Success! PSR Kansas City wins key victory towards shutting down local nuclear weapons plant.

In Kansas City, a key victory for PSR and Peace Planters came as the City Council unanimously passed one of two proposed initiatives to create a contingency plan for creating jobs should the Nuclear Weapons Plant be shut down. Ann Suellentrop, PSR Kansas City Chapter Leader, helped organize an effort to gather thousands of ballot signatures and spoke with PSR's Senior Scientist, Steven Starr, to push the City Council to pass "Safeguarding jobs with contingency plans for nuclear weapons facilities."

This is important for federal nuclear weapons policy because:

• It helps to remove one obstacle to stopping new nuclear weapons production: fear of job loss. We need not panic upon hearing that federal policy has changed, which would be good news in every other way. We’ve prepared for the possibility.
• We help set up a self-fulfilling prophecy to make such a change in policy more likely.
• We offer a precedent and example to other campaigns in other cities that this is a strategy that works, rather quickly and efficiently.

The other initiative, “Removal of City financial involvement in production of nuclear weapons components,” is lingering in committee due to heated debates and is scheduled to come up again Wednesday, March 28. In this case, the ordinance is entirely to put the measure on the ballot, since having the council pass it has never been contemplated.