What are we learning from the first.

Public hearings on the new Chiefs Stadium?

It's a once in a lifetime opportunity.

This is not a deal.

It's an insult.

Plus, the kcpd out of cash.

We want to make sure that we make budget.

Why is Kansas City not wanting to buy many liquor bottles and single beer cans?

We will be.

Banned from selling everything from beer down.

Why?

Kansas now wants to.

Add your citizenship status to your driver's license.

Those stories and the rest of the week's news straight ahead.

Free speech is free speech.

Week in review is made possible through the generous support of Dave and Jamie Cummings.

Bob and Marlese Gourley, the Courtney S Turner Charitable Trust, John H mine and Bank of America, N.A.

Co trustees.

The Francis Family Foundation through the discretionary fund of David and Janice Frank and by viewers like you.

Thank you.

Hello and welcome.

I'm Nick Haines.

Glad to have you back on our weekly journey through the Metro's most impactful, confusing, and downright head scratching local news stories.

Hopping on through the Weekend Review bus with us this week, tracking the region's top political stories for KCUR News Brian Ellison and at the helm of our Metro's newest newspaper.

Next page Casey Eric Wesson.

He is Kansas City Star on Substack.

Former star staffer Dave Helling.

And that's a. Lot of.

Assets.

I'm KCUR, local government reporter Savannah Hawley-Bates Now the stadiums, we're topping the headlines again this week.

Okay.

You're right.

Why?

When are they not in the headlines?

But this week was a little different, because it was the first time the public got to weigh in on the cheap steel in Kansas, with official hearings in Olathe and Wyandotte County.

You are taking food from the mouths of our children and giving it to Clark Hunt.

We have no more to give.

We are at the end of our rope.

We are giving away the farm for nothing and we wonder why we're struggling with no money.

This is not a deal.

It's an insult.

It's an insult.

We were never asked for input.

This has been decided behind closed doors by a small group of people.

I think it's great this.

This is an opportunity for our area.

It's a unique opportunity.

It's a once in a lifetime opportunity.

This deal, as I see it, because we're not currently generating any sales tax on this otherwise empty spot of land.

There's really nothing to lose here already.

What was the big lesson we learned from the public's feedback in Wyandotte County, where the chiefs want to build that dome Stadium in Olathe, where they want to build their Chiefs headquarters and practice facility.

I had a chance to watch the Wyandotte County hearing I. But others may want to talk about Olathe, but I think we learned a couple of things.

First, the anger in Wyandotte County about the lack of basic services is very real.

You know, I think we all thought that there would be skepticism about helping out a billionaire named Clark Hunt.

But in fact, most of the witnesses are saying, look, the are roads are a mess.

Our schools need help.

We don't even have a homeless shelter in Wyandotte County.

And here we are diverting money that might solve some of those problems to a football stadium so that that anger is real.

And the other thing I learned is, and this is true, I think, in all Arthur and certainly in the Kansas Legislature, the pressure on politicians to approve this deal is enormous.

And it's going to be very fascinating to see if they're able to resist that.

And could that be why then and also what people was also saying, well, you know, what is it going to do to our property values, you know, is we going to be able to still afford to live here, that the Olathe City Council, within moments of the public hearing ending, unanimously voted for the deal?

I think so, and I think it also shows, like Dave said, this gulf between what the public largely thinks they're largely against, that they don't want their tax dollars used for this.

And and then what politicians do, which is continue to court the hunts and the chiefs and bring them into Kansas, and it seems like they're intent on this deal going through Eric.

It's a no win situation for for Wyandotte County.

And I kind of feel sorry for Mayor Watson.

I did, talk to her this morning, and she was saying that if they vote yes, then they have an issue with the taxpayers.

If they vote no, then they have a issue with state legislatures, legislators in the state of Kansas.

So it's a no win situation.

They have infrastructure needs.

They have a ton of needs that they need in Wyandotte County.

To give it all to the Chiefs is just a bad uptick in this.

And know what they are trying to limit.

The damage or the potential harm to taxpayers.

We're talking about only using local sales tax dollars now that would be diverted in a 236 acres stretch of land there, which is really about the same size as the Truman Sports Complex is now.

Right.

So in theory, these sorts of arrangements are supposed to be very focused in the tax dollars that are being redirected.

And in theory, they are tax dollars that would not otherwise be generated.

This is land that wasn't previously developed.

I think that it does raise the question, and this is where I think there's there's some legitimacy to that point.

Why is it an either or?

Why is it that, the the dollars have to be coming out of children's mouths, those dollars, if they are they going into children's mouths now before we've even got the stadiums and I think, I think a lot of the questions that, that, that are raised around times of development are not really questions about the particular tax incentives.

There are questions about whether funding is being directed correctly in the first place.

That bites got lots of attention.

But how does this deal take food from the mouths of Wyandotte County children?

It's so significant amount of money, even from this smaller parcel over many years.

Right now it's an empty piece of land, zero sales tax.

Dollars.

And in fact, the ordinance sets the baseline at zero.

So all of the I say all, most of the local taxes that the stadium would generate would go back to the stadium.

That is money that, at least theoretically, could go into the mouths of children.

A couple things to talk about.

First, that Wyandotte County officials, were talking about trying to convince the state of Kansas to also shrink its district to the stadium side by itself, that is really would be almost impossible.

You can't pay for this stadium if you just limit it to taxes that come from this vacant part of land.

And the other thing, to Eric's point, they still lack a community benefits agreement in Wyandotte County, which is a huge problem because you can't go to the people of Wyandotte County and say, hey, look, you do this and we will give you roads, we will give you daycare centers, we will give you training, we will give you small business help and set asides.

None of.

That.

But don't you think, though, by the end of this whole process, the Chiefs are going to be offering a lot of things.

You know, it'll be, football fields for kids in Wyandotte County, a lot of other, little amenities, to make this a much more palatable situation in that county.

No, because they got everything they want.

Why would they have to negotiate and force a deal now when they have everything they want?

And that was done and go to vote voters, right?

That is why they don't Kansas.

That's right.

You don't have to go to voters.

So you don't need a CBA.

And so it's difficult to face those constituents and say, hey, you're not getting what other people might get.

Well, I. Would also caution people to think like, yes, maybe the Chiefs do build a youth sports complex.

Maybe they do build a daycare center that does not pay back what the public incentives in the public tax dollars are.

They're going to the stadium.

By and large, we know that public dollars for sports stadiums like this are not paid back.

They will not be paid back through, the sales tax.

And I would caution people who think that the SA ones will be paid back before the deadline, as they never have before, which is what personnel the lawyers for the chiefs are saying.

And this is what comes up again and again when we're talking about either the Chiefs or the Royals or really any other public investment of this nature is the numbers don't support the idea that the economic growth to the community is going to outweigh the cost.

You have to decide that you're going to support a program like this, because you think the public good of having a professional sports team is worth the public investment.

Some people agree with that because they love sports.

Some people think it brings community spirit.

Other people say it is such a lower priority than other pressing needs.

Whatever your reasons, though, it's not an economic incentive.

It's not an economic benefit to the community to keep pouring money.

Another interesting thing that came out of the meeting in Water County was that the stadium seems to have moved three miles.

It's gone from the eastern edge of where the legends was to far north west of where the Kansas Speedway is a three mile distance.

Are people happy with that location, as it got just as much pushback as it was before?

It's sort of a de minimis.

I mean, wherever it ends up going, there will be some impact on people who live nearby, but bet it's vacant land now.

So I don't think there's a lot of objection to the specific location.

But they haven't kind of pinpointed a location and.

They haven't bought.

The land and they.

Haven't bought the land still.

So it might be the north side, it might be the west side, who knows?

And nobody knows.

But putting it out, I'm sorry.

Putting it out by the legends and by, by, by the Speedway really emphasizes that this is part of an entertainment complex, not something that they're actually trying to integrate into the the Wyandotte County community.

It's really a place for people to go out there, park their car, go to games, and then drive back home.

As rumored plans to build an Ice detention center in Kansas City remain up in the air this week.

Just up the road in Leavenworth, plans to open a mass detention center at a former private prison got the green light from the city planning commission this week.

Free speech is free speech.

All righty.

As you can see, it got a little feisty over there.

But after a year of fighting, the reopening of the core civic prison located just 16 miles from KCI airport, why did the Leavenworth Planning Commission say yes this week?

What changed on it?

I think in Leavenworth point of view, nothing changed.

This has always been about zoning.

That's all we've ever heard.

They were fighting it, fighting and fighting it.

Well, they were fighting it in their point of view from the aspect of making sure there were zoning compliance, okay.

They reject the notion that they were fighting it for any human good standpoint.

Although the people of Leavenworth and the people of the Kansas City area would definitely disagree.

I think this change is they finally got, you know, sort of the zoning that they wanted to see.

And there's a lot of pressure back on them to, to actually push it through.

I mean, what changed is core civics attitude toward this.

They they were trying to sue Leavenworth.

They were trying to sort of weigh in with all the power and authority of the Trump administration's support for, for their detention center.

Eventually, they showed up at a planning committee meeting and said, here's how we're going to comply with your requirements.

And they got a 5 to 1 vote.

Yes, but closer to home, we were expecting also some big votes from Jackson County lawmakers this week, one, to place a moratorium on the opening of any Ice detention centers in the county.

The second, a ban on law enforcement officers, including Ice agents, from wearing face coverings.

But hold the front page.

Neither vote happened.

If the public is so incensed about Ice activities.

Eric, why is Jackson County struggling to pass any of these measures?

I think it's the language.

I think they're caught up with the language of what it should say and who specifically it would target.

We had some pushback in Jackson County from the sheriff.

Yes, wanting that that part of a change.

So I think the presentation and the language, I think is what they're caught up on now.

The sheriff, Carol Forte, said not only was he concerned that they were quite, quote, prioritizing politics over community concerns, he says it could threaten the safety of his deputies.

Why would that be?

Well, I think I think his argument is that these requirements are unenforceable against federal law enforcement officials.

He doesn't want to put, sheriff's deputies in a position of confronting federal law enforcement.

You know, I think his broader point is that he simply doesn't like the Jackson County Legislature meddling in his management.

He's an elected official, too, of of the of the sheriff's department.

And I think you're seeing a little bit of power struggle as well as, genuine differences.

You mentioned that on a recent program, the concern that, our Jackson County sheriff's deputy is going to be arresting Ice agents, right.

It's not clear how you would enforce it if an Ice agent showed up with a mask.

Who does the arresting?

Is this who does the issues?

The citation.

On the other hand, Nick, I think the fear is for Ice agents that if they're identifiable, their families will be threatened, that they will be what they call doxed, and exposed.

I remember a time when law enforcement officers had badges with numbers on them so that you could identify them by number.

So the idea that police officers or any law enforcement officials should be able to, execute the laws anonymously is, goes against a real tradition in this country that those, police, are accountable to the public.

And so I think that's also at stake.

And name tags, body cameras, those kind of things are what kind of the trend is going toward having those Ice agents do?

Because right now they're just pretty much do what they want to do.

Now, the Kansas City mayor and city council are just learning of a new memo from the Kcpd police chief, warning they're out of cash.

Chief Stacy Graves is canceling overtime, putting a freeze on hiring and placing a hold on equipment purchases.

Matt Quinton Lucas says the news caught him off guard.

Drastic cuts are coming to the Kansas City Police Department.

This comes as the mayor is asking the.

Question where is the money being.

Spent?

We did have a board of Police commissioners last meeting last week.

This letter was not discussed.

What went so terribly wrong at police headquarters that they're now scrambling to pay the bills?

Well, this news, that the mayor said he hadn't heard about it and city council said the same also came at the same time as Chief Stacy Graves got about a $20,000 in a raise.

So I think that's important to look at.

You know, part of Kcpd budget issues might be because they spend millions of dollars in settlements to people, or that they buy so much massive equipment.

Kansas City gives more than 25% of its general funds to the police department, and often exceeds that, and approves almost every budget request that comes through city council for more equipment, for more officers.

They've been largely supportive of the Kcpd.

So this budget crisis, I think coming up right before the city's budget season, is really interesting to look at.

I want to know what's happening really behind the scenes here, because you do have, you know, Stacy Graves, the police chief, saying, you know, I go to the Board of Police Commissioners meetings.

I outlined the budget, the NASA.

I knew nothing about it whatsoever.

You know, so the.

Police for.

What it is.

And so, you know, to me, it's like, is there something else going on?

She also says, you know, we've you see a lot of headlines as we did there.

You know, this is a big deal.

But she says it's not going to involve any service cuts.

It's it's confusing, to say to.

Me, is there a political motivation for making this a big deal?

Yeah.

Right now, right before the budget, they get grants, they get money for things.

I remember some years ago and like, Catherine was a city manager, I remember he took me out to the airport.

They had a parking garage out there.

And he said at the end of the fiscal year, when they had money left over, they bought a bunch of police cars.

So I think now.

I put that on the front page.

I broke that story.

They bought 100 cars with leftover money.

Parked.

At the at the airport and understood at the time, there was no way to put those cars on the street for.

Years because they.

Had to be outfitted with lights and sirens in that.

Time.

That's the confusing part of this story for me, is that how can it be that there's this massive shortage in the budget and no services will be cut?

Everyone will be just as safe and nothing will be affected.

Those two facts don't seem to line up, and I haven't read or heard anything that makes that clear to me, how that can continue to be an argument coming from the police department.

But those lawsuits also are part of this.

Like he's saying, there's a lot of lawsuits today.

They pay out money.

And that's something to look at when they say they're facing this budget issue.

They continually if you look back at the city's previous budgets, they continually underestimate how much they have to pay in these settlements that they continually have to settle for millions and millions of dollars.

Just as Kansas City is loosening its drinking laws for the World Cup, City Hall wants to ban the sale of miniature liquor bottles and single beer cans.

The ban would not apply citywide, but in high crime areas, including Prospect and Independence avenues and parts of Midtown, there's.

Research out there suggesting that by reducing the sales of certain products, you can improve, public safety related issues, public disorder issues and quality of life issues.

I can't wrap my head around it right now.

We will be banned from selling everything from here down.

We stand to lose everything our employees stand to lose their jobs.

So who is pushing this?

Well, it's the mayor.

Why does Quinton Lucas think banning many liquor bottles and single tallboy Budweiser and quiz cans is going to reduce violence in Kansas City?

Eric?

Because at a stop, people from hanging out around the liquor stores, I had the opportunity to go into Martin Luther King Village and talk to some of the residents there that use the top spot that they just showed, and they're saying that they couldn't go to top spot.

They buy, you know, something to drink for a nightcap for a month to last them.

Now they would have to get in their electric motorized wheelchairs and go all the way down the Truman Road in Brooklyn just to buy the drink that they could buy right around the corner.

And there's no crime at that, that top spot.

So why include them in this so-called crime area?

But but banning sales in some parts of town, though, Brian, is that got, a discrimination lawsuit written all over it.

Well, it certainly is.

That is the concern, right?

There have often been laws that are implemented, whether that name poverty or name geography, but ten are generally understood to be about race, about ethnicity.

I, I think there is.

We should note that some of the neighborhoods included in this potential law are Midtown, downtown, areas that perhaps are not seen as as so, racially identified.

Having said that, I think, I think there's going to be a lot of concern about that.

And I think that will continue to be discussed at the council.

There have been attempts to, mitigate the damage from liquor sales for 40 years in this town.

I remember covering in the 90s an attempt to ban 40 ounce beer bottles.

People said, hey, but kid, people were buying 40oz.

Drank in them, getting drunk, getting into trouble.

There are, have been long discussions about, whether there are too many liquor licenses in the inner city and whether the liquor stores are too close together.

Those discussions are 25, 30 years old as well.

What I think happens a lot is the council passes something like this, and then the liquor industry reacts and you just sort of squeeze the problem into another place.

It's very difficult to get a handle, but.

It is about jobs and things like that.

And the gentleman that we just saw saying, you know, it's going to cost jobs at our convenience store.

And he says, you know, 40% of all their sales involve some sort of a miniature liquor bottle being sold.

Yeah.

And that's sort of the I guess the philosophical question here is, is that worth, what they think will mitigate the crime, that happens around these liquor stores when or when people are hanging out, loitering with that.

I do think, though, this will be a really interesting, thing that will play out in city council and in public hearings.

There should be one in March about this.

And I think the public's reaction to this will, kind of sway how city council views this.

Now, Kansas is wading into the immigration debate this week by calling for citizenship status to be added to your driver's license.

The measure has the backing of the Secretary of State's office, saying it would add an extra layer of protection to prevent non-citizens from voting, either by mistake or intentionally.

Currently, no state universally requires driver's licenses to explicitly print U.S.

citizens on them.

Is Kansas about to be the first?

Brian?

Maybe.

I mean, I will say there's very little evidence, Nick, that, that there's a real problem with non-citizens, voting or representing themselves as citizens in any other context.

So the the, the evidence to support legislation like this doesn't really exist.

The question is whether lawmakers are, gaining the political, advantage they are seeking by promoting these sorts of laws.

I don't like to overemphasize certain stories if they're not going anywhere, because anybody can introduce legislation in Kansas and Missouri, you know, does this have a prospect of actually becoming law?

Well, it may it might I mean, as we talked about last week near state legislatures in Kansas, this is no exception.

Spend the first 3 or 4 weeks of their sessions always on these performative message sending bills that don't really have any practical impact, but somehow make someone happy.

So this may be another example of that going forward.

By the way, even though no United States does it, I did notice that in news stories I research for this program and that Alberta, the province in Canada, is going to be doing the same thing later this year.

And on one of the reasons because of concerns about elections.

So it is happening in some other places.

Is this the biggest thing to ever happen to Prairie Village?

We're learning that the England soccer team is going to base itself in Prairie Village for the entire World Cup, even though they're not playing any of their games here.

Ranked fourth in the world, the England squad will take up residence at the Inn at Meadowbrook well before the tournament begins.

Is this going to give Kansas citizens the first tangible experience of how life might be disrupted when the World Cup arrives in town?

Here are the safety protocols.

Barricades around the 54 room hotel, 24 hour law enforcement protection coordinated by Homeland Security.

Abrupt road and intersection closings to secure the route between the hotel, the team's training facility at Swope Park, and to and from the airport.

Now, that's a lot to take in.

How is that going to go down?

Or our local residents still not quite clued in to the disruption that's about to hit them?

Brian.

Oh, I think they're pretty clued in.

I think most folks are pretty excited about, about all things World Cup.

That might not be the case when they're unable to, to make a left turn across.

Metcalf is.

Exactly right.

I did.

Well, one of the fun things in the story I didn't notice, because everybody knows that American food is not terribly great, and British food has such a sterling reputation as being gourmet that they're bringing their own chefs so they won't have to eat any of the American food.

I think maybe it might be that they maybe they can't handle the barbecue before their matches have their their beans on toast and things like that to keep playing right the way they do.

There's a really fine restaurant at that.

I don't know if they're going to an all fish and chips menu, perhaps for the next few weeks.

Yes.

But okay.

All right.

Well, you can't get to every program when you put a program like this together every week.

You can't get every single local story.

What was the big local story?

We missed?

Did you know this was an election week?

Voters and independents heads to the polls to pick a new mayor, Council member Bridget McCandless and union leader Bryce Stewart winning the mayoral primary.

They'll face off in the April general election.

Black History Month turns 50, and there's lots to celebrate locally.

The Negro League Baseball Museum is free all month long, with the Kansas City Royals picking up the tab.

The Winter Olympics gets underway with a starring role for Lee's Summit West grad Caleb Fornell, who's clinched a spot on the US bobsled team.

The notorious Independence Bridge chews up its 40th truck in five years, despite added safety features to warn drivers.

And all you team Seahawks are team Patriots.

So are you.

Team don't care now that the Chiefs are watching from the couch, some local businesses to the feeling the pinch and reduce sales of Chiefs merchandise from shirts to baked goods.

And I did notice that my local Price Chopper, all of the Chiefs paper, where the napkins and the little plastic cups were all in the clearance cart, selling for like.

$0.50 by the English soccer.

Team.

I'm so.

So, did you pick one of those stories?

Souvenir or something completely different?

Something else?

I think one of the biggest stories to come in recent days is, the bow and Towers tenant union out in Raytown winning their rent strike.

That was going on for months.

This is one of, one of KC tenants, multiple rent strike wins.

And I think this is really interesting to see the material benefits that they gained after withholding hundreds of thousands of dollars in rent and rent and, and the wins they had in eviction court as well against us.

Thank you.

Brian.

We saw our first reports on the impact of sports gambling in Missouri this week and learned that in the first month, $543 million were wagered on sports in Missouri.

Of that $521,000 or less than 1/100 of 1%, has emerged as revenue to the state.

That may change when some of the promotional deals, run out in the coming months, but but so far, just as many lawmakers feared when they argued against sports gambling, Missouri does not seem to be reaping huge benefits from this new opportunity.

Eric, I said the Negro Leagues baseball.

Yes.

Free admission there.

And they're going to be open on Mondays when they're normally closed on Mondays.

So that's a big story that we missed.

And also the Chiefs not being in the Super Bowl is going to be a snoozer.

I don't know how we're going to make it.

You're wearing your Chiefs red.

That's right I hey, I'm still you know.

They're watching from the couch.

Exactly.

I'm by the way, I did see also next door to the Negro League baseball museum, city Hall, looking to approve $3 million to renovate the American Jazz Museum.

Jazz museum again.

And just quickly, there was discussion of, light rail or, streetcar extension to 18th and vine, which would be very important and continues to reflect the idea that making the streetcar east west as well as north south is an important.

Goal from the new Chief Stadium to the 18th.

And didn't you say, way to go over some additions.

Yeah, yeah, that some day.

So alrighty, just briefly my friend Sam's effort Casey you are had an important story this week about Lenexa police and city officials who surveilled a young man who had written an op ed in the Kansas City Star that was mildly critical of the department and its relations with Ice on immigration issues.

It was a black eye for the police in Lenexa, where I live, and a black eye for the city council.

And on that, we will say our week has been reviewed courtesy of Casey Watts, Savannah Holly Bates and Eric Wesson from next page KC, Brian Ellison from KC, one news and news icon Dave Helling, and I'm Nick Haines from all of us here at Kansas City PBS.

Be well, keep calm and carry on.