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BCCP
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THE BRUSH CREEK BULLETIN Volume
13, Issue 3
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BCCP
4743 Troost
Suite 200
Kansas City, MO
64110-1727
Ph: 816-523-2991
Fax: 816-523-2281
THE BRUSH CREEK BULLETIN
Volume 13, Issue 3
July / August / September 2011
WATERFIRE OBSERVES FIFTH YEAR
ON BRUSH CREEK OCTOBER 22BCCP is Event's Producer
As the sun sets on Saturday, October 22, the music comes up along Brush Creek just south of the Plaza. Kansas City Mayor Sly James will light the first of 55 braziers in the creek as a prelude to continuous entertainment between Main Street and Pennsylvania Avenue for the next four hours.
WaterFire observes its fifth year in Kansas City this fall, drawing as many as 30,000 spectators to the free event. This year's
programming has expanded to include jazz performances, as well as swing and tango dancing, opera and show tunes, folk vocals and guitar, joined by the talents of a multi-faceted creative ensemble that fuses together any and every art form, and fire dancing.
Brush Creek Community Partners has become the producer of WaterFire. "Our interest in producing this event supports our efforts to enhance the Brush Creek Corridor's identity as a regional cultural and recreational destination," said BCCP Executive Director Carol Grimaldi. "We also want to replicate WaterFire experiences in other locations along the creek, using the arts and Brush Creek to connect the community from east to west."
WaterFire is the creation of award-winning artist Barnaby Evans, who initiated the art installation on the three rivers of downtown Providence, Rhode Island in 1994. It has become a signature event for that city. Organizers of WaterFire Kansas City have worked closely with Evans since before it was launched in 2007.
WaterFire would not be possible with considerable public and community support, including Presenting Sponsors: the Kansas City Neighborhood Tourist Development Fund; the Missouri Arts Council; Highwoods Properties, Burns & McDonnell, Kansas City Parks & Recreation Department, Husch Blackwell, and UMB Financial Corporation.
The rain date for WaterFire is Saturday, October 29. More information about the event can be found, and contributions to support it can be made on line at www.waterfirekc.com.
UMKC BLOCH SCHOOL
RECEIVES $32 MILLION GIFTManagement Programs Advance
in National RankingsHenry W. Bloch, who with his brother Richard founded H & R Block in 1955, has contributed $32 million to fund a state-of-the-art building to house the Henry W. Bloch School of Management's graduate and executive programs. The facility is expected to open in fall 2013.
The donation is the largest outright gift in UMKC's history and among the top 24 largest in 2011 according to The Chronicle of Philanthropy.
The announcement coincided with news the Bloch School's Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation graduate program has been ranked 21st in the nation by the Princeton Review, and the undergraduate program was ranked 14th. Only eleven schools
nationwide have both undergraduate and graduate programs included in this ranking.
Henry W. Bloch
(Photo courtesy of UMKC)Bloch has been a lifelong advocate of education and began supporting the UMKC School of Business and Public Administration when he endowed the school in 1986. Bloch cited his support of and confidence in UMKC's and the Bloch School's leadership as reasons for his gift, believing they "will propel the school toward national and international renown."
Bloch School Dean Teng-Kee Tan said the new building, which will be adjacent to the existing Bloch School, will be dedicated to its graduate studies. A unique feature of the building will be its purpose-built, design-led innovation laboratory space architecture. It will allow students to conduct entrepreneurial and innovation studies with brainstorming, simulation, concept-making, prototyping, and proof-of-concept design studios and flexible classrooms for participative and collaborative team learning.
CORRIDOR ABOUNDS IN SUSTAINABLE SUCCESSES
Four of the region's seven 2011 Sustainable Success Stories are in the Brush Creek Corridor!
The Mid-America Regional Council has selected what it considers exemplary policies, programs, practices or projects from across the region, including the:
University of Missouri-Kansas City Sustainability Team. UMKC's new Student Union and Herman and Dorothy Johnson Residence Hall are state-of-the-art green buildings. Sustainable gardening is encouraged at three rain gardens and a student-led community
gardens, and the Student Union and Miller Nichols Library have rooftop gardens. The Hub bicycle repair center helps keep students mobile. Students and the community can stay informed through the Recycling-on-the-Go educational kiosk, and can use the solar
recycling center east of the library. In partnership with Kansas City Area Transit Authority, every student has an ALL Access Bus Pass.
UMKC rooftop gardenIvanhoe Neighborhood Council's Grown in Ivanhoe Project. The project addresses food desert issues in the Ivanhoe community. Through a combinations of education, infrastructure development, experiential learning and systematic environmental changes, the Grown in Ivanhoe Project draws upon recent city government policy changes in order to implement grassroots, community based food access.
Pembroke Hill's Closeline Sale Recycling Program. In 2008 Pembroke Hill High School's Environmental Team observed what items were treated as trash during its large donation event; educating parents about what items could be recycled and foraging through the trash to recover a great number of recyclables. Every year since, the team has worked to improve the recycling program through the Closeline Sale event and the amount of trash and waste has been dramatically reduced.
Metropolitan Energy Center's (MEC) Project Living Proof. Project Living Proof is a 3,300 square foot, 100 year-old house at
917 Emanuel Cleaver II Boulevard, which now serves as a model for residential scale new and existing homes. MEC believes the
strategies it picked for energy efficiency, alternative energy and improving indoor environmental quality results in a 67 percent energy savings for this house, which is also a demonstration site for Kansas City Power & Light's SmartGrid, which allows for real-time monitoring and control of energy use.The Sustainable Success Stories honorees will be recognized Friday, December 2, 8:30 to 11:00 a.m., at the Kauffman Foundation Conference Center, 4801 Rockhill Road.
PARTNER UPDATES
MRIGlobal has been awarded a five-year, $28 million contract from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Division of Cancer Prevention to operate the new Centralized Chemopreventive Agent Repository and Drug Chemistry Support program of the National Cancer Institute (NCI). As the prime contractor, MRIGlobal will maintain a centralized source of chemopreventive agents for NCI's Division of Cancer Prevention to support research to reduce and prevent cancer. MRIGlobal acquired a 90,000 square foot facility in North Kansas City this year, in part to strategically position itself for this contract.
The University of Missouri-Kansas City has announced the appointment of two Vice Chancellors. Sharon Lindenbaum has been named Vice Chancellor of Finance and Administration. Prior to joining UMKC, Lindenbaum was Senior Director of Finance at Time Warner Cable in Kansas City. She is a member of the Executive Committee of the University of Kansas Hospital Authority and on the board of the Kansas Chamber of Commerce. Anne Hartung Spenner is the university's new vice chancellor of Marketing and Communications. She comes to UMKC from The Kansas City Star where she was Assistant Managing Editor.
Husch Blackwell has been named eighth on the 2011 Top Trademark Firms in the nation by Intellectual Property Today. The magazine determined its ranking according to the total number of issued registered trademarks obtained by firms for their clients with the law firm's 80 trademark attorneys registering 535 in 2010.
UMB Bank opened a branch in the Nutter Ivanhoe Neighborhood Center in August. The cashless operation at 3700 Woodland Ave. does everything a bank branch does including opening accounts, mortgages, refinancing and credit applications, only without handling cash. The banking center is open 1 to 5 p.m. Wednesdays and Thursdays, and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Fridays. Financial education classes including topics of banking basics and avoiding identity theft are being offered at the neighborhood center through the branch bank.
CORRIDOR A HOME FOR GRANDFAMILIES
Pemberton Park, the first apartment community in Kansas City exclusively for grandfamilies - grandparents raising their grandchildren - opened at 5010 Cleveland Avenue in September.
The community's 36 apartments include two, three and four-bedroom units all on one level, and fully equipped with appliances. The site features a playground, grandparents’ retreat room, computer learning center, craft room, social work office, and a community room. All units have controlled access and are handicap accessible.
The 2000 Census says approximately 9,500 families in Jackson County were headed by grandparents, 45 percent of which were below the poverty level. The 2010 Census indicates nationally that the number of grandfamilies is growing.
Pemberton Park is adjacent to Swope Health Services, the Thomas Roque Child & Family Development Center, and is within walking distance of shopping, including a grocery store, and a community center. It is also located on several metro bus routes.
The project cost of $7.9 million was funded by the Missouri Housing Development Commission. The property was developed by Cougar Capital, and is owned by Housing Services of Kansas City, Inc., an affiliate of the Housing Authority of Kansas City.
SAINT LUKE'S HEART INSTITUTE AND UMKC
CENTRAL TO REGIONAL RESEARCH GRANTA grant of nearly $20 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is allowing researchers and clinicians from University of Missouri-Kansas City and Saint Luke's Mid America Heart Institute (MAHI) to collaborate with colleagues from across the bi-state region to create a broad new multidisciplinary translational research network.
The five-year grant award from NIH Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) program to the University of Kansas Medical Center will create Frontiers, a regional program which will be administered through the Heartland Institute for Clinical and Translational Research.
The CTSA grant program was established by the NIH in 2006 to support the development of regional initiatives to accelerate the
translation of laboratory discoveries into treatments for patients, work with and engage communities in clinical research efforts, and provide training opportunities for researchers.The award is, in part, recognition of research being conducted at UMKC and MAHI. Recognized as one of the leading outcomes research centers in the country, including being one of only four outcomes centers supported by the American Heart Association, the Mid America Heart Institute has led more than 115 clinical research trials in all aspects of cardiovascular disease. As part of the Frontiers network, the Mid America Heart Institute will serve as a model for developing successful research programs in other disciplines.
Swope Health Services is among a number of other local partners in the Frontiers initiative.
$2.3 MILLION KAUFFMAN GRANT TO SPUR SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY,
ENGINEERING AND MATH EDUCATIONThe Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation has made a $3.2 million grant over five years to create the KC STEM Alliance - a new organization that will grow and strengthen science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) programs to build a stronger pipeline of students prepared for 21st century careers.
The KC STEM Alliance, a one-of-a-kind model, will consolidate the program management for two organizations in the Kansas City region: Project Lead The Way (PLTW) and FIRST (FIRST Robotics, FIRST Tech Challenge and FIRST Lego League). The KC STEM Alliance is designed to leverage the strengths of these two and other STEM programs. It is housed at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Computing and Engineering.
PLTW offers a variety of pre-engineering courses that students take in middle and high school to best prepare them for STEM-related college degrees and careers. Through PLTW, students experience hands-on and project-based learning of math and science concepts by doing engineering design and building projects, as individuals and in teams. More than 10,000
students are enrolled in PLTW courses offered in 24 area school districts.
The STEM Alliance will strengthen robotics and engineering educational experiences.FIRST offers similar hands-on experiences through teams of students that collectively build robots, which compete in regional and
national contests. The Kansas City region has the largest concentration of FIRST Robotics teams of any city in the nation -- with 40 high school teams along with nearly 100 FIRST Lego League teams composed of elementary and middle school students.Since 2005, the Kauffman Foundation has made investments of nearly $5 million to help both the PLTW and the FIRST programs become established in the Kansas City region. Both programs also rely on significant funding from other industry, state, federal, and community resources, along with support from volunteers and mentors from area companies.
VP JIM RINE HOPES TO CREATE AWARENESS SO BCCP CAN GROW
When asked why he joined the Brush Creek Community Partners Board of Directors a year and a half ago, Jim Rine says it's simple. His employer, UMB Bank, considers BCCP an important community development organization in Kansas City, and part of the bank's community involvement emphasis is to support organizations that build sustainable and healthy communities.
"UMB has been one of the lead supporters of Brush Creek Partners from the inception," Rine says. "Since we think it's important, we've had senior leadership on the board since Brush Creek Partners began."
Jim RineRine has been regional president of UMB Bank since 1994. He explains that means he manages the commercial banking teams for Kansas City, St. Joseph and Lawrence. "Everyone has a bank and every business has a bank," he says. What brings businesses to UMB is building relationships with people in those businesses. He is also involved in numerous community boards and activities including the Sunshine Center Advisory Board, the National Tooling and Manufacturing Association, the Heavy Contractors Association, the Kansas City Industrial Council Advisory Board, and the Drumm Farm Advisory Board. Rine was one of Ingram's magazine's "40 Under Forty" in 2004.
Rine brings a marketing perspective to the BCCP board. To him, the challenge is to spread awareness of the great things happening in the Brush Creek Corridor. "Maybe the rest of the metropolitan area doesn't realize how much activity is going on in this area," he says. BCCP creates a voice for the area, which Rine thinks is important. His major goal as a board member is to help raise awareness of the organization so its budget can grow so it can accomplish even more.
He sees WaterFire Kansas City as one of the greatest opportunities to broaden awareness of BCCP. He's excited that the organization has taken over the event. "I would definitely like to see that continue to be a success. It's a large volunteer effort. It could definitely increase the organization's profile and the outreach to that event is metro wide. That would be a large positive for Brush Creek Partners."
UMB's connection to the Brush Creek Corridor has also recently led to a new branch bank in a traditionally bank-less area. Last month, UMB opened a cashless branch at the Nutter Ivanhoe Neighborhood Center. "From the neighborhood perspective, we felt like it is be a service and a good community partnership," he says.