urbanSTL

Not totally opposed to this development. My main concern is lack of orientation to the street and too few residential units to take place of the housing that will be lost.

Agree or disagree?

RPA 1 [The Olive and I-170 area] and RPA 3 [the rest of Olive in U City], by reason of both a predominance of each of, as well as a combination of, defective and inadequate street layout, unsanitary and unsafe conditions, deterioration of site improvements, improper subdivision and obsolete platting constitutes a menace to the public health, safety, morals or welfare. The defective and inadequate street layout and the unsafe conditions detailed herein with respect to the roads impair safe vehicular traffic and access for emergency vehicles, constituting a menace to the public safety and welfare. The general deteriorated conditions and unsanitary conditions in the Area constitute a menace to public health and safety. As a result, the Area is a menace to public health, safety, morals and welfare in its current condition and use.

http://www.ucitymo.org/DocumentCenter/View/12601

^It's asinine, of course. But then, portions of downtown Clayton have been declared blighted.

A good lawyer can convince you that an elephant isn't really that big.

Great article about this on nextSTL today:

https://nextstl.com/2018/04/university- ... -is-wrong/

I'm all for the propositions the author makes, but how do we get those? Request an adjusted proposition, point out the requirements it doesn't meet, and deny / re-open the request for proposals until something more acceptable comes along?

I'd be probably more concerned with the plan to eminent domain, especially given Novus' track record. That and they plan on eminent domaining some of the largest landholders who seem less than impressed with the price Novus offered.

KMOV - Many residents, businesses against plan for major development along Olive in University City

http://www.kmov.com/story/37990948/many ... rsity-city

^Sounds to me like the identity of the anchor would negatively impact the chances for a TIF, so . . . deny the TIF. Makes me think it's Wal Mart.

Walmart hasn't been shy in the past. See Ellisville TIF drama. And Shrewsbury TIF.

^Valid point, but the atmosphere around TIFs is changing fast. I'm still inclined to think the lack of an ID is significant cause for concern.

Concerns about STL's unofficial Chinatown, from St. Louis Public Radio:

http://news.stlpublicradio.org/post/cur ... n#stream/0

TIF Commission Public Hearing, 7 PM, Wednesday, May 23, Mandarin House Banquet Center, 8008 Olive Blvd.

framer wrote: ↑

May 22, 2018

TIF Commission Public Hearing, 7 PM, Wednesday, May 23, Mandarin House Banquet Center, 8008 Olive Blvd.

Sounds like things got "interesting"

https://patch.com/missouri/universityci ... rsity-city

^Yeah, I was at the meeting, and that article is fairly accurate. It was hot and crowded, a few folks yelled out of turn, but overall, it was no big deal.

The TIF commission stayed long after the scheduled closing time, so they could hear everyone who signed up to speak. Lots of people were not allowed into the hall (due to lack of space), so they have scheduled an extra meeting for those who missed out.

Seemed to me that the speakers were about evenly split between yeas and nays. Clearly, many of the opponents didn't quite understand how the TIF is intended to work, or even what the various boundaries were. The head of Novus didn't help his cause by constantly talking down to the folks in the crowd. Not the most diplomatic speaker.

Very few people spoke about design issues, such as parking lots, siting, big box strip malls, etc. The overall concern was for those being displaced, allocation of tax dollars, and the potential loss of U City's ethnic enclave.

Bottom line is that the U City Council and Mayor are all very much in favor of this project, so I expect it to pass easily.

It seems like they city really wants to get this done, rightfully or not for the tax revenue. It seems like they didn't do the out reach and include the stake holders in the process. And let's just say Novus' track record isn't inspiring confidence.

There's clearly a lot of details to still flesh out, probably the biggest are the development budget and the relocation packages.

A U City councilmember fired her cleaning lady because she wrote a letter opposing the TIF. Classy:

https://www.riverfronttimes.com/newsblo ... posing-tif

I think everyone would feel a lot better about this project, given Novus' track record, if they filled in a lot more details about their plan. The cleaning lady was pissed off over the whole Sunset Hills fiasco (she was a homeowner), it seems pretty strange that the U city council member is getting paranoid about outside forces.

The only party that makes sense as the "outside forces" is the one Vietnamese property owner who owned a significant chunk of that stretch. Anyone else have any ideas?