There's just something about Kansas City is brought to you in part by the generosity of our friends at the Cockrell Family Foundation, the Bergmann family, and the Sherman Family Foundation.

Thank you everyone.

Welcome once again to another episode of There's Just Something About Kansas City.

I'm your host, Frank ball.

We talk about the people, places and things that make Kansas City such a great place to live, work, and raise your family.

I can't tell you how happy I do have this guy sitting across for me today.

My old friend, my old good buddy from my channel four days and now the the publisher of the KC Hispanic News, the one and only George.

Hi, Joe.

How are you, my friend?

Thanks for having me, Frank.

I'm fine, I'm fine.

Been very busy, but doing well.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, your career is so interesting because, you know, we work together for a long time, you know, for.

You started there in 1971.

I think you then started a, Cassius Bank news, 1996.

But I got there in 1981, ten years after you had already been there.

You were pretty well established by that point of who you were and what you were doing.

But, they were they were the golden years of TV.

Oh, absolutely.

Was a great time to work until.

Absolutely.

I'm like today.

Yeah.

So true, so true.

You know, we all worked really hard to make that station number one.

You know, it was it was a team effort.

You know, I'm very proud of the years that I spent there and also with you as well because, I mean, we covered a lot of sports back in those days.

Yeah.

We did, we did 20 GS in the Royals and we got to cover Super Bowl, but we covered, well, you ended up covering, two World Series.

That's true with the Royals before you left.

Absolutely.

And I covered 85, but you had covered 1985 81, but what was the job opening your channel for the opening for film processing.

And they would be willing to train me and, and so, a person by the name of Don Keough, he was the person that hired me.

And so, and, rest his soul, he just passed away a couple of years ago, but, he saw something, I guess, in me that he felt as though that maybe I could do the job again.

No training whatsoever to go going in.

but I knew, that I could do the job.

And so I did it for a couple of years, and then I graduate.

I gradually moved up to, film editing.

And then, from there went to shooting video and film.

you know, we had on film I don't, I don't, I don't think what people realize now because they get everything from their phone or whatever, is that now you're in the process.

You're shooting 16 millimeter film.

Correct?

Absolutely.

In the beginning.

So there's your shooting film and you've got to bring you've got a story.

You're not going to be out there in a in the back of a truck, okay.

Editing.

You're on a computer okay.

You've got to bring that film back.

Take it off of the camera.

Good darkroom.

Go the darkroom.

Okay.

And process all the film.

Exactly.

And then bring the film up and start going through and editing and edit the film and splice.

And so, I mean, it was such a different world then.

Oh, it wasn't, in fact, some of the newer journalists and our photojournalists, you know, we they got to some of them don't even know what B-roll, you know, where the work came from.

That actually came from film.

Yeah.

And a lot of good.

A lot of the new, it's, college students that come in, they never heard of that word.

You know, they get to learn that word as they're working.

Yeah, but those are the type of things that they learn.

But I won't tell you this.

In 71, when I was hired, I believe was, the following year, within the 96 months after I was hired, we were on a death watch for Harry Truman.

Yes.

You remember that?

Wow.

And, NBC hired me, and so they put me on call.

And so I spent several weeks, seven days a week.

I was getting paid by four.

And also for NBC.

Double dip.

Yes.

I'm so sorry for being actually one of the original entrepreneurs there you go.

Because they wanted to make sure that I was available to process that film the moment that he passed.

Yeah.

You know, so I felt I was in play.

I was playing an important role.

Yeah.

in history.

Exactly, exactly.

So you are at channel four and you're doing all this stuff.

When did you become a full fledged photog?

There.

And then I think I'm going to call you the original one man band.

I was.

Yeah, you're the original guy.

nowadays, all these guys, they're all just doing what?

I mean, I was doing back then, you were doing back then.

Just one person goes out, they shoot it, they set up their own live shots.

They edited it all in whole thing.

But you were doing that way back when did you first pick up a camera at Fox?

No.

probably.

I picked up the film camera probably in 73 until 76.

And the reason I remember 76, because, there was a camera who came out for video was, 276, and that's what they named it.

And so right around 7677, I was sent to the airport, to cover a Richard Nixon coming into town for a fundraiser.

And so, I had all this gear on me.

Bingo, battery belt, lights, camera off, microphone.

I could barely get my hand up there for services oh, six or so were pulling on me, and they all said that they were telling me things like, no, you can't get too close to the president.

You know?

So finally, I pulled up Sam Donaldson.

You old enough to.

Yeah.

So I hollered a question out at him.

He came towards me and the, Secret Service was so mad at me for that.

But I was able to get an interview with, Nixon, and I was able to bring it back, and everybody said, well, did you get some B-roll of him out there?

And I go, yeah, but I got an interview, too.

And then the newscast.

Yeah.

And it not only did lead to newscast, but it was on national news.

Yeah, it led one the national newscast as well.

you are doing all these things and it has to be in the back of your mind somewhere that there's a lot of news here to do in Kansas City, but nobody is doing Hispanic news or news on the Latino.

We had we had one publication was doing it, but I made my newspaper different than there was the fact that I wanted to do local news.

This is all I knew was local news, and it's fine to have some international news.

But if I was going to take a piece that I was going to do a story on, something that was going on, in a foreign country or something like that, I wanted to localize it, you know, whether it be from Mexico or Cuba or something like that, you know?

So I would have a little bit of that information plus a local reaction to that.

So those are the type of things that we were doing in order to do international news, along with localizing the story.

So so you double dip it a little bit with channel four.

Two in cases, fake news.

How did you get that started?

And off the ground in 1996, I announced to Mike McDonald that I wasn't that I was leaving, to start this newspaper, but he didn't realize that I had already kind of not launched it.

But then the beginnings of launching the paper.

But he said to me, well, you're not going anywhere.

I go, what do you mean, I'm not going anywhere?

He says, I don't want you to leave yet.

And so I got some assignments.

So I want you to go cover.

one was going to cover the second occupation of, President Clinton.

So I covered that, and I worked for about another year, partial news.

And it was extremely difficult.

I was putting in 40 hours there, plus putting in another 30 to 40 hours in my own business.

So it took a toll on me.

So after a year, I finally had to announce that I was leaving.

and it was a good time for me, but it was a blessing at the same time because it allowed me to grow my business.

I had no advertising.

So when I first started my newspaper, you on a wing and a prayer, Joe, I was, you know, luckily that year that I had that, that I was working at a Fox four news plus having the paper, I had income coming in, so that really helped a lot.

Right.

And there was competition, right.

Those windows for sure.

Right.

Had been established for how long?

About ten years.

And why did you believe that we needed the Kansas City area, needed two Hispanic newspapers, not just.

Well, you know, I asked myself if if, if television station, we had four television stations in Kansas City.

So which two newspapers?

You know, it's just two different points of view if you go covering the same story.

But we already had two newspapers.

Two at that time.

Yeah.

So, you know, I felt as though that, you know, it's a different perspective, you know, from one story to the other.

I mean, you turn on all the television stations, they may take a different angle on a certain story, you know.

So I thought, well, I can probably do this as well.

And we may we move forward with it.

Yeah.

And you sure.

You probably had a lot of people in your community who were saying, you know, Joe, that sounds great.

I think, you know, we could back you.

Oh, I absolutely think you were going to need that in 1995 before even got knew this.

I had set up a little booth down at the City market, and a friend of mine had called me.

He was having a fiesta, and he says, Joe, would you mind seeing the fiesta?

And I said, yeah, but can I have a booth so I can promote my newspaper and so I had no prototype of anything.

I just had a sign saying, Come in Kansas City Hispanic News.

And people believed in me, and all of a sudden people wanted to buy subscription to our newspaper.

Okay, so the other story I think, was huge was we've, celebrate a few Super Bowls here and, the last Super Bowl, we, we celebrated, ended up in gunfire and we lost.

I'm going to let you tell the story, okay?

Because, we lost somebody who's very near and dear to your heart.

You know, Lisa Lopez Galvin and it still resonates today with this entire community.

Because the kind of person she was, she got just hit.

Wrong place, wrong time.

And it was just devastating to everyone.

Absolutely.

Because now all of a sudden, it becomes a national story about Kansas City, that they're celebrating Super Bowl parade, and somebody ends up getting shot and killed other people end up getting shot and wounded and whatever, and it just puts that pall over top of the whole thing.

So talk a little bit about about Lisa and your history with her goes back a while.

So.

Well, you know, Lisa's family and our family go back, you know, decades.

And, when I first got word of this, I was getting basically a play by play during that time that the shooting took place.

And, I was getting calls after calls of the calls about her situation.

Had she made it, had she not made it?

it was very difficult.

it was very hard to believe that this would that that had happened to to anyone.

But we knew Lisa and and her community involvement in our community.

And so when we finally got the final, statement that she had passed because there was so much, so many different, a lot of information was going back and forth.

You couldn't, you know, to confirm.

I couldn't confirm, her passing and I couldn't write about that.

I had to confirm it.

I had to hear it.

As journalists, we have to hear these things.

in order to write to.

And so, finally, I learned that she had passed, and it was devastating.

And, I knew her father and and my daughter also, Rachel also grew up with Lisa, and, and Rachel went over to the house that same day that we learned that she had passed, to her parents house.

And then her dad, whose name is Bethel, Lopez senior.

he says, what are you, dad?

And she's.

Well, he's home to.

I want to talk to you, dad.

So I went to visit him the following day.

I didn't ask him anything about what was going on.

I didn't go there as a journalist.

I had to take my cap off.

First time ever in 54 years.

I had to take my journalist cap off.

I had to be a friend to him.

I had to share, I just had to be there for him.

He wanted to see me.

He wanted to talk to me, but not as a journalist.

He wanted to talk to me as a friend, you know?

And, I spent a couple of hours with him, and we talked and we visited and had something to eat.

and it was devastating for for the family.

And, and she has a large family and she was so well loved.

Oh, absolutely.

You know, and and she knew how to give back to the community.

That was one of the things, you know.

Yes, she was a DJ, a radio, but she was also a DJ in the community before him and getting into radio.

And she had been doing that.

And she was also, volunteer at a time with baseball teams, with basketball teams and, what have you.

She played a little baseball as well.

So, you know, she was very well-rounded person.

She just loves people.

And she was just just enjoyed life.

Yeah.

Fullest.

Right.

And I think it's the only time Casey is being news.

We have it right here.

Hold up for, you dedicate an entire issue to one story.

One person, basically.

Right.

Was that exactly?

There was so much information and everybody wanted to to.

There was some meeting information to us, my staff and I, we basically visited one morning on a Saturday morning.

Paper comes out on Thursday, which says, you know, we have to figure out, a way to do this, the stories, you know, all of them, as much, as much as we can and get different perspectives of that.

And if you read the headlines, this is why.

Yeah, you know, that says there are why did this happen?

Right.

And why her why did she get hit with the only fatal bullet from that day?

You know, you do you just I know some people say, and I think the fact that you went to visit the family and your daughter went to visit the family, so something because sometimes, you know, you don't know what to do.

You just shit.

Oh, there they are.

They are, they're grieving and I'll let them grieve.

As a reporter, we don't know what to do.

Interfering.

I'm, you know, I, I just I don't know, because you're thinking reporter friend, reporter friend.

but this is things that people I think out there have to know that this people need you.

They have human friends who are human.

They don't want another human be.

You don't want to be isolated.

That time.

You want other people to come in and share your grief with you.

I think at that point.

Exactly.

I think that's that's a big thing.

And I think that's why it went over.

And I think be prior to that, even did a, a, an interview with her dad.

Okay.

And, and her weather and her at the same time.

She was a, she's a D.J.

you she's a typical kid.

When she was young she liked the 80s rock and roll and did all that.

But when she became a DJ, I think she learned from her father, who was a mariachi band member.

Right, right.

That she got away from the rock n roll and started to do, you know, the handsome music.

And she loved the mariachi music, you know, and she wanted her father to know that this is why we wrote the story.

she really appreciated the fact that he taught her music.

You know, she didn't play an instrument, and he played trumpet and she couldn't play an instrument even she wanted to.

But but, she wasn't that musically inclined there.

But she loved, all sorts of music, all sorts of genre.

And so, she just wanted to tell her dad.

Thank you.

And she did it to our paper.

And, you know, I tell that story.

You know how sometimes we have evergreens we hold?

Yeah, she'll do a story.

Well, we do the same thing here, Joe.

You mean to tell me I'm going to going in and, you know, you might meet him for a Hispanic month next year.

Okay, well, yes, I no, I have it on before that, but, yeah, she, so, you know, she would call me, she would say Joshua's.

Are you about ready to run that story?

And I go, yeah, I'm about ready to, maybe within the next week or two, you know, and I'm going to it.

It's just a matter of about less than six months that she passed after we ran.

After you ran that.

But she was so grateful.

In fact, I still have it on my phone.

she text me with so much appreciation after she read the story.

You know, she was just she's so appreciative that, that, her dad got that message.

Yeah.

You know, that she loved him and appreciated everything that she had done for her.

Right?

He's so appreciative to, that that was like.

Because sometimes the kids don't communicate that way.

You know, I think we know we have a feeling that they we know they love us or whatever.

But you always wonder what you have imparted on them.

Oh, even into their own adulthood.

What are you think that's me?

I think I think you and I have gone through this.

You know, I used to tell my kid, you know, I was on television that one time.

Oh, yeah?

Sure, dad.

Yeah.

Same thing.

Right?

Yeah.

I sent back a couple of my daughters were thinking about doing it, and after a while they went, nah, I never it doesn't look like that much fun, because you have to be honest with as much as you see us on TV and think, oh, wow, what a great job.

I'm interviewing George Brett or Tom Watson or, you know, Eric Hosmer, Alex Gordon or whatever, right?

They just think, oh my gosh.

But everybody out there thinks that my kids are going, he's never home.

Okay.

You know he leaves at 1:00 in the afternoon.

Doesn't come home till 11:00 at night.

One of those days I see him in the morning for I go to school and then that's it.

I hope you you people out there see more than I want.

In fact, I think we all share this too, is that, you know, and I realize I realized this as well.

And that is, is that one time left television took me about a year or two to realize how much I missed in my daughter's life.

Yes, because of the time that we spent in television.

You know, it's not just an 8 to 5 job.

No, you know, sometimes you end up staying, you know, depending on the story that you're working on.

so, you know, it is a demanding, job.

Yeah.

It is, it's not all the it's all all it's cracked up to be, especially these days.

So.

Yeah.

And now the other thing for you, you know, you've you're now have spent more years with the Spanish 28, than you did in TV.

But that's up to 54 years and growing and growing and continuing that you've been in the media job.

I mean, that is that is fantastic.

That is just incredible.

People don't some people in the last 50 days, let alone 54 years, right.

So I mean, that is just the hats off to you.

That's incredible.

I love what I do though.

That's the you know, if I can make a difference in someone's life, to me that's really, really important.

And the stories that we covered, you know, we kind of get a little bit of everything when people ask me what type of stories you cover, we cover the good, the bad and the ugly.

Yeah, you know, you're not afraid.

I'm not a cover.

The negative part of that.

No.

You know, I did a story just recently, I think in the last three weeks on breast cancer and, a lady called me and she was telling me her story about that.

And then I made another contact.

And now the the lady lives here in Lenexa.

She started a podcast where, women can call in and they can talk about, their issues, what they're going through with each other.

and they can just do it on a podcast, our website, shall I say.

And then, and I asked her, because I've done these stories as well before.

I said, well, what about the men?

Because men go to Berks County.

They do.

Which people?

Well, they forget.

I think by now everybody's heard that men do.

It's not very, prolific.

It's not like women's cancer, but it's still breast cancer.

Right.

And what I learned in interviewing the person that had breast cancer, he didn't talk much about it because at first he was ashamed to talk about it.

You know, he didn't want nobody to know that he had breast cancer.

But, he also started a website sharing his story, you know, because it's it's it's it's something that, that some men do face and they don't have outlets.

And I said, well, you know, why was that?

You were scared to talk about it.

He goes, because sometimes men have a tendency of being embarrassed about it and all that just happens to women or what have you, you know.

So, but he started also a website to share his information.

And these were non-Hispanics, by the way.

I had one lady that was Hispanic because it's also prevalent in our in our Latino community.

But sometimes it's a perception that our paper that we only want to talk to Hispanic people, we talk to our people.

Right?

okay.

So the future of Casey Hispanic news.

You can't do this forever.

So do you.

I know you'll try, but do you have any?

When are you thinking about maybe stepping down or stepping back a little bit?

And who will take over for you at the Casey?

Well, there's good news and bad news there.

the way you want to go, Joe, you just go.

The good news is, is that, I do have a maybe a date.

when the World Cup comes to Kansas City.

When I'm sure when it's done.

When it's done.

Okay, that's when I will be done.

Okay?

I want to be a part of that, I want this, I want our readers to experience that with us.

So because that's my goal right now.

Right.

The international flavor of that is right up your alley.

Absolutely, absolutely.

And so that's my target, year, so to speak, in 26.

And but as far as, having someone else take over the paper, I'm not sure about that yet, to be honest with you, because, you know, we are considered an alternative newspaper.

Yes.

And so what happens sometimes?

not always, but, I believe, and I don't say this to toot my own horn, but we have a good reputation.

and I wouldn't want that reputation ruined, by someone else that takes over the name and the paper.

and it doesn't take much these days, to for something to go wrong.

So I thought about just the fact when I leave, the people will go with me.

Oh, my gosh, Joe, I don't think the people in the Hispanic community don't like that right now.

You can't get one of those kids who was on the the Chavez scholarship.

And, you see one kid.

Yeah.

That's right.

We need Georgia, right?

Right.

We we need you back here.

Believe me that, you know, I think about that a lot.

Yeah, yeah.

So there's nobody really, right now that you're grooming to take over that position.

If I were to groom someone, it would be my daughters.

But, you know, this dream was mine.

It wasn't theirs.

And I, you know, my daughter, both of my daughters worked for me when I first started the newspaper.

And don't ask me how much they got paid.

but, but they went on to to their own careers, in their own dreams, you know, at least I wanted to dream about being a police officer.

She says.

It was a high school, and, then she went on to Umkc and got her degree and, in criminal justice.

And so, you know, this is what she wanted to do.

My daughter Rachel, she went to the insurance industry and she's been there ever since.

And so, so I kind of forced that upon them.

I got grandkids, and I'm like, the groom.

One of them maybe.

Sure, sure.

But but, so so no one in the community had this kind of like you.

You've probably told other people that 20, 26 maybe.

You're right, I have.

And no one going to be shocked.

Right.

But but I mean, there's no one has come to you said, well, what's going to happen?

And then they have you probably have told them the exact same thing, but no one then has come back to you, said Joe.

I think we could it could continue on this way.

That hasn't that hasn't happened yet.

And I have, people have approached me.

but I've not really wanting to have that discussion yet, I guess.

Right.

Yeah.

Okay.

All right.

So so it's going to be a minute.

Yeah.

It may be a lasting, last minute thing.

Yeah.

Right.

Exactly.

I think it'll be I think it'll be very difficult for the people in this bank for me to let this go.

So I think so.

One of the promised things I think that we do, yeah.

The opportunity to read our paper, we do a lot of in-depth reporting.

We do a lot of exclusive interviews.

those are the type of things, I think, that separate us from pretty much any other papers?

some of the other papers that chase our newspaper.

Yeah, sure they do.

as well.

And, but the thing of it is, is that I just.

You know, at times, maybe I'm shooting myself in the foot, but there's just so much news that, out there.

I just wish there was more, people that were covering the Latino community because, I find myself with some great stories, and it needs to be televised.

It needs to be on radio and things of that nature.

I and, I can't be everywhere, right?

That's the thing.

And it's getting harder and harder because, yes, I get a little bit older.

I get, you know, I'm not slowing down, Joe.

Come on now.

I don't have the stamina that I once had.

Yeah, right.

But but I'm always working.

I'm not, you know, whether it be, in my office or at home, you know, like I'm known to call you at 10:00 at night.

I'm known to call you on Sunday morning for an interview.

you know, you go.

I'm sure you've done the same thing.

You know, this is what we do.

Sure.

You know, and it's been your life.

And again, like I said, I thoroughly enjoyed it.

and, most people retire 65 or maybe 70.

And you're you know, keep still, keep on going for a little while longer.

I think there's a push behind both of us a little bit.

Yeah.

Because there's that hand in your back.

You know, yours is from Ramona and Sarah.

Yeah.

They don't want us around the house.

That's true.

Which is?

Oh, she's retired and she retired at age of 49.

Of course I lost.

Where's my mind?

Where's my remote?

Am I recliner?

And what's your watch on TV for from there.

Exactly.

Okay.

I can't thank you enough for coming in.

Oh one for your story had to be told in this, especially about the success of the Casey is bad news.

But my lasting image of Joe RC, you're you're going to you're going to remember this and I'm sure it is at the WWF, at the channel for parties or whatever with a towel over your shoulder on the dance floor, which is, do you still put the towel over your shoulder?

and not so often.

Not so often, but we have slowed down a little bit.

But, you know, it's and it's just not you.

I can still go to a dance or an event in Hispanic community, and people will offer me a towel or window or start, remember, going down memory lane with remembering the fact that I danced with the towel we danced on the dance floor from from the time the band started.

At the time it ended, we just love dancing.

Yeah, well, the other great thing, Joseph Kinsey community, remember you for Casey Hispanic News, and then all the great things you did on television.

So I appreciate that.

It is just great.

And you are one of the reasons we always say there's just something about Kansas City.

God bless you, my friend.

I appreciate you spending some time with.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

Man gives a family my best.

Absolute.

You too.

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