KANSAS COMPUTERS STOLEN http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2011/feb/21/heard-hill-computers-stolen-audio-reader-kansas-pu/

Heard on the Hill: Computers stolen from Audio-Reader; Kansas Public Radio hires new classical music director; reader ‘references’ inattention to KU debate successes

Your daily dose of news, notes and links from around Kansas University.

• Stealing is bad. We all know this.

But maybe there ought to be some other, higher punishment reserved for people who steal from a nonprofit agency devoted to helping the visually impaired.

Audio-Reader, KU’s radio-reading service, reports that someone stole eight of their computers worth more than $6,000.

The touch-screen computers allow readers to access newspapers online, and resize the typeface on the screen much like a smart phone.

The computers were purchased as part of a grant from the Douglas County Community Foundation, which paid for 13 of the computers. Audio-Reader raised private funds to match the grant, and all told the project cost more than $17,000.

“The project will continue to go forward,” Audio-Reader Director Janet Campbell said in a statement. “Individual recording studios will be outfitted. The ‘live studio’ can’t be upgraded right now and we won’t have any for backup.”

The theft occurred sometime between Jan. 30 and Feb. 16, and KU police are investigating.