Greater St. Louis Area

The Greater St. Louis metropolitan area is a sprawling Midwestern urban core which grew across state lines with the expansion of the area’s namesake, St. Louis, on the Mississippi River. A population of approximately 2.8 million people occupies sixteen counties in two states. In Missouri, the region includes Crawford, Franklin, Lincoln, Jefferson, St. Charles, Warren, St. Louis City, and St. Louis County. Across the border in Illinois, Bond, Calhoun, Clinton, Jersey, Madison, Monroe, Macoupin, and St. Clair counties are part of Greater St. Louis.

Today, the area’s economic value is as high as it has ever been with many of Missouri’s biggest businesses headquartered in the area. These include Monsanto, Energizer, and Enterprise Rent-a-Car. Several other Fortune 500 companies call the area home, bolstering the region’s business credentials.

A large population, an expansive geographical reach, and an extremely lively economy combine to create Greater St. Louis’s thriving and crowded job market. For businesses hiring in the region, these conditions make it easier to attract strong applicants in response to new job postings. The scope of this metro area necessitates a thorough and demanding vetting process to ensure a good fit and protect the company.

Background checks are the most useful tool for verifying an applicant’s suitability. In metro regions such as Greater St. Louis, such checks take on even greater importance. Relying strictly on a narrow background check, such as one that looks only at records in Crawford County, can allow relevant records held elsewhere in the region to escape your notice. Instituting a metro-wide background check policy is the best way to avoid missing potentially game-changing details. 

In creating any vetting policy, your business must comply with the rules governing background checks in your state. In Illinois, a statewide “ban the box” law disallows businesses with more than 15 employees from conducting background checks until after making a conditional job offer. No such rules apply for private employers in Missouri. Illinois also disallows the consideration of arrest records, and only convictions related to potential job duties are admissible as part of employee vetting. Missouri gives employers wider discretion in hiring choices in this area as well.

By broadening your search to include relevant counties across both states in Greater St. Louis, you can significantly enhance your confidence in every hiring decision. backgroundchecks.com facilitates fast and easy record searches for many of the counties within the Greater St. Louis area. 

With our instant criminal record US OneSEARCH package, you can obtain instant data for Crawford, Franklin, Lincoln, Jefferson, St. Charles, Warren, and St. Louis counties in Missouri. For Illinois, an instant US OneSEARCH is available for Bond, Calhoun, Clinton, Jersey, Monroe, Macoupin, and St. Clair counties. Only Madison county in Illinois is not instantly available; a direct court record search for that county is available instead.

The value of the US OneSEARCH package lies in its ability to reach systems across the nation, including data from US states and Puerto Rico and Guam. For a more focused search, Missouri and Illinois-specific state searches are available, as are regional OneSEARCH packages that allow up to 5 states to be searched at once. 

Information available in these reports varies by state. Records available in Missouri include those from the Administrative Office of the Courts and the Department of Corrections. Admin Office records begin in 1999 and may include:

• Name
• Year of birth
• Offense and degree of offense
• Disposition and date

Illinois records include data from 1986 on supplied by the state Department of Corrections and include much of the same information, such as race, county of disposition, and sentence. Other record sources include both states' sex offender registries and Illinois' methamphetamine offender registry. 

By putting all the right tools at your disposal, backgroundchecks.com vetting services can be a strong part of any metropolitan hiring process. Find out how your business can tap into this powerful resource in the pursuit of the most well-rounded candidates in Greater St. Louis and beyond.