Rank Hypocrisy from the Kansas City Star?
On July 10, 2015, the Kansas City Star editorial board bemoaned the state of mental health care in Kansas. Of...
Kansas City’s Reverse Robin Hood
The poor in Kansas City face a double hit: We are generally a high tax city, and development policy ignores the poorer...
Audit the Kansas City Public Schools
We actually went back about eight years and found that there was over $25 million paid in stipends either unapproved,...
Righting the Wrongs of the Power & Light District
One of the reasons Kansas City is on the hook financially for so much on the Power & Light District is...
Urban Neglect: Kansas City and TIF
My colleague Michael Rathbone and I authored an essay titled “Urban Neglect, Kansas City’s Misuse of Tax Increment Financing.” In the essay we examined...
Map Series: IV. Kansas City Area Travel Time to Work
The map above shows the mean travel time to work per census tract in the Kansas City area. The dark...
Another Push for Rail Transit in Kansas City
Recently, Jackson County Executive Mike Sanders announced that the county had received a $10 million federal grant to buy just...
Hospital Price Transparency Bill A Bold And Necessary Reform
In the coming days, the Show-Me Institute will release a policy brief about what Missouri can do to improve access,...
Missouri Privatization Documents
The Show-Me Institute has released a comprehensive project about privatization efforts in Missouri. This project documents the wide variety of...
Wow: Jackson County Voters Say No To Research Tax By Five-To-One Margin
We had our concerns about Question 1 in Jackson County, a proposal that would have imposed a half-cent sales tax...
Kansas City Next Last Giveaway
This November, Jackson County voters will decide whether to impose a half-cent sales tax to support medical research. Officials predict...
On Tax Policy And Iocane Powder
Last week, our friend and fellow blogger Dave Helling at the Kansas City Star wrote a critique of my post...
You Can Call Them Buzzards, But That Makes Missouri The Carcass
Another day, another governor courting — or as some are saying, “trying to poach” — Missouri’s businesses. This time, it’s...
Woe Is Me – Kansas City School District
Joe Robertson, of the Kansas City Star, recently had a piece explaining that the property tax levy in the Kansas City...
Jackson County Assessment Facts, Part 2
If Jackson County assessments went up at approximately the same rate as Saint Louis County assessments during the boom real...
Jackson County Assessment Facts, Part 1
Is Jackson County property poorly assessed? If so, is it systematically under-assessed, or just inaccurate all the way around? If...
Two Thumbs Down on the So-Called ‘Arch Tax’
Voters in Saint Louis City and County will go to the polls on Tuesday, April 2 to decide the fate...
Trolleys, Trains, And Travails
The past few days have delivered even more sobering news for trolley and train transit in Kansas City. First, we...
2013: A TIF Odyssey
Tax Increment Financing (TIF) is marching onward in Missouri. Today’s Kansas City Star has a great editorial on a proposed...
TIF Gives Cities An Unfair Advantage Over Other Governments
Would you like to be able to unilaterally take some of your neighbor’s money and spend it in ways that...
