Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Can you hear me now?

Mayor Mark Funkhouser has heard the pleas of Northeast residents but still seems to be offering little help to the area in the budget that he and the council are set to approve on Thursday.

In his most recent town hall meeting, Funkhouser said he has heard the concerns and seen the letters from residents showing their support for Old Northeast Inc and his mission, but fell short of offering any kind clue as to whether the council would make a place for the organizations in the prodigious budget it has to finish by tomorrow.

"I hear you," Funkhouser said to Lee Lambert, vice president of Independence Plaza Neighborhood Association. "But right now (when it comes to neighborhood funds) it is like sharks in a feeding frenzy with everyone fighting for less and less."

Lambert pointed out that many of the neighborhood programs to the North of the river and south of Northeast were getting funding while ONE Inc seemed to be one of the few neighborhood programs being left out.

Funkhouser said the process was not over and still needed to go though more debate at Thursday's council meeting.

The council is set to approve the budget at its 3 p.m. council meeting at City Hall.

Buzz for Wednesday, March 26

Aaaaaand they’re off!!

We here at The News must have missed the starting gun and the track announcer introducing the candidates but we sure didn’t miss the cheers and jeers as the candidates rounded turn number one in what promises to be one of the hottest tickets in local politics this season.

We are definitely off to the races.

The verdict? It’s going to be Politics as usual, Northeast style this summer.

Based on the mud that’s been thrown up thus far — we don’t think anyone will be immune as both the weather and the political scene heats up this summer.

When I got this gig about ten years back, former publisher Brock advised me: “Don’t do endorsements, you’ll make nobody happy and everybody angry.”

Well this little dog is livin’ by those sage words of advice and currently has no intention of throwing support behind someone or even taking a stand on who to vote for in this one — unless someone runs for dogcatcher, then we might howl a bit.

Kibble is a fine treat, but this dog lives off the truth.

We are not here to make friends and be popular. We are here to be a voice for Historic Northeast neighborhoods and be the voice of truth standing tall amid the din of political rhetoric.

We hear that you cannot teach an old dog new tricks. Well, this old pooch still has some young blood in her and she not going to “sit” or “ stay” during this primary election.
Bette Davis said it best: “fasten your seat belts fellas, its going to be a bumpy ride.”

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We would like to offer a personal wag of the tail to the find folks at the Kansas City Police Department for their crime lab and smart police work.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms recognized the Kansas City Regional Crime Lab for their use of technology when matching weapons used by criminals in certain cases.

Since 2002, the lab had successfully made 100 matches of bullets recovered at crime scene with the weapon that was used. And, to add to the kudos, the labs in just the past two months has already made another 20 matches using the ATF database.

In one case police were left with no clues other than the spent shell casings from the crime scene. LAter that year a police officer was assaulted, the suspect was arrested and his weapon seized.

Police using the weapon and lab technology were able to match the weapon and the shells and made a case against the man.

Congrats and keep up the good work.

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