The Land Clearance for Redevelopment Authority on Tuesday recommended 15 years of tax abatement for the museum, which would be an affiliate of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City. The Board of Aldermen has final say on incentives.

The $18 million museum would honor the St. Louis Stars, the local Negro League team, and Black baseball in the city, said Guyton Harvey, the developer behind the project.
Harvey bought the Jeff-Vander-Lou building, located next to Rumbold Park at 2423 North Spring Avenue, from the city’s land bank last year. The building was built in 1908 as a streetcar trouble station. It is listed in the National Register of Historic Places, a designation that will enable Harvey to use state and federal historic tax credits.

The St. Louis Board of Aldermen is considering a bill that would provide tax abatement and a blighting study for the JeffVanderLou area — where a new Negro Leagues Baseball Museum hopes to open.
The museum, planned for 2423 North Spring Street, will be an affiliate of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City that will emphasize the role of the St. Louis Stars as well as other prominent Black baseball players who contributed to the city, developer Guyton Harvey said during a committee meeting on Tuesday.
The Stars were originally known as the Giants before the team was sold to a new owner, according to the museum. Overall the team won the Negro National League pennant (in 1928, 1930 and 1931) and the Negro National League Second Half Chamionship in 1925 and 1939. The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum is also developing the nearby Buck O’Neil Education and Research Center, which will hold a Sports Science Center, research library, technology center, exhibit space with a changing gallery, an event center and office space, according to documents provided by the St. Louis Development Corporation, which helped present the project.
Ward 11 Alderwoman Laura Keys sponsored the bill that would provide up to 15 years of tax abatement to three developments proposed in the JeffVanderLou area including the construction of 34 senior housing units and retail and a commercial building that would house the baseball museum. 
This bill was heard at the board’s Housing, Urban Development, and Zoning Committee on Tuesday. Aldermen recently passed Board Bill 174 — which went before this same committee during its legislative process — that would approve blight redevelopment in this area, teeing up the board’s use of eminent domain against Paul McKee’s developments. Bill 174 will impact 821.4 acres in the St. Louis Place, JeffVanderLou and Carr Square neighborhoods, RFT previously reported. 

Keys’ Board Bill 211 would impact scattered sites in the JeffVanderLou area and it is anticipated that at least three redevelopment projects will take place in the area of these scattered sites around Rumbold Park.