Anxiety over crime now pushing Kansas City leaders to adopt big police changes from requiring officers to write.

So low in patrol cars to insisting they keep their flashing lights on all day long to help deter criminals.

Will it work?

Warning Get ready for the big month long streetcars shut down beginning on Monday.

And good news, you no longer have to search for loose change to feed the media when you're heading downtown.

The bad news?

Get ready to pay $40 to park.

We look at the uproar over Kansas City's new parking meter changes.

And the election may still be about 40 days away.

But this week, Kansas City is casting their first votes for president.

As absentee balloting begins, we look at the latest election issues and trends where we live.

Weekend 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 N.A.

Co Trustees, the Francis Family Foundation through the Discretionary fund of David and Janice Francis.

And by viewers like you.

Thank you.

Hello, I'm Nick Haines.

Hold on to your hats.

There's a lot going on this week.

Over the next 26 minutes, we take you on a journey through the most impactful, confusing and downright head scratching local news stories, taking you behind the week's top headlines from KCTV Five's Investigation unit, Angie Ricono from KCUR News.

Lisa Rodriguez From behind the microphone, the KCMO Talk Radio 95.7 and FM, Pete Mundo and from our metro's newest newspaper, next page KC Eric Wesson.

Now, amid rising anxiety over crime, Kansas City is scrambling to come up with new ways to show it's doing something.

This week, KC TV5 reported on a new list of recommendations for 20.

In all that are now being considered, they are contained in a new policy document from city manager Brian Platt that until now has been kept under wraps.

It includes 20 major ideas to change the police department mandatory overtime for police officers.

A proposed partnership with the Jackson County Sheriff's Department and eliminate the, quote, costly helicopter unit switch to drone.

Also on the list, no more buddying up.

It's recommended officers write solo in patrol cars to spread out staffing, keeping patrol, car lights flashing all day long to help deter criminals, reducing police presence at special events like chiefs games and modifying patrol cars to add larger, more visible police signage.

Okay, Angie, that was your story.

I found it so fascinating.

First of all, that was with an open records request.

This correct?

Immediately available, was it?

Right.

And I always think it's interesting to see what conversations are taking place behind the scenes.

And we know that there's kind of a frustration in this city with what's been taking place with crime.

So we wanted to know if there were some conversations being said.

And of course, it's important to point out that we don't have local control, that the police department answers to a police board of commissioners.

But this represents what they would like to do if they could.

And you are seeing some of these things taking place, like merging 911 that was also in the document.

They want to merge police and fire.

So some of these ideas we do start seeing that they're bubbling up.

But things like sharing staffing with the Jackson County Sheriff's Office, I thought that was an interesting one.

It is.

I think there's a lot of frustration with like bigger events because you lose so much of the patrol at those things, like an arrowhead.

So what do you do to protect the city?

I think that's the biggest one they're talking.

And Eric, I was interested in know, no more buddying up in police cars.

They would have to ride solo so we can spread out the staffing around the city more.

But I thought one of the reasons for doing that in the first place is to keep officers safe.

It was to keep.

Okay, So if they ride up on something, they need a backup.

They'd have to wait for another patrol car to come because they would need another officer.

So having two officers in the car, they could address the situation immediately.

The interesting thing, though, is going to be is not I don't think it's so much the border police commissioners, as I do the RFP and the contract that they already have and adding these other things to the contract, I think might be a little bit much.

But I to Andrea's point, Angie's point one of the things that I've heard this week was that the chief of police would meet with the city or the mayor about it.

It's like, I don't want to talk about it.

I'm not going to address it with you.

And there's other avenues in which they could address it.

How much difference does making bigger police logos on vehicles and keeping the patrol vehicles lights on all day long?

How much of a difference does that really make?

I think increased visibility can make some difference.

I don't know that keeping lights on all the time would be better or cause more confusion, particularly as a driver.

What I'm trying to get out of the way of a police vehicle, but certainly these tower cameras that we've seen in some entertainment districts, if you know that someone's watching, you may be less tempted to commit a crime.

So there is something to say about visibility.

But this story in this list to me is is a sign that the city knows that all eyes are on them.

And whether they have control with police or not, they need some sort of proof that they are trying to do something because, as Angie said, like it or not, and that was as many times as we've discussed it on this program and in all of our outlets.

Most people don't realize that the mayor and city manager really have no control over how police execute their job.

And so and so really, this is a list of suggestions, some influence they can toss about, but they really don't have any control over whether any of these are implemented.

It seems like they're throwing everything at the wall here, all manner of things, Pete.

I mean, clearly the panic button is being hit here.

Yeah, no one's hitting the right button.

The button they hit is a prosecutor's office that the cops don't trust the city.

I think residents don't really trust for the most part, and it's finally getting highlighted.

Even Quint Lucas is now saying, we've got a problem.

We've got teenagers shooting people in broad daylight while they're trying to steal vehicles.

And now the question this week on that case at least, is whether or not you're going to charge these kids as adults.

So you have that problem that permeates all of Kansas City.

Ask the cops.

They arrest the same people over and over.

There has been a jail in ten years.

They got to ship them out.

The burning county.

And finally that part's getting figured out.

So that part's getting figured out.

Hopefully, we know there's a prosecutor's race that's going to have all eyes on it coming up here in the next few weeks, and that'll get a lot of attention as well.

But remember, the cops respond to crime.

That's what they do.

That's where their job kind of ends and that's where the conversations get lost.

Does this end in an email that sent out angry because of what we've just heard, that the city really doesn't have control of the police department anyway, And these are sort of strategic tactical decisions that are in this email from the city manager, Brian Platt, and they would have to be approved by the Board of Police Commission, of course, but now it's public.

And I think in some ways when I approached the mayor, you know, it was a day before we could meet up, but he was very willing to talk and he supports it because there's one thing to say, hey, here's this great plan.

We can't do it.

And then you make it public and say, well, what about you, Kansas City?

What about mandatory overtime?

And the mayor pointed out, you know, that's what we do for fire.

That's what we do when it snows.

But a lot of these things, as Pete said, it's going to be hard for the, you know, the police union to swallow because that's not the current plan.

I was also eliminating the helicopter unit.

How does that make the public safer?

I think it's just a concept of money that went somewhere else.

Where do you spend the money?

And I think for them, they're like, do we do helicopters or do we switch to drones?

Next up, a quick trip down memory lane.

Just a few years ago, it was being touted as an oasis in a food desert.

Kansas City plowing $17 million into building a new sun, fresh grocery store at Linwood and Prospect, the first full service grocery store east of Troost.

This is part of $2.3 billion of investment on the east side for private and public money since 2011.

We said we were going to grow the grocery store that was second to none that rivaled anything in the words in Overland Park, Kansas.

We've done that.

These are scenes from 2018.

Now, the store is on the verge of closing amid shootings, prostitution, sex acts and a customer attacking store workers with a machete.

Manager Adriana renton says in three years, the store has gone from 60 employees down to 39 because workers don't feel safe.

Unheard of.

Things are what's happening every day here in our store.

Just today, an officer detained one person for theft, then stopped a man making threats.

Then another shoplifting.

All in 15 minutes.

So it's not a good.

It's a camera.

Clerks are put on hold when they dial 911.

The store owner says the city owns the building.

As a tenant, they should have quiet enjoyment as part of their lease.

If you have to pass a war zone, then you're not going to come and shop and get your healthy food from the store.

So that's causing a real challenge.

They've had vandalism, prostitution, sex trafficking, drugs and more in the parking lot.

People don't shop when they don't feel safe.

The store is asking for more police, more arrests, more prosecutions.

They also want $500,000 from the city to keep them open past the holidays when Brookside screams as crime.

We jump right on it here.

We've been screaming about crime for the past year and a half and we're just now jumping on it.

Or is this the line in the sand then, for the mayor and the city council?

If this store closes, what does it say about the rest of the investment we've made?

East of truce strike that it pretty much goes down the drain, especially in that area.

It's been a problem there for some time.

There was a woman that had a tent right there on 31st Street that was performing sex acts in a tent.

They removed that.

To me, this is not just a grocery store.

This is almost all in one spot, all in one tiny little spot of Kansas City where all of the issues of crime come together in one place.

Right.

And the closure of this store would be a massive blow to the city's efforts to develop the east of truce.

And I think what we've seen is a real lack of follow through.

We open a grocery store.

We celebrate it.

But then that a grocery store alone cannot save or promote further development in an area that has been disinvested for decades.

And so the crime is a big deal.

And we heard in that story when Brookside or Waldo calls attention to it, where they're right away, this has been a response.

But so late.

And if we're not investing, law enforcement resources continue to invest in other development, not just in the grocery store, but in the surrounding area, then we cannot expect a single store to save a part of town When a man comes in with a machete.

They call 911 and are placed on hold and they get placed on hold.

Yeah, it's continuing to be a problem.

And yet this week we hear that there is another solution which will be to combine the police and fire departments to do 911 service.

Does that really make a huge difference?

I think there's just a frustration where they're like, we have to try something.

I mean, hold times are outrageous.

It's something I've focused on for for more than five years.

And every year when you look at the data, it's longer and longer.

But in addition to that, Nick, if they would catch somebody in the store shoplift and the police come and all they could do is write them a ticket.

They get on the bus, they take the things that they've stolen, get on the bus, go down the street, sell it on 27th Street, come back, go in and steal some more.

And all the police could do is write them a ticket because there's no jail to take them to.

I'm going to beat the dead horse here.

But I mean, it really ties back to these progressive ideas.

The last few years have failed.

The free bus is a failure of an idea.

Not not prosecuting low level crimes is a bad policy move because you just get more crime and people get emboldened and then you get these situations and the people who are impacted the most are those who are just trying to be law abiding citizens and utilize the grocery store.

But we have GOP, the speaker this week saying, hold the front page.

It's not me.

She goes on the offensive this week blasting those who say she's been too soft on crime.

Take a listen.

It's wrong.

It's false.

This is the amount of crime that happens.

This is the amount that comes to me.

She's the sliver represented in this chart.

The police have to send it to me.

And I think the perception is that all of them are sent to me and I just choose not to file.

When of course, of the ones I get, I have a very high file rate.

I just don't get very many of the more than 1600 reported burglaries or break ins, she says.

Last year, only 81 cases were submitted to her office.

So what's the disconnect?

Well, the disconnect is you look at law enforcement and they say right now these things we know aren't going anywhere.

We just I mean, we know that they are not going anywhere.

You're telling me so the police are not sending them to her?

Correct.

And you're telling me that the cops would prefer to not send this stuff to her office and then arrest the same people over again, which puts their own lives at risk?

That's basically what she's saying, which is the stupidest argument I have ever heard in that case.

We're going to have a brand new prosecutor in the next few weeks.

In fact, we do have the election.

A Jackson County prosecutor will be chosen, by the way.

Both of those candidates, you can make up your own mind.

We'll talk about the points that Pete is making with them on this program when they debate on this program next week in this slot.

You know, the death penalty was back in the spotlight this week as well in Missouri as it carried out its third execution of the year.

Marcellus Williams was put to death by lethal injection more than 20 years after being convicted in the killing of a Saint Louis area.

Reporter by the name of Felicia, gail williams was the 12th death row inmate executed since Governor Mike Parson took office.

But why is it that this case seemed to get more media attention than all those others?

I think we've seen in the past few years a lot of these death penalty cases get a lot more attention than this one, particularly because there are still questions about Marcellus Williams innocence.

It is we still don't have all the answers there.

But the argument is there is that if there is still a question about it, why why put someone to death?

And increasingly, across the country, even states that have the death penalty don't have a huge appetite to use it.

It is very difficult to kill someone to obtain the drugs needed to do this.

So not only is it procedurally hard to do because there's fewer there's tends to be a lot more controversy around them.

And a lot of states just don't have the appetite for Governor Mike Parson is going to be out of office in a few weeks.

So we could be picking a new governor in November as well.

How does this race for governor with Mike Keyhole and Krystal Quade change the equation when it comes to the death penalty?

Crystal Kate is certainly opposed to the death penalty.

What about my key?

How would he be different than Mike Parson?

I don't think a lot different.

I don't think this is something that will be on voters minds come November.

And, you know, this this was a tough case and this was one of those where you wonder whether or not the right decision was made.

And I think any time these things get attention, they're going to get national attention.

We saw some cable news outlets.

News Nation had a big piece on it on Wednesday night.

So it's gotten national attention and I expect more of these cases to get national attention going forward.

And remember, Kansas also has the death penalty reinstated in 1994, but yet no one has been executed in that state since 1965.

Get ready for Monday.

That's when the Kansas City streetcar line will officially shut down for a month.

You heard that right.

They're trying to connect the existing tracks to the new extension down to the plaza and you MKC and all of that takes four weeks.

I guess so.

I guess it does.

They have to make sure that everything is connected properly.

Their line doesn't have any glitches in it, and it's going to take four weeks for that to happen.

You're going to have to find a new way to get to work then, Lisa.

Well, I don't take the streetcar to work.

It doesn't run past it past where I live.

But still, I think one of the issues with with streetcar construction is that the only turnaround points in the current line are at the beginning and end of the streetcar line.

So if any section of track needs to be shut down, the whole line is shut down.

So this is quite an important piece of work, but it means the whole line has to shut down.

The city is going to try to implement more bus service to get people where they need to go.

But certainly it'll be a headache.

I also, by the way, beware.

The parts of Main Street will also be closed during that time and street parking won't be available in some parts of Maine, which could be, as we find out this week, a major cost saving to you.

KC While reporting this week that Kansas City is now charging a flat $40 fee to park at some of its parking meters during certain times, we've heard about inflation.

This sounds excessive.

What is happening?

This was a policy that the city council approved unanimously in June that quietly implements event parking in metered spots downtown.

So certain zones near power and light near the river market in the crossroads at a certain point when an event is designated, automatically switches from your dollar to park and then, you know, $0.30 after that to a flat 30 or $40 fee.

If you want to look up what event is going to trigger that parking.

Good luck.

It is not publicly available.

The only indication is that a sign on street posts that indicate it's subject to event parking.

They talk about concerts or musicals downtown and whether or not you're attending them.

You may be subject to those two, though, because you might not have to now rifle through your pocket for loose change.

You just have to have a credit card to be handing over a lot more cash.

Yeah.

And take out a second mortgage as well while you're at it.

I mean, that's unbelievable to Lisa's point, too.

It could hurt restaurants if people are looking to go out, not going to these events.

And what does that mean to if the royals want to end up downtown?

Could that go up to 50, $60?

What does that look like?

A lot of questions.

Also trying to drive people, I think, on to more mass transit using the streetcar, making it appear like a big win for the city.

And I think that's probably in the back of their minds, along with collecting as many, many of our dollars as they can.

And certainly parking was a big issue when it came to the stadium issue, when it was up for a vote earlier this year.

And I think that's what a lot of people question.

And I wonder if there will be confusion around these parking meters.

If you go downtown, you're like, oh, it's after hours, I'm good, I don't need to pay.

And then boom, it's event parking and you don't know and you get a big ticket.

That's going to be a lot.

And so are the events just for downtown.

Because Negro Leagues baseball has a hot dog festivals in this thing on 18th Street.

So does that bleed over into the downtown area?

We may we may even be charging you $40 to park in our parking lot here.

Come on.

We can review as a result of this.

That might be the way we pay our bills around here.

All right.

We're still about five weeks away from Election Day, but the first votes for president were cast this week in Kansas and Missouri.

There, the absentee ballots from active duty military and overseas voters in both states.

And for Missourians who, due to illness or travel, won't be around on Election Day.

But other than putting out a yard sign, do we have any sway on this election here in Kansas and Missouri, since we told only seven battleground states matter?

Will we even see any of these candidates before Election Day?

What about a VP candidate or a spouse, even at a local coffee shop?

Is that too much to ask, Pete?

Yes, it is.

I mean, this election will come down to seven states.

Time is a zero sum game.

So any time spent in Kansas and Missouri is not time spent in Michigan.

Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia and Wisconsin and Arizona and Nevada.

So that's where they should be.

That's where they're going to be.

And it's a waste of time to come here.

I think the down ballot might be affected by more so than the top of the ticket in a lot of the races.

It's essential.

We've got a lot on our plates.

We've got about almost there's nearly a dozen different state and local election issues.

We've got a governor, a senator, we've got district attorneys and prosecutors all on the ballot, never mind Georgia's the state legislature.

But do you see any of these races like the presidency, in a sense, which is so nip and tuck, We have no sense of what the outcome is.

I can remember election cycle where we have so much, where there isn't any suspense over in any of these races.

And I'm not seeing, at least in Missouri, anything that really looks like it's going to be a surprise either.

All the statewide races, I think, presumably will go Republican for as much attention as the as the Senate race is getting in ads.

I think it's it's just Harley's race to lose.

I think the only spot where we may see some difference are some of these Missouri State House races, where it is, you know, some that that there are seats that are trying to flip from from red to blue and break that supermajority.

There may be some tension there, but not a bunch of excitement.

What is the race that you're most focused on for Election Day?

Oh, that's that's tough to tough to say.

I mean, I do think I will be paying close attention to all of these races, including the U.S. Senate race.

There's an interesting one up in the Northland Senate District 17.

That's where Clay Como and a lot of union population is there.

That flipped red in 2022.

We've got a Democrat, a member of the UAW running there.

That may be an interesting one to watch, but we'll be paying close attention to whatever you want.

Angie, I'm looking at the issues.

I think abortion on the ballot is going to be interesting to watch.

And also sports betting.

You know, we talked a little bit before the program about how the abortion issue in Missouri isn't playing out the same way in terms of this huge amount of attention as it did when it was on the ballot in Kansas.

It was such a big thing.

And I don't know if it's because it was so new and so fresh off of Dobbs.

And it's different here now because instead of it being more theoretical, it's more of a reality based.

But we're not seeing the same intensity that we saw in Kansas.

Yeah, it got a lot of national attention, too, with the Kansas deal, since it was the first one after Roe got overturned.

You know, if there's something to look at, I was going to use the abortion one, but I probably would just be on the Kansas side.

Can they hang on to their supermajority on the Republican side in the House?

In the Senate?

I mean, right now, that's kind of been the thing that they've had over Governor Kelly.

And I know that Governor Kelly wants to break that supermajority in Kansas.

So not a lot of intrigue on some of the statewide races on the Missouri side.

That's something under the radar to keep an eye on.

Please.

You mention that because that's actually where you can have an influence in a way you're not going to have for the race for the White House.

And it will impact, you know, she's going to try to flip a lot of the seats in Johnson County as well to break that supermajority.

So a lot of that's going to be happening here.

Eric, sports betting and the Jackson County prosecutor race, that's going to be an interesting race.

The sports betting, the commercials that they're coming out with and they're bombarding us with them already.

There's got a lot of people raising eyebrows.

You know, usually when when there's an issue like that, the first thing they go to is elderly people or children.

And a lot of people are saying, you know, they tell us about the school districts getting money.

There's a thousand school districts in the state of Missouri, $100 million.

How much will those school districts really get?

It won't cover the parking that we've been told about.

Exactly.

Downtown.

That's how much time the red light cameras like cameras.

Forget that.

Don't forget that.

Now, when you put a program like this together every week, you can't get to every story grabbing the headlines.

This was a week that saw first responders from as far as Topeka and Columbia come to Kansas City for the funeral of fallen firefighter Kyle Brinker.

It was the week of the big political question.

Does he live in Florida?

The star claiming Kansas Senator Roger Marshall now only has a small cabin in Kansas and is increasingly found at a $1.2 million home near the beach in Sarasota.

Those are two headlines we didn't get to hear or some others we missed this week.

It was a nail biter week for Royals fans with playoff hopes on the line of the last game of the season.

Coming up on Sunday, the chiefs making off the field news confirming they're still in talks with Jackson County on the future of Arrowhead.

Team president Mark Donovan says they would like to know the location of their new home by the end of the year.

Travis Kelce making his acting debut.

This was surprising.

The KC Rep breaking ties with you and KC is a new theater on the way and a big milestone celebration at the Camping Museum, Missouri's largest contemporary art space opened 30 years ago this week.

He's hoping to be one of the big winners when the new extended streetcar line stops right outside its front door starting next year.

Already, Eric Wesson, did you pick one of those stories or something completely different?

Something different.

The $1.3 million settlement for the firefighter Rebecca Reynolds, abuse and discrimination.

But from the fire that she received as an employee of the fire department.

Pete, I will go with the Roger Marshall story.

That was just it was kind of goofy.

The point of the story was in part, that is Florida property is worth eight times more than his ranch in Kansas.

Guess what?

Waterfront property in Florida is worth more than ranch property in western Kansas.

And I think having people that are serving their state after successful private careers are kind of what we want to encourage in politics.

And it seemed like much ado about nothing.

It's also become increasingly common when you look at it, and that included US Senator Pat Roberts before he left office, where he just had the recliner that he was renting in someone's home.

I was not even living in Kansas at all, and he still got reelected.

Amid all of the property tax drama and tension in some parts of the city, Platte County announced this week they are reducing property taxes because they've got an excess of cash.

So that that is.

Meanwhile, Kansas City, Kansas, which also froze property tax, is now looking at a $12 million budget deficit.

We all know the drama happening in Jackson County.

So I thought that was an interesting detail and remembering in one county, I even have to cut baselines there as well, which is we should not forget about, I think the teenagers being charged in Sean Brady stuff.

What happens next?

Well, I was shot in Brookside at.

Yes.

Will they be charged as adults because that is an issue in the city where people are saying what's happening with juvenile crime?

How tough will you be on crime?

Absolutely.

A great question for my candidates Next week when we do, our Jackson County prosecutor debate.

That is our week in review, courtesy of Eric Wesson from next page, Casey and from 89.3 FM, Casey, while Lisa Rodriguez from the Investigation unit at KCTV five News.

Angie Raquel no.

And 6 to 10 weekdays on KCMO Talk radio 95.7 FM.

Pete Mundo.

Next week again, we headed to debate mode.

We expand to an hour to bring you back to back debates between the candidates who want to be the next Jackson County prosecutor and Johnson County district attorney.

Until then, I'm Nick Haynes.

From all of us here at Kansas City, PBS, we will keep calm and carry on.