• About Us
  • Advertise
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy
Thursday, January 21, 2021
46 °f
Platte
30 ° Sat
37 ° Sun
30 ° Mon
28 ° Tue
The Platte County Landmark Newspaper
  • Home
  • Local News
  • Opinion
  • Landmark Live!
  • Looking Backward
  • Home
  • Local News
  • Opinion
  • Landmark Live!
  • Looking Backward
No Result
View All Result
The Platte County Landmark Newspaper
No Result
View All Result

Somebody is getting their christmas shoplifting done

Ivan Foley by Ivan Foley
December 25, 2019
in Between the Lines
6
SHARES
139
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare via Email

And so this is Christmas. I hope you have fun.


In order to allow our staff to enjoy both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with their families, and in order to get the weekly newspaper in the hands of most readers before Christmas Day, we’ve cranked out a slightly smaller than normal Landmark for you on Monday as opposed to our normal Wednesday printing date.

RelatedNews

Sometimes the big lie gets used as a political strategy

Get your popcorn ready for health board meetings

Wait, 2020 wasn’t that bad, was it?

Merry Christmas to all our Landmark readers and friends. Thank you for inviting our work into your home throughout the year.


Listen, I love all you folks but no more Christmas treats for The Landmark office. No more pies. No more boxes of fancy chocolates.

I’ve put on eight pounds in the past two weeks and the holidays aren’t even here yet. We do appreciate your kindness and thoughtfulness but my belt is feeling the pain.


It appears thieves are getting their Christmas shoplifting done.

The six stolen vehicles from the Dodge dealer in Platte City, as detailed on our front page in last week’s issue, may be the work of an organized group that targets car dealerships.

Platte City has had three or four burglaries that appear to be connected to that group, police say.


The work of thieves taking items from garages, outbuildings, vehicles, etc. in northern Platte County in an area around Interurban Road appears to be the work of a group from KC, let’s generally say the southeast metro, authorities with the Platte County Sheriff’s Department told me recently. Major Erik Holland said local authorities are pretty sure they have targeted the right suspects, and when we last spoke he said the next step would be to get arrest warrants and search warrants if needed.


With a lot of publicity and buzz about alleged racist activity at the Platte County R-3 School District, some other public entities are taking an introspective look and holding conversations to see if there are any signs of similar concerns within their own ranks.

For instance, the topic of being alert for any sign of bias in traffic stops by area law enforcement agencies. The Platte City Police Department’s ratio in the important category of “disparity index” was a topic at a recent public safety subcommittee meeting.

The verdict? The latest available numbers show no signs of racial concerns with the Platte City Police Department.

The perfect disparity index number is 1.00. Platte City Police Department’s number is 1.61 for stops of African-American drivers. While city leaders would always like to see the figure closer to 1.00, it should be noted that in the Kansas City Metro area only Plattsburg had a better ratio than Platte City.

DJ Gehrt said the ratio is a matter the city takes seriously. “It is important,” he emphasized.

Police officers in the state must report specific information, including a driver’s race, for each vehicle stop. Law enforcement agencies must provide their vehicle stops data for the calendar year by March 1 of the next calendar year.

The disparity index relates each racial/ethnic group’s proportion of total traffic stops to its proportion of the driving age (16 and above). A value of 1.00 indicates that a group’s proportion of vehicle stops equals its population proportion: it is neither “under-represented” nor “over-represented.” Values above one indicate over-representation in traffic stops, meaning a higher proportion of vehicle stops for the ethnic group’s population proportion. Values below 1.00 indicate under-representation in traffic stops, meaning a lower proportion of vehicle stops for the ethnic group’s population proportion.

Officials stress it is an imperfect benchmark, since obviously a person does not need to live in an area to drive through it. “This dynamic can lead to the racial/ethnic makeup of drivers on a jurisdiction’s roadways differing from that of its residential population,” says DJ Gehrt, city administrator for Platte City.

While the 1.61 number for Platte City police in regard to stops of African-American drivers for the city’s population is not the perfect 1.0, there are some outside factors that may contribute.

“Platte City serves as the home of the Platte County R-3 School District and the county seat for Platte County, which significantly affects the demographics of drivers (traveling through) the city,” Gehrt points out. For instance, while only five percent of drivers age 16 and over living in Platte City are African-American, that number is 10 percent within the R-3 school district.

With that knowledge in mind, “further consideration of Platte City’s traffic stops in 2018 when compared to the Platte County R-3 School District demographics do not indicate a significant over-representation of traffic stops of African-American drivers,” Gehrt said.

So overall, it’s a very satisfactory report for the Platte City Police Department.“It’s important and a good practice to review these metrics regularly. It is equally important to continuously review police reports and traffic data to evaluate potential bias,” Gehrt remarked.


Last week the Platte County Sales Tax Structure Advisory Committee met for the fifth time and adjourned with what sounded a plan to start getting jiggy with it when it next meets on Jan. 13. Committee member Aaron Schmidt pushed for the pace to pick up a little bit, asking for the parks department and all the law enforcement departments’ (sheriff, prosecutor, courts) long financial needs to be summarized on one sheet so the process of figuring out what level of sales tax would be required to meet projected needs.

Committee member attendance, having struggled at 60% recently, was at 80% last week.

If the county commission’s intention was to get a sales tax question(s) on the April ballot, it’s getting late in the game. The deadline for an entity to place an issue on the April ballot is Jan. 28.

(It’s never too late in the game to follow Foley on Twitter @ivanfoley or find him on Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram and YouTube. Email ivan@plattecountylandmark.com)

Tags: electionsplatte cityplatte countypolicePublic Safetytaxes
Ivan Foley

Ivan Foley

Ivan Foley is owner/editor/publisher of the Platte County Landmark. Foley has been on the news beat in Platte County with The Landmark for 38 years, specializing in local government issues and accountability journalism. He has penned multiple award-winning investigative pieces. He provides weekly observations and editorial commentary in his Between the Lines column and serves as host of Landmark Live, a light-hearted videocast featuring newsmakers and events in the Northland. During his time at the helm of The Landmark, the newspaper has been awarded on multiple occasions for General Excellence in the Missouri Press Association’s Better Newspaper Contest. In 2016, Foley won the Tom and Pat Gish Award, a national honor given by the School of Journalism and Media at the University of Kentucky for displaying courage, tenacity and integrity in rural journalism. A big fan of the Chiefs and Royals, Foley resides in Platte County not far from KCI Airport.

Related Posts

Stephanie McKinley

Familiar face, familiar place

by Debbie Coleman-Topi
January 18, 2021
0

Assistant takes over as chamber director The newly appointed executive director of the Platte City Chamber of Commerce already has a lifetime of local contacts. Stephanie McKinley was just named last week to replace Angie Mutti, who left the position...

Fatal fire at Weston

Scene of fatal fire

by Ivan Foley
January 18, 2021
0

Arson and murder charges have been filed in a deadly blaze that occurred at this home in the 600 block of Prospect Street in Weston early Sunday. Local authorities and fire investigators were still on the scene Monday morning investigating...

Anthony C. Fleming

Arson, murder charges filed in deadly blaze

by Ivan Foley
January 18, 2021
0

Weston man dies in fire at residence Arson and murder charges have been filed in a deadly blaze that occurred at a home in Weston early Sunday. Local authorities and fire investigators were still on site Monday morning investigating the...

Weston fire

Weston man dead at suspicious fire scene

by Ivan Foley
January 17, 2021
0

Detectives speaking with person of interest A Weston man was found dead inside a structure fire in the 600 block of Prospect Street in Weston early today. According to authorities, at just before 2 a.m. this morning (Sunday), the Platte...

Next Post

Store manager dies after alleged assault by shoplifter

Popular News

  • Parkville Mayor Nan Johnston

    State ethics board investigating Parkville mayor

    35 shares
    Share 14 Tweet 9
  • Arson, murder charges filed in deadly blaze

    22 shares
    Share 9 Tweet 6
  • Weston man dead at suspicious fire scene

    21 shares
    Share 8 Tweet 5
  • Things ‘just make sense’ for North Platte senior

    20 shares
    Share 8 Tweet 5
  • Scene of fatal fire

    15 shares
    Share 6 Tweet 4
  • About Us
  • Advertise
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy
Call us at 816-858-0363

Copyright © 2019-2020 The Platte County Landmark Newspaper - All Rights Reserved

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Subscribe Online
  • Local News
  • Opinion
  • Landmark Live!
  • Looking Backward

Copyright © 2019-2020 The Platte County Landmark Newspaper - All Rights Reserved