Economic Development Commission - Regular Meeting

e and then we're gonna yes sir chairman um commissioner patterner shock here Comm commissioner delinski here hold on for just one second that's all the m sorry about that not sure it does give it a nice um 1950s tone doesn't it so um chairman zalinsky I'm still here thank you for confirming chairman Jacobs here or not chairman I'm so sorry

commissioner Jacob whatever commissioner moons here yay and um also in attendance is uh our in lie of uh our city council chairman protm Rick KN Knox we have uh mayor Missy Walman in attendance as well as Carlos tro director of planning and Community Development and myself Don Dodie senior planner thank you very much all right fantastic um item agenda number two public comments anyone online St no surprise surprise I'm sorry I didn't use my microphone uh but no attendees it's fine okay item number three on the agenda allette Spotlight speaker my pleasure to call to the podium Mr Greg yawitz developer of all that Crossing Olive Crossing Olive Crossing Olive Crossing I've just added another couple of syllables letters friends what what's that it's like when um my wow it is weird it does sound like I'm in a tin can tin can fish bowl maybe that's it oh yeah maybe that's hyper sensitive mics we'll find out I'll lean back a little chairman be before beginning if if I can give a quick overview of we are with the the process now everybody has a uh little volume setting down here and if you could just it could be one of these not sure okay and it could be any other of these up here because they were doing some work on on the

mics as long as the red lights off you should be in good shape yeah I turned mine all the way down I think sounds like it's going away you know what you might also do is adjust the output volume on the speaker because it sounds really loud and I'm not talking loud soon as Don gets back I just got a brief overview over uh the the development and and uh this kind of chronology of of activities at the site let's see if that's better I think that's better yeah that better no now that didn't do anything that's weird all right Carlos you go all right Don if you could get the projector back on now you're going to share the the workstation okay if you go to the of course we have Mr ytz and if

everybody recalls the old 14 Acre Site there or the former Amo uh daycare and if you look at the very far back you can see the a Office Max facility um and there where we kind of started back in uh heading even back to 2016 and this was always part of the 20 e and then you need to go back to the share here you

go so in 20 in 2019 we approved our first amendment and that was the introduction of two office structures and a hotel to the original retail development uh and there uh and shortly after uh I think another amendment was approved in the next slide uh to uh add a residential component to the development that was in July 2021 uh and since then if you go to the next slide uh We've issued permits for what we call the Clover that's the 184 apartment unit uh on the site grounds that is completed uh in 2023 we issued the uh permit plans for lot three which is going to be the uh roughly 1100 11,000 ft² uh multi-tenant retail uh which includes the Paris Baguette and the Brass Tap uh and there uh construction on the structure hasn't started but there's been some improvements on the site and then in May 2024 uh lot one and lot two which got combined for the Audi grocer uh that one was uh issued and now of course that is now completed uh so there's just a quick chronology on on the site I think I got one more slide uh in there and then this is what we anticipated in the the development review by 2024 um we would be at 100% completion uh the council did did Grant an extension to I believe it's June or July 2025 uh and there now that we're approaching or approaching the summer uh in there it's going to be you know something we we uh the council's going to start to engage probably with the developer about the status and the uh the site grounds and that's why we invited Mr uh YT here to kind of talk

about where they are what has been some of the uh the issues with the the the uh meeting the the completion schedule um in here and he will talk about uh the status of the project and then uh uh what he sees as as a where uh the project as a whole is going to go uh in there uh so that's what I just kind of wanted to introduce without to answer any questions we'll have Mr yawitz here um you're here to talk any questions for Carlos before I start great all right well uh Mr members of the commission I'm Greg ytz is doing that thing again um six Heather Hill Lane also ke properties ke elivate Gateway you know maybe one of the largest land owners in the city um so yes uh I love that uh Carlos showed the original vision of the first plan that was approved back in 2015 which was a roughly 85,000 foot in total development uh that was projected to cost about $35 million so far between the site work the land acquisition the Clover and the Aldi we've spent north of 85 million already so while this has taken significantly longer than any of us wanted including myself and the interest payments that we make um it is significantly larger and and a much greater impact to our community now why have things taken just so long well number one when I started this project back in 15 I really didn't have a concept of how significant the sitework challenges were um and just to refresh uh we spent well over $2 million

uh widening and improving Olive uh to address the traffic concerns not just of our project but coincidentally the timing happened with the Costco side and what took time and additional delay for that was that it made no sense for me for me and my partner uh we had an approved MoDOT plan to widen the road the Costco required additional changes what made no sense to any of us was that I do all my work as approved they come in and rip half of it out and inconvenience the olette public now getting that deal done took like an extra year because the other side didn't want to pay their fair share and there were issues with the highway department but we got it done and I I didn't I think that's a positive reason for a delay because what really would have been bad I think for alette was if I fully improved the road called it done and they came and tore it all apart so we had issues with waiting for materials because for example the Mast arms for the signals we bought them they were delivered and they weren't usable because we needed bigger Mast arms because the road got wider another thing happened during the period of trying to get the project approved um many of you may not be aware you may remember there used to be like a look like a little creek that ran through the project that was actually a um federally governed uh Tri navigable tributary according to the US Army Corps of Engineers took us four years to get the permit to encase the creek in a storm tube that is uh about two inches taller than me I could actually walk through this pipe uh we went through three government shutdowns uh finally finally got that done and then and this may be news to all of you there was this thing called the pandemic and well that just sort of threw his curveball um sort of killed everything

uh massively affected material prices labor Ava availability and so forth and one of the things I was talking to Cole about before the meeting started was I could have advanced part of this project a lot sooner namely where Aldi is because there were interested parties restaurants with drive-throughs another small retail building was sort of if you recall we had an option A and option b plan for Lots one and two but the message I heard from the council going all the way back to 2015 was if there's anything we want if you can in any way make this happen get us a grocery store well it took three rounds of negotiation with Aldi over the course of almost three years to get this to happen and in the end I think we're better off for it right do I love all the interest payments we made as a result no but I love the fact that our city now has a grocery store so we have the apartments the Clover their last report I got last week I think we're about 95% least people love it it's great um Aldi obviously opened February I think it was the seventh uh sixth or seventh um which is great and it looks busy every time I go there um I did go there twice in the beginning and twice had to tell them that they weren't charging the right sales tax which is their problem not the cities but they got that corrected I bought my wife flowers on Valentine's Day and I looked at the receipt and went told the manager nothing happened went back again it was wrong again figured email would solve it which it it did so they're open Clover's doing great uh you may have seen in the last week or so the construction trailer showed up it's actually sitting on lot five but it's the construction trailer for lot three as Carlos mentioned uh we have the first brass tap in Missouri we're going to have the first Paris Baguette in Missouri um very exciting I know you're

all waiting for baded br the next tenant Verizon because well you know you got to mix up uses can't have all restaurants won't have enough parking come to price Crossing at lunch on a Wednesday Thursday or Friday when the weather's DIC and you see what that looks like uh and I'm exchanging comments on another lease with uh we had a deal with a Smoothie King uh but the franchisee decided they wanted to go somewhere else so they walked away we have another smoothie concept I really want a smoothie concept maybe you can tell so that lease hopefully be finished up in the next couple of days we have a 1364 feet to lease uh we were planning on starting earlier this year um had a little bit of a weather problem which affected not only the ground but the survey that my Engineers were supposed to deliver me the week of February 7th came in today so that's caused us a little delay but as you can see the equipments there we're mobilizing uh one other thing you may notice is uh we're starting to get dirt off the Dirt Pile on lot six um again construction slowed down there have been a lot of places to offload dirt our goal is to find somewhere convenient and close that we can give somebody the dirt versus just paying it and dumping in a hole somewhere so we're working on that um the so lot three you'll start seeing a lot of lot more activ in the next literally like couple of weeks but it's it's happening it's you know we've made commitments to deliver space to our tenants this summer for their buildout and that's going to happen uh lot six you want me to switch mics okay let's see if this works better oh yeah all right look at that uh so lot six which is the hotel and I mentioned this in a c city council meeting so when we originally franchised the hotel we

franchised a dual brand Marriott it was going to be 80 rooms of Courtyard and 80 rooms of element by Weston as things have changed over time what our operating Hotel partner has found is that these dual brands are not all they're cracked up to be so we went back to Marriott and we've changed our franchise to a courtyard only hotel number one number two 128 rooms instead of 160 which means that unless something happens that I'm unaware of we're also not going to be building a fivestory hotel which I think is positive news for our neighbors it'll only be four stories um it'll have slightly more like I've seen the interior designs we're not going to have like a giant Ballroom space But as Courtyards go it will have more meeting room space I think it's around 1,400 square feet which is larger than most Courtyards can't handle a big big wedding or anything but it gives olette businesses and area businesses a place to do meetings um or people are staying in the hotel or whatever um so that's one two three six so let's talk about lot five so as Carlos showed you in the plan you know originally back when things were goo and great we thought oh two Office Buildings because we had a lot of interest from Office tenants and then that sort of waned and started getting a little the market started changing a little we went down to one uh as a result of the pandemic and again I think we're all aware of this the office Market has irreparably changed uh there's almost no office construction anywhere anymore now we're still in the market we're still talking to tenants we're still trying to court large tenants we had one recently and they decided they would rather take what's called second generation Space versus building something new because there's an

abundance of vacany space for them to take and it it is very cost prohibitive as a result of the pandemic our our rents would be less than brand new space in Clayton but not that much less um so uh Carlos mentioned uh about the extension of the development agreement expiring in June and I've already been in conversations briefly with the council and uh with the city manager about that extension uh and I I know J Jennifer's behind me um and so what we are going to uh propose with our extension is sort of an either or plan uh for lot five either the office that we're approved to do and this of course is subject to the council's consideration and in decision but they may ask your opinion of this or retail restaurant space um which will one facilitate the near immediate beginning of developing that line and which um is to the best of our ability mathematically analyzing this within about 5% of our original Tiff projections and you say oh well wait you're not you're not there right you're 95% well if there is any issue with that that issue becomes our risk not the city's because it's not the city's responsibility to fund the nodes it's ours according to our consultant that actually doesn't impact us because the projection are based at need plus a reserve plus another Reserve Factor so she's assured me that it it will work just fine uh W without being able to say exactly who I'm talking to we're talking about the potential for likely to Ballpark 7 to 9,000 foot midscale sitdown restaurants sharing that 4 acres

and all of the parking um with the when we have overflow in the uh in the Clover garage and while you know I can't tell you if that plan's going to work why I'm going to formally request this from the council is that I think it will work and I think that in light of the way the economy is we could certainly just keep asking for extensions forever waiting for that magical office tenant to come around or we could get the project done and flowing for our community and that's sort of where I sit which is you know we all thought a big office building was a great idea and then then the world changed and there just aren't large office deals happening anymore um and so that's kind of where we are in that you know uh one two done four done three is going to start construction be done this year ideally tenants will open by subject to their schedules because they do their buildout but ideally they'll all be open by the Thanksgiving season um the hotel will hopefully get started in design soon we had some delays big corporations are are fund so our agreements with Marriott with this change of the franchise I needed some document changes I started requesting them in October I got them four weeks ago finally from the president of Marriott so you know it's not for lack of trying it's basically for lack of uh engagement on third parties who are critical to our uh to our decision- making so you know I when I started this project and I was telling Mr Cole you know I called my attorney cousin former Olivette resident Bill Reis former member of the Planning Commission I believe in February of 2014 and said I got a really bad idea I'm going to do the thing nobody's been able to figure out for almost 50 years and

you know what it wasn't easy it's not easy we bought 14 different Parcels from 11 different sellers not the least issue was one of them was the state of Missouri who was the approving entity for the road work and the seller we buried two 34,000 volt circuits underground at a cost of about $1.4 million to bury those power lines between what we paid Amon and what we paid ourselves uh what we had to pay to get the physical work done under the ground we did over $2 million worth of road work and we've got roughly 60 or 70 million apartment building building built and a grocery store open and I can't wait to see what their sales tax looks like that K starts getting kicked into the city um so I'm surprised we're at the Slightly North of 11year Mark from when I called my attorney um I'm I'm I'm a lot grayer than I was back then slightly shorter from spinal compression um but I love where we're going right I love pulling into the town I mean you may have all recently seen uh we installed a node piece um that when at the corner right at the corner in front of Aldi it's like nothing I've ever seen it none of us really knew what it should be and we found a designer who created something unique specifically to olette it's a little bit of signage and a little bit of Art and it makes a dramatic statement when you get off the highway um and when we get finished with lot three the Basin will be finished the fountain will be in the plaza will be in that'll all be done this year um and we'll be moving along but you know these things are hard enough in general when you deal with the obstacles that are normally involved in development throw in a global pandemic and um yeah well you know we're still here so I am happy to answer as many questions as I possibly can but that's sort of the where I'm

at hey Greg uh question about lot six I remember from I don't know how many years ago it was there was a comment that we can't build the hotel until we have the office tenant Marriott will not break ground until we have an office tenant and it was something about driving cars over nails or something like that I can't remember that uh that far back is there still this prerequisite by Marriott that there is an office tant before they move into that space no so the issue with the issue with that's all right the the issue with Marriott was the construction issues if we move forward and if the council grants the we'll call it Plan B like we had for Lots One and Two and A or B if we go Plan B on lot five and do the restaurants the difference between that construction and the construction of an office building is massively different which means we can build self-contained we don't have to worry about you know uh cranes and erecting structure 100t in the air so that is one of the other reasons we can accelerate the rest of the project if we move along that path which I'm confident we have at least one half of that lot somebody will take um immediately um so if we were to build the office building and stick with that plan I think we're still getting grief from Marriott about when we start if I say to them we're moving forward with Plan B which I can't quite do yet um and we're going to do restaurants and Retail instead their objection drops because again the construction conflict becomes a on issue with the differential scale of the construction okay

if yes yeah so the question was if we go if the council does approve the a orb option for lot five and we go with that when is the total completion so we're we're asking the council to give us until June 30th of 27 so a two-year extension from the current uh expiration date and and I'll walk you through the logic of that so if we start soon with our plans and design for the hotel and we submit those to the city figure the it takes about 5 and a half to six months to engineer and design a hotel after we have site planner architectural approval and you can't you don't want to draw your construction plans for the hotel until you have site plan architectural so our goal is to bring in site plan and Architectural in the next few months to pcdc get that approved start the plans a hotel build should be as long as the weather isn't egregiously bad 12 to 14 months so it is my hope that we are off the site so to speak by the end of the extended expiration date we're asking for which is 2 years from the end of June I've had enough no you haven't uh with regards to the uh the possibilities of the office building you mentioned and I've heard this too that nothing's getting built right now um new class A office space is like hen teeth really hard to find uh but I have heard that there are some um uh companies po potential clients looking for that have you heard the same thing can you elaborate on what the market is like for new new construction office space so the New Market in our specific subsection which is Class A and and what are known as whale tenants because we

can't build a speculative 180,000 foot building off a few you know 5,000 foot doctor's office here 10,000 foot right we need a 50 to 100,000 foot tenant to kick off this building there are just not that many of them looking because the market is soft and they're able to keep rents where they are low us Capital Plaza got built in Clayton there's still a decent amount of vacancy there um their rents would be probably close to $10 higher than ours but we' like I met with a Fortune 50 probably about six weeks ago looking for 300,000 square feet which would have required me coming in and asking for the building to go from six stories to 10 which I didn't think was the greatest idea um they of course decided as I mentioned earlier to go look at second and third generation space um there's interest in class a space but not from big enough tenants to get this building kicked off is sort of the subset of this um because we you can't Finance it unless you have at least well over 50% and so we were out in the market just to tell you where we were we we have designs out to different companies that that office building ranged in size from three stories to six because if we only got a 60,000 foot tenant we might only build three floors if we got an 80 we could build four and so we were looking at variability to everybody in the market they're just not there or they're saying hey there's the second generation space I can get for 50% less there were a number of large law firms we courted trying to get them to move out of the city of St Louis um exceedingly long negot not even negotiations I call it a courtship but then the the inertia problem is that the rent is overd double from what they can

get in the city to stay versus moving to the county and you're talking when you're talking about 100,000 square feet and a differential of north of $20 a square foot you're talking about hundreds of thousand thousands of dollars a month and the question is how big of a deal is it to stay in the city if you're going to save millions in rent um so we've been I mean we we didn't profess like I'm I'm a retail broker by trade we hired the best in the business to be our office Brokers because we wanted them to get us exposure internationally for this space it just hasn't it just hasn't happened again pandemic wiped out a bunch centine went vacant everybody back back filled it everybody that backfilled it came from somewhere else so there's this relocation going on where there's tons of class b space and those Class B landlords are also spending money on amenities to make their buildings nicer to make them aish and they can do it substantially cheaper than we can build new so if that answers your question R said it does yes the chairman confirmed that answer this question so when we started was retail oh thanks when we started was retail and then thing changed and we were like because that was going to be our retail engine because we were going to build the apartments there retail engine there things Chang and we were like that's cool because we're going to have a bigger development right because we're going to have more square feet put the apartments there get the office building take a little bit longer so there's been a lot of numbers you must look at these numbers tirelessly so many times I your eyes are probably crossed so help me just in plain terms is the city better off worse off and about in the same shape when this all gets done from what

we thought we were going to have way back in 2013 great question compared to our original 85,000 foot originally approved concept significantly better off for a number of reasons one the property tax on the hotel combined with the uh Apartments combined with the other buildings which if we do originally plan a was 85,000 Aldi's 225 lot three is just under 11 so that's 335 let's say we build on lot five 13,000 Square ft so that's about 40,000 ft so that's half of the original project you apartment building without the garage is 225,000 square ft and the hotel is probably going to I haven't seen the the four floor design but let's call it somewhere at least 90 so we have a multiple of the original square footage and just to give you sort of a dollar reality of what that means so the first year after we brought bought the property the property taxes for all of the Lots were somewhere in the neighborhood of about I think with the houses and everything let's call it I think it was sub 50,000 for all of the property tax our 2024 tax bill for the Clover which is a not fully assessed tax bill because it was not fully complete in the eyes of the county was $465,000 add that to I don't know what Aldi is going to do I can tell you that our economic modeler who oversees 120 taxing jurisdictions in the state of Miss believes the store will do $20 million a year in sales granted the Tiff has to be paid off and there's the split of the taxes

and so forth but at 20 million after Tiff at 3.8% which I think is the total gross take to the city of alette plus you figure the building at 225 is 22,500 feet is probably going to have a tax bill in the neighborhood of well price Crossing is over $5 a foot so Aldi is going to be at least $5 fo there's another 100,000 so we're we're looking at a property total in total flows of taxes of seven figures ideally and I think it's real in under 24 months I mean there may be some lag on the finish of the last buildings and the full tax year full tax year of those but as it compares to the original plan a multiple better and more diverse in that it's now um live work in retail play and stay because we didn't have a hotel in the beginning and one of the things this community and I get calls from people all the time hey my kids bar mitz was coming up when's the hotel going to be ready and I'm like I wish it would I I would really love my Marriott owner's card it comes with amazing benefits they won't give it to me until we break ground um so I'm like these are the amenities that at least my friends say to me grocery Hotel more restaurants so that's and that's sort of where the Market's leading us I mean the office would be an economic benefit from a property tax standpoint not necessarily a direct Community benefit it's dollars and there's certainly a benefit to that but imagine if there were two nice large sitdown restaurants there what don't we have an all ofet either large sit down I mean we fallons is lovely but that's 4,000 feet is a much different vibe in a 7,000 foot restaurant um and a much higher

volume with the change in the plan um originally you had the um I I don't remember what the number of the lots are but they you had the the hotel and the office building right next to it and between the two was a parking garage so that's gone we don't need the parking garage anymore correct if we do this again if the council approves this alternate concept for lot five we no longer would need a parking garage so again another I'll call it intangible benefit for the Neighbors is that there's not a 100 foot tall building in their backyard there is certainly the hotel which at four Stories won't be the full height that's approved Carlos what was approved 60 for the hotel the hotel yeah I believe so yeah so take off 12 feet so it should be about 48 feet instead of 60 so it's you know it's still not short but it's also not 100 feet tall the the current approval for six stories was somewhere in the 92 foot range restaurants are going to be 25 ft with parapets maybe 28 so you know there's pluses and minuses to that the the tall building is actually a sound barrier to the highway um at the same time you know if I live there maybe I don't want to see 100 you know but that's again that's what we thought was a great idea and got approved and and again I'm because I because things happen in weird ways what I don't want to do is ask the council to replace plan a with P Plan B because the way the world works is the day after that gets approved some amazing office tenant will call me and say now that you can't do it we want it so that's why I'm going to ask the council for the either or likely Plan B is where I think we're going to end up I just I've seen things before where you immediately decide not to do something

and then somebody wants it so that's just you so you understand my logic of why I'm asking for optionality like I did for one and two I don't think it's going to happen but you never know I mean there's a I've always believed or I thought what was going to happen on the office side is with the national geospatial agency there are a lot of companies moving to this town I thought one of them might want to be more Central near the airport hotel behind them you know it has this site has all the makings of a perfect corporate campus food place to live place to stay office and right to the east more restaurants Costco Target de all right it just hasn't we just haven't found anybody willing to bite so if the city council doesn't Grant you the extension does it just like we get the land back and we get to RFP it again like what happens like we keep talking about the extension option a option b but what if they say no what happens then it's a great question I'm not a 100% sure but what I'll tell you is what I think happens is that we don't achieve substantial completion we own the land so the city doesn't right we the city has issued us roughly 20.8 million of the Tiff notes of the 23.2 maximum the city would refuse to issue me the last 2 point or whatever it is 2.8 3.1 million in notes [Music] um yeah and we would sit and wait until something came along that made the city happy that we could get approved um I don't feel like that's the best option right but yeah I you know it's because we've already built a number of buildings because we've already issued a

bunch of notes the Train's moving right and again I'm not an attorney so I'm not going to profess to be an expert in these documents but like when I look at the facts on the ground the notes are issued the buildings are built the real question we're down to in all of this is one fouracre lot um which is why we're coming up with an alternative because I don't want to just keep waiting I don't think it's in it's certainly not in the developer best interest I don't think it's in the city's best interest either so the timing of Carlos's record quests in case the council asks you hey what do you guys think about this right so the laon question again where the parking garage the uh office building were you mentioned that um fallons is 4,000 square feet but you're looking at restaurants larger um 7,000 it sounds like you have a um fairly detailed idea of what you want are you act actively talking to people right now now I know you usually don't tell us exactly who they are but uh it'd be nice to know are they local are they chains are they um unique Concepts um you know you're talking sit down type of restaurants versus you know no drive-throughs that sort of thing can you elaborate on on on what you're looking at and who you've talked to and what kind of um feedback you're getting so it would be likely two s to one of the concepts is 13,000 ft so it could be a seven and a 13 could be two sevens these will in all likelihood be Regional or national chains locals would never be able to afford it or have the credit that our banks would be be comfortable with it and there's a certain um at least from our perspective uh stability in a brand that we know they're actually going to do the sales

to support the Tiff and be productive long term um as to who mid-priced familyfriendly diverse menus one is has a specific um type of food that they sell um the other one is if it h the second one I'm not so sure about is more around concept of food and stuff um I can obviously not tell you who I'm talking to to answer your question am I talking to them 100% and all I've said is I have an idea I got to go to the council if it works I'll let you know and they've said if it works we want it at least one of them has 100% so it would be built to spec built to built to their specifications yes it it's it would be a custom building for them yes and the just to to understand on the four acres for these size restaurants you need about two acres per per user like that's the size pad they normally take in a development so we happen to have four acres inside the roads so my vision is one in the north one in the South one just north of the uh hotel and Sh a shared parking field in the middle you know and maybe some you know again I I have an engineer design it and Architects and all that but we've taken some stabs at what could this thing look like and when I when they expressed a if you could get this approved we'd be interested that's when I engaged my consultant and said does this make any sense for for the city to do and for the Tiff does this work the answer is yes um and so again because the risk of any shortfall falls on us um but we don't we're we're confident in it so that's why we're moving forward with it I think I answered all your questions how big is that California

Pizza Kitchen that closed is that and that Stir Crazy are those 7,000 squ be or is that small I think those are six okay so it's around that size it' be a little larger than one of those okay I can't spatially see things like that you could have said it as the bage you I'm like yeah that's 7,000 square feet okay well to give to give you a frame of reference the first floor of price Crossing is 27,000 Square F feet it's over 300 feet long so yeah it's I'm trying to think what building in alet is around 7,000 ft Walgreens are CVS are usually like 13 Enchanted bride Enchanted bride might be about that size I know that store well my condolences um it's expensive uh so yeah except obviously the difference being you need a lot more parking for a restaurant than you do for um for retail so so yeah Franken Hill is maybe 3,000 square feet and we um you know I I I'll say it now that they've closed I spent two years trying to help them understand why they should take the spot where Brass Tap is met with them I couldn't they're lovely people met with them over and over and over again I introduced them to another one of the very successful families in the restaurant business in this town and said you two should work together they'll fund you they want to be your partners they grew up on your pizza I tried and I because that was my vision right like if you ask me in 2014 when I started and ask me today what are the things I really what I really wanted and I I think brass tap's going to be great right but I wanted a pizza place in allette and you know I love I love fallons but and they make a pizza it's

not really a pizza um it's not pizza it's it's it's Irish pizza right I tried and tried I mean I all but beg Gerard craft I kind of beg rcraft I begged a couple of the other Italian families um to open pizza places we got close a number of times but you know some of it happened as the pandemic was ending and they were nervous and the restaurant business going to be around anymore and blah blah blah and then Brass Tap came along and um it's a viable concept I think they'll do great it it's a you know I look at it as fallons is sort of that familyfriendly Pub and Brass Tap is sort of that younger hipster loud sports bar that's going to be because Brass Tap is like Buffalo Wild Wings um and you know both Brass Tap and uh Paris Baguette are local owned locally owned franchises so it's it is a chain but the owners are local and that's important to us is we want I don't want some again with these bigger restaurants there's no choice in it but in the building I wanted somebody who lives there lives in St Louis not necessarily in alette but they got skin in the game they're going to be present right they're going to be part of the community they're going to do like fallons does they're going to participate in events and things at the park and all of that like that's that's what I wanted and so I'm happy about that one of the the family that's uh the franchisee of Paris Baguette they started calling me in 2016 and said we're going to find a way to open a restaurant in your development they wife's on one of the Committees at the school board or do schools like they're very hyper local people and the husband's family was in the restaurant business and they're like they've been dying for us to get going as of High um and now it's finally happening what's the size of chies that's a big

building I think that building's close to 10 to I I think it might be larger than 10 because it seats well over 300 people um and that lot is bigger than two acres yeah I think that building that building could be 13 14,000 feet all day and that's what you're looking at configured obviously not like a barn um right right the qu it was it was a bus repair building um it was a bus compan what was that glass it was glass and then it was buses and um for one of the concepts one concept we're talking to is about 13,000 Square F feet the other one that's more serious is just food well I mean food and drink yeah okay yeah um and what is the size of brass tap 3,000 Brass Tap is 3,000 Paris bagett 3189 uh Verizon's 1500 the Smoothie concept is 1350 I think and we have 1364 left so whatever those add up to is that building Carlos u based on the the Tiff that's already going uh are we going to have to look at like any reconfig figuration of numbers we I know we have looked at different iterations of the project in the past but is this something that's going to come before us or is this basically just informational I think it's right now I I think it's I don't know the answer I I think it's something that we would given the Tiff uh and there that we would be looking or it be be as a city to look at what revenue generated would be on those type of uses because right now

the uh what is it called the uh the cost analysis is based on an office use and then these other specific users that were in there uh if you take that out though you know I think we would want to know does it still meet those projections in there the other thing is in in terms you know that that would probably require some adjustment to see if it's compliant and then of course it's in a tighter time frame we can't change the the the years of the Tiff we're it's 21 years I believe we're seven years in so you're with 23 it's 23 minus 7 y so you're within this 14 year window and then does it meet you know the the rest of that adjustment so I would assume something would probably come back uh and there is some type of analysis in that process does that answer what your yeah and um who do we use demand strategies or did we use I think the the last analysis was done by pjv this is the one I showed up and again I I think the developer you had your uh the development Dynamics or yeah development Dynamics yes yeah so I I mean I I've had our I've had our team model it if the council will consider it we obviously want to keep it confidential because we can't name who the tenants are um so it's you know again it's it's the council's decision it again given the fact the notes are issued and the risk sits with us it you certainly I mean if Council wants to review the math we'll provide the math um at the end of the day the math is the math and if there's a shortfall it comes out of our pockets not the cities so but that's just that's kind of true but not necessarily because we're we're like co-signers I mean we're while we're not on the line for for that it it it does

impact our credit I mean we we have a credit that's based on the assessed value of the community as a whole and that credit while it's not our our our funds for use they're they're within our you know within our maximum within our credit limit uh in there so you know you know your success is is important to to Our Success of course but it's not yeah we're not uh we're not like on on the line if if if if the 21 years was not met or 23 years was not met but we kind of are uh in there we we're still you know well you're the you're the beneficiary of the resultant product at the end if it's not the same but you know I mean to to Nathan's point if the answer is no we're gonna get there anyway we're going to get to we're g to get to a a failure of the math you know eventually the the graph will s if you will will cross time and dollars where even if we built what's approved we still won't make it right if the longer we wait the closer we get to that date so um again you know if the council says hey we want to see your runs to see what the math looks like trust me I checked them or I wouldn't be asking for it when are you presenting this to council the new Council or the current Council I guess is my question time is it it may be a little of both right so it may come in during the current Council um our attorney is talking to the city's legal council and if we come around on an agreement of the presentation um it you know our documents so our our Redevelopment agreement has a substantial completion date of June 30th 2025 our lenders who are loaning us the money to build lot three and will loan us additional money for the rest of of it are very interested in seeing that date get extended as soon as possible they actually wanted it done already and

I said but that's actually not real like we can't just poof right so um it is my hope that that will actually get done before the end of the month of April um again if the council agrees and I don't know you it's their choice we'll ask for it hopefully it'll get done thanks for your time gr yeah any other questions Becky okay great uh very informative oh and last thing on an unrelated note um but sort of related to dollars so as you all are probably aware uh the credit union moved out of price Crossing and wine merchant moved in there's one of those things that we never dreamed we could generate this much more sales tax out of a building uh because you know I just thought it was going to be a credit union for 30 years because they had the lease that long and then they made what I consider one of the worst real estate decisions of all time instead of asking me if I would make the space smaller because it was too big they went and moved out and built on Lindberg couldn't have been a better gig for me or olette in in the form of I I I like bourbon um and having uh them downstairs is fabulous um and they are um you know they they have tastings now and it's and they have the they have I bought the world's greatest cheese Rogue River Valley blue cheese won World cheese championships two years in a row it's also $60 a pound for cheese which is a little crazy but it's spectacular when they get it anywh who I just thought I'd mentioned you know back in 200 what Missy five when I was here doing price Crossing

predecessor members of the this commission were convinced price Crossing and they told me out loud price Crossing was going to fail was never going to generate what it was going to generate in 2005 my first property tax bill was $27,000 on that building last year's Property Tax Bill $247,500 $1 times the property tax plus now even more sales tax than I ever thought I think the building May generate taxable sales of $15 million this year which I thought 10 was going to be a stretch I think we modeled six and I think we're going to hit 15 so you know it all it was it was concerned back then it was concerned about Olive Crossing it's going to be in the end it's going to be Services benefits dollars and then I'll figure out what else I'm going to do to help the city let's just hope that uh that retell tariffs don't U don't really cut into their business oh right sure go ahead Mr YT whatever the uh retail that you're looking at for possible option two to the council um if your legal team could hurry up I'd love to hear it um is I'd like to know is it something that is not within a 10 mile mile parameter of our area I mean okay if it's somewhere else but is it at least not like up in creef corp you City you know something of that nature nowhere near it there in the let's just say let's say

the first two of these things that I'm talking to if they were both to take the closest one for number one ought to be 15 miles number [Music] two I'm actually driving in my head at least 15 miles completely different communities and and given the size of these things they won't be near each other right they the these types of things do not it's not like they it's not like a McDonald's or a Taco Bell or something like that where they knock one out every two miles they don't want these things that close because the sales of these buildings the smaller one should be not less than 8 million a year in taxable sales not less than so that's the magnitude of you know where a brass tap might do 3 million something like this do 8 to 12 that's that's why this can work within the context of the Tiff So In fairness when you come back in 20 years and talk to the next EDC I I I won't speak for everyone else but it's not concerned it's probably still a mix of excitement and impatience I think is what you're hearing In fairness absolutely okay oh oh yes yes I that was meant to tell a story about the past and back then right as as Becky remembers allette was kind of sleepy nobody wanted to be here right people people told me I was crazy for building price Crossing it was the guys at thf you're out of your mind I'm like I live here I want what I want for my community I'm not going anywhere I've now been here since January 94 so 31 years so I'm all in and like I know what my role in this community my goal is to create taxes and

dollars for the city to spend money on services for the residents that's what I consider my job to be so I'm going to keep doing it I think I figured it out 15 miles I think he's opening a a bues oh 2004 yeah you know my memory Fades after this many years awesome well I appreciate the audience I appreciate the questions if you think of more ask Carlos and Jennifer and they'll get with me and I'll get and answer thank you so much for coming in Greg oh sure and as we sign more leases we'll make more announcements then with that um moving right along with the agenda discussion item number four Business Awards yes sir and I'm sorry I'm sorry for all the audio interruptions but I did confirm that we are um definitely being on screen our our everything is recording the audio and the visual so we don't have to worry about there um I am going to share my screen because most of this is on will be on your screen so we had an amazing nomination turnout uh 200 oh Carlos I can see this and there we go I see when my screen changed I just thought everybody's was so okay so we had 21 total nominees uh these are the

businesses business of the Year nominees I there were a number that were dis qualified uh but to focus on those that made it through the vetting process uh if you remember our original uh the rules of of the game are to uh be a current business uh or sorry to be located in alette uh they cannot be honored in LA in the previous years um or sorry the immediately previous years and um they have to be in good standing so clear of code violations and a current business license all of those were broken for some nominee um there were quite a number that were had to be uh ruled out uh for every single one of those reasons uh so if we any any rules that we add will be felt um in the in the nominations uh moving to business of the year The UPS Store came out on top over 51% of business Nom of the businesses that were nominated 39 that is uh came in for the UPS Store I cannot think that that um it may have been a coincidence uh but whenever I dropped off the flyer to put in their front door the owner's mom was there and um so they they came out really strong in nominations and that was very sweet so um I did prepare a little bit of uh as you know uh we quantify the uh attributes uh there's a a list of

attributes and they could select up to five per business so um as you can see everybody's represented uh veteran own was the top one that came out that that was why they voted for who they voted for and you can see that it's actually represented across almost all the leaders uh which I thought was kind of interesting that and it's orange so it stands out but uh these are reflective of the tenants of our comprehensive plan these were the things that we thought made a good or a business you know worthwhile and it is showing through of you can look at these surveys and the business nomination process as a um a finger on the pulse of what is what is still our matters as far as um you know opinions of the people like what what is what is the most important thing to you uh good parking it was actually not very high on this list uh but you know sustainable business practice prompts customer service or prompt service um supports training and Workforce amazingly High uh that that came through and uh I think that those are really positive things uh as far as uh or this the only uh thing that you have in your package tonight are um all of the results uh by business so it's alphabetical by business um and I can give you a copy if you're interested

um but a so you can see what feedback was given for all the businesses and I did not take out the businesses that were disqualified so um yes oh would would you to the mic please my name is Cole Donaldson I'm just an observer um but I did have an observation on the last slide I just wouldn't want the commission to take the wrong lesson you've looked at this a lot more than I have but it seemed to me like the orange in almost all the bars was actually the sum of exemplary customer service and the on the right side the key wasn't in like order of um like popularity but it was just in the order of stacking it was supposed to be um and when whenever I sorted it it was supposed to be in the order that it was greatest however when I am seeing here is that it prioritized the number the greatest vote getter and you're right it is the somewh of exemplary customer service yeah didn't want to distract people but just also didn't want people to take away the wrong lesson for whatever used this for uh yeah nope I was and I was portraying it incorrectly so I appreciate that you bet uh this is these were just some outstanding comments uh obviously that was the the caramel house some of them were were very long other ones not so much uh when we get to the

restaurants you could definitely see the more uh quick of the feedback uh but I did think that some of these um are worth calling out um and the bridge uh did not receive very many votes but it you know you can tell that the person who nominated them was very passionate about their nomination so um while not all the businesses have the numbers or their moms they whenever the fire is being dropped off uh there really are a lot of great businesses to the restaurants of of the Year balance uh came out very very strong uh it was really really uh for the ones that fell off the list uh the second and third highest of the restaurants were disqualified yes so it was really interesting that's where that's where the that 211 number starts to not add up with the pr so uh but there was a lot of love shown around uh and as far as we can go ahead and see here uh and and thank Colt for uh his of of an assessment because we can see here that exemplary customer service was the highest uh or or was the most prized of of what came out here as far as the restaurant nominees went and uh yeah I thought that these were great but probably my

favorite um lot of compliments on the staff uh the speed of service but classic olette I think that was my favorite comment and authentic food ta shaboo shaboo the original and best smoke so I I so apologize that I put in two for sugar fire uh as far as what the commission weighs in for the best business and the best restaurant um is there anything from you ultimately do get to decide who the winners are you can uh let it go along with the nominations which last year we had two ties or we had a tie so it it was there the the commission was a tiebreaker this year we have clear winners so we can stick with the public um and and have those both as your your winners but if we could have the commissioner uh or sorry uh chairman um acknowledge uh the winners of the business of the Year award uh and the restaurant of the Year award um then we can move on to the commissioner's choice award or sorry chairman oh yes commissioner ch um the two top vote Getters in the two categories they are eligible yes yes no everything that you see all the businesses that I've put out on the screen are ones that were eligible they've been vetted so they made it through were not

eligible they are not on the list that's on the screen yeah so the businesses that you're asked to I guess award Andor choose from are are shown here so can I suggest we approve the UPS store and Fons to win this year second so sorry by the way we uh just don't lean in too closely the bridge is this super amazing place that no one knows about that's based in all of that so we should figure out how to do something cool that if if if we could just we'll discuss I I completely concur they they are awesome I being in the business that I am we're dropping stuff off there all the time cool so um or do you I need to take a vote for both of them okay so um the motion for to okay I apologize uh chairman pck yes Vice chairman zalinski yes commissioner Jacobs yes and commissioner Mo yep thank you that is um unanimous and then back to the commissioner CH yeah commissioner's Choice Award of do what the criteria here is basically our discussion we have to choose whoever we want it it it is um we did look at or Bas based on the nominations that we were got that that were uh submitted or you do not have to base it on your nominations whatsoever

can be completely new um in fact uh I do think you know the bridge uh it didn't come up from staff uh and they didn't come up from the business sponsors but what you have on the screen here U the artery I know does a lot with uh to do the framing for Five Oaks on Warson um plant Haven I think not just as a you know a gifts and plant store uh that this was my staff recommendation sorry uh they've really brought a quality development uh to this area they they went from being a temporary stand that came up in the summer I hoped every year to being this fantastic thing well but that being said thank you yeah I would say um I would make the nomination for well I'll preface this by saying um this is a little bit of a different business with with the bridge um and I think that um I I don't think they're struggling or anything like that but it's it's really a communitybased um Endeavor that not only do they um they they help people get rid of their Stuff Etc they make the experience for for people who are uh less off than than ourselves than anybody else um they do an awesome job and I I I don't want to really get into what they do Etc but to to give them some sort of a um a recognition beyond what what is usually given through like a like a pleite or like a a tally of votes or something like that I think would be really worthwhile to give them a little bit of publicity do you mean St or St Louis help or you mean the bridge as in sorry the bridge the bridge

yeah okay I just wanted to make sure because can we confirm they're eligible yeah they were on the list they actually know that would that's a really good question um I did I I I did vet the ones that I put on the screen but it is entirely possible that they would not have made it through uh because there had been previous years when they did not have business a business license or you know uh and things so uh you know it's it's good to ask to if they're f it they were on screen prev screen prev this somebody no no they I you're they were on a previous screen and the previous screen was vetted so I but it's still a good idea to ask if they are in good standing before we nominate and I I can generally do that or somewhat by memory well why why don't we we go ahead and we do I have to table this till next meeting or do we do this by email or something or all right they they are vetted they are good I would like to make a proposal that we a second that commissioner moons um sorry can you speak into the microphone yes okay um I'll call a vote uh chairman patters

yes uh Vice chairman zinsky sure commissioner Jacobs yes and secretary moons yes all right it's unanimous uh we have the bridge as our com first commissioner's choice award thank you all I fought for the sports cards again and I fell short somehow I got to talk to my buddy Devon maybe he's not paying his bills here um but yeah paperwork it's probably paperwork maybe next year I'll no uh that's outstanding I think as a commission these three businesses are unique and different and well-deserving and I'm excited to honor all so awesome stuff I I didn't know how to preface the next steps but this is what our uh this is what the award looks like um and we are going to go with the same design again uh I am going to be do the very happy job tomorrow of informing the winners and making sure that they can make it to our coffee with the mayor uh on May 14th and then uh right away on May 15th we have the luncheon with uh the prore olette chamber where they'll be honored all right fantastic moving right along um other business uh we have some meeting minutes we do not have meeting minutes that's good okay next uh reports City staff reports Carlos did you have anything to report did anybody have any questions on uh developments or anything going on I I honestly would like to understand what council is going to do like what are I think Nate asked the question but it was not incredibly clear like what what is what are the paths that are taken if

there isn't an extension till June of 2027 and that was not made clear when Greg was here maybe we don't have to talk about it now maybe it could be done over email but I think it's very interesting to try to figure out how how is the city going to navigate these Waters considering that this person we empowered to develop this property is going to likely Fall two years behind plan L luckily we have the mayor sitting right there we can ask her I just don't know if this is an open meeting discussion or this happens in close session or how it gets done or when it will get done but I'm very curious to know the city's plan on this I don't know the city's plans because it has to take the majority of council to make a decision okay what I will say is this you know if you drop the ball and you say and and you don't continue as a partner in this process you know and you stop it you know is that worse than dealing with a little bit more strength and power on the city Side to say if you want this then but four you have specific deadlines that now have to be met no more third parties no more pandemics uh you've got your financing you've got 90% of the Tiff money um you know you know to me I would to me personally I would rather see negotiations and things continue um um you know these projects and what I've learned over my 25 years and looking at other cities and other Tiff efforts and other Tiff projects uh and I will even include Castlegate as I worked

on that one as a trustee where you start is not all is where you finish and I will say that yes in the very beginning that first design was a flat one level design and we went back to the developer and said we need depth we want depth and so it's been this ying and yang and pull to where I'm going to say I would rather see you know something continue I will not unless he brings it on before April 22 second I will not be an individual making that decision you will more than likely have three fairly new council members on that will be beginning to learn some history so you know at the end of the day I hope we could all continue to be decent partners and just have a little bit of the hammer down and say here here's your deadlines here's what needs to be done but I I will not be a part of that body um okay thank you I chy man I I think it puts us in a in a unique position and it's not like it doesn't happen I think these things do happen in in developments of this size the fundamental thing from a planning component was did we get our vision you know completed did we get it done and I think again we had a choice of what they did on the east side to what we did on the west side and I think there is a distinction between once you go the one side to the other side and I I you know biasly I think we got a better product and we knew it was going to be complicated we knew it was going to be tough I'd like to see the whole thing come into fruition but I

understand you know you know we started you know we work in plans that go 20 years and things change we have a new comprehensive plan a plan that is about building Community as opposed to building Vision uh in there and I think it would be who you know when the council gets into the discussions is you know what can we do within this spot to build our community and make it better not necessarily that the buildings have to be taller now but what you know what are these two new you know restaurant tours in the hotel you know how are they going to strengthen you know or bring attributes to our community that we don't have just beyond just going to go eat you know in there and I think it's it's going back to that table of that you know we're you know we're we expect a little more we expect a little more because some of it's coming out of our Pock you know it's not our Direct Tax but it's it's it's that investment well maybe so yes the development will get done one way or another but at what point is the city going to get reimbursed or paid for giving people unlimited time or extra time to do that if our negotiation point is yes we'll give you an extension but this time you're going to meet it that's not negotiation like what what are we and maybe that's a question for us to understand what we can actually negot what is available to negotiate from a financial recompensation for lost funds during this time I don't know how that works but that would be more something I can bring towards Jennifer discuss you know just just to add to that I I think Nate's right on because there's two other situations one is um we' talked about the the storage facility and the uh the presentation they made you know saying oh the price of lumber is going way up but when we saw the building

going up it was all metal studs and secondly um we've um there was um Shan son came um in front of council um last month and um you know with regards to the outbuilding in front of uh the Oliver um I we basically you know gave some things to that developer to get that project underway and part of it um that we wanted back in return was some sort of a um public space commercial um uh product um be can be used by the uh by the community restaurant whatever but it's still sitting in phow it's just not not there so what do we have in terms of clawback and what what do we do this a very good point and something we'll bring up since I brought up S so thing is there anything on that nothing uh more recent since the council development uh in there I know that they were doing some Outreach uh Beyond just having Pace to do that themselves uh and there and I know they've had some discussions because it's been brought up with discussions with other uh people looking at the at the sites so U like Mr Sanson approached Mr cah and they were talking about possibility of you know working together on something um I gu my last thing to say is that uh the uh business license renewals for um are due on May 15th um I do have samples of the letters that we sent out and our forms if anybody's interested in seeing that uh but we sent out uh between uh yeah last Friday about

394 uh envelopes got mine did you well the mail Works uh and uh that was a wonderful thing so uh it's busy busy and not to overshadow the business but um Madame May if you want to do your uh thing I also I I took the liberty of doing the upcoming events oh I appreciate that all right so yes next week we're going to have coffee with the mayor and it's going to be the alette city council we're going to kind of talk about things whether it be historical or or what the prodct of or you know what we feel we've accomplished uh what I feel has been accomplished in 25 years maybe they'll uh be with less time um uh we have an election coming up uh that will uh change the face and the look of your Council um Native uh plant sale uh is going to be April 26th and it's also going to be the National Prescription takeback Drug takeback day but you all know that we have the capabilities for you to come on in anytime during the business day and drop those drugs off into a drop slot box it's back by the police department um um after April 22nd uh there will be a little gathering after that brief meeting to say hello to the new and goodbye to the old um and I will uh let you do you want me to read this whole thing here no okay all right um I will tell you that I've eaten that great heart it was very yummy um I'm I'm proud that we have another

place in our community to gather and um that's pretty much my report one last thing chairman though that May 26 meeting if that's the Monday that's Memorial Day and uh ah then we will be looking I will be emailing you for a different date for the May meeting with that um any other reports any other comments no I think we're done here with that uh close the meeting we are adjourned