Candidate Demands 'Freedom to Have Barbecues'

“I think we need the freedom to have barbecues,” said Cynthia Davis during a telephone interview Sunday.

If you think it sounds crazy for Davis, a former state representative now serving as chair of the St. Charles County (Mo.) Republican Party, to stake her claim on the right to have a barbecue without government interference, you don’t know the half of it!

On Saturday, Davis hosted her “First Barbecue of the Spring” on the lawn in front of the Back to Basics Christian Bookstore which she owns and operates with her husband, Bernie, and several of her seven children in O’Fallon, Mo. On the menu of food items offered to invited guests was dangerously-delicious meat from T-Bones Natural Meats, suspiciously-sumptuous cakes from Susie G’s Specialty Cakes and — OMG! — chips and salsa from Chevy’s Fresh Mex .

Though several dozen people attended the early-afternoon event, Davis did not expect Rick Etherington, an environmental public health specialist from the St. Charles County Health Department, to be among them. But he showed up, explaining that he said there in response to the health department receiving calls about the barbecue on Thursday and again on Saturday.

Davis and others at the event agreed that Etherington was polite and only doing his job. It appears, however, that he was being used by someone as a pawn in a thinly-veiled effort to shut down Davis’ event and, in turn, hurt her chances of winning a seat on the board of the St. Charles County Ambulance District during elections April 5.

The ambulance district? I know, it might seem unimportant, but keep reading and you’ll understand why the matter caught my attention.

Etherington spent about an hour at the event, according to Davis, but did not shut it down. Instead, he allowed her to send a representative to the health department when it opened for business Monday morning to obtain a no-cost, after-the-fact permit for the event.

Two days after the event, one question remains: Who would want to disrupt an invitation-only barbecue on private property by calling out a health department inspector who, I’m told by one local restaurant industry insider, almost never works weekends?

All the arrows seem to point to the ambulance district paramedics represented by the Professional Firefighters of Eastern Missouri IAFF Local 2665 — and for good reason.

Fresh on the heels of contract negotiations that ended with them fairing pretty well (i.e., their wages were frozen and they lost one vacation day per year) despite a bad economy, those union paramedics don’t want a person like Davis on the board when their next round of salary negotiations with the ambulance district begins in 2012. After all, she states in her campaign literature that “She’ll ask the tough questions.”

Somewhat surprising to anyone unfamiliar with the first-responder agency is that it serves a county population of more than 350,000, according to the ambulance district’s web site. In addition, it’s board members are responsible for a 2010 budget that almost certainly exceeds the prior year which ended with expenses totaling more than $21 million and revenues at $8.1 million, according to the SCCAD’s Comprehensive Annual Financial Report for the year ended Dec. 31, 2009 available online.

Below are more interesting facts about the ambulance district:

The ambulance district’s board chair is Mark Fenton, a retired paramedic who once represented paramedics on the union side of the table during contract negotiations;

The ambulance district had to borrow $1.4 million in September 2010 just to meet payroll, according to Davis;

The district that was sued in November 2009 for hiring union contractors for their construction projects rather than selecting the lowest bidder; and

On Jan. 24, 2010, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that members of the paramedics’ union were at the center of a firestorm that resulted in allegations of union influence, threats and back-room deals on the normally-quiet board.

So, is it worth paying attention to who you elect to little-talked-about county government-level boards? You betcha, especially if you’re a conservative politician — even an 85-year-old “Potato Lady” — thinking about hosting a barbecue for friends!