KC Buzz Blog

Guv wants no part of 60-hour 'fund-raising frenzy'

   Gov. Matt Blunt, who signed legislation that scrapped Missouri’s limits on campaign donations, has sworn off massive contributions – at least for the first 60 hours of next year.
   Blunt’s campaign issued a statement this week pointing out a loophole in the bill that he signed into law last summer. The bill eliminated all limits on the contributions candidates can accept, but also prohibited lawmakers and statewide elected officials from accepting any contribution while the legislature is in session.
   Blunt’s statement pointed out that the law takes effect Jan. 1 and the legislative session does not begin until noon on Jan. 3. That gives those elected officials 2½ days to snatch up every lobbyist contribution and special interest dollar in sight -- just before lawmakers begin deliberations on legislation that affects those same special interests.
   But Blunt wants to take away the punch bowl.
   "It is important to begin the legislative session focused on doing the people's business and making Missouri a better place rather than engaging in a fundraising frenzy," Blunt said.
   Therefore, he is discouraging lawmakers and other elected officials from accepting contributions in excess of the current limits – $1,275 for statewide officials, $650 for senators and $325 for House members. Presumably, Blunt meant his suggestion to include Attorney General Jay Nixon, Blunt’s likely Democratic challenger in 2008.
   Blunt said he would abide by his own advice. He pledged not to accept contributions beyond the current limits for those first 60 hours of the new year.
   Once the legislature adjourns on May 17, however, unlimited contributions would be acceptable by all candidates. The new law will require stricter reporting of those contributions and prohibits funneling contributions to candidates through committees established by the Democratic and Republican parties.

Posted by Kit Wagar

Up, up, up in a puff of smoke

   The Kansas City City Council has decided to send the smoking ban ordinance back to the Finance Committee for more study.

   That doesn't kill the plan... not yet.. but shows there is opposition to it.

   More in Friday's Star.

Posted by Dave Helling

Rally to try to snuff out coal plant in Kansas

  The opposition to the largest coal-burning power plant west of the Mississippi is moving from a 5 (fresh winds) to a 6 (strong winds) on the Beaufort Wind Scale. 

    A rally will be held Saturday on the steps of the Kansas state capitol to ask Gov. Kathleen Sebelius to place a moratorium on new coal-burning power plants in the state. Instead several grass roots organizations want the state to increase the use of wind energy and other renewables.

    The rally is being organized by True Blue Women of Johnson County, who have joined with groups such as the University of Kansas Environs, Concerned Citizens of Platte County, the Sierra Club of Kansas, and Sustainable Sanctuary Coalition of Greater Kansas City.

    Sunflower Electric Power Corp.has plans to build three 700-megawatt power generators in western Kansas.

    But only a very small amount of the electricity will be used in Kansas. The rest will be sent out-of-state, leaving Kansans to deal with the greenhouse gases and mercury, all damaging to the environment.

    Sunflower says, however, that they will use “the cleanest coal on earth.”

    Will the governor issue a moratorium on this political hot potato?

    Nicole Corcoran, spokeswoman for Gov. Sebelius, told The Star that the governor is eying the storm.  “Sebelius is considering all options to balance energy development and conservation in our state. At this point, we’re still gathering information but I can tell you Goveror Sebelius is looking at all possibilities closely.”   

    State regulators, who must permit the plant, got an inkling of the opposition on Nov. 16 when they held a public hearing and more than 300 people turned out.

    Saturday’s rally is at 11 a.m. on the south steps of the Kansas state capitol in Topeka.

Posted by Karen Dillon

Thursday's open thread

    What's up?

Morning buzz

In The Star:

• Lynn Horsley reports on the expected vote today by the Kansas City Council on a smoking ban.
• Tim Hoover writes a full account of the citizens commission approval of pay raises for Missouri officials.

Elsewhere:

• The Iraq Study Group's report will apparently "call for a gradual pullback of the 15 American combat brigades now in Iraq" but sets no firm timetable, The New York Times discovers. The group will release its report Dec. 6 and "tour the country" to promote it. Meanwhile, President Bush denied plans for "some kind of graceful exit."
• Senate Democrats are calling for a special envoy to help Iraq quell the violence in Baghdad, The Times also reports.
• Iowa Democratic Gov. Tom Vilsack this morning announced his presidential bid, complete with jabs at President Bush. Thomas Beaumont of the Des Moines Register discusses the kick-off announcement tour with today's speech being representative of his planned campaign, "speak plainly and say what you believe."
• Kansas Secretary of State Ron Thornburgh said he's working with other Midwestern states to set their primaries at the same time in 2008. 
• After his reported confrontation with President Bush, Virginia Democratic Sen.-elect Jim Webb said the White House wants to paint him as a "hothead." But White House spokesperson Dana Perino said, "That is not true. At all."  The Richmond Times-Dispatch has the story. Meanwhile, George Will calls Webb "a boor."
• The Rev. Rick Warren's decision to invite Illinois Democratic Sen. Barack Obama to speak from the pulpit to the 20,000-strong Saddleback Church in Orange County, California, is being criticized by some conservative Christian radio hosts and pundits, as well as some evangelical preachers. (Obama will appear with Kansas GOP Sen. Sam Brownback, among others.) Saddleback Church responded to the criticism by defending Obama's appearance at the conference but pointed out Warren's disapproval of some of his political beliefs. "Let it be made very clear that Pastor Warren and Saddleback Church completely disagree with Obama's views on abortion and other positions he has taken, and have told him so in a public meeting on Capitol Hill," a statement said. The Los Angeles Times has the story.
• The chairmen of the Iraq Study Group posed for Men's Vogue. (Read down in Dana Milbank's story.) ExtremeMortman.com reacts.

Posted by Keith Chrostowski

Rail-ality

    Several people posting here have asked for more details about apparent changes in Clay Chastain's light rail plan.

   Here are some important changes in his draft proposal:

1)  The ballot language clearly requires "new ground level power supply technology (no overhead wires.)"  The new proposal says "incorporate the wireless light rail technology into at least the the downtown central corridor of the first stage, if possible."

2)  The ballot language clearly requires the 3/8th cent sales tax extension "to fund the construction, operation, (and) maintenance) of the light rail system."  Chastain's new proposal, though, takes not only that money -- which he estimates at $36 million per year -- but an additional $25 million annually from the city's general fund.  Chastain estimates light rail will generate that additional amount of tax revenue each year (much like a TIF) but he has no way of knowing if that's true.

    Regardless, his plan now envisions a $600 million local light rail bond guaranteed by the sales tax and general city revenue of $10 million per year (the rest of that "TIF" $25 million, $15 million, would go for operating costs, despite a promise in the ballot language that the sales tax extension would pay for operations.)  Even so, the new proposal concedes the local $600 million will only pay half the construction cost of light rail -- the other half, he says, will come from Jefferson City and Washington. 

   It isn't clear what happens if that money isn't made available.

3)  Chastain's new plan also anticipates another vote, in 2009, for Smart Moves, to provide, in his words, "a financing contingency built in for providing additional funds for the KCMO light rail system if needed."

    My original point was simply this:  Clay Chastain can't unilaterally change anything in the ballot language, which is now locked into city law (until changed by another vote or by the council.)  The ballot says sixty electric shuttles; Clay can't agree to change that to 59 shuttles.  The language says no overhead wires; there cannot be overhead wires when the system is built.

   The council has often been rightly criticized for changing projects approved by voters because of vague ballot language.  This is the flip side of that coin:  the language is so specific that Chastain, you, and the council have little flexibility going forward.

Posted by Dave Helling

Hey, Mom, I'm on TV!

   I'm off to Kansas City Public Television for Steve Rose's Talkback program.

   It airs tonight at 7 and again Sunday at 10 a.m.

   The topics: stem cells, Talent/McCaskill, light rail, Johnson County soccer and a bunch more.

Posted by Steve Kraske

816-224-4833

   Jackson County Fifth District legislative once-upon-a-time "winner" Neal McGregor said Wednesday afternoon that he hasn't decided yet whether to seek a recount in his squeaker-of-a-race with Greg Grounds.

   The Democrat said he has until mid-December to decide. In the meantime he has some investigating he wants to do and questions he'd like to get answered, including about how results initially showed him winning and then how the votes were found that allowed Grounds to win.

  He does think that Jackson County Election Board Director Charlene Davis failed to do her job properly. And he's incredulous at some of her claims, including that she couldn't call him because he didn't put his telephone number on his campaign finance disclosure form.

   He says he did. And a form filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission and easily available on their web site shows he is correct.

   "And there is a thing called a phone book," McGregor said. "I have been listed for years." (Again, he is right. See headline. And McGregor even had The Star publish his home number this fall in an article so voters could reach him with questions.)

   He said the television reporter that Davis relied on to tell him that he was no longer the winner of the race actually didn't. Instead, he said, he received the news first from a radio reporter and later a Star reporter. He said he thought it might be a joke and wasn't sure it was real until he read Davis' comments in a Star article the next day. He said it was unfair and discourteous that Davis called Grounds but not him.

   "I just couldn't believe it," he said. "I don't feel that she gave me the dignity of giving me a call. It should have come from an official rather than third or fourth party."

Posted by DeAnn Smith

Roberts off Intell?

    Well-informed scuttlebutt on Capitol Hill has it that Kansas Sen. Pat Roberts may be looking for an exit from the Senate Intelligence Committee, which he has chaired since 2002 and which Democrat West Virginia Sen. Jay Rockefeller will chair in the 110th Congress.

    Those in the know say this editorial from the Lawrence Journal-World is worth a close read on Roberts' intentions, especially the "he has told some" sentence.

   With the soon-to-be-minority Senate GOP determining committee assignments for the next Congress right now, things could shake out as early as next week.

   Roberts has drawn partisan barbs for years for his stewardship of the committee. Critics say he did all he could to protect the Bush Administration from oversight; Rockefeller once memorably accused him of taking "all his talking points from the White House."

   But Roberts points to his committee's investigations - some completed, some ongoing - of the uses of pre-war intelligence as evidence of his commitment to effective oversight.

   The Roberts move also means Missouri Sen. Kit Bond could become the committee's top Republican, depending on where and how various chips fall.

Stay tuned...

Posted by Matt Stearns

Run for your lives!

    Jackson County folks say the county is sending most workers home and will be operating courthouse offices until 5 p.m. with skeletal (but essential) crews.

   Posted by DeAnn Smith