Subject: Unified Government

• 'Developer' Sued Over Shirt Bill

  February 8, 2008

• Ex-GM exec investigates BPU

  November 11, 2008

• BPU handed out 21 no-bid contracts

  The black eyes keep coming for the Kansas City, Kansas, Board of Public Utilities. Yesterday, a legislative audit was released showing that the utility company failed to seek competitive bids for 21 of 25 contracts valued at more than $50,000. I'd heard for a couple of years that the BPU wasn't bidding contracts. Finally, a legislative audit report from Tom Wiss and a special master's report proved it. The reports were commissioned after the indictments of the BPU's Chief Administrative Officer

  February 6, 2009

• Color bind

  August 15, 2002

• The Give-a-Shit List

  This week: vet candidates to thin the ranks of crooked officials in Wyandotte County, vent about KCP&L jacking up your electric rates, get involved in an East Side beautification effort that continues to flourish without city handouts and toss a pair of old shoes for your under-shod neighbors in Africa.

  March 9, 2009

• Kansan: UG Commissioner calls Star reporter a 'Klansman'

  Mark WiebeI've met The Kansas City Star's Mark Wiebe. He covers the Kansas City, Kansas, Board of Public Utilities, and he does a pretty good job. He's hammered the BPU in his columns -- and rightfully so. Wiebe seems like a pretty good guy, so I'm shocked why anyone -- let alone a Unified Government commissioner -- would call him a "Klansman."  But the Kansas City Kansan reported today that UG Commissioner Nathan Barnes labeled Wiebe a Klansman in front of a couple of reporters at a meetin

  March 10, 2009

• UG considers stronger oversights of BPU

  BPU watchers definitely want to read Mark Wiebe's column in The Kansas City Star's Wyandotte Couny section about oversight of the troubled utility company. Wiebe does a great job of outlining the failure of the BPU to self-police and the need for independent oversight. The Unified Government looks to be fed up with letting the BPU raid the liquor cabinet while mom and dad are out of town. The UG is thinking about keeping a closer watch on the BPU. Last Thursday, BPU General Manager Don Gray said

  March 11, 2009

• The vision of Kaw Point nears completion

  Five years ago, when Robert F. Kennedy Jr. stood in the parking lot near Kaw Point Park, an overgrown spit at the confluence of the Missouri and Kaw rivers littered with debris and wafting the odor of dead fish, someone in the crowd asked him what he saw. The noted clean-water activist said simply: "A squandered resource." Mike Calwell was there that day. In fact, he and his wife, Laura -- and their work with the Friends of the Kaw -- had brought Kennedy to the gritty industrial bottoms jus

  March 24, 2009

• Kansas’ foray into casino gambling makes a joker of everyone

  December 4, 2008

• Municipal Court judges really get around — and rarely pay their own way

  November 13, 2008

• Kansas State Senate candidate Kelly Kultala fears a political hit man

  October 30, 2008

• Letters

  October 30, 2008

• Monopoly Boy

  The second-in-command of Wyandotte County’s power company faces a 57-count indictment.

  October 16, 2008

• Letters From the Week of August 14

  August 14, 2008

• Letters From the Week of July 31

  July 31, 2008

• Anthony Mots was driving the firetruck that killed Aaron Becerra. Afterward, Mots’ brothers in the Kansas City, Kansas, Fire Department rallied to defend him

  July 17, 2008

• From Our Readers

  July 5, 2007

• Disney Delusions

  Signing up to blow a billion bucks, WyCo leaders look like Dumbos.

  June 21, 2007

• Lunch Money

  November 30, 2006

• A Real Gas

  May 4, 2006

• Water Worked

  We drag the river for stuff you didn't know you were missing.

  September 29, 2005

• Can Kansas City turn its trash problem into an opportunity?

  April 23, 2009

• Unnatural Habitat

  Not everyone who moves into a Habitat for Humanity house finds a dream home.

  June 26, 2003

• Heaven Is Hell

  March 27, 2003

• Bearskin's Gamble

  Introducing the 81-year-old Oklahoma man who has laid claim to some of Wyandotte County's richest real estate.

  September 12, 2002

• A Sorry Free State

  While Quindaro rots, slaves who escaped to freedom there must be turning in their graves.

  March 21, 2002

• Jailhouse Knock

  Wyandotte jailer angered many coworkers.

  July 26, 2001

• Inmate Apparel

  March 15, 2001

• Care Ward

  A mall goes on life support as a department store closes.

  February 8, 2001

• House of Horrors

  Kansas regulators wouldn't close Christine Allen's house of horrors -- until a state trooper ordered them to.

  January 25, 2001

• Oh, Give Me Your Home

  With deceptive contracts, landlords trick KCK housing inspectors by 'selling' slum houses to tenants -- but the poor buyers find that some sales are never final.

  January 18, 2001

• Building Inequity

  The region's real estate boom is but an echo in Wyandotte County.

  January 4, 2001

• Kansas City Strip

  All we want for Christmas is snow-free streets.

  December 21, 2000

• Cruise Control

  Sheriff Leroy Green finds out that the Unified Government isn't so unified.

  November 2, 2000

• Loop Road remains a place of controversy

  Last month a bystander was shot and killed at Swope Park, resurrecting the debate over safety at the Loop.

  May 4, 2000

• The Give-a-Shit List

  This week: Celebrate Earth Day in the cinema, the public forum or out in the field; get schooled by local and national experts on how to stem the foreclosure hemorrhaging; be part of the dedication of Precious Doe Memorial Park; and hear the thoughts of a now-famous mom who's still rallying activists against the Iraq war years after her son's death.

  April 20, 2009

• Quindaro Ruins: as important as the Grand Canyon

  Here's a little news about what may be Kansas City's most sacred ground.A lot has happened since 2002, the last time we wrote at length about the Quindaro Ruins. A town that once stood on a hill at the Kansas City, Kansas, edge of the Missouri River, it was a stop on the Underground Railroad. Forgotten by time, then threatened with becoming a landfill, the land on which runaway slaves first set foot on freedom is slowly turning into a place where people can go and wander paths to see the remaini

  April 28, 2009

• The tragic story of how Kansas City leaders, blinded by the Wizards’ pro-sports glamour project, turned their backs on an idea that might actually have saved Bannister Mall

  September 17, 2009

• STAR, TIF... WTF?

  Courtesy of Populous​Owners of the Kansas City Wizards now want to build a stadium at Village West in Kansas City, Kansas. In this week's feature, I describe how the decision jolted public officials in Kansas City, Missouri, who thought the Wizards were going to kick soccer balls at the site of the old Bannister Mall.KCK's capture of the Wizards is being credited to Sales Tax and Revenue (STAR) bonds. A state program, STAR bonds essentially created Kansas Speedway and the Village West shopping

  September 16, 2009