Northeast News
November 2, 2016

The Mayor’s blue ribbon, anti-violence task force released its recommendations last week, and this dog called it: not one substantive item on the nine-point list that aims to reduce violence in this cow-town.
The very first item is the creation of a new city position that will allegedly coordinate all of the city’s anti-violence efforts and implement the recommendations of the task force. This news-dog was spot-on when he predicted that this panel would do nothing but throw more money at the problem with touchy-feely social programs that look good on paper and make the panel feel all warm and fuzzy on the inside, but do nothing to address the root cause of the violent crime that plagues Kansas City’s urban core.
What’s interesting is that it took over a year to come up with nine bullet points that would have taken a private business two hours to put together. Some of the recommendations (number four in particular) advocate for the development of an electronic database of community resources and agencies. Seriously? This information doesn’t already exist? Recommendation number five advocates the development of a Youth Master Plan. That’s rather a nebulous statement with no real direction or meaning.
Sadly, what isn’t written in any of the bullet points tells the larger story. Not one mention of actually prosecuting violent criminals and putting them in jail. Not one mention of eliminating the term “plea bargain” from the vocabulary at the Jackson County Prosecutor’s office. Nothing either about adding positions back to the Police Department so they can effectively and proactively address crime trends, instead of running call to call in reactive mode. We noted last week the ever-decreasing number of allowed positions at East Patrol since 2012. Extrapolate those numbers department-wide and you get the real picture of police staffing, not the picture the Mayor would have you believe.
Here’s the bottom line: nothing is going to change until parents start parenting instead of pushing their spawn of Satan ne’er-do-well kiddos off for everyone else to raise. Maybe holding parents responsible for the actions of their offspring might change a few behaviors.