Letters: Tax help for developers, the bully pulpit, a message for Brownback’s

Area’s tax struggles

After reading a recent issue of your 913 publication, as a former city and county official in Kansas, I was disappointed to see so many Community Improvement Districts that have been created in the Kansas City area that rely on the sales tax to retire the debt associated with business development. Now that the Kansas Legislature has raised the state sales tax, this will be a drag on the revenues needed to fund these improvement districts.

In a rush to eliminate the state income tax, the Legislature has shot an arrow through the heart of public and private development in the Kansas City area. And the same goes for transportation districts that are used to get the consumers to the retail stores they support.

Being new to Kansas City, it is sad to see the retail malls that are already vacant. With competition with the state to fund its budget, it will only be a matter of time that other malls and development will cease and be empty as well.

And to think that the Wyandotte Unified Government was tricked into believing the state was going to help it in its redevelopment. I can only guess that local Kansas City area taxpayers will have to make up the difference.

Larry Tucker

Overland Park

Trump broadcasting

Once again, billionaire and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump opens mouth and in goes his foot. I have a suggestion for him.

If he wants to make outrageous statements, he should get his own radio show like Rush Limbaugh.

Danny Estrada

Shawnee

Fresh water conflicts

Water water everywhere and not a drop to drink. Do my eyes and ears deceive me?

From my television, I see reservoirs dry in California one moment and areas of the country inundated with water the next. Throughout history there have been wars fought over the right to fresh water.

Today, there are “water hackers” who divert water from streams and rivers for their own use. The Jordan River in the Middle East essentially runs dry by the time it reaches the Dead Sea.

Israel, Jordan and Lebanon are among the few countries that continually battle over the Jordan River. Farmers in the Dakotas divert water from the Missouri River before it reaches places to the south. It’s not a far-flung observation to see that Australia, an island, is solely dependent upon rainfall to replenish its water supply.

In my humble opinion, fresh water is the major issue in the world today and will continue to be in the future. Technology allows us to transfer electricity from its source to its users over great distances.

There is all this political talk of the Keystone XL Pipeline to transport oil and yet very little discussion of transcontinental pipelines for the transportation of water. There are many predictors of the future, scientific and otherwise, who believe the next world war, if it’s to be, will be fought over fresh water.

Steve Katz

Leawood

Forceful president

I’m tired of the same ole political pusillanimous poltroons spouting politically polled tested pabulum. Instead of “I tend to support....” We need: “I can, I have and I will make the following happen again.”

We need a larger-than-life character who transcends “this is the process, presidential dignity, professionalism, acceptable expression, the way it works, personal attacking.” A person comfortable doing big things: renegotiate an international Chapter 11 with China, including fairer trade deals, tougher with the Middle East, a realization that the world needs us more than vice versa and enter all international conversations as a bully spouting that bluntly.

Get tough to get great again, America. We need someone to be that proverbial bull in a china shop with federal agencies and whole Cabinet level departments, shouting, “You’re fired.”

We need someone who has, and knows how to create jobs in the private sector. We need someone to turn our dependency from out federal Big Brother, and return it to the private sector, home, father and mother.

We have not seen such a force of nature “Trumping about” since Teddy Roosevelt.

Otto Rieke

Overland Park

Brownback change

President John F. Kennedy failed miserably in his decision to invade Cuba during the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Not mired by his tenacity of choice, he publicly admitted his mistake and moved on to be one of the most popular statesman of the 20th century.

His message to the nation was, “Victory has many fathers, and defeat is an orphan.” Our governor could take a lesson from Kennedy's playbook and rather than continue to make a fool of himself and the state, by his tenacity of choice, relent and admit his mistake.

He should repeal his flawed policies and re-institute the very income taxes that the state of Kansas voted upon themselves before he entered office rather than ramming down our throats the failed trickle-down economic policy, which has proven disastrous for the entire nation and for a generation. Having the courage to admit ones mistake and going back to the successful status quo before our governor and his pocket legislators, would, as it did with Kennedy, endear him to most Kansas voters, and be a welcome relief to both legislators and the poor who have to bear the burden of this “experiment” that's gone terribly wrong.

Paraphrasing Lloyd Bensen, former secretary of the Treasury, “I knew John Kennedy, I lived through his presidency, and governor, you're no John Kennedy.” And, in the words of Nike Tennis shoes and Ronald Reagan, “Just Do It!” admit your mistake, and “tear down that wall” of intransigence and put us back where we were, happy with our income taxes and the services that we voted for.

And, more importantly, a balanced budget shouldn’t be balanced on the backs of those less fortunate. Gov. Sam Brownback should ensure that the state isn't the laughing stock of the entire nation.

Tom Davis

Merriam

This story was originally published July 28, 2015 at 5:10 PM with the headline "Letters: Tax help for developers, the bully pulpit, a message for Brownback’s."