HISTORIC Kansas City Pet Project Ripoff Well-Remembered

We've posted dozens of reminders . . . It's nice to see a thoughtful write-up and documentation of one of this town's biggest bait & switch schemes in contemporary history . . . Check-it: 

In 2017, Kansas City voters approved a general obligation bond that included money for a new animal shelter. It passed with 67% of the vote. The project was sold as a public–private partnership: The Swope Park campus would cost $26 million, with $18 million from the bonds and $8 million raised privately. Another private campaign, “Raise the Woof,” hoped to raise another $5 million for an endowment. The city would own the building, and the nonprofit KC Pet Project would run it, in an arrangement similar to the Kansas City Zoo or Starlight Theatre . . . The city council included what seemed like a safeguard. Its $18 million was contingent on KC Pet Project raising $5 million. At the time, Councilwoman Jolie Justus said the campaign had already reached $3.8 million. Finance Chair Scott Wagner estimated that once the new shelter opened, the city’s annual cost of running it would rise from the $1.4 million it was spending on the old one to about $3.8 million—the only prediction in this mess that turned out to be correct. That is exactly what the city now pays under its operating contract.

Most of the construction money came through. When the campus opened in January 2020, private donors had committed more than $5 million in cash and almost $5 million in pro-bono services. The separate $5 million Raise the Woof endowment, meant to help with operating costs, is another story. There is no indication it was ever raised—the only endowment the city now mentions covers building maintenance.

Read more via www.TonysKansasCity.com link . . .

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