Blue green algae was plainly visible last summer in the pump strainers at the intake station at Marion Reservoir used by the cities of Hillsboro and Marion as their source for raw water.

State officials from several agencies said at a media briefing last week in Topeka that it’s hard to predict what kind of blue-green algae season lies ahead for public lakes in Kansas this summer, including the two lakes in Marion County.

The officials characterized last year’s outbreaks of toxic blooms as likely worse than they’ve ever been.

Between March 18 and Oct. 31, KDHE received 42 requests for testing at different lakes, according to Tom Langer, director of KDHE’s Bureau of Environmental Health.

He said the agency tested 38 bodies of water affecting 39 counties. Six lakes were under a warning or advisory for 27 days or more in 2011. Logan State Fishing Lake topped the list at 111 days; Marion and Milford lakes were next at 91 days.

Memorial Park Lake in Great Bend is the only lake currently under a warning.

Last year’s blooms affected lake visits, said Steve Adams of the Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism. About 6 million visits were made to state parks last year, down nearly 1 million from the year before.

“Some of that could be because of the excessive heat last summer, too,” Adams said. “It’s hard to say.”

Officials said they will continue to monitor public lakes in the state and will issue advisories and warnings when problems are discovered.

As for 2012, “I don’t think any of us really know because the factors that work into whether or not we have blooms tend to be the weather and what’s going on in the watershed,” said Mike Tate, director of the Bureau of Water at the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.

Lehigh’s post office was one of six post in Marion County that had been targeted for closure before last week’s announcement.

The self-imposed moratorium set to end Tuesday that could have seen the closure or consolidation of 134 U.S. Postal Service offices in Kansas ended when a plan to keep them open was put into motion last week.

According to information from Postmaster General and Chief Executive Officer Patrick R. Donahoe, a decision was reached to cancel plans to close almost 4,000 offices nationwide because of community and congressional pressure.

“This news is a win for communities across Kansas,” said U.S. Sen. Jerry Moran, who is also a member of the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Govern­mental Affairs Committee.

“For the last year, we have been asking the postal service what Kansans need to do to save their post offices—and USPS listened.”

However, the flip side is many of those facilities will face drastically reduced service hours and minimal staffing.

Yet, for the majority of rural communities, drastic cutbacks to remain open are better than closure.

This oil rig was erected last week near the Strassburg Baptist Church along Pawnee Road north of Marion Reservoir’s Cottonwood Point. Leo Kremeier of Herington, owner of Kremeier Oil & Gas, is drilling the well on land owned by M.E. Meisinger.

The new oil rig going up just north of Strassburg Baptist Church near Marion Reservoir seems to symbolize what’s coming to Marion County.

Leo Kremeier of Herington, owner of Kremeier Oil & Gas, is drilling the well on land owned by M.E. Meisinger for Ventex Operating Corp. of Dallas, Texas. He said the well is conventional rather than the new horizontal “fracking” variety that goes through rock at great depths to bring up oil.

But the horizontal drilling will begin here in about two months, he said, with even side lines from wells going under the reservoir if negotiations with the Corps of Engineers are successful.

He said the fracking would be so deep that it would have no effect on the reservoir.

Kremeier expects to be drilling another conventional well a mile and a half north of the Strassburg well soon.

He said he has recently drilled four new wells in Morris County with 16 new wells total. In the near future, he expects this area to have about 100 new wells––70 horizontal drills and 30 conventional.

Both Marion County Register of Deeds Jo Ottensmeier and Appraiser Cindy Magill said the activities coming into their offices generated by oil companies are unprecedented in the county’s modern history.

Magill said in the Marion County Commission meeting Monday that her office is under a shriveling April-May timeline to make sure they get new oil leases by companies with Marion County landowners on the tax rolls for the coming year.

According to what she has heard from the public, Magill said, “We’re laying on a prime oil belt in Marion and McPher­son counties.”

One or more thieves broke into the City of Hillsboro shop this weekend, loaded copper wire and specialized electrical equipment onto a 2003 city-owned pickup truck parked inside the shop and drove off.

Hillsboro Police Chief Dan Kinning said the incident appears to have taken place sometime Saturday night. It was discovered Sunday.

At press time Monday, neither the vehicle nor its contents had been recovered.

Residential and commercial utility customers in Hillsboro soon will have the option of receiving their monthly city bill via e-mail.

City Administrator Larry Paine said staff are already testing the system with a small group. He plans to open the service for general use with delivery of the June bills.

“We’ve been slow to adopt new technology,” Paine said. “One of the things customers are looking for now is that they want to get their bill via e-mail, and they want to pay their bill on the Internet. So we’re trying to build that capacity.”

The ability to pay a city utility bill online via credit card is projected to begin later this summer. But to begin receiving their city bill via e-mail, customers will need to sign up for the service.

“We’ll be mailing out a letter that’s going to describe it to all of our customers,” Paine said. “It’s going to be open to residential and commercial (users).

“If people miss the first cycle (for signing up), then they’re ready for the second cycle or third cycle,” he added. “It’s something they can do at any time.”

Paine stressed that e-mail billing is optional.