Task force helps UMKC with image

A task force assessing how the University of Missouri-Kansas City can help make Kansas City a top-ranked U.S. city views a split between UMKC and the UM System as feasible. However, a representative for the organization that formed the task force said this is just one of many options being considered.

Larry Jacob, senior vice president of the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation, said it is possible for the task force to conclude that no split is necessary. Although media emphasis has been heavy on the idea of a split, he said the task force is still in the information-gathering phase.

Jacob said the task force was appointed after reports on Kansas City said that to become a top-ranked city, it needs a great urban research university. He said MU and the University of Kansas fit that description but UMKC does not.

Since its creation in April, the task force has held forums to receive community input on how to upgrade UMKC. This is where the suggestion of a split between the campus and the UM System originated.

The idea did not grab headlines until last month when Benno Schmidt, former president of Yale University and the leader of the task force, told a committee of the Missouri State Government Review Commission that he and his colleagues considered it a viable option.

In response to Schmidt’s statement, UM President Elson Floyd sent a letter to the Community Foundation in which he wrote that the UM System Board of Curators, the governing body, strongly opposes a split.

“I want to be clear that the University of Missouri stands firm in its commitment to UMKC and to the people of this state and to the greater Kansas City community,” Floyd wrote. “The (UM) Board of Curators and I cannot support any report that might suggest a severing of that relationship, in whole or in part.”

Jacob said a reason that the split has been suggested is because citizens of Kansas City may feel uncomfortable with the lack of a local governing board for a school in their city; one of the nine curators is from Kansas City. If UMKC were to split from the UM System, Jacob said it may “give people in the city a feeling of a local channel of communication.”

Joe Moore, director of media relations for the UM System, said that since UMKC — which was originally the University of Kansas City — joined the system in 1963, it has only seen improvements.

“Look at where UMKC was before and then now,” Moore said.

Moore said anybody who doubts the Board of Curators’ involvement with UMKC should remember the board has put in about $240 million in renovations and improvements at the campus.

“(The board) has added a vast array of academic programs at UMKC,” he said.

Moore also said when former UMKC Chancellor Martha Gilliland resigned in January, Floyd became immediately involved in Kansas City.

“Dr. Floyd stepped onto that campus in a very hands-on way,” Moore said.

If UMKC decided to leave the UM System, it would require many steps, including approval from the Missouri General Assembly and the governor’s signature. Although the suggestion of the split has incited controversy, Jacob said he is happy people are letting their voices be heard.

“This study is the first step to continuing the conversation,” Jacob said.

A formal recommendation from the task force is due in mid-August, he said.