Mayor Cara Spencer has abandoned pursuit of a lawsuit aimed at blocking the state takeover of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department, at least for the time being.
The action comes to the delight of St. Louis unions, and Gov. Mike Kehoe, who worked with Jefferson City Republicans to seize control of the department from St. Louis residents in March.
Aldermanic President Megan Green, with the support of ex-Mayor Tishaura Jones, filed the lawsuit a day before Spencer took office. The federal lawsuit seeks to have the new law declared unconstitutional and stop it from being enforced.
The city is counting on us to do this, and I think we must fight with every mechanism we have.”
Aldermanic President Megan Green
In a one-on-one interview with then candidate Spencer in March, she expressed doubts about pursuing legal measures to challenge the state takeover. Spencer expressed concern about how the state would direct “aspects of our police department” but added that she heard “through the grapevine” that the mayor’s legal counsel advised her there was no way to victory on the matter.
Green’s suit said the state law infringed upon city officials’ First Amendment rights and imposed an unconstitutional requirement to increase spending on the police department. She asked a federal judge to declare the whole law invalid.
The lawsuit had been in the works since Rep. Brad Christ, a Republican from south St. Louis County, filed the state takeover bill late last year and moved into motion after the Missouri Legislature passed the bill in March.
“The bill was a mess,” wrote Post Dispatch columnist Tony Messenger, who, last week, stood by Green’s right to sue.
“It’s the sort of big-government-trampling-local-voters bill that no Republican in the GOP-dominated Missouri Legislature would allow to be passed for their jurisdiction, no matter how badly a police or sheriff’s department is performing.”
Spencer told the Post Dispatch the existing lawsuit “missed the mark.”
“I have no clue what she’s talking about,” Green responded.
She adding that her suit hinges on the Hancock Amendment which theoretically means the state takeover violates the Missouri Constitution’s prohibition on unfunded mandates that require the city to dedicate a specific amount of its budget to policing, regardless of its financial situation.
“If the Hancock Amendment is upheld one of two things can happen; it could strike down the entire law or they (the courts) could say ‘you can take over the police, but the state must pay for it.’”
Green said Spencer’s newly appointed city counselor, Michael Garvin, has not issued counsel on the merits of her lawsuit. But, she added, the mayor doesn’t have the authority to direct the city counselor not to work with her on the lawsuit because the city charter gives “equal weight” in representing the mayor and the board of aldermen.
Last week, U.S. District Judge Matthew T. Schelp, noting that states cannot generally be sued in federal court, said the city and Green needed to show they had a right to sue to continue the case. He gave the city until Monday to amend the suit. Neither Green nor the city law department filed anything by that deadline which set the stage for dismissal.
“The judge said we need to be suing the attorney general or the governor, not the state of Missouri,” Green responded. “It was dismissed on a technicality, but it was also dismissed without prejudice, which means we can re-file it.”
Green said they didn’t file on the designated date for two reasons. Number one she said, they hadn’t heard back from Garvin, the city’s interim attorney and number two; her team is trying to figure out if they are going to file again in “federal or state court.”
Other than criticizing the Green-Jones lawsuit, Mayor Spencer hasn’t put out a statement committing to refiling the lawsuit. “We are evaluating our options and weighing the merits of refiling a sound suit in state court,” she said.
Green said she will refile the lawsuit even if she must pay for it herself.
The Post Dispatch reported that Spencer was irritated when Green and Jones filed the lawsuit because they didn’t involve her in the planning. Green noted that as an alderman at the time she filed her suit, there was no reason to involve Spencer.
“Yeah, that seems to be what she’s hung up on but if the issue is that I’m doing it and she’s not, then she can join the other plaintiffs, and I hope she does,” Green said.
“I said from the beginning, if she has interest in this lawsuit, join in. The city is counting on us to do this, and I think we must fight with every mechanism we have.”
Sylvester Brown Jr. is the Deaconess Foundation Community Advocacy Fellow.