Posted on 08/10/2009 10:04:15 AM PDT by End Times Sentinel
KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Dozens of children with a Connecticut youth group and their parents were kicked out of a Kansas City hotel in the middle of the night this week after hotel officials said they had gotten tired of fielding noise complaints from other guests.
But members of the Nation Drill Squad and Drum Corps, based in New Haven, claim their eviction from the Sheraton Kansas City Sports Complex Hotel culminated several days of what they called prejudicial treatment because they are black.
"Everyone should be respected regardless of your skin color," said Douglas Bethea, director of the group of 32 drummers and dancers, ages 4 to 17.
Bethea's group arrived at the hotel Sunday to participate in the Elks Grand Lodge World National Championships, a competition for youth drill and dance teams, which was held at another Kansas City hotel.
He claimed the group, which included more than a dozen chaperones, received poor treatment almost from the start with some of their 10 rooms lacking toilet paper and members having to wait two days for their rooms to be cleaned by housekeeping.
Ted Frerking, the hotel's general manager, said his staff received several noise complaints over the first three days, which they relayed to the group's leaders. He said he didn't know of any toilet paper supply problems and housekeepers may not have made the beds because the guests had left personal items on them and staff are prohibited from touching guests' property.
The group won numerous trophies at the competition Tuesday and returned to the hotel in high spirits, said Titiana Person, a parent of three drill squad members who was a chaperone on the trip.
She said hotel staff warned the group's adults about noise after some of the children came back from the swimming pool and were visiting each others' rooms.
"They were being typical kids," Person said. "They (hotel officials) wanted us to go in our rooms and stay in our rooms. That's not possible."
Frerking said the group was given a final warning at 10:30 p.m. and told that subsequent complaints would result in the group being asked to leave.
By 1:15 a.m., Bethea and Person said the children had settled down while some of the adults sat in one room, talking and laughing. They said a hotel official came to the room and said they were being evicted.
"He comes to the door and says, 'You people have to leave this hotel now ... or we will call the cops and they will come move you by force,'" Bethea said. "When they came to kick us out everyone was asleep."
He claimed eight officers came upstairs immediately and, armed with stun guns and Mace, helped hotel security pull group members from their beds.
"I was scared to hear cops with Tasers and things like that," said drummer Ronald Huggins, 17. "The kids were scared, we were scared. We didn't know what to expect."
Kansas City police spokesman Darin Snapp disputed parts of the account, saying there were only five officers at the hotel and they were present only to "keep the peace."
"At no time did we ever enter rooms or pull out Tasers or Mace; we didn't have to," Snapp said.
Frerking said his hotel's security doesn't carry stun guns or Mace. He denied the eviction was based on race.
"The only issue was noise," he said. "If other guests hadn't complained we would never know."
The group left Kansas City on Wednesday, and the hotel reimbursed the group for the two nights it didn't stay at the hotel. But Bethea said he is considering his legal options.
"What about the pain and suffering and the crying and the kids being woken up and scared half to death?" he said.
We all totally agree with you. But I fear it was the content of your character of you and your minions that was the problem.
Did you read his post??? I think he is saying that the hotel management probably let it slide more than they normally would have if it had been a non-minority group. Newbie doesn't necessarily mean troll.
Courtesy and consideration for others is not a racial issue.
It’s a cultural one.
Not if they ever want to have guests again. Not getting sleep when I am traveling is close to a killing offense. I would have called the cops about twelve times without looking out my room to see what color the cause of the noise was.
10-1 odds that the parents were worse than the kids.
Why hotels allow this and create such an unpleasant experience for
their adult guests is beyond me!”
WHY do the CHAPERONES allow this?
The fault lies with the chaperones not being able to control the kids. The kids take advantage of the sheer numbers of kids vs the number of chaperones, and they have often been ‘raised’ to think that they are all-important and all-powerful on their own. No consequences at home for bad behavior.
I have stayed at hotels for a number of different events & trade shows thru my 69 years, and adults know better.
Even more recently, I have been in horse camps where there are over 250 horses and the riders , crews & volunteers & ride management. Ride management will announce that generators cannot run after 10 pm, and if some group wants to stay up and talk around the campfire on the night before the main event, other campers will douse their noisy behavior. We just don’t tolerate it. Riders and crews need their sleep, and the horses need to rest, also.
Kids are away from home, and if there was video of their behavior, I can bet that any subsequent lawsuit would be thrown out of court.
based on the posting history, I don’t think this one is a troll.
civility on both sides.”
NOt often possible when blacks and others have been raised all their life to believe that whitey only wants to ‘put them down’ and not let them achieve anything.
All this group acheived was to upset other paying customers.
Next time, I suggest they find a smaller hotel and book the whole thing so that there will be no other customers to bother. With their past behavior record, they might have to pay a damage deposit in advance. If this hotel was part of a chain, I hope the other units in the chain were notified of the actions of this group.
They obviously won’t self-restrict their behavior, so others must do it for them—ragardless of their color or age.
I was to quick with the trigger finger. This thread was ripe for a DUmmy to post something on.
Understood.
I’ve been on several trips as a chaperone and driver for drumline groups, and ours usually behave themselves well. If the chaperones establish and enforce the rules to require proper civilized behaviour, then even teenagers can manage to follow the rules.
Anyone who claims it is impossible is just a lazy chaperone.
Where I grew up they called it a lack of “home trainin’.” Lot of that these days
This has evolved into a modern day witch hunt: a member of an eternal grievance group violates some law and then follows a simple two-step plan (1) cloak yourself victim-hood (2) blame whitey and shake him down for all you can get.
And they receive all the cooperation necessary to facilitate its success from the media, politicians, and more and more the courts.
Sorry, you’re in error..reread their post.
BUWAHAAHAHAHA!
If hotels want to protect the other guests from this mess, they need to schedule extra security, at least 1 for each floor, for those nights and include it in the room charge for that group.
You got that right.
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