Columns

WICHITA MATTERS: The Coronavirus in Kansas: Wichita’s Weaknesses and Strengths

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When it comes to the coronavirus pandemic, it’s sometimes easy, here in Wichita–a large city nonetheless somewhat isolated and disconnected from the larger metropolitan areas of the country, a city which centers a largely rural and therefore much more low risk part of the state–to be unclear if we’re overreacting or not reacting enough. But feeling as though we’re stuck in the middle, feeling divided, is nothing new for a midsized city like ours. In general the news for Kansas overall seems to be pretty good. It is looking like the spread of the virus, as it peaks in April, won’t be as deadly as we feared, almost certainly in part because of Governor Laura Kelly’s (and locally, Sedgwick County Commissioner Lacey Cruse’s) insistence on pushing for stay-at-home orders as early as possible. But is it true that, in taking these actions, Wichita will suffer even more than it would have had the city, and its surrounding county and state, not shut things down?

Feature Stories

It’s Time to Take a Trip

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The pressure of isolation weighs upon many of us. As countless studies have confirmed, human beings do not thrive when kept apart from each other. That’s why this is the perfect time to travel. Before you turn me over to the Quarantine Police, let me assure you that you will not need to leave your home. Though it will be helpful to have internet access, even that is not absolutely necessary for this trip.

Columns

The Coronavirus in Kansas: A Week of Triage

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This has been a week of triage for our city. With the Sedgwick County Commission at first resisting and then finally
submitting to medical opinion (and political pressure) regarding the need to
order many businesses and places of public gathering to close for the sake of
minimizing the potential spread of the coronavirus on Monday, the other
shoe–which every small business-owner and all of their thousands of supporters
throughout the city have known was just waiting to be dropped–came down
on Tuesday, and the scramble find a new normal began in earnest. We’d seen
libraries, movie theaters, restaurants and shops of various kinds, and so much
else start to limit their hours or close down entirely last week; this week it
finally became official. The question becomes the classic one which arises in
every emergency, every instance of limited resources: what can be sustained,
what can be changed, and what can’t be saved? Like many Wichitans, toward the end of last week I made the time to check in
on places of business I was most worried about surviving the loss of commerce
which this order–and, let’s be honest, the even stricter ones likely to follow
it–is going to entail.

Columns

The Coronavirus in Kansas: The First Week

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It’s a dark and quiet Wednesday
morning here in the Fox household, March 18, 2020. It’s been dark every
morning–and mostly gray and cloudy and cool all through the days as well–for
pretty much a whole week now, appropriately enough. Partly that’s because our
schedules, both external and internal, haven’t caught up with the hour in the
morning we lost less than two weeks ago when daylight saving time began. But
most, I think, it’s because of the gloom which has descended upon many of us
here in south-central Kansas in the past seven days, with the
weather–unhelpfully but perhaps unavoidably, reciprocating. A week ago, Wednesday, March 11,
I was wrapping up my classes in anticipation of spring break.