Déjà Vu: Casas Confused About The Group He's Working For, Again

A long while back, I reported on how St. Louis "Democrats" were being paid off by extreme right-wing ideologue Rex Sinquefield to work on the ballot initiative restoring local control of the police department to St. Louis.  As I've said many times, I support local control, and in fact worked with the groups who had been pushing for local control long before it occurred to the St. Louis establishment that it might be a politically useful campaign. However, I had concerns about the way the campaign was being run as a PR campaign for Rex Sinquefield and anti-tax groups around the state.

Specifically, I was critical of one of Sinquefield's group's primary beneficiaries, Martin Casas, who repeatedly claimed to be clueless about the operation he was working on.  Casas wrote an article for Vital Voice asking people to sign a petition for United for Missouri, a right-wing group run by Sinquefield's employee Carl Bearden, who among many other things:

Voted to ban the existence of gay/straight student alliances in Missouri.

Was a co-sponsor of HB885 in 2004, which would "Prohibit public institutions or any entity receiving state funds from adopting discrimination policies that exceed state and federal protections against discrimination."

Voted in favor of placing a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage in Missouri on the 2004 ballot.

So Casas wrote an article for St. Louis's premier LGBT news source asking people to hand their contact information over to a dude categorically opposed to equal rights.  And to make it worse, rather than just being honest about it, when I asked Casas about who was handling the emails from the petition, he responded by claiming: "I have no idea! I'm working on #LocalControl!" The idea that Casas, a failed candidate for state office, had been contracted to get signatures to an online petition without having any idea of what would be done with the signatures is pretty ridiculous, even for him.

So now we have a new Sinquefield-backed initiative, described by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch way back in August, created to "study" various aspects of City and County services. Again, I personally think the City and County should be merged.  But like the Post-Dispatch editorial board, I think this discussion should be transparent and honest, rather than opaque and deceptive.  However, rather than being honest, the group, staffed by Rex's previous campaign operatives, is pretending to be unconnected to Rex Sinquefield.

So for starters, let's just be clear that the Twitter feed for the group, Better Together St. Louis, is run by Martin Casas.  With his usual stealth, Casas managed to tweet and post on facebook an identical post using his personal account and Better Together simultaneously, demonstrating that he's running both.

But what's really amazing is that Casas is again acting clueless about Rex Sinquefield's involvement in the group.  During a Twitter conversation, Casas initially said that Sinquefield wasn't involved in funding the group, then said he "didn't know" after it was pointed out that Sinquefeld was previously the only funder of the group, MCBE (Missouri Council for a Better Economy) that paid for "A Better St. Louis":

So Casas, for the second time, gets very confused when he's asked about whether he's working for a Sinquefield group and in what capacity. Of course, in the grand scheme of things, Casas is pretty irrelevant to whatever policy outcomes might occur.  Yet this whole approach is suggestive of a broader disdain for the public from the group.  Rather than simply being up front about Sinquefield's involvement, the effort so far has been designed, rather sloppily I might add, to act as though Rex has nothing to do with it, though he clearly has been involved in the planning and financing of the plan for a long time.  And if they can't just admit that he's a key part of the effort, what else are they trying to hide?  And more importantly, as the Kansas City Star's Yael Aboulhalkah asked, "What's in it for Rex?"

Priorities: When Mayor Slay's Staff Chooses To Fight

Just an observation based on yesterday. When the St. Louis tea party was burning photos of Russ Carnahan outside his office, Mayor Slay's staff said nothing. When they carried a coffin to Russ Carnahan's home the night after healthcare reform passed, the Mayor's staff said nothing. When the tea party falsely accused two SEIU employees of "brutally beating" a guy in a parking lot, the Mayor's staff said nothing. When the local tea party edited video to falsely claim that an UMSL professor was "advocating violence in his classroom," the Mayor's staff said nothing.

But when President of the Board of Aldermen Lewis Reed works on a compromise with the Firefighters regarding their pensions, the Mayor's staff publicly attacks him on Twitter.

Does this make any sense?

Twitter Fight! Foreshadowing The St. Louis Mayoral Election?

Lewis Reed, President of the Board of Aldermen, is rumored to be running for St. Louis City Mayor against incumbent Francis Slay in 2013. Slay recently has been pushing a plan to dramatically cut the pensions for firefighters, a move Slay's people say is necessary to keep the city budget from spiraling out of control. President Reed, however, is working on his own plan which he describes as a compromise. Reed's meeting tonight has set off a flurry of angry tweets from Mayor Slay's people, including his Chief of Staff Jeff Rainford:

This led to a sharp comeback from Alderman Antonio French, a strong supporter of Reed:

Sure seems like there's going to be a pretty interesting Mayoral election.

Update: More from Antonio French:

Here's the video he linked to:


Also:

Mayor Slay's Education Team Turns a Blind Eye to Michelle Rhee's Scandals

Michelle Rhee, hailed as a prophet by people who want to privatize education and destroy teachers' unions despite her sketchy results and lack of an education background other than a year short stint teaching, is getting involved in Missouri politics, with her group "Students First" (bankrolled by undisclosed donors) pushing for new education laws in the state. Local right-wing zealot Mark Reardon naturally had Rhee on his radio show to discuss her history and the legislation. Here's what Mayor Slay's education adviser Robbyn Wahby, last seen attending a Koch brothers-funded American's for Prosperity propaganda panel on education with Dick Morris, Dana Loesch, and Gateway Pundit, had to say about it:


It's sad that the Mayor's staff would so uncritically praise Rhee's status despite the fact that numerous experts have claimed that the D.C. school district results that catapulted her to fame were fraudulent. A recent article explained it well:

Investigations questioned many of Rhee’s accomplishments in increasing test scores in D.C. schools. In 2008, the Office of the State Superintendent of Education discovered that 103 schools -– more than half of D.C. schools -- were flagged by third parties for suspiciously high wrong-to-right answer changes. These including eight of the 10 campuses where Rhee handed out TEAM awards “to recognize, reward and retain high-performing educators and support staff.”

During Rhee’s tenure, CTB/McGraw-Hill informed her office of abnormally high rates of answer changes at Noyes Elementary School. Answers were consistently changed from wrong to right. The gains in test scores made at Noyes earned the school recognition as a Blue Ribbon School. Rhee promoted the school as a model for her education reform movement.

Statisticians, including Professor Emeritus Thomas Haladyna, told USA Today “the odds are better for winning the Powerball grand prize than having that many erasures by chance.”

Haladyna suggested the answer sheets had been tampered with.

Furthermore:

The Washington Post reported Jan. 31 that for the most part there was little meaningful change in the D.C. schools’ testing performance over the past two full school years following Rhee’s exit.

Moreover, the graduation rate was also essentially unchanged -- moving from 72 percent in 2009 to 73 percent in 2010 (2011 rates will be released later this year).

According to Rhee’s own policy standards, her performance bonus program has not worked. And the same thing goes for her other signature policies, including D.C.’s new evaluation system and the annual dismissals based on the results of that system.

So Rhee is someone with almost no education background, who is being funded by undisclosed donors, and whose only success story was based on an absurdly high erased wrong-to-correct test answers. Yet she is being hailed uncritically by Mayor Slay's staff in order to push their agenda (and, no doubt, to keep that sweet, sweet Sinquefield money flowing to the campaign). If Slay's office really wants to claim that they're doing this "for the children," then they owe it to the children to make sure they are relying on credible information rather than propaganda.

Update: To be clear, Rhee doesn't, as far as I know, advocate for the privatization of schools; I just meant she's a hero to those who do. And I agree that we need changes in education, but let's do it carefully and not rely on the gospel of someone whose "success story" looks pretty questionable and is currently being investigated!

Finance Report for Fake Local Control: How A Right-Wing Idealogue Pays Off Local "Democrats"

Now that the Mayor's office and right-wing multimillionaire Rex Sinquefield have thrown local control activists under the bus and are pushing for a new ballot initiative that would actually decrease accountability and transparency, it might be worth taking a closer look at some of the campaign finance reports for Rex's front group, A Safer Missouri. Rex, if you recall, wants to gut state government and shift the tax burden to the poor, and local "Democrats" who get paid by him conveniently stay quiet on these disastrous ideas, just like they did when Rex pushed a statewide ballot initiative to get rid of the earnings tax. How many local "Democrats" need to be on the payroll of a right-wing ideologue with crazy ideas before St. Louis residents start to worry about our City's future?

First things first for documenting the atrocities: the astroturf local control group is called A Safer Missouri. Only one person has ever donated to the group: Rex Sinquefield.


And who benefits from the amazing generosity of Rex, who graciously took time out of his busy schedule of trying to privatize everything in Missouri to magically start caring about this issue last year? Why, St. Louis "Democrats" of course! One of the biggest beneficiaries was Martin Casas, former President of the St. Louis Young Dems and a current candidate for the Missouri House of Representatives. Casas, if you recall, previously said that he had no position on the disastrous Everything Tax, which should be enough to disqualify anyone from calling themselves a Democrat, asked people to sign a petition from the right-wing front group United for Missouri while working for Rex, and also claimed that he had "no idea" if signing up for A Safer Missouri would help build Rex's email list:


In light of how much Casas was paid by Rex, it's pretty hard to believe this claim was true. And how much was that? Casas got close to a cool $20,000 from Rex Sinquefield in 2011 according to the most recent campaign report:

And this is all in addition to the fact that Casas's wife is also on Rex's payroll, through a different organization.

Another local principled "Democrat" who benefited from Sinquefield's kindheartedness was Gregg Christian, Democratic Committeeman in the 15th Ward. Here's A Safer Missouri's payment to Christian's company Gladius Communications for "graphic design:"

Was Gladius responsible for this beautiful logo? Cause I'd say that's worth about $4,000 just by itself:

Another local Democrat paid off in this campaign is Nancy Rice, but she's paid by Rex for a lot of things (she works for Pelopidas) so I won't bother to document the cash for this situation.

Every politician who has ever taken money from ideologues has claimed that the money has *nothing* to do with their future votes. Yet we know our democracy is broken because the uber-wealthy have far too much influence on our laws via their donations. If St. Louisans are really worried about Democracy being for sale, we're going to have to start paying better attention to what's happening locally. Having "Democrats" in office isn't any better than Republicans, if they're all getting paid by the same people.

Roorda Says Only "Cop Haters" Could Be Opposed to Rex's Phony Local Control Ballot Initiative

To review, last year, activists working for local control of the St. Louis police department teamed up with the Mayor's office and other opportunistic local Democrats to try to get a bill passed through the Missouri legislature. Mayor Slay and the other opportunists, of course, used this as yet another opportunity to get paid by multimillionaire Rex Sinquefield who, just like every other entity that donates huge amounts of money to politicians, obviously doesn't want anything in return. I agreed with the St. Louis American on this: though I was suspicious of the group working with Rex, I ultimately thought local control was a good thing because the activists endorsed the idea and it could get St. Louis closer to a system with increased transparency and accountability.

However, the bill failed last year thanks to the incompetent GOP legislature, and when it returned as a ballot initiative, it was in a mutated form that discarded the original reasons for supporting it. The whole point of local control was to bring accountability and transparency, not to just shift from one opaque, unaccountable board to another. But the new ballot initiative pushed by Rex, Mayor Slay, and the other "Democrats", but not the actual activists, actually takes a step backwards on accountability and transparency, because what it actually does is prevent the creation of a civilian review board, and puts all of the power in the hands of a board appointed by the Mayor. Don't take my word for it: read the op-ed by Brenda Jones, executive director of the of the ACLU of Eastern Missouri.

But to give you a sense of how nasty the "Democrats" are who are doing Rex'$ bidding, check out this quote from Jeff Roorda saying that only "cop haters" could oppose the Rex Sinquefield phony local control ballot initiative:

Let’s not get distracted by cop haters that are trying to drive a wedge, when we’re coming to the table trying to find a way to make this department work better,” Roorda said. “Civilian review boards do not work. They’ve never worked anywhere they’ve been tried. They’ve got one function, and one function alone, and that’s to drive a wedge between the police department and the community.”

Yep. Only "cop haters" could possibly agree with the ACLU about having accountability and transparency be a part of the law. Or maybe it's just, you know, people who want accountability and transparency.

Local Control Activists Thrown Under the Bus

This was an amazing story in the Political Eye that I had not seen before (but see the update):

As for the activists, they had been on the side of local control all along. Not because they love and trust this mayor, which they do even less than the coppers love and trust him, but because they see city control of the city police as a stepping stone towards citizen overview of a police force that has done much to test public trust in its authority to impound, confiscate, arrest and use lethal force. Whether this is reasonable thinking or not, activists have believed that mayoral control of the city police would be a meaningful step towards a Civilian Review Board. Activists believe civilian review is needed because the police department has a proven, poor track record of cracking down on its own. Even federal investigators, who were expected to bring down a host of white shirts along with the petty operator Greg Shepard in the towing scam, have let down the public where there seemed to be obvious, widespread corruption in the department.

This incredible, tentative coalition is officially quitsville. The POA and Mayor Slay have sided with Sinquefield on his local control ballot initiative, and the activists have turned against them. On the face of it, it would be difficult to imagine local control activists siding with any group that includes Slay, the coppers and Sinquefield, but they have specific reasons for their opposition that were outlined in a suit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri.

Please read the whole thing if you haven't already. It offers some important insights into St. Louis City politics.

One thing not mentioned in this article is that several St. Louis City Democrats were paid substantial sums of money by Rex Sinquefield to work on this issue. These same Democrats are supportive of Rex's plans to inch ever closer towards privatizing education, and turn a blind eye to his insane policy suggestions (backed by millions of dollars) like the everything tax.

Update: There was a nice op-ed in the Post-Dispatch about this by Brenda Jones of the ACLU.

Mayor Slay Sends Education Advisor to Koch-Funded Public Education Bashing Session Moderated By Gateway Pundit

(Image from JD Wilson)

How's this for absolutely un-freakin-believable? Robbyn Wahby, Mayor Slay's education adviser and wife of City Democrats Chair Brian Wahby, was on a "School Choice" panel put on last night by the Koch Brothers-funded Americans For Prosperity. The event was moderated by Gateway "race-baiting extraordinaire" Pundit. Her fellow panelists included Dana "drop trou and urinate on dead Afghanis" Loesch and Dick Morris. Yes, that Dick Morris.

The event was a teachers union-bashing propaganda festival, with words of wisdom like this:

And this:

Dana Loesch says that part of that reform must involve reforming the teachers unions and the way they work. She related a personal story about a young energetic teacher who was very popular in her high school. This teacher used lots of applied learning (hands on) and was a great teacher. The union came in and told her to "tone it down" because she was angering the older, less energetic teachers who had already established the "proper" way to teach. Putting the kibosh in new ways to teach and maligning fresh young teachers has long been practiced in teachers unions across the country. For those teachers, all the talk of "the children" is just that, talk. They care nothing about the children, they care only for their cushy jobs and sweet pension

And afterward, Robbyn Wahby told the extremists to be more vocal about supporting the Mayor's policies:

At the end of the panel discussion, they wrapped up with a few final thoughts. Robbyn Wahby reminds us that any good idea is twice as likely to succeed with good support systems. If we have ideas we want implemented or we feel the mayors office is promoting good choices in education, we can support that effort by making it known we support it and doing things that promote the choice.

Reasonable people can disagree about issues like school choice. But there is absolutely no excuse for the Mayor's office to be coordinating with unapologetic right-wing ideologues who categorically do not have the best interests of the vast majority of city residents in mind. Mayor Slay is already known for having taken over $100,000 in donations from Rex Sinquefield, the man who wants to privatize education in Missouri. And he's been caught playing footsie with the tea party before. If he plans on running for reelection again in 2013, maybe he should start thinking about how to appeal to the 99% rather than the 1%ers like Rex and the funders of Americans for Prosperity.

Kudos To Slay and the St. Louis Police for Not Using Militarized Police Force

Obviously I've been pretty critical of aspects of how Slay's administration has engaged with Occupy St. Louis. But one thing that is extremely important and definitely deserves major credit is the fact that they decided not to use an overly-agressive, militarized police group when they decided to arrest protesters. The officers who showed up were not wearing riot gear, and did not have any weapons drawn. And, as such, there weren't really any incidents of confrontation between them and the protesters who were arrested. There is some question about whether the officers used fake name tags (some on took a photo of an officer with a name tag that said "Chupacabra," which doesn't match poilce records), but in general they did not behave aggressively.

Now you might say, "praise them for not being overly aggressive? That's how they're supposed to act!" And that's true, except that what we've seen constantly since 9/11 and the "Battle of Seattle" is police acting waaaay over-the-top in using force to bully non-violent protesters. I was at a protest in New York shortly before the Iraq War started and we were forced into pens and random people doing nothing wrong were tackled by police in riot gear. And at numerous protests since then, I've seen police in full riot gear completely overreacting to the actual circumstances. There's an excellent summary of some of the history over at an article at the Atlantic (though I'm not sure I agree with the premise that Pike is blameless).

Given the coordination among cities on cracking down on the Occupy groups, it seems pretty certain that the City of St. Louis made a conscious choice not to use these overly aggressive tactics. And that's important, and should be acknowledged.

Mayor's Staff Plots How to "Disarm" OccupySTL Members

More fun with Sunshine Law requests! Mary Ellen Ponder, a staffer for Mayor Slay, sent Jeff Rainford (Slay's Chief of Staff) an email suggesting a strategy for "disarming" the Occupy St. Louis members:



The text:

Jeff,

I would like to recommend that you start the meeting by asking them what they want from the City. I suggest this because I think it will disarm the occupiers. I also think it will make the meeting less hostile. If at all possible, I would like to know who Jeff plans to bring to the meeting.

When you ask the occupiers what they want from the City, they will say they want to continue their freedom to assemble in public spaces: they believe it is their individual right to come together and collectively express, promote, pursue and defend common interests. The right to freedom of association is recognized as a human right, a political freedom, and a civil liberty. They will say they believe this freedom, documented in the 1st amendment, trumps all other laws.

Also, i do not think we should move to remove them until after November 17th. On November 17th, the AFL-CIO and Jobs with Justice plan to rally and march with the occupiers. If we remove them before November 17th, November 17th will turn into a rally and march against the Mayor instead of a rally and march about joblessness.

I don't think it's a bunch of anarchist kids anymore. I think there is a decent number of labor peeps and veterans that support this movement.

Sincerely,
Mary Ellen

Being but a humble distributor of the facts, I will refrain from comment.

Did the City Decieve Occupy St. Louis About Helping the Homeless?

Last weekend, shortly after the city decided to kick Occupy St. Louis out of Kiener Plaza, I saw the following post on facebook:

I generally like Eddie (who used to work for the Post-Dispatch and now works for Slay), so I decided to investigate what this claim was about. According to the occupiers, Roth and city officials had promised that when they evicted the Occupy St. Louis group from Kiener, they would make sure to find housing for the homeless who had flocked to the Occupy demonstration because it provided a safer and friendlier environment than living on the street (and because housing was not available through the city). Yet, when last Friday rolled around and the police arrested anyone staying in Kiener past curfew, the only thing the homeless received was a slip of paper with the same old phone numbers to call. When they called, they were told there was no new space available.

The claim that Roth promised to provide an alternative came from a general assembly on Wednesday of last week where Roth and fellow Slay representative (and former union supporter) Mary Ellen Ponder were there to present their non-negotiable proposal. As can be seen from this video, there was already tension regarding the city's proposals about the homeless at Kiener, with one of the occupiers asking Roth why the homeless were being used as a bargaining chip by the city:


The comment in question from Roth, however, came earlier in the meeting in response to a different question from one of the group's longtime members, Cheryl, who also happens to be homeless. Roth says in the following video, "I'll be happy to come down with some people tomorrow to make sure to check with you and others."


This, as noted above, apparently did not happen. However, in my Sunshine Law request, I did see an email from Roth to Bill Siedhoff (who coordinates the city's response to homelessness) where Roth specifically mentioned a commitment to two men from the Occupy St. Louis group.

Here's the relevant text:

Hi Bill,

Mary Ellen and I were at Kiener Plaza last night for a second consecutive
night. We presented a proposal we hoped they might agree could serve as an
alternative to the encampment. One element is your stepped up effort,
already underway, to connect the homeless men and women who are participating in
the Occupy St. Louis demonstration with housing and other services.

Durin the back and forth with the demonstrators some, who said they were
homeless, disputed what you had said at Tuesday's meeting and claimed that the
City and other service providers have not been a presence at Kiener Plaza in
behalf of the homeless. I said that I believed the city could find through
its network of providers temporary shelter to all who wanted it.

Two men came up to me at the end of the evening and said they wanted to be
connected to housing and services. I said I would help them. One is going
to call me at 10 a.m. - and said he does not have a phone but will find one to
call me then.

Bill, could you please help me with these two guys--and use them to show the
group what we are capable of doing?

Please give me specific advice on how to simplify the path for these two men
that I can use for one of them when he calls at 10 a.m.

Many thanks,

Eddie

I checked with several members of the group and as far as they knew none of the homeless people at Occupy St. Louis had been helped out. It's still possible that Roth dropped the ball in following up with Siedhoff, but it certainly looks like he made an effort to help. Nevertheless, as far as the people I spoke with have heard, there has been no actual help. Whatever the exact story is, it seems clear to me that the Occupy encampment, just like Hopeville, is exposing some very serious problems in the City's ability and/or willingness to provide the homeless with adequate resources.

Did St. Louis City Cave to Downtown Partnership Requests? New Evidence Suggests Yes

Occupy St. Louis has previously alleged that St. Louis City's decision to evict them from Kiener Plaza was prompted by a meeting with the Downtown Partnership, a St. Louis business partnership whose board includes representatives from Bank of America, Wells Fargo, US Bank, Peabody Coal, and many others. Reporter David Hunn of the Post-Dispatch followed up on this suggestion by asking Mayor Slay's Chief of Staff Jeff Rainford about the allegations, but the city apparently would not answer his question:

Jeff Rainford, Slay's chief of staff, refused to say if the city met with the Downtown Partnership last week, but insisted that the complaints are coming from many, not only the Partnership.

"There are lots of people complaining. I'm not going to point at one versus the other," he said. "I'm not going to get into it. What I would prefer not to happen is to have this personalized."

The city, he said, would not meet with occupiers today, nor would it discuss the issue in the press.

In documents obtained from a Missouri Sunshine Law request, I have found conclusive evidence that officials from the Mayor's office did meet with the Downtown Partnership to discuss OccupySTL. In fact, an email sent from Maggie Campbell, the President and CEO of the Downtown Partnership, suggests that the St. Louis group had been communicating with "counterpart organizations" around the country with the express goal of "unoccupying public parks." Campbell is forwarding an email from Jane Jenkins of Downtown Oklahoma City, Inc. about a man found dead in a tent at Occupy Oklahoma City. Here's the exact quote from Campbell's Oct. 31st email to Jeff Rainford (Chief of Staff for the Mayor) and Sam Dotson (Director of Operations for the City of St. Louis):

Fyi - newsflash from Oklahoma City - we are talking weekly with counterpart organizations in dozens of American cities, learning that more of them are moving forward with local plans to unoccupy local parks and return them to a condition that everyone can use them, while still allowing for the right to assemble and protest without taking possession of public space. We look forward to our meeting tomorrow to discuss this issue further, and we appreciate your support and thoughtful guidance.

I've uploaded the document to DocStoc, blocking out emails and phone numbers for the people involved. I can make the original, unaltered version available for any press who are interested in following up. Here's the document:

DowntownPartnrship


If it is true that the meeting with the Downtown Partnership is what promted the City to evict Occupy St. Louis from Kiener Plaza, this seems like an important example of exactly what the movement is complaining about: city policy being determined by business elites. Why should the city of St. Louis bow to pressure from groups like Bank of America who have a vested interest in shutting down protests that remind the public of their unethical and likely illegal behavior?

I think this also suggests that people in other large cities should also start investigating the communication between their city governments and the local downtown association. It sounds like St. Louis was just one of any number of city's where local business groups pressured the city's to crack down on protesters.

Slay Obeyed: Mayor Slay Messaged Dana Loesch to Tell Her He Was Arresting Protesters

Yesterday, I pointed out that Mayor Slay's office said one of the reasons they decided to arrest protesters was because of feedback from "talk radio." Apparently, they think it's good city policy to try to appease the furthest right-wing fringe that carries coffins to local congressperson's yards, calls USDA officials "racist" based on doctored videos, and regularly attacks St. Louis institutions like UMSL and SEIU.

And thanks to a helpful tip from a commenter, it sounds like Mayor Slay was so eager to appease the right-wing fringe in St. Louis, he sent Loesch a personal message on Friday to let her know that he was going to be arresting protesters. She couldn't just wait to read about it on the news like all of the other rubes; nope, she's gets a special message so that she could cheer about those darn hippies getting their due.

Here's the clip of Loesch telling her rabid audience that Slay sent her a personal message on Friday:


Throughout the occupy protests, protesters have often chanted the following to the police: "Who do you protect? Who do you serve?" I think it might be more appropriate to ask the Mayor these questions.

Slay's Representative Cites "Talk Radio Complaints" And "Newspaper Comments" As Reason For Evicting OccupySTL

Prior to last Friday's mass arrests by the city of St. Louis of people engaging in political activism in Kiener Plaza, Mayor Slay's representatives Eddie Roth and Mary Ellen Ponder went to the Occupy encampment to make a non-negotiable proposal. While they were there, they were asked why, after nearly a month, they all of a sudden decided to kick the occupiers out of Kiener Plaza.

Here's Cathy asking the question:

And here's Eddie Roth's response:

He went on to note that in his impression it wasn't a decision made by "the plutocrats."

Roth worked for the Post-Dispatch editorial team. He knows better than to take those comments seriously.

And, in what can only be described as a remarkable coincidence, Jeff Rainford was on Dana Loesch's show today to receive her congratulations for kicking the violent dirty hippies out of Kiener Plaza (more on this later). It was the third time in less than a week that a representative from Slay's office was on her show.

St. Louis City Violates Their Own Rules During Occupy Eviction

For a group that decided that all-of-a-sudden they needed to follow the precise dictates of every rule and ordinance, the Slay administration didn't do a very good job of following their own rules. Here's the text of the eviction notice they sent to OccupySTL:

PUBLIC NOTICE: The City of St. Louis has a policy in place for handling and storing unattended property in downtown parks. The parks dept will gather up the property, put it in bags, tag it and store it in a secure place. To retrieve any items you leave in a downtown park, go to 1212 N. 13th between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m, this Saturday Nov. 12th or Sunday, Nov. 13th. After that, you can call the Parks Department at 314-289-5300. You are responsible for securing your valuables and personal belongings. We will use our best efforts to return belongings you leave behind.

Yet during the raid they threw signs and tarps into a garbage truck to be crushed:

In fact, they even destroyed and trashed the media tent:


Lesson for the day: following the rules is really, really, really important... except when it isn't.

Video From Arrests at Occupy STL

I tried out UStream on my relatively new Android phone today. Here's some video of the arrests of the St. Louis Occupiers after Slay decided he wouldn't let them stay in the part anymore (for reasons that so far are still not entirely clear).





It really was pretty tame, in its own way. In contrast to a lot of other peaceful protests I've been at, the police were not wearing riot gear. And while there was a small group of people who wanted to antagonize the police, they were greatly outnumbered and didn't really have much influence on how things went down.

Legal Analysis of Mayor Slay's Decision to Remove OccupySTL

Fox 2 News had lawyer Chet Pleban on yesterday to analyze the legality of Mayor Slay removing the occupiers from Kiener Plaza. For some reason I can't embed the video, but you can watch it here. It's pretty clear both people on the program have a lot of biases about the occupiers. The clip starts with them linking the Anonymous hacking to the St. Louis group, despite the fact that the Mayor's spokesperson Richard Callow said he didn't think the hacker was part of OccupySTL. They also call the part of the legal interpretation that says Slay is justified in kicking the occupiers out "the good news," later suggest that they're worried about riots from the group, and lament that horrible time in U.S. history known as the 60s. So yeah, it's pretty clear who they're rooting for.

However, what I thought was interesting is that Pleban suggested that while St. Louis City would normally be justified in removing they occupiers (a claim I'm sure Occupy STL disagrees with), the city is now in a pickle because they waited a full month to take any action. So it sounds like he thinks they need to provide some legal justification for why they made the change. I find this interesting because it seems to track the trajectory of my own thoughts.

I previously stated that I could understand why the city felt like it had to enforce the codes on the books. However, I objected when Slay's Chief of Staff Jeff Rainford suddently tried to suggest (on Dana Loesch's radio show) that something had changed and that the occupiers were no longer "not harming anyone." It seems to me that he has not provided sufficient justification for that claim, and if the decision really was the result only of complaints from groups like Bank of America, then it does seem like a change in policy based on a decision to prevent the occupiers from speaking out (quite effectively) against corporatism run amok. Thus, following policy consistently from the beginning might not have been a violation of First Amendment. But changing how they enforce the policy based on the fact that the message was offending local businesses seems like it would be a restriction of free speech.

This is why last night I filled a Sunshine law request with the Mayor's office to try to ascertain what the actual complaints were, and to compare them to statements in support of the occupation. I'll let you know what I find out.

Former St. Louis Police Officer To Make Statement In Support of OccupySTL

Press advisory:

Occupy Police Stands in Solidarity With Occupy St. Louis

Former St. Louis County Police Officer to Make

Public Statement of Support While Denouncing Brutality

What: A Public Speech delivered by a former St. Louis Officer, directed to both officers and citizens of St. Louis. Topics covered in short will be: The officers history with St Louis Police, brutal tactics used against protesters by some departments, and what can result from it, including the officers own firsthand experience with police brutality. Oakland PD's open letter to the citizens of Oakland where they openly state "We are part of the 99%" Bad department leadership in a time when true leaders are needed, and finally Occupy Police's mission and position in the Occupy movement, which in less than 10 words is that "Police are part of the 99% too" and communities across the nation are needing them to stand openly with the rest of the 99, now more than ever -

Goal: To call out Mayor Slay and put an end to the planned raid @3 - To let it be widely known that officers are part of the 99% and that they don not have to obey commands put forth by unstable leaders who represent the interests of the 1% and not that of the common man or woman. Lastly to let it be widely known that Occupy Police supports officers and entire departments who protect their communities without the use of brute force or violence.

When: Today, Friday November 11th at 2pm sharp - Before the impending raid @ 3pm

Where: The corner of Market and 7th on the stage at Kiener Plaza in St. Louis

-Occupy Police Team & Officers of the 99

KMOX reported on this development earlier today.

Statement From OccupySTL On Their "Eviction Notice"

Press release:

Hey Hey, Ho, Ho: The Occupiers Will Not Go!

On November 10, 2011 Occupy St Louis received notification from the city of St Louis that we have 24 hours to remove all structures and obey the city curfew laws before they would forcibly remove our non-violent occupation from Freedom Square (formerly known as Kiener Plaza). Since October 1st, we have maintained a peaceful occupation in this public space, founded on the principle that large corporations have too much influence in the actions of our government. Mayor Slay and his Senior Staff have once again validated this by bowing to pressure from the Downtown Partnership of St Louis to restrict our First Amendment Rights to peaceably assemble.

Since its inception, Occupy St Louis has been a model of cooperation and non violence, and has made Freedom Square a safer, cleaner place. The city claims that in addition to violation of curfew that the tents and supplies we have in Freedom Square are a direct violation of city ordinance and provides a safety concern. We strongly disagree and believe that our encampment is a valid form of political speech justified by the First Amendment. Additionally this precedent has been set in other occupied cities across the nation.

On November 10, 2011 Mayor Slay stated in his personal blog that the city would be creating a space for a 24/7 public demonstration. On November 9th, senior members of the Mayor’s staff attended our General Assembly to propose this space to us as a possible alternative to Freedom Square. This was not a proposal, but rather an ultimatum to Occupy St Louis. The City had already made up its mind on the course of action that it would be taking. This new space would not allow for tents or occupation, which we feel are a valid forms of political speech. This proposal was blocked by a consensus of our General Assembly. The General Assembly uses consensus as our decision making process. It allows for all participants to have an equal voice. Occupy St Louis maintains that just because one states they are using the consensus process, does not mean that they are actually using it.

Occupy St Louis hopes that Mayor Slay realizes that our freedom to assemble is not limited to one space, but guaranteed to all people, in any public space, at any time. We believe that we are engaged in a vital attempt to restore the cornerstone of American ideals: equality, unity, and social mobility. St Louis City must recognize that Occupy St Louis is not mutually exclusive with public safety and the common good, but an ally in promoting social justice and in preserving order downtown. The medium is the message and our medium is occupation.

Slay Spokesperson Doesn't Think Hacking Was Done By Member of OccupySTL

As previously noted, Mayor Slay's website was hacked by a person claiming to be a member of Occupy St. Louis. However, Richard Callow, a spokesperson for Slay's campaign, doesn't think the hacking was actually done by an OccupySTL member:

Slay campaign spokesman Richard Callow said no financial info was leaked.

"It gave our web guy a chance to earn his retainer," Callow said. "I sort of doubt it was done by a member of Occupy St. Louis. Our experience with them has generally been more positive."

Any guesses as to whether Gateway Pundit will correct his post?