The Committee for Research, Treatments and Cures must be getting used to rejection by now.
Tonight, the Citizens Association, a non-partisan, Kansas City political organization followed the lead of several other political and civic organizations and recommended that citizens vote against the proposed half-cent sales tax for “translational medical research.”
The Citizens Association is the fourth major organization to come out against the tax, which will be on the ballot throughout Jackson County on Nov. 5.
The others have been the local branch of the League of Women Voters, the local branch of the NAACP, and Freedom Inc., the powerful, east-side Democratic organization.
Dr. Wayne O. Carter spoke Tuesday night in favor of a half-cent sales tax for “translational medical research.” Standing to the side was Pete Levi, who also spoke on behalf of proponents.
The Citizens Association has been in existence since 1934 and has long stood for progressive and honest government. The association was largely responsible for breaking the Pendergast organization’s stranglehold on city government.
The association usually limits its range to city activities, but it made an exception in this case. Association Chairman Dan Cofran came out against the tax proposal on this blog on Sept. 5.
Members of the board of directors said the board voted overwhelmingly to oppose the tax, which would extract $40 million to $50 million a year from the pockets of Jackson County residents.
A news release from the Citizens Association said:
While well intended and thoughtful, local sales taxes are regressive, are getting too high in our community, and in any event should be used carefully to provide services that only government can provide, for example, basic local government services.
In addition, the community would benefit from having more time to consider this relatively complicated proposal.
Proponents of the tax — primarily the biggest business and law-firm leaders — dropped the tax proposal on the Jackson County Legislature three weeks before the deadline for the legislature to put a measure on the Nov. 5 ballot. After being heavily lobbied by the monied set, the legislature voted 7-2 to put Question 1 on the ballot.
…Before making its decision Tuesday night, the Citizens’ board heard from representatives of both sides of the issue.
Representing the Committee for Research, Treatments and Cures were former Chamber of Commerce President Pete Levi and Dr. Wayne O. Carter, president of the Kansas City Area Life Sciences Institute, which is a driving force behind the proposed Translational Medicine Institute of Jackson County.
Representing the opponents were Linda Vogel Smith of the League of Women Voters, Marcus Leach of Citizens for Responsible Research and yours truly, treasurer of the Committee to Stop a Bad Cure.
The board members had many questions for the proponents but none for the opponents.
Although the Committee for Research, Treatments and Cures is losing the endorsement battle badly, it has, as noted above, at least $1.5 million to spend on its campaign. Most of that has been contributed by the Civic Council of Greater Kansas City (from organizational coffers), construction and engineering firms, lawyers and wealthy individuals.
The proponents’ campaign will rely primarily on TV advertising and full-color, four-page mailers to frequent voters. They also have hired the area’s best local political consultants, including Jeff Roe, Steve Glorioso, Pat Gray and Pat O’Neill.
We, the opponents, will rely on appearances before neighborhood organizations, limited TV ads, newspaper ads, billboards, yard signs and flyers.
**
Of note to some of you, The Kansas City Star held fast with its apparent new policy of not reporting major endorsements immediately after they happen. Reporter Mike Hendricks attended the meeting, but he did not write a news story for the kansascity.com website.
Last week, the paper didn’t bother to send a reporter to monitor the Freedom Inc. board meeting and, on Friday, it relegated the Freedom Inc. development to a throwaway paragraph in an otherwise unrelated political column. If you could find it, Yael Abouhalkah also wrote a column for the website’s “Opinion” section. Neither piece made a printed edition of the paper, as far as I could tell.
It’s too bad that Star readers, most of whom VOTE, are not getting these significant news developments in a timely manner and on readily observable website pages.
The paper is missing a chance to connect with its core readers, baby boomers and elderly people, many of whom have subscribed for years and rely on the paper to keep stay informed.
Oh, well…let’s hope those readers hear the political news by word of mouth.
**
You can see the same story on the Committee to Stop a Bad Cure website…http://stopabadcure.org
JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC 
I thought Yael wrote an opinion piece that took our side.
He did, Larry. It was on Friday’s website under the Opinion section, not in the “latest news” category on the home page, with is what the vast majority of online readers go to, I would assume.
The only way you would have found Yael’s column would have been if you were trolling through each specific section heading. Ridiculous, in my opinion.
The paper’s avowed focus these days is “local, local, local” now that the paper is too thin to carry a significant amount of national and international news. So if they’ve gone local, why the hell aren’t they covering breaking political stories? A lot of readers still care…
I think you are winning Fitz.
When you look at it from this vantage point, it probably does, Chuck. But the consultants on the other side are experts at identifying “yes” votes, nurturing them and making sure they vote. They have frequent voters lists and phone phone banks, and the time and money to cull out the votes they want and need. (Their starting point might well be all the employees of St. Luke’s, CMH and UMKC who live in Jackson County. That alone could get them two or three thousand votes.)
The only way to beat them is for the opponents to make enough noise, get enough media and endorsements and, most important, enough people to the polls. Many of the “yes” voters will have a strong motivation to go to the polls, particularly those employees I mentioned. (Give us more medical research so we can keep our jobs!)
The majority of the vast pool of potential “no” voters probably won’t bother to vote, however. It’s a one-issue election, and it’s just as easy to stay in your daily routine and not cut out 15 minutes and go the extra mile, literally, to vote.
See the problem?
Well, now…I’ve figured out how to find out about political developments on The Star’s website.
Mike Hendricks sent me an e-mail this afternoon linking to this story about the Citizens Association’s decision last night.
And here’s all you have to do to find that story:
Go to the kansascity.com home page. Click on the “news” tab at the top. When that opens, you’ll see three columns of stories with links. The one at the far left says, “In this section.” Today, there are 10 stories in that column. The middle column is titled “More headlines;” it lists six stories today. The column at the far right is under the heading “Blogs and Columns.” Listed below that (today) are six links, one of which is titled “Buzz.” If you click on “Buzz,” you find the story that I linked to above.
See, it’s not too hard to find out what’s going on in politics; you just need a good map. (Suggest you create a Word file and put this on your desktop for easy reference.)
Jim,
Tax proponents have been trolling facebook w/ stories of people w/ health issues that they say will end once we get this ball rolling. I have posted a link to stopabadcure,org on each one of these. I have also cut and pasted some of the facts you have brought to light in you articles. Hope you don’t mind!
Also, if you have any yard signs ready I would love to decorate my front lawn with one. Let me know and thanks for stepping up to the plate on this.
Jason Schneider
P.S. I will try to get a donation in sometime next week, hope it’s not too late to help.
Thanks, Jason…That’s great. Good counterpunching.
I expect to have yard signs as early as Friday. I’m supposed to get 150 from the Citizens for Responsible Research, which whom I’m collaborating to some extent. The signs are good. I’ll let you and all the other readers know when i get them. I can drop two or three by the shop for you.
Well, maybe the reason they don’t report on these clubs is because Dave Helling just wrote a piece that says they’re unimportant anymore and have no influence. He points out that after the vote Freedom Inc.got 25K from Brad Bradshaw. Yet he made no mention that they turned down 200k from the pro tax people. Once again, welcome to our world.
http://www.kansascity.com/2013/10/10/4544639/clout-of-political-clubs-dwindles.html
You are so right, John. The Star fails to report the original news — the decision to oppose — and then reports the $25,000 contribution, like it’s some sort of eye-popping,under-the-table deal. And no mention of the $200,000, which was widely known. Sucks. Helling is slipping way down the reportorial ladder.
Watch RUCKUS. Not one dissention. No one likes this tax.
I’lll watch the re-run, Chuck. I had two meetings last night, one at Volker Neighborhood Association. Every meeting I go to, it’s like what you saw on Ruckus — seldom is heard an encouraging word (for the tax).
I feel like the word is getting out, that people are starting to pay attention and momentum is building against the tax.
When the proponents speak at meetings, like Volker and Citizens Association, they just don’t have a lot of bullets in their belts. And we’re usually able to shoot cannonball-sized holes in their case.
That points to another big advantage we have: PASSION. When Linda Vogel (League of Women Voters) and I speak to groups, our hearts and emotions are in it. The proponents usually do an OK job, but their presentations are flat; it’s like they’re trying to sell overly ripe bananas.
Thanks for your support, Chuck. The most important thing you readers can do is talk to everyone you see about this — everyone. Whether they live in Cass County, Johnson County or Jackson County, talk to them. The more people we get talking about it, that many more “no” voters will show up at the polls.
it’s essential that you take a sign up sheet when you give presentations so you can contact your supporters on election day and remind them to go out and vote. All of those law firms and hospitals, etc will show up so you’re going to have to hustle to make sure these people follow through. nothing else on the ballot to be motivated for.
Which is why no one watches Ruckus. It’s little more than a poorly orchestrated chorus on all of the current affairs programs over there. Indeed, they have a new scam coming that they allege to be a journalistic enterprise except they won’t tell you where they got the money. However, as luck would have it, George Soros has been funding projects just like this one so it’s pretty clear where the money came from and what strings are attached.
While I do despise George Soros, I can’t help but tune in RUCKUS. The condescension from Yale, the expectation of entitlement and faux exasperation at lack of concensus for that same entitlement from Gwen, the pedagoguery from O’Halloran the harridan juxtapositioned against Woody’s understated contempt (RUCKUS is a Liberal attempt at the “Knockout Game” every week. 3 on 1.).
This last week, if you are watching the program, there is a mention of Steve Rose and his support for Heil Hillary for president. Mary gets a chance to reminisce about her high times with Joe Biden and his salt of the earth qualities, which in turn, will, as she hopes, serve him well as president.
We are so fucked.
There for awhile they even had Steve Rose on as a conservative, a role I’m sure he was as uncomfortable with as those tuning in who were conservatives. But it’s an indication of how pathetic their programming is. Worse yet is that they’re using disgraced former news director at KCTV5, Sam Zeff for their projects. It’s the all left, all the time network and needs to be defunded. PBS is a useless channel that, like all liberal entitlements, has long outlived its usefulness.
Great suggestion, John. I’ll start doing that.