Happy birthday, Al Brooks

To the one person who has dedicated himself, his life and more of his time and efforts and energy for and to the betterment of the city he lives in than nearly anyone else in it for the last 50 years--and not for his own personal, financial benefit:

Happy 81st birthday, Alvin Brooks!

And thank you for all you've done for Kansas City and Kansas Citians, all these years.

Links:  Happy Birthday Mr. Alvin Brooks - NBCActionNews.com - KSHB-TV

Ad Hoc Group Against Crime

New Facebook page for the Ad Hoc Group Against Crime

Mayor Pro Tem Alvin Brooks posted on his Facebook page today they have a new page there for their  Ad Hoc Group Against Crime.

You can find that here: 

Ad Hoc Group Against Crime

Missouri Ethics Commission in name only?

The Kansas City Star does another great job this morning (sorry, TKC) with an article about candidates for office who still have debts from earlier campaigns but haven't closed down the accounts, even though it's required by a 1997 law. Once again, this proves what newspapers can and should do best and why we still need them, in some form or another. Hopefully, they can somehow make it profitably to the online, digital age successfully. The biggest problem for me on this, I think, is that we need this Ethics Commission to be and do more than just their name. We need the Missouri State Ethics Commission to do their assigned jobs. We need them to follow through on their mandates. We need the Ethics Commission to keep tabs on the candidates and campaign contributors so the laws are followed and their mandates are fulfilled. That clearly didn't happen here and they--the Ethics Commission--failed us. It makes you wonder what else they're not doing. Hopefully there's nothing else they've missed or let us down on. Fortunately, in this case, we have The Kansas City Star, this time, to follow up on this for us. Who or what will it be in the future to keep them honest and law-abiding? Note to Missouri Ethics Commission: You only have one job--you may have many tasks but you only have one job--and that is to keep politicians, possible politicians and the associated organizations within the laws regarding ethics. Please do so. Link to original story:http://www.kansascity.com/2010/09/04/2200330/missouri-ethics-reforms-raise.html

Kansas City: Let's use this moment to come together, at last

I see from the newspaper this morning--again--that there will be additional police out in town tonight, most specifically on the Plaza.

The Mayor announced yesterday that he'll be walking around down there. (Thanks for the warning, Mayor).

Then there's this: "A group of African-American community leaders, led by Alvin Brooks, who is a police commissioner, held a news conference Friday to announce they will be present tonighton the Plaza to make sure any youth gathering remains peaceful and safe."

Thank you, once again, Mr. Brooks.

More: "Brooks, who is president of the Ad Hoc Group Against Crime, was joined by ministers, Kansas City school board president Airick Leonard West and others. They said they wanted to have a good dialogue with any youths who gathered."

This, then, is how a great deal of good can and, of course should, come out of this whole "Plaza melee'" mess from the last few weeks.

Can we not, now, learn something from all this?

Can we not, now, come together as a city and as one group of people who live here and work together, as one, to better this city?

We could.

We should.

We can.

We should use this as a catalyst to stop being East Side/inner city/West Side/suburbanite, etc., and, again, come together as one city and work to solve our problems.

And right now, we have the attention of the Mayor and his office, the "establishment", represented by Highwoods Properties (the Plaza owners and managers), all the retail store owners and managers down there, the leaders of the African-American community, virtually everyone.

We all have a stake, certainly, in seeing to it that no one group terrorizes or intimidates another, anywhere in the city, at any time.

It's not who we are.

It's not how good cities work, of course.

And we all have a larger stake, too, in having our problems addressed by all of us, for the good of all.

Alvin Brooks or Mayor Funkhouser or Airick West or somebody needs to say as much, in a very public way, while the television cameras are rolling and the media has their attention.

Let's get at this, people.

A question/suggestion to KC to stop the shootings and murders

Suggestion/question:

Why don't people like Airick West, Alonzo Washington, Mayor Pro Tem Alvin Brooks and Ernest Evans (from KCK) get together with the churches and other community organizations to see what can be done to stop the shootings and murders in Kansas City?

I don't mean this as a challenge, per se. I mean this as an earnest question (no pun intended).

Clearly, if we are to stop this, we have to do it as a community.

And yes, I'll join in to work on this, too. It's "put up or shut up", absolutely. (Tony? Would you join us?)

I'm just asking.