TIF Vote Was Just First Step For Contentious U. City Development

UNIVERSITY CITY, MO — Backers and opponents of the tax increment financing (TIF) plan that passed in University City Thursday night both agree that the vote was only the beginning of a long process. Third Ward Councilmembers Bwayne Smotherson and Stacy Clay have promised monthly community meetings as the development progresses. Those calling for a Community Benefits Agreement have vowed to fight on, demanding the city listen to residents and live up to its promises.

Now that the plan has passed, Novus Development is set to reap about $70 million in tax breaks for its planned shopping center, likely anchored by a Costco, which will displace about 60 homeowners and dozens of small, minority-owned businesses. Big box retail stores, offices, luxury apartments and more than 2,000 parking spaces will take their place.

Taxpayers will contribute more than a third of the development's costs, mostly in the form of new sales taxes, as well as fund about $15 million of reinvestment into the Third Ward. Officials say the money will be used to improve infrastructure and boost home values, but many of the people who live in that ward say they are distrustful of the city after years of neglect.

"You have had years to fix [the deterioration of the Third Ward]," said 15-year-old Marquis Govan, who has lived in the ward his entire life. "Why didn't you fix it? Because those people look like me."

"I want investment in my neighborhood, don't get me wrong," Govan continued. "But this isn't the right type of investment." He cited other historically black neighborhoods throughout St. Louis that have been lost to development, adding that he is "appalled" the same thing could happen in U. City.

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"I oppose the TIF because my grandmother was red-lined into her house 50 years ago," Govan said. "She wouldn’t be there if you hadn’t put her there in the first place. And now you have this plan with all these supporters that don’t live where I live, that don’t drink the same water I drink, that don’t breathe the same air that I do. ... My neighbors tell me they don't support this."

But some of Govan's neighbors were there to support the project. Nicole Angieri, a homeowner in the redevelopment area, said her heart breaks when she thinks about what she will be giving up, but she nonetheless supports the proposed development.

"If I want my children to have a neighborhood as wonderful for their children as they've had, then something has to be done," she said. "Because I hear the sirens north of Olive getting closer to my quiet neighborhood. I see that my neighbors are getting older and can't care for their properties."

"What I'm here to say is I'm willing to sacrifice," Angieri continued. "I'm willing to sacrifice my quiet, safe neighborhood with the hopes that my children will have a quiet, safe neighborhood."

Many of the homeowners most immediately affected by the development seem to share Angieri's outlook, saying they've been offered good prices for their homes and are eager to start packing. But just outside of the development area, residents are worried rising property taxes and rental costs could price them out of homes they've lived in for decades.

State Sen. Maria Chappelle-Nadal, who participated in a protest outside the high school before the hearing began, said she spoke for many of those residents when she called the TIF a "Ferguson-like event."

"I do believe this is a redistribution of wealth," she told Patch. "If you look historically at communities in St. Louis that were originally African American, the same things happened. Communities of color were allowed to decay. In some cases, it was municipalities that ignored neighborhoods of color and let them decay purposely for decades. And as homes became vacant, developers swooped in."

She said a lot of people in University City's predominantly white First and Second Wards want to see this project move forward because they own property in the Third Ward. She doesn't blame them — "We live in a capitalist society," she said — but she thinks that the city should treat renters as more than commodities.

"Renters are people too," Chappelle-Nadal continued. "Renters are residents who are invested. They may not have the credit to own a home, but they matter just as much as other people."

Chappelle-Nadal said she doesn't believe the city is considering the longterm costs of the development, citing gentrification and a retail landscape shifting away from big box stores.

"I also suspect we're going to go into another recession within the next couple of years," she said. "When you have a TIF project like this, what does a recession do to a community that's already hemorrhaging residents?"

The state senator said she would like to see people lying in the streets protesting, stopping traffic, until the city starts to listen. "Black, white, Asian — people should all be standing up, in the streets protesting against it, because I think it's discriminatory," she said. "I think it's inhumane. I think it's classic gentrification."

Some, including Rev. Mike Angell, who is rector at the Episcopal Church of the Holy Communion, have called for the city's promises to be put in writing in the form of a legally-binding Community Benefits Agreement.

"If this is approved this evening, if the TIF goes forward, I confess I will be a little disappointed," Angell said. "I do think the kind of change we're hoping to see would be better supported by an independently negotiated CBA. ... If the TIF Commission approves this funding tonight...I really hope we can have a strong and robust discussion about the development agreement, and I hope that the council will be as tenacious with the developer in negotiating that agreement as they have with the folks who are proposing a CBA."

Since he spoke in favor of a CBA at a neighborhood meeting two weeks ago, Angell said he has been personally attacked by supporters of the development, calling the process "a wholly uncivil affair" in a statement on his church's website.

"I have had my motives and my integrity questioned in person, over the phone, and online by advocates of the Olive project," Angell wrote, saying that his deepest regret is that his actions may have played into a climate of incivility. "I regret the whole environment of distrust, anger, and point-scoring which has come to characterize our public life in University City. I lament that this is the way we are choosing to engage the biggest economic decision our city will make in a generation."

The city manager, Gregory Rose, called Angell and others a vocal minority, telling commissioners he saw no critical mass around the issues of gentrification or a Community Benefits Agreement. He nonetheless said he valued their input.

Rose said that 90 percent of homes in the redevelopment area are already under contract — "What we have are a willing seller and a willing buyer" — but he seemed to offer a less convincing promise regarding the city's pledge not to use eminent domain than at past hearings.

"I have talked with each of the councilmembers, and the inference from each of those discussions is that they will not use eminent domain for owner-occupied homes," he said.

Renters, for whom eminent domain is still on the table, have no such promise. Rental homes will be treated the same as businesses, the city manager said previously.

Rose said all financial information that is not proprietary has been shared with the public, "because it's the right thing to do." Notably, that does not include a financial analysis by the St. Louis Development Corporation's Jonathan Ferry.

Ferry has previously scored projects in St. Louis City, and his reports typically show projected rates of return for projects with and without public assistance.

In cases where Ferry has evaluated TIFs in St. Louis City, his work is almost always presented publicly, and Ferry himself is usually present to explain his findings. While the secrecy surrounding the report has been previously reported, Patch has learned the report was not even shared with TIF Commissioners.

TIF Commission member Glenn Powers, who also serves as chief of staff to St. Louis County Executive Steve Stenger, told Patch he would have liked to have seen Ferry's analysis, but that the city did not provide it. Powers said he voted no because he believed the TIF was "too rich" for the developer.

Before recommending the TIF's approval, Rose called the city's outreach to residents and business owners "unprecedented."

Patricia Washington, one of the chief advocates of a Community Benefits Agreement, scoffed at that assertion.

"It may be unprecedented for University City," she said, and vowed to fight on. "The approval of the TIF was not unexpected. Not at all. This was a done deal. But for us this was phase one. This is a 23-year process. There are legal avenues available to pursue. There are civil avenues available to pursue. People can be voted out of office."

Lede Photo: University City Mayor Terry Crow speaks in favor of the proposed TIF Thursday night. "This proposal was about two things," he said. "It was about stabilizing and increasing our tax base. And it was about allocating funds for investment in the Third Ward to help our citizens." (All photos by J. Ryne Danielson/Patch)