Fiber Filibuster

The Official Unofficial Minutes of the WL BOA
April 1

After a hiatus from attending the monthly meeting, it was back in the saddle for me, along with 4 other citizens who attended the proceedings.  Alderman Stevenson was not in attendance.

A work session started at 6:30 to review changes to the Employee Handbook.  Mostly updates to be in compliance with the Feds and state.  City Attorney John along with partner Scott will prepare draft based on comments from the Mayor and BOA, possibly for final next meeting.

GF
Jerry acknowledged during his Comments that he had received a "significant" number of phone calls and emails from citizens interested in Google Fiber.  Apparently WL resident Mary Florence has had a fair amount of interaction with GF in downtown KCMO and might be a source with her connections to GF.  Bos mentioned there had been contact with a person named Rachel Hack (sp?) at GF and was told there are no intentions to come to WL in the near future and that they would "be in touch".  Jerry posed the question on "how aggressive do we want to be?".  General discussion included horror stories of infrastructure being torn up in preparation for GF.  Jerry observed some of the City has utilities on poles while some not (Westridge) possibly complicating the install.  The mayor quizzed yours truly regarding the existence of utility poles on Potomac (there are) but some of us have buried utilities including Time Warner...I presume GF would be no better/worse than others.  I guess that is the key, there have been no serious discussions regarding GF with GF and the discussions at council to date are mostly presumptions.

Bos has shown little leadership on issues like this in the past and because of his lame duck status opted to establish a "committee" to further investigate the issue.  Alderman Steve Clark will be the council designate and WL resident Rick Footer who spoke in favor of GF volunteered to be part of the posse.  I assume Mary Florence will be asked to join as well.  So the grass roots will have to drive the issue, I would highly recommend contacting Steve Clark (presuming he will be elected next week) and/or City Hall to throw your hat into the ring, if you have a passion and need for high speed.

Heads Up - Today's Star 816 magazine features candidates bios for WL as well as PH School Board candidates.
http://www.kansascity.com/2014/03/30/4926480/candidates-with-experience-on.html

The west ward alderman race is also featured in the issue/link.