Help collect signatures on a petition to convert nuclear weapons production jobs to sustainable-energy jobs. Turn in your signed petitions by April 20, and attend a news conference May 12 at 12:30 p.m. at City Hall in KC, Mo., to deliver the petitions to city officials.

Why the focus on City Hall? In 2010, Mayor Funkhouser and the City Council allowed municipal bonds to be sold to finance the new National Nuclear Security Administration facility, to be built at Mo. Hwy. 150 between Botts Road and Prospect Avenue, close to Grandview. The city sold bonds worth up to $815 million for the new plant. Furthermore, the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority, with members all appointed by KC mayors, holds the title to the NNSA facility. No other city in the world is known to have an agency owning such a facility.

The KC Peace Planters, a coalition*, is gathering signatures for the petition. To help, contact Rachel MacNair at 816-753-2057, rachel_macnair@yahoo.com. She can notarize the petition pages after they’re signed by voters registered in the city. Turn in the signed petitions to MacNair by April 20.

As of April 6, about 2,150 voters had signed. To put the measure on the November ballot, 3,520 valid signatures must be obtained. Because some people do not sign with the precise name or address under which they’re registered to vote, their names will stand to be rejected by city officials. So the Peace Planters are aiming for about 7,000 signatures.

Most of the city does not yet know about the new plant. The news conference will help put the city on alert that citizens oppose nuclear weapons production in KC. The new plant will replace the current plant, the Kansas City Plant, at Bannister Federal Complex (Bannister and Troost), an area under investigation for contaminants related to producing parts for nuclear weapons.

KC Peace Planters is a coalition including Physicians for Social Responsibility-KC; PeaceWorks-KC; East Meets West of Troost; Holy Family, Cherith Brook, and St. Lawrence Catholic Worker Houses; The Recipe LLC; KC’s Loretto Peace and Justice Network; and Benedictines for Peace.

By: Rachel MacNair, PeaceWorks Kansas City

Ed Ford, the only person to stand valiantly against the new Kansas City Plant when the Council voted before, got re-elected by a solid margin – and now he’ll be joined by at least two others who are with us on this issue. The first district’s Scott Wagner and the third district’s Jermaine Reed both won by large margins, and this gives us a solid three on the Council.

More good news in the mayor’s race: While Sly James hadn’t given us enough support to allow us to list him, Mike Burke had made it clear that he was against us. We have good possibilities of conversations with James, so his win is a big relief. He’ll be replacing a mayor who attended the groundbreaking for the plant with a sneer for those of us protesting.

Unfortunately, Brandon Ellington and Tracy Ward lost by substantial margins. Ellington attended the PeaceWorks annual meeting. As a young man (30 years old) running his first race, and proving to be knowledgeable and well-spoken, he should still be able to have a bright future in later attempts at office. Ken Bacchus of the fifth district probably lost, but since the vote count is within 1%, there might be a recount.

John Sharp won, and won by a large margin. This was expected, and only keeps things the same rather than making them worse. But it does mean that the most prominent pusher of the plant on the Council is still there to push.

The next step is to meet with the four newcomers, as well as those of the incumbents who might be willing to listen. We know that the original vote was mainly based on the fear of losing the jobs and under the pressure of the moneyed interests who knew how to bring people out for the hearings. Our own strength has been shown to be with the one-on-one meetings, a format where the soundness of our reasoning trumps our low resources. So we are somewhat optimistic about bringing more Council people to our understanding as time goes by – especially when they have a quarter of the Council using the reasoning, not just one lonely voice.

Meanwhile, the number of people who voted for mayor was 70,382, and 5% of that is 3,520. That’s the number of valid signatures we need to get this approved for the ballot. Advice is to gather double that many signatures to be sure of having that many valid, because so many get knocked out. So the goal is to get at least 7,000 signatures by April 20, in time for us to organize and make a splash in early May right when the new Council meets.

Everyone hustle! Even one sheet counts, because our strength is not in money for paid signature-gatherers but in the number of people who care.

New Nuclear Weapons

Components Production Plant

The KC City Council voted to replace the old plant with its contamination of workers and environment with a new plant likely to have similar problems – and in an unprecedented move, a city agency actually holds title to the facility and the city is issuing municipal bonds!

Ed Ford is the only incumbent who voted no to this outrage – our hero!

Election: March 22, 2011

These are the candidates running for City Council who favor converting away from nuclear and toward more life-affirming jobs. For those who care about this issue, these are the people to vote for:

At Large – Everyone Votes

1^st District Scott Wagner

2^nd District Ed Ford

3^rd District Brandon Ellington

6^th District Tracy Ward

In District – Those in the District Vote

3^rd District Jermaine Reed

5^th District Ken Bacchus

This candidate favors the voters having a say:

6^th District Terrence Nash

For more information:

KC Peace Planters

Rachel MacNair,

Coordinator of Information on City Council Races 2011

rachel_macnair@yahoo.com

(816)753-2057

For more information, including a few excellent articles by Rachel, please see: www.peaceworkskc.org/kcplant.html

If you are a registered voter in Missouri, please visit our sidebar and check out the “Initiative Petition.” (Thanks to PeaceWorks KC!)

KC Peace Planters*

Contacts: Ann Suellentrop, annsuellen@gmail.com, 913-271-7925; Henry Stoever, henrystoever@sbcglobal.net, 913-375-0045

‘Breaking the Silence’ Friday night

targets dangers of making nuclear weapons,

shines light on KC Plant contaminants

Contamination from nuclear weapons production and what to do about it in the Kansas City area—these topics take center stage Friday night during the “Breaking the Silence” conference March 11-12 at Reardon Convention Center in Kansas City, Kan. (See www.breakingthesilence.us.)

Friday’s 7-10 p.m. plenary session will highlight the NBC Action News list of sick and deceased workers (http://media2.nbcactionnews.com/pdf/sickBANNISTERlist.pdf) from Bannister Federal Complex at Bannister and Troost in Kansas City, Mo. There a Department of Energy (DOE) facility, the Kansas City Plant, has made and procured parts for nuclear weapons for 61 years. “The DOE and contractors to the same are responsible for the culture of safety in its workplace,” says Marcus Iszard, Ph.D., associate professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Pharmacy. Reviewing the list of more than 100 dead workers and more than 250 sick workers and their diagnoses, Iszard says pancreatic cancer, “a most serious and debilitative cancer,” is showing up at an increasing rate. This and other diseases, he says, are being found in Bannister’s tradespeople and technical and maintenance workers, as well as administrative and professional ranks.

Friday Iszard will propose a Toxicology Education Center (TOXEC) for residents and health professionals in the area. “Environmental safety and health education can alleviate ignorance, thereby reducing illness among us,” he says. He encourages metro residents to write the UMKC School of Pharmacy to request the establishment of the TOXEC.

A nurse from Mound, Ohio, a former site for nuclear weapons material, will address contamination issues Friday. “Plutonium, tritium, and volatile organic compounds—contaminants discharged into the environment—presented a compromise to environmental health” in Mound, says Sharon Cowdrey, R.N. The former DOE complex had a $92 million clean-up over 17 years. “Although contaminants are still shown to be present, the site is declared cleared for industrial park use. Partial occupancy exists now,” says Cowdrey. She will present a study showing that Montgomery County—where Mound is—has the highest cancer rates in the state. Environmental toxic links to the cancers, including brain cancer, have been established, says Cowdrey. She serves on a volunteer watchdog organization funded by the Environmental Protection Agency to monitor Mound’s environmental safety and health.

Rocky Flats, Colo., is home to another former nuclear weapons production site. Past employee James Turner will reflect on his work there and his diagnosis of chronic beryllium disease or CBD. (Many Bannister employees have respiratory conditions, including beryllium sensitivity and CBD.) Working in trucking and delivery in the late 1960s, he frequented the yard with drums of contaminants and helped decontaminate after a major fire. Turner became an electrician but developed a chronic cough. After receiving a CBD diagnosis in 1992, he filed for worker’s compensation, was rejected, sued, and won. The Rocky Mountain News and the Denver Post reported on his case. “Many people were anonymous, but my name was published,” Turner says. “The supervisors and a manager gang-banged me—they took me off my night shift and assigned me to another shift where I lost $4,000 in income in a few months. They assigned me to Building 771, with plutonium, a very hot building. They were trying to get rid of me.” They succeeded. He started a support group for workers and took voluntary separation in 1994. “I was sick and tired of being sick and tired,” says Turner. Now Rocky Flats is shut down, but the area may become a wildlife refuge, he reports.

Local speakers Friday night will discuss the petition drive for green jobs, not nuclear weapons jobs, at the new Kansas City Plant to be opened in 2013 at Mo. Hwy. 150 and Botts Road, near Grandview. The petition may appear on the November ballot in Kansas City, Mo.

Other speakers during the Friday night plenary include:

• Maurice Copeland of Kansas City, Mo., an employee at the Kansas City Plant from 1968 to 2000 and an organizer of plant workers seeking compensation for work-related illnesses;

• Ann Suellentrop, M.S.R.N., director of KC Peace Planters, a Board member of PeaceWorks-KC, and a member of Physicians for Social Responsibility-KC;

• David Kingsley, Ph.D., who teaches statistics at the University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas City, Kan., and once worked at the Church Rock, N.M., uranium waste site, which in 1979 had a waste spill that still contaminates Navaho property—an accident second in nuclear weapons history only to Chernobyl (Three Mile Island ranks third); and

• Terrie Barrie, who founded the Alliance for Nuclear Workers Advocacy Groups and whose husband is dying from contaminants from his work at Rocky Flats.

The fourth annual “Breaking the Silence” conference focuses on environmental issues. Saturday sessions, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., will explore topics such as corporate personhood, environment-friendly breakthroughs in home and business energy efficiency, and the move to “buy local first.” Conference founder Richard Mabion, community organizer, coordinates the annual conferences.

*Peace Planters, a growing coalition, includes PeaceWorks-KC; Physicians for Social Responsibility- KC; East Meets West of Troost; Cherith Brook, Holy Family and St. Lawrence Catholic Worker Houses;, The Recipe LLC; KC’s Loretto Network for Peace & Justice; and Benedictines for Peace.