Former Fire Chief Sherman George and the committee organizing a wax figure and museum exhibit for him must have appreciated the appearance of Kevin Killeen of KMOX news at their press conference on Tuesday morning. Killeen’s report alerted a large mainstream audience to the fact that a committee has been organized to raise funds for an exhibit to be produced for the Griot Museum of Black History in North St. Louis.
The museum is situated in a very uncertain stretch of North St. Louis; but we will come back to that.
Unlike KMOX, the city’s only daily newspaper, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, did not staff the announcement of this good news about St. Louis’ first African-American fire chief. There was, however, a rescheduled police board meeting overlapping with the event at the Griot Museum. But then, last we checked, Lee Enterprises could afford more than one Metro reporter for the Post.
Speaking of Lee Enterprises, they own a piece of property and an aging physical plant that bears an interesting relationship to the property where the Griot Museum is situated. We will come back to that, too.
Killeen’s report provided a useful public service, and perhaps it will alert someone with money to the fact that committee co-chairs Brenda Jones and Addington Stewart are raising $50,000 to immortalize the former fire chief in wax.
Jones is executive director of the ACLU of Eastern Missouri, and Stewart was president of the Firefighters Institute for Racial Equality (F.I.R.E.) during George’s long standoff against the administration of Mayor Francis G. Slay over a contested set of promotions.
The ACLU and F.I.R.E. belong on the all-too-short list of organizations that stood solidly behind Chief George as he battled Slay for what he saw as Slay’s rough-riding over the fire chief’s City Charter-granted authority.
“It’s easier to praise you when you are gone than to stand with you when you were here,” George told his supporters on Tuesday.
Those who have stood with Sherman George, at this point, know who they are.
Killeen couldn’t resist himself in doing what the mainstream reporter always seems to do when provided with a chance to speak to a prominent African American with any relation to city politics: He asked Sherman if he would run for mayor.
This hearkens back to the never-ending Slay campaign’s advance work on last year’s mayoral primary. This was when Post reporter Jake Wagman continued to pester Comptroller Darlene Green (and a couple of others on what must have been a short list provided by his editors), asking her if she planned to run for mayor.
Green told Wagman “no” so many times, yet kept getting the same question, that she turned to The American to formally announce her reelection campaign in hopes Wagman would leave her alone.
Or, at least, stop helping the Slay campaign do its advance work in setting up opponents that could then be targeted for destruction.
FBI speaks out on KMOX
Speaking of black officials targeted for destruction, it was amazing to see Kevin Killeen working the Sherman George story. It was amazing to see him doing anything other than listening to those ever-present “swirling rumors” about an alleged corruption investigation into St. Louis County government.
Most recently, Killeen – who claims to have unnamed inside sources who know what is what – claimed those rumors swirled past his pesky ears and told him the investigation goes “all the way up the elevator.”
Assuming Killeen isn’t hinting that the ceiling of the elevator is going to be indicted, or the pigeons that loiter on the roof are crooks, this swirling whisper could only malign County Executive Charlie A. Dooley.
Dooley and his right-hand man Mike Jones repeatedly have told KMOX and the Post, who swirled with these rumors on the front page before Killeen got all swirly, that they have not been subpoenaed or interviewed by agents working corruption cases.
Typically, denial of “swirling rumors” of alleged felonious acts is enough to make those allegations die down in the media – especially during an election cycle – in the absence of actual evidence or named sources whose evidence and motives can be questioned.
Not so with KMOX, home of the Rush Limbaugh Show, getting all swirly on Charlie Dooley.
The lapse of journalistic integrity in this case was so appalling that the FBI did something that the feds – famously – almost never do: They denied that an investigation was ongoing.
St. Louis Special Agent in Charge Roland J. Corvington actually stepped out and told KMOX its swirly rumors are unfounded and that Dooley is not being investigated.
That was an amazing gesture.
The thing about “swirling whispers” concerning alleged federal investigations is it usually is impossible to make them die down if someone wants to keep them stirred up. The feds tend to keep their mouths shut until they are called into court by the prosecutor to prove their case. The victim of the rumor can deny it all he wants, but repeated denials of the same rumors start to look suspicious – no matter how baseless the rumors might be.
Corvington stuck his neck out. Now maybe Killeen will shut his neck up. Unless he wants to put one of his alleged sources on the record, so we can all question their evidence and motivation.
Post: not blighted
The Griot Museum of Black History is located at 2505 St. Louis Ave. This property now falls within what has been classed as Part D of the controversial Northside Regeneration redevelopment.
Had Wagman or a colleague from the Post Metro desk made the jaunt to the museum to do a little reporting into a positive development in the black community concerning one of its cherished local icons and leaders, that reporter likely would have made the drive up to 2505 St. Louis Ave. from 900 N. Tucker, where the Davenport, Iowa-based Lee Enterprises operates the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
One of these things is not like the other.
The Griot Museum of Black History at 2505 St. Louis Ave. falls within the Northside redevelopment grid.
The Post-Dispatch at 900 N. Tucker does not. It could have – several of its neighbors do. But it does not. In fact, it appears as if the Post property has been literally cut out of the redevelopment grid.
Attorney Eric E. Vickers pointed this out in court, representing plaintiffs that seek to have the redevelopment agreement voided. Part of their complaint is their property is declared blighted under the terms of the agreement, when they may not see any benefits from the development for years, if ever.
Vickers thinks he has found an important connection between the Post’s editorial support for the Northside project and the fact that the property was not included in the development agreement – that it was not “blighted.”
Vickers loves to start fights with Kevin Horrigan on the Post’s editorial page, which is tempting, and he loves to copy others on his taunting messages to Horrigan.
On Friday, Vickers wrote to Horrigan:
Trial testimony, particularly that of the City’s Director of Development, Ms. Barb Geisman, revealed that the boundary lines for the redevelopment area were, curiously, drawn around the particular block on which the Post-Dispatch sits.
Ms. Geisman stunned the courtroom when she testified that she had urged Paul McKee Jr. to have discussions with the Post to have its property placed outside the boundaries of the redevelopment area because it was the “news media.”
As a result of those “discussions,” the Post property is placed outside the redevelopment area boundary line and is, therefore, not now deemed “blighted,” which all property within the redevelopment area boundaries is, by law, so considered, irrespective of the condition of the property.
This same opportunity given to the Post – to be exempted from Mckee plan – was not given, Ms. Geisman admitted, to the home owners in north St. Louis, including homeowners like the plaintiffs.
Horrigan, pleading for privacy that Vickers did not grant him, responded, “Had Mr. McKee approached Post-Dispatch ownership about including the building in the redevelopment area, we on the editorial page would not have known about it. Those decision are made way above our pay grade, and several hundred miles up river from here.”
Yesterday morning, The American emailed Lee Enterprises “several hundred miles up river” in Davenport, Iowa, asking them to comment on this interesting matter. No response had been received by press time, which might give us something to talk about next week!