Last Week's Meeting

 

President Neil Barnett welcomed all to the meeting on the 28^th floor of the Crowne Plaza Hotel. After saying the Pledge of Allegiance, Karla Schuning delivered a beautiful invocation emphasizing community. Two guests were introduced. Peter Ho announced the Bolte Beer Bash will take place at his home on September 24 from 5:00-7:00. Sign up early as the Bash is limited to 35 attendees. Tom Davis announced that the annual Foundation dinner is set for November 6 at the Carriage Club. Our club has been a top sponsor in past years, and the goal this year is to have two tables full of Club 13ers. If you have an auction item you are willing to donate for the cause, please contact Kandi Kos. President Neil then presented the opportunity through Rotary to help those in Nepal devastated by the recent horrific disaster. Individual Rotarians can donate to the “Let’s Stand with Nepal” fundraising effort by giving directly to Rotary’s partner, ShelterBox, or by donating to District 6040 which will collect all gifts received and make a single donation. The Club is looking for Bagel Run volunteers for the month of October. Contact Kandi to sign up. Mark Horner then led the Club’s recording of a birthday video to former Rotary International Director, Patrick Chisanga.  Ted Higgins then took the podium to remind us of the upcoming “Hit for Haiti” fundraiser for the Higgins Brothers Surgicenter for Hope on October 3 at Homestead Country Club. A robust Happy Bucks session then ensued.

 

Rick Hughes then introduced Bill Dietrich, the President and CEO of the Downtown Council of Kansas City since 2002. Mr. Dietrich described his job as “community building” within the area characterized as “downtown,” from the Riverfront to the Federal Reserve Bank to the south, and 18^th and Vine to State Line on the west. Much of the presentation was a comparison between the state of the downtown area in 2002 and now. From the film poking fun at Kansas City’s empty downtown and likening it to the Charlton Heston movie, Omega Man, to present, there has been substantial development. The Crosswords area was essentially abandoned and is now thriving with many older buildings renovated as restaurants, offices, hotels, and living spaces. An old coal plant on Pershing Road is now the home of the Kansas City Ballet. The statistics are impressive. 32% of all employees in the City of Kansas City work downtown. 183,000 people will visit downtown on a daily basis. There are 7.3 million unique visitors on an annual basis. Compared to other cities, Kansas City’s downtown has recovered well from Covid with 95% of the workforce returning. Kansas City has a 17% office vacancy downtown compared to Denver’s 50% vacancy rate. There has been $10.3 billion in investment since 2002 with $2.7 billion of that currently under development. There is another $7.3 billion in the pipeline with ongoing development of, among other things, the Riverfront and West Bottoms. Mr. Dietrich touted other well-known successes such as the Current Stadium, the college sporting events held downtown, and the World Cup, and pointed to the plan for Royals Stadium at the Crown Center area and development of the new downtown park area over Hwy. 670 as examples of important future projects. In order to support more downtown dwellers, it is important to have a robust retail market. The downtown retail market is second to the Plaza in revenue generation. Much of the retail is entertainment and art-based consisting of theaters and art galleries and amenities such as restaurants which support the arts organizations. There were questions about the challenges robust development brings such as parking and congestion, and our speaker suggested these were “good” challenge to have.