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Thursday, November 20, 2008
A Soccer Pitch
Readers know that I love soccer. I’ve played the game and I value the habits – teamwork, competitiveness, stamina, good nutrition — it taught me. Many St. Louisans share my interest in the game: St. Louis has one the country’s highest rates of participation in the sport.
I had hoped to find a site in the city for Jeff Cooper’s proposed major league/youth soccer complex. But, the 400 acres – ready for construction now — required for the project were simply unavailable here. (Think: that’s more than three times the size of Fairground Park at Grand and Natural Bridge.) Jeff’s eventual selection of a site near Collinsville, barely ten minutes from the Edward Jones Dome, Scottrade Center, and Busch Stadium, is next-to-perfect, and I expect it to be an asset to the City and, especially, to downtown.
I support Jeff’s project for many of the same reasons I support the new Mississippi River Bridge: it keeps the City at the center of the region. The City and its neighborhoods are the region’s most important economic engine. There are 90,000 or so jobs located within a brisk ten-minute walk from my office at City Hall. Building new things in southern Illinois supports the City’s economy.
New thoughtful construction east of downtown, particularly along an existing transportation spine, is a positive development that I have been asking the local corporate community to support. As heartened as I was by the business community’s pledged support for the ultimately unsuccessful bid to win an NCAA Final Four selection in the next decade, I believe that Jeff’s bid to win a MLS men’s franchise here and his proposal to construct the soccer complex in Collinsville will have an even greater and more positive long-term economic impact on St. Louis than landing a single sports tournament.
The key to Jeff’s proposed development is landing an MLS franchise. The key to securing the franchise is a strong demonstration of community and corporate support, and — ideally — local owners to join Jeff and Albert Pujols. For the reasons I have sketched out above, I strongly urge you to step up now.
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Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Police Board Must Reconsider Chief’s Request
Earlier today, the St. Louis Board of Commissioners failed to approve a request by St. Louis Police Chief Dan Isom to fund a gun buy-back program. Gun buy-backs in St. Louis and other cities have resulted in the surrender of thousands of weapons to the police over the years.
Because the Police Board meeting went longer than scheduled, I had already left the meeting on other City business by the time several non-controversial (I thought!) agenda items were discussed. Some police commissioners voted to deny the request.
Reducing gun violence is one of Chief Isom’s – and the City’s — top priorities and challenges. Major Adkins had prepared a strong, reasoned, logical case that a gun buyback program would help. I strongly believe that easy access to guns by criminals is one of the biggest problems facing some of our neighborhoods. I have assured Chief Isom this afternoon that the Police Board will consider this item again and that, when it does, I will vote in the affirmative.
The Board’s failure to approve the chief’s gun buy-back proposal surprised and disappointed me. There are plenty of reasons to support the City having its own police department. I am adding today’s vote to my list.
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Tuesday, November 18, 2008
At St. Frances Cabrini
One of the most important elements of a great city is the opportunity for parents to find an affordable education for their children in the sort of diverse student body that simply does not exist in most suburban or exurban areas. St. Louis offers lots of such good educational choices, but not enough of them – and not enough affordable ones.
That’s why I am grateful for the efforts of the Today & Tomorrow Foundation. The foundation has raised more than $25 million to provide needs-based tuition assistance scholarships to City families who want a faith-based or private elementary school education for their children.
Earlier today, I joined the foundation’s Kevin Short at St. Frances Cabrini Academy, 3022 Oregon. The location was purposeful.
This school term, St. Frances Cabrini is providing a rigorous education to 188 students in grades K-8. The school’s success is the result of a strong partnership of teachers, parents, supporters, and students. Forty-five of St. Frances Cabrini’s students – and more than 300 throughout the City — receive scholarships through the foundation. It is unlikely that many of them would be enrolled without the $2,000 that the foundation provides (matching at least $500 from parents).
The foundation’s scholarship program helps schools like St. Frances Cabrini continue to offer great educations to City kids — and it gives more good choices to kids’ parents.
I told Kevin that he was helping a City grow stronger.
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Tuesday, November 18, 2008
A Call From Brito
Carlos Brito phoned this afternoon. Since most of the world had already heard the news that his company had formally completed its purchase of Anheuser Busch, the call was a courtesy. But, it was conducted with the easy charm that I have come to expect from him. I think that St. Louis is going to like him — and I am looking forward to working with him. Brito said that he and his team will spend the next several months changing things at A-B and that he still looked forward to the tour of the City’s neighborhoods and cultural institutions that I had promised him.
Closing the AB/InBev deal, of course, means that thousands of St. Louisans will now be sharing one of the largest infusions of wealth into this region in our history. Given the state of the national economy, it probably could not come at a better time.
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Monday, November 17, 2008
Breaking Some Ice
One of the most common reasons offered by the City’s big companies about why they don’t do more business with local MBE/WBEs is that they are unfamiliar with their names, their work, and their leaders.
That’s sounds like a chicken-and-egg problem. You can’t get work if nobody knows you; nobody will know you if you don’t work.
There is, however, an interesting program of City government that helps out. Every several months, the City’s development agencies host a reception to spotlight an MBE/WBE to help it network with large companies in its industry. The setting – wine, finger food, and an attentive mayor — allows the spotlighted company to begin the sorts of informal conversations that may eventually lead to contractual relationships.
This Thursday, I will be attending a Spotlight Reception for Document Imaging Systems, a minority-owned company located at 1463 S. Vandeventer in The Grove neighborhood.
Document Imaging Systems is already a success story. It graduated from our small business incubator in 1995. Over the years, the development agency has been able to match it with several major St. Louis companies – and I have been able to name it one of the City’s top Businesses of the Year in both 2005 and 2007. Its annual sales now top a million dollars.
Owners Adrienne Scales-Williams and Michael Orr do great work. I am delighted that they have kept their growing company and its jobs in the City of St. Louis. I want everyone to meet them and to learn from their success.
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Saturday, November 15, 2008
Citizens’ Service Bureau
A survey elsewhere on this website asks readers to rate some municipal services and evaluate the City of St. Louis’s customer service.
I hope that you will take the time to complete the survey.
A recent memo from the City’s Citizens Service Bureau included the following information:
95% of Street Light Out requests are now responded to within 4 days
83% of requests for Building inspections are completed (ie: inspection done) within 10 days
94% of requests regarding an entire block of street lights out are responded to within 2 days
74% of complaints about debris dumped on a vacant building or lot are responded to within 20 days (responded means inspector has verified and asked crew to clean)
79% of complaints about unsecured vacant buildings are responded to within 10 days (responded = boarded if city owned, owner notified if privately owned)
84% of complaints about items illegally stored in homeowners yard are inspected within 10 days
98% of calls about a stray animal are responded to within 6 days (animal not always caught)
75% of calls about debris on occupied property are cited within 20 days
83% of requests for dumpster repair are completed within 4 days
58% of requests for graffiti removal are completed within 10 days
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Saturday, November 15, 2008
Holiday Cards
Some of you send cards to honor the holiday of your religion. Others send secular cards to celebrate a season. My official cards are more of the latter type, a splash of colorful non-denominational sentiment from me to the people who have somehow ended up on The Official Christmas Card List.
My official cards’ design always shows off the artistic talent of a St. Louis schoolchild, whose work has been chosen from among the hundreds of creative entries mailed to my office each year in crayon, water colors, paints, pencil, ink, and color pencil. The entries always include flocks of ecumenical angels, courts of wise men, corrals of wooly sheep, stadiums of holiday-inclined sports mascots, flocks of festive dinosaurs, plenty of bloated little brothers, conga lines of dancing pets, and troops of candy-cane decorated, flame-throwing tanks.
I love them all – and choosing ten finalists and one winner is a tough job.
It is possible that some of you have children or grandchildren whose talents lean toward Hallmark moments. If so, please encourage them to send in their card designs. You can read the rules here.
(Once again this year, I would like to remind the staffers at MayorSlay.com that I am on to their tricks and that I can easily recognize their anonymously submitted handiwork. The blogging Santa was only amusing the first two or three years.)
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