After reading this, I don't think I could ever choose to live in St. Louis County or Missouri

[CreekDog]

It's not the only place with problems like this, but these problems are well described, documented and pervasive.

Knowing this, I just could not willingly live there. And I'm white and I have enough resources to mostly choose where to live, but I'm as scared to live in communities that harass black folks as I'd be if they harassed white folks.

How municipalities in St. Louis County, Mo., profit from poverty

...

One might think that a town with those sorts of problems would at least be hospitable to the businesses in the area, to attract revenue from business licenses and sales tax. But Antonio Morgan says that isn’t the case. Morgan — the same man who was arrested for child endangerment for leaving his kids in his car outside the Hazelwood court — owns a car repair shop in Pine Lawn. But here too he says he faces regular harassment.

Morgan says that over the last few months, his employees have been cited and fined by Pine Lawn police five times for operating a business without a license. Morgan has a license for his business, but it’s in his name. The citations are happening when he isn’t there.

“The police come by and ask to see the license. A couple times, the guy working for me didn’t know what they were talking about, so they wrote him up. The other times, they showed the cop the license, but it was in my name.”
...

Michelle Monahan is a former St. Louis County public defender who now works for the federal public defender’s office in St. Louis. She met Morgan in 2008 and has represented him pro bono in several cases over the years. “About 75 percent of the times that I’ve talked to Antonio in person, he’s been wearing work clothes,” she says. “He’s a husband, a father. I know few people who work as hard as he does. And I know of even fewer people who have had to put up with as much as he has.”

...

Morgan’s plan is more concrete. “I need to get out of here,” he says. “I’m saving up to move my business out of Pine Lawn. Maybe get a bigger garage. This is just no way to live.”



http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2014/09/03/how-st-louis-county-missouri-profits-from-poverty/?tid=trending_strip_6

[CreekDog]

1. I still wouldn't!