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This month, the council pitched its most ambitious idea yet: To ask voters to remove the county executive and any department head from office, with or without cause.

“The way the charter has been written and applied over the years, it’s really skewed toward the executive branch,� Republican Councilman Dennis Hancock, of Fenton, told the Post-Dispatch. “Since the council is supposed to be a coequal branch of government, it would make sense for us to at least consider what we can do if we get some bad actors.�

The first recent move came in 2019, when the council hired a budget coordinator to evaluate county spending. But over the past year, the council has picked up the pace. In November, it successfully asked voters for a few new powers, including hiring its own attorneys — after relying for years on county executive appointees for expertise and information.

And now, councilmembers are considering two more: the power to remove the executive, plus the addition of a professional county administrator, hired by the council, to handle day-to-day operations.

The moves, taken together, could turn the county executive into a figurehead. The council would gain influence over everyday county operations. Department heads, who manage such key divisions as health, streets, corrections and finance, would have to answer to the council, or face removal. That would give the council more influence over road money, public health policies, budget decisions and jail operations.

Democratic County Executive Sam Page has never had the seven-member council’s full support since he took office in 2019. And, in recent years, an anti-Page contingent has grown to include members of his own party.

Page has seen the changes coming. But he called the council’s newest effort, to gain the power to remove him, a disenfranchisement of the county’s 734,000 voters.

“It’s terrible government. It’s unprecedented, and it really works against the ability of the people to pick their county executive and to remove the county executive themselves,� Page said after the council introduced the plan.

David Stokes, a local government observer with the Libertarian Show-Me Institute think-tank, favors the changes the council has made in recent years to balance its power with the county executive’s. But the measure pending before the council allowing it to remove the executive goes too far, he said.

“To have one body of legislative officials, the council, be able to remove an independently elected official, the county executive, without any demonstration of cause, I think that would be highly, highly troubling,� Stokes said.

Republican Councilman Mark Harder, of Ballwin, said Page brought this upon himself.

“All these things that are being proposed at this point probably wouldn’t be proposed if we had an executive that was responsive to the people and the council as a whole,� Harder said.

Page’s sway dwindles

St. Louis County’s charter, first adopted in 1950, spells out broad power for the county executive. But a corruption scandal involving former County Executive Steve Stenger in 2019 threw uncertainty on the office as a whole, leading to a slew of ideas to weaken the position.

Stenger was indicted in April that year and later went to prison for accepting bribes in exchange for awarding important county contracts. The council was charged with appointing a replacement, and it picked Page, then a councilman, to serve the remainder of Stenger’s term.

Throughout the year, a special charter commission evaluated ways to fundamentally change how the county operates. Many of the same ideas the council is considering now came up then: The council needed its own attorney. Some wanted to replace the county executive with a professional administrator to oversee day-to-day operations. The council wanted more staff and power over how the county awards grants and contracts.

But little changed.

Then Page’s popularity among councilmembers began to wane.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused the first big controversies of Page’s administration, starting in 2020. Three Republicans on the council excoriated Page’s public health policy decisions, especially mask mandates and restaurant closures.

Page withstood another controversy in the summer of 2020 after he fired Hazel Erby, a longtime councilwoman who had taken a job in Page’s office as a diversity director. She was the first Black woman to serve on the council, and a prominent leader in north St. Louis County.

One of Erby’s allies, Democratic Councilwoman Rita Heard Days, of Bel-Nor, began siding with the Republicans periodically, including in opposing some of Page’s COVID-19 policies. She also said she regretted giving Page control over the first tranche of federal pandemic relief funds.

The real breaking point came after the November election in 2020 when Page’s allies on the council tried a maneuver to take the chair position, which comes with control over moving legislation. The attempt failed, but left trust broken with two North County Democrats on the council: Days and Shalonda Webb, of the Old Jamestown area.

Since then, Page has rankled the councilmembers:

• Webb clashed with him bitterly over federal pandemic relief spending.
• Page didn’t deliver on a track and field project Days wanted on the University of Missouri-St. Louis campus.
• Hancock, of Fenton, blamed Page for using the county’s senior property tax freeze program as political collateral.
• Newly seated Democratic Councilwoman Gretchen Bangert, of Florissant, accused Page of offering her a job to get her to quit the council race.
• New Councilman Mike Archer, a Republican from South County, won in a Republican primary last year where he criticized his opponent’s support for Page.
• Councilman Harder has long been a Page critic, but his opposition to the county executive deepened during the pandemic. Harder attacked Page’s public health orders that shuttered businesses, and the bitterness between the two remains.

Altogether, six out of seven councilmembers are poised to oppose Page. Only Democratic Councilwoman Lisa Clancy, of Maplewood, remains an ally.

Taking steps to seize power

The council has managed to take more autonomy in recent years with help from voters:

• In 2019, the council created a budget policy coordinator job to help evaluate county spending. Later that year, it hired Chris Grahn-Howard, who still holds the position.
• In November voters approved a measure allowing the council to hire its own attorneys. For years, the council has relied on an attorney appointed by the county executive for legal advice. Councilmembers have complained the county counselor protects the executive and stymies the council’s will. Page hired the current counselor, Dana Redwing, in early 2023.
• Also in November, voters allowed the council to take back its power to choose appointees to the Port Authority, a county agency that awards millions of dollars in grants annually.
• Voters also approved moving the day the councilmembers are seated up by a week, from the second meeting of the year to the first. Page’s council allies in 2021 used the later seating date to try and choose the council chair, who controls the flow of legislation.
• Last spring, the council began considering a bill that would ask voters if they want to replace the county executive position with a professional manager who would oversee daily business. The manager would be tasked with preparing the budget, running departments and carrying out policies set by elected officials. At least in theory, they’d be less susceptible to politics and corruption.
• And now there’s the measure that would grant the council the authority to fire the county executive, the county counselor and department heads, who have broad authority to decide how to spend money. It would take five of seven votes.

The most concerning part of the legislation is the power to remove the county executive, or appointees, “with or without cause,� said Stokes, of the Show-Me Institute.

“You could have a situation with nothing more than five members of the council deciding they don’t like the county executive, and just deciding to remove him or her,� Stokes said. “You need to have cause to overturn the will of the voters.�

Voters can technically remove the county executive, but it’s extremely difficult. First, tens of thousands of signatures — the equivalent of 10% of votes in the last gubernatorial election — have to be gathered on a petition for a recall measure to make it to the ballot.

It’s practically impossible to gather enough signatures, said Benjamin Singer, CEO of Show Me Integrity, a voter advocacy group. The council could consider making the process easier.

“If they cut the percentage in half, and tied it to votes in county elections, it would still be difficult, but more reasonable,� Singer said.

Still, some on the council have begun to reconsider the idea. A few met Tuesday morning to talk about softening the bill, said Days, the council chair from Bel-Nor.

Harder said he has another idea: Let the council put a recall measure on the ballot, bypassing the stringent petition process. The idea would need voter approval before the council could take that authority.

But time is running out to put a measure before voters: Councilmembers have until Jan. 28 to get one on April’s ballot.