You have seen that headline before during the days when it was referred to as Speck's Folly, but this time the money is there and the medical school is coming to Joplin.
From KODE's report:
The Kansas City University of Medicine and Biosciences' College of Osteopathic Medicine has been granted permission to begin developing a school in Joplin. KCU anticipates 150 students per year passing through the new school. The facility would be a collaborative effort, involving Mercy Hospital Joplin, Freeman Health System, the City of Joplin and other local organizations.
Freeman has pledged a multi-million dollar gift to help develop the campus, along with committing to provide residency and training opportunities for students of the Joplin campus. Officials with Mercy have offered to donate the property and buildings that served as the hospital's temporary facility following the May 2011 tornado.
The medical school is a coup for Joplin! Thank you to those that worked to make this happen; I know that this has been in the works since long before May 22nd. Maybe this is the jump start that we needed to finally become more than a city of strip malls, fast food/family restaurants,call centers, Wal-Marts,and convenience stores. We could really become the educational hub of SW Missouri!
ReplyDeleteCity Council, what is the long-range vision and plan for Joplin? No, not the CART plan, what was the plan before May 22nd? Delegate the Wallace-Bajjali foul up to someone and then start to lead this city. Throw away the CART plan and use the old vision and plan as a starting point to really begin to move forward. Please remember that TIF's and additional sales taxes are not the answer to everything We can't erase the the missteps and scandals but we can take them out of center stage and focus on moving forward.
David Wallace has received plenty of attention and free publicity; I see a "Made-for-TV" movie in his future along with a book deal. Maybe one of our local writers needs to beat him to the punch and write the book; a percentage of the proceeds could go to area charities.
City Council, we elected YOU to be our voice and make decisions that will benefit the entire citizenship and city as a whole. Tell the CART Committee "Thank you for your service, you may go now; we will take it from here."
Maybe this is the jump start that we needed to finally become more than a city of strip malls, fast food/family restaurants,call centers, Wal-Marts,and convenience stores.
ReplyDeleteWe're a whole lot more than that. Just look at this 2010 list of top employers. In that list of 18262 jobs, 19% are in manufacturing and 17% in transportation. Our geographic location is related to over half those jobs, transportation, the hospital complexes, university, electric company and so on that serve the area population. As do those "strip malls, fast food/family restaurants,call centers, [and] Wal-Marts", it's a well diversified economy.
On the other hand, to the extent the school district is ruining the current generation of children it'll be hard to continue a lot of these ventures.