When extreme heat descends on the Kansas City metro, you can feel it radiate off of buildings and dark pavement. Built-up areas, like downtown, become nearly unbearable — superheating well beyond the outlying areas. It’s called the urban heat island effect, and Kansas City, dominated by highways and parking lots, gets hit hard.

On this week’s Kansas Reflector podcast, reporter Allison Kite dives into extreme heat in Kansas City, which can be devastating for the city’s most vulnerable residents and is expected to become more frequent over the coming decades.

Urban heat islands in the Kansas City metro

Kansas Reflector opinion editor Clay Wirestone chats with Emily Bradbury, executive director of the Kansas Press Association, and Max Kautsch, a media lawyer based in Lawrence, about the landscape for journalism and free expression in the Sunflower State.

Surveying the landscape of Kansas journalism in 2024

Sean Miller, a Statehouse lobbyist working with the diverse Kansans for Conservation, says the coalition proposes the state — without raising taxes — dedicate about $50 million annually to voluntary conservation programs to protect and upgrade water and land resources.

Kansas coalition proposes conservation initiatives

Sierra Club lobbyist Zack Pistora condemns legislation that would ban plastic bag bans, and gives an overview of other environmental measures up for debate under the dome.

Sierra Club lobbyist on plastic bags and other environmental issues

The Kansas Legislature has renewed its attack on transgender rights with a bill that would ban gender-affirming care for those who are younger than 18.

A committee led by Rep. Brenda Landwher, a Wichita Republican, has advanced the bill — after debate on the issue was compromised by preferential treatment of out-of-state interests, transparency concerns, and misinformation from a pair of Republican lawmakers who are also physicians.

On this podcast episode, we are elevating the voices of Kansans who have been stifled along the way. They are:

Anthony Alvarez, a Loud Light fellow

D.C. Hiegert, Legal Fellow for the ACLU of Kansas

Iridescent Riffel, a co-chiar of Equality Kansas, and sometimes opinion contributor to Kansas Reflector

Transgender advocates on the Kansas Legislature's ongoing attacks

A task force appointed by Gov. Laura Kelly last year recommended consolidating services for early childhood development into a single office, and there's a new piece of legislation that would do just that. Children's advocates Monica Murnan and David Jordan explain the proposal and how it could help.

How early childhood office could give Kansas kids a crucial boost

Phil Journey, a two-term national board member of the National Rifle Association, offers an insider perspective of financial misconduct threatening the future of the prominent gun-rights lobbying and educational organization.

A Kansas judge's inside view of NRA corruption

Sharla Smith, the founder of the Kansas Birth Equity Network, Sapphire Garcia-Lies, the founder and executive director of Kansas Birth Justice Society, and Abriona Markham, executive director of Topeka Doula Project, discuss the need to improve health outcomes for mothers of color, along with their view on maternity bills under debate in the Legislature.

Kansas advocates talk crisis pregnancy centers, racial disparities in maternal health care

YWCA Northeast Kansas CEO Kathleen Marker and Fatima Perez-Luthi, the founder and CEO of The Grind Coaching and Consulting and manager of a local financial literacy program, talk about financial empowerment for women, looking at workplace trends and gender-based discrimination.

Kansas advocates talk financial empowerment for women, gender pay gap

LaTonya Boyd, along with Courtland Davis, director of operations at the YWCA Northeast Kansas, and LaRonna Lassiter Saunders, a civil rights advocate and attorney, discussed the nuances of Kansas gun violence. In an average year, 456 people die and 655 are wounded by guns in Kansas, according to Everytown statistics.  Approximately 135 people in the state die by gun homicides and 271 are wounded by gun assaults annually, with 311 estimated firearm-related suicides.

Kansas advocates describe effects of gun violence on their communities

The Community Voice editor and publisher Bonita Gooch and Wichita State University professor Michael Birzer discuss discrimination in traffic policing

Racial profiling during traffic stops and the need for police training

The Kansas Reflector Podcast, hosted by senior reporter Tim Carpenter, presents voices from the people and politics of Kansas.

Urban heat islands in the Kansas City metro

Reflector Podcast

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