When Cara Spencer said goodbye to her colleagues on the Board of Aldermen last week, she received plenty of praise for her 10 years of service — including from Alderman Rasheen Aldridge.
But the 14th Ward alderman didn’t support Spencer in her successful mayor’s race this month against incumbent Tishaura Jones. During an appearance Friday on the Politically Speaking Hour on St. Louis on the Air, Aldridge noted that he worked well with Spencer on issues affecting downtown St. Louis.
“We both share downtown. So coming into the Board of Aldermen, we work very closely with having meetings in the neighborhood to remind people that, ‘Hey, downtown may be split between two alders, but we are working close together to make sure that downtown gets what they need.”
Aldridge said he supported Jones because he liked her emphasis on building up north St. Louis and holding developer Paul McKee accountable. But he added that Jones faced big challenges allocating American Rescue Plan funds and providing better city services to residents.
“The mayor could have shown up a lot more in neighborhoods, and for people to actually see her,” Aldridge said. “It's one thing to do the press conference. It's one thing to make statements. And a lot of the statements on the reduction in crime, all that was great. But people want to have that human-to-human contact.”
In any case, Aldridge said city residents want the city government to do a better job on tasks like trash collection, road repair and snow removal. He said one problem holding any momentum back is the inability to offer competitive salaries to potential workers.
“So many people throughout the city of St. Louis want the basic things done. I think that was a huge reason why Alderwoman Spencer won, because of a simple message of: ‘Hey, we're paying taxes. We want services to be complete,’” Aldridge said. “The challenge that she will have, and that the previous administration also had, is we need to fill the positions at the City of St Louis. We need more workers.”
Aldridge cool on city-county union
One possible way to get a larger pool of money is for St. Louis to join with St. Louis County.
While there are many variations of a city-county union, one idea would involve St. Louis becoming a municipality in St. Louis County – similar to Florissant, Richmond Heights or Ballwin. In that scenario, city and county residents could both pay into efforts to pave roads, plow streets, maintain parks, record real estate deeds or bolster public health programs.
Asked about that topic right after she was sworn into office last week, Spencer noted that her inauguration speech featured a desire to not work in silos — which includes divisions between St. Louis and St. Louis County.
“There are a million ways to do that, and we are going to be exploring that,” Spencer said. “I think it's really critical that it's community centered, that it has a broad range of support. So I'm looking forward to those conversations in the coming months. But I do think that working together is going to provide a better path.”
Aldridge does not like the idea of St. Louis joining St. Louis County. He pointed out that St. Louis County has had chronic budgetary problems — while St. Louis is in a relatively decent financial position because of a large settlement from the St. Louis Rams departure.
“I don't think the city needs to become another municipality in the 88 municipalities of St Louis County,” he said.
He added, though, that it may benefit both St. Louis and St. Louis County to have more cooperation between departments. That includes joint initiatives with both jurisdictions’ health departments and on making St. Louis Lambert International Airport better.
“I'm not a fan of a merger, but I am a fan of regional collaboration between the city and the county,” Aldridge said.
Listen to Rasheen Aldridge's interview on the Politically Speaking Hour on St. Louis on the Air via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or by clicking the play button below.
“St. Louis on the Air” brings you the stories of St. Louis and the people who live, work and create in our region. The show is produced by Miya Norfleet, Emily Woodbury, Danny Wicentowski, Elaine Cha and Alex Heuer. Jada Jones is our production assistant. The audio engineer is Aaron Doerr.
