News & Issues
Stories from around the Kansas City Metro area on a variety of topics.
Three Strikes: KC Public Housing Smoking Ban Puts Onus On Tenants
Despite the well-known risks, rates of smoking have remained stubbornly high in Missouri – about 25 percent of adults, compared with 18 percent nationally. In Kansas City public housing, the problem is even worse, with smokers comprising 40 percent of all tenants. That high rate is especially disturbing to health advocates because of the high…
Coalition launches to fight stigma of mental illness
Organizers on Wednesday unveiled a new partnership that builds on a mental health initiative started in the local Jewish community. The aim of the effort, known as the Greater Kansas City Mental Health Coalition, is to broaden to other parts of the metropolitan area the message from the Jewish community that it’s all right to…
Hall foundation gift propels KU Med Center building project
A $25 million gift from the Hall Family Foundation has generated the funds needed by the University of Kansas to move forward with a critical building project on its medical center campus. The gift, announced Tuesday at the KU Med Center, gives the university most of the $75 million needed to construct a new medical…
KC Week in Review: KC "ride share" feud heads to Federal Court….
Kansas City’s feud with Lyft heads to federal court. City officials are trying to put the breaks on the new ride sharing service. They claim Lyft and its pink mustached vehicles are operating illegally in the city. Its drivers, they argue, are bypassing the normal screening and certification process and have not paid the required…
Curator’s Choice: National Archives at Kansas City
This month marks the 60th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, case, which stated that segregated schools are unconstitutional. The historic decision was handed down May 17, 1954. Just a few years earlier, the District of Kansas upheld a state law that required black and…
Plans advance for mental health crisis center in KC
Representatives from a broad spectrum of agencies and organizations, including hospitals and courts, are crystallizing plans they hope will help solve a health problem in Kansas City, Mo. The issue is that people who are high, drunk or in psychiatric crisis clog emergency rooms and tie up first-responders with needs more suited to mental health…
Bigs, Littles bridge time between visits with tech
Big Brother Tom Cowherd and his Little Brother Aaron, now 18, have been matched for 10 years — paired in the youth mentorship program at Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Kansas City. They have spent the past decade playing football, fishing and going to movies. Aaron’s mother, Kathy Wilmes, enrolled Aaron in the BBBS-KC…
Entrepreneurship, education meet in the form of a hot dog cart
E.B. Wiltz is passionate about three things: good sausage, quality construction and creating better opportunities for young people in the urban core of Kansas City, Mo., through his organization Brother for Another. A construction worker by trade and Cajun by birth, Wiltz got the idea to work with a group of five young men to…
KC Week in Review: After a year of talk, the KCI Task Force finally makes a terminal decision. Plus, Overriding Nixon: What Missouri’s big tax cuts mean to you…
After a year of study, there’s finally a decision. A task force appointed by Kansas City Mayor Sly James says they’ve wrestled with all the information and decided that the metro needs a new single terminal at KCI. Also on this edition of KANSAS CITY WEEK IN REVIEW, Friday May 9th, 2014 at 7:30…
Missouri Likely To Remain The Only State Without Prescription Drug Database
Missouri has a distinction that troubles many involved in public health: It’s the only state in the country that does not monitor prescription drugs. Some say that heightens the problem of prescription drug abuse. Missouri legislators are trying to create a drug monitoring system, but concerns over privacy have stirred opposition. Rising abuse Since the…