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Thanks for joining us for Last Call where we broach the topics we couldn't find time for in the first 30 or so minutes.

Wendy, we go to St. Peters, Missouri, where, you know, in this day and age, people are concerned about bees and pollinators and how their numbers seem to be dwindling.

And one thing we can do to grow the population of bees, for example, is to have sunflowers and flowers that these bees like.

Well, a guy in St. Peters has covered his front lawn with sunflowers and it's turned out to be very controversial going back and forth with city hall.

In this day and age, should homeowners and subdivisions kind of revise the rules so that yeah, if a guy wants to plant sunflowers, that's good for the planet.

I I know that HOAs are not terribly popular in 2025.

They were not terribly popular a long time ago.

Um, but they are there for a reason.

Now, having said that, now stop.

Having said that, having said that, I'm like, follow the bouncing ball.

I was all prepared to just think this guy is a, you know, he's just a mal content.

He's messing it up for the entire subdivision.

But the way city hall seems to have handled this is not good at all.

They, you know, we're going to we're going to lower the boom on you and you're not going to get away with this anymore and then they, you know, they they will they will discontinue uh a proceeding or they will cancel a proceeding entirely, a court proceeding.

And so he continues to try to make the neighborhood okay with what he's doing.

At least it sound from the sound of the the story.

Um I I like people who follow rules, but I feel for this I felt for this guy after I read the story because he is trying to abide by the rules.

They keep kind of moving the line.

So leave his sunflowers alone as long as the neighbors are okay with >> and you know I think he should hire Pam Bondie's brother.

>> His sunflowers will be 27 feet tall.

You know um because of that whole HOA thing.

You know, I don't know where to go with this other than to say to have a quirky neighbor and I don't.

So, I it's easy for me to say, but don't neighborhoods need stuff like that?

Maybe just, you know.

>> Oh, that's very granola, Mr. California.

>> If it's not good enough for Kirkwood, >> and it's not like I say, and it's not next door to me, right?

So, it might be a little different, but >> it wouldn't bother me at all.

>> But, I mean, sunflowers, that's what I'm saying.

Sunflowers, it's all good.

>> You know, it it I I agree with you.

And I think sunflowers are fine, but people get all upset about these little things with their neighbors that you look at and go, that's such a micro offense here.

But people get all wrapped up.

And you know, I I remember people would call me when somebody's house was pink.

>> They go, they got a pink house next to me.

They go, well, that's really not so bad.

On the other hand, some people take things to an extreme.

Well, >> and I talked to them and say, "No, you really ought to like move to Jefferson County or something where where you you don't have neighbors right by >> or, you know, you could just move to the city of St. Louis.

Like everything's kind of loosey goosey in the city.

There's a a house in um on Shaw Avenue on the hill where this guy has a yard full of sunflowers."

And I think in the city of St. Louis, wisely, we realize we have bigger problems than trying to go after this guy.

And he's doing just fine.

And it's not even a problem because those sunflowers, I believe, remediate uh polluted soil, do they not?

>> I think they do.

And they have a pretty short bloom time.

Like, you know, this this yard is absolutely wild for like a month and then it's gone.

>> Well, some somebody's child will be stung by a bee that came to the sunflowers and that'll be a big >> Call Brad Bondi, right?

I think Alfred Montgomery is going to grow marijuana in his front yard.

>> Yeah.

>> He may be celebrating.

Who knows?

or singing the blues, one or the other.

Alvin, I want to ask you about the St. Louis public schools.

Uh, your paper, the St. Louis American, ran an op-ed piece by Ray Cummings, who's a union representative who said that the superintendent has to meet with the teachers in the community before closing 37 of 68 schools as announced in July.

Uh, but truth be told, despite that column, I mean, schools have to be closed, right?

Right.

I mean, you can get all the input you want, but the population of students has just declined such that, hey, we've got like 23 schools now with less than 200 students.

>> Yeah.

Well, but of course, the teachers union is right.

There should be some consultation as to what schools are going to be closed.

I don't think they're saying that every school should remain open because some schools are just empty and they need to be repurposed and they need to be redone.

But here's the thing.

We also had an editorial this week that said like whatever the discussion is on closing schools, it should not be led by Milis Borisade.

Millisent Borsche should not be the superintendent of SLPS.

Um some of the same leaders that backed, you know, Cara Spencer's campaign and it was all in the name of a better St. Louis need to come together, raise enough money to buy her out of her contract and send her along her way.

The leadership of SP SLPS right now is up not up to the task of what needs to be done in the wake of tornado.

She needs to go.

That's just >> that's the third week in a row you've said that.

You've made your point.

But >> apparently he hasn't.

She's being appointed to blue ribbon panels, >> right?

She's not the issue.

The issue is there's I mean, no matter who's in that job, they're going to have to close the schools so she can show up at a public meeting or someone else can.

>> Well, well, we need we need someone who can speak to the community with a little more authority than Millisent Borisade and say, "We have to shut about half the schools.

We're trying to save the school system."

And Millicent Borishade just is not the person to do that.

>> And she was just a warm body.

That is the only reason that she is there today.

Well, I think that this was the Tony Cousins and Matt Davis uh kind of middle finger salute to the >> the citizens that if you're going to criticize us for hiring uh Dr. Stewart >> here's Millicent Borishade.

Yeah.

How you like doing that?

>> I think we we just don't want to close these schools.

We don't have the political will to close the schools.

So it's like okay let's you know you've got to consult all these voices before you do it and you know we we'll get this giant committee assembled and that's going to slow down the works and that gives us all what we want which is the status quo which >> no I really do think that schools will close there will be some school but isn't Ray Cummings somewhat uh compromised in this because he represents teachers and they're going to lose jobs so of course he wants to slow things down but they said that that even with the tornado when the schools that were closed they didn't know teacher lost their job so that this doesn't mean that a lot of teachers will lose their jobs.

The school people are not better use of the school >> and they ought to have a voice in it anyway even if uh their union leader is compromised as you say Charlie you have to talk to the teachers >> and and that I've never understood the whole yes well the police union in St.

They're they they represent the police officers.

Who else are you going to listen to?

I want to listen to the teachers.

I don't want to dismiss or uh denigrate anything that they have to say.

>> Sarah, I want to ask you about the vaccination rate in the state of Missouri.

It's it's low.

It's lower than the national average.

It used to be about 95% and now it's going down.

>> City of St. Louis is only 74% right now.

St. Charles County is 95% something like that.

But for some reason, perhaps because Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is kind of an antivaxer at times and he's in the president's cabinet.

The information about the importance of vaccines has been muddied.

Do you think that a kindergartenner or someone who wants to enter kindergarten without the measles, reubella or mumps vaccine should get into class?

>> I got to say yes.

And I understand it's a huge problem for these kids that are getting vaccinated.

We no longer are going to have her immunity and that's dangerous for all of us.

But just because a kid's parents are selfish or idiotic and don't want to vaccinate their kids doesn't mean we should deny that kid an education.

If we get these 5-year-olds and they're not getting to go to school and they're left in the hands of somebody who's not a motivated homeschooling parent, that seems like the problems with Missouri are going to get awful bad awful quick.

>> Well, you know, before she resigned, uh Dr. Maddie Davis, who was the city health director, put this warning out there.

like last February that we are to a point now where this is like alarming and it's going to cause some health problems.

I think you have to find a way.

Maybe you use one of the closed schools to send all the anti-vaccinated kids to the same school.

And I know that sounds like typhoid asylum area, but at the same time, I just, you know, I I don't think that you have to >> cowttow to just some very very serious nonsense, right?

Right.

You know, I you got to do something and and I think if it is the step that the kid can't start school if he's not got his initial rounds of vaccinations, then that's just the way it's got.

It's hard because you got two groups of people who aren't vaccinating their kids.

You have some people who are uneducated and you have a group of highly educated people who are uh you know the crunchy granola moms or whatever they're called.

And you know, you have to try to re I have a daughter-in-law who's not quite there, but uh you know, is a believer in that sort of stuff.

>> Well, that I mean, that's great.

But you know what?

We had a big problem in the United States and we all decided to get vaccinated.

Not we, but our parents and their parents decided, no, you're getting vaccinated and we eliminated this stuff and now it's making a comeback for one reason because kids aren't vaccinated.

That's enough for me to say we got to take action.

We got to take it now.

>> I'm afraid that's all the time we have for this program.

Thank you, Elvin.

Thank you everybody and thank you for joining us.

We'll see you next week at this time.