urbanSTL

leeharveyawesome wrote: And if the city would just hire everyone who was unemployed we would have a 0.0% unemployment rate. Problem solved.

This is true, but you probably intended to be sarcastic.

I'm getting mad robocalled by the vote no people.

Although i live in St.Louis County i work in St.Louis City I'm completely open arms to keeping the earnings tax alive.

erina wrote:I'm getting mad robocalled by the vote no people.

Gotta spend that $2M on something

I'm surprised I haven't gotten any mailers yet.

Got nothing from No camp and 6 mailers from Yes, 3 today alone

dbInSouthCity wrote:Got nothing from No camp and 6 mailers from Yes, 3 today alone

You're in the Slay machine target area. I've been getting an equal number of both here in TGS.
Kind of wondering how many sewers could be repaired with the money MSD is paying for pro-Prop S & Prop Y mailers though. I have gotten one of those every day this week.

I haven't gotten any on any prop., darn.

Vote NO on Prop S and Y!

I'm in an area where I would benefit from Props Y and S; I'm curious why people in other areas might be opposed to it?

Prop Y wastes money on bond interest for sewer work that happens whether the bonds pass or not.

Prop S taxes the wrong thing and is a subsidy for parking lots.

https://nextstl.com/2016/03/vote-no-on- ... y-april-5/

I'm a fan of Ogilvie. I hope he considers a mayoral run someday.

The people that worry me are the ones who believe if only we could make the earnings tax 10% then STL would magically become America's Greatest City. Scary.

erina wrote:I'm getting mad robocalled by the vote no people.

Same here. Not a peep from Yes so far.

I got a few of the "Better Call Paul"mailers. Fake ad how to shift your business earnings to the County and avoid the tax. Anyone else?

leeharveyawesome wrote:I got a few of the "Better Call Paul"mailers. Fake ad how to shift your business earnings to the County and avoid the tax. Anyone else?

Can you upload a picture?

stlien wrote:

leeharveyawesome wrote:I got a few of the "Better Call Paul"mailers. Fake ad how to shift your business earnings to the County and avoid the tax. Anyone else?

Can you upload a picture?

Just checked. They got thrown out by the girfriend. Girls are dumb. I gave it a cursory glance initially. Totally crazy mailer. It exists.

From the "Tone is Everything" department:

(From the SLPOA Facebook feed):

"For the next few days we will be placing the same message in hopes that city residents will listen. An important issue is coming to city voters. We ask that our supporters VOTE YES ON PROP E. The St. Louis City earnings tax pays our salaries. Without it, can you imagine the state of public safety in the City of St. Louis? Whatever you hear on the negative side to this proposition, just know it is not good for your city to lose this. The selfish attempt by billionaires to get rid of our earnings tax will harm every aspect of public safety."

I guess whoever wrote this is one of those ex-city resident (and now a non-city voter) police department employees? Or maybe "your" friend, Jeff Roorda?

It's "your" city...

But it's "our" earnings tax...

Do you think anyone else is offended by this choice of words?

No

I don't find it offensive...technically they are paying it too, so it theirs too.

I don't like it because of the way it highlights the fact that they are not part of the community as they once were, rather more a "taker" when it comes to collecting a paycheck. I also don't like the fear tactic. And how often do they weigh in on city issues? I can't remember them ever doing so, except here where it affects their income.

I suspect they were just trying to maximize the impact of the statement by using "your", not implying that it isn't their city. Or maybe they didn't want to repeat "our" so many times.

I suspect they were just trying to maximize the impact of the statement by using "your", not implying that it isn't their city. Or maybe they didn't want to repeat "our" so many times.

I just can't shake the "us" vs. "them" feel of that wording. And I admit, I'm generally a bit biased on this topic. The police have done a lot to alienate themselves from the rest of us city residents, especially in their relentless effort to get out of the residency requirement. Watch next for them to try and exempt themselves from the earnings tax.

Judge friends of mine say this about city cops: they are the biggest whiners they see.

I've heard it countless times from the horses mouths, and if you read the old STL Cop Talk website, you know what they had to say about the city and it's people. It wasn't pretty.

So I guess all I'm saying is that I won't be basing my decision on this issue on what the SLPOA or Jeff Roorda have to say about it.

dweebe wrote:

Ebsy wrote:

erina wrote:I'm getting mad robocalled by the vote no people.

Same here. Not a peep from Yes so far.

Do the "Yes" people have a billionaire backing them?

ironically yes...Rex is funding the yes campaign too, indirectly.

Rex donated $100,000 to Slay and Slay in turn donated $100,000 to Reinvest STL, the yes campaign.

ironically yes...Rex is funding the yes campaign too, indirectly.

He is funding it because he believes the tax is a disincentive for businesses to locate or relocate to downtown St. Louis. You can certainly make the argument that that theory is true over the last 50 years. Many companies do throw out that the reason they won't come into the city is because of the additional tax. Whether that is the main reason or not is subject to debate. Today, Cortex is thriving and we are seeing companies relocate from the county to the city.
I would argue that the status quo is NOT working for office tenants in the downtown market. The city should be pulling out all stops to attract more businesses downtown and see ZERO leadership from city hall making this effort. Downtown is slowly turning into an all residential area. The golden egg of the city is the downtown business community and the city takes it for granted. As a side note they also don't synchronize the traffic lights for the business district and don't quickly repair potholes either.
A part of me is leaning towards the phase out of the tax. Funds to the police department don't need to be cut first. What about a city employee base that far exceeds usefulness for a city with 315,000 people. we don't need a "jobs program" at city hall.

I'm all for getting rid of the earnings tax when I hear of a realistic plan that will replace those funds. I have yet to hear anyone lay out how we can replace the tax....didn't Mayor Slay promised to work on something around his last election?, but......

I'm hearing a lot of arguments about the mismanagement of funds at City Hall and I agree with some of those arguments, however I can't vote to bankrupt the City because I'm mad about the stadium debacle, et. al.

I'm not saying I want to keep the E.T., but at this point in time, I feel getting rid of it will be disastrous for the city and its residents. I'd rather focus energy on getting people into office that will work towards developing and implementing a feasible plan for getting rid of the E.T.