We Won’t be Neutral on a Moving Train*

This is an open letter to Webster Groves leadership from members of the community regarding our municipal hiring policies and procedures.

The recent hire of Neil Bruntrager as city attorney for Webster Groves has galvanized community concern about our city’s standards and best practices related to municipal leadership. The hire of Mr. Bruntrager in particular is troubling given his role in recent high-profile cases involving police officers accused of excessive force. These cases are highly symbolic and painful for our town and region at large. But our concern isn’t focused on this individual.  Rather, the hire has led to community wide revelations about the limitations of the hiring process that underscore the need for some revision and additional safeguards.

We believe that Webster Groves should be a city that strives to serve all its residents equitably. We recognize the power of municipal government and its potential to either contribute to--or mitigate--existing injustices and disparities. We recognize that while some municipal leaders are elected by the people, others - those hired, appointed or contracted - are not. Because these positions have significant influence on residents of Webster Groves we need additional lines of accountability to our larger community.

While many of the signers of this letter have serious concerns about Mr. Bruntrager’s hire, our goal is not to call into question the specific qualifications of an individual in a vacuum, but rather to consider this experience in context of what our region calls for at this pivotal time. This is about our collective imperative: to work together to do better by more people. To learn from recent history. To rectify injustice. To take ownership of our responsibilities to our community. To build systems that ensure we expect and deliver on the best we can do.  We believe our lens of racial justice needs strengthening.

In that spirit we call our full community to action.

Action that:

• Prioritizes the improvement of systems and institutional practices;
• Invests in building the capacity of our leaders (hired, appointed, and elected) to incorporate an anti-bias, anti-racist lens into their role and responsibilities as they serve our city;
• Recognizes our regional responsibility, role, and history;
• Reflects the principles of the Ferguson Commission, as well as its ethos of community engagement;

Forward Through Ferguson offers the following values as guidelines for work that propels a community-centered, unflinching focus on equity: Racial Collaboration, Radical Listening, Transparency and Accountability. The below proposals are informed by these values.

[PROCESS:]

We ask that the Webster Groves city leadership take the necessary steps to prioritize the improvement of systems and institutional practices, possibly including but not limited to:

• Amend the city charter to rescind the residency requirement for—or allow the residency requirement to be waived for—City Attorney.
• Amend the Conflict of Interest Policy to include alleged or convicted perpetrators of Excessive Force, or their legal representatives.
• Reform city hiring practices to expand and diversify the hiring pool, strengthen transparency, and increase community accountability. We suggest practices such as:
  1. Engaging with a consultant to reconsider how to expand and diversify the hiring process for city leadership positions.
  2. Creating a 7 day public comment period, prior to the recommendation to city council, for city positions such as city attorney and city manager.
  3. Ensuring that one member of the Personnel Board or respective hiring committee have training in racial equity principles.
  4. Including a representative of the community who has training in racial equity principles or is representative of a community group or non-profit dedicated to racial equity and community relations in Webster Groves, as a member of the Personnel board and respective hiring committees.
  5. Creating a prohibition that prevents circumventing the hiring process by returning to a candidate pool more than 4 months old.
  6. Creating a procedural step whereby city council, the Personnel Board, or an appointed representative certifies that a robust enough candidate pool has been obtained during the application portion of search process, before the selection process continues.
  7. Considering appropriate leadership of hiring committees to ensure that our policies prioritize a diversity of perspectives and so that one person isn't the sole decision maker across the majority of the hiring process.

[OVERSIGHT/TRAINING:]

We ask that Webster Groves invest in the capacity of our leadership to bring both a racial equity lens and regional perspective to their work:

• All members of Webster Groves City Leadership (including but not limited to the Mayor, City Manager, City Attorney, and City Council) attend trainings that will help leadership understand the roles that systems and institutions like municipal government play in maintaining racial disparity and inequity, and be better equipped to leverage their leadership in service of all residents. Two such workshops are offered by the Crossroads Anti-Racism Organizing and Training organization, and would be attended sequentially: 1. Introduction to Systemic Racism and 2. Understanding and Analyzing Systemic Racism Workshop. Other education providers who similarly focus on the institutional and systemic manifestations of racism and oppression, analyze the role of power, and incorporate a historical context would also be sufficient.
• All members of Webster Groves City Leadership (including but not limited to the Mayor, City Manager, City Attorney, and City Council) contract with professionals such as Professor Bob Hansman for a tour of STL that highlights the role of municipal laws it relates to practice and policy. Generate Health also offers such opportunities.
• The City Attorney and City Manager hold twice yearly listening sessions with residents, as non-elected leadership.
• The City Attorney and City Manager attend monthly meetings of community groups such as The North Webster Coalition and The Alliance for Interracial Dignity to build relationships with community members, and to stay abreast of community concerns such as housing, development and community policing through the experts and programs that such groups engage.
• Webster Groves City Leadership to build relationships with regional leaders such as Forward Through Ferguson, and analyze the Ferguson Commission report to look for implementation opportunities based on the 189 calls to action--especially those where Municipal Government is cited as the appropriate accountable body.

[REPAIR:]

We also ask city leadership to prioritize and invest in restorative actions:

• The Mayor and City Manager to make a public commitment to the items included in this petition.
• The Mayor and City Council to report out meeting notes from meetings and sessions with community stakeholders (such as a closed door meeting with community clergy on the weekend of Dec 8 and 9) related to this issue.
• The Mayor and City Council include regional equity leaders in community sessions and meetings related to community concerns about the hiring of Neil Bruntrager.
• The Mayor, City Manager, and city council to hold a Town Hall to hear residents’ concerns about the hiring of Neil Bruntrager.
• The Mayor to issue consistently monthly communication about the progress made according to the items in this petition.

Related materials:

City Charter
(City Manager, pg 13, please note that the City Manager is an employee of Webster Groves. City Attorney, pg 31, please note that the City Attorney is a contract position)

City Attorney Position Description

Useful resources:

The Making of Ferguson: Public Policies at the Root of its Troubles

Ferguson Commission Report

DOJ Investigation of the Ferguson Police Department

For the Sake of All

The Color of Law

Pruitt-Igoe Myth

* This title (You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train) conjures a famous quote from historian Howard Zinn, “You Can’t Be Neutral on a Moving Train.” Zinn famously refused to “pretend to an objectivity that was neither possible nor desirable.” “You can’t be neutral on a moving train,” he would tell his students. “Events are already moving in certain deadly directions, and to be neutral means to accept that.”

We as Webster Groves residents and regional community members must also recognize the weight of our actions and the impact they have on those we call neighbors, classmates, and friends. We’ve inherited a broken legacy and a history rife with pain. We have ample opportunities to set things right, but first we must eschew the fantasy of neutrality and accept the mantle of responsibility. We must not be neutral on this moving train.