May 9, 2019

St. Louis County Council Heeds Page Call For State Audit

The St. Louis County Council wants state Auditor Nicole Galloway to look into county government in the wake of Steve Stenger’s guilty plea on federal corruption charges.

That move came as St. Louis County Executive Sam Page announced that the county is getting back to the negotiating table with the owners of Northwest Plaza.

The council voted unanimously Tuesday to ask Galloway to perform an audit of different parts of county government. Specifically, Page wants her to perform a risk assessment on county contracting. He said that’s vital after Stenger pleaded guilty to steering contracts to his political supporters.

“In light of St. Louis County’s criminal victimization in the hands of my predecessor, I’ve asked the county council to pass a resolution asking Missouri State Auditor Nicole Galloway to conduct a risk-assessment audit of county government — beginning with our entire contracting process, including those made through the St. Louis Economic Development Partnership,” Page said. “And her team is ready and willing to begin their work immediately.”

https://news.stlpublicradio.org/post/st-louis-county-council-heeds-page-call-state-audit

May 8, 2019

Andrew Yang Policy on THE FREEDOM DIVIDEND

Andrew would implement a Universal Basic Income, ‘the Freedom Dividend,’ of $1,000/month, $12,000 a year for every American adult over the age of 18. This is independent of one’s work status or any other factor. This would enable all Americans to pay their bills, educate themselves, start businesses, be more creative, stay healthy, relocate for work, spend time with their children, take care of loved ones, and have a real stake in the future.

Any change to the Freedom Dividend would require a constitutional amendment.

It will be illegal to lend or borrow against one’s Dividend.If one does not graduate from high school, your dividend does not begin until 20.

A Universal Basic Income at this level would permanently grow the economy by 12.56 to 13.10 percent—or about $2.5 trillion by 2025—and it would increase the labor force by 4.5 to 4.7 million people. Putting money into people’s hands and keeping it there would be a perpetual boost and support to job growth and the economy.

https://www.yang2020.com/policies/the-freedom-dividend/

May 8, 2019

Andrew Yang Policy on THE FREEDOM DIVIDEND

Andrew would implement a Universal Basic Income, ‘the Freedom Dividend,’ of $1,000/month, $12,000 a year for every American adult over the age of 18. This is independent of one’s work status or any other factor. This would enable all Americans to pay their bills, educate themselves, start businesses, be more creative, stay healthy, relocate for work, spend time with their children, take care of loved ones, and have a real stake in the future.

Any change to the Freedom Dividend would require a constitutional amendment.

It will be illegal to lend or borrow against one’s Dividend.If one does not graduate from high school, your dividend does not begin until 20.

A Universal Basic Income at this level would permanently grow the economy by 12.56 to 13.10 percent—or about $2.5 trillion by 2025—and it would increase the labor force by 4.5 to 4.7 million people. Putting money into people’s hands and keeping it there would be a perpetual boost and support to job growth and the economy.

https://www.yang2020.com/policies/the-freedom-dividend/

May 8, 2019

Parson Seeks Wentzville GM Expansion With Tax Incentive Proposal

Missouri Governor Mike Parson is pushing an economic development plan intended to incentivize General Motors to expand its automotive plant in Wentzville.

If approved by state legislature, the plan would make the auto manufacturer eligible for more than $50 million in state tax credits. Parson emphasized that the company’s expansion was only potential, and a GM spokesman told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that the company won’t make any decisions until it has had more discussions with community officials and the United Automobile Workers union.

Parson visited Wentzville on Wednesday to publicize the plan. Parson also surveyed flooded farmland in St. Charles County during the trip.

He said the state legislatures approving the economic development plan is key to keeping jobs — and GM — in the state.

https://news.stlpublicradio.org/post/parson-seeks-wentzville-gm-expansion-tax-incentive-proposal

May 8, 2019

Sculptor Edwina Sandys Discusses Art, The Cold War, Life As Winston Churchill's Granddaughter

https://news.stlpublicradio.org/post/sculptor-edwina-sandys-discusses-art-cold-war-life-winston-churchills-granddaughter

The “Breakthrough” sculpture on the campus of Westminster College in Fulton has layers of connections to the site on which it stands. Composed of sections from the Berlin Wall, it stands in front of the National Churchill Museum, which commemorates the site where Winston Churchill famously described the Iron Curtain dividing eastern and western Europe which that wall came to represent.

But Edwina Sandys, the artist behind 11-foot-high, 32-foot-long sculpture, also has a direct connection to that history: She is Churchill's granddaughter.

Sandys, who returned to Fulton last weekend for the 50th anniversary celebration of the museum, joined guest host Jim Kirchherr on Tuesday’s St. Louis on the Air. Sandys said that she had the idea to make the sculpture when she saw friends returning from Berlin with pieces of the wall after it fell in 1989.

“People were chipping away at the wall, and nobody seemed to stop them,” she said. “And I thought, ‘Wouldn't it be wonderful if I could go to Berlin and make a sculpture out of the Berlin Wall?’"

May 8, 2019

Andrew Yang Policy on DECRIMINALIZE OPIOIDS

We are in the midst of a crisis in this country. Opioids are killing 8 Americans every hour and that trend has only increased over the past several years.

While those who brought this plague on our citizens must face serious consequences, we need to make sure that those who are afflicted by the illness of addiction are treated and not criminalized. The individuals behind pharmaceutical companies who promoted these drugs as non-addictive while knowing better are the ones who belong in jail, not those who fell prey to addiction.

We need to decriminalize the possession and use of small amounts of opioids. Other countries, such as Portugal, have done so, and have seen treatment go up and drug deaths and addiction go down. When caught with a small quantity of any opioid, our justice system should err on the side of providing treatment.

"Opioid addiction is rampant in our country. In 2016, more than 11 million Americans misused prescription opioids and 2.1 million had an addiction to heroin, fentanyl, and other opioids. This is a public health crisis, and the top priority has to be getting Americans well. Many Americans are not seeking treatment because they are afraid of life-destroying criminal penalties. We need to remove the stigma of an addiction that literally millions of Americans are struggling with. The War on Drugs has not worked. We need to give more American families and communities a real chance to get well, and we need to evolve from a punitive approach that does not serve the public. If you are caught with a small amount of drugs, we should refer you straight to treatment, not a prison cell."

https://www.yang2020.com/policies/decriminalizeopioids/

May 8, 2019

Andrew Yang Policy on DECRIMINALIZE OPIOIDS

We are in the midst of a crisis in this country. Opioids are killing 8 Americans every hour and that trend has only increased over the past several years.

While those who brought this plague on our citizens must face serious consequences, we need to make sure that those who are afflicted by the illness of addiction are treated and not criminalized. The individuals behind pharmaceutical companies who promoted these drugs as non-addictive while knowing better are the ones who belong in jail, not those who fell prey to addiction.

We need to decriminalize the possession and use of small amounts of opioids. Other countries, such as Portugal, have done so, and have seen treatment go up and drug deaths and addiction go down. When caught with a small quantity of any opioid, our justice system should err on the side of providing treatment.

"Opioid addiction is rampant in our country. In 2016, more than 11 million Americans misused prescription opioids and 2.1 million had an addiction to heroin, fentanyl, and other opioids. This is a public health crisis, and the top priority has to be getting Americans well. Many Americans are not seeking treatment because they are afraid of life-destroying criminal penalties. We need to remove the stigma of an addiction that literally millions of Americans are struggling with. The War on Drugs has not worked. We need to give more American families and communities a real chance to get well, and we need to evolve from a punitive approach that does not serve the public. If you are caught with a small amount of drugs, we should refer you straight to treatment, not a prison cell."

https://www.yang2020.com/policies/decriminalizeopioids/

May 7, 2019

Andrew Yang Policy on RANKED CHOICE VOTING

Our current plurality voting system, where everyone selects a single preference and then the person with the most votes wins, is viewed negatively by election scientists, for several reasons:

It’s vulnerable to a spoiler effect, where a third-party candidate can take just enough votes away from a candidate to cause them to lose, even if that candidate would be preferred to the eventual winner.
It can cause strategic voting, where voters don’t vote for their favorite but rather the person they like who is most likely to win.
Especially with a party-based primary system, it leads to partisanship, as centrist candidates, despite having wider support, lose out to candidates who appeal to the fringes of each party.
There are many alternative voting systems that are superior to plurality voting. We should move to a ranked-choice/instant runoff voting system, a system that has recently been implemented in Maine and is being explored by many other localities.

In ranked choice voting, each voter ranks their top three candidates, from 1 to 3. After this is complete, every voter’s first choice is tallied. If one candidate received over 50% of the vote, they win the election. If no candidate hit the majority threshold, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated. Then, everyone who listed that eliminated candidate as their first choice has their second choice considered. These second-choice votes are added to the totals for the remaining candidates. If a candidate at this point has received over 50% of the votes, then they win; otherwise, the process repeats itself until someone does receive a majority of votes.

https://www.yang2020.com/policies/rankedchoice/

May 7, 2019

Andrew Yang Policy on RANKED CHOICE VOTING

Our current plurality voting system, where everyone selects a single preference and then the person with the most votes wins, is viewed negatively by election scientists, for several reasons:

It’s vulnerable to a spoiler effect, where a third-party candidate can take just enough votes away from a candidate to cause them to lose, even if that candidate would be preferred to the eventual winner.
It can cause strategic voting, where voters don’t vote for their favorite but rather the person they like who is most likely to win.
Especially with a party-based primary system, it leads to partisanship, as centrist candidates, despite having wider support, lose out to candidates who appeal to the fringes of each party.
There are many alternative voting systems that are superior to plurality voting. We should move to a ranked-choice/instant runoff voting system, a system that has recently been implemented in Maine and is being explored by many other localities.

In ranked choice voting, each voter ranks their top three candidates, from 1 to 3. After this is complete, every voter’s first choice is tallied. If one candidate received over 50% of the vote, they win the election. If no candidate hit the majority threshold, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated. Then, everyone who listed that eliminated candidate as their first choice has their second choice considered. These second-choice votes are added to the totals for the remaining candidates. If a candidate at this point has received over 50% of the votes, then they win; otherwise, the process repeats itself until someone does receive a majority of votes.

https://www.yang2020.com/policies/rankedchoice/

May 7, 2019

'How Am I Gonna Handle Tomorrow?': Missouri Jail Officers At Risk Of PTSD

Tonya Harry had been working as a correctional officer for about a year when she had one of the most traumatic experiences of her life.

During her shift at the Medium Security Institution in St. Louis — also known as the Workhouse — she discovered an inmate who had died by suicide.

“Sometimes I still think about it,” said Harry, who serves as the jail’s chief of security more than 20 years later.

A recent St. Louis University survey of about 300 jail officers in Missouri found more than half reported symptoms consistent with post-traumatic stress disorder.

https://news.stlpublicradio.org/post/how-am-i-gonna-handle-tomorrow-missouri-jail-officers-risk-ptsd