It's official.

Kansas City Green lights a new Royals ballpark at Crown Center, but not without angry protests.

Put your hand up for me, I said.

Hey, hey hey, hey.

Will the voter resign?

The embattled Jackson County executive, still clinging onto power after being indicted on federal bribery charges.

Seismic legal rulings shake up Missouri politics.

Oak Park Mall announcing big changes plus downtown drivers experience.

City Hall's newest torture device.

Week in review is made possible through the generous support of Bob and Marlese Gourley.

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

Thank you.

Hello and welcome.

I'm Nick Haines, glad to have you with us again on our weekly journey through the most impactful, confusing and downright head scratching local news stories.

Hopping on board the Week in Review bus with us this week from KC UR's Lisa Rodriguez, former star reporter, now Mr.

Kansas City Stack on Substack Dave Helling from 41 news political reporter Charlie Keegan and at the helm of our metro's newest newspaper.

Next page KC Eric Wesson.

It's official Kansas City greenlights the funding for a new Royals ballpark at Crown Center, but not without angry protests.

Okay, please.

All right, all right, here we go.

Let us go.

Let us go.

That are some of the scenes from City Hall this week is the financing of the $1.9 billion new Royal Stadium is approved.

Council member Jonathan Duncan calling the plan rushed and reckless.

With too many details still up in the air.

He says the city raced to get the deal done before a citizen petition could trigger a public vote.

Does the city council's actions this week, Charlie, mean there definitely won't be a public vote now?

Well, I don't know if I'd go that far.

I don't think there's still this petition that the people who want to vote on it put together and submitted to the city for review, and they seem to think there's this August 31st deadline for the city to act.

And put some question to voters.

The mayor and city council see it a little different.

Absolutely.

I was reading the mayor's press release just this morning, and it seems pretty much sealed.

This this deal is done, Lisa.

Although the mayor and council people deny that this action and the timing of it had anything to do with circumventing a public vote, Councilman Crispin Ray was on up to date on Kcrw just this morning, saying that absolutely had nothing to do the timing with one and the other.

And in fact, he thought a public vote would have been successful this time around.

I think, skeptics might disagree with that and that the timing was, in fact, rushed.

Exactly.

To prevent this, to be in time before this, deadline at the end of the month.

Is there any opportunity still for a public vote?

Well, the mayor, Mayor Quinton Lucas, has said a couple of times this week the petitioners will get their vote.

That's his exact words.

So there's some anticipation that a vote will come up at some point.

You can't ignore it.

As we've talked about on this show, what the impact of that vote, though, is very much up in the air.

They could have a vote, rescind it, take it to court, try and stop the results, whatever they turn out to be.

There is clearly a motive to try and wrap up as many details as possible before the petition becomes ripe.

And that's why there was such haste this week.

Okay, well, Kansas City is committing $600 million to the stadium, but other than being able to say we're home to a major league baseball team, and the Royals didn't move to Kansas, what's actually in it for Kansas City?

The Royals will pay $1 rent.

Eric, as the city owns the stadium, the Royals won't pay any property taxes and any sales tax revenue will be used to pay off the construction costs of the new stadium.

So how does Kansas City make money off this deal?

They don't.

If you're know, one of the funny things about it was not so funny.

There was no way people would believe that Mayor Lucas would lose two sports teams.

They rolled out the red carpet.

They sold the farm.

They did everything.

But they have this community benefits agreement.

But they college something else.

$5 million goes to the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, $5 million goes to the arts, and and 15 million goes to some nonprofit organizations that qualify.

The problem is, it's not clear whether that's over a 30 year period of time.

A ten year period of time, or they're going to get that money immediately.

But it has really no benefit in it, for the taxpayer.

Well, why doesn't the city get to keep 5% of all the revenue from non baseball events like concerts, leaving 95% of the revenue to to the team and the Royals?

And actually, Councilman Ray, I confirmed this morning that that $55 million community benefits agreement is over the 30 year life of that of that stadium.

So it really is shortstop.

It really is such a small amount when you consider the vast cost of this.

Let's just put that on our screen by the way.

So the Royals committing $55 million in a community benefits agreement, $5 million of that going to the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, another 5 million go to homeless programs, $14 million, Charlie, towards the city's public art program, which may now include acquiring the signature FIFA fan fest heart and moving it from its entry way, to the to the new ballpark district.

There's this silence many of the project's biggest critics.

I don't know if I would throw that food and go that way.

There are a lot of folks who were wondering what would happen with the World Cup heart.

So I think there's some, people who are happy to see that the Royals will pay for it to be moved and set up permanently in the city, but I don't know if that's enough to sweeten the deal for the critics of this, whole proposal.

And one other thing, Nick.

It has a provision in there where people that work at the stadium get a competitive salary for other people that work at other sports stadiums.

So I'm like, how how much are they getting paid now to where that has to be a provision in the agreement that.

But would you agree?

Lisa, this is very different than the previous vote that took place two years ago and its location.

Wouldn't there be less public opposition to this if it was put to a public vote?

I do think that the circumstances have changed in the last two years.

I don't think that this deal is the best for the city, but I think had they put it to a public vote, having lost the Chiefs already and and narrowing it to just the Royals, I do think that they might have seen a more favorable result had they let the process go and, and put it to a vote as it is now, even issuing bonds without a public vote, without citywide support is going to cost the city more money in terms of interest rates or other insurance, to make sure the city can can guarantee those bonds.

Where does that $600 million go that the city where where is that coming from?

Dave?

Well, we don't know where it's coming from in a specific sense.

The agreement sort of says, well, we'll capture all legally available revenue, whatever that means, including hotels, presumably restaurant taxes, sales taxes from the district.

But the one of the biggest problems with the agreement is we don't know specifically how much money that will generate and how much they have to pay every year to pay back the $600 million that was borrowed.

And in fact, the agreement refers to the financing page.

And if you go to that page, appendix C, it's blank.

It's blank.

It's it says nothing.

So that's the kind of thing that the council sort of, approved, which is trust us, will fill in the blanks later.

And this is all going to work out.

And they are committing future councils for the next 30 years to pay the mortgage back, if you will, on that 600.

That sounds like the income tax vote that that was taking place just recently in Missouri, where, you know, trust us, we will find the money to replace that revenue if we get rid of the income tax.

Right.

And the city is doing the same thing, whether the money's going to come between the the seat cushions or under the in the ashtray or whatever, nobody knows.

And Dave is right because that page is blank.

So where is that money going to come from?

That means you're going to have to cut services somewhere to make up for that.

I think we'll get some clearer picture of where the money's coming from next week when the Tiff Commission meets and they're supposed to, debate a boundary for this area.

And, you know, the argument could be, well, if you don't like the rules, you don't have to spend any money.

And the boundaries of that, tiff, district, and you wouldn't ever.

And none of your money.

You also need this royals to do spectacularly well on the field for them to get some of that money back to.

If they're not doing very well, they may take a long time to get any of this money back.

Me missing.

Right.

It's I mean, the whole thing is a big gamble, betting that the the Royals will continue to be a draw.

We've seen how dismally they've played in the last few seasons and that people will spend money there.

But we still we have no revenue projections.

We really are going into this fairly blind as a public.

And I didn't mention, by the way, the $540 million from Missouri.

Yet I saw in the report that says we're hoping to apply for state funding.

That seems kind of, loose in language that, doesn't it?

It does.

But you also have to remember that Governor Kehoe called a special session to put together a, framework to give money to the Royals and Chiefs.

So I think he wouldn't turn his back on that quick note, there is some indication that the TIF district, which will generate revenue for this project, may extend all the way to the downtown loop, you know, from Crown Center.

That is a repeat in some ways, of what they're trying with the Chiefs over in Wyandotte County, which is expanding the district to such a degree that you can capture that revenue, because ultimately, Nick bond buyers will tell us whether this is going to work.

All right.

But I can imagine viewers screaming at the screen saying, don't do you want this team to go, do you want to go?

This team to go to Nashville?

Do you want this team to go to Kansas?

And isn't that really the reality that the city wanted?

If the mayor and the council had sold it on that basis and the Royals, they would have had a better argument.

But instead, they argue this is some big economic boom.

That's all they talked about yesterday.

Going to the restaurants, walking to the bars, that type of thing.

And can I just saw this.

And quickly, Eric, anyone who thinks, anyone who thinks the council will now turn this down based on future numbers is not paying attention, making the decision done that making the district extend to the power and light district per se.

What does that do for the sales tax revenue that they're supposed to generate to pay for the bonds we've been paying for for what, 15, 20 years on a power and light district?

So it's like, where are you?

Where are you getting all this money from?

All right, believe it or not, there are actually other stories happening in the news this week, embattled Jackson County Executive Phil the Voter was scheduled to be in court this week for a pretrial hearing in his federal bribery case.

But hold the front page.

The trial now moved to next year, which means you'll be out of office by the time he has to answer to the five federal charges, accusing him of offering high paying jobs to legislator Ron McGee to entice him to drop out of the race for county executive, now been charged with offering a job in exchange for McGee withdrawing from the county executive race.

I categorically deny that allegation.

Now there are rising calls, Charlie for low voter to resign.

Now, though, any signs he'll step down?

No.

No signs yet.

I know there's this group led by Justice Horn that started an online petition to try and, encourage the voter to step down.

But and every conversation we've had with low voter, he seems steadfast on finishing his term, saying he's got a lot of work to do.

Yet could fellow legislators in the Jackson County legislature oust him from office?

Lisa, there doesn't appear to be a straightforward mechanism for legislators to do that in Jackson County.

And on top of that, I don't see that there's a big appetite among legislators to do that.

I haven't seen public outcry, among many among a majority of the legislature.

And in fact, Legislator Sean Smith this week said he prefers to keep him there, to keep momentum going.

Other legislators have said, really, it didn't cause that big of a, of a kerfuffle within within our offices here, day to day business as usual.

And so even if there were a mechanism, I'm not sure that they would use it.

It's interesting, the confidence that Mr.

Voter is showing in all of his public appearances that this is really he's going to be cleared of this anyway.

There is no wrongdoing.

He is a former prosecutor himself.

He knows how these things work.

This is not going to be a big deal.

He's a laser focus on his agenda of helping the people in Jackson County.

And I think he's just kind of blowing off all the other things, but areas one thing that he might want to pay attention to and that might be lying to the FBI, I think the other charges are kind of flaky.

He might be able to get by with those.

But that line to the FBI part, he is the third county executive, Dave, to face federal charges in the last 20 years.

A force, of course.

Frank white was recalled by voters ousted from office is what is happening in Jackson County.

What is it about that culture, that political system that has created so much drama and turmoil?

Yeah.

And and by the way, throw in Bill where us who was no longer county executive but was convicted of lying to the FBI, which, you know, here's the rule never lie to the FBI that you get you in big trouble.

I've often said, Nick, that the reason Jackson County officials get into this kind of trouble is that they don't really have a lot of things to do.

They run the jail, they collect taxes.

There are they have a few parks, but by and large, there's far too much intrigue down at, 12th and Oak in the county courthouse and out in independence.

So why do why isn't there then, in more of an effort to consolidate government, put Kansas City and Jackson County together, that would be one big government or would it just expand the problems to Kansas?

Actually, I worked on before I left the store.

That was one of my last projects, which I never finished, was a discussion about whether it makes sense, like Wyandotte County.

Yeah, which has its problems, but its problems with corruption have been narrowed since the two governments were joined.

And maybe it might work here.

The opposition and independence and Grandview and Lee's Summit would be fierce, so it might not ever work.

Let me just say one other thing about, le voted fil a vote of not quitting.

Almost, said Paul.

Fill the vote of not quitting.

It's his bargaining chip with the federal prosecutors when he goes in to bargain this, which he may well do before the trial, to say, look, let's maybe I plead guilty to one thing.

And as part of the agreement, I resign the office.

That happens all the time in public corruption cases.

If he gave that up now without getting anything for it, it might not be the wisest strategy.

What?

Missouri Republicans scored two big wins in court this week in a pair of seismic legal rulings, with huge implications on the November ballot.

Let's start with ruling number one.

That puts Kansas City Democratic Congressman Emanuel Cleaver in an increasingly perilous position.

That's because a judge in Jefferson City has blocked a public referendum on Missouri's newly drawn congressional map that carves up Cleaver's district and forces him to campaign in large parts of rural Missouri.

Now, help us understand the ruling.

The Lisa citizens group collected more than 300 signatures or thousand signatures.

That's more than twice the amount necessary to put it to the public.

What was the legal reason for stopping it?

Well, the judge ruled that there was no clear language in the Missouri Constitution that allows congressional redistricting to be, recalled or re decided through a referendum vote.

It has.

There's one instance of it happening in Missouri, nearly a century ago, and that was not challenged.

But he didn't find that there's that, that you can even challenge redistricting in this way.

No, Eric, I've asked you this before, but, I mean, is Emanuel Cleaver now hitting the panic button, getting the moving boxes out of his office?

No.

I talked to his campaign yesterday, and they were on the campaign trail, so they have, you know, 20 something years of being in office in the state of Missouri.

He's built relationships, and they're depending on those relationships.

You know, I was actually out in Odessa and Lafayette County, last week and talking to voters there about Cleaver, and they seem to actually remember him representing him and remembered him.

Well, one voter told me that he's a cleaver for life because he helped him out with something at the Veterans Affairs Veterans Hospital.

So there's some I did also see.

He was at the Missouri State Fair in Sedalia this week to win over agricultural interests.

So that was a day one.

You know, there's one area in there and it escapes me where it was.

But he had a build a bridge built across the highway.

So the kids, when they were getting on a school bus, could get to the other side without having to run through the highway traffic.

If I could just quote the great philosopher Fred G. Sanford from Sanford and Son always bet on the black, okay?

And I think he's he's going to pull that one out already.

Well, the group, by the way, people, not politicians who was behind this referendum effort is not staying still.

They want to appeal this.

But time is running out here.

Isn't September 8th the deadline by which changes could be made at the ballot and the court?

The Missouri Supreme Court will hear arguments September 2nd.

And my guess is will, issue a ruling quickly?

But there's a problem, Nick.

And your viewers should know it.

The ruling from the district court judge gave about six different reasons why the referendum could not go forward.

Lisa mentioned one.

It wasn't explicitly permitted in the Constitution, but he also said it would create chaos.

It would be havoc at the polling place.

It violates the U.S.

Constitution, the guarantee of a Republican government.

So there were 5 or 6 reasons why he said this could not go forward.

The court only has to endorse one of those reasons, just one.

And the referendum will be stalled.

Now, there was a second big ruling this week that also has big implications.

The same judge also blocking amendment six from being added to the Missouri ballot.

What's that you say?

Well, that's the measure that would prohibit state lawmakers from making changes to the citizen initiative process and stop them from overturning previous voter approved ballot questions without a vote of at least 80% of lawmakers in both chambers.

So is that the end of amendment six two, or is this also now going to be settled?

And, unless the Missouri Supreme Court weighs in on this one?

No, you really ought to get down to Jeff City on September 2nd.

The Supreme Court will hear this case as well.

They'll hear redistrict and this amendment six and decide whether they can make any changes and put it on the ballot before that September 8th deadline.

I actually think it's more likely the court will overturn this decision and put this measure on the ballot, because the decision of the circuit court was there are too many subjects in the in amendment six, so you can't have more than one subject in an amendment.

But the Supreme Court has been very, very, liberal.

If you will, about allowing, amendments to go before voters that have a lot of different facets to them.

You'll remember a couple of years ago when there was a ballot measure on clean Missouri, and they were going to redistricting and how there were a lot of different things in that amendment.

But the court sort of said, no, it's all kind of one thing.

And so I think it's more likely they may overrule judge, Daniel on this one.

Green.

Judge green on this one.

Well, there's been a lot of media coverage about the big changes on the country club plans are under its new Texas based ownership group.

But is the fading fortunes of bricks and mortar retail also now disrupting Johnson County's most thriving shopping Mecca?

The owners of Oak Park Mall asking for city approval to add hundreds of new housing units, a hotel, a three level performing arts center to a mall that has up until now survived America's love affair with online shopping.

Is this a sign that it's not working anymore, or a reflection that any place needs an update?

It's, you know, it's 50 years old now.

It is.

It's it's the place I had my very first job, Oak Park Mall.

Okay, so you can't say anymore because you have been in I because I used to work at the JCPenney.

Montgomery Vaughn's on Dillard's.

That used to be there.

No, but this and Oak Park Mall really is the only mall in our whole metro area that has had some success, as we've seen the decline of indoor malls across the whole country.

Now it is 50 years old, we have seen a rise of online shopping while you go there and it's still there are people there today.

The parking lots are not full.

So it is in need of updating and perhaps housing and entertainment.

This is kind of the direction all of these are going.

Just a better use of space, a more revenue generating use of space.

Yeah.

There's this keyword that every developer uses density.

Right.

If you can like build, density and have shoppers living right in your parking lot, essentially that mall has been a sales tax machine for the city of Overland Park for decades.

And if it is changed dramatically to a housing, office space, that revenue stream may be may be choking off a little bit for Overland Park, precisely when the people in Johnson County, and I can tell you this from some experience, are furious about property taxes and increases and in spending.

So that's something to watch going forward.

I've never been out there and it's been a ghost town.

It's always crowded when I go out there.

So people are utilizing a lot of this stuff is going to be happening in the parking lots because they don't have enough cars filling them.

So that's going to take up some of those parking spaces.

Did you see this story?

Downtown drivers are now beginning to experience City Hall's newest torture device, the barnacle.

Having paid your parking ticket, how about a heavy, bright yellow electronic slab that uses 1,000 pounds of force to suction itself onto your entire front windshield?

So you had to get somewhere?

You know, it seems like you're stuck, and, because you can't see through the window, it seems a little violating.

So what happened to Eric?

To just putting a parking ticket under your windshield wiper?

We have gone past that.

We've gone past the boots on the.

Well, we.

Now we've got something.

This stuck on your front windshield.

I think it's kind of humorous, but it does make you have to pay the ticket.

Unless you can drive around looking up underneath the bottom of it or something.

Yeah.

The city says it's a safer alternative for their parking folks when they attach a boot, they usually have to go out in the middle of the road and passing traffic.

But here they're going to slap that onto your windshield from, you know, the sidewalk or from in front of your car.

I may be interested in looking online, that all these people have all these ways of getting around it, and you use a, you know, a credit card or debit card.

You put your defroster on on the windshield and that will take it off for you.

But essentially some of OFI was asking, when would they stop next?

You know, if you've got an expired tag, will that be the new solution?

Oh gosh, I don't know.

I mean, I all jokes aside and and honestly, if this were to appear on my car, I would not be happy.

But what I prefer it to being towed.

Yes, absolutely.

And it does appear that you can pay right on the spot and it'll I don't know if it if it just comes off and you leave it on the sidewalk or, or what happens if you pay your ticket, someone comes out and you have to take it to a off box.

And then once you've done that, then you are released from the whole thing.

If you don't take it back, you get new fines, going to you.

We'll just stack them up.

Absolutely.

You know, when you put a program, I love that when you put a program like this that's coming next year, 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?

Another big storm whips through the metro, ripping off roofs and leaving thousands without power.

Kansas City homicides hit a full year low as new data comes in for the first six months of the year.

The construction be halted on a contentious new mega data center in independence.

Months after work began, a group of neighbors suing to stop the new facility that, when fully built, will be twice the size of Arrowhead Stadium.

Meanwhile, over in Kansas, the Johnson County city of Edgerton is being accused of retaliation as it sues residents who launched a petition to block a new data center in that town.

Ringing alarm bells again about kids on electric scooters.

Hollywood child hospitalized after being struck by a vehicle just outside their school.

The Western Auto sign is lighting up the downtown skyline again after going dark for more than a year.

The 75 year old neon landmark was partially lit during the World Cup.

Here's the makeshift fix, though, as repair work continued, the city spent $100,000 on restoring the sign.

And if the Chiefs can play overseas, why not our top musicians?

The Kansas City Symphony getting ready to board a plane for a new European tour of acclaimed concert houses in Amsterdam, Hamburg and Berlin.

All righty, Charlie, did you pick one of those stories and something completely different?

No, I wanted to build off of the first one.

The storms, in fact, particularly this week.

That left thousands without power.

And as we taped the show on Friday, there's still thousands of customers in Wyandotte County without power and just really highlighted how significant that was, even though there was no tornado involved at all.

Eric, the Western auto sign being lit up, that's an interesting thing coming after the World Cup.

Lisa.

I mean, I think data centers is a huge story that's not going away for years.

But I picked a tragic story in western Kansas.

Another high school football player died on the first day of summer practice.

I think the fifth high school or college football player in Kansas to die in summer of practice when it's so hot outside.

We're still awaiting details about whether the heat was a factor, but we have to figure out how to protect our student athletes today.

I think this region is going to have to come to grips at some point with the petition process.

Edgerton, independence, State of Missouri.

City of Kansas City, who either have a process in which people can go to the ballot box or you don't, and they're sort of half in, half out is going to leave everyone angry, council members and citizens alike.

It needs to be fixed.

And on that we will say.

Our week has been reviewed.

Courtesy of KCUR”S, Lisa Rodriguez and Channel 41s Charlie Keegan from next page KCEric Wesson and news collumist The Kansas City Stack on Substack.

Dave Helling and I'm Nick Haines from all of us here at Kansas City PBS.

Be well, keep calm and carry on.