Current News

Mar. 11, 2004
Bonds should fix the basics in KC
YAEL T. ABOUHALKAH, Kansas City Star

Get ready for the campaign speeches and slick brochures in mail boxes.
City Hall is rolling out explanations for how it wants to use up to $300 million in bonds being considered on the April 6 ballot. It will be one of the largest requests in Kansas City's history.
Elected officials are concentrating their attention on a $250 million proposal to repair streets, bridges, parks, public buildings and other city assets.
Advocacy groups are touting separate ballot items of $30 million for the zoo and $20 million for Liberty Memorial.
The major topics for voters to consider so far:
• The $250 million package is the star of the show. Most of the money would go for the best possible cause — fixing what the city already has.
These priorities include too many substandard roads that damage vehicles and clogged catch basins that cause flooding.
But Mayor Kay Barnes and the City Council also passed a resolution setting aside $50 million for new projects. They likely would include an aquatic center north of the Missouri River.
Plus, $19 million of the zoo bonds would be used for enhancements such as a polar bear exhibit. And the $20 million for Liberty Memorial would go for a new museum.
That's $89 million for new projects from bond funds that, instead, could have been strictly set aside to deal with the city's huge backlog of basic maintenance.
• Elected officials have outlined sensible, general ways to use much of the bonds for vital upgrades of city assets. It was a commendable start to build voter trust.
However, the city failed to tell voters exactly how it wanted to use the first large chunk of bond revenues, which could reach about $100 million over the next three years. Taxpayers deserved to know what their money would buy.
Putting out this list would have had another benefit. It would have told voters, before the election, when the city planned to give money to the zoo and Liberty Memorial, if those issues are approved. Now, that's uncertain.
• Bond supporters constantly point out that issuing the $300 million would not require a tax increase.
True. But how the city pays for the bonds still would affect residents.
First, the city would have to dip into its current maintenance budget. The city estimates it would be taking $11 million a year out of this pot to help pay for bond debt by the end of this decade, slashing into an already inadequate maintenance budget.
Second, the city would not reduce its property tax levy when some current debt was paid off starting in about six years. Instead, the property tax would stay at its current level, producing funds to pay for new bond debt.
If they approve the bonds, taxpayers would not receive a tax decrease that's scheduled to occur in the next decade.
• So what's to like about the city's financing plan?
It would pump more money, more quickly into basic repairs.
Say the city issued $100 million in bonds over the next three years. Add that to the city's regular maintenance funds, and the city could accomplish almost $200 million worth of capital improvements over that time.
Without the bonds, however, the current maintenance fund would pay for only $111 million in projects over the same three years.
• In mid-February, I invited readers to say what they wanted from the bonds. Responses were overwhelmingly clear: Fix the basics and don't spend money on new capital projects.
A sampling of comments:
“Concentrate, for the next few years, on catching up with our deteriorating infrastructure — even if this means putting new projects on hold.”
“I may be an oddball, but I don't mind paying taxes if they are used wisely and everyone pays their fair share. I do mind paying taxes when I see big private corporations getting huge tax breaks while our city cuts more and more services and defers more and more maintenance.”
“In this case I am tunnel-focused. We absolutely, positively must improve what the city is supposed to do — furnish basic city services.”
I agree. On April 6, voters will decide whether the city fashioned reasonable ways to do that with $300 million in bonds.

Mar. 10, 2004
Zoo supporters promote bond issue
By MATT CAMPBELL The Kansas City Star

Kansas City Zoo supporters launched their campaign Tuesday to persuade voters to approve $30 million in bonds on April 6.
They waved pink and blue posters with a polar bear peeking over the top asking citizens to “renew our zoo” by voting yes on Question 2.
The money would be used to catch up on deferred maintenance as well as to fund a polar bear exhibit, a children's zoo, restoration of the original zoo building and improved visitor accessibility.
“My hope is that people recognize the opportunity we have here,” Jackie Johnson, co-chairwoman of the zoo campaign, said at a gathering inside the original 1909 building. “This (zoo) is one of Kansas City's greatest assets. This bond issue really gives us the opportunity to jump-start, to renew our zoo.”
James E. Stowers III, president of Friends of the Zoo, called the vote “a no-brainer” for citizens because it will not result in a tax increase.
Paying the debt service, however, would require using some City Hall funds that could be used for maintenance of other city infrastructure.
Of the zoo's package, $11 million would go for maintenance projects that have been neglected because of a lack of funds. Those include roof repairs and improvements to animal holding areas.
Another $11 million would rejuvenate the area of the old bear pits by creating a modern polar bear exhibit. Four million dollars would rehab the 1909 building for a year-round tropical exhibit near the zoo entrance, and $2 million would create a children's petting zoo.
The remaining $2 million would improve visitor pathways. Those improvements would include making a shortcut from the entrance to the African exhibits.

Tue, Mar. 02, 2004
KC begins campaign to pass $250 million bond issue
By LYNN HORSLEY, Kansas City Star

The Kansas City StarTwo-hundred public buildings. Nearly 500 bridges. Nearly 6,000 miles of roadway lanes. And that's not counting 1,790 miles of sewers, 83,000 streetlights, 725 traffic signals, and 30,000 catch basins.
It's a daunting amount of infrastructure that Kansas City has to maintain in its 317 square miles.
That's why supporters say voters on April 6 need to approve up to $250 million in general obligation bonds — to begin to deal with the huge maintenance backlog that confronts the city.
“The needs are great,” Mayor Kay Barnes said today in starting the campaign for Question 1 on the ballot. If approved, it would be the largest general obligation bond authorization in the city's history. City officials say it won't require a tax increase. But it will need 57.1 percent voter approval to pass.
The bonds would not be issued all at once and not all projects would be built immediately. Instead, the bonds would be issued in $50 million increments every two years and completion of projects could take a decade or more.
The City Council has not provided a specific list of projects, but it has listed broad categories of work: 30 percent for street preservation and reconstruction; 10 percent for bridge rehabilitation; 10 percent for catch basins and drainage; 10 percent for city buildings; 8 percent for streetlight upgrades; 12 percent for park facilities; and 20 percent for such new projects as a Northland aquatics center.
Barnes acknowledged that the bonds would not solve all of the city's maintenance backlog, which totals as much as $1 billion. But she said they will provide money more quickly than the city's traditional approach _ fixing projects slowly, on a pay-as-you-go basis.
“This is responsible; it is the right amount of money,” Barnes said of the proposal, adding that Kansas City has “no other viable option” for tackling its maintenance problem in a timely manner.
The April ballot will include two other bond measures. Question 2 seeks approval for up to $30 million for improvements to the Kansas City zoo. Question 3 seeks approval for up to $20 million for a new Liberty Memorial museum.

Feb. 16, 2004
Barnes advocates three bond issues
By Mike Rice, Kansas City Star

Three bond issues on the April ballot would go a long way in tackling a nearly $1 billion backlog in deferred maintenance, Kansas City Mayor Kay Barnes said Sunday.
“It’s the right thing to do and the responsible thing to do,” Barnes told several dozen persons at the All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church near the Country Club Plaza. “And in the future, I think we will look back at this and say we really made the right decision.”
Barnes addressed the three bond issues, the proposed city budget, a possible health-care tax increase to help stave off more than $8 million in cuts to the city health providers, and other issues at the forum.
The ballot questions, on which Kansas Citians will vote April 6, seek approval for up to $250 million in general obligation bonds for infrastructure, up to $30 million in bonds for the zoo and up to $20 million in bonds for the Liberty Memorial.
City officials have not identified specific projects that would be addressed with the $250 million bond issues, but have said that percentages of the funds would be devoted to streets, bridges, curbs, city buildings, streetlights, parks and new capital projects.
Most of the debt services on the bonds, especially in the first few years, is expected to come from the city’s maintenance fund.
Barnes stressed that the bond issues, which require 57.1 percent voter approval to pass, would not result in a tax increase. City finance officials, she said, have suggested that the city make more use of general obligation bonds to speed up infrastructure repairs and catch up on deferred maintenance.
And now is a good time to issue bonds because interest rates are low and the city has a strong bond rating, Barnes told the audience. Without the bonds, she said, the city’s planned maintenance projects would be financed on a pay-as-you-go basis.
“the longer these projects are delayed, the more expensive they will become in the future,” she said.
Barnes added that the more than 250 neighborhood assessments that have been done throughout the city as part of FOCUS, the city’s long-range plan, show infrastructure needs that could be included in the $250 million bond issue.
Barnes also talked about the challenges reflected in the proposed 2004-2005 city budget. The budget, proposed by City Manager Wayne Cauthen, calls for the health-care cuts and water and sewer rate increase to deal with a $40 million revenue shortfall.
To restore the $8 million in fund cuts for indigent health care, Cauthen has proposed an increase in the health tax levy for the August ballot. Barnes said she has proposed ways to close the funding gap for the health-care providers such as Truman Medical Center, Children’s Mercy Hospital and Swope Parkway Health Care until such tax is passed.
The options, which Barnes elaborated on last week, range from an across-the-board 0.6-percent reduction in proposed general-fund expenditures to salary adjustments and mandatory no-pay furlong days for city employees.
“These are options that none of us like,” she said, “This will be a year for us to bite the bullet like we never have before.”
Barnes added the Cauthen, who came to Kansas City last year from Denver, has “done an excellent job.”
“Wayne was a chief of staff to a strong mayor in Denver,” she said. “He was in a political environment, so he is sensitive to the community and multiple interests in a way that the traditional, academic city manager, which we have had in the past, was not”
Despite the challenges, Barnes said there are many things that Kansas Citians should be proud of. The city- thanks in large part to growth in the Northland and other suburban sections – leads the metropolitan area in the number of housing starts. The number of new residential units between the Missouri River and the Plaza has grown by 5,000 in just three years. And the revitalization of downtown is in full gear, especially with H&R Block’s decision to move its headquarters downtown.
And she used the example of two local sports personalities as she challenged residents with a negative viewpoint of the city to change their attitude and “get into the Tony Pena/Dick Vermeil way of thinking.”

Feb. 12, 2004
KC Council works out priorities for bonds
Lynn Horsley, Kansas City Star
The Kansas City Council is poised to vote today on a resolution spelling out how it would spend $250 million in bonds if voters approve them in April.
The resolution, if passed by a council majority, calls for spending the money on broad categories of infrastructure, such as streets, bridges, drainage and park facilities.
An exact list of projects is not being identified. But the public Improvements Advisory committee, a citizens’ oversight group, would recommend projects to be funded by each bond issue. A second committee of finance experts would recommend the timing and amounts of the bond issues.
The money would be spent in the following ways: 30 percent for street preservation; 10 percent for bridge rehabilitation; 10 percent for city buildings; 8 percent for streetlights; 12 percent for park facilities; and 20 percent for new capital improvements.
The council’s Finance Committee endorsed the resolution Wednesday as a way to speed up the city’s infrastructure repairs and begin to catch up on the huge maintenance backlog.
“This is a very exciting and terrific opportunity for us to deal more effectively with our deferred maintenance needs,” Mayor Kay Barnes told about 40 neighborhood representatives Wednesday night. She said most other large cities use general obligation bonds to fix infrastructures, but Kansas City has not frequently done that.
“We are not doing anything that hundreds of cities have not already done,” she said.
The $250 million in general obligation bonds is one of three bond issues that voters will consider April 6. Another issue would authorize up to $20 million in bonds for a Liberty Memorial museum. A third ask for up to $30 million in bonds for zoo improvements.
All three questions require 57.1 percent voter approval to pass, but city officials point out the bond issues would not require a tax increase.
On Wednesday night, some neighborhood leaders were skeptical of the city’s plans. They wondered whether the projects would be equitably distributed throughout the city and address the most pressing needs first.
If voters authorize up to $300 million in bonds, current plans call for the to be issued in $50 million increments every two years, beginning in August. Annual debt service on each $50 million bond issue is projected to be about $3.7 million.
The final bond would come in 2014-15. The maximum annual debt service, once all bonds are issued, is projected to be $24.6 million, although that depends on interest rates.
The city expects to pay that bond debt through three sources: the existing capital maintenance fund, surplus revenues as the economy improves, and revenues that will be freed up as other general obligation debt is retired.
Finance officials have said they are confident Kansas City can issue up to $300 million in bonds over time without having to raise the current property tax levy. The city can afford to pay the annual debt service on that amount of bonds with existing tax revenues.
The money for debt services will not come from the city’s one-cent sales tax for capital improvements. That tax generates about $60 million each year, and city officials assured the neighborhood representatives that money will still be used annually for capital improvements.
But city finance officials caution that the plans for financing the bonds could be jeopardized if voters only approve the museum and the zoo ballot measures and not that basic infrastructure measure.
That is because most of the debt service on the bonds, especially in the first few years, is expected to come from the city’s maintenance fund. The reason for issuing bonds is to accelerate work on Kansas City’s existing list planned maintenance projects that would other wise be financed on a pay-as-you-go basis.

Feb 7, 2004
Bond issue resolution sheds light on list
By Gene Hanson, Dispatch Tribune

A resolution that gives some insight into how the proceeds of a proposed $250 million bond issue will be spent was introduced to the Kansas City Council Thursday, Feb. 5.
The package will go to the voters in April.
Although the lion’s share of the money will be spent on roads, bridges, storm drainage and streets, two projects in the Northland were mentioned as examples in the resolution: improvements on North Oak Trafficway and a new aquatic center in Platte County.
The resolution is nonbinding, and an oversight committee, yet to be appointed, will decide on specific projects.
Mayor Kay Barnes said there was no specific list of projects because the council needed the latitude to respond to changing needs.
The bond issue will require a 57 percent approval by voters to pass and will not require a tax increase.
Voters will be asked to approve a total of $300 million in bonds on three proposals. In addition to the $250 million for maintenance, voter approval is sought for $30 million in improvements at the Kansas City Zoo and $20 million to complete the museum at the Liberty Memorial.
The council will consider resolutions on all three proposals next week.
The resolution calls for 30 percent of the $250 million to be spent on street reconstruction, 10 percent on bridges, 10 percent on catch basins, 10 percent on municipal buildings, 10 percent to upgrade streetlights outside the Kansas City Power and Light area and 12 percent for park facilities.
But voters will not know what specific projects will be funded until after the election. The oversight committee, which will decide on specific projects, will not be named unless the bond issue is approved.
The committee would consist of several city officials, citizens appointed by council members and the mayor, the chairmen of the City Plan Commission and the Public Improvement Advisory Committee.
Northland council members John Fairfield and Bonnie Sue Cooper gave a list of Northland projects they thought should be considered for funding to the council’s Finance Committee several weeks ago. It is not clear what those projects were.

Feb 7, 2004
Plans for zoo, memorial
Kansas City Star

Over the last decade, Kansas Citians stepped forward to save Liberty Memorial with a superb restoration, and the significantly expanded the zoo. Soon voters will be asked to further improve these worthy institutions. Liberty Memorial is our city’s and our nation’s important testimonial to World War I history. But to transform it into a broader educational site, especially for children, it needs an expanded museum. On April 6, voters will decide whether to help build such a museum under the monument’s deck. Voters also will determine whether to repair older parts of the zoo while adding new animals and renovating some exhibits. Each intuition will have a separate bond issue on the April ballot; city officials say they can pay off the bonds without raising taxes. On Wednesday, supporters should start clearly explaining hoe they will use the money. The City Council Finance Committee will review resolutions that ought to be approved this month, far before the election. The resolution should contain only promises that can be kept, to boost the credibility of the two projects. Liberty Memorial backers want authority to spend $20 million to help build the museum. Memorial officials have a plan that focuses on programs and educational information to schoolchildren, teaching them about the consequences of war and important part of U.S. and world history. A museum would serve that purpose well. The Liberty Memorial Association – a nonprofit group that soon will operate the monument – has pledged to raise all the extra money needed to build the museum. A few council members have discussed requiring the association to come up with those private dollars before the city would release public funds. But the public – rather than the philanthropic community – should make the first decision on a vital project. A more complex task faces zoo Director Randy Wisthoff and the Friends of the Zoo, which operates the facility. They are asking for $30 million in bonds, with about one-third for capital improvements. Zoo officials already have a good case for using bond money to repair water lines, sidewalks, roofs and other physical assets. These are basic repairs, long ignored by the city. However, Wishoff still must give voters more details about the new exhibits and additions he wants to bring to the zoo to boost attendance. Preliminary plans include restoring the children’s petting zoo, renovating the original zoo building into a rain forest and improving visitor transportation. Each bond issue will require 57.1 percent voter approval, a super majority, which gives Liberty Memorial and zoo supporters good reason to be as precise as possible with their spending plans. It could mean the difference between victory or defeat on April 6.

Oct. 24, 2003
Two firms to draw up master plan for KC Zoo
By Matt Campbell, The Kansas City Star

Two Philadelphia companies have been chosen to create a new master plan for the Kansas City Zoo.
The Friends of the Zoo on Wednesday approved contract negotiations with CLR Design Inc. and Schultz & William, two independent companies that have worked together before.
Randy Wishoff, the newly selected zoo director, told Friends members at their annual meeting that he expected to have preliminary ideas by spring and a new master plan to present to them by this time next year.
“We’re going to build a zoo that reaches all the needs of our visitors,” Wisthoff said.
“Zoos are businesses, and they are family recreation destinations. They are not cheap to operate, and they are not cheap to build.”
Wisthoff has said he expects improvements to the zoo to cost $100 million or more. He has said he wants to bring in penguins, and he said Wednesday that he would like to bring tigers and bears back to the zoo.
CLR Design’s projects include a Chinese forest exhibit at Zoo Atlanta, a primate exhibit at the Philadelphia Zoo and an arctic exhibit at the Toledo Zoo.
Schultz & Williams specialize in helping nonprofit organization generate funds through marketing and management strategies.
Wisthoff, who officially begins work Nov. 17, said he expected attendance at the Kansas City Zoo to be about 403,000 this year, down from 425,000 last year. He said he had set a conservative goal of brining attendance back to the 2002 level next year.