This happened fast.

No excuse.

Absentee voting now underway in the big Frank white recall election this week, we're taking the recall debate on the road.

Tonight.

We're bringing our cameras, along with hundreds of your friends and neighbors, to the Kansas City Plaza library for an hourlong special edition of the program.

A frank decision.

Jackson County's historic recall vote, is a power grab, to get me out of my office so that I believe that the stadium vote is plays a big part here.

It is about our property access.

It isn't about the stadium.

You're misreading us, this taxpayer.

Thank you so much.

Let me just make it real clear.

This recall has nothing to do with the color of his skin.

It has everything to do with his political.

I know I get two minutes, nine people on that.

Okay, I know we can review is made possible through the generous support of Dave and Jamie Cummings.

Bob and Marlese Gourley, the Courtney S Turner Charitable Trust, John H. Mize and Bank of America na Co trustees, the Francis Family Foundation through the discretionary fund of David and Janice Francis and by viewers like you.

Thank you.

To recall or not to recall, that is the question over the years, by the way, as long as I've been doing this job, we hear about recall elections all the time.

Mark Funkhouser, when he was mayor, they wanted to recall him.

Quinton Lucas, mayor of Kansas City, not once or twice.

And the poor mayor over in Prairie Village, there have been eight, nine actually recall efforts against him over the last few years.

None of them, though, have gone absolutely anywhere, which makes what we're going to have as this vote right in front of us so rare and historic.

And over this next hour together, we're going to look at the pros and cons, the impact implications and ripple effects of this big vote with Jackson County Executive Frank white.

Thank you for being with us.

First of all, can I count you as part of the no side?

Yes.

In this, but also with us is Shawn Smith, who has been one of the most outspoken supporters of the recall effort on the Jackson County Legislature.

Though, he's one of the only people, one of the only people who couldn't be appointed to this position if this recall a successful because he's a Republican.

we'll have more on that in just a moment.

Megan Smith right over here, was the only member of the Jackson County legislature who didn't vote to authorize this recall election.

That doesn't mean she's a full throated defender of the Jackson County Executive, but she has a lot of questions about where if this is the right move, we'll get to them during this program and some political scientists, some political scientists have called recall elections the, quote, nuclear bomb of politics.

This isn't good for democracy, for somebody to just collect a bunch of signatures to oust somebody from office with us, to get the impact and repercussions of this vote from the political science department at the University of Missouri, Kansas City, is Greg Vaughn to me.

Thank you so much for being with us.

and I've certainly been reading a lot of interesting articles of late from around the country about concerns that its elected leaders of color who might be more likely to be recalled.

By the way, Gwen Grant, the CEO of the Urban League, joins us to weigh in with her perspective.

but thank you.

There's also a sixth panelist, and it's you will be hearing your questions 20s or less.

Everyone, there's a lot of us.

no big statements or essays or diatribes, 20s or less.

Ask a question of the panelists.

But let me start.

Frank white, if I ran into you at the local grocery store and I saw you all the county executive, I heard there's this recall election against you.

I'm picking up my cornflakes from the cereal aisle.

Why should I vote no on this?

I think you should vote no on the recall.

Because the recall itself, is it's really, it's a power grab.

it's a power grab, to get me out of office so that I believe that the stadium vote is plays a big part here.

prior to the stadium vote, the recall was going nowhere.

After the stadium vote and $400,000 went into the recall at the recall election.

So I really feel like it's a paragraph for, for politicians and for backroom deals for the stadiums.

Sean Smith, what has the Jackson County Executive done so terribly wrong that he should be ousted from office by voters?

Yeah.

So I'd say that's a question for the voters.

I think the most frequent reason that I hear is because we've had such a struggle to get our assessments right, not just in 2023, but even before that.

And lately in 2025, with respect to commercial assessments, that and I think the public a lot has a perception that Frank isn't working for them, by not showing up for legislative meetings while we're in the middle of a, a budget stalemate, by locking the legislatures out of his offices and the executive offices.

And and that includes keeping us from our own county council.

it's just apparent from the inside and from the outside that the desire to collaborate and fix things isn't there.

How do you respond to that, Mr.

White?

I think those are all false statements.

I've been in office for ten years, and my door has always been open to anyone who wanted to come and visit and talk.

and for us, locking folks out there.

And I have no clue as far as the meetings go, Nick, I don't have to attend their meetings.

These are their meetings.

I send my people to their meetings as a courtesy.

but I don't have the attending meetings because our legislative our setup is different than the city set up, where the mayor is part of the legislature.

He runs.

I mean, the city council, he runs the council.

He gets a vote.

I don't even have a vote.

So I go because I'm interested in things, but I'm not mandated to be at every meeting.

Megan Smith, what problem does the solve?

A recall in any in any fashion can cause a great deal of collateral damage, regardless of what the reason is.

Because at the end of the day, the ones who end up paying the largest cost are our taxpayers and our communities.

And I personally don't think from my own experience that removing one person from office for whatever your reason may be, and I'm not saying that your reasons are not justified, won't push the ball forward as far as governing is concerned.

I mean, you've seen, you know, the biggest claim that Franklin show up to our meetings.

I honestly don't think that Frank's showing up to our meetings.

The legislature function any more cohesively than what it is right now.

So the legislature has to take a great deal of blame as well as part of this whole process, because we are here to work together.

We hear a lot about property assessments as being one of the main causes of concern of voters.

If Frank white is recalled on September 30th, do we fix the property appraisal mess?

The property taxes go down.

Short answer no.

And and I'll say the reason why is because the assessments are only a piece of your property tax bill.

And in fact, right now in the month of September, your taxing jurisdictions, which are those multiple entities that we pay our tax, our taxing dollars to.

So if you look at your bill, you see your school districts, your fire districts, your city, if you're not in the unincorporated area, those assessments and those levies that are being set right now are being those meetings are being held in the month of September.

Those are public meetings.

They they invite public comment.

And so when you get your bill that is going to be due December 31st.

What's happening right now, in the month of September in your various jurisdictions, weighs a lot on what that amount will be.

If you're unhappy with Frank white, why not just vote him out at the next election?

Well, see the importance of understanding why a recall is to know that the recall measure is an opportunity to get for the voters, for the public to have redress when the elected official failed the people.

And in this case, this is not about a power grab, as the county executive is claiming.

This is about poor failed leadership.

So it is important to say I don't have to go to the meetings.

It's really disrespectful of the legislative process.

Every county executive before Frank white attended meetings and worked collaboratively with the legislature.

The county executive has said he will not seek reelection.

No, it's going to be it's going to be in about a year.

He'll be out of office anyway.

Why not just wait till we don't need to leave another year?

There's too much, costs to have Frank white in another year.

Seven.

I can give you 70.2 reasons why I believe that we are still sitting on $70.2 million in Arpa funds, that he has stonewalled, as opposed to getting those dollars on the street into social service organizations.

He can't even answer the question when, on one of the news stations, how many meetings have you attended?

I can't answer that.

Well, I would think the county executive would be able to say, I've only attended, what, ten out of 80, whatever that number is, just say that will answer this question.

Mr.

white, are you are you still intent on leaving office and not running for reelection?

If you are successful, yes.

But in response, a hung up on these meetings, these meetings that are not my meetings.

They're meetings where I have my chief of staff, my chief operating officer.

They're all at these meetings as a courtesy to these to these meetings.

so this this recall election is costing us $1.8 million of money that I think can be saved.

I don't I don't think that, is responsible, governing to, have to go through, one, $1.8 million election.

I want to bring in Greg Vaughn in the middle, not putting his finger on the scale person from Umkc, but as Americans get so frustrated with their political system, are we having more of these recall elections?

Are they more frequent now?

short answer is no.

so if you look over the last ten years, recall elections follow a little bit of a sore tooth patterns.

Some years are a little higher, some years they are a little lower.

But is there any great trend towards a significant increase or decrease in recall elections?

No.

By the way, I did look up actually last year that there were 108 recalls across the country.

77 of those leaders were removed from office, 31 survived, 33.

But just as interestingly, 16 officials resigned before the election and one leader in Flint, Michigan, died before the recall.

vote was held.

so just because a recall election is added to the ballot, many voters are willing to give elected leaders the benefit of the doubt.

Greg.

you see?

Yes, yes.

No.

so that's a great academic answer.

that is our major line for our tease of this program is.

Yes.

No.

so do they give them the benefit of the doubt?

Yes.

if you look nationwide.

So most local elections that we see are at the local level.

There's no federal recall process in the Constitution at all states, mostly don't allow recalls.

So most of what we see, we see at the local level, on average, about one out of every thousand in a year local elected official will face a recall effort.

Most of those, as he talked about locally, fail.

Once they get on the ballot, then most of them succeed.

Thank you for that.

By the way.

We're going to be getting your questions, but we've already heard because we we know we've been doing this.

We've had a lot of our own viewers call in.

One of them is Frank.

I hope it's a different Frank.

But we had a Frank from Jackson County who says, do the owners of the royals and chiefs immediately declare their staying in Jackson County if Frank white is recalled?

So of course not.

But I think one thing is they tried to work with Frank for years, not not just before April in 2024, but they tried to work with him before the election in 2022, and they've consistently said that they couldn't constructively work with him.

Usually he would send staff.

So we start to detect a pattern, and it's not clear that he's even aware what his staff is doing.

Let's not get get it twisted or forget the Chiefs.

The Royals are a business.

And just what?

A year ago in April, we were in this very same room when that question made it to to the ballot and whether they refused to negotiate with Frank and his team is completely beside the point.

They were willing to to accept a 40 year, almost $2 billion tax on the backs of you all without any promises or any type of community benefit agreement in writing legally binding, that would, that would tell them what what that would tell the teams what they're going to do to the community.

So whether the teams say they're going to stay or they're not is null and void at this point.

And the voters vote very clearly in April and said, regardless of our love and our history with the teams and what what this county has done for the teams, we have to be able to take something back.

And what are you going to do for us?

And that question was unanswered all the way to and through to this day.

Mr.

White, what you guys have to understand is that I stand between you and and in terms of getting a good deal from these teams right now, Jackson counties paying more and getting less, we're spending $54 million a year and getting 6 million in return, the city spending 2 million a year and getting 18 million in return, the state spending 3 million a year and getting 36 million in return.

I wanted to negotiate a better deal for you, the taxpayers, with the teams.

Right now, they got the best deal of any sports teams in the country where they've had absolutely zero.

And all we've done is paying taxes.

And and that's why I was able to, send them a proposal that said, okay, let's, let's do the three sales tax, let's do it in one third.

It's one third for you, the teams, one third for the county infrastructure and safety and one third for public health.

No response at all from the teams.

So as Mr.

Smith say, I was in third negotiation with these teams and they basically had a run around me with two of the legislatures to legislate to put it on a ballot, which they can do without my consent.

And that's what they did.

So it wasn't the fact that I was not negotiating with the teams that the teams had a better deal.

They had a better deal with the legislature who was going around me to get this on the ballot.

And like Smith said, when this was put on the ballot, there was no agreement with the teams.

We didn't know what the rules were going to go.

We didn't know what the Chiefs were going to do, but yet they voted on the ballot with no agreement with with Miss Smith correctly said it would have cost U.S.

taxpayers 40 years of taxes at $2 billion.

Thank you very much, Gwen Grant.

Well, the let's get back to the original point.

It is not about the failed stadium deal, Frank.

Recall is about poor leadership and incompetence and the unwillingness to work with the legislature to solve problems on behalf of the people.

Mr.

white, Mr.

white has seven years.

Mr.

white has said this is a political, sideshow funded by a dark money group trying to score sweet tart deals on the next stadium.

They're upset.

He says he didn't rubber stamp the stadium vote.

Who funded the recall effort?

It is funded by through a 5 a.m., AC4, which is a nonprofit.

And I forget the name of it and got it in your notes.

The name of the.

But it's the C for before I can legally accept, private donations and private donations.

So this whole notion that, oh, it's dark money, which is more than is a lot of rhetoric, basically, it it protects nonprofits.

It protects people against retaliation.

If someone knows if someone works for Jackson County and they want to, make a donation because they're not pleased with the county executive, if their information's out there, there's subjecting retaliation.

Let's let's talk about retaliation to an increasing number of stories around the country, news stories talking about how, elected leaders of color may be more likely now to be subject of recall elections.

Does that pattern worry you?

First of all, let me just make it real clear.

This recall has nothing to do with the color of his skin.

It has everything to do with his political affiliation.

Let's just be clear about this, because I am a black woman and I support the recall.

So?

So race has nothing to do with it.

Greg.

So I'm not aware of any published studies that have shown a racial bias in recall elections.

the elections are district based.

you know, most of them are city councils, school board elections, who face recalls, many states, by the way, require there be a specific reason to initiate a recall.

Kansas is clear cut.

There has to be a felony conviction, misconduct in office, or failure to perform duties as prescribed by law.

Is there any reason that has to be stated in the Jackson County charter to recall a public official?

Just unless you just don't know.

so this is strictly putting the power in the hands of the voters and the residents of Jackson County.

That's what our charter does.

The idea that some standard would have to be met before that, if people are disenfranchized and upset with their leaders, they ought to hold them accountable.

And I think that's when we talk about what comes next.

The most important thing is what comes next is the next person knows this can happen to them if they don't do a good job.

So I think this is vitally important to to change the trajectory of Jackson County, which has been challenging for some time.

Our last county executive went to federal prison, so we need to change the trajectory.

And a recall election is as much about putting on notice all elected leaders in Jackson County, one of which is me.

And I admire the voters that have signed this petition without fear, without fear of retaliation, which is real.

I hear it from people every day.

If I sign this or my property taxes going up, that's not where we want to live.

Megan Smith, are you concerned about the domino effect that could include you?

Well, for me personally, no, I'm not concerned about the domino effect.

because the way I choose to govern and lead is, I mean, I came into this position with a certain level of morality and integrity, that type of stuff.

You just can't you can't learn on the job.

have I had to learn some things while in this position?

Absolutely.

I've had on the job training is is real.

When you're in you're when you're in government because no one knows what it's like to be a legislator, to be an executive or whatever that position is until you're in that position.

but the intangible things, give me that confidence to, to make decisions and stand on the courage of my convictions and not worry about the domino effect, which more recently you've seen when, the petitions were certified for this election.

Absolutely.

The the constituent spoke very loudly.

However, when I did learn additional information and how having an election on August 26th would, coincidentally, disenfranchize certain segment of voters, well, I had to back up on that.

And I think as an elected leader, once you know better, you do better.

And as you learn and you evolve, you make better decisions.

So I think, for a recall to happen, I mean, our charter is is very clear cut.

It's not or it's not as clear cut as Kansas.

You know, a lot of our things are done based on how people feel in that moment.

but I think the domino effect could be real with the type of, leaders that we have in the future.

I know you've got something to say, but we have a lot of questions coming in.

Angela is one of them.

With a question for you, Frank white has legally challenged the recall effort, claiming the signatures were not collected in compliance with Missouri law.

Is there a time limit on when signatures have to be collected, or is it open ended?

I think it's open ended right now.

so so if it's open ended is not in violation of Missouri law, that's fix that to Trump's, county.

so right now we're at that point now that we haven't been able to challenge this in the courts, to see if there is an issue there.

But, we're moving forward with with what's in front of us.

But I want to respond to Mr.

Grant's and talk about my leadership.

quite frankly, don't think she even knows what my job is.

when you're talking about county versus city, I mean, you talk about me, I'm holding back legislators from doing certain things where I've just put up $30 million and, and funds for disadvantaged communities.

when I took over, I, I don't want to be the next county executive in the same mess that I got in when I got it here.

So I've.

I took a pension plan from 74% to 93%.

You know, I took a paid family leave from six weeks to 12 weeks of fertility benefits to health care.

You know, I've funded health initiatives in our community, doing Covid.

I spent $120 million in our community when when the governor wouldn't fund our cities, funded our cities in Jackson County, have fun.

Funded our health departments, all our school district, all our first responders.

and both my health department and I spent $40 million on housing and rental assistance.

So to me, that's leadership.

That's taking it.

That's taking the bull by the horn and making things happen.

Thank you.

Gwen.

Leadership.

Leadership requires collabo duration with from a county executive.

It requires collaboration with the county legislature for joint decision making on behalf of the people who put all of them in office.

So, you know, yes, your job is to be the, executive administrator over county affairs.

It is also your job to work with the legislature, to arrive at a budget that is in the best interests of the people of this county, and not to single handedly, veto an entire budget rather than line item vetoes, because your entire that veto formed so many institutions and organizations and the very people you funded, and then you vetoed the budget so they couldn't get any money.

So I don't know, like that's a contradiction.

Well, I'm still talking the budget.

I am still talking Mr.. County executive okay.

So we know that under his leadership, we have a failure on the property assessments.

We had $70 million in Arpa funds still sitting unused.

We have a building sitting down there that he wants to invest millions of dollars in.

It makes absolutely no sense.

We have people, even though the budget has been approved, the very people who work at Jackson County whose raises are being held up because he's sitting on that.

I mean, we can go on and on and on and list a number of reasons.

I know what your job is about and you're not doing it.

And that's why we need to recall you're behind Frank white.

You are now talking.

I think Mr.

Grant is definitely misguided on this, on the on the issue of the budget.

We give the legislature a balanced budget on November 15th.

They hold it, as long as they want to hold, it has to be passed on December 31st.

And when that whenever I get the budget back, I have a ten day look at it to see if I need the line item veto or veto the entire budget.

But they gave me the budget on December 31st, and then I said, you don't have time to look at it.

Then they pass what they the changes that they made without me looking at it.

And then when I did me till the entire budget, then that's when they filed a lawsuit on the budget.

That's why we took us six months to get a budget passed.

But when you look at what was in the budget, they they cut they cut salaries.

They cut salaries in my office, county counsel's office, the HR assessment collections, their job was not to fire people.

Their job was to give us a reasonable budget to pass.

Then they tried to move our finance department underneath the legislature.

When I saw that I had to do veto the whole budget, why wouldn't you just say, I don't need this job anymore?

I quit because that's not me, okay?

I didn't become a world champion running from things, so.

Okay, okay.

By the way, we're going to take your questions.

If you have a question you can ask in 20s or less, but any panelists can answer when you can come to the microphone.

But I got a lot of questions here, including from Charles, who writes, I won't vote to remove Frank white until I know for certain who his replacement will be shown.

How do you respond to Charles?

Yeah.

So first off, the recall question is just that it's a recall question.

the one other large county that I've ever found that actually did a recall was in Miami Dade in 2011.

They didn't have a replacement until they held a special election almost six months later.

So the fact is that this is this is not unprecedented.

To not know who's next.

Just like any election when somebody decides not to run.

So what we have is good options that have been presented to us already.

And the hope is that we'll have even more options so that we can make a great choice that can help get the county out of the mess that Franks.

Lieutenant Greg, I don't like the states, though.

Actually put two questions on the ballot, one to say, do you want to recall that official?

And secondly, there's the list of candidates who would be appointed or elected, if if that person is recalled.

Yeah, there's basically three ways of doing it.

So some places you'll see a recall and a replacement on one ballot.

some places you'll see a recall.

And then if it's successful, you see an election afterwards in some places, which is more the Jackson County model, you'll see a recall.

And then if it's successful, it essentially creates a vacancy.

And then the vacancy is filled, usually using the usual vacancy process.

And by the way, the California governor, Gray Davis, was recalled.

And they had a second question.

And that's what that's how Arnold Schwarzenegger became governor.

He was one of 135 people on a huge list of who should replace them.

And it doesn't take much of a vote at that point to actually win.

And that's exactly what happened in California.

Of course, we're not from California.

We're right here at the Plaza Library.

Listening to you with your question, madam.

Yes.

For Miss Smith, you said there are there's collateral damage to doing a recall, and I would be interested to know what those damages are.

Thank you for doing all of that.

In less than 20s you get a Kansas City, you get a Kansas City.

And Megan, yes, that's a great question.

Thank you for the follow up.

well, in short, the the immediate collateral damage is $2 million.

That cost to actually conduct this election that wasn't budgeted for.

That's something that is bought and paid for by the taxpayers.

the other type of collateral damage really was alluded to from, Charlie's question that Nick had, proposed with what's next?

a lot of people may not agree with Frank's leadership, however, they're not too sure about ousting Frank, because they don't know what's next.

It's kind of like that, that, devil, you know, type of scenario.

And so the collateral damage, that you faced when you were kind of in that situation of unknown or you have a lot of community services and a lot of, the county's not only in charge of assessments, were in charge of public health, were in charge of public safety.

Those types of things just kind of screeched to a halt somewhat until there's some type of stability and of course, not to mention just the erosion of trust that's been just growing within the county, even though it's not require it under the charter to actually name who this person is.

Couldn't the Jackson County Legislature voluntarily, for the benefit of being transparent to the voters, say this is who we would name if Frank white is recalled on September 30th, why not do it voluntarily?

Absolutely.

That's best possible.

What I would say is there's a couple of impediments to that.

One is that, we don't know yet who the best candidate is because new names will continue to appear until the recall is successful.

The next Jackson County executive could be this man.

Oh, I don't know.

We don't know that term.

No question.

Sir.

with all due respect, Mr.

White, how on earth do you feel that you don't have to communicate with your own fellow legislators?

And you repeatedly have said that up here?

I don't have to show up.

You only solve problems in this country by face to face communication.

And one final thing it is about our property taxes.

It isn't about the stadium.

You're misreading us as tax payer.

Thank you so much.

Your chance to respond, Mr.

White.

Thank.

And in terms of, of showing up, I'm there every, every single day in my office every day.

We have meetings every Monday to go over the agenda.

my door's been open.

I've met with every legislator when they first came into office.

so I laid out what the county was all about.

Well, we had ahead of us what we can move forward with.

But when you look at a legislative branch, sometimes they get five votes, and those five votes stay together.

And regardless of what you do, what you do, I work with different legislators on different projects.

but they still vote and a block.

And it's hard to get things moving when you have five legislators who vote in a block, you have four legislators who want to get something done, but they can't get anything done.

Can I ask you this?

Then how would your life be any easier if you survived this recall vote and was still in office?

Then for another year and a bit, well, I would, I would, I would just implore the legislature to, communicate that we have a lot of things that we need to get done at the county.

like I said, right now, we're in the middle of trying to do a pay study.

we're in the middle of trying to, maybe do another, retirement, an increase in the pension.

so we have a lot of things that we have on the on the table.

Like I said earlier, there's $30 million already.

RFP that's out there that the legislature will have to vote on who gets those funds when.

So allowing Frank and the county executive to stay in office.

Another year will just result in a year of lost time and progress because he refuses to work with the legislature.

He's not worked with any legislature that has been there since he's been in office.

And to say that, oh, if I'm there, they need to do he's not talking about what he needs to do.

So everybody needs to cross over and do what Frank wants.

And the reason we don't get any progress is because if those five people vote against something, because they don't agree, he's not willing to communicate, collaborate, to try to find middle ground.

That's been the problem.

But he hasn't worked with any legislature productively since he's been down there.

Okay, Sean.

So the idea, the idea that it's five members of the legislature that always vote in a block is just a fallacy.

The fact is that Mrs.

Smith, when she was Mrs.

Marshall, in our first year, was consistently with a certain group of five.

Things have changed and they have evolved for me as I realize the challenges that were coming from the executive branch and that early on, the folks who I thought were trying to grab power were, in fact trying to balance power, trying to do their jobs in a way that the executive and his staff did.

Okay.

What do you what have you done to work with Frank?

Why?

I have reached out to him and his staff consistently.

I can produce for you a memo where he's decided just in the last couple of months to direct every legislative inquiry through one specific individual, one of the same individuals who gave themselves a raise last month.

So we're ready for your question, Frank.

I really like to read together on ball field with our kids.

We're playing ball.

And even after I became county executive, I saw you once.

I thought you were a good guy.

But I got to ask you.

You don't seem to appreciate the way you were talking about these funds you did for this and how you say that's that?

That's our money.

That's our tax money.

That's not your money.

That's not so much anybody else's money.

I just was wondering, why don't you think a little more about that way of looking at it?

Well, sir, these these funds are being put back in the community, these these funds that I'm talking about, this $30 million, the RFP that's out today is for disadvantaged communities.

So that is your money working for the community?

Mr.

Smith?

I've never refused.

We've never had a face to face meeting when he first came in office.

And he's never requested a meeting since then.

So he's always met with, my, my county administrator, but never to me, face to face.

So I've always, been available.

I mean, when we look at when Mr.

Smith wanted to get radios for, for long, Jack and Greenwood, we got radios when Mr.

Donna Payton wanted money for housing.

This $3 million in the budget for housing when they wanted money for, outside a this is a $6 million in the budget for our state agencies.

they want a street lights and blues summit.

We've got that ready to go.

They want a playground equipment and blues summit that that's ready to go.

So we're doing our job now.

The notion, the notion that you can send your staff to a meeting that we elected you to do is disrespectful of the people who put you in office.

We didn't elect your staff.

We elected you, and we expect you to show up in these meetings and negotiate and work on behalf of that.

So why do you do that then, Mr.

White, if that's true?

Well, I went to meetings earlier, in their tenure, but the meetings turned out to be performative politics.

it was one of those if you if you go back and look at a lot of the agendas, there's a lot of things held.

And then and then we get down to, Mr.

Smith and Mr.

Abarca.

It's just, it just performative politics.

So it's never anything being passed.

It was always hold this, hold this, hold and go back and look at agenda.

I mean, it's there for you to see.

And I think that was it for me not going.

And I usually would go and make some type of announcement of what something good is going on in the county, but it turned into performative politics, and I really felt like if I wasn't there, then things would get moving along and would still had to happen.

I'm assuming you got this t shirt from a thrift store.

It's just random.

It doesn't say how we are voting on this election, but your question, madam, my question is, I know Frank remembers this when we were at a meeting out in town, I asked, I literally was standing in a puddle of tears for my friends.

And.

Right, because it was hit harder than any other city.

And I asked Frank, how can you just sit back and watch this happen to all these people, people at the property assessments?

Yes.

And your your answer to me.

Mr.. Fired me.

You said you don't understand.

The lobbyists are not doing their job.

How are the lobbyists supposed to do your job?

I'm wondering okay, okay.

Thank you.

That's to me.

Okay.

And friend, your wife has to clarify, Mr.

White.

Thank you.

Mr.. Thank you.

Well, I don't I don't recall using the word lobbyist.

that I mean, when you look at what we're mandated, we're mandated by the state to do assessments.

We don't make these decisions at the county level.

When we follow the mandates of the state tax Commission.

And then my assessor puts a plan in place around those mandates.

That goes back to the state tax Commission for their recommendations and approval.

Then the final, of this plan that she puts together has to be passed by the legislature before it goes in the in the action.

I'm going to pause some of the questions.

Just a second.

Stay there.

Miss.

I just want to clarify.

So so we don't miss out on something I talked about.

We don't know who would be the county executive if Frank white is recalled on September 30th.

So, Megan Smith, who decides who will fill Frank white shoes if he is recalled?

the chair of the legislature appoints a interim for 30 day period, and then that is voted on by the full legislative body.

What if the full legislature can't agree on that person?

Well, which is very likely to happen, right?

I have been watching the means to Frank white.

I would that's what I would say.

If that doesn't happen, then the decision is made by the presiding judge of the county, Judge Harrell.

Okay.

Well, I think I think it's important to point out that if there is, it takes five votes to appoint that person after the 30 day.

So the county, the chair appoints for 30 days, and they have for the first 30 days, then they have what is another 30 days.

Actually, we have to make that decision within the first, the 30 days.

So that temporary appointment might only serve a day.

and Frank says we vote as a bloc will, and it should be pretty determined if there's going to be five votes for somebody if we're all voting is a bloc, right?

Yes.

You can't do the math.

Both ways and claim that you're accurate and honest.

Okay, madam, we ready for your question?

I recently heard about her kidney cancer, and I was curious to know, how were you able to have a kidney removed and take that amount of time off work, and nobody noticed?

I was only off work six days.

Asked and answered.

Do you have a question, sir?

Yes.

Thank you for waiting for us from.

Okay.

Hey, Frank.

Hi.

Thank you for being here.

I'm brand new to politics, and I'm glad your kidney stuff went well.

so I think a vote yes to recall you is to remove you from office.

But my question is, if you are not, recall, what are you going to do differently for your last year?

Thank you for that question, Mr.

White.

I'm just going to continue to move the, the things that we have on the agenda forward, hopefully with the legislature working with me.

I know we've got some pretty, key things ahead of us.

And I mentioned some of them earlier with the with the pay study, the pension, the multiplier trying to do some things there.

we have, administration building that needs to be, refurbished for, for, for the administration to come out of the courthouse and be one of the few cities of our size where the administration is actually located in the courthouse.

So the previous legislature voted that building to us, and we had the funding for it.

but this new legislature felt like they wanted to do a different, different funding source with these dollars.

And so the building is still sitting there with, assessment work in there and, more visualizations working out of it.

Greg, I want to bring you back in because another thing I'd been reading, looking at recall elections all across the country, is there was a concern among political scientists that not only does this undermine representative democracy, recall elections, we have votes.

After all, why do we need to do this?

But also it creates an environment in which an elected leader may not want to make a tough decision, because it's too easy to be recalled.

Yeah.

So, I mean, the first thing I would say is recall elections are very rare at this point.

Is it possible that they could be weaponized on a grand scale at some future point?

It's possible, but at this point, recall elections are really rare that the circumstances in which you see them are extraordinary.

You know, in terms of politicians making tough choices.

Yeah, I mean, that's something that that we look at a lot in terms of institutional design.

There are things that matter.

So particularly you look at like the fiscal health of the region, bond ratings, things like that.

That's where we often see evidence of tough, tough fiscal decisions either being made or not being made.

There's no systematic evidence that recall elections in some places or not in some places, impact the politicians willingness around willingness to make those decisions.

Mr.

white, you know, I think if you're an elected official that's trying to climb the ladder, I think it would be difficult for that, like the leader to make, tough choices.

It's very difficult in politics to make the right choice because of the repercussions that come from that.

But when I was elected, this is as high as I wanted to go.

I wasn't looking to go to state.

I wasn't looking to run for Congress.

So I was it was easy for me to make the tough decisions.

I make the tough decisions on Covid.

I make the tough decision on the stadiums.

So my that's my tough decision made because I'm from the community and they've made and and really look at the community and say, okay, is this going to benefit the community?

the stadiums that didn't benefit the community.

It doesn't benefit the community.

Now, what does the community get from the stadiums that get funded at 100%?

And so you get thousands of people in Kansas City that will never set foot in that parking lot, let alone.

And that's what would be the impact on Jackson County, in your view, then, if the Royals and the Chiefs decided to move to the Kansas side?

I don't think that's one thing that I want people to be clear, I my intention is to keep both teams in Jackson County, but I want to make sure that the teams understand that they have to have a relationship with the community.

It just can't be 100% give to the teams with no return to the community.

And I think when you look at the, the fact that a lot of people are making these decisions on on behalf of you, the Kansas City residents, don't live in Jackson County.

So so I think that's what you have to look at from us.

And my my standpoint is to look out for the taxpayers.

The taxpayers come to me and say, hey, we don't care what we pay on taxes or whatever.

You have to give these guys, give it to them.

Then maybe you look at it differently.

But as a as a leader of the county, I'm looking at it from the standpoint of where we are fiscally versus what, because right now it's not a good deal.

We're paying too much again to a little bit, but I'm just trying to make sure that I'm still talking.

Please.

Okay, okay.

You gave me the okay.

We'll even let me say what even and we can move on.

Thank you.

Okay.

So quite frankly, you failed the people.

when it comes to taxes, okay, the real estate property assessment debacle was a failure of the people.

But the important thing here is to understand that a recall is never easy.

And in this particular case, there's a high threshold to get this recall on the ballot, 43,000 signatures had to be.

So I mean, 42,000 plus signatures had to be certified, 43,000 signatures were certified.

That is a high threshold.

So it's never easy to do a recall, but a recall gives the voters redress when the leader has failed them.

And that is in fact democracy in action.

So it's not just, going to a grocery store on a couple of weekends, early in the morning, to make this happen.

Absolutely right.

It was a tremendous effort, first by grassroots folks that started well before the stadium vote was even placed on the ballot and scheduled for an election later with, some outside professionals, which somebody did choose to contribute and kick in the fact that they were fearful and did it through a 500 1C4 and in some cases are the same organizations that supported Frank in his original campaign and are now opposed to him.

That's interesting.

What I want to talk about is the hundred dollars or so per household in sales tax that was defeated, compared to the thousands of dollars per household that we jacked up people's property taxes in an unlawful way, and are still holding their quarter of $1 billion, a quarter of $1 billion for two years worth of receipts that the state Tax Commission was, Frank says.

We have to follow their orders.

He appealed it in court over the objection of the legislature.

And when he lost, he appealed it again and is still holding the money of the people that are sitting in this audience tonight and thousands of others.

That's a that's that's abysmal.

Thank you, sir, we're ready for your president.

Thank you, thank you, thank you all for being here.

I am a senior citizen.

So we're a little bit concerned about the taxes.

But my two questions are power grab I think the seat goes to a Democrat.

If I'm correct.

I don't know how.

That's a power grab.

Frank says he's not going to run again.

People can say whatever they want.

I would just wipe that off the slate until you actually see it happen.

And then I'm going to challenge my host here we are in Missouri, not Kansas when it comes to election law or thank you, sir.

Thank you for challenging me.

Mr.

White.

Your response?

The only response I have, on on the power grab, meaning that there are elected officials who want to give the teams everything that they want, and they're never going to get a better deal anywhere than they have right now.

And the backroom deals that are made, at your expense.

That's the power grab.

The power grab is to get me out of office, appoint their favorite person in there that they know well.

And I really believe that if I'm not in office next April, you will have a state and vote on the ballot.

And for this, for members of this legislature, excluding Mr.

Smith, to vote to put a tax on a ballot that's going to cost you 40 years of taxes at a cost of $2 billion, with no agreement in place to me, that's egregious.

That that question, I had a reference that to the political aspect of it all.

And one of the parts of the charter, Sean Smith, is that and if an elected leaders recall, they have to be replaced by a member of the same political party as the person, being recalled.

Many people are scratching their heads.

Why that's even in there.

Why does that make a difference?

Yeah.

So I'd love it if our charter had us nonpartisan.

Frankly, most of the things the county deals with are not Partizan issues.

we don't vote in the legislature as though we're Partizan.

So I very much like that to to change someday.

But for now, it simply is what it is.

It means that I'm not eligible and Miss Lowry is not eligible.

And name another Republican in the audience.

They're not eligible either.

what's interesting is that our boards and commissions, when people apply to participate in their government, ask what party you're with.

And we often have 75% of those right now are either not filled or they're or they're filled by people unexpired terms.

That's bringing the government potentially to a grinding halt.

And all of those appointments are part of what the county executive supposed to do.

And he's excluding 40 to 45% of the Jackson County population by not even considering Republicans.

Megan Smith, as you've gone through this arduous process of recall, would you support changing the recall provisions in the charter?

Absolutely.

What would you change?

I think the one question that the, the manager spoke there and ask about the party affiliation, I don't think the replacement should have to be at the same political party.

those are provisions that the legislature, knowing that a recall would have been an error, we could have gotten together, if we would have had cooler heads and made those provisions in place before we got to this state.

So, yes, I would support we've learned a lot.

Given that this is such a drastic measure, removing someone from office, should it require more than a simple majority vote, that we should have a higher bar than that?

That's interesting.

That's interesting.

You would ask that question.

I think that looking at the nature of of, special elections, when you talk about certain, areas of our county who have historically low voter turnout in regularly scheduled elections, I think that you do, invite an avenue of approach for those special interest groups and those different, organizations and outside interests to come in and influence, someone that the public has voted into office, because the numbers that you need to actually vote someone out are, are far less than what you need to put it on the ballot.

So I think that is something that is worth looking at.

and for the future.

And Greg Vaughn to me, are all there places that require a higher threshold to say, hey, this is a kind of a drastic measure here.

It should be more than just 50% of the vote.

There's no place that I'm aware of that that requires more than 50% to recall.

And of course.

All righty.

Thank you.

Yes, sir.

We're ready for you.

Thank you.

Frank, if I call you Frank, you seem to be reapplying for your job here, and there's a pretty large selection committee.

We've heard a lot about your strengths, your discussion of budget numbers and things.

Those are all opinion.

What is your greatest weakness as a leader?

And what can you do?

What can everybody do to help you overcome that?

Thank you very much.

I think every, every administrator, the weakness is going to be how do you bring all of your legislators into an agreement that we're going to work together on a regular basis?

And I think that is that is tough when each of the nine legislators have their own idea of what they want to get accomplished.

And sometimes that is not working with you as working with, what they want.

Because I don't I don't set policy for the county.

The legislature does all I recommend things to the legislature when they want to listen, but they don't have to follow my direction as they did with the, when they put the tax on the ballot.

You know, I said, don't put a use tax on a ballot.

And a and a reassessment year.

But they ignored me, put it on the ballot, cost us a $1.5 million.

And it got killed at the, at the polls when I said, don't put the chief's, tax on a ballot, let the chiefs pay for it and pay for it, because if we do it in April, it's going to cost us $1 million.

They ignored me and they put it on.

That was $1 million gone.

I'm looking at your face today because you're sitting here.

You don't meet with them and then you're saying, you know, we need to meet and work together.

And then you say, well, I told I told them to do this, and they did that.

You did not collaborate.

You dictate.

And that's why you don't get anywhere with the legislature.

I mean, it's just ludicrous to me that you would sit here and say, oh, the person needs to meet with them and work with them.

When you don't show up for a meeting, for a quick rebuttal, then, Mr.

White, there's a reason with this.

There's a reason with this legislature that you have for legislators who come to work every minority to try to get something done.

And you got five who don't, don't want to do anything.

So even even the four who want to get something done are stymied by these five.

They don't want to get anything done.

And you don't have to ask.

You don't have to take my word for it.

You can ask Mr.

Smith.

You can ask, Miss Lauer, you can ask Mr.

Franklin, you can ask Mr.

Anderson.

They want to get something done.

They're stymied because the other members of the legislature who are not on our panel.

Miss, we're ready for you.

Thank you, Mr.

White, could you please explain the reasoning behind the recent valuation of my agricultural property as commercial, despite it being actively used for agricultural purposes for over 11 years?

I can tell you that, as a county executive, I don't set values.

I'm not allowed to set values.

They're set by the Boe and the state task Commission.

But I will tell you that we'll have two years.

Jackson County is not a poor job of property assessment.

Oh, who is at fault for that?

Is that the assessor?

I think I think over the years it's just been a combination of assessor.

When I came into this office, our county assessor was just a friend of of a legislator.

There wasn't an assessor, when I hired, Miss Bailey, she was the first assessor that was hired by the county in some time.

So.

And I get your frustration.

But that is not of the purview of the county executive.

And if you read that in chapter 20 of our county codes, it reads.

And my only responsibility is to make sure that you have, an appeals process in place.

I can fix clerical things if you get double tax, if you have a wrong address, those type things.

Now you've got homework.

Next, read chapter 25, but I will, we're ready for your question.

I'm going to say this is the assessor was appointed by Frank white.

Yeah.

And not only does he therefore control that position, but also he sends us a budget request to determine what funds are needed.

And two different courts have determined that our assessment in 2023 was done with gross incompetence and that we denied people due process in the appeals process.

And Mr.

White didn't change anything for 2025.

So the fact is that it is ultimately with him because the legislature can't fire our assessor only now the community can, by first choosing to replace Frank.

Yes.

We're ready.

You.

Linda McClellan here.

And I am a real estate broker.

I thank you all for being here, Mr.

white.

I really respect you and I see a leader as a person that can delegate.

And it appears that you've done that.

I also see and believe that there are people here on the panel that are disgruntled employees.

Okay?

These high taxes has not just happened.

They've been going on for a long, long time.

And it's my understanding when someone says, this has nothing to do with color.

I want you to look at this audience we have here today, okay?

And second, what I want to say is my understanding there's nine people I know.

I get two minutes, nine people on that.

Okay, I know it's nine people on that legislation questioning the question is we have to go above and beyond.

You hold your head up and you march out of here knowing you've done a good job.

There is no question.

I'm just making a statement.

You've got support, Mr.

White.

Okay, let's go to you, sir.

All right.

Frank, I am a, a retired executive at a large company in Kansas City.

I had 350 plus people, and I found it appalling that you do not show up to meetings.

I find it appalling that you do not have communication out there.

And I want to ask a question.

Why now?

Are you standing up here and having your face on TV when you did not do that during the during the tax, assessment and you did not do that during the, Royals game or the Royals and Chiefs?

Also, have you ever talked about the, Kansas City sales tax that we're going to lose out on when the Chiefs and the Royals moved to Kansas and something that you might recognize.

You're out.

Okay, Mr.

white, you have a chance to respond to anything that you choose to from that at the I think I was in 13 negotiations with the chiefs of the Royals.

So that speaks for itself.

we'll we'll let that go.

Okay.

Let me ask you this.

What happens if Frank white survives this election?

Meghan, I think we need to get back in the drawing room and start learning how to work together, for this next year that we have, because there are still a lot of things at stake.

And, the taxpayers elected us to do a job.

and so that's what needs to happen.

Yes.

Mr.

white, you've just been successful.

You are not being recalled.

It's September 30th and you are staying in office.

What's the first big change you will make?

The first big change I would make would work with the legislature to try to get the, the funding out to the community.

That's not being, right now.

I got 30 million in an RFP at this time.

But they have they also have funds in their budget, for us ad agency funding that needs to get out to the community.

So just encourage them to get those funds out so we can move forward.

Will you hold a beer summit where you hug and make up with your fellow lawmakers here?

Yeah, I'm a I'm a team player.

So that's something I want to do.

I'll do I don't I don't mind that when you join in at the summit, I'm more of a whiskey guy, but.

Yeah.

Okay.

All righty.

Gwen.

So if he, survives the recall, he'll he'll be a lame duck county executive, and we can expect another 12 months of not, you know, unproductive governance in Jackson County.

So we will suffer a lot if we do not recall Frank white.

He will not make changes and he will not cross over and meet with the legislature.

Have you gotten done it in the past?

He's not going to start doing it in the next month.

Have you got that final balancing thought for us as we weigh this decision?

Greg, I get the final five.

yeah, sure.

is it a yes?

Yes.

No.

Yes.

No, this is this is just a straight yes.

I'm very grateful for everybody who comes at this with passion and different perspectives.

And I'm very grateful for for Nick and for everybody in the audience who so engaged with us.

Absolutely.

I was impressed that people were able to ask most of their questions in 20s or less.

You have been watching Jackson County legislator Sean Smith, Urban League CEO Gwen Grant, Professor Greg Vonnahme, Frank white, our Jackson County Executive and Jackson County legislator formerly known as Megan Marshall, now Megan Smith.

Congratulations.

Thank you.

And thanks to you for your questions.

remember, Election day is Tuesday, September 30th, and advance voting is already underway.

from all of us at the Kansas City Plaza library here in Kansas City and from our crew here at Kansas City PBS.

Be well, keep calm and carry on.

Yeah.

Okay.

I might.