MGP Ingredients said Thursday it would close a distillery in Kansas by January 2024.
The distilled spirits and food ingredient company said it would close its Atchison, Kan., distillery, which makes grain neutral spirits and industrial alcohol products, as part of its plan to address profitability within its distilling business.
MGP said in a regulatory filing that it expects to incur one-time expenses of $23 million to $31 million related to the closure, and for the closure to reduce net sales in the next year while helping margins. Restructuring expenses related to assets make up the majority of the costs.
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The company said it also expects to spend about $4 million to $6 million to decouple the distillery from another facility in Atchison. The company would still continue to operate its ingredient solutions business in Atchison and its distillery in Lawrenceburg, Ind.
This offseason, improving at wide receiver has been a main point of emphasis for general manager Brett Veach and the Kansas City Chiefs. Following the signing of Marquise “Hollywood” Brown and the 2024 NFL Draft pickup of Xavier Worthy, however, the team doesn’t appear to be finished doing its homework on the position.
According to a Wednesday night report from Adam Schefter of ESPN, a free agent wideout will meet with the reigning Super Bowl champions soon. Former Jacksonville Jaguars wideout Zay Jones is “scheduled to visit” Kansas City on Thursday.
Late last month, Jones was released by Jacksonville in a move that saved just under $4.2 million against the team’s salary cap. He was previously set to enter the final campaign of a three-year, $24M contract signed back in 2022. The deal came with $14M in guarantees.
The Chiefs won’t be the first club Jones visits with in his newfound free agency experience. According to Schefter, three other teams — the Tennessee Titans, Arizona Cardinals and Dallas Cowboys — have already had chances to leave a good impression on the 29-year-old.
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Former Jaguars WR Zay Jones is scheduled to visit Thursday with the Kansas City Chiefs, per league sources.
After Jacksonville released him last week, Jones has visited the Titans, Cardinals and Cowboys – with the Chiefs on deck. pic.twitter.com/thxVqQOvL8
Originally a second-round draft pick by the Buffalo Bills back in 2017, it’s been an up-and-down last few years for Jones. Following a big-time 2022 that saw him haul in 82 passes for 823 yards and five touchdowns, he was held to just nine games played this past season. In those contests, he was on the field for 73% of available snaps but saw his catch (34), yardage (321) and touchdown (2) totals all drop. He dealt with knee and hamstring injuries during the year.
The fact that Kansas City is doing its due diligence on the receiver class in free agency is interesting. The Brown and Worthy additions are nice, and 2023 second-round pick Rashee Rice emerged as a significant force as a rookie. With that said, off-the-field problems have plagued Rice this offseason, as the latest one is an alleged assault in Dallas earlier in the week.
On Wednesday, Joshua Brisco and I wrote about whether Kansas City adding a new wideout would make sense. I brought up Jones’s name in our discussion here on Arrowhead Report on SI.com.
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“Of the thin group of remaining free agents, Zay Jones is interesting, although there are serious questions about what he has left in the tank,” I wrote. “The same is true for Michael Thomas, who is a good fit in Kansas City and had a bit of a rebound in 2023 but still saw his year end early. Odell Beckham Jr. was my go-to pick, but the Miami Dolphins swooped him up.”
Jones is an intriguing case. On one hand, he does have somewhat recent production and wouldn’t have to be a No. 1 or No. 2 target in Kansas City. On the other hand, he’s pushing the age-30 mark and declined a season ago. A visit doesn’t signal a signing is imminent, so the next handful of days will be worth monitoring.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) – Law enforcement continued to gather details on Wednesday for a triple shooting east of Hickman Mills that proved to be fatal.
The Kansas City Police Department told KCTV5 that officers responded to the 11700 block of Corrington Avenue and found a woman outside a home suffering from a gunshot wound and unresponsive.
Officers also found a man inside a home suffering from gunshot trauma and unresponsive. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
A third gunshot victim, a teen, was taken to a hospital. He and the female victim were listed in critical condition.
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Police said a juvenile teen was taken into custody in connection with the shooting and was held in juvenile detention.
Law enforcement stated that they have continued to work on identifying additional people believed to be involved in the shooting.
Recently, the Kansas Infrastructure Hub hosted its second convening for state, local and private sector partners (details from the first convening can be found here.) Attendees gathered in Salina, Kansas to provide updates from state officials on implementation progress, share best practices in applying for discretionary grants and coordinate resources toward project implementation across transportation, water, energy and resilience sectors. The meeting was enhanced by a targeted workshop on broadband project permitting and deployment, which took place the following day and coincided with the federal government’s approval of Kansas’ Broadband Equity Access and Deployment program Initial Proposal – a critical step in bridging the digital divide in Kansas.
In June 2022, Kansas Governor Laura Kelly launched the Kansas Infrastructure Hub (the Hub), a coordinated approach to align state agencies and local entities as they administer and apply for funding available through the federal bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA). Over the past two years, the Hub has worked to identify best practices from across the nation for deploying funds and maximizing opportunities for Kansas.
On April 24, attendees were introduced to Matt Volz, the newly appointed Executive Director of the Kansas Infrastructure Hub. An experienced grants manager, Professional Engineer and Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT) alumnus, Volz will be building out a team of capacity builders to support local governments throughout Kansas. Next, KDOT Secretary Calvin Reed provided a series of updates on how Kansas is making progress on accessing and deploying funding under IIJA. Secretary Reed also highlighted the Build Kansas Fund, a $200 million fund for organizations that successfully secure federal grants for infrastructure projects under IIJA. The intent of the Build Kansas Fund is “to accelerate local infrastructure investment to support transformative community projects enabling Kansas communities to move forward with infrastructure projects, including improvements to water, transportation, energy, cybersecurity, and broadband.”
Throughout the day, participants heard from state agency experts on topics ranging from transportation to water to broadband to cybersecurity. The Kansas Infrastructure Hub Team provided additional “deep dive” insights on building regional partnerships to bundle infrastructure projects, developing performance metrics, financial tracking and reporting, braiding and blending funding sources, and grant opportunity research, among other topics. The day finished with a networking opportunity. Participants left the first day of the meeting with additional connections as well as tools to engage more cooperatively with each other and competitively in the marketplace for grants and support funding.
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Broadband Deployment Permitting Workshop
On April 25, the Kansas Office of Broadband Development hosted a day-long permitting workshop, where participants from federal, state, and local government, utilities, railroads, and telecommunications providers discussed best practices in broadband permitting. Participants heard from the federal officials from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, state officials from the Kansas State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) and Department of Transportation, and voices from the utility, broadband, and railroad sectors. Following a review of the Kansas SHPO online process, the NTIA reviewed how the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) applies to federally-subsidized broadband deployments.
Participants in the workshop also benefitted from a discussion with utilities and broadband providers regarding operational hurdles and practical insights to streamline the process for accessing existing physical infrastructure such as telephone poles. The informational sessions were rounded out with discussions of utilizing rights-of-way and a review of common permitting practices featuring voices from the state, federal and private sector.
The day was capped off with an announcement that the NTIA had, earlier in the day, approved the state’s Initial Proposal under the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) program authorized by IIJA. Kansas can now request access to over $450 million in funding to close the digital divide and begin implementation of the BEAD program, including the subgrantee selection process and deployment-related activities.
NGA congratulates Governor Kelly and Team Kansas on a successful two days of infrastructure discussions and for the approval of their BEAD Initial Proposal . To follow NGA’s ongoing activities and support for infrastructure implementation, please visit: https://www.nga.org/bestpractices/infrastructure/.
