Slay to call for tougher Metro security after wave of attacks
Mayor Francis Slay will join the city’s new acting police chief at City Hall today to call for tougher security at MetroLink stations. 
The push comes after a wave of assaults near the Delmar Loop, detailed in a story by Post-Dispatch transit scribe Ken Leiser, including one where a gang of at least 20 youths attacked a family at the Forest Park MetroLink station.
Alderman Lyda Krewson, whose ward includes the area around the park, has called the attacks “pretty unusual”; Blueberry Hill proprietor Joe Edwards has called them an “aberration.”
Slay, in a statement on his website, took a slightly different take, suggesting the perpetrators migrated in from the county.
“One of the many disturbing elements in the recent incidents is a report that throngs of badly intentioned youths from other municipalities have been walking across the city line from University City,” Slay writes, “and threatening customers and employees of stores and restaurants in the Loop’s eastern portion,” which is in St. Louis.
The city recently passed the century mark for the year in homicides; the last thing it needs now is seemingly random attacks at a major tourist destination.
Today’s 2 p.m. press conference will be the first joint public appearance between Slay and the department’s interim leader, Lt. Colonel Stephen Pollihan, who replaced the recently-retired Joe Mokwa.
Great.
Trying to get people to take the Metrolink is hard enough, and when you throw ‘dangerous’ into the equation, that will really keep people away.
Nice reactive management style Mr. Mayor. Why wasn’t the possible problem addressed years ago? After watching that video of the roaming gangs last nite, I’ll be taking my protection into my own hands.
Safety has been a concern forever on the Metrolink and Slay is just now calling for more security? Hey Mr. Mayor how about you stop being reactive and start being proactive.
It’s amusing enough to hear $75000-a-year (or more) jerkweeds demanding more from Security Guards lucky to make $12 an hour, but if you want to really have a laugh, ask somebody from Wackenhut Security why they lost the MetroLink contract almost immediately after it was awarded to them.
Our community has historically placed no value on private security, and over time the industry has done a great job of living down to expectations.
As long as we expect people to protect our employees, customers, and property for wages we’d never accept ourselves, we deserve what we get.
These mayors and police commanders can freaking bite me.
It sounds like Mayor Slay, as usual, is the only person in the St. Louis REGION taking a leadership stance on this. Where is Charlie? These mobs start in the county and then the county cops send them into the city. Hello Charlie, Joe Adams, Linda Goldstein? Can you hear us? It us the tax payers and we are tired of you doing NOTHING! Heck, if I could sell my house I’d consider moving into the city…at least Mayor Slay is doing something about this.
The Mayor now wants more security after there have been incidents. Why not be pro active with an event and budget for more money for this prior.
The Mayor has now gotten rid of Mokwa so that he can put a black in as Police Chief since he got rid of Chief George. This way he looks like he cares about the blacks.
Nice deflection by the Mayor, as if its not his problem that kids are walking 15 feet from the county into city limits. I mean, how can Slay do anything about that? He’s only the Mayor of St. Louis CITY?!?
And if Adams and Krewson really think these attacks are unusual, they obviously never use Metrolink.
Long time city resident here - I ride the bus everyday to the metrolink and then take the train to work. Same way home. Done it for about a year now.
Never seen a single crime or fight. Not one.
Just out of curiosity - how many of the “we need guns and armed guards on every train” people actually ride the train every day? Or is it just to the occasional ballgame, and then back home to the burbs wher you complain about the city’s “negro problem”?
The Arrogance of the Mayor is amazing! You can tell he knows he is going to be re-elected for another 4 years so he now is starting to blame the County for the City crime, he has pushed the City Fire Chief out, he has made the Police Chief resign so he could put a black in, he failed at Ballpark village, he failed at City Schools, he continues to fail,… And we continue to re-elect him. If only Clinton had won then he would have gotten his Federal Judgeship.
To “Metro Stinks”.The job I work I make less than $11.00 a hour,and havn’t had a raise in over 2 and a half years,and still do everything I’m ask to do for my job.If you can’t do what you supposed to do in your security job for $12 a hour,pack your bags for another job.Maybe you can go to Rally’s and flip burgers for $6.50 a hour.