St. Louis city leaders got a win in court today in their ongoing battle with the state-appointed Board of Police Commissioners. Judge Joan Moriarty denied the board’s request that $67.5 million be added to their coffers this fiscal year, which ends in about a month.
The Police Board had sought to lay claim under state statute to not just 22 percent of the city’s general fund, but also the city’s Rams settlement funds and 22 percent of its fiscal reserves Moriarty wasn’t buying its argument. “The court finds that general revenue only includes current income of the fiscal year in question and does not include income from prior years,” she wrote—which “uncontradicted evidence” shows both the Rams funds and accumulated reserves to be.
Mayor Cara Spencer had previously said that moving that sum to the police away from other city services in such a short timeframe would be absurd…