KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A multi-million dollar public improvement program in Kansas City is being told it needs to be more transparent and user-friendly.
Kansas City’s Auditor looked into the last five years of Public Improvement Advisory Committee (PIAC) projects, covering $119 million that was given out to more than 700 projects.
“We received a few suggestions from the public, ‘Hey audit PIAC, this needs to be looked at we’re concerned about the timeliness,” said Kansas City Auditor Douglas Jones. “How long are projects taking, we don’t know.”
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The report shows that 43% of those projects weren’t completed on time and an additional 15% were either cancelled or the city didn’t know where the project stood.
The Auditor’s Office came up with six recommendations, mostly centered around creating goals and expectations for how long projects should take and consistently reclaiming money from cancelled or closed projects that might have funds remaining.
One big suggestion was to, “develop an external reporting system and its written procedures to periodically communitcate …the status of all projects receiving PIAC funding,” the report states.
“If the project’s been funded, everybody will know it’s been funded and its process,” said Jones. “Where it is in the progress? Are we still planning it, are we building it, is it done? What is that status is the important thing, public transparency.”
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That would be a welcome upgrade for Missouri Wolverines Youth Football Athletic Director Jim Tuso.
“We were hoping and we requested PIAC for to have a staircase, something that would allow people with a railing just to come down,” said Tuso pointing to the steep hill next to the field his organization uses for games and practices.
His $45,000 project was approved more than a year ago and is in the design phase, but still can be a challenge to keep tabs on, Jim says, because of how the current system is set up.
“Unless they contact me, there’s really no way for me to know where the process is at,” said Tuso.
Kansas City Councilmember Johnathan Duncan supports the improvements suggested in the Auditor’s report to improve transparency, but also to avoid potential communication breakdowns when members of the public inquire about projects directly through city councilmembers.
“For me, there was never even a need to look into what was the public-facing side,” said Duncan. “I actually kind of had an assumption that that stuff was public-facing because we have public-facing trackers for waterline improvements, we have snow plow and snow removal.”
There are a series of meetings across Kansas City intended to help people better understand the PIAC process and apply for funding through it:
District 1
Tuesday, June 4, 6-8 pm — Green Hills Library Center
Wednesday, August 21, 6-8 pm — Shoal Creek Golf Course
District 2
Tuesday, June 18, 6-8 pm — North Oak Library
District 3
Monday, June 10, 6-8 pm — Gregg/Klice Community Center
District 4
Tuesday, June 11, 6-8 pm — Northgate Middle School
District 5
Wednesday, June 12, 6-8 pm — Hillcrest Community Center
District 6
Wednesday, June 26th, 6-8 pm — South Kansas City Chamber of Commerce
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