EARL WATT

   • Leader & Times

When Seward County Commissioner Todd Stanton contacted the Kansas Public Employment Retirement System to verify whether or not the recently retired long-time county employee and most recently Emergency Management Director Greg Standard was listed under the proper retirement plan, he did so on the recommendation of Seward County Sheriff Gene Ward. Since then, the fallout has led to a filing for recall under the accusation that Stanton improperly obtained records on Standard’s retirement and then tried to use those records to do harm.

According to Stanton, he was made aware of the issue during budget discussions more than a year ago when it was discovered the emergency management staff were listed on the rural fire budget.

A Seward County employee whistleblower reached out to Stanton, who saw employees listed under KP&F and believed the claims could potentially be fraudulent.

Because Stanton and Seward County Administrator April Warden had a strained relationship, and with the claim the benefits filing could potentially be fraudulent, Stanton said he did not know who to trust with the whistleblower’s concern of whether or not requesting public benefits that were not earned could potentially be criminal, so he reached out to Sheriff Ward.

“(Ward) called the Ford County sheriff, who happened to be the vice chair of the Kansas Sheriff’s Association,” Stanton said. “He basically stated, ‘We have an emergency management director receiving Kansas Police and Fire benefits rather than Kansas Public Employment Retirement benefits, does that qualify?’ The opinion was no, it does not. At this point we were talking about county funds in excess of $100,000. His advice to me was to talk to Topeka, not local, because we had no idea who might have filed for benefits that were potentially not earned. We didn’t know who might have made that request.”

Ward verified he did suggest Stanton reach out to KPERS.

“I did tell Todd he should contact KPERS with his concerns,” Ward said.

Following that advice, Stanton called KPERS to ask about the retirement plans for emergency management directors.

Laurie McKinnon, legal counsel for KPERS, returned Stanton’s call, and then the two had an email exchange.

According to email, Stanton was not asking about one individual but about anyone listed with emergency management, which at the time had two acting directors, Greg Standard and Timothy Newman.

“I am attaching the county job description for our Emergency Management Director,” Stanton wrote in his email. “The job description is the same for both involved parties, one was supposed to replace the first but the first has yet to actually retire.”

The job description Stanton provided was last updated by Human Resources Director Rosa Conley in January 2024.

Upon review of the job description, KPERS made the determination that some of the years Standard was applying for did not meet the requirements based on the job description.

“I can tell you from my review of the position descriptions, they are not EMT/EMS positions as defined by the statute,” McKinnon stated “Regardless of when he retires, we can make sure it’s a KPERS retirement and he would be welcome to initiate a formal appeal, which would be to KPERS, not Seward County. I think at this point, it’s a KPERS issue, so it wouldn’t be that the County was “punishing” him.”

KPERS reached out to Warden, and a string of emails provided to the Leader & Times indicated Warden believed that Standard did more work than was listed on the job description that was last revised in January 2024. However, the job description Warden provided KPERS was 10 years older dated March 2014.

Warden also stated in the correspondence Aug. 1, 2025, “We have learned through this process we need to be very specific on our job descriptions. Do we need to send you a letter stating the additional duties/responsibilities that Greg was handling that were not clearly defined on his job description?”

Warden than provided KPERS a list of additional duties ranging from HAZMAT calls, EMS calls, storm watching, providing mutual aid as well as his handling of the COVID response as justifications for the much higher retirement benefit of KP&F.

With the additional information provided by Warden, McKinnon believed KPERS would be able to revise Standard’s retirement with more dates available for KP&F than what would have qualified with the job description alone.

Accusations began to fly about who said what, including a statement from Warden that McKinnon should not have discussed the issue with Stanton.

But McKinnon responded by saying, “I have no recollection of saying that, given it’s not how I view this situation, but I might have said I should not have only spoken with you with respect to Mr. Standard’s retirement. My only job is to ensure Mr. Standard receives the service he has earned and that’s what I’m going to do.”

In an email from Warden to McKinnon, Warden also stated Stanton was not the authorized agent to discuss county issues with KPERS.

“I am also concerned that Commissioner Stanton is not a designated agent on our account and am not sure why issues about Seward County employees and their retirement coverage were discussed with him and changes made based on his conversation with staff there,” Warden said.

While McKinnon stated she assumed Stanton was communicating on behalf of Seward County, she also stated it was not unusual for commissioners like Stanton to contact KPERS.

“It was my understanding from the very beginning that Mr. Stanton was operating on behalf of the county,” she said. “When I received the information form Mr. Stanton, along with the position description you said you’d never seen before, it was my job, then, to review the position, itself, to determine if it was covered under KPERS or KP&F,” McKinnon said. “Because the description had few actual “on-call,” EMS-related activities, it did not appear to be covered under KP&F in my experience.”

Claims have also been made by administration that Stanton wanted Warden arrested. But Sheriff Ward did not support that claim.

“Todd stated someone should be held responsible,” Ward said. “I don’t recall him saying it should be (Warden). Todd never asked me to arrest (Warden).”

Commissioner Stanton also requested that McKinnon contact Rosa Conley who at that time was the head of human resources for any additional information needed, and McKinnon noted that in her email response to Warden.

“I figured at that time it was known in the office what was going on given her role in HR,” McKinnon said.

While McKinnon also acknowledged she should have contacted Warden earlier in the process since she was unaware of the concerns Stanton had of potential falsified documentation, she also stated that Stanton was not alone in contacting KPERS as a commissioner in Kansas.

“We work with may other people other than designated agents at KPERS-affiliated employers,” McKinnon said in an email response to Warden. “By the time something gets to the legal department, we’re usually dealing with the head of the agency or at the very least, their human resources and executive team on various matters. I don’t work with DAs very often, in fact. My error was not contacting you, specifically, to make sure KPERS was moving in the right direction. I take full responsibility for that. But it’s common for someone in Mr. Stanton’s position to contact us with these kinds of matters.”

Adjustments were made so that Standard received what KPERS believed was his rightful retirement based on the job description and amended data provided by Warden.