Last year, I wrote about legislative efforts to wrest local control of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department (“SLMPD”) being rooted in Confederate ideals.
Missouri engineered a state takeover of SLMPD during the Civil War because the then-Governor was a Confederate sympathizer who wanted to ensure the city could not use its force and armory to support the Union. A state-appointed board continued to govern SLMPD until 2012, when voters overwhelmingly approved an initiative petition to provide the City of St. Louis with local control.
The real reason for the state takeover of SLMPD is based upon campaign contributions and lobbyists. A West County resident, Mike Rayner, has spent millions of dollars supporting a state takeover of SLMPD.
In approving the 2012 statewide initiative petition, Missouri voters recognized principles this country was purportedly founded on. No taxation without representation, and local control over local issues.
Unfortunately, Republican legislators and Gov. Mike Kehoe have prioritized a state takeover of SLMPD this legislative session that would turn St. Louis from a city into a colony. Colonies, like those governed by Great Britain before the American Revolution, are places controlled from the outside, rather than from within.
Chris Hayes’s 2017 book A Colony in a Nation argues “[t]he American criminal justice system isn’t one system with massive disparities but two distinct regimes: One (the Nation) is the kind of policing regime you expect in a democracy; the other (the Colony) is the kind you expect in an occupied land.” Whether or not you agree with Hayes’s framework, the current Republican state takeover of SLMPD could turn the city into an occupied land where residents have little say in how they are policed, how it’s paid for, and how wrongs are addressed.
The current legislation being advanced by Republicans, HB 495, has already passed the Missouri House of Representatives, and would replace local accountability of SLMPD with a five-person board. This five-person board would include the Mayor of St. Louis but would also allow the Governor to appoint the remaining four members. The City’s voice would be one fifth as powerful as it is today.
The proposed law allows the two St. Louis police unions to nominate candidates for a panel that would be selected by the Governor to serve on the board, giving those who are bound to defend their union members the keys to making decisions on discipline and pay.
Forget local elections, board members would not even be required to live in the City of St. Louis, with business owners allowed to serve if they live within 50 miles of the city.
Republican justification for state takeover of SLMPD is weak and suspicious. They have admitted that the state takeover of SLMPD is not a crime plan. At first, they argued that high crime rates motivated their efforts, but homicides are down over 40% since 2020. Next, Republicans argued that officer pay was an overriding factor in moving for state takeover. Inconveniently for Republicans, SLMPD officer pay has increased 15-20 percent in the last year, the largest jump in two decades. Now, Republicans are arguing that recent population loss in St. Louis justifies a state takeover. This new argument is puzzling, because St. Louis lost over 500,000 residents from 1950-2010 when the police department was under state control.
The real reason for the state takeover of SLMPD is based upon campaign contributions and lobbyists. A West County resident, Mike Rayner, has spent millions of dollars supporting a state takeover of SLMPD. Rayner has used his family’s vast resources to hire nearly 20 lobbyists this legislative session to push for SLMPD state takeover and contributed over $2 million to various state Republicans campaigns since last year.
Large campaign contributions from a West County resident are no substitute for local accountability. Public safety remains one of the most important electoral issues. If residents do not like how they are being policed and feel less safe, they generally will vote for new leaders to do so. Under state control, residents would be forced to lobby four unelected officials who may not even live in St. Louis.
We are in a moment where a Governor, who received less than 20% of the vote in St. Louis, wants to take control of our city. It is time to ring the bells of alarm – the Republicans are coming for St. Louis, and they want to turn it into a colony.
Jared Boyd is chief of staff, St. Louis Mayor’s Office