News & Issues
Stories from around the Kansas City Metro area on a variety of topics.
Federal Agency Concerns Over Homeless Situation at Ilus Davis Park has KC Downtown Council Scrambling
By Kevin Collison Ilus W. Davis Park, the centerpiece of the downtown Kansas City Civic District, has become a regular sleepover spot for homeless people, irritating a prominent next door neighbor, the Federal Aviation Administration. The Downtown Council has asked the Kansas City Parks Board to impose a night-time curfew in the two-block park in…
Kansas City Museum Opening Downtown Exhibition Space in the Historic Garment District
By Kevin Collison The Kansas City Museum is opening downtown exhibition space this summer in the 800 Broadway building in the heart of the Historic Garment District. The 3,300 square-foot space on the first floor of 800 Broadway will feature both displays and programming beginning Aug. 16, according to a release from the museum. Hours…
Olathe Native And Former U.S. Health Official: GOP Health Bill Poses Threats To Families
Olathe native Tim Gronniger served as a top official with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services under the Obama administration. Currently a non-resident fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, he also was a senior adviser for health care policy at the White House Domestic Policy Council, a senior staff member for Rep. Henry…
(Faith)fully Serving Listeners
Virtually every Sunday morning for more than two decades, the Rev. Robert Lee Hill has left his Brookside home before sunrise to make his way to the studios of KCMO radio. The live talk show he co-hosts with Rabbi Michael Zedek and Bill Scholl of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas has also become…
‘Praise The Lard’: A Barbecue Legend Shows Us How To Master Smoked Chicken Wings
Mike and Amy Mills are a father-daughter team from southern Illinois. Mike was trained as a dental technician. “I made false teeth — crowns, bridges, partials — this type of thing. It’s what I did as a trade,” he recalls. “Later on, I started barbecuing just for the fun of doing it.” And that’s what…
Downtown Spring Housing Tour This Saturday
People interested in living downtown Kansas City will have an opportunity to visit 11 residential developments this Saturday, June 3, in an open house event sponsored by the Downtown Neighborhood Association. The DNA Spring Urban Living Tour runs from 1- to 4 p.m. Saturday and features both new and historic renovation projects. Most of the…
Welfare Spending Drops As Fewer Kansans Receive Cash Assistance
Kansas is on track to spend less than a third of what it did six years ago on cash assistance and to serve a third as many low-income people, according to a state budget office memo. Those numbers have been falling steadily since Gov. Sam Brownback took office in 2011, when Kansas began incorporating work…
Eating Chocolate, A Little Each Week, May Lower The Risk Of A Heart Flutter
There’s a rich body of evidence that links chocolate to heart health. Now comes a new study that finds people who consume small amounts of chocolate each week have a lower risk of developing atrial fibrillation, a heart condition characterized by a rapid or irregular heartbeat. “The rate of atrial fibrillation was 20 percent lower…
Without Big Trade Deals, Missouri Farmers Worry They’ll Lose Out
President Trump made campaign promises to pull the U.S. out of big international trade deals and focus instead on one-on-one agreements with other countries. But that has farmers worried they will lose some of the $135 billion in goods they sold overseas last year. Two years ago, Missouri rancher Mike John expected the U.S. beef…
A Community Rebounds, Copes After Targeted Murders
Since that bloody Sunday in April 2014, when a neo-Nazi targeted Kansas City’s Jewish community, this area’s 18,000 Jews have been adjusting to the reality that evil forces still want them dead. The three people he murdered — two at the Jewish Community Center, one at nearby Village Shalom — turned out to be Christians,…