Challenging Charter Changes

Drinking from a fire hose. That's an expression I learned in my days as a teacher's assistant. Sometimes that's what it feels like to a student when you're overwhelming them with a lot of information in a short period of time. The council last week finalized resolutions for the charter changes that will appear on the August ballot. They proposed no fewer than seven individual ballot propositions affecting the charter. I agree that our charter needs some updating, but what the minutes from the charter review commission fail to reflect is after I said "our charter should be a living document" I went on to say that we should only address one or two charter issues per ballot. Let the voters digest one thing at a time. If you frustrate people by overwhelming them in the voting booth, they're likely to just vote "no" on everything. Here's what we're going to be considering in August: 050953: Calling for submission to the voters of Kansas City, at a special election to be held on August 8, a question amending the Charter of Kansas City by repealing its current twenty articles and enacting thirteen new articles to be known as the Charter of the City of Kansas City. 051253: Calling for submission to the voters of Kansas City, at a special election to be held on August 8 a question amending the Charter of Kansas City to require a committee of petitioners seeking the recall of the mayor or a council member to identify the actions or failure to act on the part of the official •051254: Calling for submission to the voters of Kansas City, at a special election to be held on August 8, a question amending the Charter of Kansas City to increase the mandatory retirement age of municipal judges from age 65 to age 70 060508: Calling for submission to the voters of Kansas City, at a special election to be held on August 8 a question amending the Charter of Kansas City to provide for a vote by the mayor to fill a vacancy in the office of council member only in the event of a tie; •060511: Calling for submission to the voters of Kansas City, at a special election to be held on August 8, a question amending the Charter of Kansas City to enact a new section 463.12 to authorize the removal from the park system and sale of approximately 1.7 acres of park property located generally at 22nd Street and Gillham Road commonly known as the Fire Alarm Exchange Building contingent upon use of the proceeds of any sale to be used for the restoration of the Women’s Leadership Fountain located at 9th Street and The Paseo •051255: Calling for submission to the voters of Kansas City, at a special election to be held on August 8 a question amending the Charter of Kansas City to extend term limits applicable to future mayors and councils from two to three consecutive terms 060549: Calling for submission to the voters of Kansas City, at a special election to be held on August 8, a question amending the Charter of Kansas City to repeal term limits for the mayor and members of the council; I'll admit most of these are pretty innocuous like selling the old Fire Alarm Exchange Building, but two term limit proposals? These people really want to stay in office!

Don't Quit Your Day Job

The mayor and council positions in Kansas City, MO are part-time positions. As a councilperson you're only required to be at City Hall for the general council meeting every Thursday as well as your various committee meetings. This allows council members to have "day jobs" in the private sector. Historically the council has been made up of people whose jobs afford them the flexibility to attend to their occasional responsibilities at City Hall. There's more than a couple of firms in town that would love to have one of their own on the council. Conflict of interest? You bet! In my opinion there's a couple of things that have led to this situation. First, the salary for a councilperson is about 55K. Not a bad chunk of change, but when you consider what should be the responsibilities of the job, overseeing a 1Billion dollar budget and looking out for the welfare of a 317 square mile city you can begin to see the gap between the demands of the job and the salary that is offered. Try posting a job on monster.com asking for someone with years of experience in administration, financial analysis, conflict resolution, budgeting and leadership skills at 50K. You probably won't get many resumes. Second, when the concept of a part-time mayor and council was put forth (in the early 20th century) things were a lot smaller, administration was less complicated and frankly the job was less important than it is today. I brought up the concept of making our Mayor and Council full-time positions at a charter review meeting and received a lot of flack from the presiding commission member. She even came at me again at a another event to tell me the err of my ways. I only found out later that she's also considering running for council so I imagine she doesn't want the gravy train to end. I cannot campaign for a salary and job requirement change during my tenure. It just wouldn't look good. There's enough contempt for City Hall without someone like me asking for a raise. It should fall on the citizens though to determine how their decision-makers spend their time. Working for their constituents, or working at their "real job."

New Look : Same Attitude

As traffic to my site continues to increase, I've decided to do a little makeover so hopefully the blog reads a little easier and I'll have less backend work to do trying to maintain the page. I hope you enjoy the new look. Comments and suggestions are welcome!

Terminal Hypocrisy

Eric commented on yesterday's post with a question about how the council term limits came to be. You are correct Eric, it was a citizen's initiative. I believe it was around 1991 and was headed by some big names including James B. Nutter and Charles Wheeler among others. It was in response to the corruption that had swept through the council resulting in some indictments. I'm against repealing the term limits. However, I don't object to putting the question before the voters. Times change as do attitudes but as I said yesterday, in my world 8 years is an entire career. The Charter Review Commission heard tons of testimony telling them to leave the term limits in place yet they still came back to the council with a recommendation of increasing term limits from two terms to three. I don't understand the Charter Review Commission's motivation behind repealing the limits other than certain people want to continue receiving some extra income for a part-time job. Have I mentioned that before? Did you know that technically the mayor and council positions are part-time? That will be the subject of another post. Stay tuned...

Endless Terms of Endearment

Two proposals to change term limits will be on the August ballot. The first is an increase in terms from the current limit of two consecutive terms for council and mayor to three. This was the recommendation of the Charter Review Committee which seemed determined to increase term limits regardless of the overwhelming opposition I saw at public input meetings last summer. The second proposal is an elimination of term limits all together. We've always had term limits for the city council in one form or another. Back in the 80's and 90's we called them indictments. Some councilmen have complained that eight years is not enough time to accomplish anything. Pardon me if I disagree! I come from the high tech industry where eight years is a career. Our project cycles are measured in weeks, not years. If you "can't accomplish anything" in eight years, maybe you should consider a career change.

Transforming Curitiba

I had the privilege yesterday of attending a lecture by Jaime Lerner. He is the former mayor of Curitiba, Brazil and is widely respected for having transformed that city into a model for urban civilizations. Jaime Lerner is an urban planner who advocates mass transit. As he said yesterday, "the automobile is like the party guest that will not leave." His ideas are not new, but his implementations are successful examples of turning theory into reality. I particularly like his assertion that "Money is not always the answer." I could write a book on what I saw and learned yesterday, but for your sake I'll provide a couple of links if you're interested in learning more about Mr. Lerner. Jaime Lerner Wikipedia Entry Vision + Participation = A City That Works

In Cordoba I have what I need.

The Kansas City Business Journal reports that the old Saks building will be getting two new occupants. Sony Style and Burberry. Sony Style will sell "fashion electronics" while Burberry is what I assume to be Burberry's of London, a clothing store. The two will join Mark Shale which is relocating from the east end of the Plaza. The building will be renamed "The Cordoba Building." No word yet on how much "fine Corinthian leather" will go into the furnishings. Am I the only one that remembers the Ricardo Montelban commercial?

You stay classy Kansas City

What a week! First the interview on Tony's Kansas City brought a whole new group of readers to this blog. Then BlogKC picks up my post(s) about the Gateway TIF. This has been my biggest traffic week by far. I appreciate the emails, comments and website contacts. I hope the buzz will continue to grow and our little grassroots campaign will shake up the old guard method of politicking. So in the words of Ron Burgundy, "You stay classy Kansas City" and Veronica Corningstone says "Thanks for stopping by." Have a great weekend!

Gateway we hardly knew ye. Phase III

BlogKC has picked up my little book report on the Gateway TIF deal. I like BlogKC because 1) They linked to me (see Joe Miller's post on that topic) and 2) They concentrate on my favorite subject; Kansas City. There's plenty more to write about on the Gateway TIF deal. I haven't decided if I'm going to bore everyone with every detail. Most times I feel like the details are only interesting to me. There's the issue of Gateway claiming they couldn't find enough office space in Kansas City back in 1994. What? I don't think our commercial real estate market was at 100% occupancy back then. Then there's the little tidbit that we used TIF funds to pay off Gateway's exit penalties for vacating their lease at Town Center Plaza. Finally there's the wording in the council resolution that stipulates that Gateway must be a "permanent employer." I don't know what your definition of "permanent" is but I expect permanent to last longer than a few years. Maybe the resolution was drafted by a cosmetologist. My wife got a permanent once and that thing only lasted a few weeks.

But what will it appraise for?

kc buzz blog's Dave Helling shows he can be almost as sarcastic as me. Check out kcb. I'm not much for reading about local pundits' views on national and world affairs but their coverage of local happenings is pretty good.

Gateway, we hardly knew ye. Phase II

I posted yesterday about Gateway Inc. leaving its West Bottoms facility. I was asked if I knew if Gateway will be paying back any of the generous incentives the City forked over back in 1995. The short answer? From the best I can tell; no. I read the entire TIF plan last night. Even against the best advice of my wife who warned me that I'd never get to sleep because "you know how worked up you get when you start digging through one of those things." I also read the original ordinance and the Gateway section of the 2005 Annual TIF report. Yeah, I'm a geek. What of it? Here's the highlights. We gave back $1.5 Million in 1% Earnings Tax over the first 5 years of the plan. That figure is hidden in the EATS (Economic Activity Taxes) figures which also include sales tax. They're not broken out in the annual report because only a finance wonk like myself would be interested in that level of detail I guess. The initial dog and pony show put on by Gateway for the TIF Commission included an upward revised employment figure of 3000 people and a future expansion plan of Phase II which featured a 2 to 7 story office building of up to 200,000 square feet, and Phase III which from the best I can tell was a 2000 space parking lot. I won't rant about parking lots. Not in this post anyway. BUT! Beware the developer who shows you Phase II and Phase III when they're telling you they can't build Phase I without a handout from the taxpayers. Phase II & III are usually pie in the sky dreams that won't require any public subsidies. Do you think Phase II & III ever get built? Do you? Please answer no, I still hold out hope for my fellow taxpayers. Phase II & III are pretty pictures that make the TIF commissioners "ooh and aahh" and vote yes. They never ask for guarantees on Phase II & III because we all know a developer would never stretch the truth to get free money, right? Well? Okay you better have learned how to answer these by now. At least we didn't float any bonds for this fiasco. This plan was a "Pay As You Go" TIF which as TIF plans go is the least risky for the municipality. This story ends with an absentee landlord (Gateway) sitting on an empty building in the West Bottoms that we won't even see a full tax burden on for another 15 years. At least we got rid of all that nasty blight in the West Bottoms. Oh wait a minute. Blight can mean anything. A vacant building can be blight. Darn it! What did we get out of this?

Gateway, we hardly knew ye.

The Kansas City Business Journal reports that Gateway Inc. is finally putting their ill-fated West Bottoms facility out of its misery. The final 130 employees that remain from a one time high of about 1500 will be laid off and the building shuttered on July 14th. Remember all the hoopla surrounding the "relocation" of the Gateway customer service center? It was the mid-90's and then Mayor Cleaver and the rest of the council threw every incentive they could at the South Dakota company. That included TIF, tax abatements and even a pass on the 1% earnings tax that the rest of us enjoy paying. The idea behind all those incentives was that the Gateway development would serve as a catalyst for the surrounding area (the West Bottoms). Well? What did we get out of it? A vacant, crappy looking, neo-modernist, 150,000 square foot monument to our failed economic development policies. Hey, at least it's not blighted anymore. Right?

Where's The Love?

Local blogger Joe Miller of KC Soil appeals to the folks over at KC Buzz to share the love. Even though he misspelled my name (there's an "e" on "Forsythe" Joe!), I think it's a great critique. No word yet on whether the Star will hire him so they can immediately fire him for insubordination.

Holy Traffic Spike Batman!

Yesterday at about 3PM my blog traffic meter started going through the roof. When I finally got around to seeing what all the ruckus was about, I found that TKC had posted the interview he conducted with me last Friday. It was almost scary to sit there in real time and watch the traffic come in. Tony's Kansas City is what I consider a real blog. Not a mildly interesting pretender like you're reading right now. He's off color, irreverent but always insightful. If you look past the character he plays, he provides some much needed commentary on life in Kansas City. I'll admit it took me a couple of visits before I started to understand that "TKC" is just a caricature of every racist, sexist, unpolitically correct guy you've ever met. The Tony Botello behind that character is nothing like TKC. TKC is out to shock, anger and instigate but in the end provide some valuable commentary. Make it a regular read. You can handle it. I'm proud to get such a glowing endorsement from him. Tony is a very critical guy and I have to say I was pretty apprehensive about actually going through with the interview. I think it turned out pretty well. I definitely need to work on my "on camera" skills though! What the heck was I constantly turning and looking for off to my left? Anyway, enough blathering. Here it is.

"So then I picked a fight with a blogger..."

I love to argue. It's probably due to my Scottish heritage. Even the great Roman army stopped short of entering into Scotland when they got a look at my ancestors. Thousands of angry Scotsmen in itchy wool skirts are nothing to mess around with. Even I have learned that not every battle is worth fighting. That's why I marvel at people who would attempt to take on a blogger by commenting on his/her posts. What on earth could they possibly hope to gain? They expect the blogger to do a big mea culpa post professing the err of their ways? "Thank you Mr. Anonymous for pointing out that I don't share your point of view." "Never pick a fight with someone who buys their ink by the barrel" goes the old saying. I think the 21st century equivalent is "never pick a fight with someone who has unlimited bandwidth." I'm very fortunate. So far the local bloggers that are following the city council race in the 4th district seem to like me. It also helps that I haven't really given them anything to pick at, although TKC thinks my blog is too vanilla. I said recently in an interview that I believe this race may be the first in KC politics to be directly affected by blogs. Bloggers are people with strong opinions in an unfettered venue with thousands of readers. They are becoming (have become?) a very powerful political presence and a fight with them is not something a wise individual would choose to take on. The aging power structure in this town doesn't really get the blogosphere. They think they do but these are people who didn't grow up with email, IM's and MySpace. Having the resources to hire a professionally done webpage is not an internet strategy. It's more of an admission that you don't understand cyberspace. We're nine months out from the primary and already the "comment sniping" has begun on a couple of local blogs. This is either going to get very ugly, very funny or both. That's all for now. I have to get going. I spotted a hornets' nest the other day and I think it would be a really good idea to go poke it with a stick.

Three Card Monte

There's a reason a lot of people don't trust city government. There's probably more than one reason come to think of it. The Star reports this morning that the city council has once again been playing fast and loose with the numbers. Back in 2004 we got the hard sell to renew a general obligation bond to fund the tremendous backlog of infrastructure repair this town so sorely needs. At the time, the promise was made that all the funds from these bond instruments would go towards infrastructure repair. Technically that is still true, but in a move worthy of a three card monte hustle here's what they weren't telling us. The funds from that 2004 G.O. bond are indeed going to deferred maintainence. What you're not being told is that money is being cut from the general fund that was also earmarked for deferred maintainence. So while dollars that you thought were in addition to the current level of funding are added from the bonds, dollars from the general fund that normally were earmarked for infrastructure are moved somewhere else. Neat trick! I don't entirely blame the council. There isn't a finance or accounting degree in the bunch and expecting them to understand fiscal issues is probably akin to expecting me to understand what David Glass hopes to gain by destroying the Royals. However, it doesn't take an MBA to understand right and wrong. We deserve better.

I've Been Polled!

A good friend and fellow blogger emailed me to let me know that he got a phone survey last night asking for opinions on the 4th District candidates. Some of the names are people who have declared, some have not. Polls are an interesting phenomenon. We studied poll taking in grad school statistics. Depending on your desire, you can make the results look any way you want. It all comes down to how you ask the question. In politics, another use of polls is to advertise a candidate and get his or her name in people's minds. Especially this early when nobody has heard of most of the candidates. You can ask a question like "Tell me your opinion of the following people; Joe Smith, Ann Jones, MARK FORSYTHE, Sue Adams...." The idea is to call back in a few weeks and ask again, this time maybe changing some of the names but making sure MARK FORSYTHE is among them. Now the voter has heard the name twice. At least subconsciously your candidate has name recognition with that voter. Sneaky! I'm not doing any polling. Number one it costs money which I don't have a lot of, and number two it doesn't really fit with my campaign strategy which basically involves darkening every doorway of every 4th District voter and personally asking for their vote. That's only going to cost me some shoe leather! So if you get a call asking your opinion on 4th District candidates, make sure you score me super high and everyone else super low. That will skew their data. Trust me, statisticians hate that.

The Early Bird Gets The Boot?

One of my opponents got kicked out of the Brookside Art Fair this past weekend for campaigning within the boundaries of the artists' tent. Obviously I enjoyed this news more than the average voter. I find a little schadenfreude is good for the soul every now and then. I appreciate this person's enthusiasm (kind of) but I don't think it was the right time, or even the right place for campaigning. I just think public campaigning for the city council is a bit premature. Between now and the city primary in February we have an August primary in which we are going to decide representatives for the Jackson County Legislature, the MO state house and senate as well as US Senate. Then we'll have a general election in November. I prefer to campaign when invited, but not be overt about it. I'm getting plenty of publicity in the blogosphere and that's a place where people can either choose to read about the campaign or not. It's not like I'm placing myself between them and a new painting for their living room. Maybe I'm the one that's wrong. Maybe I should be marching in parades and lurking around art fairs with campaign literature. Is it just me?

KC Political Phrase Book: "I was asked to run."

"I was asked to run." Translation: 1. I want to make myself sound important and highly respected so I'll create an imaginary group of people begging for my leadership. Of course the existence of these individuals can never be verified. 2. I'm easily manipulated by others and there's a special interest group out there who wants a mouthpiece. 3. I was actually asked to "go away" but I'm using some poetic license. Beware the politician who claims they were asked to run. They'll rarely say who, if anyone actually made the request. The usage is usually "They asked me to run" or "I've received phone calls asking me to run." Nice and vague. Entirely impossible to verify. Of course if you want to have some fun you can always try to pin the candidate down on who "they" are.

Humbled Once Again

Campaign contributions are few and far between these days. I'm not out beating the bushes for the usual suspects who contribute to every campaign. It's easy to raise a lot of money that way, but there are too many favors asked and owed when you go that route. Every so often I get a check that really brings me down to earth and makes me think about why I started this campaign in the first place. Yesterday I received a fairly large check. Okay, maybe not large to a couple of my opponents but to me it's pretty large! Anyway, this couple has struck out on their own with a small business. They have two children, one a newborn. They are watching every dime, praying they can afford health insurance. And they write me a check... It's supporters like that who will keep me humble and keep me going that extra mile when it comes time to knock on doors.

KC Political Phrase Book: "I've been fighting for that for years."

Today's installment of the KC Political Phrase Book is a catch-all phrase. One powerful sentence let's the politician absolve him or herself of any responsibility or blame; seem completely informed on the subject; AND at the same time position him or herself to take credit for any positive outcomes. "I've been fighting for that for years!" Translation: 1. I knew about the problem but I couldn't get anyone else to see things my way because I have no consensus building skills. 2. This is the first I've heard of it but there's no way I'll admit my ignorance so I'll make it appear as if you are the one late to the game and I've been the champion of this cause all along. 3. This sounds like a fantastic opportunity for self-promotion so I'll position myself in such a way that if anything gets accomplished I can take credit for it. The third translation is perhaps the most powerful. Think of the possibilities! If you say you've been fighting for something and it actually happens, you get to attach yourself to the cause celeb. If you're good enough, you can even take credit. There's no end to the possibilities! Let's try it at home. Don't be afraid to get creative and insert your own verb to make the phrase more personal. "They just solved world hunger?" "I've been fighting for that for years!" "They just found a cure for juvenile diabetes?" "I've been researching that for years!" "The EPA just handed down a judgement that we have to fix our sewer system?" "I've been working on that for years!" What fun! Stay tuned for our next installment, "I was asked to run." Don't be shy about sending in your favorite phrase for translation. I've been working on these for years! ;-)

Brush Creek Fights Back!

I took this shot yesterday. It's the corner of Wornall by the Fairmont. This little pond was obviously caused by a clogged stormwater inlet but it made me think how long we would have ignored our sewer system if Brush Creek could somehow have refused to take our raw sewage. I think a little sewage in the streets of the Plaza may have actually caused our leadership to take notice. We've known about this problem for years. The federal Clean Water Act has been around in one form or another since 1972! The whole time we were working on the Brush Creek beautification project we still ignored the raw sewage outlets. I remember Ollie Gates, the chairman of the Parks Commissioners at the time stood by the recently completed Brush Creek project and gave his "don't drink the water" speech while then Mayor Cleaver and some of our representatives looked on. The rationale at the time was the sewer system could not be fixed because we didn't have the money. Mr. Gates saw no problem with the sewage. His advice was not to swim in the creek or drink the water. Gee thanks for that nugget of wisdom. So we couldn't fix things back then because we didn't have the money. So we have the money now? No we don't. But the EPA will make us find the money. It's just a matter of when. This brings me to tomorrow's installation of the KC Political Phrase Book. Something you'll be hearing council and mayoral candidates be using in reference to our sewer troubles. The phrase will be, "I've been fighting for that for years!"

First Forum Foray

Last night was my first candidate forum. I want to thank GDFAKC for inviting me and putting on such a great event. I had forgotten how much I love being in front of a crowd. Give me a microphone and an attentive audience and I'm definitely in my element. Youngest child syndrome I guess! The questions were excellent. Even the "stripper question" which was unexpected but a great opportunity to air my views on Jefferson's "wall of separation" between church and state. It was refreshing to be in front of a group that is so active, concerned and informed about civic issues. If more of the electorate was like these folks we'd see a lot better quality of candidates rising through the ranks.

KC Political Dictionary : "Consensus Builder"

I was going to have a pool amongst the volunteers to see who could predict the first opponent to use the phrase "consensus builder" and when it would first appear in the campaign. Sadly that phrase already went out in a letter last summer. There's a lot of words and phrases you will hear politicians use. They don't always mean what you think they should, so I'm going to be offering handy installments to help you out. In honor of my pool that never was, today's phrase: Consensus Builder. con·sen·sus build·er One who facilitates an opinion or position reached by a group as a whole: “I honed my consensus building skills as president of... blah blah blah". A cliche phrase used by politicians in an attempt to make themselves sound like a leader. See also: "People Person" and "Team Player"

I Made It!

The rain ended just in time for a great Trolley Run yesterday morning. I was even able to manage a smile for my wife in the ambush photo she took just after the finish. I managed a respectable 28:55 for the four mile course. It was fun to see friends and neighbors along the course. Runners next to me would spot someone they knew and words of encouragement were shouted all along the way. It seemed like every intersection down Brookside Boulevard there was someone who knew someone. It was kind of like being in a parade. It was also interesting to see two candidates for the Missouri Senate 10th take the opportunity to have a presence along the route. Jason Klumb had yardsigns strung along in front of a house in the 6200 block of Brookside Boulevard and stood in the street waving and shouting words of encouragement. Jolie Justus was further down the route and had even more yardsigns and had set up a water station with Justus for Senate plastic water bottles. It was refreshing to see some youth and enthusiasm in local politics. If there is anyone else running for the Senate 10th they missed a golden opportunity.