St. Louis Business 500: The Political Scene

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Mayor Tishaura Jones is facing her first reelection campaign, up against three opponents: Alderwoman Cara Spencer, who lost to Jones by four points in the previous race; Michael Butler, the city’s recorder of deeds; and businessman Andrew Jones. Mayor Jones’ tenure has been marked by a significant influx into the city’s coffers, including hundreds of millions of dollars from the American Rescue Plan Act and the Rams’ departure. The ARPA money has all been allocated but, after the Board of Aldermen failed to reach a consensus on what to do with the Rams money, the bulk of it remains in a bank account, accruing interest. Under Jones’ leadership and with the appointment of Police Chief Robert Tracy—the first chief hired from outside the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department’s ranks—and no-nonsense Circuit Attorney Gabe Gore, the city has seen marked improvements in public safety. Logic Systems and architecture firm Trivers are among those who have recently set up shop downtown or in Downtown West. The biggest news of all may be the city attracting its first publicly traded company in some time to relocate here, EV battery component maker Evolution Metals. And Spencer co-sponsored a bill to give Anders CPAs + Advisors accounting firm a break on the city’s 1 percent earnings tax in exchange for a plan to funnel that money into improving its office space and double its workforce at the Bank of America Plaza downtown.

St. Louis County Executive Sam Page has recently faced a series of controversies, as well as numerous antagonists on the county council, including Mark Harder, Rita Heard Days, Shalonda Webb, and Dennis Hancock. That discord is all too often reflected in the wider dynamic of the region, which sees its myriad fiefdoms battling each other to retain businesses. A few cases in point: Emerson decamping from Ferguson to set up shop in Clayton, Clayco subsidiary Concrete Strategies moving from the city to the county, and AT&T moving employees in the opposite direction. Clayton has benefited from the fact that the Hoffmann Family of Companies is keen on St. Louis and has scooped up a pair of the best pieces of commercial real estate in the county’s central business district.

St. Charles County has fared well under the leadership of Steve Ehlmann, as the county’s population has continued to grow, alongside its economy, which includes strong presences by household names such as Mastercard, Boeing, and Amazon. They’re helping make the county the fastest growing one in the state. Political and business leaders are working to capitalize on these tailwinds; they’ve recently commissioned a study to plan the county’s next five years of growth, which seems likely to center on manufacturing and transportation and warehousing, meaning that in addition to things getting made here, goods made elsewhere will continue to pass through St. Charles logistics hubs. Whatever the future holds, it looks like Republicans aren’t losing their hold on the county any time soon. Any concerns otherwise were no doubt assuaged when Adam Schnelting bested challenger Matt Williams by nearly 10,000 votes to be the county’s representative in the state house.

Two overarching forces define politics in the Metro East: its proximity to St. Louis and its disdain for Chicago. Congresswoman Nikki Budzinski, who represents Illinois’ 13th Congressional District—which includes East St. Louis, Belleville, and Edwardsville—would be right at home in St. Louis. Her background is in organized labor, and she’s a close ally of Gov. J.B. Pritzker. Prior to the November election, Budzinski sounded the alarm about Democrats losing working-class voters, and she worked to block the sale of U.S. Steel, which has a strong presence in Granite City, to Japanese firm Nippon Steel. The left-leaning Budzinski does not align with all of the Metro East, though: Madison County, which includes Alton, Godfrey, and most of Collinsville, voted in November to secede from Illinois and form their own state. The vote was purely symbolic but fueled by a sense among its supporters that liberal Chicago does not represent the interests of downstate Illinois. If the state’s political establishment was worried about the vote, they did not show it.