Wichita Metro Chamber of Commerce on the campaign trail

We want to believe that The Wichita Metro Chamber of Commerce and its PAC are a force for good. Why does the PAC need to be deceptive and untruthful?

In a mailing supporting David Dennis, the political arm of the Wichita Metro Chamber of Commerce makes this statement about Karl Peterjohn: “The current county commissioner has spent his life making money from the government sector. When not working for the government, he worked as a registered lobbyist.”

If we look at reality, we find that the candidate who has been a government employee for his entire adult career, according to his bio, is Dennis. Working as a lobbyist is a private sector job, except for taxpayer-funded lobbyists. It’s not “making money from” the government sector. (Even if you disagree with lobbyists not “making money from” the government sector, Peterjohn has worked in private sector jobs that had nothing to do with government. There’s an outright lie from the Chamber.)

As I’m sure the Chamber knows, Karl Peterjohn lobbied on behalf of Kansas taxpayers, working to keep taxes and spending low. The Wichita Chamber, on the other hand, wants more taxes. Voters may remember that the campaign to create a Wichita city sales tax was run by the Wichita Chamber.

Why does the big-taxing Wichita Metro Chamber of Commerce and its PAC support David Dennis? The answer is they want more taxes from you. They must see Dennis as compliant with their desire for higher taxes.

It’s not only this. Another mailer says Peterjohn opposed building the Intrust Bank Arena. An accurate statement is Peterjohn opposed raising taxes to fund the arena. Many others held the same belief, as the vote for the arena tax was close, with 48 percent voting no tax for the arena. By the way, that tax was a sales tax, the type that falls disproportionately on low-income families.

We want to believe that our Chamber of Commerce is a force for good. Why does the Chamber need to be deceptive? Why does it lie to voters?

It would be one thing if the Wichita Chamber was a positive force for the Wichita-area economy. But the Chamber and its subsidiaries have been managing economic development for a long time. Nearby is a chart of job growth data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Wichita job growth hasn’t always lagged behind the United States. But Wichita is now behind, and as the Wichita Chamber has taken more responsibility for managing our local economy, the gap between Wichita and the country is growing. Wichita is falling behind.