Archive for March 2023

Carol Howard spent the first 30 years of her professional life in the hallways of St. Louis Public Schools.

After retirement, she moved into the political arena as the Democratic committeewoman of the 14th Ward, where she has lived all her life.

Howard had no real plans to move up in the political echelon. But a 2010 phone call she took while in the Miami airport changed that.

“I was on my way to Ecuador to visit a friend and I got a call saying, ‘Hey, [former alderman Stephen] Gregali’s quitting, would you be interested?’” Howard said.

Howard talked to her friends and her husband, who all said, why not? She handily won the 2010 special election to fill out Gregali’s term, and had no opponents in the contests for her first two full terms. But she won her third election in 2019 by just 53 votes, and found the tone of the race distressing.

With the internet, things got more personal, she said. “And it was like whoa, you know, this is more than I ever anticipated. I thought it was a really ugly campaign.”

In retirement, Howard plans to golf, paint, and bring her standard poodle Contessa to veterans homes and childrens’ hospitals. Here’s what else she discussed on the podcast:.

• In addition to changing the nature of campaigns, social media like Twitter and Facebook permanently altered the job of alderperson. “It was like, you’re supposed to be available on Facebook, you’re supposed to be available on Twitter, you know, and it’s just like, that’s so invasive,” she said.
• Because she was leaving the board, Howard took on the responsibility of shepherding through a pay raise. Aldermen who take office in April will make $72,000 up from $36,000. “People were telling me, ‘Oh, that’s too much,’ so I said, ‘Hand me an amendment,’” she said. “I didn’t get an amendment. I was really kind of disappointed.”
• Howard hopes that progressives who are securing more and more positions of power “are able to keep the sights of the citizens of St. Louis in the forefront, and make our city better so that people will want to live here and grow here.”

Annie Rice’s election to the Board of Aldermen in 2018 was a marker of how quickly the politics in St. Louis were shifting.

Stephen Conway had represented the 8th Ward, which was north and east of Tower Grove Park in south St. Louis, for 27 years. Conway narrowly won reelection in 2015, then resigned after being named city assessor.

“Folks told me it was great to have a voice that was more like theirs in the room,” Rice said.

After the special election victory, she handily won a full term in 2019.

But nearly three years of legislating in a pandemic, combined with personal loss, left Rice exhausted.

“I like to serve from a place of love and community and enthusiasm and found myself very tired and disillusioned,” she said. “I think that maybe more politicians could stand to admit to themselves when that happens.”

Rice is spending her last weeks in office campaigning for Proposition C, which would implement a regular review of the city’s charter by an appointed board of city residents.

“Our charter was written in 1914,” she said. “There was a whole lot of the city that wasn’t eligible to vote in 1914. And the city is just a very different city.”

Here’s what else Rice discussed on the podcast:

• She often found herself struggling with the balance of working toward her legislative priorities, such as setting policies for the city’s surveillance technology, and putting out the metaphorical fires that cropped up in her ward.
• She hopes the bribery convictions of three former aldermanic colleagues push residents to pay closer attention to their elected officials and “not just support what they do because they like their position, or they hate their opponent, or they think someone is good-looking.”
• She’ll miss debating with her colleagues on the floor and having robust conversations in public about the issues but not the bad-faith questioning and the “long, mean, unnecessary arguments,” she said. “I won’t miss the pit in my stomach of, what is this going to devolve into today.”

The issue of foreign ownership of Missouri farmland, including who can buy it and how much can be obtained, has drawn several proposals from lawmakers this session.

A bill passed by the House reduces the amount of agricultural land foreign entities can own from 1% to 0.5%. The bill lists five countries, including China and Russia, that would not be allowed to obtain any land in the future.

Sen. Rusty Black, who has filed his own bill on the issue, thinks the state should revert to the total ban it used to have as opposed to just reducing the amount.

Black, who is the latest guest on the Politically Speaking podcast, spoke on what his bill would do as well as why he thinks this issue is a priority this year.

Here are some of the other things Black talked about on the show:

• His background as an agriculture teacher and why he decided to run for public office. Black said he’s always been interested in politics.
• How he’s adapted from being a member of the Missouri House to a senator.
• The state’s budget, including how much the legislature’s proposal matches the one brought by Gov. Mike Parson. Black serves on the Senate Appropriations Committee.
• Parson’s proposal to spend nearly $900 million to expand Interstate 70 in three parts of the state.
• Why bills targeting the transgender community, including barring trans girls from playing girls sports and prohibiting trans minors from accessing gender affirming health care, have gotten more focus this session.

Black was an agriculture teacher for 33 years before retiring. He graduated from the University of Missouri with a bachelor’s degree in agriculture and a master’s in agriculture education.

He was first elected to the House in 2016 and was in office until 2022, when he won election to the Senate.

Black’s district encompasses northwest Missouri, including a part of Buchanan County.

On the latest episode of the Politically Speaking podcast, state Rep. David Tyson Smith talks about the trajectory of the 2023 legislative session — including his prognosis for how gun control measures may fare.

Smith is a Democrat who represents a portion of Columbia in the Missouri House.

Here’s what he had to say during the show:

• Even though the GOP supermajority tends to be hostile to gun control, Smith is more optimistic than some of his colleagues that the legislature will pass measures to keep some firearms out of the hands of minors. Smith sponsored a bill barring anyone under the age of 20 from selling or purchasing semi or fully automatic firearms.
• He was critical of a measure that would raise the threshold needed to pass a constitutional amendment to 60 percent. In particular, Smith doesn’t like how a provision stating that noncitizens can’t vote in Missouri elections (which is already law) is the first bullet point in a ballot summary. He said Republicans are trying to disguise the constitutional amendment threshold change as something more palatable to voters.
• Smith also is skeptical that bills barring transgender girls from playing girls sports and banning gender affirming care to minors will pass this year. Even though Republicans have made that legislation a priority, Smith noted that previous iterations of this legislation faltered in the past.

Smith easily won a special election against a Libertarian candidate in 2020 and reelection in 2022 without opposition. He is one of four Democrats whose House districts encompass parts of Boone County — the first time that’s happened since the end of 2012.

Smith is a Columbia native who graduated from the University of Missouri. He received his law degree from Tulane University, then stayed in Louisiana for five years to work on litigation against tobacco companies. He came back to Columbia about 20 years ago and eventually started the Smith and Parnell law firm.