A public-relations specialist who had a $40,000 contract with the City of Kansas City, Missouri, appears to be struggling to produce evidence that she was worth the money.
In 2009, the city formed a committee to study a potential 1,000-room convention hotel. The committee received $500,000 to hire consultants, and a portion of the money wound up with communications pro Kim Carlos. What kind of work did Carlos perform? She has canceled three meetings with city officials to discuss the subject, indicating that she's (a) a busy gal or (b) embarrassed to say.
Some background: The convention-hotel committee is made up of members of the City Council, bureaucrats and business leaders. The committee has identified a site for the new hotel and is evaluating the proposals that two developers have submitted. The project will cost a staggering amount of money ($350 million, by one estimate) and will require substantial public assistance.
Throughout the process, the committee's chairs, Councilwoman Cindy Circo and taxi-and-limo man Bill George, have tried to emphasize that the committee's role in to bring the best possible deal to the city, should the City Council decide that a new convention hotel is worth the risk. And why would a fact-finding committee need a press agent? Hard to say.
The deal raised eyebrows (mine, anyway) because Carlos had advised Circo's 2007 campaign. Circo said she distanced herself from the award of the $40,000 communications contract.
Carlos' gig lasted six months. Last November, the committee turned over paid flack duties to Jane Mobley, who was in the news for her company's $234,000 contract to help the General Services Administration crisis-manage the contamination problem at the Bannister Federal Complex.
As for Carlos, chances are that she did not undercharge for her services.
On December 17, The Pitch asked the city's Convention and Entertainment Facilities division for any materials that K.C. Consulting submitted while working for the convention-hotel committee. Officials at the city set up a meeting with Carlos to discuss the request. She canceled.
Another meeting was scheduled. Carlos canceled.
A third meeting was scheduled. Carlos canceled.
Unable to interact with Carlos in person, city officials have only the paper record to consider, and it's a thin one. Apparently, they found a couple of press releases. "If she did more," says Nathan McCommon, the business manager of the Convention and Entertainment Facilities division, "I haven't seen a product to represent it."
Carlos told The Pitch in an e-mail on Friday that she would call on Monday to talk about her work. But it didn't happen.
UPDATE [11:15 a.m., January 18]: Carlos called this morning and spoke about K.C. Consulting's efforts.
First, a correction: Her contract lasted for six months, not a year, as the post originally stated. Carlos also noted that her work was somewhat different than Mobley's in that Mobley is working as a subcontractor to C.H. Johnson, a firm the convention-hotel committee has asked to evaluate the hotel proposals that two developers have submitted.
Carlos disputed the suggestion that she left the city empty-handed. She says she attached "all of my documentation of our work product" with her invoices when the city inquired. "In addition to, obviously, media releases, we have an entire communications plan. We have our database. We have the steering committee meetings. There was a separate communications subcommittee -- we met and built that. We have [a] frequently asked questions . We have a fact sheet that was developed."
At the same time, she allows that the city may not have the fruits of her labors in one neat pile. "I am trying to put it together for them all in one nice package," she says.
As for the delays, Carlos says she needed to spend time in mid-Missouri in order to tend to family. "I basically was out of town for three weeks because my grandmother was ill," she says.
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Well, that's one of the answers. It also helps that she's white, reasonably attractive, just connected enough and eager to play the same pocket-lining game that has enriched so many in this town. (Jane Mobley, are you listening?). Prediction: She'll be running for City Council in a few years -- and will win.
What did Kim Carlos do for the $40 grand from city hall? She's just one of the little group of insiders, contractors, lawyers, developers, general grifters, and assorted hangers-on who makes it their business to work the candidate game and manipulate the system to make sure it works finanacially for them, their families, and their friends. And they know that the public and the mlocal media are so exhausted from being frozen out and taken advantage of for so long, that there'll be no exposure of their self-dealing and no public outrage even if the taxpayers found out.
Next question!
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