Over the past 50 years, the Kansas City community has seen a dramatic decline in its urban neighborhood communities. Plagued by highway, river and state bifurcation issues, racism, white, suburban and class flight, crime, highway construction and poor schools, the urban core neighborhoods of Kansas City have had severe problems. While federal funds exist to address these problems, the city sponsored progress of neighborhood development has been criticized by Kansas City interest groups and several audits.
In the summer of 2004, the Cookingham Institute of Public Affairs joined the city manager, Wayne Cauthen, to address the need for a re-visioning of Kansas City’s housing and neighborhood processes. Cauthen set up a housing task force made up of local community leaders, developers, constituents and council members to make recommendations about the process through which funds are allocated for neighborhood development. He tapped Robyne Turner, PhD and the staff and students at the Cookingham Institute to facilitate the task force meetings, and provide content and research needs in order to create a master set of recommendations that would direct the overall allocation process.
Cauthen challenged the Housing Task Force with the following tasks:
- Develop consensus on a common purpose: a comprehensive neighborhood improvement strategy
- Provide guidance at the neighborhood level
- Develop a path for neighborhood success, not just housing production
- Make recommendations that guide how to best leverage housing and other federal dollars
UMKC led the task force through 8 sessions to accomplish the tasks assigned, resulting in a series of 43 recommendations that included some of the following:
- Funds should be allocated by the city using an RFQ/RFP process to create a coordinated and comprehensive approach to neighborhoods and housing.
- All contracts should have performance measures and impact measures.
- Funds should be allocated only when the organization can demonstrate its likelihood of success through its resources and their own capacity to undertake the project.
- A coordinated neighborhood priority system should target the use of funds in neighborhoods with greatest need. The priority system establishes thresholds and processes to assess need and identify targets as well as coordinate the use of city resources.
- Existing housing stock should be preserved and improved when possible, and expressly when new housing is being built in the area.
- Federal funds must be leveraged to bring more private funds and other city monies to the housing and neighborhood revitalization process.
- The city must support community organizations’ capacity through organizing, leadership, and support from elected and administrative officials.
The city manager used the recommendations to create an implementation plan which was then presented with a report from UMKC and the recommendations to the city council for approval. The following documents detail the Housing Task Force process (all require Adobe Reader):
Housing Task Force Final Report – The final document submitted by Robyne Turner, PhD, staff and students overviewing the housing task force process, their recommendations and Kansas City’s history of housing and neighborhood problems.
Kansas City Practices Matrix – Compiled by the Cookingham Institute, this document overviews current Kansas City housing and neighborhood practices.
National Best Practices Matrix - Compiled by the Cookingham Institute, this document overviews current national housing and neighborhood practices.
Kansas City Maps – This links to a set of maps that show the Consolidated Strategic Plan Areas, Minority Population by location, Housing Structure Conditions, Housing Infrastructure Conditions, Median Rent, Average Sale Prices, and Median Household Income.
Kansas City Land Use Maps – This links to two maps that show vacant land, 353 projects, urban renewal zones, TIF projects, and planned industrial expansion.
