City Council - Regular Meeting

Order the Legislative and Intergovernmental Relations Committee meeting for Monday, October 19th, 2026. Could I get a roll call, please?

All right. Knowing no changes to the agenda, I will look for a motion to approve the agenda.

Council Member Frazier, we have a motion to approve the agenda by Mayor Lopez. Could I get a second?

I have a motion and a second for approval of the agenda. Could I get a vote on that, please?

Aye. Thank you, and the agenda has been approved. We'll move on. Probably no public comments. Nobody likes to talk to us. All right. We'll move on to business. Item 5, Item 5A, I'll look for a motion for approval of the September 21st, 2026 Legislative and Intergovernmental Relations Committee Action Letter.

I move for approval to the September... 2026 Legislative and Intergovernmental Committee Action Letter.

Motion to have a second. I have a motion and a second. Can I get a vote on the approval of the Action Letter?

Aye. Action Letter has been approved. Item 5B. Yes.

I think she's frozen again. She's frozen.

I saw you talk now. I'm sorry, I'm trying to work on my set. It's telling me that it's on right now, so I'm sorry. Yeah, you're good, you're okay.

Okay. Item 5B, discussion legislative breakfast regional outreach. Mr. Head, are you taking this one? Nope, this is Ms. Weber. Ms. Weber. Ms. Weber.

I'm open for, I'm pretty flexible. I think Council Member Frazier, Council Member Atkins, Mayor, you guys have a time preference.

That's a date where I have a holiday reception for my office that I'm leading in the evening from five to seven. So I can do something during the day or morning. Okay. But that day would not work in the evening for me.

But I think that's the day that everyone else can do it, I guess, unfortunately.

I mean, if we stick to that day, would everybody be good with a 4.30 kind of kickoff? And I think we were leaving this kind of, it was going to be kind of just an open forum, maybe say a few words at the beginning and then just kind of let it be more of a networking thing. Is that kind of how we were approaching this, Ms. Weber? Yeah.

I see on my calendar that that particular day, I think we have our monthly Eastern Jackson County Betterment Committee meeting anyway. I think we have a luncheon that day with the mayors. So I'll leave that to Mayor Pro Tem Funk and what the rest of my council colleagues would like to do.

I think it would probably only be... respectful if we did let the mayors or someone that that city designated you know maybe we just tell them hey can you sum anything everything into a little five to seven minute What's going on in your community? What are your priorities? And we just kind of move on to the next one. So I think it's only fair. I mean, we know we're bringing them in to share our thoughts on what we're trying to accomplish in our legislative priorities. We should allow them to do the same.

And I just want to make sure, Crystal, just Again, not being discounting or disrespectful to Councilmember Atkins, but that's the day that I guess it was a consensus from most of our neighbors, I guess.

I'm flexible if we can accommodate other folks.

Yeah. I mean, I could be flexible if you get any feedback from our neighbors that, hey, that third's not going to work. I think Fridays will be tough. Just people will have holiday functions. People will have, you know, Friday night football games, all of those kind of things going on.

Sure. I mean, if we do it early enough and yeah, I don't know. Sure. That would work.

Okay. Don't worry about, don't worry about me though. Like if you, I don't know, did you already talk to the other groups or?

Oh yeah. As much as I want Council Member Atkins and all of our team to be there, I think Thursdays are easier for these kind of events than Fridays.

Yes. I thought I had said that last week. I'm sorry. I thought I gave that date out last month. It's not being available.

No, I think Thursdays sound like they're going to be best. Don't worry. Don't worry about Yeah, that's great. If we're coming up on it.

Let's shoot for the December 3rd date, Crystal, and see what kind of feedback we get.

How does that after the first of the year fit for everybody that Thursday the 7th?

Nothing on the calendar yet. Yeah, that works.

There was no storm or ice storm, but... Yeah.

That would be the... 14th? The 14th? Oh. Oh, in January. I'm sorry.

So the 14th is just going to be used as a backup date?

Sounds perfect. Thank you. Anything else on the regional get together?

That's a few days away from the I-70 shutdown, so maybe it'll be a morale-boosting activity for everyone. They can all practice their alternate routes, right? There you go. Make it like a game.

Come through Lake Summit. I did it. Okay, we will move on to item 5C, discussion, 2027 legislation priorities. I think that's why Ms. Dillard has joined us to show us her outline.

I can, I'll just work through Council Member Frazier, I'll start with you. Do you have any comments here?

I like the reference to the multimodal transportation options and the Amtrak reference. There are many that do not know or aren't aware that we do have a stop downtown Lee Summit, so I like that reference for sure.

Absolutely. I think that's a great idea.

Mayor Lopez, anything you see? Oh, sorry. Sorry, Council Member Frederick.

I can't see you. I'm on, but you can't see my face?

Go ahead. I was just also going to comment. I like the protect the authority of special taxing districts. I think that is important now. It is a relevant topic and something that I think we need to focus on as well. But other than that, I think it looks good. And I think you did a very good job in in consolidating and, as you mentioned, reducing at least, I think, some of the redundancy that was present previously. Thank you.

Thank you. Mayor Lopez, anything to add?

Yeah, I won't repeat anything that's been said. I like kind of the way it's shaping up as far as the look, the layout. I love the legacy piece, as Megan knows. It's about the people, talks about core values. I mean, I think YOU KNOW, YEAH, THAT PUTS IT OUT THERE. THIS IS WHO WE ARE. AND, YEAH, WE DO HAVE PRIORITIES IN ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, MUNICIPAL. YEAH, I LIKE IT. I LIKE THE FORMAT SO FAR.

NEW SPEAKER THANK YOU. COUNCILMEMBER ATKINS.

NEW SPEAKER YEAH, LOVE IT. LOVE THAT ALL THE ABOUT US STUFF IS ON THE FRONT AND THEN OUR PRIORITIES ON THE BACK. AND I THINK I LIKE THOSE SUBTITLES UNDER EACH OF THE PRIORITIES. I THINK THAT'S WONDERFUL. I think it's great. Very easy to read.

I would love to go through each one at a time and just make sure we all, can we just talk, is that okay? Do we have too much, does that take too much time?

I'd be willing to let, I know you're good at that, Council Member Atkins, you and maybe Mr. Head and Ms. Dillard or anyone else on the committee, it's more wordsmithing, but I think the concepts themselves, I think we all agreed on the concepts and the goals, but if you all want to wordsmith, have at it.

Yeah, I don't, I mean, where are you seeing something, I mean, is there something that's jumping out at you, Council Member Atkins? No, not at all.

I was just going to, no, thank you. I was just going to have Mr. Head walk us through each one at a time and make sure we're all still, just refresh what they all are. I think it's great. Just so we can be reading while he's talking. Okay.

When you say refresh what they are, are you talking about, for example, transportation? Are you wanting to understand what each of those mean? I guess to help Mr. Head out of an explanation, I guess I'm not understanding what you're asking to do. I apologize.

I don't know. The last time we just went through the bullets one at a time and everyone was like, yes, this is my feedback. It's all good. So it just seemed like a good format to cover it unless we're just supposed to stamp it and move on. And that's fine too.

Yeah. I mean, as far as the concepts, like I said, I feel very comfortable that we were pretty thorough last time we had this discussion. Yeah. If there's better ways to kind of, like I said, wordsmith things and, change bullet points around. I mean, like I said, you have several of you, Council Member Frazier as well, have more creative eyes than I do with that kind of stuff. But I'm good with the goals, the concepts. I like the layout, like I said earlier, about talking about who we are culturally, you know, core values, mission. Yeah. I mean, I don't want to kind of keep repeating that, but

No, I'm, I'm with you, Mayor. I think we're, we're spot on. And, and Megan, you, you're going to just now take it next steps to color, outline, that type of thing, correct?

Perfect. Mr. Head, does that satisfy you?

Okay. Perfect. Perfect. Anything else on this topic before we move to roundtable?

But I was just going to comment that I have heard many times mayors say, this is who we are, or this is not who we are. But I like the use of the word we under each one of these. under transportation, we support, we support. I just wanted to make that comment. And to the extent that we could, I mean, I'm all for communication and wording, but I agree with you, Mr. Head. Sometimes it looks lengthy, but you know what? I understand after reading it, I understand exactly what's being said.

No. Perfect. Thank you for those comments. Job well done by everyone. Thank you, Ms. Dillard, for getting this back to us, and we'll sit impatiently waiting to see how you lay this out with all the colors and everything.

And we have one more opportunity to, sorry, Council Member Atkins, to just review before it goes out to print or whatever.

Yep, I agree. Council member Atkins, did you have anything to add to this before we move on?

You had a question on a transportation. Is there any value? In any of those five bullets. Maybe under the fourth bullet. No, that's not the one. Under the third bullet, saying something about federal funding. Is there any, would that be a trigger word to put in the word federal somewhere so that someone reading it would know that it's on our mind to go past Jeff City this year? Funding priority projects with federal partnerships, including I-470 and Third Street Just the word, just the word at all. Is there a way to insert that or is there value to that?

Okay. All right, we will move on to item number six, round table. Mr. Head, I know we've got a couple of things to talk about here.

With the committee, would there be any issues... To make the timeline smoother and easier for you, Brian, reading through your email, if we had a quick... Monday, October 26th. If anybody, if everybody could take a peek at their calendars.

What about the morning? Uh, what about, um, Like the morning of the 27th.

How does that look for everybody if we had a quick 8 or 9 o'clock morning knock it out and everybody moves on with their day? Come on, November? November. No, October 27th. Okay, let's see.

Yeah, so that's my mark day. I'm down at mark offices pretty much all day. So, yeah, the earlier the better, probably.

Would you want to do, would an 8 o'clock work, Brian, if we just got it out of the way?

sorry that's the week i'm gone okay well we can still take care of it they're reported the clerk can handle it okay right yeah we're just just approving the you know we'll we'll score this stuff get it back to Brian, he'll get it put together, and then it would just be a matter, you're going to bring it forward to the committee, the recommendation, we're going to approve it, and we send it on to council.

Okay. Council Member Atkins, you're good at 830 on the 27th? Yep, thank you. Gina? Gina? Yes. Can you make sure Brian gets that on the calendar before you leave?

Got it. Perfect. Anything else, Mr. Head?

Got it. Well, thank you, everybody. Ms. Dillard, thank you for bringing that forward again. We'll wait and see the final thing, and we'll all be excited for that. And if there's nothing else, we will adjourn this meeting at 1210.