Window on the West
by Mary Rupert
Recently, the Unified Government heard some criticism from the community about an auction for Backfire BBQ, a Legends Outlets restaurant that failed.
Some community members who did not hear about the auction in advance expressed a desire to know about these events, and possibly to attend them and have the chance to bid on something. At a recent meeting, a few UG commissioners even noted that they had not heard anything about the auction in advance.
I saw some of the public’s outraged comments on Facebook and social media. I certainly don’t blame people for feeling this way.
Kansas has a law mandating public notices in certain situations that would have taken care of this situation. Maybe that law needs to be strengthened. Obviously, the people want to know about these events, and the fact that they didn’t hear about it made certain members of the public feel like this was one of those backdoor deals that only a privileged few would be invited to.
At a recent UG Commission meeting, though, a representative of the auction company explained that actually thousands of notices were sent out about the auction, mainly to other restaurants and to motorcycle dealers (https://wyandotteonline.com/ug-responds-to-critics-on-closing-of-backfire-bbq-restaurant-at-legends/). Still, a lot of the auction items brought in just cents on the dollar for these antique motorcycles and restaurant equipment.
Perhaps the auction might have done better if a better effort was made to let the community know about it. It’s something that could have easily been done.
The UG needs to make better use of public notices. That would have brought more citizens of Wyandotte County to the auction. After all, the citizens, through the local government, were the owners of those items and should have been notified so they would have the chance to bid on them. Sometimes we hear that no one really reads the public notices, but we also heard this time that some attorneys who usually read the public notices were not aware of the auction.
Expanding use of public notices to include all sorts of different publications would be a first step toward fixing this community discontent. While laws say that public notices, which are paid ads, have to be published in only one publication, the laws don’t say that the local government can’t put notices in several publications to reach even more people.
Some community members have criticized the restaurant’s developer for spending so much on expensive décor that later would be sold for a fraction of its worth. However, as a tourist attraction, the restaurant needed to do something different to attract tourists’ attention, much like the T-Rex restaurant at The Legends Outlets or like the Schlitterbahn’s addition of the world’s tallest water slide. No one can really tell in advance which idea might catch the public’s attention and draw tourists.
I think the UG has plenty of opportunity to get the word out about interesting events, through public notices, its electronic newsletters, news releases to the media, advertising in various venues, its Facebook and social media pages, signs on street corners or fliers distributed at various meetings. With today’s audiences, it would be wise for the UG to continue to use public notices on such things as auctions and supplement them with these other efforts, as well.
To reach Mary Rupert, editor, email [email protected].
