President of Saint Louis University
As president of Saint Louis University, I have had the opportunity to see firsthand what works and what does not work in St. Louis. What concerns me most is what I see as a lack of a coordinated vision for our entire metropolitan area. I would suggest that we think of a coordinated, effective leadership model that reflects the interdependency like a three-legged stool, the three legs of the stool being government, business and higher education.
How often can we honestly say that all three legs work together cooperatively and effectively for the benefit of our metropolitan region? I do not see it very often. In my opinion, it is one of the key reasons why the St. Louis area continues to suffer from an inferiority complex.
It is often convenient to say the city and county are too different from each other, that there are just too many municipalities with too many different priorities to get everyone on the same page. And so we meander along, with successes here and there, but with an equal or greater number of failures.
For example, we watch major retailers move their stores from area to area, in search of better tax credits, leaving abandoned buildings and diminished neighborhoods in their wake. Why can’t the successful model of the Zoo-Museum Tax District – where city and county citizens together support our major cultural institutions – be applied elsewhere?
For too many years we have allowed our city public schools to continue to fail. We must get everyone to understand that if our public schools fail, our community fails. And our schools affect everything – from property values to economic development to future community-wide leaders. We can no longer justify our lack of involvement with the excuse that it is a “city problem.”
Many of us continue to panic about the coming Highway 40 construction project. Why? Because for many commuters, there is no reliable alternative for transportation. And as a result, we are going to suffer through years of traffic nightmares that will affect every business and institution all along Highway 40.
Our region faces another transportation challenge. With the demise of TWA, the lack of direct flights in to and out of Lambert Airport not only annoys our residents, travelers and visitors, but it also has a direct impact on our status as a world-class city. How are we as a region working to attract more flights to Lambert? We have a new billion-dollar runway expansion, yet a recent Post-Dispatch story headlined it as a “runway to nowhere.”
Over the last decade we have seen far too many quality corporate citizens move to other cities. As a region and a state, what should we be doing to make our community more attractive for businesses? Are the taxes effective? Does our city’s earnings tax help or hinder businesses?
To grow and succeed as a region, we must understand that we will thrive from being diverse. There remains polarization that must be addressed.
There are few truly integrated neighborhoods in our region. We also need to integrate our workforce. The workforce on any construction project in our region is not representative of the citizens in our region, and more needs to be done. We have to find ways to get more minorities and women trained and certified to work on construction projects.
And while I am talking about inclusion, what about those who have emigrated here from other countries to try and improve their lives? Rather than see them, as some do, as a threat, why are we not reaching out to them and seeing how they can enrich both our culture and theirs?
I challenge all of us here today to come together to articulate a coordinated vision for the St. Louis region. I am not talking about Blue Ribbon committees that issue 100-page reports that are filed away and collect good Midwestern dust. I am talking about the leaders of this region taking the reins and deciding how best to set definite goals and then to find the appropriate methods for implementing these goals.
It is risky. We might just have to support some ideas or plans that do not benefit us directly. But we also might find we are more alike than different, and from that reality, our region might just grow and even blossom.
Edited from his acceptance speech at the Citizen of the Year Award Ceremony held Wednesday, April 19.