Northeast News
October 7, 2015

Boss Tom had a way around town. Under their influence, Kansas City was considered a wide open town. Gambling, racketeering, graft, nothing was off the table when Tom ran the town. If you were one of the power elite and had Tom’s ear, the city was your oyster and your company flourished. If your operation wasn’t in the good graces of the Pendergast machine, then you had a long road to hoe. In many ways, Kansas City is still run according to the rules Boss Tom put in place. High level business deals made in smoky back rooms that encumber hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars are more the norm rather than the exception these days.

A perfect example of this is the way the new, taxpayer funded downtown hotel was ramrodded through the old city council with nary a public comment on how over $300-million in taxpayer dollars were to be spent. Recently we learned that at almost the same time the signatures were put on the contracts for said hotel, a citizen petition was being turned in to the city clerk asking for a public referendum on the whole matter. “Let the taxpayers decide” said representatives of Citizens for Responsible Spending. But the City Manager and Mayor Boss Sly once again reject the will of the taxpayers. Citing the illegality of the petition now that the contracts are signed, Boss Sly says we can’t cancel now, just look at who booked us for conventions. With all due respect, this ex neighborhood association president has heard the same cry from prospective bar owners who foolishly pour thousands of dollars into renovations before their liquor permit is approved, pleading to the judge, “you can’t turn me down, I’ve spent thousands of dollars making this hole halfway palatable.”

If Boss Sly gets his corrupt way, Kansas City will have the dubious honor of having not one but two monuments to Boss Tom. City Hall, which was built under the influence of Boss Tom during the Great Depression with his Ready Mixed Concrete, and now the new, taxpayer funded downtown hotel, which was built under the very same influences, using the same Pendergast bully tactics with deals signed in the same back rooms that the ghost of Boss Tom still haunts today.

This dog reckons that if you visit Boss Tom’s grave in Calvary Cemetery down off Troost Avenue, you’ll see wafts of cigar smoke coming from the ground and hear faint laughter. Boss Tom is quite pleased with himself as his way of governing is still alive and well at city hall.