A few weeks ago, I posted my belief that St. Louis city and county should merge – instantly changing our population size, making us the 7th largest city in the nation. Our crime statistics would instantly drop – we’d no longer be one of the most dangerous cities in America.

Of course, all that is perception and simply messing with statistics.

The real problem seems to be that there are simply too many kingdoms in the St. Louis metropolitan area. All the various police departments, fire departments and all the associated governing bodies of each and every municipality would have to change. The city and county government structure would have to change – and change dramatically. The tax base of both the city and the county would have to change as well.

Being a life-long St. Louisan, I realize all that change is probably way too much for the powers-that-be to accept. The status quo would be turned on its head and St. Louisans in general, don’t seem to be in favor of upsetting the status quo. That’s why we continue to march down the wrong paths leading to more sprawl, more racial divides, more economic disparity and more corporations leaving the area vs. new ones moving in.

There is no simple answer. It would take a massive overhaul of the city-county governmental structure that would affect everyone who lives in this area. The only way this could ever come about would be a grass roots movement. And how does one go about starting a grass roots movement, particularly in the social media dominated world in which we live?

I guess you start a website. You begin an on-line petition movement. You start a group and try and get your voice heard. I’m going to post a comment Mark Travers made regarding my last post …

Doesn’t this sound like something worth considering?

Is there anyone out there who might be on board with this? I’ll help if I can but I’m not quite sure what we need to do. My friend Ken Underhill, who now resides in Arizona, said he’s in and ready to help start the website. That’s two, maybe three of us if Mark joins in as well.

Who’s with me? And what exactly do we do next?