(Good stuff. I’ll try to rebut ashriver’s points and make an opposing case over the holiday. – promoted by Clark)
Below are some reasons why I think anyone who believes in the values expressed by the Democratic Party should not support the candidacy of Francis Slay for St. Louis Mayor. I think all of these reasons fit into a general theme: in every local issue of substance, Slay has sided with the rich and powerful over the working class and the disenfranchised. In my opinion, one of the most important things about the emergence of the netroots in recent years has been that it pushed us towards a more meritocratic system. That is, in the traditional system, the power brokers in the media and the political establishment decided what ideas could even be heard and discussed, and they were very bad at doing so (often because they had vested interests in certain ideas). The emergence of blogs allowed good ideas to get a wide audience simply because they were good ideas, and not because they had to get the approval of someone in power.
From what I have seen, the St. Louis political system is exactly the kind of system that bloggers have raged against in the federal government. Insiders make decisions behind closed doors. Businesses have complete access to the political process and activists are ignored. Short-term, narrow-minded development plans to build “suburbs in the city”” are hatched and funded with taxpayer money, while intelligent people who propose plans to make St. Louis more urban and environmentally friendly are brushed aside. I have to admit I don’t know much about Maida Coleman, but she’d have to be pretty bad for me to think she’s a worse choice than Slay, not because I have any personal issue with him, but just because I think it would be an intrinsically good thing to win a victory against the gatekeeping establishment.
Anyway, here are some specifics about what I dislike about Slay’s administration thus far:
I. The School System. Slay has been one of the top recipients of Sinquefield’s pro-voucher money, and has already received 100,000 dollars from Sinquefield’s group for the upcoming election. This is already sketchy enough in my book, but looks especially bad when you consider that Slay personally campaigned for St. Louis school board members in 2003 who went on to run the public school system into the ground (yes, I agree it was bad already). In my mind, it should raise some serious red flags that a mayor who is literally getting hundreds of thousands of dollars from a pro-voucher group personally oversaw the collapse of the public school system. How do the parents of public school children feel knowing how much money Slay gets from voucher groups?
II. Development. Slay has allowed real estate developer Paul McKee to buy up large swaths of property in St. Louis neighborhoods, actively let them decay by not protecting them from brick rustlers (which reduces the property value of the surrounding properties, including those of residents and rehabbers), and then buy up the reduced price properties. In fact, the city itself allows its properties to deteriorate and drive down the property values in areas McKee is buying in. McKee has thus far not been required to provide any explanation for his plan for development and the city has shown no interest in enforcing the numerous code violations. More info is here and here.
III. Race Relations. Slay has politically ignored the black population of the city. He fired Fire Chief Sherman George in questionable circumstances, which resulted in a huge outcry from the black population of St. Louis. His response to the outcry in the black community was basically to ignore it, which has resulted in many more problems. Take a look at this video from last year’s MLK Day and tell me if this would happen to a “good administrator.”
IV. The Police Department. The St. Louis Police Department has had a series of scandals since Slay has been in office. For example, in 2005 a story broke about how the police department “discounted rape complaints at the scene, shredded records, let cases evaporate and shelved evidence that could have identified predators.” There have been several cases of police brutality. There was recently the scandal with Chief Mokwa’s daughter. Now, due to an archaic law, St. Louis is one of the only cities in the country that does not have control over its own police force (a state board controls it), so perhaps you could claim that Slay should not be blamed for these problems. Which might be a good point, except that after a group of activists had worked to craft a bill for a Civilian Oversight Board that would at least establish some small amount of accountability to the people of St. Louis, and after this bill passed the board of aldermen, Slay vetoed it. Thus, he has actively worked against giving the people of St. Louis oversight of their own police department.
There are of course a lot of other issues in St. Louis that could be mentioned, but that’s good for starters. McCain got only 16% of the vote in St. Louis City in the election; I think we can do better than this.
put a lot of thought into this and you make some good points.
BUT.
You don’t vote against candidates you vote for them.
So I’m willing to look at an alternative to Slay but it has to be a REAL alternative that is not going to throw the City of St. Louis into chaos (once again). I’ve lived through that.
Now, on the Board of Education – yes, the schools are a disaster. Yes, he campaigned for his own slate. Yes, we all hoped that by having a unified group on the school board we could finally work some change. Yes, they got into office and IMMEDIATELY discovered that a situation that had looked bad was terrible. Did they made a mistake in hiring an outside consultant – maybe. I’ve never been clear that they were wrong to hire a consultant or that they hired the WRONG consultant. But the fact is that being a member of the Board of Education is not and SHOULD NOT be a full time job and they needed to hire someone to actually do the day to day work to try to fix things.
Yes, they made enemies. They decided to look at the public schools as a school system and not a jobs program. Many people in St. Louis look at it like a jobs program. The fact is – it is both.
In the end the Board did not work. But you know what? I consider Slay’s actions in getting those four elected a GOOD thing – because every mayor knows that he can’t turn the city around unless the schools are turned around and he at least TRIED something. It didn’t work. But he tried. I give him credit for trying something. The real reason the whole thing fell apart? Race relations in this city.
On development – the McKee things was a disaster. But on balance the Slay administration has been good for development in the city. I think the McKee thing mostly ties into your third point – he is TERRIBLE on race relations and relations with the north side and the McKee thing is just a sypmtom of that.
On the police board – we need control back. Control in most cities goes through the mayor with the council approving salaries. That’s the way it should be. So there is some logic in him not wanting to muddy the waters with a citizen’s board – at least not until we get back the powers AS THEY SHOULD BE.
The biggest problem with Slay and the principal reason I would be willing to look at someone else is race relations in this city. I think he has been terrible and I think that is at the heart of all his failures. BUT unless someone in whom I have confidence runs against him – I’m going to vote for him.
but if people are serious about getting somebody else into the job, the time to do something about it (at least this election cycle) may have come and gone. Efforts to draft a viable candidate and start building a warchest should have been ongoing for the past couple of years. Perhaps, as I believe was suggested, the effort that went into the recall effort a couple of years ago might have been put to better use to begin the work to put a challenge together.
Of course, maybe folks have done just that and I don’t know the details, but I don’t think that I see a real challenger among those who have declared their intent to run against him.
1.) The SLPS is the among the worst school districts in the nation. It is dysfunctional on every level. The school board he elected inherited a $60 million budget deficit due to mismanagement from the previous board. With the failure of St. Louis residents to elect school board members who realize that we need drastic educational reform to TEACH THESE CHILDREN. Mayor Slay was the only politician in recent history in this town to fight this hard fight. In lieu of a Board that puts adults’ jobs over children’s education the only viable option left was the SAB and Charter Schools. The goal of the SLPS is to educate children, not provide jobs for the sake of jobs. The entirety of the SLPS should be held accountable for their abysmal failure. The mayor should be commended for having the courage to take on an issue that no other politician would touch. The fact that he is supported by sinquefeld is the end result of a long process and fight for the future of the children of st. louis. Plenty of other Democrats take money from donors with questionable motives, this is an extremely weak argument on your part.
2.) There are multiple logical flaws in your argument here.
A. “
”
The mayor does not have power over who can buy what properties in the city, so he doesn’t have the power to “allow” anyone legally buy or not buy anything.
B.
Paul McKee’s properties were ransacked by Brickrustlers and were left to fall apart. I highly doubt that the mayor engineered this. Were only Mckee’s properties ransacked or perhaps these brick rustlers are equal opportunity criminals. Do I think Paul McKee is a bad neighbor and an unethical landholder? Yes. Is it fair to say the Mayor is part of some secret conspiracy? No, not with out proof which no one has, nor does anyone have a believable case for collaboration.
C.
The largest property owner in the city of St. Louis is the CITY OF ST. LOUIS. The city does not maintain or repair vacant buildings, it would be nice if it did, but I challenge anyone to find the funding for it, or pay for security on all these properties to stop illegal brick rustling.
D.
The Mayor or anyone has no power over any landholder to force them to make any plans public before any construction permits are applied for. If Paul McKee has a plan, it isn’t public because he hasn’t started anything yet. Real Estate speculation isn’t illegal. Also, Mckee has routinely been fined by the city for code violations, which he has paid.
3.) Sherman George did not do his job for THREE YEARS, denying the men in the Fire Department the titles and salary they deserved for doing the jobs without promotion. George lost his argument in Federal Court and had an option to keep his job, all he had to do was do his job by making the promotions.
Call me cynical, but perhaps there are some black politicians in this town more concerned with scoring cheap points by playing politics with race rather than improving their communities by taking advantage of Chief George’s failed gambit. BTW. isn’t he filing a court case to get another court granted financial windfall? Three years of failing to perform ones duties, a federal court case and then an option to keep the job of chief…I bet a lot of people wish their boss was that lenient.
4. The Cops. You even acknowledge the City does not control the police department. The mayor did not support THAT version of a civilian oversight board and was supportive of an amended version of the bill. The activists were the ones who would not compromise. The Mayor even supports Local control, which would accomplish public oversight by various elected officials including the Board of Alderman and the Mayor’s office that could directly influence the direction and procedures of the Department. So your argument of “working against giving the people of St. Louis having oversight is a fallacy of composition.
The gauntlet’s been thrown, lets argue!
it is probably true, as somebody noted above that the school system was very broken. But over the past five years that I have lived here, the impression I have taken from what I read is that the Slay administration efforts to “fix” the schools, have been fairly cynically undertaken and, to nobody’s surprise, destined to fail. And the solution when they fail: charter shcools of course, along with the destruction of public education in St. Louis.
Sometime ago I wrote the following in a posting on this blog called The Micro-Shock Doctrine in Missouri:
http://www.pubdef.net/2008/11/…
the fact that other politicians take money from Sinquefield is not an excuse. It’s still a pretty obvious conflict of interest. You do not have a healthy democracy when the mayor of a city is getting $100,000 from any group, let alone a pro-voucher group that has a vested interest in the failure of public education.