The Kansas City Plant Accountability Project

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Kansas City NNSA/Honeywell Watch (Blog)

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On this page:

• Two petitions move to City Council; think bumper stickers, billboards
• City clerk receives signed petitions re making parts for nukes in KC
• Sign 'Hands Off Iran' petition
• Trespass vs. nuke-parts production in KC caps war resisters' meeting
• War tax resisters gather in KC, call attention to new nuke-parts plant
• Prevent more KC funding of nuke-parts plants; require plans for alternative jobs
• Nuke-parts plant resisters testify in court
• No, or No Way? Peace Planters and KC City Council Square Off on New Nuclear Weapons Plant
• City Council set to derail anti-nuke measure despite testimony; lawsuit may be filed
• 20 plead guilty of trespass at nuke-parts plant; 30 others may come to trial Sept. 28
• City Council votes 12-1 vs. peace petition
• Anti-nuke petition set to appear on ballot unless legal issues interfere
• Register your support for peace petition, for environmentally sound jobs, not nuke jobs
• 53 people go to jail for resisting KC's new nuke-bomb plant
• Seriously, resistance can be a hoot
• PeaceWorks members lobby during DC Days
• The New Nuclear Weapons Plant in Kansas City
• Photo story: KC Peace Planters rally at new nuke-parts site
• "Beans, not bombs!" say KC Peace Planters at new nuke-plant site
• Charges dropped, anti-nuclear activists claim victory

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Two petitions move to City Council;
think bumper stickers, billboards

The KC Board of Elections confirmed Dec. 27 that two new anti-nuke, pro-peace petitions had sufficient validated signatures to move forward to the City Council. "We’re in!" said Rachel MacNair, petition coordinator and a PeaceWorks member. The new initiatives, each with at least 100 more validated signatures than needed, require the city to divest itself of current financial involvement in the new nuclear weapons parts plant, refrain from further fiscal involvement, and plan for alternative work for the employees.

There’s a chance, says MacNair, that City Council may pass the initiative on planning for alternative work, in which case planning would begin. Even if the Council rejects the measure, the Council may still allow it to appear on the Aug. 7 ballot. However, MacNair notes, it’s likely the Council will fight the financial measure, and there may be a lengthy litigation process to bring it to a ballot.

So what’s happening now?

At City Hall: The initiatives may soon come to a committee or committees, hearings may be held, witnesses may testify, and the committee(s) may vote on the measures. Then the initiatives would return to the City Council for a vote.

In the city itself: People are requesting bumper stickers and yard signs, volunteering, and contributing for billboards and coverage of legal costs.

In other words, proponents are in a full-fledged public information campaign, trying to inform citizens that the city sold up to $815 million worth of municipal bonds to fund the new nuclear weapons plant and that citizens oppose that.

Bumper stickers, billboard: The bumper stickers trumpet these messages:

• Get Kansas City out of the nuclear weapons business!
• To hide federal debt, a new nuclear weapons plant uses Kansas City’s bonds.
• Safe Jobs & Clean Politics -- End Kansas City’s Role in the Nuclear Weapons Plant!

Thus far, research indicates that one large billboard in the heart of the city would cost about $700; a second billboard with the identical message would be an added $600 or so. To make tax-deductible contributions for the public information campaign, send checks to the Missouri Peace Foundation (the 501-C3 arm of PeaceWorks) at 4509 Walnut, KC, MO 64111, and write on the memo line "billboards" or "educational efforts." Checks for covering legal costs should be written to PeaceWorks at the same address.

Volunteer smorsgasbord: PeaceWorks and the KC Peace Planters (a coalition PeaceWorks members began) need volunteers to work at literature tables, especially at libraries, and to leaflet appropriate crowds. The next opportunity for reaching groups of already-registered KC, Mo., voters is Feb. 7, the presidential primary. "We’ll take advantage of the fact that the Republicans are the only ones with a real contest to leaflet people coming out of the polls north of the river," says MacNair. "This is a more Republican area of town and one we've mainly not covered, but it’s a prime opportunity to acquaint people far away from the plant with how the city’s financial scheme is a gimmick in the federal budget deficit."

Anyone interested in helping with tabling or leafletting opportunities should call Rachel MacNair at 816-753-2057. Anyone with questions about the billboard proposal should call Jane Stoever at 913-206-4088.

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City clerk receives signed petitions re making parts for nukes in KC

KC Peace Planters, a coalition including PeaceWorks, turned in petitions for two ballot initiatives on Nov. 14 to the city clerk of Kansas City, Mo. The next step in the process is for the election board to verify the signatures; once that's done and sufficient signatures are verified, hearings start with the City Council.

"We need 3,572 signatures on each petition to be verified in order for them to qualify for council hearings and the April ballot," says PeaceWorks member Rachel MacNair, coordinator of the petition drive. "We gathered around 5,000 signatures on each petition." For comparison purposes, MacNair notes that in the earlier petition drive, the single petition gained about 5,000 signatures, and once the unverifiable signatures were eliminated, the initiative still had about 800 signatures to spare.

Here's what the new initiatives provide for:

Summary, Petition 1
Remove city financial involvement in production of nuclear weapons components

1. Kansas City won't make any more contracts for producing parts for nuclear weapons or finance their production in the future.
2. Kansas City will divest itself of the municipal bonds for producing nuclear weapons parts, to the extent allowed by law.
3. No local agency will own the plant.
4. If the court knocks down any provision, that provision can be cut off and the rest remain.

Summary, Petition 2
Safeguard jobs with contingency plans for nuclear weapons facilities

1. The city will make detailed contingency plans for converting the local nuclear weapons plants to other work in case the plants are no longer to be used for making parts for nuclear weapons.
2. Renewable energy production is an option to be considered.
3. The plans will be updated annually.
4. The plans will be available for public comment.

Click here for full legal language of the ordinances on the petitions.

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Sign 'Hands Off Iran' petition

Consider signing this short petition to President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hilary Clinton:

"At no time since the Iranian people rose up against the hated U.S.-installed Shah has a U.S./Israeli military attack against Iran seemed more possible. Following three decades of unrelenting hostility, the last few months have seen a steady escalation of charges, threats, sanctions and actual preparations for an attack.

"We, the undersigned, demand no war, no sanctions, no internal interference in Iran."

Go to http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/hands-off-iran/ to sign the petition.

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Trespass vs. nuke-parts production in KC caps war resisters' meeting

By Susan Miller & Jane Stoever
Photos by Robyn Haas

"No tax bucks for nuclear bombs!" This was the chant of 46 protesters Nov. 6 at the country's first new, huge plant to "modernize" nuclear weapons. The five-building facility, under construction on Mo. Hwy. 150 in southern Kansas City, Mo., will replace the current, 62-year-old Kansas City Plant. Products of the current and future facilities include nuclear bombs' non-nuclear parts such as triggers and radar. The new KC Plant is the first of three new facilities for the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal, with the other two in Los Alamos, N.M. (think plutonium) and Oak Ridge, Tenn. (think uranium). "We make the gun, they make the bullet," Ann Suellentrop told the war tax resisters during their Nov. 4-6 meeting in Kansas City, Kan.

At the new site for nuke-parts-making, five people crossed the line from the public right-of-way to the facility property and were arrested. The trespassers included Jim Hannah, a PeaceWorks Board member from Independence, Mo., and four current or former administrative committee members of the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee (NWTRCC): Charles Carney of Kansas City, Kan.; Kima Garrison of Portland, Ore.; Erica Weiland of Seattle; and Jason Rawn of Union, Maine.

Garrison and Weiland were released four hours after their arrest on $100 bonds; their wrists still showed handcuff marks, but they talked about the guards' respect for them. The other trespassers decided not to post bond and were held about 24 hours, with Carney and Hannah released on signature bonds. Rawn went free with "time served"-- no court date, no fine, no community service--facilitated by lawyer Henry Stoever. The court date for the others is Jan. 17.

Right after his release, Carney e-mailed supporters, "It was an ordeal, but nothing compared to what the political prisoners around the world go through." Noting Rawn's need for gluten-free food, Carney said Rawn "essentially went through a forced 24- hour fast. (Can't eat bologna sandwiches, go figure!)" Carney, local coordinator for the NWTRCC annual meeting, added, "What a gift to be able to converse with these two 'mensch' (Rawn and Hannah) for the last 24 hours."

Before the trespass, several people shared reflections on the new nuke-parts production site, a former soybean field.

"Big things are expected from this little bean field!" said Hannah. "Take a look: This project is gargantuan. The administrative office alone is larger than KC's new Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. And the manufacturing plant covers 17 acres--equivalent to 13 football fields! The Kansas City Star reported a million dollars a day is being poured into this project. A billion dollars will be spent to construct the buildings, and another four billion dollars operating it for the first 20 years. Five billion dollars! It would be like writing a million-dollar check five thousand times. That's not peanuts, and certainly not soybeans! You could buy a lot of good with that money. Or a lot of death and destruction."

Weiland encouraged the protesters to begin and continue resisting war taxes, giving the results of a survey she conducted during the NWTRCC meeting. Among the 17 survey respondents, 12 have lived or are living below the taxable level and 9 have filed or do file tax forms while refusing to pay some or all of their taxes. The respondents reported 432 years total of resisting war taxes and/or refusing to pay, plus 180 years of resisting/refusing to pay the telephone tax that goes to the military. The respondents have resisted paying $359,610 in income taxes, and out of that amount, the Internal Revenue Service had collected $94,000. Weiland also named what respondents said were positive consequences of war tax resistance: having a cleaner conscience, belonging to a community of resisters, living in line with their values, and feeling empowered.

Bill Ramsey of St. Louis, a NWTRCC leader, trespassed at the new nuke- parts production site Aug. 16, 2010, when he joined about 75 trespassers and saw 14 arrested after stopping Caterpillars at work in the former soybean field. At the Nov. 6 demonstration this year, Ramsey read his poem about that 2010 action:

The Mice Will Play

Soybeans have given way
to busy yellow Cats.
Beans plowed under as
Cats go round and round,
pushing and packing good earth,
clearing the way for a new generation,
for the planting of sanctioned terror,
a second round of readiness,
to threaten all generations.

The merry band of folks
like mice file into a field,
meandering toward the Cats,
sowing wildflowers as they go.
Through deep mud they trod
into the forward path of one Cat
and securely surround it.

Then one detains another Cat
and the worker Cats fall silent
across the field's expanse.
While the Cats are waylaid,
the mice will play.
And for a portion of minutes,
the only movement
across this piece of earth is
the silent sprouting of wildflowers.

Susan Miller of Hesston, Kan., is a former administrative committee member of the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee. Jane Stoever of Overland Park, Kan., is a PeaceWorks Board member. Robyn Haas is web developer for PeaceWorks and The National Catholic Reporter.

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War tax resisters gather in KC, call attention to new nuke-parts plant

By Susan Miller & Jane Stoever
Photos by Susan Miller

The National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee (NWTRCC) held its annual meeting Nov. 4-6 in Kansas City, Kan., with the theme, "Plant Peace—Resist War Taxes!" The meeting at the First Central Church of the Brethren culminated in a demonstration against the nuke-parts production facility being built in southern Kansas City, Mo.

PeaceWorks member Charles Carney, part of the NWTRCC administrative committee, coordinated the national meeting, which about 15 PeaceWorks members attended. Carney kicked off the meeting with musings on unilateral disarmament. The first time he heard that phrase, in 1982, it was not from a peace activist, a college professor, or a socialist, but from Catholic Archbishop Ray Hunthausen. "He said our faith impels us to be the ones to disarm first," said Carney. "As archbishop of the state of Washington, he said he hoped 500 or 5,000 or half a million Catholics would refuse to pay all or part of their taxes as a way of ending nuclear proliferation. He courageously stated that he himself was going to refuse to pay half his taxes in the coming years." That put Carney on the war tax resistance path.

Carney also noted that it disturbed him in 1982 when Secretary of State Alexander Haig said, "Let them march all they want, as long as they continue to pay their taxes." Carney soon was claiming the maximum number of legal allowances—nine—so taxes would not be withheld from his paycheck. He said, "What a freeing thing: to be able to lay down my sword and shield. What a freeing thing: to tell the government, to tell the military- industrial complex, to tell Wall Street, 'No. You can't have my money. All my checks will be written out to the people.'"

PeaceWorks member Beth Seberger of Kansas City, Kan., spoke at the NWTRCC meeting about her lifelong war tax resistance. She began by not paying the $18 she owed the IRS in 1970. "I had two older brothers serving in the Air Force in the war," she said, "but I had been more influenced by Martin Luther King and his example of nonviolent resistance. I was seeing many young men my age struggling with their consciences over what to do about the draft."

Seberger said she asks her employers to keep her income below taxable levels and use the rest of her salary for projects otherwise unaffordable. "I have helped in the development of the Kansas City Interfaith Peace Alliance, Episcopal Social Services, Catholic Charities Refugee Services English as a Second Language program, and Literacy Kansas City," says Seberger. "I've also been able to give shelter now and then for folks in need." A video of Seberger's talk is online at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-bhrTVCgWk.

Bill Ramsey of St. Louis reported that the Conscience and Military Tax Campaign Escrow Account (http://seanacc.org/escrowaccount.htm) has been moved from Seattle to St. Louis. He encouraged deposits to the account from across the country.

NWTRCC coordinator Ruth Benn of New York invited meeting participants to send photos, captions and stories about local actions to her for the NWTRCC newsletter ( http://www.nwtrcc.org).

Naomi Paz Greenberg of New York, who serves on the board of Conscience and Peace Tax, said that April 15, "Tax Freedom Day," is a good time to point out that taxpayers are in fact working for the government, doing military service, for a long part of each year. Asked why she resists war taxes, she said, "Over one hundred members of my family were killed in the Holocaust. I can't inflict that on others."

The NWTRCC group and KC-area peacemakers protested at the new nuclear weapons parts production site on Nov. 6 with signs such as "Plant beans, not bombs" and "War taxes are killing us." The demonstrators tied bright yellow cards saying "I won't pay taxes for nuclear bombs" to the fence enclosing the former soybean field. Several persons spoke, including Daniel Woodham, a North Carolina farmer. He said people should nurture what they plant if they want it to grow and should not nurture the KC nuclear plant with tax dollars.

Writer/photographer Susan Miller of Hesston, Kan., belongs to the Heartland Peace Tax Group. Jane Stoever of Overland Park, Kan., writes for PeaceWorks.

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Sign new petitions

Prevent more KC funding of nuke-parts plants; require plans for alternative jobs

By Jane Stoever

Kansas City, Mo., voters can sign two new petitions to keep the city from further financial involvement in making parts for nuclear weapons and to require the city to plan for alternative jobs in case the nuke-parts jobs are discontinued.

"While we did gather a sufficient number of signatures to place a previous measure on the ballot, the City Council declined to place it on the ballot, and the judge at the Circuit Court was concerned about the involvement of federal agencies," says Rachel MacNair, Ph.D., coordinator of the petition drives. "Because our attorney advised us that the nature of federal litigation was such that we could get a measure on the ballot more quickly, cheaply, and surely by using all that we had learned in this process and running another initiative campaign, we decided that this was the better route."

The first petition is based on this premise, says MacNair: If the city's financial involvement in the new plant turns out not to be enough to give city voters a say over the new plant, it is nevertheless still true that city voters have a say over the city's financial involvement. With City Council approval, the city sold up to $815 million worth of municipal bonds to private investors last year to fund the new nuke-parts facility on Mo. Hwy. 150, near Grandview. Furthermore, the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority, a state-chartered agency whose members are all appointed by KC mayors, holds the title to the massive new facility.

The financial arrangement with city ties is important because the bypassing of proper U.S. Congress appropriations procedures, says MacNair, means "the city is doing more than merely participating in building weapons of mass destruction. It is enabling a set-up that might not happen with more federal attention and accountability."

The first petition is "Removal of city financial involvement in production of nuclear weapons components," and the second is "Safeguarding jobs with contingency plans for nuclear weapons facilities." A supporters' petition--for persons outside the city--enables a wide range of people opposed to KC's commitment to nuclear weapons production to voice their concern. A brochure* outlines reasons for the petitions. (*Note on printing the brochure: to create a 3-panel folded brochure use the first and second pages; for two-sided flat handouts use the first and third pages.)

If you'd like to pitch in and obtain signatures for the petitions and/or the supporters' petition by early November, contact MacNair at 816-753-2057.

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Nuke-parts plant resisters testify in court

by Jane Stoever

Contradictions and courage. Both rang clear in Municipal Court in Kansas City, Mo., Sept. 28.

The charge: trespass on May 2 for crossing a property line at the construction site for the new nuclear-weapons-parts production facility in southern KC. The site lies between Botts Road and Prospect Avenue on Mo. Hwy. 150.

The accuser: CenterPoint Properties LLC Senior Vice President Jim Cross; CenterPoint, a Chicago financier, and KC realtor Zimmer helped plan the financing of the new plant through the sale of KC municipal bonds to private investors.

The accused: 28 of the 53 resisters who crossed a line May 2 near the site; others came to court earlier. Two of the 28 could not be identified in court, so they were acquitted, and one was ill, so his case was continued. Most of the resisters live or volunteer in Catholic Worker houses where, without pay, they feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, and oppose violence.

The sentences: 25 hours' community service or a $250 fine for the nine pleading guilty; 50 hours' community service or a $500 fine for those pleading not guilty; seven days in jail for two resisters who refused to do community service or pay $500. The community service cannot occur where the resisters live and work.

After Judge Ardie Bland announced his guilty verdict to those pleading not guilty, resister Greg Boertje-Obed of Duluth, Minn., said, "I cannot in good conscience pay anything to this court. I believe this court upheld a criminal activity," the creation of a plant to modernize nuclear weapons. He also refused to do community service, knowing he would do jail time. "I'm reminded of a saying of Martin Luther King: 'We will win you over by our ability to endure suffering,'" he told the judge. Boertje-Obed was taken into custody and released three days later.

During the afternoon trial, Eric Garbison, a Presbyterian minister and member of the Cherith Brook Catholic Worker community on 12th Street near Benton in KC, referred to a statement of the Presbyterian Church in the USA and said, "The building of nuclear weapons is unjust." Garbison said he has testified at City Hall since 2008 in favor of meeting social needs instead of funding the building of parts for nuclear weapons. Speaking of Cherith Brook's efforts to stem violence, Garbison explained, "We have a commitment to oppose the root causes of homelessness." Saying he would not pay or do community service, he explained, "My life is community service. I live in a place where homeless men and women knock on the door any hour of the day or night." Garbison went to jail and was freed in two days.

Before issuing sentences, Bland told the resisters, "I applaud each and every one of you" for being willing to "stand up and fight" for their beliefs. "To be honest with you, this country would not be where it is without people like you," he said, noting that he was a man of faith and "my heart takes notice of you." He asked those who worked as part of a Catholic charity organization to stand to one side before the bench, saying, "They've chosen a life of poverty." He asked those with part-time jobs, paying jobs, to stand to the other side. Then, as it seemed those with jobs might refuse to pay, he allowed them also to do community service.

Later, Defense Attorney Henry Stoever, chair of the PeaceWorks Board, said he felt the judge feared many people would end up in jail and didn't want the attention that might create. When Bland asked Prosecuting Attorney Kendrea White for the city's recommended jail time, she said, "Fifteen days." Stoever then told Bland, "I ask you to be Solomon and come down somewhere in the middle." Bland answered, "I was thinking of 10 days; however, I'll go with seven." With the time they had been in jail after their arrest and with "good time," they were released in a few days.

Witness for the prosecution

When White questioned Cross about his work, he said, "I'm responsible for the construction and development of the new GSA (General Services Administration) facility at Hwy. 150." He identified the GSA as "my client" and said, "GSA's tenant is NNSA (National Nuclear Security Administration). I have 185 acres under construction. At that point (May 2), I probably had 450 people working. Unless you've been safety-trained, and now everything's choreographed, it's a dangerous site. Safety is No. 1 in our book."

Then Defense Attorney Ruth O'Neill of Columbia, Mo., and Stoever cross-examined Cross.

O'Neill asked whether Cross owned the property, and he said CenterPoint Properties Trust owned it with the PIEA (Planned Industrial Expansion Authority--chartered by the state and with members all appointed by KC mayors). O'Neill asked whether the PIEA was an arm of a municipal, state, or federal government, and Cross replied, "I couldn't say." He added, "Honeywell (under contract with NNSA) is a name. We're building for the GSA." Later, when O'Neill asked about the purpose of the plant, Cross said, "I've been told it's a nuclear weapons parts plant."

Speaking of the protesters, O'Neill asked whether they engaged in any violent behavior. "What is violent?" Cross asked.

"Were they peaceful?" asked O'Neill. "What is peaceful?" Cross asked.

"Did they have any weapons?" asked O'Neill. "What is a weapon?" Cross asked.

"Did you read their signs?" asked O'Neill. "I did not," Cross replied.

White objected to the questioning as immaterial to the case, and the judge sustained the objection.

Stoever asked, "Are you the owner of the property?" Cross said, "Yes." Then Stoever referred to some 34 documents recorded July 14, 2010, conveying the Botts Road Development property to CenterPoint-Zimmer, and Cross acknowledged "the waterfall of documents." Stoever noted the transfer of the property to the PIEA, but White objected to the paperwork as irrelevant. Stoever insisted, "This is relevant. James Cross has signed this document. It's a conveyance to the PIEA of Kansas City, Mo., a statutory, public body of the state of Missouri. He has given testimony that he is the owner, where in fact he had conveyed this property to the PIEA."

O'Neill began, "Which goes to whether he has authority to direct," but Bland interrupted her and accepted the paperwork. Stoever explained the warranty deed to Cross and asked, "Is this your signature?" Cross replied, "It looks like it." Stoever asked about leases and subleases, and Cross replied, "I'd have to ask my attorney. I was instructed to sign."

Stoever asked Cross whether he had read the tickets given to the resisters. "I believe I'm the owner," said Cross. Stoever noted, "Every ticket says the GSA," and had Cross read, "...owned by the GSA." Stoever then asked, "Are you an employee of GSA?" Cross answered, "I'm not."

Art Laffin of Washington, D.C., a resister who represented himself at the trial instead of having a lawyer, asked Cross, "Do you know what the property was used for before you bought the property?" White insisted, "Objection! Immaterial!"

O'Neill asked Cross, "Are you aware soybeans were being grown there?" Again, "Objection!"

Laffin asked Cross, "Does CenterPoint have any ethical guidelines about what you build?" Again, "Objection!"

Laffin continued, "There are companies that have ethical guidelines--are you aware nuclear weapons violate international law?" Again, "Objection!"

Laffin persisted, "Are you aware nuclear weapons are instruments of mass murder?" Again, "Objection!"

Eventually, O'Neill asked Cross, "When you say you are the owner, do you mean a representative of" the owner? And he agreed, "representative of; Jim Cross does not personally own the property."

No acquittal

O'Neill and Stoever requested acquittal on several bases: the city failed to introduce the ordinance under which the protesters were charged with trespassing, a failure that this year, in City of Joplin v. Marston, led to acquittal; Jim Cross did not have authority to sign the tickets since he did not represent the GSA; and neither a GSA representative nor the KC police captain came to court as witnesses for the prosecution.

Laffin gave the protesters' closing argument. "We ask you to find us innocent," said Laffin. "You have legal ground to stand on in finding us not guilty. We appeal to you to ... work together with other judges to issue an injunction barring further construction of the new Kansas City plant. Please join us!"

Not this time. Maybe next!

Jane Stoever serves on the PeaceWorks Board.

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No, or No Way? Peace Planters and KC City Council Square Off on New Nuclear Weapons Plant

By Jim Hannah

It's a rapidly-unfolding, high-stakes drama.

Thursday, the Kansas City city council said "No" to a citizen's initiative to let November voters decide the fate of the city's new nuclear weapons parts plant.

Friday, Kansas City Peace Planters petitioned the court, saying "No way!" can the council ignore the 4,300 voters' signatures obtained to get the item on the ballot, by provision of the city charter.

Monday morning, Judge Edith Messina will rule on whether to make permanent her preliminary writ granting placement of the Peace Planters' initiative on the Nov. 8 ballot.

Monday afternoon, both parties will have an opportunity for appeal.

And Tuesday is the deadline for all items appearing on the November ballot.

So it's all come down to the wire. No one knows which side will ultimately prevail in the next step of a protracted struggle about Kansas City's role in the national nuclear weapons complex. Kansas City is one of three key production sites for the United States' nuclear weapons arsenal, producing about 85 percent of its non-nuclear components.

The contested Peace Planters' initiative would allow Kansas City voters to decide whether construction will continue on the city-controlled nuclear weapons parts plant at Botts Road and Highway 150 , or whether voters prefer to transition the facility to manufacture "green energy" technologies such as wind power.

The city council's 12-to-1 vote Thursday (with councilman Ed Ford casting the only dissenting vote) came as no surprise to the Peace Planters, a coalition of some dozen peace activist groups in the Kansas City area. Their opposition to the plant has been ongoing for several years, including civil disobedience and arrests both at the 65- year-old Federal Bannister Plant, and at the new plant, where peace activists last year were arrested for blocking earthmovers on August 16 and for blocking traffic at groundbreaking ceremonies September 8.

This year, during the Catholic Workers' Faith & Resistance Retreat (April 29-May 2) still more peace activists were arrested. The growing resistance is evidenced by the number of arrests--four at the old Bannister plant, and at the new plant: 14 blocking earthmovers, 8 during groundbreaking ceremonies, and 52 at the Faith & Resistance Retreat.

Peace Planters member Rachel MacNair is plaintiff in the current law suit, represented by Phil Willoughby of Gunn, Shank, & Stover law firm. Dr. MacNair questioned the last- minute timing of the legal proceedings, noting "The Council has had two full months for the Charter's requirement of passing an ordinance directing the Election Board to place the measure on the ballot. The deadline for certification is August 30. Waiting until the last possible time allows the court only five days, two of which are a weekend, to consider the case. While the letter of the law is fulfilled in the timing, the spirit of democracy and proper deliberation is not. We believe this timing is an unfair power play."

MacNair also questioned one of the city council members' assertion that the citizen's initiative might be unconstitutional, saying instead, "If a party to a dispute can decide the dispute in its own favor while ignoring its own Charter, then the very purpose of the initiative petition process in upholding democracy is being sabotaged."

Whatever the intent or the timing, matters are coming to a head in the next few days. Whether "No" or "No way," those who care about nuclear weapons abolition have a new drama unfolding in Kansas City that is worthy of their attention and support.

Jim Hannah is a PeaceWorks Kansas City board member and columnist.

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City Council set to derail anti-nuke measure despite testimony; lawsuit may be filed

By Jane Stoever

A committee of the Kansas City, Mo., City Council heard testimony Aug. 17 on a measure to bar a peace initiative from the city's Nov. 8 ballot. The Finance, Governance and Ethics Committee voted 4-0 to keep the initiative off the ballot; the full City Council will vote Aug. 25 on whether to follow suit. The peace initiative would prohibit production of nuclear weapons components at the facility under construction on Mo. Hwy. 150, near Grandview, and would recommend having green jobs there (wind or solar energy jobs) instead of nuke-parts jobs.

The Aug. 25 vote is expected to go against the peace initiative. Then a lawyer for KC Peace Planters, a coalition formed by PeaceWorks leaders, will file a lawsuit to compel the city to keep the initiative on the ballot. However the judge rules, the ruling will very likely be contested, and may go to an appellate judge and perhaps the Missouri Supreme Court in expedited fashion.

Asking the committee to block the initiative from the ballot, Sixth District Councilman John Sharp noted, "To stop this project after it is so far along is clearly bad public policy, but more important, it is on its face unconstitutional. It conflicts with the power of the federal government to provide for the national defense."

Among the 20 people speaking up for the peace initiative and against blocking it from the ballot was Beth Seberger, who collected 270 signatures to put the initiative on the ballot. "You cannot divorce yourselves from the hideously immoral purpose of these (nuclear) weapons," said Seberger. "It would be as though the city agrees to finance the production of the gas to be used in the gas chambers against Jewish people and others for the sake of 'jobs.' Would you consent to that?"

She continued, "I don't believe Uncle Sam came begging for this city to get involved in this scheme (to build the new nuke-parts facility). I think a few powerful politicians thought it was a good opportunity to bring what they think will be a boon to the city's economy. I think they are mistaken, and I believe the people of the city have the right to stop this wrong-headed decision if they want to, and I hope they will."

Second District Councilman Ed Ford, the lone Council member to defend the peace initiative in earlier votes, said he would not speak on nuclear weapons issues but on City Charter guidelines. If sufficient ballot initiative signatures are obtained and validated, the Charter says, "The Council shall submit the proposed ordinance to the electors at the next available municipal or state election." Ford added his own accent: "The Council shall--not may, not should, but shall, mandatory--submit the proposed ordinance to the electors."

Ford reviewed the history of a 1995 petition initiative on Union Station: the Council voted to keep it off the ballot, the Council was sued, and the measure went to the ballot. Said Ford, "In the words of that great philosopher Yogi Berra, 'It's déjà vu all over again!'"

Ford explained that after the people vote, the Council may then rule the measure is illegal or unconstitutional, but first, it should come to the public.

Rachel MacNair, coordinator of the peace initiative campaign, said that as she listened to speakers who wanted to keep the initiative off the ballot, she was amazed that they all took the premise that if the measure were on the ballot, it would win.

Henry Stoever, chair of the board of PeaceWorks, asked, "Are we a government of laws or of people, corporations and special interests?"

Yolanda Huet-Vaughn, MD, chair of the local chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility, said, "The jobs you're talking about don't exist in a vacuum. These jobs and construction (jobs) are connected to an end (nuclear weapons). ... In this economy, where everybody's hurting, if we discontinue the building of nuclear weapons, we'd save $1 trillion. We could spend that $1 trillion on health care, education."

Amrita Burdick, who obtained scores of signatures for the peace initiative, asked Council members to consider the serious health and environmental issues that may arise from the new nuclear weapons facility. With international agreements to decrease the number of nuclear weapons, she said, there will likely be less demand for such weapons.

Nick Pickrell spoke of losing his grandfather to an illness he may have contracted while working at the current KC Plant, the DOE facility at Bannister Federal Complex that makes parts for nuclear weapons. Supporting the new facility, said Pickrell, would mean that "mothers will continue to lose children" from contaminants workers take home from the plant, and "children will continue to lose grandparents, as I did."

Sahj Kaya (Rhonda Gibson) labeled the City Council move to bar the peace initiative "tyranny."

David Quinly noted the dangers of contaminants from making parts for nuclear weapons, warning against a "KC Death Camp."

Eric Garbison asked, "Isn't it a court of law that should decide constitutionality?" Garbison, who testified during the last three years against the city's support for the new facility, said peace activists have followed City Council's process, talked to city attorneys, gotten votes from city citizens, "and you're telling us we can't be on the ballot."

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20 plead guilty of trespass at nuke-parts plant; 30 others may come to trial Sept. 28

By Jane Stoever

A hushed crowd in the Municipal Court of Kansas City, Mo., heard 20 civil resisters one by one plead guilty on July 19 to trespassing May 2 at a nuke-parts plant under construction in southern KC. The judge let a few resisters speak their minds.

"I am guilty of knowing the difference between what is legal and what is right," said repeat offender Steve Jacobs of Columbia, Mo. "Trespass laws which protect the makers of weapons of mass destruction against nonviolent resisters have no authority over my conscience and act of resistance. ... Any weapon that indiscriminately kills hundreds of thousands of innocents along with those who are targeted are immoral and have no right to exist. Creating more makes their use more imminent, so we have a duty to stop their production now. ... I am guilty of loving my planet more than I fear your jail."

Jacobs was one of 53 resisters on May 2. They crossed a boundary line near the chain-link fence sheltering a massive new shell of a building for making non-nuclear parts, such as fuses, wiring, guidance systems and triggers for nuclear weapons. Jacobs had done two other local protests, the first at the current, 61-year-old facility owned by the National Nuclear Security Administration and operated by Honeywell, and the second at the site for the new plant. Judge Elena Franco ordered Jacobs to pay a $500 fine within 90 days, the same sentence she gave repeat offender Frank Cordaro of Des Moines.

Most of the resisters, including several PeaceWorks members, were first-time trespassers or had paid their fines for earlier resistance. They received a $250 fine, to be paid within 60 days, or could choose to do 25 hours of community service at a place to be assigned. They were not to be credited for the aid many of them provide at the Catholic Worker houses where they live and offer services--food, shelter, showers, and clothes.

Local PeaceWorks members sentenced at the hearing included Sharon Hannah, Mark Bartholomew, Robyn Haas, Sister Cele Breen, Sister Theresa Maly, Brother Louis Rodemann, and Micah Waters. Besides the 20 sentenced, five resisters asked for a trial where they can voice their opposition to nuke-making in KC. About 30 of the 53 resisters, including PeaceWorks members Gina Cook, Rachael Hoffman, Joshua Armfield, and Eric Garbison, will come to trial Sept. 28 at 9 a.m.

According to the National Catholic Reporter (http://www.ncronline.org/news/peace/twenty- nuclear-weapons-activists-found-guilty), Nicholas Pickrell of the Cherith Brook Catholic Worker Community in KC told the judge he would neither pay a fine nor do community service because he "lives with the poor" and "practices community service every day." Sentenced to two days in jail, he was free within three hours in consideration of the 20 hours he spent in jail May 2-3 awaiting processing.

Pickrell told PeaceWorks members that the last words Franco whispered to him were, "Keep up the good work," most likely referring to his 24/7 community service, not his resistance.

The Kansas City Star ( http://www.kansascity.com/2011/07/19/3024287/honeywell-plant-protesters-appear.html) noted, "The future Honeywell plant ... is a key component in the modernization of America's nuclear deterrent. Anti-nuke opponents are attempting to block the project by putting it to a public referendum on the November ballot. They argue nuclear weapons are immoral, and that the project poses environmental dangers."

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Initiative proceeds toward 11/8 ballot

City Council votes 12-1 vs. peace petition

By Jane Stoever

The first peace petition Kansas City, Mo., voters have ever brought to City Council got rejected 12-1 on June 16, and peace leaders are--as planned--asking the City Clerk to put it on the Nov. 8 ballot.

"We always knew the City Council would vote against it," said Rachel MacNair, a PeaceWorks member and coordinator of the campaign for the petition, "Production of Nuclear Weapons Components Prohibited." She added, "We're submitting our formal requirement for the initiative to appear on the ballot, and the City Charter requires the Council to put it on the ballot. Unless there is a hold-up with that or unless Honeywell or the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) or another agency tries to take it to court to stop us, the initiative should come to voters Nov. 8."

In other words, a "no" vote from City Council does not stop a measure from coming to voters in an election.

The initiative's prohibition on making parts for nuclear weapons applies to the facility under construction in southern KC, near Grandview, financed through the sale of up to $815 million in municipal bonds. The initiative recommends converting the 2,000-or-so nuke-parts jobs to jobs in green energy (such as solar or wind energy projects).

Councilman Ed Ford cast the lone vote for the initiative. Before voting, he made four points:

• "Councilman (Jim) Glover was correct when he talked about the trigger mechanisms (made at the current NNSA plant and expected to be made at the new facility) making nuclear warheads safer. But the other testimony we heard (in a June 8 Council committee meeting) was they make nuclear weapons more reliable in the sense that if we ever use them, we want them to work. A lot of us find that morally offensive."
• "You wonder how permanent the jobs are. As Councilman (John) Sharp pointed out, a change in U.S. policy might drastically reduce our nuclear stockpile--we wouldn't need this many workers."
• "Nowhere else in the world is a municipality a partner or investor in a nuclear weapons component (plant). This is a creature of the federal government. I don't know why Kansas City is involved. It just doesn't happen."
• "We don't have a fact sheet. I'd like to see how these two questions would be answered in a fact sheet by someone who thoughtfully tried to answer them: Does this contribute to a sustainable Kansas City? Is it good for the children?"

Councilman Sharp called the building of the new facility "the biggest construction project we've got going in Kansas City right now" and said more than 20 percent of the project was already complete. "It's way too late to be trying to stop this project," Sharp insisted. He took no notice that the initiative doesn't try to stop the building project, but rather calls for converting it to a more constructive use.

From $1.4 million to $1.6 million in taxes from the new plant will benefit the Grandview School District each year, Sharp noted. He contrasted the current federally owned plant--which can't be taxed--with the new plant, which can be taxed because it is not a federal property but is owned by the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority, a state-chartered, independent agency whose members are appointed by successive KC mayors. The tax support, said Sharp, will make a big difference in the Grandview School District; the support "will help those kids have a fair chance to compete with kids from more affluent districts."

Councilman Scott Wagner questioned the legality of the initiative, saying that on the grounds of the U.S. Constitution, the Missouri Constitution, and case law, it would not be legal to change the project because it would go against contracts that have already been signed.

Councilman Scott Taylor agreed there are serious legal issues to address and, referring to the tax benefits for the Grandview School District, said of the new nuclear weapons production plant, "I think this is good for the children." Concerning the initiative's option for converting nuke-parts jobs to other jobs, Taylor questioned whether renewable-energy companies would be interested in such a controversial location.

Expressing frustration, Ford commented, "I don't understand why, when you have a limited number of nuclear warheads and you're building components to make them safer and more reliable, at some point, haven't you completed the job? Why does this go on and on, and over and over, for 20-plus years? I've yet to have an explanation of really how sustainable these jobs are."

To see the video of the Council members' debate, open http://kansascity.granicus.com/ViewPublisher.php?view_id=2, scroll down to "Legislative Sessions," and click on June 16, 2011. Council members made arguments PeaceWorks members may confront in asking Kansas Citians to vote "yes" for the Nov. 8 ballot initiative.

Call the PeaceWorks office at 816-561-1181 with questions about the initiative and to ask for speakers for small and large gatherings. In addition, register your support for the initiative and request yard signs or bumper stickers via the registry now, for delivery in the fall.

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Anti-nuke petition set to appear on ballot unless legal issues interfere

The Board of Election Commissioners has validated signatures on a petition that would prohibit making nuclear weapons components at the facility being built for that purpose in southern Kansas City. The initiative, which recommends jobs at the facility in "environmentally sound energy or other environmental technologies," is set for the Nov. 8 ballot unless blocked by legal questions.

"The people have spoken!" says Ann Suellentrop, a PeaceWorks Board member and leader of the KC Peace Planters coalition*, sponsor of the initiative. "Our petition can help stop the nuclear weapons build-up," she says in a news release. The petition pertains to the facility sprouting up at Mo. Hwy. 150, between Botts Road and Prospect Ave. The plant is designed to replace the current Kansas City Plant, a nuclear weapons parts facility at Bannister Federal Complex.

Never before has a KC peace group launched a city-wide ballot initiative, says Henry Stoever, chair of the PeaceWorks Board.

Steps in the process:

• Some 4,966 voters signed the petition between February and early May.
• The Board of Election Commissioners, by May 24, found 4,389 signatures valid. Only 3,572 were required to bring the measure to the City Council, which has 60 days to consider passing the initiative. Lacking that, petition supporters have 10 days to ask for it to be placed on the Nov. 8 ballot, unless the measure comes under legal challenge.
• A media blitz on the petition has spread news about it. Media hits include The Kansas City Star (here), India Times, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The National Catholic Reporter (here), KKFI Community Radio, local National Public Radio, and online news sources.

The petition says the city sold up to $815 million in city bonds to finance the new plant. The initiative also notes that the city's Planned Industrial Expansion Authority (PIEA), with members all appointed by the city's mayor, "holds the legal title to the facility."

Speakers at a KC Peace Planters news conference May 12 announced they were submitting the signatures that day to city offices for validation.

"The previous City Council essentially made the voters of Kansas City landlords of this facility, so let us as the landlords have a say," said Rachel MacNair, Ph.D., petition drive coordinator.

"I don't want Kansas City to become known as the American Auschwitz, where the common citizens pretended not to know what was going on," said Yolanda Huet-Vaughn, M.D., chair of the Board of the KC chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility. "Nuclear weapons are a great threat to the health of all humanity. As we have seen with Fukushima (the site of a nuclear power plant disaster in Japan that began March 11), even the peaceful use of nuclear power is extraordinarily dangerous if anything goes wrong."

City Councilman Ed Ford, who cast the sole vote last year against the plan for the new plant, keyed in on sustainability. "When we had a vote in City Council, it struck me that building a plant for making nuclear weapons would not make the world more sustainable, so it certainly can't help make Kansas City more sustainable." He complimented the KC Peace Planters for asking the city to use the facility for something truly sustainable. "You folks battle adversity, get arrested, get signatures, and ask for a level of commitment to get people out to vote," said Ford. "You're the most sustainable people I've ever met."

Jude Huntz, director of the Office of Human Rights in the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City and St. Joseph, harked back to Bishop Robert Finn's statement in September, "The accumulation of weapons of mass destruction--which this nuclear plant proposes to construct-- constitutes a grave moral danger. ... Since the use of such weapons is morally questionable, it follows that the production of such weapons is also morally questionable."

Huntz added, "This ballot initiative represents an opportunity for Kansas City to meet this moral challenge. It provides us with the opportunity to decide what we wish to see built at this new facility; to decide what we will be as a city, a nation, and as a global community."

Maurice Copeland, a 32-year employee at the current plant and whistle-blower about contaminants there, said KC citizens would choose whether to be "the only city on the face of the planet that owns a nuclear weapons parts plant" or a city that would take the lead in the business of alternative, clean-energy sources. "I would rather have a city targeted for progress, not a terrorist target because of its product," said Copeland.

What's that "terrorist target" about? In a Dec. 22 memo concerning an early version of the petition, Assistant City Attorney William Geary says in a footnote, "It might be argued that by building even non-nuclear components, the City becomes a target of foreign nuclear powers during a conflict. The decision to build these weapons and where to build these weapons is a federal matter. In other words, which United States residents to put at risk is a federal decision which cannot be changed by local laws."

A May 16 article in The Kansas City Star quotes City Attorney Galen Beaufort as saying "legal issues" should kill the initiative. Beaufort says the ballot initiative would impair contracts between the developer, CenterPoint Zimmer; the tenant, Honeywell; and the National Nuclear Security Administration. He also says the plant will not be owned by the city but the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority (a fact the petition itself recognizes).

In the May 25 Star story noted earlier, Stoever says, "When the citizens sign enough petitions, the citizens say we want to speak on the issue." The article adds that, according to Stoever, if the City Council decides the ballot proposal is unlawful, the petitioners are prepared to challenge that decision in court.

The May 16 Star article reports that Suellentrop says the new facility (close to high-wind- energy Kansas) would be ideal for manufacturing wind energy equipment, such as high-voltage power lines, turbines, and windmills.

*The coalition KC Peace Planters includes PeaceWorks-KC; Physicians for Social Responsibility-KC; East Meets West of Troost; The Recipe LLC; Cherith Brook, Holy Family and St. Lawrence Catholic Worker Houses; KC's Loretto Peace & Justice Network; Benedictines for Peace; Called to Purpose for Greater Works; and the Social Justice Office, Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth.

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Register your support for peace petition, for environmentally sound jobs, not nuke jobs

Now that the Board of Election Commissioners has validated signatures on the peace petition for environmentally sound jobs, not nuke jobs... what next?!

Enter the education phase of the peace-petition campaign.

"Now we start getting ready for the election campaign," says Rachel MacNair, petition coordinator. The KC Peace Planters, a coalition begun by PeaceWorks members, gave the go-ahead May 24 to MacNair's "Petition--Registry of Support." This downloadable registry comes in two forms: a version for KC, Mo., voters, and a version for others.

The new registry is a sign-up sheet for people who want to endorse the original petition that prohibits making nuclear weapons components at the new facility being built in southern KC for that reason. Instead, the original petition recommends "production of new environmentally sound energy or other environmental technologies." PeaceWorks leaders have been quoted in media reports as suggesting wind energy jobs, such as creating wind turbines and tall towers to support heavy transmission cables.

The "Petition--Registry of Support" has space for contact information and a checklist to volunteer for the education phase, to request a speaker, and to order a yard sign and bumper sticker. Besides the downloadable registry (it includes instructions for getting support signatures), an online registry is available here.

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53 people go to jail for resisting KC's new nuke-bomb plant

By Jane Stoever

Fifty-three people were arrested May 2 for trespassing at the construction site for a new nuclear weapons production plant, a new Kansas City Plant. Most of the civil resisters spent the night in holding cells at the downtown KC, Mo., police station. Their arrests, part of a retreat, were sparked with hope, joy, and the support of more than 100 other activists.

The resisters and most of the supporters, uninvited visitors to the new nuke-parts plant site on Mo. Hwy. 150 near Grandview, Mo., walked across a police line into trespass territory. As they approached a gate to the construction area, J.E.Dunn Construction Co. employees blocked the gate with a truck. The protesters gathered around the truck, talked to the employees, and sang.

After being asked by police to move, supporters returned to the other side of the police line, leaving the 53 by the truck. Thirty-two of the civil resisters hail from Missouri, and 15 belong to PeaceWorks.

Why the resistance?

"The U.S. has an incredible opportunity for global leadership," says Sharon Hannah, one of the 53, a PeaceWorks member and former adjunct professor of peace studies at Park University in Parkville, Mo.

"In April 2009, in Prague, President Obama pledged a reduction in our dependence on nuclear arms. He modeled powerful leadership. Other nations responded with relief and support," says Hannah. "Then came the authorization and funding for the U.S. nuclear complex 'modernization'--three new nuclear plants in the deal, including the new KC Plant. With this decision, the U.S. loses its integrity. We cannot effectively lead unless what we do matches what we say. For me, witnessing against the new KC Plant sends a clear, consistent message: I stand for nuclear arms reduction. Arrest is a small price to pay for calling our nation to integrity in leadership."

Hannah is a Board member of Cherith Brook Catholic Worker House, which joined with two other KC-area Catholic Worker Houses (Holy Family and St. Lawrence) in planning the April 29-May 2 faith and resistance retreat. The houses provide companionship and services: food, shelter, clothes, showers. The protest--"Transformation, Not Annihilation: No Nukes!"-- called for peaceful products, not nuke parts, to be made at the new Kansas City Plant. It will replace the current 62-year-old KC Plant at Bannister Federal Complex.

Civil resister Mark Bartholomew of Holy Family Catholic Worker House connects his work at the house with his resistance. He says he sometimes moves in between two house guests who are arguing. "In an effort to prevent violence, I put myself between them. It's a risk to put myself in the middle. I try to set an example, to stay calm and peaceful," he says. In trespassing, he adds, "I'm willing to offer myself up because I believe what is going on here is not right."

During processing at the police station, says Bartholomew, "I had been a little afraid because people were being taken away to a cell. But when I came into the holding cell, they all cheered; they did that for each one of us. We had time there to reflect, to talk about what it means to risk one's freedom even for just one night--some there had done that for six months at a time--we talked about risking ourselves for what we believe in."

The arrest and confinement process runs inconsistent, according to Hannah. Her plastic handcuffs were loose--"I pulled a very compassionate officer," she says--but several people bore red marks from tightened handcuffs even six hours after the cuffs were removed. She adds, "At one point, we were told we would all be held overnight and appear the next day before a judge by video, and after that some of us bonded out. Later, an officer said we'd be released between 9 p.m. and 1:30 a.m." The nine who put up $100 bond and several others, including the older activists, were released by 9:30 p.m., but the rest were held until about 6 a.m.

Before jail came a long wait at the construction site in what Hannah called "the herding zone," marked off by yellow police tape. Supporters across the road called to those under arrest, "We've got spirit, yes we do! We've got spirit. How 'bout you?" The chant bounced back and forth, with "We've got freedom" answered by "We've got handcuffs. How 'bout you?"

The day before the action, retreat participants wrote a media statement. Early May 2, after the "Religion of the Bomb" street theater piece and a liturgy of hope, Gina Cook of Holy Family Catholic Worker House read the statement to the 160 protesters. "The spirit of Easter has brought us together in hope," she read. "We are here to call for the conversion of this plant from an instrument of war to an instrument of life. ... We imagine a rebirth where this site would provide beneficial, peaceful and green jobs."

Art Laffin of the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker House in Washington, D.C., gave the plenary address at the retreat. "The stated Pentagon policy is that we must be prepared to use whatever military means is necessary, including the use of nuclear weapons, to protect our national security interests and to make sure another rival superpower does not emerge to challenge U.S. interests," said Laffin, a veteran peace activist. "The ultimate violence in our time is the existence and intent to use nuclear weapons. ... And yet the U.S. and other nuclear powers fail to take responsibility for this sin."

Laffin advised, "Active nonviolence, most powerfully exemplified by Jesus, is the only way out of our culture of violence and death and our greatest hope to attain a disarmed world. ... Disarmament and the abolition of weapons--from handguns to Drones to nuclear warheads-- will occur when we disarm our hearts of fear and violence and refuse to fund and support in any way the making of weapons."

The 53 resisters, including Hannah, Bartholomew, Cook, and Laffin, all received the date of July 19 for a Municipal Court hearing for their trespass. Some may pay a fine of an unknown amount in advance; some may come to the July 19 hearing; some may request a later date.

See the slide show of photos by Jim Hannah, Sharon Hannah's husband, her support person for the nonviolent resistance, and a PeaceWorks Board member. The opening pictures come from the retreat; most of the images show the May 2 witness, including huge puppets, workers in hard hats, zombies worshipping the bomb, massive deaths from a nuclear explosion, hope for transformation, the trespass action, arrest, and songs, many songs!

A 14-minute video "Transformation Not Annihilation" features the street theater piece, "Religion of the Bomb": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-s329ZW97k

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Seriously, resistance can be a hoot

By Jim Hannah

Nuclear weapons are no laughing matter.

So why was there so much laughter during the recent anti-nuke faith and resistance weekend of Catholic Workers? And why did that laughter carry over even to the closing May 2 peace witness, where 53 were arrested at the new Kansas City nuclear weapons parts plant?

It must have been baffling to the squadron of police dispatched to arrest, manacle, transport, and process the "offenders." By a margin of nearly two to one, the peace folk outnumbered all others taken into custody that day. And their disturbance of the peace was ongoing--laughing, singing, dancing--some even lifting manacled hands aloft, or leaping into the air!

Most baffling must have been the exchange between those taken into custody and the even larger number of supporters who had taken the high ground at the construction site. Across the gravel roadway they yelled words of encouragement, sang resistance songs, danced in solidarity, and at one point even engaged in a game of "Red Rover, send ____ on over!"

Now let's be real: There is something inherently laughable about a rag-tag non- army of peace activists going up against the gargantuan, highly organized, and heavily funded military/corporate/media/political combine.

If you've ever seen a modern-day combine in motion, you can picture the outcome for anything or anyone standing in the way. Only stubble remains. (No shocks, just awe.) Like the 9870 STS, for instance--John Deere's largest-ever combine, weighing in at 18 tons and generating 480 horsepower. It can mow down 12 rows of corn in a single swath.

What would it take to stop one of these $300,000 behemoths? Lots, it would seem. But my dad's an Iowa farmer, and when I was home last time, he told me something quite intriguing. It seems that one of the most dreaded hazards of the combine season is the ordinary deer antler. When shed each year by bucks, antlers most often light with the tines upright. And when a combine tire passes over them, the result often is a costly, time-consuming puncture and work stoppage.

A John Deere 9860, halted by a single deer antler--Deere vs. deer. Rather ironic, and with parallels to peace work. It seems to me that what the powers and principalities most fear is how easily their highly inflated claims for nuclear weapons as "deterrents" and "defense" can be punctured. Think for just a moment. How can weapons of omnicide either deter, or defend? Isn't it obvious they lead not to deterrence, but to proliferation; not to defense, but to escalated militarism?

And while you're thinking, ponder this: How large a pin is needed to burst a balloon? Granted, the trillion dollars spent for nukes since the Manhattan Project is one large balloon. But if enough folks stand (or lie down) in the way, even The Nuclear Combine will lurch to a halt.

Yes, it's "serious business" to contemplate arrest, fines, and jail in the cause of Zero Nukes. The powers that be surely want to be taken seriously, and may even think they have the last laugh. But did you hear the one about the nuclear weapons profiteer who fell from the Empire State Building and was heard to say as he passed the 35th floor, "So far, so good!"

--Jim Hannah is a PeaceWorks KC columnist and Board member.

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PeaceWorks members lobby during DC Days

Kansas Citians joined scores of activists from across the nation for the Alliance for Nuclear Accountability's annual DC Days, a learning-lobbying blitz in the nation's capital. ANA activists presented their concerns about U.S. spending policies for nuclear power plants, nuclear weapons, and cleanup projects in meetings April 4-6 with leaders of the Obama Administration and aides to members of Congress.

The six KC-area residents at DC Days--members of PeaceWorks and the KC Peace Planters coalition --were Ann Suellentrop, Alicia Dressman, Sasteh Mosley, Sahj Kaya, and Jim and Sharon Hannah. Suellentrop and Jim Hannah serve on the PeaceWorks Board of Directors. The Kansas City contingent went to a dozen meetings, including sessions with aides to senators and representatives from Kansas and Missouri.

DC Days participants met with officials of the National Nuclear Security Administration, which owns the current Kansas City Plant operated by Honeywell at Bannister Federal Complex, and met with staff or officials of other administrative offices and congressional committees.

ANA held a news briefing April 4 at the National Press Club to release a report analyzing reactor subsidies, weapons production, and cleanup projects, stressing their major environmental and safety dangers as well as their mammoth cost overruns. The report is "Nuclear Reality Check$: The U.S. Department of Energy's Most Dangerous, Budget-Busting Proposals." Michele Boyd, director of the Safe Energy Program for Physicians for Social Responsibility, discussed the multibillion- dollar federal loan guarantees for new nuclear reactors, an investment the private sector viewed as too risky even before the disasters at the Fukushima Dai-ichi facility in Japan. Tom Clements, the Southeastern Nuclear Campaign coordinator for Friends of the Earth, spoke about the inherent risks in the proposal by the Department of Energy to use dangerous mixed-oxide (MOX) plutonium reactor fuel, as confirmed by MOX contamination at the Dai-ichi 3 reactor. Susan Gordon, ANA director, spoke about the proposed construction of huge, new nuclear weapons production plants and warhead redesign projects, which are far over budget, many years behind schedule, and a threat to U.S. global nonproliferation goals. Finally, Tom Carpenter, executive director of Hanford Challenge, contrasted the underfunding of projects for the cleanup of nuclear contamination with the escalating construction costs at high-risk facilities, such as the Hanford Waste Treatment Plant, which is now 240 percent over budget and off schedule by a decade.

On April 5, ANA hosted an Awards Reception honoring leaders in the movement for more responsible nuclear policies. Awardees included U.S. Sen. John Kerry, whistleblower Walter Tamosaitis, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom activist Carol Urner, and Chernobyl accident cleanup leader Natalia Mansurova.

Suellentrop, of ANA, said, "DC Days provides an opportunity for ANA members to network, gain strength, and meet face-to-face with decision-makers."

Sahj Kaya, a KC artist/activist with East Meets West of Troost, performed anti-nuclear spoken word April 4 at ANA's annual pizza party. She later commented, "I found it exhilarating as a U.S. citizen to have the opportunity to give feedback to our elected officials and stress an issue that is important to our community, namely, the abolition of nuclear weapons." When Kaya performed "Nuclear Weapons," Arjun Makhijani, Ph.D., a nuclear physicist and director of the Institute of Energy and Environmental Research, was overheard singing the refrain: "Test, test, hah! Test, test, hah!"

On April 2, the Kansas City delegates also attended a showing of the new documentary, The Forgotten Bomb, and met the film's producers, Bud Ryan and Stuart Overbey. The film, a comprehensive overview of nuclear weapons issues, will premiere in Kansas City at 8 p.m. April 29 at De La Salle Education Center.

For more information, contact Ann Suellentrop, a member of the ANA Board, at 913-342-0587 or by e-mail to annsuellen@gmail.com.

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March 22 mayor/City Council election

We're in better shape than we were before

By Rachel MacNair

The March 22 election for the Kansas City, Mo., City Council and mayor brought good news to peace advocates.

Ed Ford, the only person to stand valiantly against the new Kansas City Plant when the Council voted for it Feb. 4, 2010, got re-elected by a solid margin. Now he'll be joined by at least two others who are with us in wanting sustainable-energy jobs at the new plant, instead of nuke-parts production. The first district's Scott Wagner and the third district's Jermaine Reed both won by large margins. This gives us a solid three on the Council.

More good news in the mayor's race: While Sly James hadn't given us enough support to allow us to list him as someone preferring green jobs to nuke jobs, Mike Burke had made it clear that he was against us. We have good possibilities of conversations with James, so his win is a big relief. He'll be replacing a mayor who attended the Sept. 8, 2010, groundbreaking for the plant with a sneer for those of us protesting.

Unfortunately, Council candidates Brandon Ellington and Tracy Ward lost by substantial margins. Ellington attended the PeaceWorks annual meeting and during his campaign called for cleaning up the current KC Plant and repurposing jobs at the new plant. As a young man (30 years old) running his first race, and proving to be knowledgeable and well-spoken, he should still be able to have a bright future in later attempts at office. Another ally, Ken Bacchus of the fifth district, probably lost, but since his votes were within 1 percent of his opponent's, there might be a recount.

John Sharp won, and won by a large margin. This was expected, and only keeps things the same rather than making them worse. But it does mean that the most prominent pusher of the new plant on the Council is still there to push.

The next step is to meet with the four newcomers to the Council, as well as those of the incumbents who might be willing to listen. We know that the original vote was mainly based on the fear of losing the jobs and under the pressure of the moneyed interests who knew how to bring people out for the hearings. Our own strength is with one-on-one meetings, a format where the soundness of our reasoning trumps our low resources. So we are somewhat optimistic about bringing more Council members to our understanding as time goes by – especially when they have a quarter of the Council using the reasoning, not just one lonely voice.

Meanwhile, the number of people who voted for mayor was 70,382, and 5 percent of that is 3,520. That's the number of valid signatures we need to get our petition on the November ballot. Advice is to gather double that many signatures to be sure of having that many valid, because so many get knocked out. So the goal is to get at least 7,000 signatures by April 20, in time for us to organize and make a splash in early May about our successful petition drive, right when the new Council convenes.

Everyone hustle! Even one sheet of signatures counts, because our strength is not in money for paid signature-gatherers but in the number of people who care.

Rachel MacNair coordinates the petition drive for the KC Peace Planters, a coalition including PeaceWorks. Contact her at 816-753-2057 or rachel_macnair@yahoo.com.

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The New Nuclear Weapons Plant in Kansas City

By Jay Coghlan and John Witham

Contrary to President Obama's rhetoric about working toward a future nuclear weapons-free world, the U.S. is spending billions rebuilding the complex of facilities it would need to make new nuclear weapons. Under the rubric of "Modernizing" aging and contaminated buildings used to build up the nuclear stockpile during the Cold War, the National Nuclear Security Administration is planning to build vastly expensive new facilities in order to have capabilities for which it has yet to fully justify the need. These WMD boondoggles include a new facility for enabling ramped-up production of the nuclear weapons' plutonium pit "primaries" at Los Alamos, NM; a new facility at Oak Ridge, TN to manufacture highly enriched uranium "secondaries"; and a new Kansas City Plant in Missouri that will manufacture and/or procure the thousands of nonnuclear components that transform nuclear explosives into deliverable weapons of mass destruction.

What is KCP doing? The Kansas City Plant (KCP) is the most productive of the eight sites in the research and production complex of the Department of Energy's semi-autonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). KCP produces and/or procures 85% of all nuclear weapons components both by type and quantity. It specializes in nonnuclear components, such as radars, guidance systems, arming, firing and fusing sets and reservoirs for tritium (a radioactive gas used to boost the destructive power of nuclear weapons). The Plant makes thousands of shipments each year to other NNSA sites for final assembly of nuclear weapons. KCP boasts that the Plant's workload is the heaviest it has been in 20 years, which is expected to last until 2015. This is astonishing given that the height of the Cold War nuclear build-up was over 20 years ago.

What does it cost to rebuild the nuclear weapons complex? The two new weapons facilities for handling plutonium and uranium mentioned above are now estimated to cost U.S. taxpayers up to $5 billion each. However, the new KCP will be different. It is being built and operated a private developer CenterPoint Zimmer (CPZ) LLC. This limited liability corporation is composed of the Kansas City magnate Zimmer Real Estate Services and Chicago-based CenterPoint Property Trust.

Zimmer "happened" to own the 165 acres of farmland that the federal government chose as the site for the new Plant. Although the City's Planned Industrial Expansion Authority (PIEA) declared that the site was "blighted," CPZ sold the land to the City for an estimated $26,000 an acre, when regional farmland typically sells for $2,000 to $4,000 an acre, one very tidy profit for "blighted" land!

Who is paying for the new KCP? The PIEA declared the site "blighted" so that construction of this new federal nuclear weapons production plant could be subsidized by KCMO municipal bonds. The Missouri state government created Planned Industrial Expansion Authorities to counter urban/industrial blight and spur economic development. The PIEAs' charter is to recommend to city councils whether or not tax abatements and/or bonds should be implemented to fight blight. The enabling legislation that created the PIEAs declares that Missouri municipal governments can act positively on a PIEA recommendation only when "the development of such area or areas is necessary in the interest of the public health, safety, morals or welfare of the residents of such city."

American cities are hurting financially. Some are leasing parking meters and tollways to investors in order to get cash. KCMO is closing hospitals and schools and laying off city workers, but nevertheless managed to issue nearly $700 million in municipal bonds to subsidize a new federal nuclear weapons production plant. The KCMO Council approved municipal bonds in the name of saving 2,100 jobs in the local nuclear weapons industry (with one admirable dissenting vote-of-conscience by Councilman Ed Ford). The nuclear weapons industry is arguably immoral, with for example the Vatican declaring, "Nuclear weapons are incompatible with the peace we seek for the 21st century. They cannot be justified. They deserve condemnation." Further, the nuclear weapons industry has adversely affected the health of hundreds of workers at the old Plant. According to recent findings by the inspector general for the General Services Administration, the federal employees responsible for environmental monitoring at the old contaminated KCP site were lax in their duties and misleading to the public about conditions there.

Another dead end? Local Kansas City citizens should ask why the KCMO municipal government is not prioritizing sustainable green jobs for these KCP and other skilled workers, instead of subsidizing a shrinking, politically vulnerable industry whose purpose is to produce weapons of mass destruction! With respect to the public health of Kansas City citizens, according to U.S. Dept. of Labor statistics, 1,993 former KCP workers or their survivors have filed health claims seeking compensation (sadly, only 211 have been paid to date).

The KCMO municipal government will own the new KCP after construction. As far as we know this is globally unprecedented: to have a city own a federal nuclear weapons production plant. The PIEA will then lease it to CenterPoint Zimmer Holding LLC, who as sub-landlord, will lease it to the private developers CenterPoint Zimmer LLC. CPZ will then sub-sublease the new Plant to the federal General Services Administration (GSA), who acts as landlord for numerous federal properties (including the old KCP in the Banister Federal Complex). GSA will then sub-sub-sublease (really!) this new federal nuclear weapons production plant to the NNSA. Got that? It's way convoluted.

Because the new KCP is being built and operated by "private developers," who stand to profit many times over, this new federal nuclear weapons components production plant is not included in the NNSA's annual budget. It is therefore outside of typical Congressional review and authorization, and perhaps would have been rejected. It is a very sweet deal for Centerpoint Zimmer, who first sold the land to the PIEA; then is subsidized by sale of municipal bonds to build the Plant; is granted a 20-year lease-to-purchase by the PIEA in which it pays the bonds back with guaranteed income from the NNSA; and after that owns the Plant outright. During this 20-year term the NNSA will pay $1.2 billion in lease costs, not a good deal for the American taxpayer!

Leaving aside the question whether the new Plant is needed to begin with, the NNSA has repeatedly justified it by claiming it will save $100 million/year in operational costs compared to the old Plant. However, $37 million of that results from lowering the security requirements at the Kansas City Plant to reflect the simple fact that it does not have large inventories of nuclear materials. A new Plant is not needed for that.

Even the developers were wary. After the first round of bidding for the project went bust, the solicitation was restructured with "specific cost-cutting advice from CenterPoint." This perhaps means that the contract was hollowed-out in order to make a second round of bidding successful. In any event, (surprise!) CPZ was awarded the contract.

Paradoxically NNSA also started asking Congress for around $100 million in "transition costs" for moving to the new Plant in each fiscal year 2009-2015, despite earlier claims that the new KCP would not cost the federal government any up front money.

Was this a good plan? Leasing is more costly over the long term than constructing and owning a facility outright. The federal Government Accountability Office found that the break-even point of construction costs vs. lease costs for the new KCP is 22 years. However, since Life Extension Programs for existing nuclear weapons (for which the Kansas City Plant is the main supplier of components) are scheduled to last until at least 2042, the new Plant could be operational for 40-60 years. Therefore the federal government could pay another $1.2 to $2.4 billion in lease costs to the private developers.

The NNSA wrote in its recent Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan that "because the new facility will be leased, there will be no capital investment and NNSA will not be burdened by costs for legacy disposition should the mission ever be discontinued." The "legacy" of the old Plant is one of serious contamination with cancer-causing volatile organic compounds (mostly industrial solvents) and PCBs, for which NNSA has formulated no comprehensive cleanup plan. NNSA plans to be fully operating in the new Plant in a couple of years while in effect abandoning the old Plant. The Kansas City municipal government is counting on reusing the existing Plant for local economic development, which probably cannot take place without comprehensive cleanup costing more than $250 million.

Kansas City subsidies for a new nuclear weapons production plant reward the federal government even as the federal government ignores its moral responsibility to protect its citizens and their future economic prosperity through full environmental restoration of the old Plant. The federal government should be cleaning up its nuclear weapons complex, not building it up!

For more information, visit http://kcnukeswatch.wordpress.com and http://nukewatch.org/KCNukePlant.
See Nuclear Watch's interactive map on the nuclear weapons complex at http://nukewatch.org/activemap.

Please support KC Peace Planters, which includes these organizations working on Kansas City Plant (KCP) issues: Physicians for Social Responsibility-Kansas City, PeaceWorks Kansas City, Cherith Brook and Holy Family Catholic Worker Houses, The Recipe LLC, KC's Loretto Peace & Justice Network, and Benedictines for Peace. Contact: Ann Suellentrop, 913-271-7925, or annsuellen@gmail.com.

Jay Coghlan, Executive Director
John Witham, Communications Director
Nuclear Watch New Mexico, based in Santa Fe

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Join rally 3/19

Photo story: KC Peace Planters rally at new nuke-parts site

Photos by Jim Hannah, text by Jane Stoever

Braving the cold and hopping over the snow, 35 peace activists and two dogs rallied Dec. 18 at Mo. Hwy. 150 and Botts Road, KC's new site for making nuclear weapons parts. "Coming soon to a bean field near you: WMDs" said one sign. The farmland will, by 2012, house a facility for producing and procuring non-nuclear components for nuclear weapons.

Rally participants called for green jobs at the new site, not nuke jobs.

KC Peace Planters* organized the rally and later set Saturday dates for other rallies: Jan. 29, Feb. 26 and March 19. The rallies may occur either at the new site or the current site, the Kansas City Plant, part of Bannister Federal Complex (at Bannister and Troost).

Among the protesters, Ron Faust held signs to inform drivers about the new facility that will be owned by Kansas City. Faust later shared a poem he wrote for the rally, reflecting:

So what can the resistance of a few peacemakers do,
         Not knowing that they are peacemakers,
              But no matter, the unseen waves of their actions
May just be what saves the world from itself.

 

*Peace Planters, a growing coalition, includes PeaceWorks-KC, Physicians for Social Responsibility- KC, East Meets West of Troost, Cherith Brook and Holy Family Catholic Worker Houses, The Recipe LLC, KC's Loretto Network for Peace & Justice, and Benedictines for Peace.

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"Beans, not bombs!" say KC Peace Planters
at new nuke-plant site

By Jane Stoever

Twenty-four KC Peace Planters rallied Nov. 4 at Kansas City's new nuke-plant site, Mo. Hwy. 150 between Botts Road and Prospect. They passed flyers to drivers at the stop light. They danced in the cold by the side of the road, waving signs, such as, "KC Plant makes parts for nuclear weapons--shut it down!"

Within a week, the Peace Planters decided to hold their next rally at the site on Saturday, Dec. 18, from 2 to 3 p.m., so people busy during the work week could join the peace witness.

On Nov. 4, the protesters laid 122 crosses up the hill on the public right-of-way, crosses bearing names of workers whose families say they died from contaminants at Bannister Federal Complex. That complex houses the current nuke-parts factory (the Kansas City Plant) and other federal agencies.

The Peace Planters then huddled together for prayer, granola bars, Wurther's butterscotch, petition-signing, mourning and rejoicing. They sang "Honeywell"--
"We've got nukes, they've got nukes,
Enough to make this place a Chernobyl,
Except that this would be global
And these bombs are being made in KC."

The Peace Planters called their rally "Beans, Not Bombs!" They sowed seeds at the new site, a soybean field in 2009, now under excavation for a "modern" facility to replace the 61-year-old Kansas City Plant that Honeywell operates for the National Nuclear Security Administration. A new twist with the new plant: A city commission, the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority, holds the title to the facility, not the NNSA, which simply leases the KC- owned facility. This summer, the city sold municipal bonds to private investors for up to $815 million to finance the project.

At the festival of hope in KC the night before the rally, PeaceWorks Board member Ann Suellentrop shared with more than 40 attendees the news from Jay Coghlan of Nuclear Watch New Mexico. Namely, the NNSA FY 2011 Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan says in Annex D, p. 44, "Finally, because the new facility will be leased, there will be no initial capital investment and NNSA will not be burdened by costs for legacy disposition should the mission ever be discontinued" (http://www.nukewatch.org/importantdocs/resources/ Stockpile_Stewardship_Management_0610%20Annex_D.PDF).

Legacy. In KC nuke-speak, that word refers to the history of toxins at the current plant. Now the term is being applied to the new site, long before construction begins.

Scott Dye of Columbia, Mo., director of the Sierra Club Water Sentinels, said at the festival of hope, "The Department of Energy has called the Bannister complex 'polluted into perpetuity.' DOE estimated around $289 million in 1989 as the cost to clean it up. But it's a tough political issue. No politician wants to say, 'We've got a festering hellhole here.'"

Dye explained, "They want the new site because they know how polluted the old one is."

He mentioned an Oct. 22 document prepared by Honeywell that suggested spending $85 million to clean up the beryllium and above-ground PCB (polychlorinated biphenyl) contamination at the Bannister facilities, then selling the complex to the general public in a "fee simple sale," an absolute sale, legacy pollution included. Referring to promises of a "clean" new site even though employees are expected to keep making non-nuclear parts such as radar, guidance systems and triggers, Dye said, "You can't make triggers for nuclear weapons without using depleted uranium."

Calling on festival participants to push for green jobs, not mean jobs producing nuclear weapons, The Recipe (spoken-word artists Priest and 3*3*7) used NNSA's abbreviation for the Kansas City Plant, KCP. They led the crowd in shouting,
"Warriors dream of the mean machine.
KCP must go green!"

Two of the eight persons who did civil resistance during the protest to NNSA's groundbreaking for the new plant Sept. 8 reflected during the festival of hope on their resistance. They noted the city's decision that, although the resisters blocked buses laden with officials going to the groundbreaking, the evidence did not support the charge of disorderly conduct.

Sarah Cool of Cherith Brook Catholic Worker House in KC said, "I've always been of the belief that once one knows something, such as knowing that the City of Kansas City is building a nuke-bomb plant, then one can no longer operate as if you don't know it. ... I was convicted--convicted to do something to right this wrong. ... I knelt in front of a big bus ... after being pushed back twice by the police. I knelt and prayed."

Jim Hannah of Independence, Mo., a retired minister in the Community of Christ, asked, "Shouldn't they (the police) have arrested the war profiteers in those tinted-window tour buses?!" Concerning the dismissed charges, he deplored "the dismissive powers and principalities who don't want an embarrassing trial or media coverage of their death-dealing."

Hannah said he had had time, since Sept. 8, to ponder, "Why did I speak up, and act up?" He came to one word: gratitude. He called oneness with nature, with sacred life the source of his gratitude and his restlessness, calling him to resist nuclear weapons.

 

Jane Stoever, member of PeaceWorks-KC and the KC Peace Planters, may be contacted at janepstoever@yahoo.com. The KC Peace Planters, a project begun by PeaceWorks-KC, includes PeaceWorks-KC, Physicians for Social Responsibility-KC, East Meets West of Troost, The Recipe LLC, Holy Family and Cherith Brook Catholic Worker Houses, KC's Loretto Peace & Justice Network, and Benedictines for Peace.

The Nov. 3 presentations by Hannah and Cool are also available:

• Jim Hannah: On Civil Disobedience
• Sarah Cool: Convicted

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Charges dropped, anti-nuclear activists claim victory

By Joshua J. McElwee

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- Success, it seems, is sometimes measured by what you don't have to put up with.

In a move that could be interpreted either as an indication of the full workload for local prosecutors or as a victory for activists, seven anti-nuclear organizers here were surprised (Oct. 27) by a notification that a pending court case against them had been dropped for a lack of evidence.

The seven had been charged with disorderly conduct for a Sept 8. act of civil disobedience at the construction site...

Read more at NCRonline.org.

 

 

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