Seg. 1: Families Living Downtown | Seg. 2: Black Midwesterners

By Gina Kaufmann,

Published November 11, 2019 at 5:08 PM CST

Segment 1: Families live in downtown Kansas City, but it wasn't necessarily built with them in mind.

The accepted wisdom in Kansas City has long been that families want houses in the suburbs and that the market for downtown is young professionals and empty nesters, but families have lived downtown for generations.

Rick Usher, Assistant City Manager, Kansas City
Sara McComsey, downtown resident, Kansas City

Segment 2, beginning at 32:10: People don't think of black people when they think of who lives in the Midwest.

Kansas City writer L. L. McKinney recently wrote an essay on the "magic" of being a black Midwesterner as part of a series of essays by black Midwesterners.

L. L. McKinney, author, "I Am a Black Kansan in a Sea of Red, White, and Blue"

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Gina Kaufmann

People don't make cameos in news stories; the human story is the story, with characters affected by news events, not defined by them. As a columnist and podcaster, I want to acknowledge what it feels like to live through this time in Kansas City, one vantage point at a time. Together, these weekly vignettes form a collage of daily life in Kansas City as it changes in some ways, and stubbornly resists change in others. You can follow me on Twitter @GinaKCUR or email me at gina@kcur.org.

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Melody Rowell

Melody Rowell is the lead producer for KCUR’s Central Standard. You can find her on Twitter at @MelodyRowell, or by email at melody@kcur.org.

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Mackenzie Martin

Whether it’s something happening right now or something that happened 100 years ago, some stories don’t fit in the short few minutes of a newscast. As a podcast producer and reporter at KCUR Studios, I help investigate questions and local curiosities in a way that brings listeners along for adventures with plot twists and thought-provoking ideas. Sometimes there isn’t an easy answer in the end – but my hope is that we all leave with a greater understanding of the city we live in. Reach me at mackenzie@kcur.org.

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