Gathering enough signatures to force a recall vote isn’t easy. Under the city charter, more than 39,000 registered voters citywide — 20 percent of the number registered in the last mayoral election in 2017 — would have to sign.

Within that citywide total, petitioners would have to get 20 percent of registered voters in each of two-thirds of the city’s 28 wards.

Bosley, of the 3rd Ward, and Collins-Muhammad, of the 21st, didn’t say what election they were targeting for a Krewson recall vote. Krewson was elected to her first term as mayor in 2017.

Krewson, in response, said consolidation will result in “a stronger, more efficient, more attractive and more competitive region” and her support for it is based on her desire to provide safety and economic opportunity for all St. Louisans.

She said the St. Louis area is losing ground to other metro regions “because we spend our time fussing among ourselves.” She said “this recall effort is more internal fussing, but I get it. Self-preservation is a strong instinct.”

A spokesman for Better Together, Ed Rhode, said “it’s no surprise the opposition” to the merger proposal “continues to come from politicians trying to keep their taxpayer-funded jobs while offering no solutions of their own.”