Mayor Cara Spencer announced yesterday that the city will dedicate an additional $5 million of Rams settlement money to remove debris left in the wake of the May 16 tornado, though Spencer stressed at a press conference that is only a drop in the bucket of what’s needed.
Spencer said that the price tag will run into the hundreds of millions dollars for demolition and debris removal across the 10 miles of the tornado’s path, and that the manpower and resources needed are beyond the scope of what the city can provide. It’s a job that needs to be led by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, she says.
Get a fresh take on the day’s top news
Subscribe to the St. Louis Daily newsletter for a smart, succinct guide to local news from award-winning journalists Sarah Fenske and Ryan Krull.
“We need federal assistance. We’ve been left in the lurch here by the federal government,” Spencer said. She added: “This is what a national government is for, to come in when problems are bigger than what cities can manage.”
She noted that the Corps deployed in Joplin, Missouri following the 2011 tornado that killed more than 150 people there while destroying thousands of buildings and houses. Spencer said she recently drove through Joplin. “It doesn’t look at all like a tornado ever hit Joplin,” she said. “It’s inspiring.”
Whether to deploy the Corps for debris cleanup is in the hands of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Though Spencer has been pushing for their deployment since July, she says she is still hopeful the federal agency will ultimately come through.
And she says that while members of the Corps have been on the ground in an assessment capacity, their full deployment is not for a lack of effort from the city’s representation in Washington, D.C. She cited senators Eric Schmitt and Josh Hawley as well as U.S. Rep. Wesley Bell as pressing the issue at the federal level.
Alderman Rasheen Aldridge, who represents parts of downtown and North City said that he gave Spencer credit for “fighting like hell” to try to get as many federal and state resources here as possible.
About the Army Corps, Aldridge said: “I’m hearing rumors that they are slowly coming in.”
In addition to the $5.35 million the city is allocating for debris removal, Spencer said that an additional $5 million would go to provide intermediate housing for those displaced by the disaster. She said that a few hundred people are utilizing city shelters. But many more than that, perhaps thousands, are in ad hoc situations—living everything from tents to damaged homes to crashing with friends or family. She said that the money for housing assistance is crucial right now as many of these arrangements become untenable with the arrival of cold weather.
Those two expenditures—in addition to another $1.65 million to pay for staff and other costs—will exhaust the $30 million in interest that had accrued from the Rams settlement funds that the city had dedicated to tornado recovery.
The question of how to spend the principal—more than $250 million—will likely be the subject of hot debate at the Board of Aldermen this fall.
