Mayor Francis G. Slay’s most senior and influential advisor brought a little storm upon himself and his boss with a comment he made on a local network news broadcast Monday night.
Slay’s Chief of Staff Jeff Rainford repeated an urban planner’s opinion that North St. Louis “is far worse” than New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina nearly flattened the city.
Rainford told KMOV reporter Chris Nagus, “Between suburban flight and disinvestment, our former planning guy says, the damage done to North St. Louis is far worse than what Katrina did to New Orleans.”
One North St. Louis alderman was so incensed by this remark that he had hand-delivered a letter to Rainford’s boss by noon the next day.
“While it is certainly true that parts of the City of St. Louis have suffered
greatly from decades of population loss and benign neglect under past
administrations, to have the chief of staff of the mayor make such a broad
characterization of half of our city completely undermines the efforts many
of us are making to improve the quality of life in our wards,” 21st Ward Alderman Antonio D. French wrote to Slay.
“As I work daily to attract the interest of rehabbers, developers and
entrepreneurs who can help us rebuild the 21st Ward house-by-house,
block-by-block, I definitely do not need to have an official City
spokesperson on television painting a negative picture of my North Side
ward.”
French’s description of his development efforts as “house-by-house, block-by-block” is pointed. Rainford was quoted in a story about a suit filed by a homeowner in the area targeted by Paul McKee Jr. for large-scale development.
McKee and his representatives have been meeting with the Mayor’s Office, a number of aldermen and their representatives for months. A redevelopment agreement, including conditions for massive public financing and limited right to eminent domain, was expected to come before the Board of Aldermen possibly as soon as this Friday.
From the tone of Rainford’s comments on KMOV, the deal appears to be done to the satisfaction of the Mayor’s Office. “If their motivation is not to make the community better, than they ought to get out of the way,” Rainford said of the homeowner and her lawyer, who suggested she file the suit.
French was struck by the mayor’s spokesperson now suddenly speaking up for making the North St. Louis “community better.”
He wrote to Slay, “If it is truly the opinion of Room 200 that sections of North St.
Louis are similar to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, then I welcome a
proportional response from your office in terms of a true commitment of
attention and resources to those sections of our city that present both the
biggest challenges and the greatest opportunity.”
Speaking to The American, French mused on the comparison to Katrina, a natural disaster. The devastation of North St. Louis described by Rainford is the result of human agency.
As Tom Shepard, chief of staff to Aldermanic President Lewis Reed said, the under-development of parts of North St. Louis “has roots in public policy and not a natural course of disinvestment, and certainly not a natural disaster.”
Given Slay’s longevity in public office, it stands to reason that at least some of this destructive policy was framed on Rainfords’ boss’ watch.
Slay has been mayor since 2001 and before that served as president of the Board of Aldermen for six years, starting in 1995. Slay has held one of the three most powerful positions in City government for 14 years and been mayor for eight.
“He supposedly represents the whole city,” French said of Slay.
“And they are usually such cheerleaders for the city, they almost sound stupid, discounting crime statistics and that sort of thing. And there is the chief of staff on TV throwing my neighborhood under the bus!”
Shepard agreed, in more measured terms.
He said, “The city as a whole faces problems, and people in leadership need to understand the complexities of each area (loosely defined as they are) and not make public comments that paint 12 of our 28 wards with such a broad, negative brush.”
Rainford responded to a request for comment with a history lesson. He provided a history of the depopulation of St. Louis city – since 1950 – and a history of the metaphor that French had found so insulting.
Rainford pointed out that Rollin Stanley, the “former planning guy” he had quoted, first offered the comparison in New Orleans “as part of a discussion of how that municipality could learn from St. Louis.”
Rainford did not address French’s outrage at what the alderman took to be the insulting nature of his comments. In fact, though his televised remarks pertained strictly to “North St. Louis,” Rainford’s response spoke only of the city generally.
French told The American that in 10 years of vigorous political activity, he has never seen Rainford north of Delmar Boulevard.
By the way, the “former planning guy,” Rollin Stanley, is now planning director for Montgomery County, Maryland.
Interestingly, with federal corruption investigations ongoing in the St. Louis area and the City of St. Louis currently being audited by the State of Missouri, Stanley was in the news this week for allegedly trying to block an investigation of his spending practices by the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission.
On Monday The Washington Post quoted an audit report saying Stanley “failed to fully cooperate” with requests for information and lacked “high ethical and professional standards.”
Stanley denied any wrongdoing.
Rainford responds
Jeff Rainford full response to the American reads as follows:
Since 1950, the City has lost 60 percent of its population – nearly 500,000 people. These people abandoned and left behind thousands of acres of property, both lots and buildings, many of which ended up being owned by City agencies, like the LRA, when nobody else bought them and the taxes weren’t paid.
Rollin Stanley, the former city planning director whom I quoted by name in the KMOV story, asserts rhetorically that the damage caused by this abandonment was greater than the damaged caused by Hurricane Katrina, but without the subsequent federal funding boom to address the problems. Stanley first said this in New Orleans as part of a discussion of how that municipality could learn from St. Louis.
The City’s current residents now pay for all that abandoned property’s up-keep: $5.2 million a year just to mow the lots, haul away debris, and board up the first floors of abandoned buildings; another $3 million a year to demolish the most dangerous structures. Our efforts have had some positive results. There were 2,500 abandoned buildings in the LRA-owned inventory in 2001. In 2007, there are only 1,500 – with many of the once-vacant buildings acquired, safely rehabbed, and productively re-used by private individuals and businesses.
Until 2007, the City’s primary focus was to preserve and sell what we can. We sought – and received — historic status for thousands of buildings throughout the City, making their rehab eligible for tax credits. And we also worked to identify and demolish those structures that could not be saved or that have no rehabilitation potential, placing a priority on demolishing those buildings that present immediate public safety hazards.
The state land assembly tax credit and TIF laws offer a powerful tool to do more, faster. Opposing its use – which was the topic of the story in which I was quoted – is wrong-headed.
