Because of a wording error in an ordinance passed more than a year ago, St. Louis aldermen again are considering whether to give a redevelopment firm condemnation powers along a three-block stretch of 39th Street south of Interstate 44.
About 150 people packed into a meeting room at City Hall on Wednesday for an aldermanic committee hearing on the proposal, sponsored by Alderman John Koch, D-8th Ward.
The hearing by the Housing, Urban Development and Zoning Committee lasted almost six hours, with 25 people and Koch testifying in favor and 27 speaking against it.
Committee Chairman Martie J. Aboussie, D-9th Ward, said a vote on the bill would be held at a later meeting.
Koch said aldermen thought they had approved eminent domain previously for the project but discovered later that the version before the board did not include the proper wording.
Supporters, including the Shaw Neighborhood Improvement Association, said the revived ordinance would allow the area to replace an obsolete business area no longer economically viable with new residential development.
The area includes several buildings with both commercial establishments and apartments. Koch said all but three of the buildings in the area had already been bought by the developer, the 39th Street Redevelopment Corp.
Opponents include the Rev. Larry Rice of the New Life Evangelistic Center and some owners of and tenants in buildings that would be bought.
They complained that low-income people would be unfairly forced out of their residences to make way for townhouses that would be too expensive for current residents to afford.
Koch said in an attempt at compromise that he and the 39th Street Redevelopment Corp. would agree to an amendment allowing one well-kept building in the area to remain as long as ownership and usage did not change.
That building is owned by Howard Holland and contains a music shop, an educational outreach center and two apartments, Koch said.
But Rice said that didn’t solve the problems of tenants of other buildings that would be affected.
Shaw Archives 