KANSAS CITY, Mo. — City leaders met on Thursday night to talk about Tuesday’s violence outside the Kansas City Zoo. Pam Mason is a Clay County Commissioner and chair of the zoological board. She’s been very outspoken that violence anywhere in this city will not be tolerated, but also said that leaders should work hard to make sure the actions of a few don’t punish the whole group.
A closed-door meeting was held with Jackson and Clay County city officials, the director of the zoo as well as its board members and Kansas City police. Mason said all of the options for keeping the free days going, but also keeping them safe, were put on the table.
Several of those options remain according to Mason, and she believes everyone will be happy with the outcome as the options remain positive, but give more flexibility.
“Everyone is pulling in the same direction. Everyone understands that this is an important thing for all of our community and there’s a group effort and this is well down the road to being revised. I think everyone’s going to be really excited about the outcome,” she said.
Tuesday’s fights and gunfire outside the zoo’s front gates wasn’t the first time. On an April 2013 free zoo day, a similar situation occurred with a large crowd, fights and arrests. The zoo says it moved this year’s free day to a week day and added more off-duty police. But it still wasn’t enough to combat the very large crowd that got rowdy at closing time. Mason says they expect to have much firmer plans within the next 30 days.
