JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) _ The city of St. Louis can proceed with a minimum wage increase after the Missouri Supreme Court struck down a state wage law on procedural grounds.

The ruling Tuesday says a 1998 law prohibiting some cities from creating their own minimum wages is unconstitutional because it was passed as part of a bill with a different subject matter.

The decision effectively reinstates a 2015 St. Louis ordinance that sought to raise the minimum wage to $10 an hour in 2017 and $11 an hour by 2018.

Missouri’s minimum wage currently is $7.70 an hour.

Tuesday’s ruling doesn’t affect other cities. That’s because a separate state law bars local minimum wages that weren’t already in place by Aug. 28, 2015 _ the date the St. Louis ordinance took effect.