Decision 2024: Council Endorsements

Yesterday, no excuse absentee voting began for April 2nd’s municipal elections. Those elections will be pivotal for Kirkwood as citizens will be asked to choose which four Council Members and the Mayor, fully five of the Council’s seven-member body, will chart a new course forward for the community. Next week, I will seek to tackle the Mayoral race, but today, I want to offer a brief overview of the six candidates running for City Council and offer some recommendations for whom I think you should vote for.

In choosing whether to endorse a candidate or candidates, many considerations come into play: What criteria will you use? How many candidates should you endorse? Enough to fill all the available slots? or Just the one or two who have convinced you beyond a shadow of a doubt? Will not endorsing a candidate make it harder to work with that person should they get elected?

I’ve wrestled with all of these questions for the last several months. They’re legitimately hard questions. But, after asking all the candidates dozens of questions on their housing and transportation platforms at the Candidate Forum (video here, AI-generated transcript here), sitting down to talk with most of the candidates on the phone or in person (some more than once), reading letters they’ve written and coverage they’ve gotten in the Webster-Kirkwood Times, and reviewing their voting records on everything from prior stents on City Council (compiled here) to decisions they made while serving on the obscure Board of Adjustment, I think three candidates —Bob Sears, Mark McLean, and Ron Ruzicka— stand above the rest in terms of their commitment to making Kirkwood a more affordable, more walkable, and ultimately better community.

Here’s a little bit about my thought process for choosing each.

1. Bob Sears

Bob Sears is my first choice for City Council, and it’s not particularly close. When I last endorsed candidates in the Summer of 2020 (what a time to be alive), there were three spots open on the Council and six candidates to fill them, one of whom was Bob Sears. I sent each of those six candidates a questionnaire to help inform who I would pick as my top three. While I found Sears’s answers to be fine from a housing & walkability perspective, I didn’t find them inspiring. Ultimately I left him as my fourth-ranked option, choosing instead to endorse the three candidates who I noted at the time were the least likely to win (bingo on that one).

So what’s changed in the past four years that has caused Sears to go from being left off the endorsement list entirely to now being at the top of the heap? Well, quite a bit. Sears has demonstrated his commitment to solving Kirkwood’s housing problem with every vote he’s taken in his time on the Council. By my count, Sears has voted to approve 278 new homes in Downtown Kirkwood across The Aria, The Kirkwood Apartments, The James, The Hutton, and The Madison. Amongst the current council, only the outgoing Mayor, Tim Griffin, has voted to approve more.

Sears backs up that rhetoric with a demonstrated capacity to communicate our need for more homes and state unequivocally the steps he’s willing to take to get there. At the Kirkwood for Everyone Candidate Forum, Sears gave a clear and vocal articulation of how even supposedly unaffordable developments like The James relieve pressure on the overall housing market and reduce costs:

“It’s kind of about the market, the stock of housing, the numbers of available alternatives for people. You increase the number of alternatives, the overall cost will go down. So even if you build an apartment that is, you know, we think is outrageously high rent or unaffordable, it still is an additional living unit. And so it’s going to relieve pressure somewhere else.”

That’s pretty close to a perfect articulation of how we need to focus on increasing the supply of homes if we want to get the cost of housing under control, but Sears went on to offer several policy solutions that might actually bring that added supply to fruition. He offered the strongest endorsement for allowing more varied uses along the Grant’s Trail extension of anyone on the stage, and he stated that he supported allowing developers a density or height bonus in exchange for setting aside a portion of the project’s units as affordable. On ADUs, Sear stated: “It’s only after I read the attainable housing study that I came to appreciate how useful [ADUs] could be and the impediments that the city has in the way of successful use of that program.” I couldn’t agree more, Bob.

When we combine his voting record with his rhetoric, I’m left with no doubts that Bob Sears will work to implement the recommendations offered in the Attainable Housing Study and take a pragmatic approach to future development in Kirkwood. I’m glad to stand with Kirkwood for Everyone in endorsing him.

2. Mark McLean

My second choice for Council is Mark McLean. McLean is a merger & acquisition attorney and CPA. McLean seems to be a pragmatic decision-maker. While serving as Chairman of the Board of Adjustment, he was one of two members to vote against the forced teardown and reconstruction of a new home on South Harrison after it was found to have been built less than two feet over the allowed setback line (fellow candidate and Board of Adjustment member Paul Schaefer voted in favor of forcing the home to be torn down). I hope that occasion has left an imprint of just how restrictive our zoning can be and the real costs it levies on Kirkwood’s residents.

McLean also seems to harbor some concerns that, if acted upon, would undercut our mission to improve Kirkwood’s housing policy. He has real concerns that adding additional homes might exasperate what he already sees as a parking problem, and he also raised his hand in agreement that Kirkwood would be better off without The James, which has done more to improve Kirkwood’s affordability than any single other project over the past decade. McLean later tried to walk back that statement, stating that he thought Kirkwood would be better off without The James because he wanted something better and more affordable in its place, but I think that betrays a basic misunderstanding of how housing policy works. The Council doesn’t get to dictate the perfect project to developers. They set the rules and incentives at play and then choose the best route forward from the available options. For The James, that was either 152 apartments that would provide some of the most affordable homes in all of Kirkwood or nothing, not some hypothetical third thing. I hope, if elected, McLean will come to accept that tradeoffs can’t be dealbreakers and the perfect can’t be the enemy of the good.

Those reservations aside, McLean earns his endorsement on the merits of his vocal support for things like Accessory Dwelling Units, missing middle housing, building code reform, and his openness to allowing development along the Grant’s Trail extension (“The more we can do [along the trail], the better. If there are places for housing along the trail that are reasonable and common sense, that makes sense for the residents of Kirkwood and that particular area, for sure.”)

McLean even goes so far as to cite Minneapolis and Austin as two examples we should look to. These are the right reference points as both cities are poster children for how unlocking supply can help solve the issue of affordability. He might need some tutoring, but I think McLean is undoubtedly someone we can work with.

3. Ron Ruzicka

My third choice is Ronal Ruzicka. Ruzicka is the candidate of choice for the Safer Streets for Kirkwood/Connect Our Community pedestrian safety crowd. He is also, ostensibly, a member of Kirkwood for Everyone, the attainable housing group that organized February’s candidate forum (although he has only attended one meeting and had no say in the group’s decision to endorse him) and even attended a Kirkwood Gadfly Happy Hour back in the fall.

Those social connections are not enough to garner the Gadfly endorsement on their own, but I do think they demonstrate that Ruzicka is supremely interested both in learning about these issues and aligning himself with the causes we care about here.

Ruzicka does have a lot to learn (while not a central tenet of his campaign, Ruzicka does seem broadly hesitant about development downtown in a way that cuts directly against his goals of improving walkability). But he also seems at least intellectually curious about affordable housing issues, and I believe in his capacity to grow. I am particularly encouraged by his support for granting density and height bonuses in exchange for affordable units and his seeming support for allowing housing along Grant’s Trail (which aligns nicely with his focus on walkability.

More than anything else, though, my hope is that by supporting him, we can help build the natural coalition between pedestrian safety advocates and attainable housing folks and make a housing champion out of Ruzicka yet.

How to Support

Okay, so now that you’ve made your decision, how can you support your candidate of choice? First and foremost, you can vote for those candidates and encourage your friends and family to do the same. Most people have no idea who these people are or even that there’s an election coming up. If you’ve read this far, you’re probably the most knowledgeable person in your peer group and could exert considerable sway, especially in a non-partisan, low-turnout election such as this one is likely to be. You can also volunteer to put out yard signs or knock on doors, donate money, or reach out to candidates to get a sign in your own yard. All of these things are pretty marginal, but there is evidence that they do indeed help, especially in an election where a couple of hundred votes could decide what Kirkwood will be and for whom.

If you feel so inclined, you can do basically all of these things (besides vote!) by contacting the candidates through their websites or email addresses listed below:

Bob Sears: https://www.bobsearsforkirkwood.com/

Mark McLean: mmclean@mlklaw.com

Ron Ruzicka: https://www.ronruzicka.com/

Why Not Four?

I’ve only chosen to endorse three candidates for a few reasons. First, I want to make sure that I’m endorsing candidates that I’m supremely confident will support the causes I care most about, making it easier to build and improving our community’s walkability. I’m less confident in my ability to accurately distinguish between the remaining three candidates’s positions on these issues. Second, I hope that by leaving a slot open, I’ll give you room to vote for a candidate who prioritizes other issues that you care about (I encourage you to make your case in the comments below) or who you have a personal connection with without feeling like you’re abandoning your commitment to The Swarm (I jest). Third, I hope that by not ruling anyone out, I’ll leave the door open to working with them should they happen to be elected. Housing and transportation are topics that often present counter-intuitive solutions. Just because I think a candidate didn’t whisper the right magic words on a Sunday in February doesn’t mean I don’t think the candidate can learn about the issues and demonstrate growth once elected. Finally, I’m worried that if I endorse a full suite of four candidates, I could end up hurting Sears’s, Ruzicka’s, and McLean’s chances of winning. I talked about this in my overview of Kirkwood’s electoral system, but every candidate for City Council is competing against every other candidate. I’d hate to accidentally boost my fourth-place choice past my first three (especially because the fourth-place candidate will only be elected to a truncated two-year term).

The Best of the Rest

How should you use your fourth vote? That’s entirely up to you, but to make the process a little easier, below are some reflections on the three other candidates in the race. These candidates didn’t quite make the cut for various reasons, but the most prevalent is their common decision to make the curtailment of development an explicit part of their platform. That’s not to say that they don’t have some great qualities or ideas or that you shouldn’t consider voting for them (you should). It’s just to say their vision doesn’t yet align with what I think is best for Kirkwood.

(In alphabetical order)

Gina Jaksetic

Gina Jaksetic served on the council from 2008-2016. The Great Financial Crisis and its subsequent long slow recovery halted almost any new development proposals from coming before the Council during those two terms, so it’s hard to glean too much from Jaksetic’s voting record. She did provide one of the only two Council votes against the acquisition and demolition of the old Mel Bay store for public parking, which was, in retrospect, undoubtedly the right call.

On the issue of housing, Jaksetic seems torn between really not liking apartment buildings and understanding that we can’t ban them entirely. When asked for one thing she had changed her mind about, Jaksetic offered:

“The last week or so, I’ve been driving around Kirkwood looking for a place for our daughter, and I’ve really noticed there are condos, townhomes, in the neighborhoods, and it’s one of those things that I, you know, I kind of always bristle at, but I realize the neighborhood I live in, off of Harrison, we have several up and down [the street], and they really are integral to our neighborhood. South Van Buren has some I didn’t even realize, and obviously, there’s some off of Kirkwood Road. So I do think there’s pockets where we can blend them into the neighborhood. None of them necessarily are affordable, but we can begin to work on that as well. But I have changed as I’ve looked at some of your information, there is a place for it. We just have to really do our due diligence and make the right decisions for the overall community.” Bristling at the thought of multifamily housing is not ideal, but it’s at least nice to hear that she might be coming to terms with its utility.

Unfortunately, when asked about specifics on what kind of new housing she would find acceptable, Jaksetic seems to bristle more times than not. At the candidate forum, she stated that she thought The James was a mistake, rejected the idea of offering a height and/or density bonus in exchange for more affordable units, and was the only candidate who disagreed that housing would continue to get more expensive and less attainable without further changes to our zoning code.

Jaksetic also expressed hostility towards urbanity more generally, stating, “The reason [suburbs] grew was individuals wanting to escape the noise, density, crime, and disease associated with 19th-century cities… So history seems to kind of repeat itself even as we try to move forward. …And given pandemics, high rises, and some of that risk, public health is an issue these days.” If you think multifamily housing poses a public health risk, I fear it will be difficult to convince you that its approval is good and necessary.

If elected, I hope we can work with Jaksetic to prioritize support for small businesses, a central theme of her campaign, by making the case that allowing the development of new retail spaces (preferably on the ground floors of mixed-use buildings) drives down market rents for commercial tenants (much as new housing does for residential tenants). Alternatively, if our retail development stagnates, retail rents rise, and only big chains with established business models can afford to compete. Successful YIMBYism has many fathers, and there’s plenty of room for the local business community to be one of them.

Al Rheinnecker

Al Rheinnecker is the chairman and former CEO of American Piping Products and previously served on Kirkwood’s Citizens Finance Committee, but he’s perhaps most well known as the owner of the large brick home across Jefferson from the Library. That last detail might sound irrelevant, but I think it colors many of both Rheinnecker’s strengths and weaknesses as a candidate. He’s a guy who values living in a walkable neighborhood and who, perhaps in contrast to Jaksetic, clearly isn’t opposed to the urban typology.

Unfortunately, he also seems to have centered his campaign on a policy proposal that would make it harder for those positive aspects of urbanism to proliferate. That proposal is to place “a pause on the development of large downtown Kirkwood apartments and condominiums until we can evaluate how the addition of the nearly 200 new housing units under construction impacts the city.” And he’s not being shy about it. The policy is mentioned on his website, he brought it up at the Candidate Forum, and the Webster-Kirkwood Times mentioned it as one of the central themes of his campaign.

This is even more disappointing given that Rheinnecker takes a fairly market-fundamentalist conservative approach on other topics, which could be of tremendous service if applied uniformly. Government over-regulation and red tape in the form of zoning rules, building codes, and the discretionary approvals process are huge contributors to our affordability problem, and removing those barriers to improve market efficiency should be in Rheinnecker’s wheelhouse (as should the elimination of the city’s numerous implicit subsidizations of driving as a mode of transportation).

Alternatively, a development moratorium in Downtown Kirkwood would restrict the market, leaving the citizens of Kirkwood poorer and worse off. And when the moratorium ends, what will we have learned? I think that North Kirkwood Road is probably a much more economically productive and popular place to be than it was before The James and Kirkwood Apartments, but that there are also slightly more cars on the road. Then what? Do we extend the moratorium? Or do we open things back up, having lost five years in which we could have made progress? A moratorium might be good politics (which is why it scares me), but I think it’s very poor policy and enough to take Rheinnecker out of the running for an endorsement on its own.

And that’s a shame because, having talked to him on several occasions, Rheinnecker still strikes me as a candidate who is open to having his mind changed, who is open to other forums of new housing in Kirkwood, who wants to improve pedestrian safety, and who is interested in implementing the sort of technocratic fixes that we need. I hope as he learns more about housing, he’ll come to realize that his first instinct really was the right one: We need the government to be less involved, not more, most especially in the most economically productive corner of our city.

Paul Schaefer

Paul Schaefer has served on both the Planning & Zoning Committee and the Board of Adjustment for Kirkwood and counts himself a member of the Chamber of Commerce and both the Rotary and Optimist Clubs. In other words, he’s a very well-connected guy.

The central issue of Paul Schaefer’s campaign is the retention of our firefighters and police officers (he’s been endorsed by both unions), which he says we are losing to municipalities like Wentzville, which have begun to offer better compensation over the past decade.

On issues closer to our bailiwick, Schaefer’s heart seems to be in the right place, he wants Kirkwood to be a more affordable and attainable place to live, but he also seems unwilling to make the decisions and accept the tradeoffs that would bring those desires to fruition. Schaefer agrees we need more homes but referred to The James as a monstrosity. He believes that ADUs could be part of the solution but that we shouldn’t eliminate the extra parking spot required to build them or relax setback requirements they’re beholden to. Perhaps most damning of all, though, in his Webster-Kirkwood Times biography, he lists banning buildings over three stories tall as a top priority. That might sound semi-reasonable to a lot of folks, but such a ban would mean no Station Plaza, no James, no Aria, no Kirkwood Apartments, no Hutton, Barclay, or Madison, and no Aberdeen Heights, and a poorer, less walkable, less vibrant Kirkwood overall.

I remain hopeful that Schaefer would be responsive to the idea that more development would mean more property taxes, which would mean more revenue for our police and fire departments, and that more homes in Kirkwood would mean more homes for our first responders. Some of them might even be happy to live on the fourth floor.