‘Nothing happened': No green light given on Troost name change
Monday, this item was the only for review within City Hall in KCMO, during that specific session.
KCK man convicted for high-speed chase in Leavenworth County
'This was a day of denial, but that doesn't mean that we're not going to continue to fight,' Councilwoman Melissa Robinson said. 'I think about the descendants of slaves, and I think about young people who live along Troost, and I think about them writing that name everyday as their address and I have a problem with that.'
During the public testimony of the session, many shared their thoughts and feelings on the matter. Some described their opposition to it, in its entirety, the process so far, and/or offered up their own name suggestions for the avenue.
'I am 100% against the renaming of Troost to Truth. Renaming Troost is a superficial way to addressing racial inequality,' one man shared during public comment Monday.
Out of the dozen-plus members of the public that spoke Monday, most were in favor of the name change.
Chris Goode, a business owner of a Ruby Jean's, a juicery on Troost Avenue, is one of them.
'My granddaddy couldn't have purchased the real estate that I own. My body would have not have been my own. My ancestors were whipped and spit on and forced to pick fruit trees on that land,' Goode shared.
His shop on Troost Avenue reads '3000 Truth' already.
'I've already moved on, and that was a very nominal cost for me,' he said. 'It's exhausting. What will it take? What will it take for us to be seen as equal? What will it take?'
Mayor Quinton Lucas shared some thoughts with FOX4 Monday on this ordinance as well.
'I think my focus is going to be what the people of Kansas City sent me here to do. What they sent me here to do was make sure the busses are better on Troost, are businesses are safer on Troost. That we are building more economic development on Troost and East of Troost. My priority is always going to be how do I build a better quality of life,' Lucas said.
The Committee, Monday, voted this ordinance to be 'held off docket' and wasn't given any green light to progress. Conversation surrounding it could come back up in the future.
According to the Legislation Text of Ordinance No. 250202, the name change of Troost to Truth would have been effective within six months after the ordinance passed, and $50,000 would have come from the General Fund to change street markers along the avenue.
Groundbreaking held for Cultural Heritage Trail at Brush Creek
The text also reads, Troost Avenue was named after Benoist Troost, a Kansas City physician, and known slave owner.
Robinson said, signage from Troost Avenue would live in museums, and not be erased completely, if this ordinance were to pass.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to FOX 4 Kansas City WDAF-TV | News, Weather, Sports.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Post
9 hours ago
- New York Post
Ex-Gov. David Paterson backing Eric Adams for NYC mayor— after endorsing Andrew Cuomo in Dem primary
Former Gov. David Paterson is backing a new horse in the crowded field for New York City mayor — putting his support behind Eric Adams' bid to hang onto City Hall. The 55th governor of New York became the highest-profile Democrat to back the incumbent's re-election bid, after previously endorsing his successor in Albany, Andrew Cuomo, in the June Democratic primary for mayor. 'I'm here to stand for someone who has already run this city for nearly four years and has made huge changes over the past administrations,' Paterson said outside City Hall Wednesday, surrounded by more than two dozen Adams supporters. Paterson made his latest endorsement on Wednesday. Matthew McDermott Eric Adams has been polling in the single digits with his long-shot independent bid for mayor. stefano Giovannini 'At this particular time, in this moment where so many issues are occurring, so many difficulties are coming to this state … the person we need to protect us is Mayor Eric Adams,' he said. The endorsement comes just weeks after Paterson called for the candidates — GOP nominee Curtis Sliwa and independents Adams, Cuomo and lawyer Jim Walden — to unite behind one person as the best way to beat the frontrunner, socialist Zohran Mamdani, in the November election. Under the proposal, the contender who continues to campaign would be determined by an independent poll closer to the election or by leaders across Big Apple institutions. But Paterson said Wednesday he was dropping the idea, which Cuomo had publicly endorsed. 'It was an idea to generate conversation. None of the candidates seemed particularly interested, so I considered the issue to be mute,' he said. Cuomo has maintained his runner-up status behind Mamdani in a handful of polls over the last month, while Adams has been struggling to muster double-digit support, putting him in fourth place. Paterson has repeatedly spoken out against Mamdani, who shocked the political world when he won the Democratic nomination and gave Cuomo an electoral shellacking in the primary. 'It would kind of be like comparing a lit match to a forest fire,' Paterson said Wednesday, when asked why he was supporting Adams over the party's nominee. 'Mr. Mamdani has proposed some very interesting concepts and idea. The problem is that he can't really solve them unless he has the resources. And he never really discusses where he's going to get the resources from,' Paterson said. He compared the Queens assemblyman to lefty Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, whose popularity has dipped as the Windy City's budget woes worsen. 'We don't want to go through that. We don't want to have these situations where the government is falling apart and there's no leadership and nobody know what to do,' Paterson said. The endorsement is the latest shift for Paterson, who also worked Walden early on in the lawyer's independent campaign for mayor. Veteran political operative Bill Cunningham predicted that having the backing of Paterson — the state's first black governor who served from 2008 to 2010 — will help Adams and take a bite out of Cuomo's chances of winning the race. 'It will make a difference for Cuomo. His strategy rests on being the choice of moderate to liberal elderly voters of color,' Cunningham told The Post. 'David's endorsement of Adams is like the iceberg cutting a slit at the Titanic's waterline,' he said, 'and it may help Mamdani for the same reason. 'The questions for Adams' team is how can they use it to best advantage given his money problems.' Meanwhile Sliwa, who has a longtime personal and professional relationship with Paterson, thanked the ex-gov for not backing him — calling an endorsement from him the political 'kiss of death.' 'I have political vertigo from my husband-in-law David Paterson,' Sliwa told Politico. 'You went from Adams to Jim Walden to Cuomo, now you are back to Adams. Stay away from me. Say bad things about me! But please don't endorse me.' When asked about Sliwa's comments, Paterson fired back. 'Curtis Sliwa is a kiss of death.'
Los Angeles Times
11 hours ago
- Los Angeles Times
To boost police response times, Huntington Beach looks to the skies
The Huntington Beach Police Department typically takes about five minutes to get to a crime scene or emergency situation. Drones will soon cut that time to two minutes or less. The department is expected to launch its Drone as First Responder program on Sept. 13, officials said during a news conference and demonstration Tuesday at the Lake Street Fire Station. Three Skydio X10 drones will be docked on rooftops at strategic locations around the city, including a location near the Bella Terra outdoor mall and one near City Hall, said police Lt. Chris Nesmith. Nesmith, who manages the department's drone program, said each drone has a 2-mile radius. Eventually, the department hopes the whole city will be covered. Drone as First Responder programs have been launching statewide. Large cities such as New York, Chicago and Oklahoma City have started similar programs. 'What we're going to be able to do for the officers on the ground is a huge thing,' Nesmith said. 'You have no idea what you're driving into. This is going to give you a bird's-eye view before you're even on the scene. The officers can watch on monitors while they're en route to the call [to see] what's happening at the call before they get there.' The drones will be controlled remotely from the department's real-time crime center using an Xbox controller, said Det. Taylor Davoren, a Drone as First Responder pilot. The department has 17 officers who will operate the drones, having passed the Federal Aviation Administration Part 107 commercial exam and completed specialized Beyond Visual Line of Sight certification. 'One of the biggest advantages of this program is how quickly we can get on scene to support investigations and prosecutions,' Davoren said. 'In most cases, suspect or vehicle descriptions are critical, but if it takes an officer five minutes to arrive, those details might be gone. With drones, we can often be there in under two minutes and start recording immediately, which will be extremely helpful for these investigations. 'That means we're capturing key details — who was there? How many people were there? What vehicles were they driving? — evidence that has been left behind. This not only helps in making arrests, but building stronger cases that can lead to successful prosecutions.' The program is funded for multiple years for about $120,000 annually, Huntington Beach spokesman Corbin Carson said. That includes equipment, installation, training and ongoing support. Nesmith said Huntington Beach police partnered with Skydio, an American company, due to a possible ban on Chinese drones. He also emphasized that the Drone as First Responder program is not a surveillance program. 'This isn't a 'Big Brother' program, this is a public safety law enforcement program that will be reactive only for calls for service,' he said. The department has been using drone technology since 2018, but previously the drone would have to be taken to a site by an officer and set up. Huntington Beach Mayor Pat Burns, a former pilot for the Long Beach Police Department, said he was enthusiastic about the program. 'Big perimeters take hours sometimes,' Burns said. 'If there's not an eye in the sky, if that helicopter with night vision is not available, sometimes those perimeters can be a nightmare demand on personnel and keeping that perimeter contained. With that eye in the sky, within minutes at times, you can nail that person. The perimeter is broken down and [officers] can go back to doing what they do, serving the people on the streets.' Szabo writes for Times Community News.
New York Post
a day ago
- New York Post
Michael Goodwin: Mamdani's NYC borough tour attacking Trump smacks of amateur hour
It seems as if it was only yesterday that Zohran Mamdani was running to be mayor of New York on an agenda he vowed would solve the 'affordability crisis.' He won the Democratic primary by pledging that wealthier New Yorkers would pay higher taxes so his City Hall could afford lots of free stuff for everyone else. Apparently that's all it took to solve the crisis. Because just like that, the 33-year-old socialist assemblyman is saying he has a new agenda for the general election. He's now running against President Trump, calling him an enemy and vowing 'My administration will be Donald Trump's worst nightmare.' This week he's touring the five boroughs, one borough per day, with a steady stream of warnings that the president's policies will hurt the city, and that Mamdani should be elected to resist him. He reportedly plans to mostly ignore his three main rivals and save his firepower for Trump. It's all part of an effort to paint the president as Public Enemy No. 1. Medicaid accusation He began by accusing Trump of kicking more than 1 million New Yorkers off Medicaid, cutting funding for food stamps and slashing funding for housing programs. 'We know that there is no borough that will be free from Trump's cruelty,' he said. Mamdani's next step was to dirty up his three main rivals by linking them to Trump. He says former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Mayor Adams and GOP nominee Curtis Sliwa should be disqualified from consideration because, he claims, they have cozy relationships with Trump. Mamdani said in a radio interview the 'president has three candidates in this race — one that he's directly been in touch with, another he bailed out of legal trouble and now functionally controls, and the final one literally being a member of the same Republican Party.' The decision to appeal to New Yorkers by attacking the president of the United States, a former New Yorker, smacks of amateur hour. While there are certainly legitimate issues to raise about Mamdani's opponents, overstating their connections to Trump and making that a defining issue is not persuasive. Neither is turning the president into a toxic bogeyman. All three denied being close to Trump, with Cuomo foolishly trying to compete with Mamdani by saying, 'Nobody has fought with Trump more than I have.' For one thing, Trump loves New York and makes it clear he wants to help his hometown and state. For Mamdani to bite the hand that could feed the city merely to score cheap political points reveals his ignorance of history and of the necessity of City Hall having strong connections to the White House, no matter the party of the president. His calling Trump an enemy before he's even been elected flips a seminal event on its head. Recall the legendary Daily News headline from 1975 when President Gerald Ford declined a bailout request. The words 'Ford to City, Drop Dead' helped set in motion bipartisan efforts that eventually got results, all captured in a recent documentary. A version of that headline based on Mamdani's approach would declare: 'City to Trump, Drop Dead.' Knowing what we know about Trump, attacks will not get the federal help the next mayor will need. Leaving aside whether Mamdani's effort to link his opponents to the president will play well in the November election, it strikes me as a stupendously bad idea for a city official or candidate to attack the president to score political points. Mayoral malpractice Indeed, it's malpractice for a mayor or governor to spurn the president and by extension the federal government over partisan differences. The odds of winning anything that way are low and the price of losing is far too high to make it a sensible bet. Consider some areas where the feds hold the purse strings and can offer other help. Housing, education, health care, mass transit, highways, bridges, airports, tunnels, prisons, borders, tax policies on nonprofits and the overall economy. Law enforcement depends on the feds for financial aid and operational support. Any political upside to Mamdani would be transitory, while the damage to the welfare of New Yorkers could be severe and permanent. All the more so when that president is Trump, who is a man of action and a prolific counterpuncher. He has called Mamdani a 'communist lunatic,' to which The New York Times responds by saying 'Mr. Mamdani is a democratic socialist.' Given Mamdani's radicalism, the change is a distinction without a difference. Trump's decision to federalize policing in the nation's capital and mobilize the National Guard is consistent with his view that high crime levels in urban areas should not be tolerated. It's also true the police commander of the nation's capital was suspended after being suspected of manipulating data to downplay serious offenses. Although Trump talks about making a similar federalizing move in New York, the situations are very different, with the NYPD turning in record-low numbers of shootings. Of course, that's no thanks to Mamdani and his core supporters, many of whom echo his scurrilous calls to 'defund the police' and his claims that all cops are racists. He simply doesn't understand or respect police work, and it's impossible to imagine he would have the trust of the NYPD. Another area where Mamdani is out of touch is his call for higher taxes. Even Gov. Hochul, a big tax-and-spender herself, rejects his plan. She admits the state's sky-high taxes already drove many New Yorkers to Florida. It's also noteworthy that Hochul and other top Dems have not celebrated that Trump's 'Big Beautiful Bill' increased the allowable deductions of state and local taxes (SALT) from $10,000 per family to $40,000. That marks a major concession to GOP representatives from blue states. The $10,000 limit, which took effect in 2017, led Cuomo and other Dems to argue it was a rocket aimed at destroying blue states. In fact, the higher deductions go mostly to high income families, which is why Dems never tried to raise the SALT limits during Joe Biden's presidency. Demonize the tax cutter Now that Trump has reduced the incentive for many taxpayers to leave New York, you would think Dems would celebrate. But it's apparently asking too much for Sen. Chuck Schumer, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, Hochul and Mamdani to even admit that the change benefits New Yorkers, even though no state Dems supported it. They would rather demonize Trump than acknowledge he delivered a tax cut for the state's residents. His promise to cut taxes is a reason why Trump got nearly 44% of the vote in New York last year. That kind of reaction has Hochul frightened about her re-election next year and has Republicans optimistic about keeping Congress in the 2026 midterms. It's a reminder that tax rates matter, a lesson Gotham voters must teach Mamdani in November.
