How Elliott Davis kept St. Louis watching for 45 years

For the past four decades, Fox-2’s Elliott Davis has been one of the most recognizable people in St. Louis news—offering a gleaming head, a sonorous voice, and a willingness to literally sprint after public officials when the story required it. Famous for his catchphrase “you paid for it,” Davis has been nothing if not aggressive, and the miscreants he’s targeted have responded in kind. They’ve grabbed his microphone, arrested him and even shot his camera man. Terrifying, yes, but it’s made for terrific TV.

This Friday, Davis puts down the mic after 45 years. A graduate of both St. Louis Public Schools (Vashon High) and the Ivy League (Cornell University), he spent all 45 in his hometown for a simple reason: As a divorced dad, he wanted to be there for his daughter. But he also has a genuine affinity for the region’s poor, which he attributes to his childhood in the shadow of the Pruitt-Igoe housing complex. 

Before heading into a retirement that he hopes will include plenty of time with his 8-month-old granddaughter, Rose, Davis sat down with SLM to discuss his most memorable stories, the method behind his antics, and what it was like chasing Rod Blagojevich.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Of all your investigations, which are you most proud of? 

The ones that I think gained the most notoriety involved the Wellston School District. The school board president, Dorothy Moore, was also the mayor of Hillsdale, and she tried to grab my microphone. It was a huge confrontation where she was chasing me down the street, and she couldn’t catch my camera man, so she turned on me. This was an underperforming district. Kids were not getting a proper education, people were getting these high-paying jobs, and it was just a wreck. So we started doing stories on that. Ultimately, the state dissolved the Wellston School District, fired the school board, and the superintendent was let go. And so we were able to get action on an entire school district for kids. 

You got results.

A lot of it was the colorful confrontation that got everybody’s attention. It got the state’s attention. So yeah, in my mind, it’s not show business. That’s not why I go about things. It’s getting answers from public officials who don’t want to answer questions. My thought is that if you’re a public official, you’re spending taxpayers’ money, you should be prepared to answer questions about how you’re spending it. 

Most public officials agree to an interview. But then there are those who don’t feel they have to answer for how they’re spending taxpayers’ money. Rather than just letting them off the hook, me and my photographer, Larry Washington, we go to the next step. We catch them at a public meeting and by that time, we got the cameras rolling on a three-act play.

Do you think public officials have gotten savvier about not giving you that dramatic moment?

There was a company that schooled officials on how to deal with the media. He would play my confrontations with people: “This is what you don’t want to do.” As we went forward, more public officials learned how to deal with me and how to deal with my approach. He would tell them at the seminars, ”Just to talk to Elliott. If he calls you, don’t run. Don’t slam the door in his face, because that’s what he wants you to do.” 

But a lot of things changed, and I changed the way I do things. I shifted to more trying to help resolve situations and more wanting to get answers and action from officials than I wanted them to look bad.

What led to that shift? 

One, age. Not wanting to do that chase. But two, life’s about change. And with the notoriety that I had built up because of all the confrontations, I said, “Wait a minute, I’ve got something here that I can use to really solve problems and really get action and really get officials to make the changes that we’re trying to get them to make.” In the old days, we’d just confront them. Now I’ll call them on the phone and say, “Look, here’s the problem.” And they said, “Well, I can’t solve today.” I said, “OK, I’ll come back. I’m not gonna put the story on now. We’ll revisit this in another couple of weeks. We’ll see where we stand.” They see the carrot and the stick. If they cooperate and get the problem solved, they have a chance to come out of it looking good. 

But you still hold them accountable if not.

Absolutely. I’ve had to tell people all the time, “We can do it the easy way, or we can do it the hard way. It doesn’t much matter to me.” I borrowed that phrase from a movie. Having seen me do it the old way, they know I’m fully capable of reverting. 

How did you come up with “you paid for it”? Was that from a movie, too?

In 1990, Bill Berra was the news director, and I think he had seen it somewhere. We put a twist on it by giving the telephone number of the offending official. I was the only reporter that didn’t mind doing it. I didn’t want to be loved by officials. Mayor Freeman Bosley, we put his number on the screen: “If you don’t like this deal, here’s his number, 314-622-3201, tell him what you think.” They hated that, and people loved that they hated it. You talk about theater, woohoo!

When you’re out and about, do people say it to you?

They stop their cars when I’m on the street to say it. They say it at the grocery store. 

Your photographer, Larry Washington, was a big part of this for you. How long did you work together?

Thirty-five years. All those moments, Larry caught the video that really got people’s attention. And the only time that he couldn’t get the video—it’s hard to talk about it—but it was when he got shot. There was a contract out on my life for an investigation we were doing into a towing company. We were out shooting a standup at the location. And all of a sudden the shots ring out and Larry said, “I’m shot.” He’s a Vietnam veteran. He didn’t get a scratch on him in Vietnam, only to come back working with me and get shot in Wellston. 

We had a harrowing drive to the hospital because he’s shot and he wants to drive the car. And he’s swerving into traffic and he’s fading out. And he’s my best friend too, and I’m thinking, he’s going to die right here. He got shot in the shoulder. They said another millimeter or so would have hit this vital artery, and he would have gone into shock and bled to death. 

Did that give you pause? 

I was more angry than anything. The people we were after ended up going to prison for 10 years. I remember at the sentencing [for the towing company operator on drug charges], he said, “Well, I’m here because of the media.” And he looked at me. The judge said, “You’re here because of you.” Bam, 10 years. 

You famously chased Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich right onto the tarmac. Of all the officials you chased, was he the hardest to catch?

He’s up there. Rod was determined to get away. We had to run down the stairs. He’s racing, climbing and getting in his limo. And then they get to the airport before me. I run out onto the tarmac, and I’m yelling, “Governor, will you come out and talk? Do you say something?” 

The next time Governor Blagojevich came to St. Louis, he said, “I’m not gonna run from you this time.” Because he looked so bad. Nobody in St. Louis had seen anything like that. 

What are you going to miss the most about this job?

Being able to make a difference, and being able to quickly make a difference. The people really love what we did, because we went into the poorest areas, with the people who had nothing. It didn’t matter if they were in North St. Louis, Jefferson County, Madison County, we went every place to help people who didn’t have the ability to hire a lawyer and had a legitimate gripe with the government.

I grew up in the inner city, right across from the Pruitt-Igoe projects. And my mom just graduated eighth grade, she worked three jobs to take care of me. We grew up poor; we got the government cheese and everything. It’s something that I embrace. People see that you grew up poor, so that you understand what they’re dealing with. That gave me easier access to people. 

I’ve been extremely blessed to be here. For a kid from Vashon High School to interview governors and two presidents, I look at that and it’s unlikely. 

What are you most looking forward to about retirement?

I want to see Rose as she grows up. I don’t want to be locked into an 8-hour gig and not be there as she’s growing up. You look at another two, three years, she’ll be four years old, and I would have missed that. It was important to me to free up time and see my granddaughter growing up. 

Will you be able to unplug?

Yeah. Do I know what it’s going to be like? No. People say, “Are you happy?” I say, “That’s not the best way to describe it.” They say, “Are you sad?” Well, that’s not the best way to describe it. I’m turning the page to the next chapter. It’s time. I wanted to go while I was on top, while people still wanted to see what I was doing, while I was still making a difference, while I still had support from management, and while I still really enjoy what I’m doing. 

I love what I’m doing. Even days away from retirement, we’re still doing stories every day. We still have a lot of people calling. “Can you do this one story before you retire?”