Community Transportation Academy graduate Dia shares about what she discussed in her comments at the final public meeting for the KCMO Budget.
During each budget cycle in KCMO, residents, organizations, and other key stakeholders from across the city have the opportunity to speak directly with members of the City Council. The budget process represents one of the best ways to directly influence what the city spends its money on. BikeWalkKC staff and advocates attend these meetings to speak up for multimodal priorities.
Dia Morris (right) speaks to KCMO city staff before signing up to speak at the final public hearing for the 2025 budget.
One of the people who spoke up at the final budget meeting on Saturday, March 1, was Dia Morris.
Dia is a graduate of BikeWalkKC’s Community Transportation Academy, a 10-week course where participants learned about our region’s transportation system and how to create change within it. With this new knowledge and experience, Dia went to the public meeting and asked the city council to fund priorities important to her:
“I spoke in support of traffic calming on east 63rd street because of increased traffic crashes and fatalities. On this street a school is across the street from a library and the street design allows cars to drive way too fast on 4 lanes. As a nurse I’ve cared for people after traffic crashes, it broke my heart seeing young people we couldn’t save, that’s why I support vision zero.”
She continues: “I also spoke in support of funding for our city bus service, because my patients use the bus to get to my clinic. Without reliable transportation we’re leaving Kansas City residents at risk of losing important resources like health care and employment. I didn’t have a car from 2017-2021, that’s part of how I afforded graduate school.”
Dia Morris (right, standing) speaks to the City Council during the final public hearing for the 2025 KCMO budget.
Dia is a perfect example of advocacy in action. She understood the importance of speaking up for safe streets not just for herself, but for her neighbors and her community. Making a point to go to the final budget meeting and speaking up means that she is one of the people who will have an outsized influence on what ends up in the budget when it gets finalized later this month.
As we often say with this work, “Advocacy is a team sport.” Nothing happens because of me, it happens because of we. Dia is helping us to speak up for safer streets, but she wasn’t the only one. Numerous other speakers showed up at these meetings to ask the City Council to fund better sidewalks, more bike infrastructure, and public transportation.
You can still help to shape the final budget and ensure funding is allocated for these critical needs in Kansas City. Here’s two simple steps you can take:
1) Email the City Council: Email the mayor and your councilmembers to encourage them to fund sidewalks, accessibility, Vision Zero, and transit in this year’s budget. Tell them about the streets in your area that feel unsafe and what more funding could help address.
2) Encourage your Network to Do the Same: Take a moment to encourage your family, your neighbors, your coworkers, and others to do the same. The more people who reach out, the more likely it is that those priorities will be funded.
Dia is a great example of what can happen when we speak up for our priorities. Her voice is powerful on its own, and unstoppable when more voices join hers. When you join Dia and BikeWalkKC in speaking up, YOU have the power to bring safer streets for people who walk, roll, bike, and use transit from the paper to the pavement.