Dear Editor:
We’ve historically elected state legislators to run the business of the state and city officials to run the business of the city. In St. Charles, however, this may no longer be the case. Senator Gross and Representative Dempsey, two of our elected state officials, have lately taken to drafting Missouri legislation aimed exclusively at the City of St. Charles thus enabling them to override the decisions of our elected city officials. I realize both these men have a great allegiance to their moneyed backers in the City of St. Charles who do not always see eye-to-eye with our city officials, but St. Charles citizens duly elected these city officials to run our City and the state officials should respect the voters’ preference. By passing laws that apply only to one city, Mr. Dempsey & Mr. Gross have basically created one-man laws because no one else at the Statehouse has any reason to care, much less object, to a law which has no meaning for them or their constituencies. Actually, in the case of Mr. Gross’s legislation, he had to eliminate every square inch of Missouri except St. Charles before his bill would pass as none of the other legislators wanted his bill to affect their area. If this is Mr. Gross and Mr. Dempsey’s idea of democracy, we should think very carefully before casting another vote for either one of these men should they ever run for another political office.
Eleanor McCune
Dear Editor,
I found a recent article by the City’s former Human Resource Director lacked many facts and would like to take this opportunity to set the record straight on one specific area. Carrie Caskey told the residents that the St. Charles City Council questioned Marsh Advantage becoming the broker of record because Don Dilley, the former broker, was local. That is far from the truth and demonstrates a lack of integrity that plagued the City of St. Charles for the length of my tenure.
Councilman John Gieseke and myself questioned Marsh for one reason, we believed that having the same company serve as both the broker of record and the third party administrator would create a system that lacked checks and balances. These checks and balances were necessary to protect the public’s interest in dealing with the carrier of the city’s health care insurance. This is all on tape and on the record, can Caskey say that? We conducted our meeting in open session and my comments are all part of the public record.
The need for these checks and balances were demonstrated when the council received a report from Marsh about the increase in health care premiums for 2005. The new council led the fight to get bids from brokers and insurance companies and these bids came in far less than those of Marsh. I remember watching that meeting and hearing Marsh tell the City Council that their bids were the best the City could hope for. They determined this by using bench marks from another company that they owned. So when you read things with some fiction and some fact, how do you determine fact from fiction? Marsh is now involved in the largest insurance scheme to hit the insurance industry. Marsh is accused of bid rigging and paying for business. Marsh is the parent company of Putman Investments a company that was charged by Federal Trade Commission for wrong doing. I think the people of St. Charles are lucky to have a City Council that didn’t accept the status quo from the so called professionals.
Best regards,
John Scherr
Former City Councilman
Dear Editor:
The Mayor’s Paper, The Citizen, on May 25 in an article by Kevin Smith deadlined Dottie Greer as “A Lightning Rod of Controversy”. The tone of his article seemed to imply that controversy was undesirable. Democracy is controversy. If we didn’t have controversy, we wouldn’t need elections and wouldn’t need multiple branches of government. The only governments where controversy does not exist are dictatorships. There it is not allowed.
Some people have complained to me, “Don’t you think it’s terrible that the Mayor and the Council don’t get along? We just can’t get anything done.” No. I don’t think it’s terrible. I think it’s wonderful, expected, and proper. Perhaps the “anything” that we can’t get done is something some of us don’t want done.
Plato in his political treatise “The Republic” said of democracy, “Democracy, which is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequals alike.” He also said in the same work, “Democracy passes into despotism.” Yes indeed, we do have to be careful!
Alexis de Tocqueville, a Frenchman who visited America in 1832 just to observe our democracy in action, set down his observations and analysis in a work entitled “Democracy In America” He said, “This ceaseless agitation which democratic government has introduced into the political world, influences and social intercourse.” He aslo wrote, “...but the political activity which pervades the United States must be seen to be understood. No sooner do you set foot upon American ground, than you are stunned by a kind of tumult; a clamor is heard on every side; and a thousand voices demand satisfaction of their social wants.”
In regard to our current controversies, Kevin Smith identified the position taken by Dottie Greer on several issues, implying that her position was the “wrong” one. Some of the issues mentioned were:
1. Proposing a bill to ban the sale of fireworks within the city.
2. Fighting the Boon’s Lick Road improvements
3. Refusing to be sworn in by Mayor York.
4. Voting to remove the Mayor from the dais at council meetings.
5. Opposing the convention center
6. Leading the charge to pass Amendment One.
These are all reasons why I would vote for Dottie Greer if I lived in her ward.
In regard to items three and four, I realize that the Charter states, “The mayor shall have the power to administer oaths and affirmations...” but I see nothing i the Charter to prohibit someone else from performing this function. The Charter also states, “The mayor shall not be a member of the council, but shall have the right to participate in the deliberations at all the meetings of the council.” I think that the change of seating helps to emphasize the separation of powers which should exist between the Mayor and the council. The council members who took the action identified in items three and four were simply declaring their independence from the office of Mayor, an independence that seemed to be lacking in the previous council.
In representative government, the legislature or council is supposed to represent the interests of the people in their district, not just the people who elected them, but all the people in their district. If a majority of their constituency has a certain frame of mind, then they should vote accordingly. If Dottie Greer’s residents opposed the convention center then she was right to oppose it. If they favored it, then she was wrong. If a majority of people in Mike Weller’s ward favored his no vote on subpoena power at the May 4th administrative hearing then he did the right thing. If they wished to subpoena, then he was wrong. I suspect in this case he was wrong, but not having canvassed his ward, I really can’t say.
Glen Dashner
Dear Editor,
I disagree with Daniel Roach on “What do you think about this?”
I don’t like defending Mr. Tom Hughes but if I believe a person is right I back him even if he is a republican.
I’m a democrat and I have been retired since 1996 because of social security.
No way would I go to a prayer breakfast if a anti-Christ was to speak.
Charlie R. Glear
