Category: News

St. Louis Magazine has a balanced piece on the creation of the trash districts in the county. Well, it twitches a nod to balance anyway by writing about a hauling company that will go bankrupt when it loses its share of a free market (although the author uses his creative writing chops to even tilt the verbiage against the free market solution in this portion of the story) and then, on the other side almost, adoring licky love to a sales manager for a recycling company (who gets more money from the mandated, unfree, forced recycling program, so he’s in favor of more county-mandated income for his company).

What really got my dander up, though, was this insight from constitutional scholar and unelected bureaucrat in charge of the county’s Solid Waste Management Program John Haasis:

Again, the phone started ringing in Haasis’ office: “We don’t want you to pick who our hauler is. It’s our American right. It’s our right from God to pick who hauls our trash.” Haasis sighs again. “Last time I checked,” he says, “it’s not in the Bill of Rights.”

Understand that, citizen. This fellow asserts that all of your rights are right there in the first ten amendments to the constitution, and the government can do what it wants otherwise.

And fear your government and its disciples.

On May 31, 2008, we received our “economic stimulus” check from the US Department of Treasury for $1,500.

On June 16, 2008, we shall send that $1,500 plus some back to the US Department of Treasury as our quarterly estimated earnings tax (we’re self-employed, you see).

Thanks, Congress, for spotting me a little cash flow to pay the government.

If the whole country had to file estimated earnings taxes quarterly, I’d think we’d see a much smaller annual budget.

When life gives you too much rain to write about a drought, a plucky journalist finds a way to lament the rain.

Contractors wonder when the rain will go away:

A year-to-date record of nearly 28 inches has been a headache shared by a range of local construction-related companies, including developers, general contractors, concrete pourers, bricklayers and other subcontractors.

The rain delayed several projects, required overtime work and cost developers extra money. And even though the sun reappeared most of last week, companies say the water problem will not evaporate soon.

Cool, wet spring dampening possibilities for corn crop:

A cold, wet spring put crop planting weeks behind schedule across much of the U.S. Corn Belt and drastically slowed growth where corn is already in the ground.

Now, farmers in parts of Iowa, Illinois and Indiana are replanting corn that either sat under water in flooded fields too long to germinate or can’t break through sodden, compact soils. And the cool, soggy weather continues, the last thing a heat-loving crop like corn needs.

“It’s starting to look like a very difficult year,” University of Illinois agronomy professor Emerson Nafziger said.

Fear the unrelenting dreaded fireball in the sky, or fear the unrelenting drowning death from above, but rest assured, the media will insist you fear something.

For the love of Pete, they’re all true in their promises of what will happen once you’ve given over your credit card number and social security number to a friendly pharmacy in .cn and have downloaded their special desktop price widget named attackNSA.exe.

Just ask these two fellows who’ve apparently taken the treatment. What else could explain a naked woman ramming their truck with her car to get them to stop? All the desire promised in all those subject lines, baby.

(Link seen on Dustbury.)

My, is it already the eighth year of the 20th century already? Must be why Creve Coeur has fallen into a development rut that only raising the costs of doing business in the city can cure:

City officials are asking voters next Tuesday to authorize a half-cent economic development sales tax that they say would keep the city competitive.

Creve Coeur’s economic circumstances are uncertain, said Paul Zimitzsch, chairman of the city’s Economic Development Commission. “Town and Country is opening a big box retail center. Clayton is pursuing redevelopment. We’ve become the hole in the doughnut,” he said.

Let’s see, in the last eight years, Creve Coeur has thrown up a massive business development (CityPlace); a set of mixed use buildings (King’s Landing, et al, ca 2006); tried to run a longtime auto dealer, a country club, and an American Legion post out of town to build more of the same (2001); and in 2006 put out its own fluff piece entitled WHY CREVE COEUR IS THE HEART OF COMMERCE.

Pretty damn impressive run for a municipality crying poverty.

You know what an actual business owner and resident thinks?

But David Caldwell, a resident and owner of a business in Creve Coeur, sees that kind of hole as a blessing that prevents overdevelopment.

Creve Coeur also needs to keep its sales tax low to remain competitive, Caldwell said.

That’s not the sort of thinking that wins you elections; that’s the sort of thinking that allows you to make an honest living. Which is why he’s ultimately doomed.

Another part of another government laments about the costs of keeping its workings transparent:

A bill that would require more rollbacks of property tax rates also would provide residents and business owners with more details about their property taxes.

Getting the additional information may cost St. Louis County nearly $700,000, officials said.

Dear government: please, consider the costs of doing your job transparently as non-negotiable. Pay out this expense and maybe seek to save that money elsewhere, such as doing your job efficiently and maybe not doing stupid things with tax money. There’s a pipe dream for a citizen.

However, I’m not sure I think this is efficiency:

And Eugene Leung, the county’s revenue director, wants the county to hire a company from Dallas to help the assessor. Leung wants to hire the firm without seeking bids or proposals.

You know, it would really suck to have to open things up so the public sees things like no bid contracts and the decision process for that, ainna?

Trash decision will hinge on complaints — from whom?:

It’s interesting how a handful of complaints can change something that’s working fine for everybody else.

The St. Charles County Council, for instance, is considering a plan that might change trash collection for all unincorporated areas in the county because of three negative comments.

The proposal would split the areas into trash collection districts, each served by only one waste hauler.

Currently, 11 companies have permits to operate anywhere in the county, and residents can choose which one picks up their trash.

Council Chairman Dan Foust wants to tinker with that arrangement because he got phone calls from three residents in the St. Charles Hills neighborhood, which has 1,600 homes.

The negative comments were about the nuisance produced by the current competitive arrangement.

Right now, trucks from multiple companies are going up and down the streets almost daily. It would be quieter if just one company’s trucks were going by twice a week.[Emphasis added]

You know what else would make streets quieter? How about limiting deliveries to one parcel post carrier, such as DHL? That way, you don’t get Federal Express (note: I just wanted to be the last man in America to use its full name) or United Parcel Service trucks rumbling down the streets. Or how about only allowing one furniture store to deliver to the area? This thin gruel of rationalization that seeks to move from a free market solution to one open to corruption (best bid package presented to the trash district commissioners, hint hint, gets all the business) could apply to just about anything.

But this has precedent, don’t you know, now that St. Louis County has imposed this solutions on a reluctant populace.

And the others? Well, St. Charles County isn’t going to break that ground, but if some other regional government succeeds, perhaps a good presentation or two, hint hint, to the county commission could get the commissioners on board.

Letter to the editor in the Webster Kirkwood Times:

On Mother’s Day about 2:40 p.m., I was driving west on West Lockwood Avenue. As I went under the railroad trestle just past Sherwood, I came upon a large tree that had blown over, blocking the westward lanes. The only people there was a crew working to clean it up.

I swung over to go west on one of the two eastbound lanes. Very quickly flashing lights from a police car came up behind me. I don’t know where it had been. While I was waiting for the police officer to get out of his car, a woman going east went by and said she was going to court. She had gotten a ticket too.

The officer told me to pull onto a side street. He followed me and after he got out of his car ran back to hail another car going west on the eastward lane. The officer said I should have turned around. When I said people go around obstacles all the time, he said it was dangerous and I could have had a head-on collision.

I wonder how the police chief would assess the situation. The road must have been blocked for some time before I arrived, since a woman had gotten a ticket, done her business and was on her way back, and a clean-up crew had to be assembled and brought to the location. I wonder how many tickets the officer managed to write.

Shouldn’t the police be helping drivers get around the obstacle rather than waiting (where?) until drivers get into a “dangerous” situation so they can give them a ticket?

Law enforcement not as concerned with public safety as with writing tickets and generating revenue? Say it ain’t so!

Granted, all we have here is the letter-writer’s version of events, but the story too easily falls into an anecdote supporting a cynical mindset that couples red-light cameras (sometimes with shortened yellow lights), rules allowing law enforcement to seize assets easily, and ticket quotas.

I’m very disappointed that the Webster-Kirkwood Times didn’t see this as a lead on a story, because either there is some dereliction of duty or behavior that’s not in the interest of public safety here, or there’s a letter writer spinning his tale of woe for all of us to see. Maybe signs were clear that the road was closed. Maybe there were even detour signs up. Hard to say. The paper only presents an allegation and lets it go.

But we’ve got a letter and our own cynicism that keeps us cold at night.

On May 10, I posted the picture of the LOL gas price sign on Clayton Road.

On May 23, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch posts a picture. Sure, it’s clearer, but it’s theoretically a professional photographer and he or she was not driving a temporarily unionized wife to the hospital.

Kudos to them for not explicitly blaming Bush in the article (unlike this “article” in the neighborhood paper, where the newspaper editor takes four short paragraphs, 10 short sentences, to lay the blame at George Bush’s feet. On the front page of the paper, no less. Good work, activist!). However, I wonder who told someone that LOL means “Lots of luck.”

Funny bit from the Post-Dispatch story, though, in the semi-mandatory, tout light rail section:

“I just started riding it a couple weeks ago, and I love it,” said Richards, of St. George. He said he finds riding the train so relaxing that he’d probably keep doing it even in the unlikely event that gas prices plummet. “I guess I’m hooked.”

I guess he doesn’t work downtown. The fundamental problem with the light rail system is that it has two lines: a main line from the airport to downtown, and a spur down to Shrewsbury. If the guy in St. George works downtown, a highway commute looks like this:

View Larger Map

His ride to the Metrolink station looks like this:

View Larger Map

That’s a fourteen minute ride to the Metrolink station and then a ride on the train downtown or about a 20 minute ride on the highway. When I lived in Casinoport and worked downtown, I could drive 30 minutes to the Metrolink station, wait for a train, and then ride downtown on the train, or I could drive 40 minutes to downtown.

Light rail proponents will yap that that explains why we need a bunch more rails and stops, but it took 10 years to build that one spur I mentioned above. To this day, Metrolink bleeds money. More rails mean it would bleed more money. Light rail and those fixed transit systems make no sense in a widely distributed, low-density area. But they’re BIG THINGS, and elected leaders get their names on buildings, so they continue to support it. The right-minded busybodies who tend to move downtown anyway continue to push it because it makes sense for them and the population should fund their pet projects. For the rest of us, time and tax money are wasted.

That’s a long way from pointing out I had the photo before the Post-Dispatch did. I’ll stop now.

Crestwood tax increase expected to keep city running:

About $7 million ought to cover it.

That’s what the Crestwood Board of Aldermen thinks will be needed over the next six years to maintain city services.

And to cover losses from declining sales tax and property tax revenues from its shopping mall, the board wants to place a 35 cent property tax increase proposal on the August election ballot.The measure will be on the August 5 ballot once it is approved by county election officials.

Here’s a little hair petting to calm you, citizen:

How much of an increase is that to the average Crestwood taxpayer?

Ward 3 Aldermen Jerry Miguel said residents can take the Crestwood portion of their 2007 property tax bill, and then double it for next year.

That’s an opponent of the bill speaking out. Let’s put it into context:

1. Take the Crestwood portion of your 2007 property tax bill.
2. Double it.
3. Add 20% when your property is reassessed next year.
4. Subtract it from your budget, which will be dinged by two county tax increases.
5. Put in an x in all future household budgets, where in x represents the total of all future emergency tax increases for your fire protection district, for your police pension plans, for Forest Park, for the impending museum districts, for the county budget shortfalls, and so on and so on.

When the total is equal to or greater than your income, I guess you can stop. Or keep going, assessing penalties for not making enough to cover your tax liability.

You know, I was going to use the “newspapermen blame Bush for everything except [event related to baseball].”

However, those hard working men and women of the press have found a way to demonize Bush for things related to baseball.

So I take it back. Their creative writing classes have taught them how to blame a Republican president for everything now. Their training is complete.

New taxes never sunset. Sometimes, tax cuts don’t even sunrise:

A state law requiring St. Charles to cut property taxes when the city’s share of Ameristar Casino admission receipts increases may be repealed before it ever triggers any reduction.

At the request of Mayor Patti York, the Missouri Legislature last week approved a little-noticed measure to get rid of the tax cut requirement.

Please, don’t take away her slush money. Think of the poor, bawling, hungry bureaucrats she has to feed.

Variable speed limits set to begin on I-270:

Starting Thursday morning, the Missouri Department of Transportation will begin a two-year experiment with variable speed limits along Interstate 270.

Motorists might have already noticed the digital speed limit signs that began popping up along the Missouri stretch of the highway in recent weeks. So far, those signs have shown that the speed limit is 60 miles per hour.

But by the morning commute, the speed limits on those signs could change to as low as 40 miles per hour depending on traffic flow.

Hey, we’ve already seen the authorities stretching existing laws to cover things that they didn’t. Why not just give the authorities to actually change the rules at their whim?

I’m sure this power will only be used for safety, and not revenue enhancement. So it will only be coincidence when these speed limits drop during nonpeak times when there happen to be a large number of municipal police cars sitting on the entrance ramps.

Suspect, 17, arrested in bus beating case:

The attack occurred about 3 p.m. last Wednesday, when a masked male boarded the bus near N. 60th St. and W. Silver Spring Drive and immediately began beating the driver.

The bus driver drove about two blocks north on N. 60th St. before the suspect grabbed the steering wheel and stepped on the accelerator.

The bus traveled about another 50 yards before crashing into a tree near N. 60th St. and W. Carmen Ave.

The suspect got off and ran north. The bus driver suffered minor injuries, but no other injuries were reported.

Ride mass transit, and you ride with a large number of strangers and the occasional felony-minded individual who will attack you for no reason. At which point, none of your fellow riders will come to your aid.

You know, if only mass transit used expensive, inflexible trains instead of buses, maybe this wouldn’t have happened. Or maybe the argument should be that trains won’t run in to trees as easily when their drivers are beaten. Keep trying, New Urbanists, and remember what that Urban buys you.

Story from last week: John Burroughs Teacher Arrested For Misconduct With A Minor:

A John Burroughs School teacher is on administrative leave after being arrested for misconduct with a minor.

….

Ladue Police were tipped off by an anonymous call, and a Johns Burroughs’ teacher has since been arrested. Police aren’t releasing his name because he hasn’t been charged yet.

“There was an inappropriate relationship that took place over a 3 year period,” says Detective Andreski. [emphasis added]

Ah, that reliable old anonymous call. Less reliable than the testimony of a cellmate overall.

Later: Burroughs School Still in Shock over Allegations against Teacher:

It is alleged that the teacher had inappropriate contact with a Burroughs student.

Ladue Police said they’re investigating the alleged relationship between the teacher and the student, which could have occured [sic] over a three year period. [Emphasis added.]

Hmm, that seems to hedge a little, doesn’t it?

The story now: Prosecutor: Not Enough Evidence to Charge John Burroughs Teacher:

St. Louis County Prosecutors said there is not enough evidence to file charges against a teacher at a private school in Ladue.

Not that he didn’t do it, but that there wasn’t enough evidence to file charges. Hah! As we’ve seen, there’s often a way to prosecute where something isn’t against the law; is it possible this poor, soon to be jobless teacher actually didn’t do anything?

Of course, if one presumes that one is innocent until proven guilty. However, in the world of law enforcement hemming, prosecutorial hawing, and media rah-rahing, false charges and overeager arresting get footnotes instead of salacious headlines.

Finally, after the initial furor has died down, some creative prosecutor has found a way to bring charges in the Child Commits Suicide In Response To Online Taunting case:

The incident prompted an international cry for action, but Missouri and federal prosecutors here in St. Louis examined the circumstances shortly after Megan’s death, and passed on trying to build a criminal case. No law, they said, applied.

Then, in January, the U.S. attorney in Los Angeles began issuing grand jury subpoenas, signaling a new interest in the case.

MySpace is based in Santa Monica.

Prosecutors are said to be seeking a felony fraud indictment under the legal theory that Lori Drew defrauded MySpace of computer time and resources by supplying false information.

In December, St. Charles County Prosecuting Attorney Jack Banas said that the circumstances surrounding Megan’s death defied a simple placement of blame.

After local and localized federal prosecutors decided no laws were broken, another, more ambitious headline-hungry creative prosecutor has found a way to advance his career get his name in the national papers serve justice.

In twenty-first century America, forget double jeopardy. You’re not safe from prosecution or persecution until everyone in government service has a crack at you.

(Yes, I know that double jeopardy applies to actual prosecution. However, it’s enough now that any act brings the possibility of numerous charges in multiple jurisdictions that make it clear that the principles behind double jeopardy, that the government and its individual executors shall not continuously hound a private citizen, are violated de facto but not de jure.)

Huh, who knew I was suffering from the effects of the Bush economy and endorsing a Democrat challenger in this year’s presidential election?

With the skyrocketing costs of fuel and food, people cite sticker shock as the catalyst pushing them into the garden.

“It’s crazy that we’re spending so much oil, time and money on food,” Staley said. “If we can do it in the backyard, why not?”

Concerns over food safety and the environment are among other factors prompting people to get their hands dirty. And, of course, the bragging rights that come with serving a homegrown tomato.

I mean, if the journalist is going to ignore other reasons for the draw of gardening–that is, of exerting control over the nearby environment and tying down that Gaia wench and making her do what you want for a change, the nesting instinct, the desire to have a food source when the centralized government falls and disorder reigns, or having free seeds come in the mail–and if the journalist is instead going to impute the failing environment story, why not just go right out and say that gardeners are voting for Obama this year?