TOPEKA — Members of the Kansas Senate thought it was such a super idea to issue a special license plate for the Kansas City Chiefs, they kept piling on.
Before the dust settled Wednesday on the Senate floor, distinctive plates for the Chiefs, Kansas City Royals, Sporting Kansas City, Kansas City Current and Sedgwick County Zoo had been included in Senate Bill 359. The bill was approved 36-2 and forwarded to the Kansas House.
Sen. Kellie Warren, a Leawood Republican, said she was asked by a friend who worked for the Chiefs to introduce a bill authorizing a special license plate for the NFL franchise in Kansas City, Missouri. The process began long before quarterback Patrick Mahomes, tight end Travis Kelce and their teammates defeated the San Francisco 49ers in the Super Bowl on Feb. 11.
“Being a lifelong Chiefs fan and seeing the unity of the community, of the state and the region that the Chiefs bring, of course, I said, ‘Yes,’” Warren said.
The measure pulled together by the Senate Transportation Committee’s bill would designate the Hunt Family Foundation as recipient of revenue from Kansans acquiring a Chiefs license plate for use on passenger cars and trucks.
The committee altered Warren’s game plan by including a plate tied to the professional soccer club Sporting Kansas City, with proceeds going to the Kansas City Soccer Foundation for the Victory Project. The committee also endorsed a distinctive plate supporting the Sedgwick County Zoo.
Sen. Rob Olson, an Olathe Republican, said during Senate debate on the bill that he’d been a Chiefs fan all his life and would likely acquire one of the new plates for his own vehicle. But he didn’t want to leave out the other occupant of Truman Sports Complex. He offered an amendment authorizing a plate honoring the Kansas City Royals, which was accepted by the Senate.
“Right now there are a lot of Chiefs fans,” Olson said, “but at the right periods it seems like there is a lot of Royals fans, too.”
Sen. John Doll, the Garden City Republican, said he wasn’t keen on showering Missouri with cross-border affection.
“Supporting one Missouri team hurts. Supporting two really hurts,” he said. “Hopefully, next year we can do some tags for New Mexico and Colorado and Wisconsin — all of them.”
Sen. Dinah Sykes, D-Lenexa, secured approval of an amendment creating a license plate for the Kansas City Current, part of the National Women’s Soccer League.
Under terms of the bill, supporters of each license plate must secure commitments for a minimum of 250 plates and sponsors must pay up to $5,000 for development costs. The license plates couldn’t be transferred from one person to another, but permission could be granted by the Kansas Department of Revenue to transfer a plate from a leased to a purchased vehicle.
During Senate consideration of the bill, members didn’t focus attention on the Feb. 14 shooting at the Super Bowl parade and rally for the Chiefs that left one person dead and two dozen wounded. The injured ranged in age from 8 to 47, police said.
On Tuesday, Gov. Laura Kelly directed flags in Kansas be flown at half-staff from sunrise until sunset Saturday in honor of Elizabeth “Lisa” Lopez-Galvan of Johnson County, who was killed outside the city’s historic Union Station when shots were fired into the crowd.
“Kansans and the entire Kansas City community are mourning the loss of Lisa Lopez-Galvan, a DJ and mother of two from Shawnee. I’m grieving for her family and for all the victims and their loved ones,” Kelly said.
