The city manager learns his fate.

These situations are never easy.

Did we save our busses this week or destroy the service?

It's devastating.

And Kansas, get ready to vote to directly elect your Supreme Court justices.

Ultimately, getting power back to the people is the fundamental.

Core of, I feel those stories and the rest of the week's news straight ahead.

Week in review is made possible through the generous support of Dave and Jeannie Cummings, Bob and Marlese Gourley, the Courtney as Turner Charitable Trust, John H. Mine and Bank of America, and a co trustees, the Francis Family Foundation through the discretionary fund of David and Janice Freeman and by viewers like you.

Thank you.

Hello and welcome.

It is good to be back.

I'm Nick Haines.

Thanks for supporting us during our spring membership drive.

Our thanks.

We're going to be twice as insightful and interesting today.

Are you up to the task, Eric?

Certainly.

You're going.

Okay.

That's good.

Then I have a question.

By the way, is Leeds our Metro's newest newspaper?

Next page.

Casey, I'm a star reporter.

An editorial writer.

Dave Helling is with us.

And from Casey One news, local government reporter, Savannah Hawley Bates.

I'm tracking the region's top political stories for Casey Brian Allison.

Now, this was supposed to be the week of the big firing.

The council set to vote on Canning City manager Brian Platt, two weeks after a jury found he had directed City staff to lie to the media in a whistleblower lawsuit.

You have to take urgent action.

We have to take swift action.

These situations are never easy.

But, you know, our duty is always to the people of Kansas City and showing that they can trust us.

Well, despite those well-meaning words, guess what?

Platt keeps his job, at least for now.

Rather than telling him, don't let the door hit you on the way out, the council lets him keep his $300,000 salary, placing him on paid suspension indefinitely.

As one viewer emailed me this week, who is the big winner here?

Platt gets to enjoy an extended paid vacation at the local taxpayers expense.

So, Eric, why the reluctance to fire him?

Well, the mayor came up with ratifying the suspension, which is something that they should have known about beforehand.

So he was ratifying this suspension.

So, that's why they didn't firing.

But I want to remind viewers we remember a guy by the name of Wayne County.

They just fired him, and they really didn't even have a reason to fire him.

But they fired him.

The suspension.

Now Kansas City ends up paying for two city managers.

One is kicking it on vacation, and another one is actually going and doing the work.

Savannah is it?

Conceive that Platt could stay on as city manager?

I don't think so.

I think, okay, they're using this time to negotiate a severance package for him.

I think the reason for ratifying the suspension, which is sort of just a city charter procedural move to approve what the mayor had already done instead of firing him, is that they didn't have the votes and they wanted to avoid litigation.

I want to I mentioned something at the beginning because some people watching this program will say, why do I even care about the city manager?

Yes, the mayor is an important, powerful figure, you know, but this is supposedly a city manager form of government.

And actually, the city manager has more power than the mayor, right?

at least nominally.

And in most day to day operations of the city, he or she actually does have more authority than the mayor, who, after all, is supposed to be a part time employee of the city.

In a practical sense, the mayor and the city manager must work in really close connection and for the community, for the city to work.

And when, Brian Platt lost the confidence of, Quinton Lucas, his days were numbered.

That's true of every city manager I've covered going back to the 1980s.

Is this a big deal, then?

Yeah, it's a big deal.

I mean, first of all, if when he leaves, it's going to leave a pretty big hole at the on the 29th floor, for example, in the stadium discussions which are far down the road.

And now you've got to find a new city manager, work through the finances against somebody who may or may not like baseball or like downtown.

So that in itself is going to be a complicating factor, let alone the six months to a year it would take to hire someone if they go out of the city.

Now, quickly, Nick, they they typically in Kansas City, go out of the city for a city manager, then hire within, then out of the city, then hire within.

And if that pattern holds.

So get somebody who's already been and I'm mindful.

Brian, all of this drama is taking place just before Kansas City is about to host the biggest event in its entire history, the World Cup.

Right?

The World Cup is coming 2026.

Whether we have a new city manager or not.

And regardless of who it is, as you said, Nick, a lot of the success of a city manager is involved is to do with their relationship with the mayor, and, and with the city council as a whole.

there was a rocky relationship with some members of the city council from the very beginning.

but but Mayor Quinton Lucas staked a lot of, his authority and his credibility with the council on this pick for city manager and on their ability to work together.

obviously, there was a change of heart of some kind of change of decision after the lawsuit.

We'll see if, where Mayor Lucas goes with that and and who he backs to succeed.

Brian Platt.

in the coming weeks, because it does appear, by all accounts, that that's what's going on.

It's interesting.

This lawsuit, was take to have took place over two years ago.

That's where it started.

So a lot of these allegations about lying to the media and so on were well known.

All of that had come out and the mayor stuck with Brian plot.

I was actually surprised when he decided to immediately suspend him right after that unanimous jury verdict, when they would be, the city would have to pay out almost $1 million to former communications director Chris Hernandez.

So why was Mayor Lucas so quick having backed, Platt for so long, so willing to turn on him at that moment in time?

Well, I think the main thing is they lost.

It was it's a two year old lawsuit, but it culminated in losing over $900,000 from the city.

but also I think it was sort of, you know, broke the camel's back to say, I mean, there is a pattern of behavior that they had been ignoring.

Wayne, you know, when do the cons outweigh the pros?

And I think once they lost that lawsuit, they couldn't ignore how personnel inside City Hall were being treated.

That he that he wasn't survivable after that.

What you're doing the dark eventually comes to the light as a matter of time.

And I think the the biggest issue was now this was public.

It was on the books.

People knew about it because before all the other lies and things that were going on, they were kind of sweeping it under the rug.

But to get to Dave's point earlier, and I think what you have Kimiko Gilmore as the deputy, city manager in that position now she's the interim.

She's the one that's been going to a lot of those meetings anyway.

So I think the transition from Brian to her would be good.

I don't look for them to go for it, look for another city manager, because it's only going to be there for like two years anyway.

So I think they would keep her in that position for two years and then probably go with the next council to get another job.

And in the meantime, Brian Platt is at home or perhaps on vacation, getting his $300,000 salary, not doing a day's.

Work, I think.

And his contract, his.

And one other thing that he did yesterday was give the city council a demand letter.

And in that letter he asked for some specific.

One of them was interesting because he asked for an evaluation, and that's what they tried to do when they ran this bogus contract that he's got in now.

But I think his contract calls for $308,000 in a severance package.

So I believe that's all he's going to get, unless they're afraid that he's going to talk about other things that's been going on.

We should note that Brian Platt does have his defenders.

and it appears that if the city council were unanimous, they probably could have fired him yesterday.

So it does appear that that perhaps there are some who do see this differently.

certainly we should note that, yes, he is being paid right now, but I think he's going to have a very difficult time getting his next city manager job.

So there may be some consequences for him.

It's rubber hits the road week for the bus service in Kansas City.

In a move that would impact thousands of riders, the Cata has detailed massive cuts, including eliminate nearly half of the city's bus routes, drastically reducing operating hours and laying off about 170 workers.

The city bus to me is just like one of the most essential things that a city does is moving people around the bus.

What are we doing?

You know, you know, it's devastating.

It's devastating.

The Metro's largest transit provider is trying to offset a more than $30 million budget shortfall.

Savannah, can you remind us why they've run out of money in the first place?

Yeah.

I mean, so the funding structure for Cata is that it's supposed to be a regional transit authority.

In the past few years, multiple suburbs and municipalities across the metro have pulled their funding from the Kcat for a number of factors.

most of them are funding the agency through their, general revenue, and they just couldn't afford the cost of transportation, which is increased across the country exponentially in the past few years.

and others just didn't see the point for bus service.

And quite frankly, Kcat has been struggling to provide frequent service, but it's sort of a snaking its own tail.

We keep we keep hearing a dollar about, oh, they run out of federal Covid money.

But I it makes me wonder then how did they ever operate before there was ever a federal Covid money?

It's only been five years.

Yeah.

I mean, they were using that federal Covid money to fill in the gaps of increased operational expenses.

And now that that's run out, they don't have, you know, any more money to fill the holes.

and so this these cuts specifically were for Kansas City bus service.

So, municipality funds Cata okay, provide service for that municipality.

When independence pulled its funding, independence lost its bus routes.

so this funding hole that they have specific to Kansas City, meant that they couldn't provide all of the Kansas City service that they had been doing so well.

This week, the Kansas City, Missouri City Council votes on its budget for the entire year.

you know, this is billions of dollars.

Did they find some money on the back of the sofa to help the bus service out?

And we talking about 30 something million?

Could they find it?

Did they find that money?

I think what you talked about, what did they do before Covid?

They charge bus fare people, riders paid for the fare where they.

It's as head scratching because we passed two taxes.

We tax the operational tax, we pass that and we pass the maintenance tax.

So where's that money?

People at KCA are saying that the city controls both of those, and they've been using some of that money for infrastructure repairs, streetlights and sidewalks.

So that might be where some of the money is.

So that money might be money that was already earmarked for K, but didn't.

One of the excuses for making free busses available at the beginning, wasn't it, that it was costing them just as much to collect the fares?

The infrastructure of doing that as as much of money as they were getting right?

Kcat has said consistently that fares are a very, very small portion of their budget and and that that's not the deciding factor.

It's this money they get from local governments.

and to answer your question, yes, they found a little bit of money very similar to the change you might find in a sofa, not enough to provide the services that Cata says it needs.

So it's all going to a committee.

But what does this mean then, for all of those folks?

And we were talking about thousands of people who actually rely on it to actually get to a job and medical appointments just to get around the city.

They have no vehicles.

What does it mean for them now?

Yeah.

So city council increase.

like Brian said, the change in the sofa was about $7 million added to the fact budget.

There is a plan in city council that they'll consider next week.

a that will fully fund the bus service for the next six months, from May to October, using some of that money that they have out of that $78 million, they give about 46 million to KTA over the course of six months.

In the meantime, the rest of the money would be, in escrow, saved for cata.

But but they're putting a lot of the city is putting a lot of requirements on the agency to find other, funding sources to get more municipalities on board, to bring back $2 fares and to suspend the Irish service, which would also lay off a fire.

About 100 Irish driver.

I'm not sure that the, current white House would be looking favorably on Kansas City for federal, you know, bringing federal transit money to.

Donald Trump is not going to save the bus service in Kansas City.

That's for sure.

I think that some of this problem may have contributed in some ways to the problems with Brian Platt because of the alleged diversion of some of the transit money and, and, the idea that the bus service, which, you know, provides transportation for the poorer parts of the community, were somehow being shorted in favor of, paving roads and, building sidewalks and that kind of thing.

So that may have played a role, I think Brian is right.

The fare box is less important.

It just doesn't provide the kind of money, that would cover a shortfall of 40 or $45 million.

But one of the things that's always been rumored in the background is them wanting to outsource the transit department.

So this might be an opportunity to open a door for them to finally implement that plan.

Another week and another round of rallies and protests over federal cuts and jobs in Kansas City.

This is not right.

It is not fair.

All employees are not villains.

We are here to serve the American people.

And the things that we do actually help American people every day.

Well, they should sound angry.

But if fired federal workers in Kansas City about to get their jobs back, a judge has ordered the government to rehire thousands of pink slipped employees, including more than 100 IRS workers in Kansas City.

The white House was being given a Wednesday deadline to reinstate the employees.

Well, Wednesday has come and gone.

Savannah.

Did they get their jobs back?

no.

The Trump administration is fighting the war.

And in the meantime, they're in limbo.

and even though this order came through, it was a glimmer of hope for these fired employees and for the rest of the federal employees who are looking down the barrel of firings.

but they hadn't heard anything from their agencies about whether or not they would be coming back.

So I think, it just sort of, came and went.

You know, it's interesting the Kinsey star had a story this week really sort of downplaying a lot of this.

There were economists in there saying that really we need to caution against, quote, premature doom and gloom.

Federal employment, while important, remains a relatively small slice of the Kansas City region's entire job market.

Is this story being overplayed?

Well, I think what you're seeing there, Nick, is this, the philosophical gap that's starting to open up over whether America should be, panicking and and feeling doom and gloom or whether, this is a roller coaster that you sort of need to ride out.

I think one of the things that's being revealed in this court case, followed by, and the Trump administration not being super quick to comply with the order, is, that this this may be one of several cases where we're going to be testing the power, the judicial system to, to rein in executive decisions.

And I think that's going to be put to the test again and again, including here in Kansas City.

Eric, what we can hear from local economists saying, well, perhaps we are overemphasizing this.

If you're a coffee shop owner downtown and many of your employees, as we saw from one coffee shop owner, they say 1 in 5 of their customers are federal workers.

That makes a huge difference.

It does make a huge difference.

And then you coupled the fact that you're talking about eight, 900 postal workers in addition to that.

Yeah.

And, and and workers in the federal building, it will have an impact.

Now, if you own a parking lot, you're going to make some money because they increased their parking wages.

But for small businesses, it's going to be a challenge.

Yeah.

And bottom line, I mean, even if these aren't all of the workers in Kansas City, even if Kansas City might be fine after their fire, this is still hundreds of people that might lose their jobs.

And also tens of thousands of people that work for the federal government in Kansas City, for things that provide regular, everyday people their everyday services like Social security, taxes.

I mean, these things keep the government running and also keep services coming to these people.

And so it's sort of a, you know, okay, this person got fired.

Now they can't afford to live in Kansas City, but also my taxes aren't going through anymore.

Yeah.

By the way, pay particular attention to the Social Security office that has some relevance to some members of the panel here.

Speak for yourself, sir.

Exactly right.

the other thing to keep an eye on, though, is whether or not a significant downsizing of the federal government here punches a hole in the office market, because there are lots of places where people work for the federal government.

And there is a chance that if there's major downsizing, that there would be a lot of vacancies downtown down and around the region.

Frankly, that will depress office prices and continue the vacancy rate difficulty of this community.

And Davis.

Right, because they're pulling leases on a lot of federal buildings that are paying leases, post office, especially because they said they spend a considerable amount of money with the post office bringing those, post office spaces.

Now, Missourians regularly vote on tons of issues at the ballot box, from Missouri wage hikes to legalizing marijuana.

Not so much in Kansas, but that's about to change as state lawmakers put on the ballot.

A new question for you to decide.

Do you support directly electing justices on the Kansas Supreme Court?

Ultimately, giving power back to the people is the fundamental core of our ideal.

And having that Partizan label is a piece of information that the voter can use.

You know, at the end of the day, you want to make sure that the voters go into the ballot box knowing as much as possible.

Savannah, what are they hoping to achieve?

I think Republicans in Kansas have been mad about recent court decisions on things like abortion.

they are supporting this maybe to hope that, they can sort of change that the way that voters have been feeling, in the state, opponents say they don't want this to change because it ruins the sanctity of the courts.

And when over politicized they that the judicial branch.

How would the how would it all change if we actually do elect Supreme Court justices, in your judgment, Brian?

Well, so, according to the amendment, the legislature would have the power to decide exactly how these elections go, including whether they are Partizan elections or nonpartisan elections.

But most observers believe they are going to be Partizan elections, as they are in a handful of other states.

I think it will change the electoral process and the judicial system of Kansas monumentally.

Nick, I think it's hard to overstate what a significant change it would be to depart from what is known as the Missouri nonpartisan court plan that Kansas and Missouri have both used for decades and is and on a nonpartizan basis, has been seen as sort of the pride of those states as a way to maintain an independent judiciary and turn it into an entirely political process, which it will be with all the things we associate with the political process.

Major fundraising and Partizan, primaries and Partizan attacks, even for the state's highest court.

Just for a moment, Dave, I'm going to bring you in in a moment, if I can.

I just want to point out the election is slated for August of 2026.

That's going to happen.

If it passes, might we actually start seeing candidates for Supreme Court running campaign ads, just like we see for governor and senator in other states?

It's already happening.

I'm looking for judges.

People that will respect the Constitution.

Judge Sarah Stuart, I think it matters who serves on the Supreme Court like President Trump.

Judge Sarah Stuart will protect our Second Amendment gun rights, and Judge Sara Stuart will defend the Constitution and guard our nation against evildoers, threaten our way of life.

Liberal Chris Harris wrong for the Kentucky Supreme Court.

But we have judge Bob Conley, supported by.

The NRA and Kentucky Right to Life judge coming from Chief Judge Bob Carr for the.

Kentucky Supreme Court.

All right, Dave, I see, according to ballot pedia, 24 states actually directly elect their Supreme Court justices.

And according to Kris Kobach, for more than 100 years, Kansas did exactly that, right.

And there was an attempt to get politics out of the judicial selection process, which is what the Missouri Plan ultimately is all about.

We should point out, though, Nick, and people should remember this as we approach the 2026 election.

Kansas Supreme Court judges already face a retention vote.

one year after, they're appointed to the bench.

And then every six years after.

So voters still have an opportunity to discard judges that they don't like.

but it barely happens.

And it very rarely happens because people are fairly satisfied with the, rulings of the court in Kansas and for that matter, in Missouri.

And they believe in the justice system independent of politics, which this, of course, would overthrow.

you know, the the Kansas legislature could have, considered an alternative, which I've always thought was at least to possible in Kansas.

And that is having the governor, nominee, judges in the Senate approve them, just.

Like at the interest, like.

Level, federal level, that would involve the public at the ground level and be perhaps, perhaps a little less political than this system envisioned.

And that legislation has sometimes been proposed in Kansas as well as the jury.

And yet, the Kansas Legislature, which with a Republican supermajority, saw fit to say, well, we can we can go for broke this is we can go further than.

That because they want to change the rules when they can't win the game.

I don't want to say a judge in a commercial with his robe on or her robe on with a flame thrower.

Okay, we may seeing that.

Stay tuned.

2020 6th August Election.

Another interesting story line, by the way, out of Topeka this week is a measure that would let Wyandotte County enact an earnings tax.

70% of our higher wage earners.

They don't live in Wyandotte County or Kansas City, Kansas.

So all those dollars that are being generated, through employers in Wyandotte County are being, spent in other communities.

Now, if you work in Kansas City, you been paying a 1% earnings tax for decades.

What would such a cash hole mean for Wyandotte County, Dave.

Well, it would mean millions of dollars, you know, 50, 60, $70 million in revenue, perhaps more, depending on, how the tax is administered.

it would increase the burden on residents in Wyandotte County because they would have to pay the 1% tax, just like Kansas City and do on this side of the state line.

If it's put together that way.

But it might provide some property tax relief, which is the big problem in Wyandotte County.

And KC k, particularly with rising appraisals.

so that's why I think that's being pursued.

The most stunning part of the story for me, Eric, was that a Mid-America Regional Council study finds 74% of workers employed in Wyandotte County live somewhere, work somewhere else or live somewhere else, rather, I say.

And I think maybe doing earnings tax with them would help them develop the communities and the neighborhoods and maybe attract people to move back in to the area and spend more money at the grocery stores and places like that.

So I think it would help them in a number of way.

I did see on the Kansas City, Missouri website, they bringing in $292 million a year from the earnings tax.

If there wasn't that earnings tax, what would happen?

I mean, these are this is funny things that are basic city services that people rely on.

Things like, road repaving, snow removal, trash, the, the bread and butter of what a city supposed to provide and things that people in KC has been complaining about for years.

So it would help maybe provide those services at a better.

Because there's been talk for a long time of ditching the earnings tax in Missouri.

Is that possible even this year?

Well, there's been talk about it, especially at the state government level, which is always interested in cutting taxes, on a state wide level that affect really local communities.

The, the but I will say voters in Kansas City time and again have renewed their own earnings tax.

This is seems like something that residents in Kansas City, including the ones who have to pay it, are willing to do.

What were you doing five years ago today?

If you can't remember, let me jog your memory.

Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas walked down the steps at City Hall to tell you, stay home.

Anyone who was not engaged in essential activities or working for essential businesses needs to stay home.

Yep.

This is the fifth anniversary of Kansas City's first Covid pandemic order.

Does anybody care about the anniversary today of.

We all moved on, Eric.

We've, moved on.

it doesn't even seem like it's been five years, but yeah, we've moved on, Dave.

We've moved on in many ways.

However, I've been helping the star this week, screen candidates for various school board positions across the community, including Kansas City.

The damage done to students who stayed home during the Covid pandemic remains a huge concern.

Remember, second graders five years ago are now seventh graders, and they've had a two year hole in their school experience.

That still is a problem and still needs to be removed.

When you put a program like this together every week, you can't get to every story grabbing the headlines.

What was the big local story we missed?

Happy Saint.

Patrick's Day, happy Saint Patrick's day.

Kansas City turns green.

Has this been the most freakish weather ever?

Trees collapse in Blue Springs at eight.

People die in a 71 vehicle pileup during a dust storm that shuts down I-70 in Kansas.

The attorney general is calling them acts of domestic terrorism to Cybertruck go up in flames at a Tesla dealership on state line.

And did any work get done this week as March Madness gets underway?

Perhaps it could be more accurately called March Sadness, as both Mizzou and Ku exit the tournament early as they fall in the first round.

Did you pick one of those stories or something completely different?

Bryant well, that's the big story.

Nick.

If if Ku and Mizzou have you down, you don't have to be sad.

The NCAA basketball tournament is in Kansas City.

Small colleges have their national championship every year.

It continues through Tuesday night.

Eric Independence, police officer cleared for the homicide of the lady.

But look for them to write a big check because the officer didn't contain him in the closet, though.

They let her come.

Savannah.

Yeah.

The public safety sales tax is up for election in the next few weeks, and there's a lot of opposition to it this year where it's passed before because of the municipal jail that might.

Be just coming up in April.

Missouri legislature has approved a bill that would return control of the police department in Saint Louis to the governor and taking it away from the community.

If that happens, as expected, Mike Kehoe will be responsible for the murder rate in that community.

And on that, we will say our week has been reviewed.

Thank you to our guests.

I'm Nick Haines from all of us at Kansas City PBS.

Be well, keep calm and carry on.