If Duct Tape & Twine Keeps City Fleets Rollin’; Tighten Up Belt, First!

If Duct Tape & Twine Keeps City Fleets Rollin’; Tighten Up Belt, First!

By Atty. Mike Owens

I feel badly for Todd Waelterman. The St. Louis Director of Operations is telling reporters that duct tape and twine will have to be used to keep the city’s fleet of trucks, from trash to dump, running.

This dire prediction comes after St. Louis voters narrowly rejected a $180 million bond issue to raise money for a whole host of programs. A bunch of the money was to go to the city’s rolling stock, including fire trucks and ambulances, which carry a heavy price tag.

Also included in this pot was $10 million for a program to fix up houses and so-called ward improvement money. That money would be used by aldermen to fix up their wards, without any strings. The housing money would have been doled out without much oversight, causing concern among some voters.

The vote was close and here’s a suggestion for the next go around:

I know for a fact that my own rolling stock, a couple of cars over ten years old, each with more than 100,000 miles on them, cannot be replaced in the same year. I have to plan my purchase. I cannot buy two new cars back to back. I have to save my money over time, get up a down payment and then buy the car.

Why can’t the city do the same thing? Make its vehicle purchases over time. Is the city’s financial picture so bleak that the budget makers can’t set aside a million bucks a year to buy new rolling stock?

Maybe there is no money at the end of a fiscal year. It’s all gone and that’s why every 15 to 17 years, city leaders go with hat in hand to the taxpayers and ask for a multi-million dollar general obligation bond.

The comptroller works with bond companies to peddle those bonds and maybe she needs to work out a way to help Todd Waelterman to buy some new trucks and ambulances.

I have another suggestion and it will sound familiar to anyone who is trying to put aside money for a new car. Tighten up your budget and even though the amounts saved are miniscule in relation to the amount needed, every bit helps.

For example, a handful of St. Louis elected officials have new or late model automobiles at their disposal. These officials now include the treasurer, the license collector, the circuit attorney and the comptroller. Comptroller Darlene Green has said she will surrender her wheels, after being raked over the media coals by FOX2’s Elliott Davis. Also giving up his ride is Collector of Revenue Gregg Daly.

Those keeping their wheels are looking extravagant in light of the voter rejection of the bond issue. Let’s say the license collector is needing to go to meetings, but I don’t understand why the public has to pay for it. She can take a cab and we’ll reimburse her. Or let her take Uber when it gets going in St. Louis. Maybe the city can get a group rate for these county officials to ride Uber cars to meetings. It would certainly be cheaper than cars for each one of those elected officials.

In the city’s current financial state, using twine and duct tape to keep fire trucks rolling, then the license collector, and all the others, should join us in cutting back, dig deep and surrender the keys.

Let’s be realistic. These cars are not the biggest budget item in the books. But, it is a matter of optics. What does it look like to the taxpayer being asked to drive to the polls in his 10 year old car when he sees elected officials tooling around in late model wheels. And at the same time hearing that the city’s rolling stock is being held together with gum and a prayer.

If these elected officials have any actual regard for the city and not just their own perks, they would start getting rid of the wheels now and tell us.

If I were a city worker behind the wheel of a beat up ambulance or trash truck or fire truck, I would feel like part of a team if those elected officials would give up their rides. It must be painful to watch those late model cars hum along while the truck driver looks for more duct tape.

Editor’s Note: Mike Owens is an attorney and can be reached at [email protected] Owens is the former highly respected investigative news reporter at KSDK, Newschannel 5. However, the opinions expressed are not necessarily those of this website.