Royals GM Dayton Moore helps light Mayor’s Christmas Tree

Kansas City Royals general manager Dayton Moore appeared Friday evening as a special guest at the lighting ceremony for the Mayor’s Christmas Tree at Crown Center Square.

Moore thanked fans for their support and urged people to consider donating to the Mayor’s Christmas Tree Fund, a charity that raises money to ensure that senior citizens, people with disabilities and children in need in Kansas City are not left out of the holidays. The Friday evening ceremony featured holiday music before the tree lighting.

“It feels like Christmas,” said Mayor Sly James, who praised the “tremendous generosity of Kansas Citians who have helped the elderly and needy kids and more than 5,000 families from all across the city.”

James called for a moment of silence to acknowledge the victims of recent terrorist attacks in Paris and in the African nation of Mali.

Fireworks followed the lighting of the tree, a 100-foot-tall Douglas fir from Oregon. The tree, strung with 7,200 white lights, is taller than trees at the White House and at Rockefeller Center in New York, according to city officials.

The tree will eventually be cut into ornaments and sold to benefit the Mayor’s Christmas Tree Fund charity.

For more information about the charity or to make a donation, go to kcmayor.org/donate.

This story was originally published November 27, 2015 at 7:22 PM with the headline "Royals GM Dayton Moore helps light Mayor’s Christmas Tree."