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As the St. Louis region struggles with its division and contemplates more unity, the recent attempt by five central St. Louis County cities to create a unified fire command stands as a cautionary tale.

“It was 100 percent, pure window dressing,” says Kurt Becker.

Becker is a Clayton firefighter. He’s also the district vice president of the International Association of Firefighters Local 2665, the union that represents most of the firefighters in the five cities that considered a merger of sorts: Clayton, Brentwood, Maplewood, Richmond Heights and Rock Hill.

In late August, Rock Hill dropped out of the East Central Fire Command proposal, scuttling it for now.

That’s good news, Becker says.

It’s not that he and his fellow firefighters are against consolidation, he says. Quite the opposite. He just wants to see consolidation that makes sense.

“I’m 1,000 percent in favor of finding a better way of doing things,” Becker says. “If you look at the central county area, there’s no reason that is not one fire district. We could get rid of a lot of these duplicative positions.”