News

You Say You Want A Resolution

Continued from page 2

Zlatko Cosic, multimedia artist, Shrewsbury

In 2008, at least once every month, I would love to see everyone turn off their television sets and attend a cultural or artistic event. The art community could help the overall development of St. Louis, and we can help by giving support to artists and their work. An involved community is an important force that can achieve positive results.

Joe LeGrand, butcher and owner, LeGrand's St. Louis Hills Tomboy Market

I would like to see the city encourage more small businesses to set up residency here. Small businesses make a city unique. They give the neighborhoods their personality. Places like Vintage Vinyl, Blueberry Hill, Milo's, Zia's, ServiceStar Hardware, Ted Drewes and, of course, LeGrand's. The list goes on and on. It is these small businesses that make our city different from anywhere else. I would love to see the city encourage more small businesses to come here. I'd also like to see the city promote these businesses more. It is these small businesses that make St. Louis fun, unique and memorable.

Dieta Pepsi, entertainer, St. Louis

There needs to be better barbecue in St. Louis. I'm originally from Kansas City and we have the best barbecue in the country. You'd think St. Louis, being the home of jazz, would have better barbecue. To rectify this, I would open my own barbecue stand and bring my family's barbecue recipe here. We make our own sauce and sell it in Dierbergs. It's called Gator Sauce, and my friends just love it.

Jennifer Joyce, St. Louis Circuit Attorney

I would encourage every citizen to get involved in creating safe neighborhoods. We all have a basic human right to feel safe, regardless of where we live or our economic status. My team and I are passionate about fighting for justice on behalf of victims whose lives have been devastated by violence and hatred. Involved citizens are the most powerful crime-fighting tool my office has. Although citizens may feel helpless against crime, they actually have more power than they think. I encourage people to visit our Web site for more information about becoming part of the solution: www.circuitattorney.org.

Marcia Sindel, baker and owner, La Dolce Via in Forest Park Southeast

There's a considerable population of the elderly in the city, people who bought their homes and stayed here. There are not many services for mowing their yards and getting leaves out. The old lady across the street from us just fell the other day. I've been trying to help rake her yard, but there's just too much. Now that they've cut down the street-cleaning to one day a month, you have to clean up the leaves yourself. There are so many people doing it and so few yard-waste containers. There could be an increase in yard-waste containers, or there could be a program where we put them out in recyclable bags and have the city take them out. There could be a service to help the elderly people take care of these things, and it might be a way to give people work who don't have jobs.

Kathryn Davis, novelist and writer in residence, Washington University

St. Louis drivers seem more loath to permit other drivers to merge than any other drivers in the world. They stare straight ahead with nary a glance to the right or the left, with steely, heartless resolve. (OK, I've never driven in Rome...) My solution to this deep-seated character flaw would be to advertise the fact that once a week, perhaps, somewhere in the city, an unmarked car would bestow upon an unsuspecting merge-permitting driver some sort of prize — ideally money — and that the recipient would also receive public praise. A billboard would be nice.

Kitty Ratcliffe, president, St. Louis Convention & Visitors Commission

If my leprechaun granted me any wish it would, of course, be to have all of the work on Highway 40 finished completely and beautifully — and in one night — so that a highway shutdown would not be necessary! Do leprechauns exist in St. Louis? I suppose that I have to be more realistic and realize nothing that I can do can change what will happen regarding the construction. But what we can all improve on is the way that this issue is handled. First, we have to be sensitive to how we deal with the impact that it has on our commute to work, our trips to retail outlets and restaurants, and our social interaction patterns. Road rage, chronic complaining to work colleagues and/or family and friends won't help anyone. It certainly won't endear us to anyone with whom we are in contact. For the St. Louis CVC, it is important that friends, family and business associates from outside St. Louis are not discouraged from visiting our community during this time period. So I hope that we will all use this as an opportunity to explore new routes, instead of being stuck in our old ones. I hope we will look on this as a necessary infrastructure improvement and not an unnecessary inconvenience.

Albert Watkins, attorney, Kodner Watkins Muchnick in Clayton

St. Louis needs a new police chief, one who stands behind the blue shirts.

Jenna Bauer, artist and founder, South City Open Studio and Gallery for Children

We should improve upon tolerance, acceptance and the embracing of our racial and cultural differences by creating more opportunities for connecting with one another. How? One way could be creating partnerships and exchanges between primarily African-American schools and Caucasian schools. We could offer incentive programs for groups and organizations that strive to or succeed in ending destructive tendencies that racism causes in St. Louis. We need to focus on appreciating our universal commonalities.

Mike Ocello, secretary, Mehlville school board

• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• 5
Next Page »