Northeast News
November 18, 2015

This dog knew it was comin’. It was only a matter of time and the Mayor and Council did not disappoint.

During last Thursday’s general session, the Mayor and city council voted to push aside the voice of the people in favor of advancing another crony, capitalist project, this time in the form of the taxpayer funded downtown convention hotel. Representative style government is now dead in Kansas City. There is no “will of the people” anymore, only the will of the ruling class.

This dog noted two weeks ago that those governing types think they’re smarter than we are and this is the proverbial icing on the cake. The grass roots group Citizens for Responsible Government has promised a legal challenge to this action and rightfully so, given the group’s petition bearing over 4,000 signatures was certified by the city clerk as valid. It’s all about legacy projects and funneling big money to legal eagles and developers who have the Mayor’s ear.

Why not ask development lawyer Mike Burke how his last city-financed project turned out for the Northland, shall we? Renaissance North, a planned development near Missouri 152 and Maple Woods Parkway sucked close to $26 million in bonds from city coffers back in 1999. The Mayor and Council made that problem “go away” with a $6 million settlement about a year ago. But tax and spend politicians rely on taxpayers to have a short and selective memory in order to advance mega projects like the taxpayer funded downtown convention hotel. To that end, this infrastructure improvements minded pooch will do its best to keep such issues in the spotlight. We’re not goin’ anywhere any time soon.