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DEF is a non-partisan, independent political blog based in the
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VIDEO: Conway says Forest Park deal is going to be a tough sell for BJC, Slay
By Antonio D. French
Filed
Saturday, June 17, 2006 at 7:26 PM
A PUB DEF VIDEO REPORT
Alderman Steve Conway is one of five members of a special committee charged with looking at the financial details surrounding a controversial proposal to hand over a portion of Forest Park to Barnes Hospital for the next 90 years.
In an interview with PUB DEF yesterday, he told us the status of the those committee hearings. He also said he thinks it's going to be tough for BJC and Mayor Francis Slay to get this deal pass the Board of Aldermen and the Board of Estimate and Apportionment.
Conway said he thinks a bill to approve the proposal won't be introduced in the Board of Aldermen any time soon. Because of that, the money expected from the deal was taken out of next year's budget.
VIDEO: Aldermen pass budget, give small wage increase to city workers
By Antonio D. French
Filed
Friday, June 16, 2006 at 1:52 PM
The St. Louis Board of Aldermen today passed Board Bill #1, the bill which sets the city's budget for the fiscal year begining July 1. Much to the delight of the employees of the City of St. Louis, the budget does include a pay raise for city workers, albeit a small one.
Alderman Steve Conway, an accountant by trade who co-sponsored the bill along with Board President Jim Shrewsbury, was instrumental in finding the money for the raise and including it in the budget. Just a month ago, Mayor Francis Slaysent out an email to city workers telling them that there would be no pay increase this year.
The 3% raise won't kick in until January 2007 and therefore will only be reflected in half of employees' paychecks this fiscal year. So in actuality it amounts to just a 1.5% annual increase.
Conway sat down with PUB DEF this afternoon to explain where the money was found to pay for the $3.7 million in extra salary payments and how the city may save another $10 million in management costs.
VIDEO: Percy Green says Board should not renew Superintendent's contract
By Antonio D. French
Legendary activist Percy Green has for decades been at the forefront of the struggle for civil rights and equality for African-Americans, a goal that over the years has found Green dangling from the Gateway Arch, sitting in numerous jail cells, standing before the Supreme Court, and all points in between.
In November 2003, Green found himself again in handcuffs. This time after being dragged from a meeting of the St. Louis Board of Education after a member of the school district's security team claimed he was trying to incite a riot. Green denied that charge and after hearing testimony from three witnesses, including school board member Bill Purdy, and judge agreed, finding Green not guilty Wednesday of all charges.
State Senate candidate Derio Gambaro won the endorsement of the 8th Ward Democratic club tonight. Sources tell PUB DEF the former State Rep received 27 votes. The next closest candidate was Jeff Smith with eight.
Smith had better luck in the 28th Ward where he beat out Gambaro with 29 votes. Gambaro tied with Yaphett El-Amin with six votes each.
Today is the deadline to sign up to be a tech support guy (or lady) at polling places on Election Day, August 8. The folks at the St. Louis City Board of Elections say techs are still needed.
You don't have to be a CS, able to write code with your eyes closed. Just know a bit more than the sweet white-haired ladies that will be asking for your photo I.D. before you can vote.
Do a public service and make enough to pay your car payment (or at least one fill-up). The pay is $225 for a day of training and the actual work on E-Day. Call Stephanie Doss at 622-3546 or Summer Richardson at 622-4327. Tell 'em PUB DEF sent you.
Here's the latest print edition of PUB DEF Weekly -- and boy, do we mean latest. We've been throwing so much news up here on the website, Nicky B. can barely keep up.
Most of this issue is full of stuff from last week, but still download and print it. Drop off some copies at City Hall, your neighborhood coffee shop, or give a copy to an old person who doesn't know "what all the fuss is about them fancy com'pooters and Innerwebs."
Legendary activist Percy Green was found not guilty today on charges of resisting arrest stemming from a November 2003 incident in which Green was forcibly removed from a public meeting of the St. Louis Board of Education.
Judge James Walls cleared Green after hearing testimony on his behalf from school board member William Purdy, Teachers' Union VPs Byron Clemons and Beth Faust.
Condos owned by Police Board President Chris Goodson burned to the ground this morning. The fire at Mississippi Place Townhomes, located in south St. Louis at Lafayette and Mississippi, occured around the same time as a fire just a few blocks away at at Vail Place Townhomes on South 18th. Street.
Get a whole lot more news and videos from last night's school board meeting at our sister site, STLSchools.org, home of the St. Louis Schools Watch.
See reports on the school board rejecting the superintendent's budget (with a video of Dr. Williams calling for an end to the "finger-pointing") and union leaders defending the district's contract with Sodexho, saying they don't want to be in the same boat as the teachers, "collectively begging, not collectively bargaining."
VIDEO: School Board gets on board to help save Cleveland High School
By Antonio D. French
As was expected, the St. Louis School Board voted last night to move the students and staff of Cleveland NJROTC High School to Pruitt Middle School. They also voted to approve a proposal to work with the newly formed group dedicated to raising private funds to repair and upgrade Cleveland with the goal of eventually bringing the students back.
The resolution, proposed by board member Bill Purdy, also directed the district to continue to provide basic maintenance and security to Cleveland after relocation so that the building is not vandalized and does not fall further into disrepair.
Purdy's resolution replaced one approved earlier in the meeting which was submitted by Superintendent Creg Williams. Williams' proposal also moved the students out of Cleveland for the 2006-2007 school year, but it did not address what SLPS was going to do with the building once empty.
Board members Ron Jackson and Bob Archibald said they believed that the issue of repairing Cleveland should not be considered seperate from the numerous aging buildings owned by the district, each with their own structural and maintenance-related problems.
Archibald added that he believes the district still has too many schools for the number of students it serves. "We really need to have seventysome schools, not ninetysome," he said. He suggested that Cleveland be included in a broader discussion held over the next three months on how to address the district's infrastructure problems.
Several people addressed the board on the issue of preserving the 93 year-old building, including Alderman Craig Schmid; attorney Matt Ghio, a board member of Landmarks Association which has joined the Alliance to Save Cleveland High; and Travis Reems, also a member of the Alliance. See videos:
The board approved the measure with Archibald, Jackson, and Board President Veronica O'Brien voting against it.
Members of the Coalition Against Police Crimes and Repression (CAPCAR) held a press conference in front of City Hall yesterday to call attention what they claim are serious violations to the state's Sunshine Law by the St. Louis Police Board.
Jamala Rogers and John Chasnoff said that the version of a Civilian Review Board reflected in a General Order signed in May by Police Board President Chris Goodson is different from the one presented and approved at the board's April meeting.
The Coalition said these changes are significant, and that they were not made in an open meeting is a violation of Missouri's laws on open government.
"You can talk in detail about whether the changes improve the bill or weaken the bill," said Chasnoff. "But the fact that these are unauthorized changes is a slap in the face to open government."
CAPCAR noted 13 differences between the order signed by Goodson and what was agreed to at the April meeting. Among the most significant are changes to how the CRB can interact with witnesses to allegations of police misconduct and how board members can be removed.
The latter document inexplicably removes a clause that would allow the CRB, by a majority vote, to request the Chief of Police to allow one of its members to be present at an Internal Affairs interview of a witness to police brutality.
Also absent in the second document is the phrase "for good cause" in reference to how and why CRB members can be dismissed by the police board.
Richard Wilkes, spokesman for the police department, said these issues will be readdressed at the next police board meeting. He said that there was confusion in the department over what objections to the CRB that Chief Joe Mokwa raised in the public meeting and what changes he requested to the police board members in writing.
Chasnoff said that if that's true, it is possibly another violation of the Sunshine Law since that document was not made available to the public at the time of the meeting.
What is clear is that the differences between what was presented in public and what was ordered by the police board would likely have simply become law if not for the watchful eye of citizen activists like Chasnoff and Rogers.
In other company news, regular viewers of our videos will be happy to hear that we've upgraded our camera equipment. Good-bye Canon ZR-80. Hello Canon GL1!!!One of our longest supporters was kind enough of loan us the equipment for a while. And for that, we are very grateful.
So now all we need is a couple of professional microphones and Watch out Elliott Davis!
If anyone out there has any such shotgun, handheld, or wireless mics for sale or loan, please email me at antonio@pubdef.net. Thanks.
Several candidates and elected officials were in the audience at yesterday's OBS Candidate Forum for the 4th District State Senate candidates.
State Representative Connie Johnson, Alderman Jeffrey Boyd, State Rep. Candidates Jamilah Nasheed, Joe Palm, Talib El-Amin, and Karla May all watched as Derio Gambaro, Jeff Smith, Kenny Jones, Amber Boykins, and Yaphett El-Amin answered questions on different issues facing the residents of the district they each want to represent in the state senate.
May, who is running against Committeemen Palm and El-Amin to replace Yaphett in the state house, rose to ask a question that was directly pointed at the wife of one of her opponents.
She asked where the candidates stood on the issue of Missouri becoming a "right to work" state. There are currently 22 states with laws that discourage collective bargaining by prohibiting trade unions from making membership a condition of employment, either before or after hire. There is an ongoing effort to make Missouri such a state.
Four of the candidates voiced their strong support for labor, but El-Amin, who along with her father, Eddie Hasan of MOKAN, has sometimes been critical of local labor unions, said that unions do no have an excellent record for being inclusive of blacks and other minorities.
"In order for us to all come together and for us to really see the benefit of labor, we have to be at the table benefiting from the good-paying jobs," said El-Amin.
The candidates seeking to replace the term-limited State Sen. Pat Dougherty answered a wide range of questions tonight at a forum hosted by the Organization for Black Struggle.
Derio Gambaro, Jeff Smith, Yaphett El-Amin, and Kenny Jones were asked whether they support the City of St. Louis regaining control of its police department and where they stood on the issue of requiring cops to live in the city like other city employees.
Gambaro said that the issue should be handled like the Home Rule issue a few years back, with voters across the entire state asked whether St. Louisans should have the same right as most of them. Co-moderator Irene J. Smith, former 1st Ward alderman, quickly reminded Gambaro that this is a statutory issue, not a constitutional one, and that the legislature can decide it at any time.
El-Amin said that Gambaro has spoken at the same hearings as she has on police residency, but on opposite sides of the issue. She said she firmly believes that police -- and firefighters -- should be required to live in the city, something which Gambaro has testified against.
Smith and Jones also spoke in favor of requiring police to live in the city. The fifth candidate, Amber Boykins, was not present when this question was asked. She arrived to the forum nearly 90 minutes late.
The event will be from 4 - 6 p.m. at the Rowan Community Center, 1401 Rowan Ave. Organizers say all of the candidates have been invited to attend.
The candidates are State Reps. Yaphett El-Amin and Amber Boykins, former Congressional candidate Jeff Smith, former Alderman Kenny Jones, and former State Rep. Derio Gambaro.
