Poll: Should Zoo-Museum Institutions Offer Discounts to City & County Residents?

Interesting story in the paper last week:

Property owners in St. Louis and St. Louis County paid more than $70 million last year for the region’s premier arts and culture attractions. But when it comes time to visit institutions funded through the zoo-museum tax district, they’re often treated the same as people who didn’t pay a dime.

Now, a member of the public board that supervises the 40-year-old tax district is asking whether that’s fair.

Gloria Wessels recently suggested that four of the five institutions funded by the zoo-museum district offer discounts on parking, concessions and special exhibits to visitors who live in the taxing district. If necessary, those discounts could be funded through price increases for visitors who live outside the district, she said. (STLToday)

Gloria Wessels is the wife of long 26-year alderman Fred Wessels (D-13). Should those of us who pay taxes to fund these attractions get a little something others don’t? The Missouri Botanical Garden already allows city & county resident in for free on Wednesday & Saturday mornings.  The article points out the logistical nightmare of trying to verify who would qualify for free parking.  Besides the last thing we need is to encourage is more cars trying to get to the zoo & museum.

During its thirty-seven years of operation the District’s annual tax revenue has increased from $3.9 million dollars in 1972 to more than $72 million dollars in 2009. In recent years, approximately 85% of the tax revenues come from the County taxpayers while City residents provide 15% of the District’s tax revenues.

The expansion of the number of Subdistricts from three to five is indicative of the success and vitality of the original concept of a tax supported cultural district. Today, the Metropolitan Zoological Park and Museum District is, perhaps, the largest tax supported cultural district in this country. It is a model that other cities have often attempted to emulate. (mzdstl.org)

The five subdistricts are the Saint Louis Art Museum, Saint Louis Zoological Park, Missouri Botanical Garden, Saint Louis Science Center and Missouri History Museum.

The poll this week asks you to weigh in on this issue. The poll is in the upper right of the blog.

– Steve Patterson

Poll: Gov. Nixon signed ‘compromise’ bills on puppy mills & vetoed workplace discrimination bill, thoughts?

In a poll prior to the November 2010 elections 67% of readers approved of the proposition to regulate puppy mills in Missouri (see Majority of Readers Support Proposition B).  In the election the measure passed with 51.6% of the statewide vote.  As you can see from the graphic above it was the St. Louis and Kansas City regions plus two counties in the far southern part of the state that voted yes, enough votes to pass the measure. Here in the City of St. Louis 78.4% of voters approved Proposition B. Six months later things have changed:

Gov. Jay Nixon on Wednesday signed into law his “Missouri solution,” which blends a bill that weakens regulations for dog breeders in Missouri with some language from voter-approved Proposition B aimed at cracking down on puppy mills.

Nixon signed Senate Bill 161, hours after he signed Senate Bill 113. Both measures remove a cap of 50 breeding dogs, but Senate Bill 161 keeps other Proposition B requirements in place regarding cages and vet exams as part of his compromise with farmers and animal welfare groups. (Nixon signs puppy mill compromise)

Many of my friends were angered by Nixon signing these.  But Friday Gov. Nixon made some of the same friends happy:

Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon on Friday vetoed an employment relations bill passed by the Missouri Senate, saying it would strike down central tenets of the Missouri Human Rights Act.

Nixon struck down Senate Bill 188, which caps punitive and compensatory damages in workplace discrimination cases and requires plaintiffs to prove that discrimination was an employer’s “motivating” factor in a discrimination claim, rather than the current “contributing” factor standard. (Nixon vetoes bill increasing burden of proof in workplace discrimination cases)

The veto took place at the Old Courthouse in St. Louis. This brings us to the poll question for this week, what are your thoughts on the signing of the puppy mill bills but vetoing the other? Did he make the right decisions, in your opinion?

– Steve Patterson

Poll: Have you read ‘The Death and Life of Great American Cities’ by Jane Jacobs?

Fifty years ago Jane Jacobs published The Death and Life of Great American Cities, a harsh criticism of the state of urban planning at the time.  Jacobs was 45 when Death and Life was first published. Tomorrow marks five years since her death at age 89.

A direct and fundamentally optimistic indictment of the short-sightedness and intellectual arrogance that has characterized much of urban planning in this century, The Death and Life of Great American Cities has, since its first publication in 1961, become the standard against which all endeavors in that field are measured. In prose of outstanding immediacy, Jane Jacobs writes about what makes streets safe or unsafe; about what constitutes a neighborhood, and what function it serves within the larger organism of the city; about why some neighborhoods remain impoverished while others regenerate themselves. She writes about the salutary role of funeral parlors and tenement windows, the dangers of too much development money and too little diversity. Compassionate, bracingly indignant, and always keenly detailed, Jane Jacobs’s monumental work provides an essential framework for assessing the vitality of all cities. (description via Left Bank Books)

I can think of no other book on urban planning and cities that continues to be debated decades later or have their own Facebook page.

The mistake made by Jacobs’s detractors and acolytes alike is to regard her as a champion of stasis—to believe she was advocating the world’s cities be built as simulacra of the West Village circa 1960. Admirers and opponents have routinely taken her arguments for complexity and turned them into formulas. But the book I just read was an inspiration to move forward without losing sight that cities are powerful, dynamic, ever-changing entities made up of myriad gestures big and small. The real notion is to build in a way that honors and nurtures complexity. And that’s an idea impossible to outgrow. (Metropolis)

The poll this week asks if you have read this book and your thoughts on it.  The poll is in the upper right corner of the site.

– Steve Patterson

Readers: Clusters of Cities Need to Lead Effort to Consolidate

Readers last week indicated how consolidation of St. Louis County’s 91 municipalities should happen:

1. Clusters of cities need to lead the effort. 74 [44.85%]
2. County leaders need to lead the effort 48 [29.09%]
3. The state needs to force consolidation 32 [19.39%]
4. Other answer… 6 [3.64%]
5. We don’t, 91 municipalities in St. Louis County is fine 4 [2.42%]
6. Unsure/no opinion 1 [0.61%]

The top vote getter is the one that will never result in any meaningful consolidation – leaving it up to cities.  I personally think the state needs to step in to make this happen.

1. not going to happen. these clusters formed to separate themselves for a reason
2. Reduce it to what number? Or how many can be disolved?
3. Cities need to join together for better fiscal responsibility
4. Enforce a minimum population requirement on municipalities.
5. Why? Who cares?
6. Voters in the munis should decide

Voters? Again, that is the same as saying nothing should change.

The list above will not change substantially unless the county and/or state takes action.  A first step though, is for some to unincorporate. Saint George is the only one considering such action. Actually just dissolving each of the 91 would be the simplest.

– Steve Patterson

Readers Mixed On The Term ‘Affordable Housing’

The post introducing the poll last week generated nearly 60 comments. “Affordable Housing” is clearly a loaded phrase.

Q: When I hear the term “affordable housing” I think of:

1. projects” subsidized by taxpayers 36 [22.36%]
2. Total housing costs of no more than 30% of a household income 34 [21.12%]
3. Clean/quality housing for lower-income working families 33 [20.5%]
4. Something I don’t want near my place of residence 23 [14.29%]
5. An unsafe ghetto 11 [6.83%]
6. No place I want to visit or live 8 [4.97%]
7. Unsure/no opinion 8 [4.97%]
8. Other answer… 8 [4.97%]

The other answers submitted were:

1. A Conundrum
2. Low-quality construction
3. That it should be re-framed in terms of the life cycle. Singles thru retirees.
4. The city of St. Louis is full of affordable housing
5. clean/quality subsidized “projects” that, over time, turn into unsafe
6. Mixed opinion, but obviously a negative connotation.
7. a serious problem in Saint Louis
8. One of the negative results that arise from capitalism and poverty

Despite what many might think, many in our region struggle to afford safe & clean housing.

– Steve Patterson