Retired autoworker Cynthia Canady has missed only a handful of Kansas City, Missouri, Parks Board meetings in the past three years. At every meeting she attends, Canady asks about progress on the replacement for the aging Southeast Community Center on East 63rd Street. In 2004, voters approved a bond sale to pay for projects like the community center, but Canady watched in frustration as a new aquatic center opened in the Northland and the Southeast Community Center didn't receive full funding until this past July. The president of the Swope Parkway-Elmwood Neighborhood Association, Canady is a persistent advocate without being annoying. "I'm trying not to lose my patience," she says. "I'm trying to be nice and not curse them out." We think she's probably too nice.
