Categories
Missouri Legislature North St. Louis Northside Regeneration

Distressed Areas Land Assemblage Tax Credit Act Back, Still Seems to Benefit Only McKee

by Michael R. Allen

On Monday, Missouri House Speaker Rod Jetton convened a bipartisan group of House leaders to forge a compromise version of the controversial economic development bill (HB 327) that Governor Matt Blunt vetoed. The new bill, which may be heard by the end of August or in September during a special “veto session,” includes a modified version of the Distressed Areas Land Assemblage Tax Credit Act.

The modified version has reduced overall eligible project size to 50 acres, a move that still seems to benefit only developer Paul J. McKee, Jr.’s north side land assemblage project while bailing McKee out from the political problems of pursuing a larger plan. No other developer could qualify for the revised version, which seems even more helpful to McKee’ project than before while recuperating some of the rhetoric of critics of the Distressed Areas Land Assemblage Tax Credit Act

Categories
North St. Louis Preservation Board The Ville

Mayor Slay Makes Case for Preserving Doctor’s Building in the Ville

by Michael R. Allen

MayorSlay.com is ahead of Ecology of Absence in making the case for preservation of at least one of the buildings in the Ville whose fate will be considered at Monday’s Preservation Board meeting. I’m certainly not complaining.

Writing about the Doctor’s Building, the mayoral voice states:

After neighbors and the alderman noticed the demo and reported it, the City’s buildings inspectors ordered the owner to stop. If he wishes to continue, the building’s owner will have to make a persuasive case for demolition before the Preservation Board.

Given its place in our history and the fact the federal historic designation makes tax credits available for the building’s rehabilitation, I can’t imagine what that case would be.

Read more here.

Categories
People

We Need More People Like NiNi Harris

by Michael R. Allen

This past Sunday, people flocked to the St. Stanislaus Kostka Church complex on North 20th Street for their annual Summer Picnic. Many of these people were there to purchase the new book Unyielding Spirit: The History of the Polish People in St. Louis and meet its author, historian NiNi Harris. NiNi’s book signing line was steady throughout the day.

Unyielding Spirit was definitely the main attraction, but NiNi is worth a lot of attention. Over the last thirty years, NiNi has gained a vast knowledge of the people and places of this city, especially her native south St. Louis. Her recall is quick, and her details usually precisely remembered. She likes to tell good stories, too — the hallmark of a great historian. NiNi seems possessed by a desire to see that the people and places of this city live forever.

NiNi shares both knowledge and passion through frequent walking tours, lectures, seven books, over 600 articles and what must be millions of conversations. The remarkable thing is that she is self-employed, having never sought the safety and salary of nonprofits, government or the other places historians’ circumstances usually lead them.

Above all, NiNi remains approachable and joyful about her work — and modest. She actually called me on Monday to thank me for stopping by her book signing.  (Unyielding Spirit is available for sale through St. Stanislaus Kostka and at the Chatillon-DeMenil House shop.)

Categories
Media People

Reading

SLU’s Long, Slow Mistake (Built St. Louis): Rob Powers discusses the demolition of the livery stable on Locust Street.

Sunset Hills Teardown, Revised (B.E.L.T.): Toby Weiss finally gets to repost her tribute to the Brinkop House — because it has a new owner who is renovating it!

Steal Das Book (Riverfront Times): Kathleen Mclaughlin details the complicated question of the provenance of a book that a German museum wants back from a St. Louis book dealer.

Categories
Missouri Legislature North St. Louis Northside Regeneration

Kinder Blogs, V-logs on Distressed Areas Land Assemblage Tax Credit Act Proposal

by Michael R. Allen

Missouri Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder has a blog entry with video:
Revitalizing Our Cities Can Happen If We Work Together. The blog entry and video address the Distressed Areas Land Assemblage Tax Credit Act, part of the economic development bill vetoed by Kinder’s supposed cohort and fellow Republican Governor Matt Blunt.

Kinder’s video includes footage of buildings on Chouteau Avenue that are already under renovation, as well as dramatic shots of him looking over a parapet apparently at Vin de Set.

Categories
Fire North St. Louis Old North

The Strength of Old North

Some neighbors in Old North went through a kitchen fire on Saturday. The fire did not do major damage to their house, but did take out their power lines and ability to occupy the house. However, the response to the fire was classic Old North. I was at an event when I received a message from my neighbor Barbara telling me of the damage. Immediately, I left the event to help my neighbors. I arrived to find a crew of neighbors already tackling the job of gutting the fire-damaged areas. My neighbors were in good spirits.

Barbara immediately turned her attention to the job of boarding up the damaged doorway and windows on the first floor of the rear wall, where the fire was most extensive. Another neighbor who is a general contractor was set to handle the matter after visiting the prisoner he is mentoring, but we decided to give him a good break. Barbara and I joined neighbors James and David to frame our the affected openings and to cut and screw in playwood. When we all left, the house was secure and its residents could focus on other tasks at hand. The board-up took less than two hours, due to the knowledge of the group — all of us had framed our board-ups before.

Only in Old North? Perhaps not. The response nonetheless demonstrated the unique talents of my neighbors, our get-it-done attitude and the prevalent concern for our neighbor’s needs. Ours is a strong neighborhood spirit, and one on which to count when times are tough. We take the communitarian spirit of a village and add the know-how and street smarts of a city. This is a great neighborhood!

Categories
Brick Theft St. Louis Board of Aldermen

Bosley Wants to Get Strict With Brick Dealers

Alderman Freeman Bosley, Sr. (D-3rd) has introduced Board Bill 232 to increase the regulation of brick recyclers in the city of St. Louis. The bill has two aims:

– To require that brick dealers videotape all transactions on their yards, keep the tapes for thirty days afterwards and make tapes available to the police department.

– To limit the hours of operation of brick yards so that they close at 6:00 p.m. on Fridays and do not reopen until 5:00 a.m. on Monday.

Bosley’s bill imposes the punishment of fines not to exceed $500.00 and imprisonment not to exceed ninety days for each violation of the bill by a dealer.

These measures are practical and seem to be effective steps to combat the rising tide of brick theft that is decimating vacant buildings in St. Louis Place, JeffVanderLou and Hyde Park. While the theft occurs at all hours, theft is increased during late night and weekend hours, and most thieves lack storage space and money, and thus quickly sell the stolen goods to yards. Late-night sales are not uncommon at some yards.

While the bill does not harm dealers in the suburbs who are also buying stolen brick, perhaps it will inspire ordinances in St. Louis County and other areas where dealers operate. The punishment called for in Bosley’s bill may also not be severe enough to serve as a major deterrent. However, the provision for use of cameras will no doubt have a major impact on the incomes of those who profit from dealing stolen bricks.

Hopefully, the Board of Aldermen will swiftly pass Bosley’s bill.

Categories
North St. Louis Preservation Board The Ville

Thirty-Nine Demolition Permits in The Ville on July Preservation Board Agenda

The preliminary agenda for the monthly meeting of the city’s Preservation Board (to be held Monday, July 23) contains many demolition permits:

For preliminary review:

4232 and 4234 Aldine; 1707, 1709, 1711, 1717, 1820, 1824, 1825 and 1826 Annie Malone; 1922 Belle Glade; 3950, 4320 and 4448 Cote Brilliante; 4547 Cottage; 4409, 4411 and 4417 Garfield; 4549, 4551 (front) and 4551 (rear) Kennerly; 4402 Maffitt; 4147, 4153,
4220, 4224, 4234, 4446 and 4649 Dr. Martin Luther King; 4357, 4446, 4617 and 4559 North Market; 4364 St. Ferdinand; 1825, 2510 and 2512 N. Taylor; 3013 Vine Grove, all in the Ville historic district.

On appeal:

Residential buildings at 3911 and 3961 Blair Avenue in the Hyde Park historic district;

A two-and-a-half-story storefront and apartment building at 4635 Martin Luther King Drive in the Ville historic District;

A two-story storefront building at 5286-98 Page Boulevard in the Mount Cabanne/Raymond Place historic district;

A two-story rectory at 4716 Vermont Avenue in the Central Carondelet Historic District.

Also on the agenda are five nominations to the National Register of Historic Places.

Categories
Clearance Housing North St. Louis Northside Regeneration Pruitt Igoe

Pruitt-Igoe Demolition as Seen in "Koyaanisqatsi"

Someone has posted a long segment from Godfrey Reggio’s 1983 film Koyaanisqatsi that includes the famous aerial footage of the vacant housing project and the explosion-based demolition that took down the entire complex between 1972 and 1974.

The Pruitt-Igoe sequence begins at 2:49.

Thirty-three acres of the originally 57-acre Pruitt-Igoe site at the southeast corner of Cass and Jefferson avenues remain vacant to this day.

Categories
Historic Preservation JeffVanderLou North St. Louis Northside Regeneration

One Lovely Storefront Building in JeffVanderLou

This beautiful corner commercial building stands at the southeast corner of Glasgow and St. Louis avenues in JeffVanderLou. (The mansard-roofed tenement to the east is also worthy of appreciation.) The date is likely some time in the 1880s. The front elevation on St. Louis is clad in white Missouri limestone over a cast-iron storefront and under a galvanized sheet metal cornice. One charming detail is the recessed, chamfered storefront entrance that creates one of those delightful corner triangular stoops found on many local commercial buildings. The limestone wraps the corner on Glasgow, but after one window bay the wall is brick. Overall, the stylistic effect is Italianate.

One detail that mesmerizes me when I look at this building is on the side elevation, where the galvanized cornice ends. Here, brick corbelling continues the cornice line. However, the classical formalism of the bracketed cornice gives way to abstract masonry, where all angles are right and nary a curve can be found. The tenor of the cornice line changes sharply, but the line itself extends so that even the secondary elevation has an articulated crown. The different treatments only give the eye yet one more different element to look at — one more demonstration of the expressive qualities of 19th century architectural vernacular.

This building is large for a corner commercial building, with ample space on the upper floors for residential or office uses. It is located just two blocks east of Grand Avenue. At the corner of Grand and St. Louis, the even larger Grand-St. Louis Building, recently listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is about to undergo renovation. While blocks south and east of the corner of St. Louis and Glasgow are marked by open land and vacancy, the blocks west and north are mostly occupied and well-kept. This building is at a pivotal point in JeffVanderLou, and its future reuse is both feasible and meaningful for the neighborhood.

The building is owned by VHS Partners LLC, a holding company controlled by developer Paul J. McKee, Jr. as part of his large-scale north side redevelopment project. Hopefully its preservation is part of his plan; he is fortunate to own such a unique building with amazing potential.

Unfortunately, according to records on Geo St. Louis, the city Building Division condemned the building for demolition on May 8, 2007. A separate two-story alley building behind this building has also been condemned for demolition, although given the fact that brick thieves have removed nearly two whole walls, the condemnation is more understandable. The storefront building at the corner is in sound condition.