The Kansas City Star’s endorsements in KCK BPU race | Opinion

Editor’s note: Read the races The Star’s Editorial Board will endorse and why we’re focusing on Wyandotte County’s future.

The races for the Board of Public Utilities in Kansas City, Kansas, are often quiet affairs, of interest only to political insiders and public officials.

Not this year. The BPU sits smack in the middle of the most consequential issues KCK will face in the next decade: economic development, rebuilding the electricity grid, the cost of utilities and the environment. That means members of the board must be qualified, focused and serious about their jobs.

Three seats — half the board — are up for grabs this year. Only one seat, however, has an August primary: District 1 At-Large. District 1 is in northeast KCK, where many of the city’s residents are economically disadvantaged.

Four candidates have filed for the seat. The top two vote-getters will face each other in the general election in November.

We strongly recommend Gary Bradley-Lopez and Michael Paulson.

Paulson is a financial adviser. He has thought long and hard about the impact development plans will have on the agency, which provides power to 67,000 residents.

Take, for example, plans to build potentially power-hungry data centers in the county. By some estimates, the electricity requirements for those centers will exceed all the power now generated for every residential customer in Wyandotte County.

It will be an enormous task to provide that power. It could be up to the BPU to buy power, or build power, for the centers. Alternatively, the developers could provide their own electricity.

It’s a “critical moment,” Paulson told us. If the BPU needs to provide the energy, it must do so “in a way that doesn’t harm our community,” he said. That means protecting customers from environmental or financial harm while the hi-tech centers are rolled out.

It also means avoiding expensive long-term commitments that might lock in higher rates for residential customers if the owners walk away from the centers early than expected.

“I’m committed to being an advocate and getting this right,” Paulson said. That’s exactly the posture the BPU will need as the negotiations for data centers continue. The board must have a seat at the table for these negotiations.

Candidate Bradley-Lopez holds similar views. He also thinks BPU should focus on green energy production if and when the demand for power accelerates. “These are big boy decisions,” he said.

Bradley-Lopez, a teacher, also supports improved services for customers and a greater effort to reduce costs and electricity rates. He understands the difficulty older and poorer customers face in installing new energy-efficient air conditioners or newer pipes.

Both candidates firmly oppose any sale of the BPU to a private company. “Hell no,” Bradley-Lopez said. “It’s ours. It’s the people’s. …That said, there’s a lot of things to work on.”

Both candidates also said they would work to address potentially excessive payments from the BPU to the Unified Government, known as PILOTs, or payment in lieu of taxes.

There are two other candidates who have filed for the District 1 At-Large seat. Alex Sanchez does not appear to have conducted a visible public campaign.

Lisa Walker Yeager, the fourth candidate, has also filed to run for a UG commission seat. She seems more focused on that race than for BPU.

The issues facing BPU and its customers are generational. Voters must hope that board members elected to protect their interests are committed to the task, and willing to study and discuss those issues.

Both Gary Bradley-Lopez and Michael Paulson seem ready for that job. We strongly urge a vote for one of those two candidates in the primary on Aug. 5.

This story was originally published July 29, 2025 at 5:07 AM.