Koneczny They call it the Johnson County Education and Research Triangle.
The proposal has three goals -- improved cancer research, better food safety and more high-tech jobs; two choices for voters – thumbs up or down; and one day to vote – Nov. 4.
The countdown is ticking. Still undecided?
Listen to Lorianne Fisher Koneczny, a triangle supporter, and Susan Myers, a triangle critic. Draw your own conclusion.
Koneczny, an Overland Park resident, is just one of 25,000 reasons to build the education and research triangle, supporters say.
That’s the number of people in the Kansas City area estimated to have cancer and who stand to directly benefit from the eighth-cent sales-tax increase.
While taking pre-med courses at Johnson County Community College, Koneczny, 44, was diagnosed with cancer of the pancreas on Nov. 22, 2005. Doctors gave her less than a year to live.
Her four children – Stephen Thomas, 14; Katherine Victoria, 12; William Edmund, 11; and Johnathan Alexander, 7 -- stand a 50 percent chance of contracting each one of mom’s seven rare genetic disorders. She’s lost her Dad, many family members and her cancer buddy to the “monster.”
That’s why passage of the research triangle is so important to her and thousands of others in the Midwest who have been touched by cancer.
“When I was diagnosed, I was disappointed to find out I could not receive the services I needed to give me the best shot at survival in my hometown,” she said.
She was quietly told by her doctors in Kansas City to go to The Mayo Clinic in Rochester; M.D. Anderson in Houston; Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York; or Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. She travels to The Mayo Clinic at least four times a year. She is also a patient at Johns Hopkins.
She would prefer a trip across town to a National Cancer Institute designated facility where she could participate in early clinical trials of new cancer-fighting drugs.
Gov. Sebelius, Myers
Critics like Susan Myers laud the effort, but say it is ill-timed and misguided.
“When I was 21 years old, my father died of brain cancer,” said Myers, a Democrat from Westwood who is challenging Republican state Sen. David Wysong of Mission Hills this fall for a chance to represent District 7.
“I have personally felt the effects of cancer,” she wrote on her Web site. “And if I believed that cancer research would be performed in Kansas that would truly cure cancer, then I could really get on this bandwagon.
“But, there are 13 pages of lists of cancer research programs that are National Cancer Institute designated cancer centers,” she wrote.
“In Kansas, we are asking Johnson County residents to pick up the tab with a … a permanent sales tax. I am just glad that it is a vote of the people to decide whether they want to pay $15 million each year.
“The people who I meet at doors are trying to figure out how to pay for food,gas, utilities, college educations and maybe put away something for retirement,” Myers said. “People are losing their jobs and their homes.”
Wysong enthusiastically supports the tax as a way to leverage more research dollars and bolster workforce development efforts.
For now, Koneczny says the plan is to finish seven classes at JCCC to earn an associate’s of science degree in biotechnology and simultaneously earn a bachelor’s of science degree in molecular biosciences at the University of Kansas.
A year from now, Koneczny plans to take her medical school entrance exams and maybe one day study gene mutations in fruit flies – critical science for a better understanding of the human genetic code and its lethal flaws.
“I intend to be one of the future research doctors that put this area on the national radar for excellence in biosciences,” she said.
That’s the plan.
I truly understand the need to fight the disease of ...
cancer since I have lost 4 family members to cancer.
However, I do not support the cancer that is spreading in my government with respect to PERMANENT sales tax issues and where only a small percentage of the Kansas residents would be paying for this project - I believe it should be financed at the state level and not just financed by Johnson County residents and even then it should only be considered when thousands of average citizens have signed a petition requesting the project.
I am done with permanent sales tax issues since I do not believe proper responsibility and accountability will be in effect from now until forever. Never say never but I just don't believe in these forever taxes for the most part.
I also think the county and city governments, the Chambers of Commerce, big biz, developers and other special interests look at the people now as the choice ATM machines for paying for any and all projects THEY want - very seldom taking into consideration the hardships families are facing now and whether the people even want the projects. Let projects be brought about by thousands of ordinary citizens signing a petition saying that we NEED and WANT a certain project - so many times projects are crammed down the throuts of the people and they are told they are to pay for them - I have had it up to my eyeballs with that system and it is heading me to the poor house plus many of these projects are adversely affecting my health and my quality of life.