Economic Development Commission - Regular Meeting

All right.

Oh, please use your microphone in order for people online to hear.

Now we are connected. Okay. Calling to order the Economic Development Commission for June 29th, 2026. Stoudy, would you please call the roll?

Yes, sir. uh we have uh chairman rodney pattershock here uh vice chairman david moons here uh it should say secretary but commissioner donaldson here commissioner jacobs um i see you here there you go thank you sorry uh and then uh commissioner zelenci it's great everyone is in attendance tonight um we have a correction here for our uh council person uh michael solomanov joining us for the very first time via zoom thank you sir for being with us welcome sir thank you and then we have uh staff liaisons uh Planning and Community Design Commission, Planning and Building Department Director, Carlos Trejo, and myself, Senior Planner Dawn Doty. Everybody, welcome.

All right, fantastic. We'll be right along. Do we have anyone online with public comments? Because the chairs in front of us are empty.

No, we do not have any other online attendees other than our panelists.

Oh, darn. All right. Moving right along. Item three, business communications.

All right. So for the business communications plan, we... reviewed the business survey responses. There have only been 21 responses since the survey was issued. We haven't had any really responses since April 16th. And these that are sitting in front of you, I regret that I did not get you guys physical packets. But in the agenda, you can actually access all of the documentation that I'm referring to, including the business survey responses. I did do a different format that is in person, so I apologize. I can get that to you guys tomorrow. But the different format is really just a reorganization of the business survey responses to focus on what are the key themes of the responses. And I'm going to share my screen here.

So Don, while you're doing that, it sounds like you're saying we didn't really get many responses from the individual outreach and visits we did to our, you know, the divvied up businesses we went to.

Well, as far as I actually didn't look at, or I can't tell, and I'm going to sneeze here in just a second. My apologies. I did not look at it from a, you know, what did we gain from who distributed what I can't actually tell where the link came from. If they click, you know, if they access the link from a card, I can say that we have not gained any. And I've sent out the, you know, I've sent it out by email. Anytime I send a business license in, I'm like, here, take this survey too. I checked to make sure that they haven't taken it already. But yeah, I would say that ongoing efforts to distribute a survey have not yielded any additional survey responses.

I think we should just take it for what we have. Try to glean as many insights as we can and recognize that small business owners are super busy and they don't want to take a survey. They're not going to take a survey.

I would also mention that in-house we've discussed keeping the survey available on our website so that businesses have the opportunity to take the survey and give feedback on an ongoing basis. Kind of, you know, just an opportunity portal, as it were.

Yeah, because we had 21. I'm just, I guess a point to note is we had 21 before we did any outreach and the outreach yielded zero, which isn't, you know, it is what it is. I agree we shouldn't keep beating that horse. It's just something to know that pretty low yield if we want to go through that effort in the future. Yeah. If I read it by any means.

Right. Yeah. Certainly, you know, I don't feel like there are a lot of, you know, nobody complains that they're getting too much. you know, engagement from the city. And as you look through the responses, it would say that, you know, that we're doing a good job, but they would like additional opportunities. It's possible that maybe we would do an email blast or, you know, a newsletter type thing where we kind of promote it's, feature right like say you know business survey submit your feedback but you know like to kind of keep it in the forefront or keep know it alive but other than that i wouldn't say that you know that we've done a bad job of collecting survey responses uh i would say and as you look through them uh and i don't know if anybody you know really took a whole lot of time to go through the survey responses before the meeting um even though they were available it's the did you kind of go through them and you're like, well, what is this all? What does this mean? You know, what is the survey or what are the responses? What do they really mean? And in our presentation tonight, I kind of summarized what the results were. And I do think that, you know, an ongoing collection process, you know, leaves the opportunity available for people to give feedback. I'm trying to think of ways, you know, if we refresh it year after year, then people who submit their feedback year over year will can be noted as well. So, and it would be great to, in a sense, that's an interesting metric to see, you know, if their impression, you know, has improved or if they're still just complaining about the same pothole on Olive, right? To go into the survey responses, unless there's any other questions at this point, yeah.

One thing to call out, maybe just an idea, is we could ask if anyone is interested in being highlighted or showcased in an upcoming newsletter for Alavet. And as an incentive, hey, fill out the survey and maybe let's talk about an opportunity to highlight your business.

Okay, so reaching out to people who have responded or is that a reaching out to businesses and promoting, do the survey and the... Yeah, for a future iteration, if we can just highlight, if you fill out the survey and we'll, for an opportunity to get your business showcased in upcoming newsletters. I get it.

So businesses that fill it out, we'll get that chance. Maybe we'll get a higher response rate.

I like that. Incentives are good.

Right.

Yeah, Dawn, as I recall, I think there was 250-ish businesses.

Oh, as far as the number of businesses? Yeah, there's more than that. I've got that here. Yeah, 360-ish.

Okay. So somewhere between five, 7%, something like that, which are really not that bad.

I was pretty impressed with the initial, like we got those 21 and then we stuck there. So I even tested to make sure that the survey was still working. So, but it is, I like that incentive, you know, what, what gets people to respond to, you know, even such a simple survey, which council member Solomona, if you may not be familiar with what the survey looks like. And I believe that the survey responses were given to city council at the like possibly in April. But it was a very simple survey or is a very simple survey with four open entry questions that are on the screen before you. And the survey responses that were in the agenda are grouped by the business, which I think is kind of an important way to look at things as well, because it puts into context the concerns and when you. generalize them and that is to organize them under each question, you do get a sense of what the overall response is, but it is confusing as to what they're referring to. So, uh, like what is the city of Olivet doing? Well, the first, uh, response that was given or by, uh, ALF are alphabetized anyway is accessibility. But if you, you know, discombobulate, you know, disconnect that from who responded, then you don't really know what they mean by accessibility. There are a lot of folks that didn't, you know, that didn't answer every question, which is fine too. But it did lead to, you know, some spotty. What would that be? Analysis. And I forgot where I was in this. So what is the city doing well? I was surprised or I was impressed to hear that we've been doing so well at attracting businesses and development, that there's lots of construction. We've got compliments on communication and information sharing, planning and building process. I do feel like people were kissing up a little bit because... They knew that we put out the survey. I was mentioned by name a few times and I'm also the person that collects the business license fees. So I think they were being very nice when they did that. uh as far as uh you know and they were some of the positives were things that we know um but also really great to hear that our uh emergency services and uh are of high quality that we have great response time that we are a safe and clean community clean came up more than once as well as diverse. And now all of those positives, those were not, you know, those weren't exaggerated or anything, but you will hear them, those exact same things highlighted, except for emergency services as being things that we need to improve. So commercial streets that were called out as needing improvement are Dealman Rock Island Industrial Drive and Dealman Industrial which is a different road. They are both located just north of here. And it was a little difficult to understand what the person was saying by city staff need to be more transparent in their response and it wasn't she wasn't trying to say that our responses were not transparent she was trying to say that it wasn't clear who she should reach out to so that wasn't necessarily a shortcoming on our part I would like to think As far as this question goes, any comments, questions, concerns? Anybody online?

All right. I read the responses that were published earlier, so I'm good. I have no questions.

Oh, good. All right. So the how has business been was actually the least answered question. It was nice to hear that we're moving in a positive direction, consistent, steady. Others said slow and that there was at least one remark on that. international markets, that the conflict in the Middle East was of a concern to their business. But otherwise, it was not very specific. Nobody actually said that the you know, the streets or that any city services were a hindrance to their business activity or operations, um, which one might expect, uh, you know, uh, they, they all really get a ticket more of like, how is their business doing, which you could see that in a couple different ways. If people really had something to complain about or if they felt that there was something that was a hindrance, I would think that they would express it. Now, what could the City of Olivet do better? People were pretty open about that. They are a little bit in contrast to some of the things that we've already talked about. We need Although I thought that it kind of came out in summary clear that we need to elevate our business, our businesses profile. Like we need to elevate the visibility of businesses so that they can get more customers. promote business growth, collaborate, and always it is our goal to strengthen the connection between our services and our businesses. I thought that the need to improve equity and distribution of public services, I really want to look back at which business and how that plays out, what what they might have been going at their need to improve. That's those, you know, above average planning and building processes there. uh there were you know as we already went over need to improve condition of roads for potholes and snow removal um and the roads to mention two roads that were mentioned by name i believe olive might have also been mentioned yes i think that because i was reading through the responses as well i think that the person who mentioned the inequitable distribution of public services

I think that the professional staff should take a look at that, read it a little closer, see if there really is something we need to address there.

Well, and it, I mean, it is a general statement that.

Yeah, but that particular response just seemed like she had some, or they, I don't know who they were, that they seemed to have some very specific issue, just the way it read.

Yeah. Yeah. No, it's, it's, it is all it. There's, there's a lot of nuance in the responses. Um, and as they apply directly to, you know, they, they are thinking of themselves and their business, which is what we're asking them to give us, which is great. Um, I was surprised where some folks had focused. You know, some were kind of outside their business altogether. You know, they were concerned about commercial parking. um are parking at different uh commercial shopping areas so and while those might be valid concerns that's not something that affects them as a business um their specific business or at least from that individual, they're a home-based business. So while it does, I mean, it affects them as a customer, they are both a customer and a business. So it is, it's, it, there's a whole lot to think about, you know, for the perspectives of, of how, how the responses come. Also, you know, kind of outside of, I mean, inside of the planning round, but a little bit outside of EDC, concerns over impervious lot coverage and stormwater mitigation, loss of tree canopy. It's not a lot. As an Economic Development Commission, we can encourage commercial renovations. We can try to encourage businesses to improve their lots, facade improvements, or increase the tree canopy that they provide. However, we don't have that opportunity as you know as as much as as you might think right any uh questions about this one folks online was anything repeated more than once it's a little bit hard to tell i mean there's this is all good feedback but i just looking for patterns here or trends did anything stick out See, and I would say that the minimum number of responses, like that it's hard to point out trends because, you know, it's really just singular responses. There are some, more than one business had mentioned about, the potholes you know more than one i did try to go with things that weren't singular right but um it was also like i don't want to gloss over it you know uh somebody's opinion either so i want to make sure everybody's represented but not overly the lights not shined on their response so heavily that it's overly considered. So I do, yeah, no, that was a concern. We tried to do word clouds and boy, those were just... not fun. They didn't look very good because the way that word clouds work are that it is a simple count of each and every word. And so the fact that, you know, somebody used opportunity, the word opportunity, just more than, you know, if they use it more than one time in a response and it would blow that word up. So it's the, it's, Very few number of responses that make it hard to find like an overarching thing. The last question, and I'm sorry, were there any other questions? This one. Okay. What would you like the city of Olivet to know? Our last question. This was where it did, you know, I tried to, you know, be true to the responses, but also provide a summary, right? I was not surprised to know that rent was increasing, but it's what they want us to know. Um, I like the suggested use of gift cards and at a previous meeting, um, I'm not sure where the gift cards would come from. Uh, you know, if it were donated by businesses or if we had some kind of passes or something to five Oaks, uh, where, or discounted membership type of a thing, we would have to work that out with parks.

I can offer that when my business was still in Webster, the city of Webster Groves sold gift certificates that could be used or redeemed at businesses in Webster Groves. And then we turned those in back to the city and got reimbursed. Where the funds came from? No idea. But that's what they were. They were just flat out dollar amount gift certificates geared towards keeping business in Webster Groves. Just a little... directional, informational. Here's one way that it's being done.

Okay. No, that's great. It's a good idea. I'm not sure if it's...

But I don't know if the city is funding it or if there's a benefactor. I have no idea.

Yeah, there would have to be a pot of money. You know.

Which I don't have. We do have a budget. That is true. I'm not sure. Minimal, but... But we can maybe address that because our fiscal year starts in two days, I believe.

Yes.

A little late to ask for next year. Correct. Next year being in two days. But we might want to consider that as part of EDC's budget in the future.

Okay. It's a great idea. And this was the one where Dealman Industrial Drive was mentioned, but it hadn't been mentioned in other ones.

Isn't there work going on back there now?

Currently, yeah. And it's interesting because it does affect the area and there's a lot of cones, but I feel like there's you know, traffic flows through there or it's still and people are getting around. Maybe it's a lot more busy than I recognize.

The comment was with regard to Dillman Industrial or Rock Hill?

It was Dillman Industrial.

We actually, about ten years ago, I think it was about 10 years ago, we did a neighborhood improvement district to redo the streets. And it'd be interesting to see if things have held up. And in my mind, it wasn't that long ago, but it could have been.

It really was not. And I know that they have done, you know, maintenance and improvements, you know, ongoing basis. And, you know... I did fall out of where that one came from.

I think it was maybe just a couple of people said the same sort of thing about that. But then, you know, potholes are potholes. No one really says where they are.

I'm definitely more, you know, people driving on the same pothole in... all of you know and it's just in their way you know on the way to work or is it something that's inhibiting their business be uh you know because their clients don't want to drive their vehicles on it like I it it does impact how much weight I give it personally but then you know um I guess it would be interesting. I have not gone back through this look at it, like, as in, like, associating who made which comments in a while. We've had a lot of things going on in-house here.

Well, that's all right. Not specific, yeah. So wrap things up?

Yeah, it is. So as far as the survey responses go, we did speak with our city manager, Jennifer Yackley, and discuss what the responses were. you know, the potential to meet with the different businesses and address the concerns. I know the code enforcement officer had looked at some of the pothole issues. So a in these are, you know, it's not our I believe, had they not driven and dealman industrial, because I thought or, or they depends on that it would depend on on the road classification.

Well, I know that...

Right. Well, I thought that they had just gone to see if it's as bad as, you know, they had said. But then, like, Dealman Rock Island is kind of notoriously bad, so... And it is not managed by the city of Olivet. So if there are, you know, there is limited, you know, recourse that the city has to maintaining some of the commercial roadways, even, you know, because they may not be managed by the city at all. Olive is managed by the state. So what do you have? We got Nate.

So like, I can get a citation for having grass. That's too high. Can't businesses who have road commercial roads get citations for not taking care of the road. So have we done that? They get notified just like the, so that the deal men industrial place you talked about, that's not ours. Like who gets in trouble for that?

It gets the property owner is directly in front of the pothole. Oh, okay. is usually maintains or takes care of that that segment so and there's been some uh some things our public works director has done to help improve some of those in there like msd was going to expand a sanitary line that they looked at first indian meadows park because it would be the least disruptive but it would be in our park and he coordinated with him to do the line in dealman rock island which allowed them to replace a whole lane you know recently you know re-dig it and resurface it we tried to coordinate a couple of property owners to get together to do the other side you know and they're unfortunately you know that's a hard thing trying to coordinate all these property owners to get into a process in there but we got half the lane you know, replaced. And so now we just deal with the individual potholes. And there's one or two properties where, you know, after April and the big rains, we know it's going to open up.

One comment that caught my eye was the person asking about if they could get... I just lost where it was. But get the... connections to the gym, to the Five Oaks, and if there would be incentives for businesses to get memberships there. I was wondering if that had ever been explored as a, you know, Yes.

Oh, yeah. And Parks and Recreation Department, our director, has coordinated that with several businesses where there is a, I don't want to call it an in-resident, but it's something very similar for groups of businesses in that process. And again, that's something we can contact that business directly or direct them.

And truly, those are, yeah, some of those type of things, it's like the communication or lack of communication is not, I guess there's not a lack of communication because there are inroads. They just need to ask, you know, and we don't know. And while we try to promote and say these are, you know, you should reach out, that's not always the message that is received, you know, when they're looking at newsletters or, or whatever have you.

Yeah. Good to hear that. It's already something that's been offered.

Yeah. It's something we do. Like it's not, yeah. It's not something that like is, is ethereal or anything. We, we do that totally. We totally partner with businesses and, um, the parks department reaches out actively to businesses for turkey trot and all kinds of things.

But specifically for Five Oaks membership to coordinate. If you give all your employees a membership, we'll give you this discounted rate is what you're saying.

Yes. They have worked with Emerson, I know. But their agreements are – I don't know. They have like a package. Sure.

But we're doing it. We are actively more or less trying to ask people if they want it, our businesses, if they want it.

And we can talk with the parks director to, you know, see what kind of response they've had on that. If they need any, you know, additional information on our businesses or, you know, to help do some kind of like targeted campaign to the businesses, like to say, hey, come do this with us. Yeah.

Chairman Patterson. Well, one comment is, first of all, Dawn, good for you to put this together because I tell you what, this is, I think that because of the nature of the responses, et cetera, it can be very frustrating to try and make sense of it. So you've done a good job and I appreciate your presentation tonight. One thing that I kind of get from this is that whenever you ask someone, what does the government do for you? Potholes, police protection, nice streets, bad streets, whatever. But I tell you what, it kind of leads me to the misunderstanding or the understanding on our part of what we actually provide. So maybe gleaning from this and some other things that we've done in the past, maybe make a list of the kinds of things that all of that provides for business. kind of a did you know Olivette does this or offers this, and the discussion about Five Oaks membership is a really good thing. So that could be a real positive thing that could come out of this.

I like that.

And actually, it may help the next incantation of this to put it out there. Just so they don't, you know, the obvious things are, I'm not saying the potholes are not a problem, but it's, you know, it's kind of a euphemism that gets thrown around all the time. Take care of the potholes, you don't take care of everything sort of thing. But there's, I think there's a lot of other things that the city does that can, that we can promote to businesses that they can think about.

Definitely. Thank you. Thank you.

Any other comments?

Yeah. About folks online?

I'm good. Thank you. Okay. Moving right along then. We've got some business license data for 2026.

Through my talk about discombobulated. This is all over the place. So what we have here is A business license report to date. So, uh, and I get a business license renewal almost once a day on average. Uh, but it is, we're not at a hundred percent. Um, we are almost never at a hundred percent, uh, on like the day after business licenses are due. Business licenses are due on May 15th of each and every year. Um, and there's a lot of, uh, forgetfulness, uh, but some folks, you know, uh, they, they do renew more on like a bi-yearly base or a, or a semi-annual basis, I guess you could say. Uh, so not semi-annual that'd be twice a year, but, uh, for. Our number of employees reported, we are trending ahead. Even though we don't have our full 100% number of businesses reporting, we are pretty well ahead. We're close to the number of total employees that we had with a quarter of our businesses missing, which is kind of significant. I did leave off a lot about like the annual gross sales, which are reported by our merchants because they are only provided by our merchants. So the data was not very clear. clear uh and it didn't speak like well from a year like a year over year basis or anything like that so i i i can speak to the amount uh as far as like comparatively to last year uh everything is at about a quarter down so it's like at somewhere near the 80 or 75 percent trending above the individual number of businesses and total number of licenses. We have several businesses that have two licenses that they are required to get. Those are service businesses that also sell merchandise in store. So if you are a, well, my favorite example are automotive businesses because you always get charged for parts and service. so uh we capture those sales with the merchant license and the service uh that they provide which captures their number of employees so uh we are working our way down on that 101 businesses remaining As far as the fees by quadrant, it is impressive and isn't as impressive without the other... I kind of took an ax to my presentation before coming in here. So this is our fees by quadrant and it shows... although our home occupancy and public activities, uh, don't, you know, aren't exactly revenue getters. We do have activity. Um, and we certainly have a lot of, uh, sales activity in, um, or not sales activity, but a lot of fees being generated from, uh, the dealman price area. And that is based, you know, mostly on those number of employees, um, To get those to get that amount up and what they pay in fees. And all of East also not so bad, but it that's those heavy employers there. As far as our top employers go, Murphy Company is almost always on the top of this list. Fisher Rosemont Systems, also known as Emerson, they are our new star, of course. And then Classic Air Care, I believe, has overtaken the Honeywell. So, um, and HGIS, uh, that is on also in the dealman industrial area. Um, so if you're not familiar with it, the, um, they do obviously home delivery and continent supplies and that's what they do. Uh, well, Carrollton Bank, also a new business on this list. You would not have seen them in the 2025 list. And I really love that nice little... 388.9 there for our total employees it's quite a bit and oh well here's that employment by quadrant where you can see how although and I do want to say this orange looks very similar to the home occupancy orange but the home occupancy orange is this tiny sliver of 22 and not this giant olive east orange here. So you could see how those fees really follow those large employers. And we have 18 brand new businesses for the 2026 business license year. Any of these, and I took it off, but like I had highlighted which ones are merchants, those, their sales will not, they won't be expressing their full sales figures until the 2027 or 2028. year, depending on when they open. Although that is really just Ace Hardware that will be missing a few months. And Paris Baguette, the Brass Tap, Tropical Smoothie, those will have full years.

Where was the Ace Hardware going?

Oh, in the former Party City location. Oh, sweet! Yeah, they just put up a sign.

Okay, great.

What's the opening date on that? That's amazing.

Oh, I don't think we have an opening date.

I've been in a sleeping bag outside the front door since the sign went up. I'm just waiting to figure out when I'm the first one in to get a popcorn.

Ace is the helpful place.

I'm so excited.

Same. Well, yeah, now that they have a card store and we're just never going to leave there, David. And so that was really the end of my business license report.

OK, so any questions?

Here to be none of folks online.

OK, moving along. pending text amendments and special permit use requests for PCDC.

Okay, I want to kind of go over those as soon as Don gets to that slide. This was from our previous council liaison, council person, Vashon Hellman, had requested when some items are going to PCDC that some information should be shared with the Economic Development Commission. Again, the goals of our 2024 comprehensive plan update is to proactively lead economic development to support a resilient and growing economy with the objectives of to attract, to retain, to grow the tax base, and then increase diversity of the workforce in there. So... Going on that basis, the next slide, you'll see a couple of pending petitions that are before the Commission for the month of July. One is RICS-H hardware, which is going to be where the old Party City location was at, is requesting to have outdoor display and storage. And you see that in most hardware facilities. And we're working with them on identifying the space, because between them and the ATM and Dobbs, it gets a little tight, but that's kind of an essential component uh of their seasonal displays and and products uh in our light industrial parks we're getting a couple of requests for uh non-related industrial activity uh which requires what we call special permits meaning that they're not necessarily ideal for the industrial park so therefore it is selective it's up to the council to authorize and permit one permit them one is at 10 401 bauer boulevard that's uh coming off of warson by the uh the Humane Society or the Animal Control Facility. If you go all the way to the end and they're taking up a suite where they do repair to the advanced driver assistance system. So those sensors in the cars and all that, it's all done within the building in itself, but because it's auto related, we usually require a special permit. It gives us a little bit more control to make sure it's not a full engine overhaul or something incompatible with the area. The second one, we have SSM Health Cardinal Glennon looking to do a pediatric therapy outpatient clinic at 9375 Dillman Industrial Drive. So if you go down on Dillman and you take a right-hand turn and head east, you just continue. There is a small, kind of like a strip building, which they would be located in there. That one, a little concerned because it is a pediatric and outpatient therapy in the middle of an industrial area. And now we don't have heavy industrial, but it is, you know, it's, it's a different clientele that they're bringing into an area where there's more of a workforce or a office nature type of facility. And then the third one is at 1220 North Price Road. That's a little bit past the CVS on Dealman Industrial. If you're familiar where Paddle and Pickle is, there is an indoor field hockey practice facility that would like to go in that building in itself. And again, Paddle and Pickle had to get a special permit in there, but a little concerned about seeing the building converted to full recreational use. Not saying that it doesn't work. But we're, you know, we're adding that and maybe we should rethink if that is a route we want to go, maybe rethink the ordinance so it doesn't, you know, it's more permissible in there. And lastly, there's a couple of tax amendments that are being proposed going to the Commission this July also. Somebody wants to request to operate coin operated laundromats right now in our COR district, which is the main zoning district along all of their prohibited. We allow dry cleaners and drop-off facilities, but not coin operated in there. And that was a specific request from a council in the past in there. So they can always come back and make requests and ultimately it's up to the council to determine that decision. Another one is that we have these condominium garage warehouse facilities. So what a developer comes in and builds a building with a whole bunch of garage slots. in there, and then sells individual garage slots, and then you can park, in this case, they're saying like luxury vehicles or RVs and things of that nature. The current district would permit that because it's a warehouse, it's a storage, it's an industrial district. The key thing here is that they would be condominium. So in this case, it would work like a residential condominium. Developer comes in, puts it all together, sells all the pieces, and then it becomes part of an HOA. And long-term, you know, as long as the, like the deeds and the articles are tight to keep up and make sure that it's followed through, you know, so you're not dealing with 35 property owners 10, 15, 20 years from now trying to fix the streets, you know, in that nature. So that's always a careful thing on how to do in that process. Glad to answer any specific questions on any of these.

Yeah, this is all very interesting. I appreciate being informed. Is there anything, since this is a news section, is there anything we're being asked for? Just kind of if thoughts in general, it's mostly with the PCDC and you all as staff to make the decisions is what I understand.

No, I think for right now, and this is somewhat new in a process, I value any information or concerns or any positive aspects that you may see in these to inform the commission and there, but for the most part, it's, you know, I think when I go to the council for the public hearing, they may ask, you know, were there any concerns expressed by the Economic Development Commission? I'd like to Let them know that you guys were informed and if there was. Again, that special permit process isn't the guarantee in those. I have a little concern on some of these, but some of those concerns can be worked out. Sometimes I look at a special permit is like, okay, you want a special request to go into a facility, but what are you going to do in return? And I'm not talking about like a quid pro quo, but it's an opportunity to get improvements that we normally wouldn't get. you know in a regular facility so let's say like the pediatric you know like a segmented area so there's safe parking you know right in front of the area or sidewalks you know to make sure that since this is pediatric to keep to ensure like, you know, there's safe pedestrian access to the facility or what's going to go out. For the hockey, it's a practice facility. You know, I lose, you know, I'm not going to say it's revenue producing because it could be a warehouse and box just sit on it. And I get the same thing, but, you know, you know, getting a little bit more information, you know, like if there are 30 people using the site, 30 people potentially going to sugar fire afterwards in there, or are there concerns from, it's adjacent to a residential property. This is indoor, so I don't see a concern, but it's also an opportunity to retrofit something that, you know, they haven't fixed their fence in about 10 years. You don't have to say, Hey, we'll do this or convert your lights from these wall packs to down, down lighting and things of that nature.

So gotcha. Just quick thoughts that come to mind. The pediatric therapy outpatient clinic looks like it's pretty close to Dealman. It's not in the heart of the industrial area. Although not thoroughfare, it seems like they'd It's pretty easy access for patients. The field hockey, to your point, seems like a destination. I can't imagine there are many field hockey practice indoor spaces, so maybe that is a great opportunity to get people into Olivet who wouldn't be otherwise. And then the coin-operated laundromats, that's interesting that we had that restriction. And, you know, I... I don't know, just reacting here that it is potentially another opportunity for foot traffic. Something that people said they don't have too much of in a couple of the responses of the survey, spontaneous foot traffic when you're at a laundromat, you're stuck there for a while. And if it's in the right mix of, you know, across from Domo or something like that, maybe they get drive a little foot traffic to our businesses and there's a symbiotic relationship. But overall, this looks like a good list and I would certainly have no concerns and would err on liking all of these.

I would agree with everything that was just said.

industrial space so I don't see any issue for my my only comment is just with coin operated laundromats I just wonder what the impetus is was on that originally I would think that it would be businesses that cater to a service that have minimal staffing and I don't know if that's a better clarification But I just don't know. I just really don't understand why laundromats like that should be singled out. I think most amenities, if you look at the apartments that have gone up, et cetera, the vast majority of them would be the kind of places that offer that in-house or in-unit. So I don't know if...

if this really makes sense at all, but can I throw a theory to, sorry, to have it, to have that restriction, what it doesn't make sense. Is that what you're saying? Correct. Correct. Yeah.

It's the same thing. What can't have tattoo parlors and drive-thrus and everything else. It's because some people long ago thought all these things brought riffraff to your city and it's outdated and ridiculous. And people want to open a corn operated laundromat and they think it's a good business. Let them do it.

You said it and I concur. That was a theory. I don't know. Actually, no, actually, you're probably right. But the thing is, I think that, you know, the PCDC should probably take a closer look at the impetus about why these things are happening.

Yeah, well said.

Folks online.

No, just excited by the diversity of the businesses coming in. I think like you said, Carlos, a lot of these can be worked through. So just making sure we have some questions answered, but yeah, no concerns.

I mean, I don't have any problem with any of these, the safety of the kids in the industrial park with the field hockey, or I'm sorry, off a price with the field hockey and the therapy and all that. That's, that's concerning, but I'm sure it can be addressed. I don't think it's anything to hold up business for, you know?

And again, I don't think it's necessarily something that you should apply an ordinance to or a restriction. It's a little bit of sometimes too much oversight, perhaps. I don't know.

Yeah. I think we've all learned a lesson from that. But what about, you know, there's the Just needs proper supervision and rules in place that can be enforced later. That's all.

Anybody else?

Okay, good.

Good discussion.

Just continuing on the five-year economic development plan. Don, what do you have for us?

Ah, well, we have, um, I mean, we have been talking about our objectives and our potential community actions. Uh, we took the prioritization surveys, um, and. We have, um, Carlos, as you have anything to say about this necessarily.

No, I mean, this is Mr. Moons was talking about the comparisons between the two and correlating those with, you know, the 2017 to 2024 and maybe updating those goals to be consistent with the comprehensive plan. So this kind of goes through that process. You see the two. And they're not far apart, you know, the wording has changed. And as you go through it, Don, you'll see the, you know, adding, let's say on goal one, the baseline, the stakeholder feedback, desirable businesses and industry targets, the marketing, and the internal organization, applying those to goal one, the attractor routine. If you go to the next slide, you know, taking out what we've already done through this process, shifting some of those into the comprehensive plan update goals, and then getting those set up in there and moving kind of in that direction. I think that was kind of the feedback that the commission was kind of talking about, and then adding the new information from the comprehensive plan into this kind of revised format. I think that was the last one, Don, and then you had some items too. Now that gets through the whole, let's just go back up for a sec in there. So if we can go ahead and start drafting, putting something forward to you more in a written format and for you guys to start editing. We'll start working on that.

Yeah, I think it was really our goal to have more work done on that ahead of time. It's been pretty tight stepwise. So, and then, yeah, this is all just the reiteration of things. And I'm so sorry, council member Solomon off. There's some of these things that we've discussed, you know, in the commission so many times, please tell me to slow down. It's okay.

I'll go back later and I'll go through this in a little more detail.

Okay. Not a problem. And if there's any information that I can supply you by, you know, directly, I'm more than happy to do so.

Thank you.

I am just kind of flipping through this. See, I've got that that takes us to or unless we have anything that we wanted to go over other than we are going to be drafting for the EDC or the sorry, the five year economic development plan update. Questions, comments or complaints?

Complaints? That's a new one. No complaints here. I think that's fine. We can continue to break it down. I mean, the idea behind it was we were pretty verbose in what we had in the past, and breaking it down and simplifying it with the use of the comprehensive plan is the goal.

My predecessor was a very good writer, I will say that, and he wrote a lot.

I understand.

All right, on to other business.

Yeah, reports. City staff, liaison, and commissioner.

A couple of things, and I'll let our liaison if they want to provide anything. Of course, the council's just adopted their new budget for this coming fiscal year, fiscal year 2027, and it starts July 1st. And in the process of doing it, the council has adopted the enterprise-wide goals, meaning it not only affects the council, but it's supposed to trickle down into the departments and then within the interdepartmental staff with their values being transparency, diversity equity and inclusion fiscal responsibility collaboration community service excellent and you see a lot of these words reiterated both in the five-year plan and the comprehensive plan and even what we heard in some of the the survey results of people identifying some of these things in there so kudos to the council for putting it together on the long run the council's also identified on the next slide done It's multi-year goals, and that's the transportation network to improve the Olive Boulevard corridor, housing to push for attainable housing, being welcoming and diverse as a community, environmental and sustainability, but that's in municipal operations. I think there is a grander plan there. in that process, but it's one of those, you know, let's do it first to show others how it can be done in there. So to be a safe community and to make sure that we provide the best internal city services as permissible. I'll allow the liaison if you have any other comments on those.

No, not on these specifically.

So every once in a while, we'll go back and forth, especially as we update the five-year plan to ensure that we're upholding what the council's goals are in this process too. We do that same with the commission and that.

The transportation network, is that more for cars and private vehicles or is it for public transit?

I think they're looking at more from a pedestrian perspective with the ability to make it also attainable for transit or car services. I think a lot of the concern is about the safety, more on the pedestrian side. Councilman Solomon, you probably can.

Yeah, I can jump in. So, I mean, one of the areas we focused on is Olive Boulevard. So, we've gotten feedback from citizens that, you know, as more and more businesses open along that corridor there with, like, Braveheart and, again, and other businesses, just making sure that pedestrians feel safe walking in Olive and working closely with MoDOT to explore opportunities to make that happen where right now the policy is as new offices get built we adjust the sidewalks and make you know improve the safety but if that is the only way we get get them out doing that it's going to take a while right so we're trying to we're trying to speed this up a little bit so it becomes a little bit more attainable and we're not waiting 50 to 100 years to make that happen across the whole uh street the whole stretch thank you

So I see the term advancing economic development, but it seems like that's along the olive corridor and what you just spoke to. Was there any conversation by the council of just a larger growth or economic development goal? Cause I don't see that here. I see some things that maybe if we do this, then we'll get a ripple effect there, but there's no direct statement on economic growth for the city. Was that intentional?

The thought was that as we make the community more accessible, people will be able to go around more and support the businesses more. So that was the overall thought on this bullet point. So where, I mean, I'll give you an example. So instead of maybe a family getting into a car and driving out to Clayton for dinner, maybe they walk to dinner, potentially both to one of the new businesses along Olive, just as an example.

Nate meant overall across these six things, economic development isn't called out specifically for, Was there any discussion of that being a multi-year goal or are these the priority focuses the council sees?

Yeah, between the five of us, these are the priorities. Economic development, of course, is always an underlying aspect of these things. But yeah, that was not called out specifically in our discussion. Just because there are no major, I mean, as a city as a whole, there are no major concerns in economic development. The city is doing pretty well overall.

Yeah, I hear that. If you make everything a focus, nothing's a focus.

Yeah. Mike, can you speak to what is the biggest departure from previous councils and this new council when it comes to multi-year goals? Which is the biggest that is a departure from the normal?

I think we're definitely leaning more into the transportation aspect. I would say a little bit more in the environmental sustainability. Those two became more of a focus with this round of updates. Yeah, I think those are the two. And we also spent quite a bit of time talking about diversity and making sure that no matter what the political climate looks like, we continue that for all of that because that is something that people like. Right and we want to keep all of that's very diverse. At least you know locally and support the businesses that we have. Okay, thank you.

Very good right now the city staff. Liaison commissioner, I guess there any other reports.

You got pretty much the updates of what's going to the commission based on those special permit uses and what's down the pike that we're working on in there. So those will, a majority of them will go to the commission in July. Hopefully we can get them to the council in August. PCDC is meeting this Thursday. They're considering a canopy addition to the brass tap where they'll have some covered seating areas on that patio. It's a unique patio. In terms of design, nothing special, but the patio is actually on city property. It was part of the negotiations with the developer's agreement. So we were able to acquire that to allow them to extend into the MoDOT right away by us owning that. So it was a nice process that the city went to to give them some expanded space, especially for outdoor seating. So that will go to the commission.

Is that canopy, is that a permanent structure or is it temporary?

It would be proposed as permanent.

Nice.

Okay.

And actually, because it's city-owned, is the city building this paying for it?

No. Okay. In the agreement with the developer for the development as a whole, that was their responsibility. Perfect. So they have that on Thursday, kind of went over the special permits. And I don't think I have anything additional. I do want to recognize Nate and his last meeting here and there.

But I think it's important to note, you know, 2013 was when you started with us. Thanks, Nate.

You helped us put together the five-year economic development plan. I can tell you this, you know, this was right after... The first comprehensive plan, we just got out of the recession. We were trying to get ourselves organized to where we wanted to go, how to get the comprehensive plan implemented, which was about dynamic sense of place. And that's probably been one of the most vital documents that we've had. And while we've kind of talked about it here back and forth about the need for revisions, the need for revisions are, you know, they helped my department. put the baseline of information, to be able to collect data, to streamline the contact person in the process. I would say half of those things have been implemented and made major impacts that we've had over $1.5 billion of improvement from Indian Meadows to I-170, and we still see a lot of more interest in there. And again, it's not... nate out there you know you know getting all these companies but creating a process for us to to be consistent and to work with uh in there and i i you know i appreciate that i mean that as a planner uh you know that foresight uh you know and it's the commission as a whole i mean uh that assisted in there has been uh vital for for us so

Yeah, just, Nate's been great to work with. Your comments have always been pertinent, informative, and creative. And I tell you what, I really appreciate, you know, just the discussion that we've had over the years. Thank you.

No problem.

Just do what I do.

Don Finan- Right.

Don Finan- So that one other thing I noticed that there were a couple of minutes here, but they weren't on the agenda. Don Finan- Do you want to go ahead and approve these quickly.

Don Finan- Would you please.

Don Finan- Help you out. Don. Don Finan- Forget Councilman Solomon.

Oh, yes. Go ahead, Jim.

a council report, I don't know if there was. Oh, council report, yeah.

Council member, oh, are you ready?

Yeah, yeah, I can. Let's see. I have a couple of things. So we're getting ready to interview new commission members for the few openings that we have across different commissions. I also want to let you guys know we're doing an exploratory study for merging of several fire department functions with nearby cities. So 13 cities were approached. I believe last I heard there were six cities that agreed to do a study. to see how they can be combined. And it goes from Brantwood to Webster, U City and a few other municipalities close by. So we're not talking about fully combining fire departments. We've just some functions that are already happening anyway, in many cases, you know, when there's a call, multiple fire departments end up going. So just, you know, pointing to better coordination and seeing if it's makes sense, if it's going to be more productive, effective that way. So that study, I believe should be happening next couple of months. So the city paid $20,000. 22,000 or so for it. And so everyone contributed in the study. So yeah, we talked about the budget. And yeah, that's those are the main things.

Thank you, Councilmember. And I believe that concludes our scheduled approval. Yes. There are two meetings worth of minutes ready for acceptance.

I have had a look at them, and I make the motion that they be accepted.

Can I get a second?

I second.

Second. Thank you very much. And so the meeting minutes for October 27th, I want to say, 2025 and January 26th, 2026 are logged in record.

As part of the commissioner reports, can I do a very fast question update on the action items?

Please.

So from last meeting, 4-19, we had a couple action items. There were the ones related to the business survey, which were completed, ones related to business awards, which are completed, the five-year economic development plan surveys completed. You all are processing it. That sounds great. The two I wanted to ask about are we talked about when we were talking about the digital survey last in April, staff outreaching to the highest revenue and highest employee companies in Olivet to offer a meeting. Is there any update on that? Are we still pursuing that?

Yeah, we've had some internal discussions about the format and then identification of which businesses will reach out. That kind of refers you back to Don's business license data. You saw that top 10 group, and that's probably going to be the main focus we'll start with.

I guess I had glossed over that whenever I said that we had talked with our city manager. about the survey responses and about like how the city would respond to those and, you know, outreach for the businesses.

Great. I'll keep that open. Then the last one, the business spotlight in all of that life, it's on my desk and I previewed it, have not read cover to cover yet, but I didn't see a business spotlight. Is that still something we were planning to outreach to the editor with a proposal for the spotlight? Some of the business survey responses said, of course, they want more opportunities to promote their business, is that still something?

Yes, we're working on that. And sorry to kind of put it that it's being worked on. But yes, we've had the conversation with our communications director on there. Again, it's about setting the format, the questions that we're going to ask, whether they're going to reflect the same three that we've had before and how we're going to select the business to have some things in place so there's a process on how the business is selected, what questions are asked. and all that. I don't know if you've had any more conversations with Ken on.

Yeah, I did want to mention that it's a little bit more complicated than, I mean, it is, it's not that complicated, but for selecting the businesses that we spotlight, that there needs to be a lot of thought into that process. As far as, you know, how we, you know, who we select, And as, as Carlos, all the things that Carlos just went over, what do we ask them? What, you know, how, how do we choose the people that we spotlight? I think that those were her major concerns is to have that be a decided process and not just like us picking out of the air. Yeah.

And I really liked the point Councilman Solomon have said about There's very few things where we have a carrot we can offer. Well, select things we have a carrot we can offer. And this is one of them. And there's also select things we ask them for. And the surveys they responded to, the business license responses. So maybe those, although we didn't advertise it this time, maybe that's a shortcut. Yeah.

I do. Yeah, that that may be something to to talk with Kiana when she returns. Sorry, she's just on a short vacation. But I already have a little list of Kiana things. And that would be, you know, how to start that list, not just our largest employers. And then we have four choice, you know, four opportunities to, you know, support the same four businesses year after year. uh i there's there's a lot of thought being put into the equity of uh you know how the businesses are spotlighted and uh yeah it it has been discussed but it it i really like the idea of focusing on those who have responded to the business survey

I would also say, you know, having, we should have a selection process for which wants to highlight, but we should not let us hold that back, hold us back from doing it. Right. If we select the business and others come to us and say, we also want to be featured. That's a great problem to have.

Yeah. I like that.

One of the things with, with this scheduling was that the, this newsletter, the newsletter now only comes out four times a year. This newsletter is, was to inform the winners of the, uh, the restaurant and businesses of the year. There, there's a section, uh, in there. So, so waiting for the next three months, we, we decided we're not going to, we're going to continue to do at least one, every newsletter. Uh, but Kiana thought is like once a month and there's a weekly, um, email blast that goes out that once a month we will have somebody identified in that process too. So it's not waiting for that whole timeframe.

Love it. Thanks. I'll keep that one open as well.

Can you just make a note that for the next meeting, we all come with a suggestion of maybe four to five businesses that are consumer facing that might want to be listed and that we can like set up the calendar of 12 different businesses immediately and like work with Keanu to start drafting what that can look like on a monthly basis, as opposed to, you know, kicking the can and allowing that to languish.

We'll do, David.

You're the best. Thank you, sir.

And it was conscious to focus on the business award winners and not, you know, kick the can down the road, so to speak. But you're right. We did not have a specific business spotlight. And, you know, another acknowledgement is maybe not, you know, not the worst thing right so i i have great ideas guys thank you all so very much that's the participation that brings it together and makes it work before we adjourn can we get an update on the balance of the property the yahoo it's 170 property on what's happening in

I need to cut out from that part of the conversation. I've got to be somewhere in a few minutes. So I got to check out for that.

No worries.

I'm going to bid you all adieu. Have a lovely evening.

Bye, Becky. Thank you very much, Commissioner Jacobs.

At the last council meeting, the city manager noted that she was informed by the developer, which, you know, keep properties, all of that, which Keely and Mr. Yowitz, uh, and that there was supposed to be an announcement being made within the next week or two. Uh, regarding, I'm assuming what was lot five, where they're probably looking at to have two food or retail users on that site. And I haven't heard or seen anything as of yet. So I think they still have another week or to the end of this week, if it was within a two-week time frame. In terms of lot six, which is the hotel, we're still waiting for, we've done all our approvals. We're waiting for the submission of construction drawings on there. I don't have any update in regards to where there are with that. Okay.

Any other questions?

And that covers all the lots there.

All right. There's nothing further?

Going once, going twice.

Are we voting on this again? Or are we just adjourning? All right. With that, we are adjourned. Thank you for coming out. Thank you.

Thank you, everybody. Have a great night.