Whats up in Liberal

[GraniteStater]

Originally Posted by Jim West

I lived and worked in Liberal for many years. I just sold my house in Liberal. It was known as Little Chicago before I moved there, not necessarily because of the crime rate, but because of the corrupt City Council and Law Enforcement.

If you play that right, there is a fortune to be made in Liberal. It is a seriously rough cattle and oil town, but it has one of the highest per capita incomes in the nation. It is definitely a collection of the haves and have nots. The few haves spend a lot of their time making sure that the have nots do not join the upper ranks. But if you can penetrate the ranks of the haves, then the money flows.

Depending on how you play the game, Liberal can be your way to fortune, or it can be the move that buries you.

Show me the stats about the per capita income for Liberal.
The demographics speak for themselves:
Seward County QuickFacts from the US Census Bureau
I have been to Liberal two times, but it felt a little too much like a border town to be honest.

[Kansas Guy]

http://sites.google.com/site/checkvolunteerbackgrounds/



This website shows how they let a known pedophile into the school system and then when the victims complained about him, the courts in Liberal let him off in 2004.

Before he moved to liberal, he did the same thing in Borger, Texas. Just look at the newspaper articles in this website that I found.

This guy is still loose on the streets of Liberal, Kansas

[Jim West]

GS,

You have impressive search talents, but to get the real taste for Liberal, you need to move down there and survive for about 15 years and put your money where your mouth is. If you are tough enough, you will come out rich. If not, you get eaten by the hoodrats. Crime does pay in Liberal. If you are corrupt enough you can get elected to the county commission or city council.

When I left Liberal, 62% of the kids in elementary and middle school went home to single parent households. Over 80% were latchkey kids. At that time, the population of Liberal was the most diverse in the state due to the immigrants working in the packing houses. All of SE Asia, Middle East, Somalians, and every country South of Texas is represented in Liberal just to name a few. Every one of them attempts to bring their culture and traditions to Liberal. Yup, it is like a border town. It is a jumping off station for all the illegals before they spread to Denver, KC, Chicago and other points with their load of dope.

What you dont understand is what is the reported incomes and what is the actual incomes. Just because your little internet chart doesnt say so, doesnt make it so. Fortunes are made daily there in drugs and other activities conducted in cash. Obviously, you dont believe that people report that income do you?

[GraniteStater]

Originally Posted by Jim West

GS,

You have impressive search talents, but to get the real taste for Liberal, you need to move down there and survive for about 15 years and put your money where your mouth is. If you are tough enough, you will come out rich. If not, you get eaten by the hoodrats. Crime does pay in Liberal. If you are corrupt enough you can get elected to the county commission or city council.

When I left Liberal, 62% of the kids in elementary and middle school went home to single parent households. Over 80% were latchkey kids. At that time, the population of Liberal was the most diverse in the state due to the immigrants working in the packing houses. All of SE Asia, Middle East, Somalians, and every country South of Texas is represented in Liberal just to name a few. Every one of them attempts to bring their culture and traditions to Liberal. Yup, it is like a border town. It is a jumping off station for all the illegals before they spread to Denver, KC, Chicago and other points with their load of dope.

What you dont understand is what is the reported incomes and what is the actual incomes. Just because your little internet chart doesnt say so, doesnt make it so. Fortunes are made daily there in drugs and other activities conducted in cash. Obviously, you dont believe that people report that income do you?

I am most familiar with Hays because it is the only town in western Kansas that I have lived in. I just do not get a good vibe at all in Liberal compared with Hays or Colby. In all reality SW Kansas has more in common with the two panhandles compared with NW Kansas. NW Kansas has far different demographics compared with SW Kansas. I don't doubt that Liberal has an underground market as you have mentioned. I think that the local tax base there will be strained due to a stagnant overall non-farm job market, and a huge younger population.

[Jim West]

Originally Posted by GraniteStater

I am most familiar with Hays because it is the only town in western Kansas that I have lived in. I just do not get a good vibe at all in Liberal compared with Hays or Colby. In all reality SW Kansas has more in common with the two panhandles compared with NW Kansas. NW Kansas has far different demographics compared with SW Kansas. I don't doubt that Liberal has an underground market as you have mentioned. I think that the local tax base there will be strained due to a stagnant overall non-farm job market, and a huge younger population.

I dont think that the tax base is strained, as Liberal is a major railroad town as well as a major oil and gas center. In addition, the county is comprised of mostly irrigated crops, mega dairies, a new mega alcohol plant, and huge cattle feedlots which support the huge National Beef plant there. National Beef employees about 3500 immigrant workers at wages of around $12 an hour, that in itself providing a good tax base. However the major tax base comes from the 50 some odd Fortune 500 companies that terminal and office there. The economy there is fairly strong, and that is what leads to the corrupt politics in the City and County government. The population of the city is about 20,000, but supports approximately 40 lawyers, two of whom just lost their law licenses this year for corrupt behavior. That should tell you something right there.

[LiberalKansasTaxpayer]

I dont know when L:iberal become so anit trucks but Leaving a truck shop on the south end of town tonight and was PULLED over and Wrote a TICKET for driving to the truck stop since now they have made Pine street a no thur truck route but the only way to go back to the truck stop is 5 miles out of the way and if you got a destation in the south end of town then thats not thur but the liitle young punk kid cops they got in Liberal dont understand that the city needs to hire cops that understand the law and are not mouthy and pricks. Liberal wake up if it was not for trucks you would not Have any products to sell as there is no Place that makes or puts together ,manfacture or build except National you people dont understan that your cloths gas food cars and every day stuff is trucked in to town its not made there so back off the trucks

[steveusa]

The vietnamise that live there in large numbers do not get along with the black, who do not get along with the huge number of illegal mexican ( the majority of the poulation) the whites who have lived in this once traditional town are leaving-they are ounumbered and scared- It had the only Walmart in the country that was closed in the 80s, just due to the fact shoplifting was so common Walmart decided to shut down.

[psulions2007]

I remember driving through Liberal on my move across the country (took US 54 to avoid Toll-Happy Oklahoma)...anywho, it didn't seem horrible...just an average farming/country town that just so happens to be the largest of them in a long stretch of towns. Now, it seems as if they were trying to do some sort of revitalization (very nice, new signs pointing to attractions and other important things). It was a nice oasis of civilization along a long stretch of almost nothing.

I could tell there were a lot of immigrants (but there are a LOT more in OK)...and I could tell that the town wasn't in the best shape economically, but they are trying to do better.

Whereas there are towns that are better off in the entire area, there are towns that are a lot worse (see: Guymon).