The Fix Is Obvious Kill the middleman.

 The Cesspool: How I Helped Build It, Watched It Rot, and Why I’m Done Watching

Back on September 5, 2003, I signed a letter as “Henry McClure, Developer” right alongside Mayor Harry Felker III, Shawnee County Chairman Vic Miller, Greater Topeka Chamber Chairman Dean Ferrell, and Go Topeka Chairman Kris Robbins. We were formally begging KDOT for a Break-In-Access Study so we could build the SW 49th Street interchange and make the 600-acre Commerce Park (now called Central Crossing) “shovel-ready.”

That letter wasn’t some outsider complaint. I was in the room when the pitch went to the Kiwanis and Rotary Clubs for the original quarter-cent sales tax — later the half-cent — that was supposed to get land ready for jobs and growth. I was one of the original private developers in the public-private partnership. I saw the deals get cut. I saw the same handful of insiders steer the money. And I’ve watched the same ground sit half-empty for two decades while the same organizations rebrand themselves and keep cashing the checks.

That’s not “sour grapes.” That’s the public record.

The Money Shawnee County voters passed the countywide half-cent sales tax in 2004 for “economic development and countywide infrastructure.” It was renewed in 2014 and runs through 2031. JEDO (the Joint Economic Development Organization) was set up to oversee it. Every year, roughly $5 million — now closer to $11 million in recent GO Topeka budgets — goes straight to economic development.

Do the math: 2005 through 2026 is 21+ years. Even at the conservative $5–6 million annual average before the pot grew, we’re north of $125 million in taxpayer dollars funneled through Go Topeka / Greater Topeka Partnership / the Chamber machine. That doesn’t count the citywide half-cent street tax or the TIF districts or the special incentives on top. All sold as the path to a bigger population and a broader tax base.

The Results Topeka proper has been stuck between 122,000–127,000 people since 2000. Shawnee County added a measly ~2,000 residents since 2020. No boom. No transformation. The tax base didn’t explode. The big distribution centers (Target was already breaking ground in 2003, Home Depot, Bimbo, Frito-Lay, Walmart later) landed — good for them — but large tracts at Central Crossing are still being marketed in 2025–2026 flyers as “shovel-ready” with “sites available now.” GO Topeka’s own website and CBRE listings still tout 200+ developable acres and build-to-suit opportunities two decades later.

Some pads are still vacant. Some “shovel-ready” dirt is still waiting for the next consultant study. Meanwhile the Chamber rebranded as the Greater Topeka Partnership and keeps getting the call when a big deal comes in. The mayor’s office doesn’t handle it — they refer it to the Partnership. The same people. The same loop.

The Rigged System This isn’t conspiracy talk. It’s structure.

• The Chamber/Partnership is literally in the commercial real-estate business.
• They control the marketing, the site selection, the incentives, the narrative.
• Public money flows to them. Private developers who play ball get the inside track. Everyone else gets the runaround.

I’ve sat across the table from it as a broker and developer for 25 years. I’ve seen the revolving door between City Hall, the County, JEDO, and the nonprofit economic-development crowd. The system is designed so the same insiders decide who gets the porridge — and how much public money sweetens the deal.

The Fix Is Obvious Kill the middleman. The city and county should keep the $5 million annual economic-development slice in-house. Make every single deal come through them — transparent, deal-by-deal, on the public record. If there’s money left over at year-end, split it and put it into road projects the voters actually voted for. No more blank checks to the Partnership. No more “trust us, we’re the experts.”

New blood. Real competition. Actual accountability. Stop pretending a nonprofit chamber is somehow above the fray when it’s literally brokering the deals with your sales-tax dollars.

I didn’t wake up one morning and decide to run for mayor so I could manufacture complaints. I was there in 2003 signing the letter. I helped sell the tax. I developed the land. I’ve watched the same game for 22 years while some of the loudest critics were still in their parents’ basement.

The cesspool isn’t new. It’s just been rebranded. Time to drain it.

— Henry McClure Topeka developer, taxpayer, and someone who’s been in the fight since the first shovel hit the dirt.