New report questions potential savings of St. Louis merger

ST. LOUIS (AP) — A group of professors claim the nonprofit behind an effort to merge the city of St. Louis with St. Louis County vastly overestimated the plan’s potential savings, according to a recent report.

Webster University professor Jim Brasfield is one of the authors of a report released Monday that alleges Better Together made critical errors in its tax revenue estimates and expense projections for its plan to consolidate the city and county.

Better Together released a fiscal analysis in February that estimated the merger could save taxpayers $55 million in year one and more than $1 billion in the 10th year.

Brasfield and two University of Missouri-St. Louis professors, E. Terrence Jones and Mark Tranel, claim the merger wouldn’t save $1 billion a year, but rather only tens of millions of dollars in annual deficits, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.

Read more: http://www.newstribune.com/news/local/story/2019/apr/14/new-report-questions-potential-savings-of-st-louis-merger/774341/