he said it was a decision he came to only after a lot of debate.

“OK, do we keep the square footage — as a real estate developer, you know, from a rent standpoint and a revenue standpoint — or do we take this building back to what it was before?”

Restoration was the right decision, Oborny said during the renovation, although “it always grabs you a little bit in the wallet.”

At the time, Oborny said having multiple uses in the building would have presented issues as well.

“That’s always the tricky thing with this stuff,” he said. “How do you control security? How do you give access to it? . . . How would you make this mixed-use? . . . It’s probably possible, but it was going to be challenging.”

Stafford said Faneuil’s departure doesn’t represent a new opportunity for Occidental to do something different at Union Station.

He wouldn’t say how much of Faneuil’s lease remains, but Stafford said it is still the call center’s space. That means the company has the option to return to it, as Stafford said he’s seen other companies do throughout the pandemic as they switch to remote working and then back again.

The sublease situation isn’t a bad thing, Stafford said.

“There were no incentives involved, so it’s not like the public’s losing out on anything.”

He said there’s now an opportunity for other companies to use the space, though.

“If someone needed some cool office space at Union Station, there’s some that the tenant would give up for them.”

This story was originally published January 5, 2023 1:44 PM.

Following are the ECHL transactions for Friday, January 6, 2023:

Adirondack: Add Stan Basisty, G added as EBUG

Allen: Add Grant Hebert, F signed contract, added to active rosterAdd Xavier Bernard, D activated from reserveDelete Lordanthony Grissom, D placed on reserveDelete Grant Hebert, F placed on reserve

Atlanta: Add Malcolm Hayes, D activated from reserveDelete Michael Turner, F placed on reserve

Cincinnati: Delete Brandon Yeamans, F traded to Florida

Florida: Add Michael Faraj, G added as EBUG

Jacksonville: Add Ryan Lohin, F assigned by HartfordAdd Olof Lindbom, G activated from reserveDelete Charles Williams, G placed on reserve

Kalamazoo: Add Coale Norris, F activated from reserveDelete Anthony Florentino, D placed on reserve

Maine: Add Tim Doherty, F activated from reserveDelete Nick Master, F placed on reserve

Newfoundland: Add James Melindy, D activated from Injured ReserveDelete Taylor Egan, D placed on reserveDelete Jordan Escott, F placed on Injured Reserve (effective 12/19)

Orlando: Add Clark Hiebert, D added to active roster (traded from Norfolk)Add Chris Ordoobadi, F activated from reserveDelete Bennett MacArthur, F placed on reserveDelete Clark Hiebert, D placed on reserve

Reading: Add Nolan Maier, G assigned by Lehigh ValleyDelete Kaden Fulcher, G placed on reserve

South Carolina: Add Connor Russell, D signed contract, added to active rosterAdd Kevin O’Neil, F returned from loan to HersheyAdd Alexander Fortin, F assigned by HersheyDelete Gavin Gould, F placed on reserveDelete Sean Gulka, F placed on reserveDelete Evan Wardley, D placed on Injured Reserve (effective 12/21)Delete Tarek Baker, F placed on Injured Reserve (effective 12/29)Delete Chase Stewart, D placed on Injured Reserve (effective 1/5)

Toledo: Add Brett Boeing, F activated from reserveDelete Jordan Martin, F placed on reserve

Tulsa: Add Blake McLaughlin, F assigned from San Diego by AnaheimDelete Kylor Wall, D placed on reserve

Wheeling: Add Luke Santerno, F team suspension lifted, added to active rosterAdd Jordan Frasca, F activated from reserveAdd Felix Pare, F activated from reserve

Wichita: Add Zack Hoffman, D activated from reserveAdd Kelly Bent, F activated from reserveDelete Sam Sternschein, F placed on reserveDelete Zachary Emond, G placed on reserve

Worcester: Add Connor McCarthy, D assigned by BridgeportDelete Jeff Solow, D placed on reserve

Editorials and other Opinion content offer perspectives on issues important to our community and are independent from the work of our newsroom reporters.

Shakin’ my head again today at Wichita City Hall. This time, it’s over the former Clapp Golf Course, again.

On the City Council agenda for Tuesday is an item to spend an additional $530,000 for planning the first phase of what will replace the 65-year-old golf course that was shut down in 2019. That’s in addition to $206,000 already spent on developing the park’s master plan.

The question of the day is, is this really necessary?

Plans for the park have already been scaled down from an ambitious $28 million master plan including a bistro, indoor-outdoor farmer’s market, performance stage, BMX bike track, sports courts and other amenities.

Now, it’s basically about disc golf, open space for walking, a dog park and a children’s playground. There are 14 bridges out there, some serviceable, some old and dangerous.

I’m having a hard time understanding why accomplishing the tasks at hand requires spending another half-million-dollars on someone from out of town with a briefcase.

Funny thing is, the city closed the golf course because it had been losing money for several years (although it was making money at the end). On Tuesday, the City Council might end up spending as much or more on consulting fees than the course was losing.

The improvements currently planned seem pretty simple and should be well within the capabilities of City Hall, without a lot of outside help:

▪ The disc golf course is already there. The city gets $300 a month for the use of the clubhouse by a disc golf entrepreneur who gets to sell equipment, snacks and drinks to players, with access to 95 acres of city parkland for the activity.

▪ Open space? Plenty there already.

▪ A dog park is basically just a fenced-in area with a gate for people to let their dogs run around loose. We’ve done those before.

▪ We have city engineering and public works departments that could decide which bridges are OK, which have to be torn out and which can be repaired at reasonable cost. Since the golf course closed and people don’t need to drive carts from hole to hole, there’s not nearly as much need for bridges anyway.

▪ The only real challenge in this package seems to be the playground, which, to the city’s credit, will be built to modern standards of accessibility for children with disabilities. But even that doesn’t seem like it requires a large consulting cost. Sedgwick County has an inclusive playground in west Wichita the city could model on. Inclusive playground equipment is available and has been installed in parks across America. Not sure why that wheel needs reinventing.

All this planning’s been going on since 2018, when the Park Board voted to close the golf course.

The city contracted with Wichita State University to do “public engagement” on what people wanted out there. Walking paths and trails led the survey, followed by open green space, a playground, a splash pad and a dog park.

We’ve come full-circle to simplicity and the plan for $28 million of major improvements now seems like a time- and money-consuming detour to dreamland that generated impressive drawings but not much else.

If the city can cut its consulting fees, that’s money that can be spent on actual park improvements. And after 4 1/2 years, it’s time to get this project off the drawing board and onto the ground.

South Wichita has waited long enough.

Flood relief could be on its way for west Wichita.

Wichita and Sedgwick County are hoping to tap a federal grant program to help cover a $40 million project aimed at reducing flooding in fast-growing west Wichita and areas outside the city limits.

The city and county would each pitch in $5 million, while the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s “Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities,” or BRIC, program would cover the rest of the cost.

The project – building two dams on the Calfskin Creek – would move more than 500 acres and 180 structures out of the 100-year FEMA floodplain, city officials say. The city estimates it would clear the way for more than $5 million of future property development.

FEMA rejected the city’s application last year, but the federal government has increased funding this year.

Megan Lovely, city spokesperson, said further details on the grant application won’t be available until Jan. 27.

Besides mitigating the risk of flood damage, the project is also expected to help keep streets from flooding. It could also save homeowners tens of thousands of dollars in the long run.

Most lenders require flood insurance on buildings in the FEMA floodplain map, which costs around $1,000 a year, adding tens of thousands of dollars to the cost of a house.

The area under consideration starts at Calfskin Creek west of Maize Road and extends for 4 to 5 miles east and 3 to 4 miles north and south of Kellogg.

A city agenda report on the project says the proposal “preserves 700 acres of open space for ecological and possible future recreational purposes.”

City Council member Jeff Blubaugh, who is also a real estate agent, said in a written statement that flood relief for that area – which includes some of his district – has been a top priority for him since before he was elected to the council.

“After the infamous ‘Halloween Flood’ of 1998, the Cowskin Creek was vastly improved by Wichita and the Army Corp of Engineers,” Blubaugh said in a written statement. “The Calfskin Creek is yet another obstacle that the City projects taking $40 million in expenses to correct which will save hundreds of acres and homes from future flooding.

“The city, along with Sedgwick County, has put in for a FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) grant that would cover 75% of the project’s cost. The proposal was not accepted by FEMA last year, but we are hoping for a better outcome this year.”