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Thank you so much for joining us for Last Call.

This is the program that we put on YouTube that is only available for those who go online.

And you know what?

It broaches all those topics we couldn't get to in the first 30 or so minutes, Wendy.

In fact, we could have probably a 90 -minute show with all the topics in St.

Louis.

I think you are right.

Let me ask you about this argument, if there was one, or discussion between the mayor and some new police officers at the funeral of a police officer who died.

It was just this past week.

After whatever conversation they had, the head of the police union put out word that he was upset with the mayor because she talked about pay and benefits.

And he said, you know, that's really inappropriate to be talking to new police officers about anything that can be bargained.

But also, you don't bring this stuff up at a funeral.

Mayor Cara Spencer said, that grossly mischaracterizes our conversation.

I have a theory that the police are after the mayor because remember in April on the 27th, she was not at the funeral of another police officer when she was in Boston at a conference and they made a big deal out of that, too.

How are you falling on this one?

That's a fascinating memory because you're absolutely right.

She did sort of take that one on the chin because she wasn't there and a lot of people were saying, you know, you're making too big of a deal out of this because she had already expressed her condolences to the family and to the police chief.

I thought Robert Tracy's involvement, I thought that spoke volumes, Chief Tracy, when he was essentially saying this isn't the place for this conversation at all.

The mayor's denial or, you know, charges of mischaracterization for me, if she had said I unequivocally deny, she was not, she did not seem forceful enough in her denial.

And I think, I fault Mr.

Garcia for bringing this to the headlines, you know, to the place of headlines.

This family is already dealing with a very, very difficult situation, the loss of a young life, a young police officer.

So to propel it back into the headlines in this way, I just thought, I thought everybody looked bad.

I think this comes down to who do you believe and I believe the mayor.

I do not, I'm sorry, the police department and this state board has acted in a way that I think is just, just insulting to the citizenship of the city of St.

Louis.

And to do this at this young man's funeral, who took his own life, okay, I think it's beyond the pale.

I was already headed up to here with this police board.

Now it's just beyond comprehension.

No, no, I understand.

But this is, this is the police versus the mayor and they have just sunk to a level that's inexcusable.

No, I think that the chief was totally wrong when he went on KMOX and mischaracterized what the mayor had said, saying she apologized because she didn't.

I thought that the mayor was probably well -intentioned to go to the funeral, but I suspect that when she was talking to these young officers, a couple of the older people came over and said, what's, what are you talking about?

And they said, oh, wages and stuff like that.

And you know, as a union member, if we had a funeral and the publisher was talking to a couple of young reporters and we said to them, what was the publisher talking about?

We'd be upset.

We'd say this should go to the negotiating committee.

But see, the quote that I saw from Mayor Spencer was she, they were, she was talking to two new members.

They were talking about what motivated them to get into it.

And then, of course, she said that got around to compensation.

I don't think.

And I agree with you.

I think her intentions were pure.

I think.

But, but I just, I think that is, she has to realize this is a hostile, well, the mayor has to realize this is a hostile environment with her and the police and she has to be a little more careful.

That's right.

She was also talking to a, to friend police officer, the police officer who had died.

She was just, if she asked, like, how is it going?

What, you know, how can we help you?

And then they responded, you know, if we, the wage or the compensation, we don't know that everything that's wrong with having this state police board, like sticking themselves in the middle of something is, you're absolutely right, it is now hostile territory.

And the mayor can no longer make small talk going, hey, what motivated you to become a police officer?

Because everything is being construed in the worst possible light.

And how ugly is that?

Like, we can't even work together on the same team when we're all employees of the city of St.

Louis?

Well, I think everyone's tired of the squabbling.

I really do.

Sure.

I think they think that our leaders are just involved in too many uncompromising conversations that are not productive at all.

Well, you know, having been to a police board and watched it, it's easy to see why the mayor gets frustrated because she cannot talk to the board.

I mean, the board seemed very hostile to her.

So I can see what she thought she was doing, but it was inappropriate and she ought not have said anything about wages.

Hey, Bill, let me ask you about Jill Stein, the three-time presidential candidate who actually got more than a million votes in 2016.

She was arrested April 27th of 2024.

She was on the WashU campus.

She was protesting Boeing, the war in Gaza, Israel, other issues.

Police used a bicycle as like a barricade or a ram, and she got in a tussle with a police officer according to the statement by the police.

And actually, apparently, she kicked a police officer.

The Washington Post said that the police officer suffered contusions of the testicles.

Well, so she was supposed to be in court on assault and trespassing charges on Monday reported by St.

Louis Magazine.

She didn't show, and the judge said, hey, there should be a warrant for her arrest.

Turns out the lawyer forgot it or he showed up late, Joe Welsh.

So the warrant was dropped, but do you think the county prosecutor should drop all the charges?

Well, I look at it like this.

Jill Stein was 76 years old when she did this, so I'd put it off as youthful indiscretion.

I mean, it's the sort of thing I might have done when I was 76.

So I think that the prosecutor should drop the whole thing.

I think that Ms.

Stein, though, should understand that when you're supposed to be in court, and maybe this is all on her lawyer, but you can't just say, I'm not showing up.

Well, and the not showing up was really a kick and then contusion to the testicular area.

I mean, if you think about it like that, that was just another kick.

I was covering a trial when I was younger, and there was one that was like before was going on, and this happened.

And so when I read that story, I said, like, that reminds me of that day I was in court.

Because the judge just basically, you know, had had it and just said, like, pow, and swore out the warrant.

The people that were sitting there, like, look at each other, like, we have to go arrest this person.

It was some little minor thing.

It wasn't even a criminal.

This was like, I don't know, but they just didn't show up, I guess, one too many times.

So I understand how it happens.

I do think that there's some, if this is a word, pretentiousness.

I think if any of us were involved in any kind of scuffle with the police, we would for sure show up for our hearing.

I think if this lawyer had showed up, even if Jill Stein herself wasn't there and he had humbly, like, begged the court's forgiveness that she wasn't there, there would not have been a warrant issued.

You know, this judge is a fairly new judge, and they have to sort of establish their authority.

Like when you're supposed to be in my courtroom, you show up.

So I think this was a big mistake on the part of her lawyer.

The thing that I think is interesting, there were just two protestors where they ended up bringing more serious charges after they broke up this WashU protest.

And the other one hired a smart young lawyer, Brendan Roediger.

Brendan Roediger advances the argument that WashU police officers are not actually police officers under Missouri law, therefore you can't be found guilty of assaulting them under this particular standard that they used to bring this case.

That case has just quietly kind of been dismissed.

He is a smart young lawyer.

He's a good lawyer.

And I think if Jill Stein had maybe hired a different lawyer, she wouldn't be in this jam today.

But what's interesting is your reporter from St.

Louis Magazine and the newsletter, you were the only... He was the only reporter.

And it was everywhere, and there was no attribution for St.

Louis Magazine.

That's wrong.

It's what's happened with the media right now.

You know, we have the one reporter who's there in the room, breaks the story, national media follows this like it's like an onslaught of coverage.

Not a single one, to my knowledge, gave us even a link back.

That's awful.

You might have been among the first to report on Don Rowe, who probably is not a household name, but he's the executive director of the planning and urban design group in the city of St.

Louis.

And he showed up at a planning commission meeting, I think late last week, after the commission, the planning committee, had decided that they were not in favor of loosening the requirements for data centers to operate in the city of St.

Louis.

Of course, the board of aldermen the previous month had said, okay, we're going to loosen some of the environmental requirements.

And then the planning group commission said, no, we're going to vote against loosening any environmental requirements for these data centers.

So Don Rowe shows up, and what happens then?

Well, my understanding is that Don Rowe was there the whole time, but that he then said, hey, guys, hey, you know, I've been hearing from some people who have some concerns about what just happened.

And the planning commission is like, what?

And he's like, yeah, I've heard from some people who think this maybe wasn't the right thing and we should maybe reconsider it.

And there was a lot of confusion.

Did he mean procedurally?

Did he mean that people didn't like the decision that they made that was sort of an anti-data center decision?

And he said, yeah, you know, I've gotten a text from an elected official, something along those lines.

Naturally, everybody's like, who is, what's the secret text that's trying to support data centers, you know?

He has not explained this.

I think the big guessing game right now in the city of St.

Louis is how many people have put in sunshine requests for Don Rowe's text to find out who sent this?

The mayor has flatly said, it wasn't me.

And so I think the big guessing game is, was it someone who's close to the mayor and she's being honest, but somebody maybe even without her knowledge reached out?

Plausible deniability.

I don't know.

I think it's all going to come out in the wash.

Don Rowe ought to be required to, if I was the mayor, I'd say, you have to say who this is because everybody's saying it's me.

And you know, the data centers have had this problem about lack of transparency, who owns them.

And now they have this.

There's an elected official concern.

Oh, I can't say who it is.

Well out of the blue, and just like, like stops the whole process.

That was what, this was like one of those 1930 movies where the prosecutor is about to send some notorious gangster to prison and they call him up and said, Hey, your wife's watching the ball game right now with machine gun galley.

And he like throws the case.

It's like, this is so old school.

That's part of our charm.

I'm so old school.

Like, oh, just a telephone call out to blue.

Like I can't tell you who's on the phone, but boy, we're putting his phone off.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's not a good look.

It's just bad.

And you know, the mayor said, everybody asked the mayor, like, well, who was it?

And she goes, Oh, you should ask Don Rowe and we're like, doesn't the mayor have authority over Don Rowe?

I think the mayor does.

And I think the mayor would prefer that we talk about something else, but probably not what she was talking about.

But I'm with you.

There would be, there's, this is why I would never run like for office because this would be one of those situations.

They're like, Hey, I'm in the frying pan.

You're not blow the whistle, right?

I'm not having it.

You're fired or you start singing.

I mean, I am so sorry.

I just got a text from an elected official.

Which one?

I can't say.

We are out of time.

Thank you so much for your opinions.

Thank you for joining us in the historic Studio A here at 9PBS, 3655 Isle Boulevard, signing off from 3655, at least for a year.

Charlie Brennan and see you next week.