Old North was originally going to be in the footprint of the Northside TIF (Blairmont, one of the shell LLCs, takes its name from a property McKee bought at the intersection of Blair and Montgomery in the neighborhood). But neighborhood opposition caused the McKee to withdraw Old North from his plan. The only problem is…
Tag: Northside TIF
Twenty-Three Years of Paul McKee: Hyde Park
Hyde Park was never in the footprint of the Northside TIF, but I can’t help think that it was affected by the disruption that was occurring in the neighborhoods to the south. This neighborhood is really suffering from the effects of abandonment, and the City’s reliance on McKee’s plans diverted attention from residents’ real needs…
Twenty-Three Years of Paul McKee: St. Louis Avenue in JeffVanderLou
Turning right from Garrison Avenue onto St. Louis Avenue, we pass by the abandoned Grace Lutheran, and then past the Lindell Park subdivision, which has avoided much of the Northside TIF purchases. But east of here, there are vacant lots of many former McKee buildings, some of which were demolished now close to twenty years…
Twenty-Three Years of Paul McKee: JeffVanderLou
Over the next six days, starting today, we’ll look at areas in the footprint of the Northside TIF, and see the effects McKee’s purchases and land banking have stalled redevelopment and also accelerated decline, as properties he’s purchased have gone vacant and been demolished. We’ll start in JeffVanderLou, driving up Webster in the two photos…
6,500th Post: Twenty-Three Years of Paul McKee
Wow, I suppose 6,500 posts have a way of sneaking up on you! I also suppose since Paul McKee and his failed Northside TIF is in the news, it would be germane to talk about it and how I’ve been investigating and shedding light on his dealings for eighteen years now. Some of the first…
Out of Blood (and Money)
Update: All eighty employees were terminated at the end of February. The hospital surrendered its licenses and will not reopen. Absolutely no one was surprised that the new three bed hospital opened by Paul McKee failed only a short time after it opened, and years, I mean years after it was first proposed. Property taxes,…
In Search of Francis Saler and the Old St. Patrick’s
I’d been doing some research lately on the old St. Patrick’s Roman Catholic Church, which was completed around 1845 (the parish was founded in 1843 and closed in 1973), making it the third in St. Louis after the Old Cathedral and St. Mary of Victories, a German language parish. A familiar name came up, the…
Novelty Theater Under Demolition
Due to more failure of Paul McKee’s Northside Regeneration to properly maintain its buildings, the historic Novelty Theater is being torn down. The two-screen theater, designed by Charles Deitring in 1910 possessed a capacity of over one thousand. It has sat empty for a long time. As far as whether the structure to the east’s…
St. Louis Avenue, JeffVanderLou, Winter 2024
I had originally headed west on St. Louis Avenue based on an unfounded tip that Sarah Lou’s had caught fire. Thankfully, it had not, and I ended up having a great conversation with an older gentleman waiting for the bus out front about the restaurant’s amazing fried chicken instead. Sadly, from the looks of it,…
Fire at the Former St. Liborius, SK8 Liborius
The unthinkable happened late on the night of June 28 at the former St. Liborius Roman Catholic Church, which had been closed in 1992 by the Archdiocese. It became SK8 Liborius approximately ten years ago. The people behind SK8 Liborius had been working tirelessly over that time to fix up the former church, and I…