Archives: December 2025

Best of KC 2025: Bruce Breslow’s decades of marble muse

Photo by Shea McGraw Earlier this month, we published The Pitch’s annual Best of Kansas City issue. You can take a peek at the results of the readers’ poll here. The issue also included a list, compiled and written by our editorial staff, of some local people, places, and things that we thought clearly won 2025. We’ll be publishing these…

Christian sober living homes expand in rural Missouri largely without state oversight, funding

The facilities have emerged in a part of the state where treatment and services for people battling substance use disorders are scarce.

Dayton Austin, Jayson Jackson, Ronnie Baum, Jeffrey Dunbar and Clarence Stephenson gather in the living room of Big Boy Men’s Ministry, a faith-based sober living house in Cabool on Oct. 28 (Steph Quinn/Missouri Independent) Jerry Chiasson had been living under a bridge in Gainesville, fighting larceny charges and trying to get clean. Biking from Springfield to Mountain Home, Arkansas, where…

Feds seize thousands of 7-OH products from Kansas City warehouses

Company owner says the seized products were a small portion of the total inventory, and employees were allowed to continue production while feds were there.

Federal agents seized thousands of 7-OH products from Kansas City area warehouses on Dec. 2, including these 7-OH tablets that have opioid effects (photo courtesy of the FDA). Federal agents this week seized 73,000 products containing 7-hydroxymitragine, commonly known as 7-OH, from three Kansas City-area warehouses. The seized products included things like power bars, pills and liquids shots that are…

Land Lion’s Hymns For End Times is a protest album that truly meets the moment

Land Lion. // photo credit Bailey Gabbert Say what you will about the modern hellscape in which we currently live, but the predictions regarding the artistic response to everything have been pretty incorrect. Back in November of 2024, my social media was flooded with various iterations of “We’re gonna have protest music again, and it’s gonna be impressive as hell!”…

Photos: Kansas falls to UConn in Blue Blood battle at home

Photo by Val Montanez The Kansas men’s basketball team struggled offensively in the second half, falling to 61-56 to fifth-ranked UConn in Allen Fieldhouse on Tuesday, Dec. 2. Our photographer Val Montanez was there to capture the game. Categories: Sports Tags: Allen Fieldhouse, kansas, Kansas vs UConn, KU Basketball, UCONN

If you aren’t plugged into Fazbear lore, Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 won’t come to life

Courtesy Universal Pictures The newest addition to the FNAF cinematic universe, Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, marks Emma Tammi’s return to the director’s chair and the franchise’s latest effort to translate video-game chaos into big-screen horror. Like the first film, it’s a little cheesy, pretty chaotic, absolutely drenched in lore, and completely unashamed of what it is. From the get-go,…

Missouri appeals court rewrites ballot proposal to clarify a ‘yes’ would end right to abortion

Missouri’s Western District Court of Appeals agreed the ballot language set to go on the November 2026 ballot failed to sufficiently inform voters that a ‘yes’ vote would repeal abortion rights passed in 2024.

Students hold up anti-abortion signs at the Midwest March for Life on May 1, 2024, at the Missouri State Capitol (Anna Spoerre/Missouri Independent) A Missouri appeals court rewrote the language for a proposed abortion ban set to appear on the November 2026 ballot after the judges concluded Thursday the previous wording drafted by Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins was…

KC Sipps: Strang Hall has four “new” tenants, and two new Crossroads bars open this week

This week's Kansas City restaurant news.

KC Sipps logo by Theodore Rosen Life in KC is pretty delicious. In fact, there is often so much going on that it can be hard to decide where to go and what to try. That’s where I come in.  I’ve curated this weekly list of events, openings, deals, and celebrations to keep you in-the-know. Cheers! Something New News bites:…

Julia Jackman’s 100 Nights of Hero is fantasy romance like they don’t make ’em anymore

Courtesy IFC Director/screenwriter Julia Jackson opens the curtain this weekend, nationwide, on a film that delivers on a genre I didn’t know I was missing. Based on Isabel Greenberg’s graphic novel, 100 Nights of Hero follows a world of storybook players, built on a civilization that worships a bird-god from the sky, and manifests his will into a cruel ideology….

A Kansas town chose cruelty. Now it mourns as the mayor faces voter fraud charge and deportation.

Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach, shown on Oct. 1, 2025, has charged the mayor of Coldwater with felony voter fraud. (Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector) Coldwater residents have learned a valuable lesson: Actions have consequences. Their town’s mayor, Joe Ceballos, has been charged with felony voter fraud by Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach. Ceballos appears to have registered and cast ballots in…

Afghan man who helped the U.S. fight the Taliban finally released from ICE detention in Missouri

An Afghan man who fled the Taliban has been released from a Missouri immigration detention facility following a federal judge’s ruling. Mohammad Ali Dadfar had been held in the Greene County Jail in Springfield since early October, when he was detained and turned over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE. On Monday, the U.S. District Court for the…

Dish & Drink KC: A snow day sustenance crawl in Parkville

Dish & Drink KC logo by Theodore Rosen With schools closed for snow, I decided to turn an unexpected free morning into a little adventure with my daughter, and Parkville’s charming downtown felt like the perfect escape. We stepped into Deviant Kava, a warm, welcoming spot known for its kombucha, teas, and creative coffee drinks. The barista greeted us right…

New age verification rule causes Pornhub to shut down access in Missouri

Catherine Hanaway talks to reporters on Aug. 19 after being announced as the state’s next attorney general (Jason Hancock/Missouri Independent) Pornography sites that wish to operate in Missouri must now verify that users are adults before granting access to explicit content, under a new rule that went into effect Monday. The change caused the porn industry’s largest website, Pornhub, to…

2025 Jackson County property tax bills, explained

A majority of Jackson County homeowners will see a reduction in their property assessment this year and tax credits for the next three years. But that doesn’t necessarily mean a smaller tax bill.

Homeowners will see changes on their 2025 property tax bill that reflect Jackson County’s efforts to address the property assessment spikes in 2023, including a cap on assessment increases from 2024. Next year’s bill will also show a tax credit that will be rolled out over three years. (Chase Castor/The Beacon) It’s been two years since the 2023 property assessment…

Best of KC 2025: Rainy Day Books machine punches above its weight

Photo by Joe Ellett Earlier this month, we published The Pitch’s annual Best of Kansas City issue. You can take a peek at the results of the readers’ poll here. The issue also included a list, compiled and written by our editorial staff, of some local people, places, and things that we thought clearly won 2025. We’ll be publishing these…