One key to revitalizing western Independence is pressing ahead with plans for an expressway near the area, the president of the Independence Chamber of Commerce said Wednesday.
But it will take years of effort, and chamber President Rick Hemmingsen is asking younger leaders in the community to commit to seeing the project through.
“We’re asking for fresh legs, for new faces and new ideas,” Hemmingsen said.
Hemmingsen spoke to more than 30 people gathered for lunch, alumni of the chamber’s L.E.A.D. program. Each class of 15 to 20 runs about nine months, meeting monthly, and the aim is for members to make connections and take a close look at pressing community issues.
His specific focus was on the Jackson County Roadway Coalition, which for years has pushed for an expressway that would start at Interstate 70 and follow Little Blue Parkway north to U.S. 24, then loop north of 24 and run west to the Chouteau Bridge in Kansas City.
The north-south piece is set to be wrapped up next year, and officials have long said it’s needed to open the Little Blue River valley to development. Hemmingsen said the east-west piece – specificially in the Front Street/Sugar Creek area – will be just as important for access to such things as Sugar Creek’s industrial park.
“People in west Independence can buy a house and walk to work,” he said, adding that the area enjoys a well-trained blue-collar workforce.
The expressway idea has been around for nearly 40 years, and Hemmingsen has said it take many more years – beyond the careers of those who have worked on it for a long time – to see it through. Officials are drawing up plans for the Front Street/Sugar Creek section, but funding is not in place.
Hemmingsen outlined three main priorities for the chamber for this year.
The first, he said, is to address members’ changing needs, and he said the chamber hasn’t always done a good enough job in letting members know what’s available.
“And I apologize for that,” he said, adding that the chamber has recently added employees and is at full staff.
The second, he said, is winning voter approval for renewing the city’s stormwater tax. The western part of the city, he said, faces billions in such needs, work he described unexciting but necessary.
“How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. How do you fix a neighborhood? One house at a time,” he said.
