The biggest event in Kansas City history wraps up this weekend.

Will you miss it?

Our last game is Saturday, so is our last fan Fest.

We look at the lessons learned and as the walk up signs start coming down all over town, we take a look at what's next for Kansas City Plus.

Did you see this happening?

The rap apparently in talks to move its theater from Umkc to next to the Cheesecake Factory on the Country Club Plaza.

How will that look?

And data centers aren't the only issue that can pack crowds at public meetings.

So keep messing with your local Costco, those stories, and the rest of the week's news straight ahead.

Week in review is made possible through the generous support of Bob and Marlese Gourley, 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, and glad to have you with us on our weekly journey through the Metro's most impactful, confusing, and downright head scratching local news stories.

Hopping on board the Weekend Review bus with us this week from Kshb.

41 News Charlie Keegan and KCUR's Chief political analyst Brian Ellison leading the editorial board at Your Kansas City Star, Yvette walker and former star staffer, now Mr.

Kansas City stack on Substack.

Dave Helling, a lot of stuff.

It sure is.

A lot of s is going on now.

That was fast.

Kansas City's contribution to the World Cup finally ends on Saturday in Argentina, takes on Switzerland in the last of our six World Cup matches.

It also marks the last day of the FIFA Fan Fest next to the World War One museum.

Will you miss all the global hoopla and will be glad to get back to normal?

Well, complete this sentence.

The biggest lesson Charlie Kansas City learned from hosting the World Cup was blank.

I think the biggest lesson they learned is to set maybe more transparent, a more realistic expectations.

I think we had a lot of businesses that thought that with the World Cup, they would just be a magic wand and they would make hand over fist dollars, and then not everybody experienced that.

So I think maybe being a little bit more tempering those expectations might be a lesson learned.

Brian.

You know, I think on a on a positive note, one lesson we learned is that we can do this.

We were capable of putting together, at least on a temporary basis and infrastructure system, adequate security, and, and a joyful spirit that really carried the city and made the city look good around the country and indeed around the world.

There will be lots of questions about costs and implications and long term benefits or not, but but I think one lesson is we were capable.

We worried about a lot of things that did not turn out to be worries.

One of them was Ice that we were told, you know, we might even at that time of these mass detention centers in Kansas City, people would be picked up from the street.

We haven't by and large, that has been not a huge part of the storyline.

I think that's right.

That is not to say that Ice has not been active during the World Cup, but it hasn't been in the headlines.

Whether that is ice being a more, strategic and low profile in their work or, or a genuine decision to not attract that attention in either case, you're right, it's not dominated the headlines event.

The biggest lesson was blank.

And we can behave that we can.

That's great time that we can now that we can just learn to be with each other and enjoy, enjoy the World Cup.

I mean, I think Brian's right.

I think that it that there were lots of concerns.

There were concerns about violence and crime.

You know, we were concerned that the jail wasn't gonna be ready.

And it was not, but but that didn't seem to be a real problem.

It didn't eclipse the joy that people seem to have.

And I remember we did a forum at the Kansas City Plaza Library, and boy, there was just an overwhelming amount of negativity.

A lot of the concerns people had haven't played out.

And I remember even the Johnson County posted a story, a survey, and the word that was used was anxiety.

I think we have have we got rid of most people's anxiety as a result of this, tournament?

I don't know if I can say that, but I can't say this that I have, some really good friends who live by the river right next to where the Argentinians were staying.

And it was a party all the time.

And they were there for it.

Yes, Dave, which I think is one of the big lessons that Kansas City learned from this three week event.

And that is there is a big, wonderful world out there of other people that we got a chance to meet.

The people from the Netherlands, the people from Argentina, even expatriates who live in this country now, but are from foreign countries.

And, you know, Kansas City, particularly in the middle of the country, is geographically isolated in many ways from the rest of the world and the World Cup large writ large, is a reminder that the rest of the world is out there and they enjoy a good time.

But look at these statistics, by the way.

You know, some of the, what we had the view, you know, this is going to be absolutely swarming with international visitors.

Look at these numbers.

First of all, from Fan Fest.

This is from the KC 2026 committee.

Only 13% of attendees there were global visitors.

Similarly, on the bus service that the KC 2026 put together, you got 13% of those passengers.

And at the stadium games themselves, they're talking depending on which games that will be, 20 to 30% were coming from overseas to go to those games.

Was that higher or lower than you thought it would be?

Charlie.

Maybe on the fan fest numbers, maybe a little lower than I thought they because they kept kind of shocking that they've got people have signed up from 120 different countries before it all started.

So I thought the number maybe that was the 120 people made up 15% right there.

Yeah, but no, it's good, good stuff anyway.

But I will say the the diversity of the crowds cannot be denied.

So maybe we had the, the the Argentinean communities from the whole western half of the United States were converging on Kansas City.

And so I think whether they were international travelers or domestic travelers, there was a there was a very different feel to who was on that streetcar with you, who was at Fan Fest, who was, making their way through the city to go to the games, at least in my experience.

I think some of us thought before, the World Cup started that there would be a problem with visitors coming into the country, not just here, but across the country because of the foreign relations situation.

And, you know, tariffs and, and, and ice and all the other, discomforts, if you will, in terms of how the United States relates to the rest of the world and that that might shrink the pool.

And I think some of that did happen.

But the other thing to keep in mind, Nick, is this was a very expensive endeavor for if you wanted to go to a game, you were paying hundreds, thousands of dollars for a ticket plus hundreds, maybe thousands to fly here, plus hundreds, maybe thousands to rent, hotel room or go out to eat.

I mean, it was not, you know, the middle class in Argentina wasn't getting on a plane to come to Kansas City for the games they were watching on TV.

And that may be reflected in that smaller number that you should complete this sentence.

If we could do it all over again, the one thing we should change is blank.

Bryan.

Expectations.

I think we needed to to understand that.

And we talked so much on this program and elsewhere about the costs going into this that that might have caused a lot of business owners to think they're going to see a giant surge in their business.

It might have caused a lot of hotel operators to think they'd be sold out every night at very high rates.

What we probably should have changed is our expectations to just say, no, this is a big deal, but it is not the once in a lifetime, change everything sort of opportunity that some people expect.

I think the biggest change would be a fee for change.

Not necessarily a Kansas City committee change.

Actually, I think the Kansas City committee did about as well as you could expect.

They had a lot of time.

They had a lot of money, but, as I was we were talking earlier, I don't think there was ever a moment where people just said, what were they thinking?

They were why did they put it here?

Except on the first night with transportation.

But I do think that fee for going forward should make some accommodation for people who aren't rich to go to the games, make some affordable tickets available to groups or to kids or to others so that there's more of a buy in from the community, from people who may not like soccer but would like to go out to the game but absolutely can't afford the experience that needs to be.

Of course, some people did get in for free.

Remember, while many fans were paying those eye watering prices to get in, we learned this week that 52 Kansas City elected officials and top city employees received complimentary tickets to most of the games.

We went to sit outside of city council members offices.

Here's council member Darryl Curls assign tickets for the two remaining matches in Kansas City.

I'm working on a story about the World Cup ticket allotment, but I was just curious.

Is it a slow week, slow news week or something?

All right.

Is this much ado about nothing?

Is that a slow news day story, or do public officials have an obligation to say no to freebies that ordinary residents could never afford?

Well, it is a story, particularly because and as we just said, so many people could not go.

I have not been able to afford to go.

You know, but I will say this, there were some people, in city leadership who did work on this.

They, they, they put a lot of their hard work into this.

And so I can see how some people, you know, might have it would have been good for them to go.

And of course, the mayor has explained why in his capacity why he was there at certain things.

But but we also know that FIFA gave away 75 tickets to students.

Maybe, maybe that should have been more.

Maybe they should have given away more tickets or as they said, lower cost tickets.

But you know, it's always a story.

Our, our city leaders need to understand that, that what they do reflects on the other experiences that we're having.

Was it bad optics?

Oh, definitely.

I think my pet peeve is what we just heard right there when someone says is a slow news day, is a slow news week.

I hate that sound bites so much when people give it to us.

And I don't think that helps Councilman Curl's optics at all right there.

I think, you know, the city leaders need to be held accountable.

But you answered the tape you mentioned, you know, how much the city actually, you know, spent on all of this.

So in some respects, were they any different than, say, a visa or a michelob ultra or any of these big sponsors?

Well, they would get free tickets too, because there were big sponsors in the scope of things.

Nick, that Kansas City waived its sales tax on tickets, which will cost Kansas City about $6 million, which not all cities were hosting it, but Kansas City and the state of Missouri.

But Kansas City, according to estimates, lost about $6 million in sales tax revenue.

The people on the East side pay sales tax, sales taxes, some of that money went for the FIFA World Cup.

But they did all of these things just to make sure that they got to host the games because it was so racked.

Correct.

But I do think there needs to be an evaluation of how we can make events like this that are so expensive, more inclusive to the community that helps pay for them.

Maybe this is a an unpopular opinion, but giving some tickets to elected officials is not the pressing issue of our of our time.

And I think elected officials who don't who don't make very high salaries for this tell, tell Charlie to his face.

This was a slow news.

It's not it's not that it's a slow process, okay?

It is clearly an optical problem, but okay.

But I but I don't think this is the biggest problem facing ethics.

All right.

There's lots of other things happening right outside of the World Cup in Kansas City.

Did you have this on your 2026 bingo card?

After announcing plans to leave Umkc, the Kansas City Repertory Theater was apparently in talks to move to the Country Club Plaza in a building just west of the Cheesecake Factory, which apparently had been a theater early in the shopping district's history.

Many of us are struggling to picture it.

Is there room for a major theater sandwiched between The Cheesecake Factory and Shake Shack about?

It is hard to picture.

But I think we're going to have there's going to be a little bit of wait, wait and see as far as who this is going to benefit if if it is better for the it's a better experience for the theater, go for better acoustics, whatever it is.

And that's good.

I am concerned about other issues such as parking.

We're going to talk about that in a minute.

And things like that.

I need to see.

We all need to see renderings.

We need to see how it's going to work out.

But it does seem, we're just not used to that yet.

Again, those of us who maybe have been around that long, who remember that theater, maybe once it opened in 1928 and apparently, they did musical performances, concerts at the theater at a capacity of 1950.

And actually, I just looked up for Casey Repertory Theater.

It's about 600, so should be room there.

Right.

And it it you know, the plaza may be moving to a model that involves performing arts and other, you know, of restaurants, other event based attendance rather than shops.

People aren't going to shops quite as much as they used to.

So in that way, this is probably a good idea.

But there's also something very interesting going on with the arts community.

Yes, Kansas City, the symphony is thinking about moving to a new structure right next to the plaza, to the Plaza library, second structure.

And so what you're in essence, I do think that all of these organizations are looking for money and revenue streams to stay.

Operational.

And in that sense, maybe that played into the decision to move to the Plaza.

Yeah, I think the other on the other side of this, without even addressing the specifics of the Rep's potential deal, the Plaza needs a win.

The Plaza needs some some activity.

And right now, the owners continue to have to face questions about what they've done in the years that they've owned it.

As more and more shops seem to closed, there's entire sections of the plaza that are just absolutely desolate.

Some folks are worried about the parking, but I have to say, I, I don't have any trouble parking at the plaza anywhere I want to go.

There's not that much happening there right now.

They need something to to change.

Now, there's clearly this would be a win for the kind of club Plaza and, you know, certainly for the Kinsey Repertory Theater, if they're looking for a new revenue stream, who would be the biggest loser in this plan, Charlie?

Well, my first thought goes to the business case.

The style house that's in that yes event in that venue right now.

I don't know if Plaza would kind of a deal to move to a different location in that area, but that's where my first thought went well.

So we found out this week that data centers aren't the only issue that can bring angry crowds to public meetings in Kansas City.

Apparently, so can messing with your local Costco store.

We do.

Alternative is.

It's close.

You have a lot of people who depend on the pharmacy, and these eyeglasses came from Costco.

I think we deserve more than we've gotten.

It's unfortunate that some of these items that you see, you can't have access to, they're just not going to be here at this location.

Well, this is the first public meeting on plans to turn the midtown Costco on Main Street into a business center.

But does the public still have the power to get Costco to reverse course?

Brian, or was the meeting just to check a box to satisfy the city?

I think that's mostly it, and I think they were actually pretty transparent about it.

The, you know, and and let me say full disclosure, I'm surprised that Costco isn't staying open with its current model based on my spending alone.

I it is it is a very it's hard for me to understand how it's not profiting in its current environment.

But, you know, I think this would have half the staff to be able to operate in this way than they do current.

That's exactly right.

And it's a business decision.

I mean, yes, Costco was put in Midtown with significant government incentives, but the truth is those had terms.

They had a contract.

They had years to fulfill them.

They did that.

They fulfilled all the terms.

I'm not saying it's a non-story.

I'm not saying it's a slow news day, but but at the end of the day, Costco has done what they promised to do and now they are doing what they think is the right business decision.

I'm sorry about it, for myself and for others, but they have the right to do that, but not to prolong the story.

There's really no changing this.

Well, I know I think they're going to have to get some approvals from city council, and that's really about the outside of the store, though, isn't it?

The parking lot and how they have the loading bays and where they can put their trucks in.

But if City Council says no to all that, then maybe they would change.

The problem with that is a two fold.

First, if they say no to that, Costco could just say, okay, we're closing the doors.

They made more explicit that that makes it.

Or, you know, there are, this isn't well known.

But when you deny rezoning to properties, you can get into some legal problems because the owners can claim an unconstitutional taking and demand compensation.

And I don't think the Kansas City necessarily wants to go down that road or that it would even be involved in this situation, but it isn't as simple as saying we won't give you the zoning.

Therefore, Costco will stay open that.

We also got a more explicit list of things that will not be at this new store.

Yes, they'll be the gas station about, but no pharmacy, no optical department, no tire shop, no electronics, no clothes, no bakery, no liquor.

Yes.

But I thought it was interesting in know food court.

But I thought one of the things that had the most visible groans and gasps was no rotisserie chickens, no hot dog.

Oh no hot dog for $1.50.

Yeah, exactly.

You know, it's it is unfortunate for the people there.

But you know, Costco is not leaving the Kansas City area.

I mean, they're still making investments in the Kansas City area.

You know, the new one in Lee's Summit.

It's their business.

They make business decisions, as you said.

You know, I don't know if and if enough chickens and and clothing and hot dogs was going to make the deal, you know, change at all.

But they've been pretty clear.

We're here to try to be transparent.

And this is it, or this is the highway.

Well, this week, Mayor Quinton Lucas is calling for reforms to the decades old right of Kansas City and to petition to put local issues on the ballot.

It comes as maverick transit activist Clay Chastain is back in the headlines after collecting enough signatures to put another transit proposal before voters, this time to build a monorail line around the city.

Matt Lucas says there should be more rules in place before an issue can be put before voters.

But wait a minute, isn't he criticizing Bryan Missouri Republicans for making it tougher to pass statewide amendment, something voters will get to decide in August if that's considered a slap in the face to citizens.

Isn't this the same thing?

I do not believe it's the same thing.

I think we're talking about two different, issues.

On the Kansas City side, the question is how many signatures should be necessary to get a petition on the ballot.

And I, I think there there's a legitimate argument about that.

Mayor Lucas is certainly not the first to suggest that maybe it's a little too easy to to to put a petition out to voters and get something on the ballot.

So so I think that's one question.

But the proposal, before voters in amendment for the for initiative petition review in Missouri is very different.

It would set a standard for an initiative to pass that requires approval statewide.

It would make it possible for as few as 10 to 15% of a state's voters to keep an initiative from passing.

So I think they are, you know, you can support that or not support that.

But these are two very different kinds of, Democratic changes.

The mayor could, if he wants to put something on this November ballot to rescind the petition, writing in Kansas City and the charter, there's still time to put that on the ballot.

If he really believes Kansas City and should not have the right to petition, then he should propose that and see if they if he can get voters to agree on this November.

But is he saying that or is.

Yes.

No, no, no to know.

Well, what is how much harder is harder?

Is is it 5000, 6000, 6500?

I mean, that's part of my problem always has been with amendment four in Missouri, which is if you're going to have a petition process, honor it.

One person, one vote, make it easy, make it simple and understandable.

If you don't want to do it, you don't have to have a petition process.

They don't in Kansas, Nick, as you know.

Get rid of it but have it.

But well, we'll make it easier but not easier.

And it doesn't make any sense to me now, Charlie, there have the public.

Are you done?

Charlie?

Back to the point that Clay trustee is trying to do with the monorail you both pointed out then the World Cup, the transportation was an issue.

If we have a monorail system, that would've made it much easier.

Was 16 cities across America already have something like that in place?

Why not here?

Well, there's a paying for it vote.

I guess this petition would ask voters for a 40 year sales tax to pay for the monorail.

I'm not sure what the appetite is for that among voters.

And then where does it go?

I feel there's still a lot of unknowns about the monorail, plan right now.

Do we have other options?

I mean, we have, you know, and we need to think about, our, the extended busses that we, that we have now, which maybe and they'll be using that tax to, to pay for this.

But our, our streetcar, I want to see what's going to happen with our streetcar expanded streetcar.

We've got a lot of other options before we we need to go to a monorail.

Well, have we finally fixed one of our community's thorniest and long standing issues?

Jackson County Executive Phil, a voter, declared this week, our long county nightmare is over.

After years of controversy over property assessments, the county says more than 200,000 taxpayers will now receive credits for overpayments.

People need to get their money back.

They need to be fair.

They need to be transparent.

They need to be honest.

And now that is happening.

July 6th, 2026 is a huge day in Jackson County.

Homeowners who overpaid property taxes in 2023 and 24 will now get that money back in the form of a tax credit, though some people thought this would the state would never arrive.

Charlie, we've been talking about this for so long on this program.

When do people get their money?

Well, there's still time for it to thrive.

But they said that the funds disappoint us.

The first tax credits should appear on your bill.

This this like November when you usually get your bills, you know, that are due right there at the end of the year.

So you'll get a third of your tax credit this year for if you qualify as some of those 2000.

Let's be clear.

You're not getting a check in the mail right now.

Overpayment is getting your credit against future payments.

But but does this cause problems in later years because there'll be less tax revenue than coming in?

Because now we're giving credits to people for past years, I'm I'm assuming that money's already been spent.

Well it's or was certainly was budgeted.

The school districts would certainly say yes, there is a potential problem.

And anyone else who benefits from property taxes across Jackson County.

It is an it is an unfortunate consequence that you either have to decide you're going to collect the taxes and let the services be paid for, or you're going to give the money back.

I think that is going to be the future conflict here, which will probably have to be settled in court along with other legal matters that might, as Charlie said, might prevent this tax credit from ever being all right.

And as appraisals go up, when you get your bill, the credit is applied, but your tax bill is going to raise a little bit anyway because your appraisals continue to go up.

And so people may be disappointed, end up being disappointed in their final bill.

Many a Bach actually said that on on Monday's meeting goes I want to be realistic.

People might get hundreds of dollars back, not thousands.

Yeah, well, Adam Hamilton is making history this week.

The Linwood pastor just set a record for the most money raised by a Kansas candidate in the first reporting period of a U.S.

Senate campaign.

How much did he raise in his quest to unseat Republican Roger Marshall?

How about more than $3.6 million?

But wait, didn't Marshall get outspent 4 to 1 by Democrat Barbara Bollier in his last campaign?

Dave.

And didn't he still win by double digits?

Yeah he did.

4 to 1 is a little misleading.

There was some outside money that came in to help him a little bit.

So, that was a closer financial race between Boyer and Marshall than you think.

And I do think I've talked to the people around the, the Hamilton campaign.

They are pretty pleased with where they are, not just financially, but in terms of polling and stuff like that.

We may have a race in Kansas, but he's got about 9 or 10 other candidates running against ten other Democratic primary.

I think the you follow the money and this shows that he's a clear frontrunner.

I know I believe this this indicates a lot of strength to win the Democratic primary.

I think you're right to continue to raise questions about whether it will really matter in the general election.

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

What was the big local story?

We missed?

It was the week of the big wedding.

Or as the Johnson County Post headline the story Johnson County couple marries in private New York ceremony after months of resident outcry.

Independence hits the polls button on future data centers.

Big changes in Wyandotte County.

David Johnston, out as county administrator and feeling the pinch in Missouri.

Governor Mike Kehoe cuts or freezes half $1 billion in programs, including state support for the World War One museum and Kansas City's Juneteenth celebration event and busses on the ballot.

Jackson County proposing a new half cent sales tax to fund the struggling bus system.

You could be voting on it in November.

Did you pick one of those stories or something completely different?

I did, I picked the bus story.

We've talked a lot about transportation in this show and and the need for that.

And so I think that that is going to be my choice.

Brian, I went with one of your stories to Governor Cohoes.

Vetoes and withholdings were really significant, particularly in the Kansas City area.

You mentioned a couple of them, funding for the Umkc, Missouri Western Dental School program, the Ronald McDonald House, the KC current practice facility.

That's going to be a story that we have to keep telling over the next few years, because if state funding continues to be cut in significant ways, it's going to affect a lot of local programs.

Charlie, I chose a story about the Royals downtown baseball stadium.

It looks like the Royals and or a group affiliated with the Royals have purchased the old Blue Cross Blue Shield building there, now near Washington Square Park.

So will be interesting to see what they have planned for that day.

Let's jump across the state line.

The Wyandotte County Economic Development Director has signed and there is more chat than you might expect that Wyandotte County in particular, and Kansas in general, is not completely convinced the Chiefs deal is a good deal to pursue, and that that may be, but not enough to stop it, though maybe.

I mean, depending on who is nominated on August 4th to, in the campaign for governor, you could have the next governor, for example, Cindy Hauser, if she's the Democrat.

And when she opposes the Chiefs deal, there could be a reconsideration of that.

Wyandotte County's role remains very much up in the air.

We ought to pay attention to that.

And on that, we will say our week has been reviewed courtesy of the stars of Ed Walker and Charlie Keegan from Kshb 41 news from KC, while Brian Ellison and news economist a Kansas City stack on Substack, Dave Helling and I'm Nick Haines from all of us at Kansas City PBS.

Be well, keep calm and carry on.