A Cole County judge has ruled that the 2025 law that requires the City of St. Louis to give 25% of its general revenue to its police department by 2028 does not violate Missouri’s constitution.
In an opinion issued Monday, Judge Daniel Green wrote that even though the state budget does not include any additional money for those minimum funding provisions, an exception to the Hancock Amendment for state-appointed Board of Police Commissioners means the minimum funding is not an unconstitutional unfunded mandate.
Although voters passed that exception when Kansas City was the only department under state control, Green wrote, “other statutes remained on the books that would have put a city under board control if certain conditions were met. Thus, if the exception was meant to apply only to Kansas City, the exception would have explicitly named Kansas City.”…