Racism

Racially restrictive deeds and exclusionary covenants are still scattered across the Kansas City metro, embedded deep in the bylaws of homes associations and subdivisions’ rules, even though they can no longer be enforced. Now, property owners have a way to remove the language from the documents.

A pair of exhibits at the Spencer Museum of Art in Lawrence are inspired by the life and death of Emmett Till, which helped launch the civil rights movement. The work of area textile artists helps connect the 1955 killing to contemporary violence against Black people.

Business owners have campaigned for nearly two years to sever Troost Avenue from its slaveholding past. But the effort has hit a bureaucratic roadblock, as Mayor Quinton Lucas tries to avoid another public controversy like the failed renaming of The Paseo.

Kansas City journalist Ebony Reed and co-author Louise Story explain original data they curated for their new book, “Fifteen Cents on the Dollar: How Americans Made the Black-White Wealth Gap.”

Denton Loudermill Jr. was briefly detained by police for moving too slowly away from the crime scene, but many people on social media — including a Republican Congressman from Tennessee — saw an African American man in handcuffs and falsely claimed he was one of the shooters.

In 2023, Missouri executed four people, making it one of just five states to use the death penalty — and another execution has been set for this year.

Students and community activists continue to protest Shawnee Mission East's response to a racist attack on a Black student. Several students attended Monday's school board meeting with duct tape over their mouths, bearing messages like “We don’t feel safe” and “Protect us.”

Students, parents, community leaders and activists held a protest to support Black students in the Shawnee Mission School District after a video of a white male student verbally and physically assaulting a Black female student went viral on social media earlier this week.

A white male student at Shawnee Mission East High School was charged with aggravated battery after calling a Black female student the N-word and attacking her. A number of students walked out of class over the school's handling of the incident, and another protest is planned for Thursday.

Kansas City Indian Center and the Not in Our Honor Coalition will protest Monday's game at Arrowhead Stadium over the Chiefs' name and appropriation of Native imagery. The Indigenous-led groups have called for these changes for decades, and they have no plans to stop.

Since the war between Hamas and Israel began over two weeks ago, members of Kansas City's Islamic and Palestinian communities say they have experienced hate at an increased rate. Many say that they are concerned for their safety.

In her new book “Gray Areas: How the Way We Work Perpetuates Racism and What We Can Do to Fix It,” sociologist Adia Harvey Wingfield at Washington University in St. Louis lays out actionable items employers and colleagues can take to truly support Black employees.