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Hey thanks for joining us for Last Call a few more topics before we call it a week.

Bill McClellan was kind of interesting I thought this week your paper front page story uh one day the health director for the city of St Louis is saying hey this jail has never been better we're making progress we got all sorts of medical help in there right now then the very next day front page above the fold same newspaper report comes out that the jail's a disaster that there are no books in there that in the holding cell uh guys are standing they don't have room to sit or to lie down they're in the same clothes three or four days after they're put in most of the guys are sitting in there for 23 hours a day with nothing to do what's going on here well it's an election year and and the health director called it an unprecedented turnaround I mean they keep trying to polish that jail and make it look good you know I thought unprecedented turnaround some of the locks work now what's up with this and how can you tell since nobody can get into the jail including some of the attorneys for the fellas who are uh part of your Club of innocent people he being so I there is an effort you the street director was so proud of the way they had done it and the that was the May the police chief down in uh Jefferson City saying that morale is high when say well the police Association and the ethic Society both want State Control they want out how can you say that morale is so high but there's a lot of people just putting happy faces on right now well with the police I think morale could be up with the majority of police officers but they're not running whatever the St Louis police office Association is as for the ethical Society of police don't get me started I could use up the last 10 minutes so we move off of them brothers and sisters right let me hop in on the jail here because I think Bill sort of nicely outlined these two pretty good stories that the post dispatch ran I honestly think both things can be true I think they had a terrible problem with the medical provider in there and that they are cleaning up that situation but I think the burus report uh now this interim director who did such a good job in St Louis County I think he had a very cleare eyed view of just how bad things got under Jennifer Collins Muhammad they were not letting any independent oversight into there their the own detention facilities board couldn't get in there it was Nightmare and him outlining all these things that we always kind of suspected were going on and to hear this coming from someone in a position of authority it was great to see him get that out there and I think he's going to work to fix that he wouldn't have exposed it if he wasn't willing to take it on and try to make it better I think he's a good guy he is clearly he's a good guy he knows what he's doing but as we said it's like putting a house up for sale with a garden in the front yard you know you've got some issues so you want to spit shine the place up and I think that was what was going on with the health director I think it was the May 's biggest mistake because she appointed this Watchdog group to take a look at the jail and that she wouldn't even let them in in fact one of the Watchdog members of this group was arrested in the lobby for not leaving the jail they weren't allowed to talk to the prisoners or the Corrections Officers so then all of a sudden with two months before the election we get this report from Doug burus and he's now saying it's possible because it's so overcrowed there's so few Corrections Officers that the residents or inmates are going to have to move somewhere else which raised the question how about the workhouse where uh actually the today the inmates have nothing to do but at the workhouse they could play basketball there was a chapel there was a theater there was an outdoor area but even the in the birth report he seemed to be saying that even the correction officers that they do have are kind of fraternizing with friends and relatives who might be in the jail it just seems like a mess and for the health director to make it sound like well there's no story here we've turned everything around I I think that's misleading I think the President should pardon everybody you know Sol the overcrowd right exactly I think this was has been one of Mayor Jones's bigger mistakes I think she she gave progressives a victory with the workhouse and with putting together this detention oversight board and she wasn't really prepared for the consequences I think she thought she could get away with maybe some window dressing of having this board and this board did not sit down and it was a perpetual thorn in her side for years well Reverend gray in particular has been a thorn in in the mayor's side for sure um so I you know I think the burus move is a really good move it comes a little bit late but I'd rather have better late than never well let me ask you about Reverend gray uh was his wife appointed to be personal Personnel director to kind of bring Reverend gray into the tent I mean it sure worked if that was the intent yeah and I think it was pretty much in the tent originally yeah well that's not good a watchdog should not be in the tent right yeah exactly and now he's out of the tent well uh Wendy whis I want to ask you about news from the United Way of Greater St Louis not great news uh typically speaking in previous years St Louis would raise $70 million last year was $67 million for United Way this year it's down 10 million down to $57 million um what happened well one company was giving money on a regular basis but that regular basis ended last year and some companies readjusted their commitments to uh the St Louis area uh is this a sign that we're going downhill or what do you think I mean another sign that we're going downhill I don't I just don't think so I think that there are so many um procedures there are so many traditional uh things that have kind of Fallen by the wayside in a post pandemic work from home you know it it used to be that the United Way folks would come into the workplace and there'd be a rahah and you know everybody would get behind it everything seems so completely up in the air right now in terms of the Dust settling the the workforce in terms of sheer numbers that's down um I don't I don't think it portends anything awful for the United Way and it's you know this is region wide you know this is one that you can't like oh this is the city's fault this is like region wide I would also say I would like to know what was amount of donations let's say under $500 it and was that the same or was that more during the past year because I think that's more Telltale of we just didn't have the money to give now if you're a big corporation that decision was made based on your profit line even though I know they say well that's not part of the profit that's yeah okay whatever but I would be I would be interested in just how much did people give as opposed to Corporation I remember when there was a a little pressure but in a good way like talking about Wendy when they would make their pitch and you know the the bosses wouldn't say you have to give but there was a certain Pride that the company has 94% or something people giving even if it's just a couple bucks a week and it was an umbrella organization you know it kind of covered a lot of different groups and I don't know that we're into umbrellas anymore everybody kind of likes to do their own thing I think you make an excellent point like there's going to be something in the United Way uh pot that somebody is GNA object to and they're like well I might as well I'm just going to give to my pet cause people have become they're bowling alone right a real quick story when I was at USA Today all right your you know cost of living raise was going to be 2% less one year that I was there okay and we all gave 2% to the United Way and like um USA Today was one of the biggest givers like in the metropolitan area in DC all right so we had lost 2% and everybody would give 2% guess what happened that year didn't make the goal they had to have this emergency and said everybody said like oh I'm not going to get 2% but why am I giving 2% so we all decided like no simple math I think that was going on in a lot of households well I think also don't you think at one time we had corporate leaders who were chummy at the Country Club and they kind of uh elbl each other oh sure were a branch office when when you know somebody like haline could buy the blues CU they might go out of town now you know the uh rosson Purina is owned by Nestle in Switzerland I mean the person who's running it couldn't say we'll take care of this yeah you hate the Swiss too I do you went off on Germans now well all I said was Germans like but he loves he loves gardening and stepdaughters well that's it for this last call but we do encourage everyone to give to the United Way and Nine PBS as well thank you so much for joining us see you next week at 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