ORDER versus ORDINANCE: How St. Louis County Council and County Executive Administration Bypass Legislative Norms

 

~IT’S NOT SEXY, BUT SOMEBODY SHOULD BE REPORTING ON IT~

St. Louis County Council and the Sam Page Administration

Once Again Bypass Lawmaking Norms

          ~Cindy Winkler

            I have heard this subject is not exciting enough to write about, and that it is not what people want to read. Clearly, I disagree wholeheartedly. 

            St. Louis County Council and the Sam Page Administration have begun routinely passing large appropriations via Order instead of Ordinance.  They are disavowing the Charter.  They are NOT allowed to do this.

            Why should we care?  The space of time needed for a bill to become an ordinance is three weeks or so from introduction to passage.  This gives citizens and representatives time to vet the bill thoroughly, or it should.  Using the Council Order to make laws is a one-week process that gives no time to anyone, the public or otherwise, to look into the bill.  This is especially disturbing since the current St. Louis County Chairwoman changed a rule to move public comment to the end of the meeting, after any such Council Orders would have been approved.  The public has ABSOLUTELY NO INPUT on these Orders.  NONE.

            In May of 2022, St. Louis County Council passed Bill 129/Ordinance 28,464, 2022 (the “Ordinance”), which changed the shape of the procurement and appropriation process for the Transportation and Public Works (“TPW”) Department. 

            Here are a few of the bugs masquerading as features:

            ~In the event of real estate acquisition by the County, the Director of the TPW can decide whether to hire an appraiser or use a staff appraiser.  Prior to revision, two appraisals were required for properties over $50,000.  Now we are down to one, and the one need not be performed by a disinterested party. 

            ~$25,000 is a new limit for acquiring emergency temporary rights from property owners, up from $1,500.  That is more than a 1600% increase!

            ~The most egregious update to the Ordinance requested by the Page Administration and enacted by the St. Louis County Council is the granting of approval of professional services contracts VIA ORDER versus ORDINANCE.  These stretch into multiple millions of dollars.  

            ~County Executive alone can execute contracts with Mo DOT, Great Rivers Greenway, Bi-State and municipalities up to $50,000; now, via Council order (not ordinance), the same can happen for contracts over $50,000, with no limit!

            ~Prior to passage of the Ordinance, the Director of TPW had to get County Council approval (an ordinance, in other words) to advertise for bids over $100,000.  Now, it has been ratcheted down to an order.  Furthermore, the bids no longer must be opened publicly and witnessed by certain county employees. 

            Here is the potential Charter violation:  Article II, County Council, Part 3, of the St. Louis County Charter states that the council may, by order or resolution, correct errors on assessment records, etc.; subpoena witnesses and request production of documents, with the power of arrest for failure to do so; and EXERCISE AND PERFORM ANY AND ALL OTHER POWERS OF A NON-LEGISLATIVE NATURE…

            I think most would agree that approval of multimillion dollar, multi-year contracts would fall under the Legislative v. Non-Legislative category.

            From the passage of the ordinance to date, the St. Louis County Executive’s administration has requested, and the St. Louis County Council has approved, nearly $14 million in appropriations via Order instead of Ordinance, these requests having just a cameo appearance on the county’s agenda. 

           

Date	Description of Appropriation made via Order instead of Ordinance in possible charter violation	Appropriation Amount	Total Appropriation Approved if Contracts Extended
7/12/2022	TPW/EFK Moen, LLC/On-Call Engineering 3-year contract	1,000,000
7/12/2022	TPW/WSP USA/On-Call Engineering 4-year contract, 6-year renewal at $500k per years	1,000,000	4,000,000
7/26/2022	Laclede Station Resurfacing / George Butler Associates, Inc.	396,000
8/2/2022	TPW/FSA, LLC/On-Call Architectural and Engineering $600k years 1-3, with renewals up to 6 years	600,000	3,600,000
8/30/2022	TPW/Navigate Building Solutions LLC/On-Call Architectural and Engineering/	800,000	3,800,000
8/30/2022	TPW/Crawford, Murphy & Tilley/On-Call Transportation Engineering Services	1,000,000
11/29/2022	TPW/George Butler/On-Call Transportation Engineering	500,000
12/6/2022	Audit Services / Annual Audit CliftonLarsonAllen LLP/2022-2024	567,953
1/24/2022	TPW/JEMA LLC / On-Call Architectural and Engineering / 3-years	600,000	1,800,000
4/11/2023	TPW/AR-1860/H.R.Green, Inc./Engineering Consulting	350,000
4/11/2023	TPW/Chiodini Architects/On-Call Architectural and Engineering	200,000	600,000
4/11/2023	TPW/EFK Moen LLC/Consulting Engineering for AR-1853	279,510
	TOTAL:	7,293,463	13,800,000

              The solution is quite simple:  Rescind the provisions of this Ordinance allowing appropriations via order v. ordinance.  Take the usual, normal and proper steps to pass a law.  If something is an emergency, rules can be suspended.  This flies in the face of good governance, much like the immediate and total appropriation of CARES Act funding back in 2020 done by this same administration.

            Here are the Orders (not Ordinances, as they should be):

            Other than the road resurfacing items, this nearly $14 million ties into the need to retrofit the County Government Building for fire sprinklers in the next few years.  Want to know how many bids the county has sought and received for this project?  

                                        Here’s a teaser:  The answer is zero!

                                                        ~*~