Finally, Codes Enforcement with Teeth

The city’s policiy of proactive code’s enforcement ( how novel, right?) is moving forward progressively and getting results. As some have experienced, this broad brush may get a little paint on the trimming, but we all know that is one side effect we can live with for the price of finally seeing a proactive approach to the rampant, chronic, corrosive streaks of blight that haunt this city.

More brilliant insight from Mark Forsythe

Check out the latest from the Kansas City Post on the issue of light rail transportation- this is a must read!

Another violent weekend….

RDM gives a nice take on the weekend violence round up that has become all too common in this city. Pray for the peace of Kansas City!

And when you’ve done that, call 474-TIPS if you saw or know anything about the following:  Police are looking for any information regarding the events that unfolded Saturday night in the 2600 block of Bellefontaine where an older model white Suburban with tinted windows carrying four men dressed in red with red baseball caps pulled up and opened fire on a house, killing two, critically injuring a third.

Death & Taxes: Perspectives on the Sales-Tax-Free District

Benjamin Franklin once said ‘In this world, there is nothing certain except death and taxes.’ While this quip is generally referenced for its comic undertones, it bears pointed advice for the city headlines this morning where the dichotomy of the rehabilatory efforts and destructive forces working within this metropolis could not be any more clear.

The Jackson Couny Legislature joined the Kansas City Council in endorsing a resolution to create a sales-tax-free district in central KC in what is known as the Black Heritage District comprised of Troost to Prospect and 9th to 29th Street. The resolutions may help push the state legislature over the edge of votes it needed, but didn’t quite get last year in the General Assembly. Community leaders have been working for years to see this legislation adopted and see it as necessary to bolster economic development in the urban core.

While siginifcant questions/issues surrounding the purposal abound, there appears to be consensus among elected officials and community leaders alike that this is a step in the right direction.

Yet, at the same time, one of the leading stories this morning chronicles the cold blooded murder of a store employee on Troost gunned down, seeminly senselessly, as he and another associate were locking up the O’Reily Auto Parts store at 63rd and Troost. Police, less than two blocks away heard the gunshots and were not able to locate the gunman who fled on foot. This is not the first store employee on Troost to be shot on the clock this summer. A gunman shot a Walgreens asst. manager on Troost near 47th St. as he was taking out the trash around 9am.

The move to alleviate taxes without siginficantly bolstering the efforts to alleviate the plaguing levels of crime in this and other districts will not succeed in its objective to boost economic development. At best, it will give some tax relief to a few hard working business’, such as Mr. Gates while simultaneously lining the pockets of a handful of less than admirable characters. Unfortunately, there are those who work on these types of initiatives, with the song of bettering their community, but whose real intentions are nothing more than lining their own pockets. You will no them by their fruits, need I say more.

Simply alleviating a sales tax will not bring the necessary economic development, it must be accompanied by effective crime prevention strategies. Data, such as that provided by the KCUMA project, indicates that the necessary market factors of density, spending cash, median incomes, etc are available for the markets to grow. It is the recurrent high instince of crime that has and will keep markets at bay.

Members of the General Assembly should not pass this plan without detailed additions addressing the increase of security, KCPD or otherwise, in these districts. The simple inclusion of a clause requiring the KCPD detail four to six ‘beat shifts’ where officers, on foot, bike, or horse patrol the area would go far to bringing the necessary perception of security as well as deterred instance of crime in the district. The creation of a CID (Community Improvement District) specific to this plan could also be another means of seeing this come to pass.

Without such a plan, we will simply, for a time, have death without taxes.

 

 

Excellent Piece on Kansas City’s ‘Border Boulevard’: Troost

The KC Call has put out part two of a four part series addressing the dichotomy of KC’s two worlds separated by Troost Avenue. Herron does a fine job of examining the racial, social, and econmic factors comprising the historic disparity between the two ‘worlds’. While this is a reader’s digest version of the story, it works to highlight key issues past and present as well as put the spotlight on some major players as well as those accomplishing real progress, ie. Ivanhoe Neighborhood Council

For a thorough review of the subject, I highly recommend Kevin Fox Gotham’s Race, Real Estate, and Uneven Development- The Kansas City Experience, 1900-2000.

St. Louis schools seek paternal participation

St Louis is participating in a Chicago based program that seeks to have father’s accompany their children to their first day of classes. The program, entitled the Black Star Project is looking to ‘close racial academic gaps’. What say you KCMO School District? Good for the families, easy kudos for you….

Concentrated Poverty Increasing at Alarming Rate

A Recent study from the Brookings Institute indicates that concentrated poverty is growing at an alarming rate reversing trends of the 90’s that saw a decrease in concentrated poverty. The report shows that from 1999 to 2005, CONCENTRATED POVERTY IN WORKING FAMILIES ROSE OVER 40%! They go onto argue that “policies that foster stronger national and regional economic growth—together with targeted efforts to create and protect neighborhoods of choice and connection—may offer the best route to longer-term progress against concentrated poverty.”

Check out this video of Alan Berube giving a summary of their findings. Go here to view the report in full, titled , Reversal of Fortune: A New Look at Concentrated Poverty in the 2000’s.

Using the receipt of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) as a measuring stick nationwide and in 58 metropolitan regions to gauge the economic demographics of working class families, the report found among other things.

• The number of tax filers nationwide living in areas with high rates of working poverty increased by 40 percent, or 1.6 million filers, between tax years 1999 and 2005. By 2005, 12.3 percent of low-income working families lived in high-working-poverty communities—ZIP codes where more than 40 percent of taxpayers claimed the EITC—up from 10.4 percent in 1999.
• Of 58 large metropolitan areas studied, 34 experienced increased rates of concentrated working poverty (the share of EITC filers living in high-working-poverty communities) over the first half of the decade, while 24 showed declines. Older industrial metro areas including Detroit and Rochester exhibited the greatest increases in concentrated working poverty, while the Los Angeles and Phoenix metro areas experienced the largest declines.
• Major metropolitan areas in the Midwest and Northeast experienced substantial increases in concentrated working poverty over the first half of the decade, but Western metro areas saw steep declines. Metro areas in the Northeast and West had similar rates of concentrated working poverty in 1999 (13 percent), but by mid-decade, the rate had risen to 18 percent in the Northeast while it dropped to 7 percent in the West.
• Both central cities and suburbs saw an increase in high-working-poverty communities between tax years 1999 and 2005. The number of tax filers living in high-working-poverty areas in the central cities of major metropolitan areas across the country grew by 40 percent, while the surrounding suburbs experienced an increase of 36 percent. Still, central-city EITC recipients were five times as likely (25 percent) as suburban EITC recipients (5 percent) to live in high-working-poverty communities in 2005.

This report should be a wake up call across the political and economic spectrum. The ‘War on Poverty’ is in a major skid and must be addressed immediately and emphatically. Though we are a nation at war in and in an economic downturn, these numbers are simply unacceptable.

Kicking Shouts Out to Ivanhoe

A nice featurette on the Ivanhoe Neighborhood Council and the work they are doing in their neighborhood.

Insult to Injury: Fox 4 Amplifies Perception of Crime on the Westside

A 27 year old Army Reserve officer was slain last night near 27th and Southwest Blvd. Police found his body in the passenger side of an Escalade at a car wash. Fox 4 ran the story with the angle that the deadly shooting was “no surprise to area residents” with implications that the Westside is overrun with crime and that KCPD is not doing an adequate job policing the area.

While the inicdence of crime remains a serious problem in American cities, the amplification of which by local media, adds insult to injury often creating an inflated perception of the problem. This in turn leads many residents to move out of the city and keeps potential residents from moving in.

While this is not always the case, the story linked above is a clear example of this sort of irresponsible and destructive behavior that feeds into a overdeveloped sense of fear about crime in urban centers. The Westside is neither overrun with crime nor is it suffering from KCPD negligence. A look, for instance, at the 1st quarter KCPD homicide report will reveal the fact that none of the 24 homicides in Kansas City occurred in the Westside. This is not an anomale either.  Further research on crime data through the KCPD or FBI resources will demonstrate the same trends.

Furthermore, the Boulevard has experienced a true ‘renaissance’ thanks in largepart Lynda Callon and the Westside Can Center - their storied work with the Day Labor Center and other programs has gained national attention. In addition to the Day Labor Center, Callon has taken community policing to its height in this city getting her full dollars worth out of the CAN center programs by having her officers assigned to the center and neighborhood full time where they are allowed to work in plain clothes and effectively treat many of the root issues in their community. While this has always been the aim of CAN centers- Westside is the only one to implement such practices.

So while others are hard at work increasing the viability and sustainability of our neighborhoods, the last thing we need is the scared, white flight perspective on crime making blanket statements about an entire region that are neither objective nor factual.

Light Rail Consensus

Jeff Spivak gives a thorough review of the Light Rail plan going on the November ballot. The Council voted unanimously, a rare feat, to place it there. While the vote remains to be seen, it’s fairly safe to say light rail is coming to KC and only a decade behind most other cities of comparable demographics. But, better late than never.

While a lack of reliable public transporation has been a strike against this city for some time, it hasn’t always been this way. My great grandfather worked for nearly 40 years as a mechanic for the Kansas City Cable Railway- one wonders why we ever discontinue their use in the first place. The November ballot option will pass and let’s hope our kids are smart enough to keep the the things running even when the latest trends attempt to persuade them otherwise.