Time out from the BOA minutes for an editorial comment.
The Monuments
A couple of the Comments stimulated some reflection on my part...so here they are.
The destruction/construction/reconstruction of Barry Road was the impetus for this monument situation. The entrance monuments at Barry and Eastside/Forest/Hillside had to be removed for the new road, regrettable but it happened. KCMO as part of the consideration for the project offered $50,000 in part to make amends for the loss of the monuments. Jerry Bos and the BOA agreed and signed the cooperative agreement with KCMO. Hindsight might say KCMO took us to the cleaners based on the fact that replacement of those three would certainly amount to more than $50,000...but we won't go there, over and done.
It is at that point things seemed to have gotten out of hand in my view. Let's start with the monuments not touched by KCMO. Me and Bubba run past the monuments every week. You have to get a close look at them. Structurally almost all are in good shape, a couple need a bit of tuck pointing, all need a good power washing. A number of them could use painting of the wood plaques. Up until this year they were poorly maintained, not even weeded or trimmed...possibly this blog pointing out the irony of wanting new monuments when the City couldn't even maintain the old helped get some attention. No matter. How did the removal of the Barry Road monuments stimulate replacement of all of them? I don't know. Why would a City committee (EAGC) be established by Bos, ostensibly to accommodate tax write-offs for donors? Because the monuments are being built on donated funds (less the $50,000 form KCMO) does that mean a relatively small group of folks can do what they want?
If it were put to a vote of citizens of WL, would they vote a tax increase (it would take that based on the amount needed) to replace all the monuments? If the answer is no (my bet the outcome would be no) what does that say about the whole monument effort? If the monuments benefit all, aesthetics, pride, whatever, why shouldn't we all pay? One of the Comments mentioned Riss Lake/Tremont. We never considered either of those communities when we moved North from Brookside, we had an aversion to Overland Park style living. Thanks to Mrs Bubba and Bob McCormack we ended up here, quaint, picturesque, unique.
Let's keep it that way.
And that is as I see it.
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3 comments:
Guarantee it, will never feel “pride” driving by new monuments. Guarantee it, long after they are built no one is going to feel “pride”. Like anything new, they become common place. And after a while one doesn’t even see them.
Appreciate you sentiments Mike. You hit the nail on the head.
Ditto, Mike.
What I haven't seen in this entire discussion......why are the biggest monuments going to be the least visible; next to City Hall???????????
For ages they EAG used the excuse because of construction on Barry they couldn't tackle it first. But, we all know how their timing worked out and now, there's no good reason. The city council should step up and stop the nonsense.
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