Economic Development Committee - Regular Meeting

[Applause] motion to y that's what I'm hearing although there are conflicting messages. All right. All right. We are live now. So, welcome everyone to the Economic Development Committee meeting for Monday, May 19th, 2025 at 5:30 p.m. Miss Lo, would you please call roll? Council member Utenberg here. Council member Preston here. Council member Tier, Council Member Farmer here. Council member McCutchen here. Council member Bockart. Council member CR here. Council member Alers here. Thank you. We do have a quorum, so that's always good. Next, we move on to the election of chair and vice chair. And do I solicit the nominations or do you do that? We confirm with the city attorney. And since you are currently the act, you're the chair right now. So, you can carry out that that task and then whoever is elected or even if it is yourself, then that person would resume forward. Perfect. All right. In that case, um, I will entertain nominations for the position of chair of this committee. Mr. Preston, I nominate you. Thank you. I'll second you. Thank you very much. Appreciate that. Do we have any other nominations? Seeing none, all those in favor of the reelection of Scott Frederickenberg as chair of the economic development committee, please signify by saying I. I. I. opposed abstensions. All right. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. Next, we move on to the election of vice

chair. And unless anyone has any nominations for this position, I will make one. I would like to nominate Mr. Preston as vice chair of this committee. Mr. Farmer seconds. All right. Very good. Do we have any other nominations for the position of vice chair of this committee? Seeing none, all those in favor of the election of Mr. Preston as vice chair of this committee signify by saying I. I. I. Opposed abstensions. All right. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you very much everyone. Next we move on to approval of the minutes from the April 22nd meeting. Um chair, can I add a note on that? Please do. Thank you. Um, just one note, I did obviously looking at five uh individuals that are replacing the former committee members. Uh, wanted to check in with the uh city attorney to see if there's any issue with approving minutes that you were not there. Do you need to abstain? The question it the question the answer is no, you don't need to abstain. It will reflect it in the former minutes that unless you have a specific issue, there's no issue not abstaining from it um and voting yes because the minutes do reflect that you were not part of that. So, just wanted to provide that context beforehand, but you still do need six individuals. You would need four to pass. Four to pass. So, but just to confirm, new members of the committee can vote uh either to

Everyone, if you're with us right now, we will be back in two seconds where our computer is Getting booted back up. All right, here we should be good to go. All right, very good. So, we were on item number five, public comment. There's no one out in the audience. Do we have anyone online who wishes to make public comment? If you would like to make public with comment if you want to go ahead and use the raised hand feature. We do have two members but no one is raising their hand at this time. Chair. All right. Very good. Thank you. Then we will move on to discussion items. Um under for information we had an item here committee introductions and that was designed primarily for the two new members of the committee to get to know

some of the other members of the council that they're going to be serving with on this committee. Seeing as how neither of the two members of the council uh and of this committee I should say are uh here I think we can safely dispense with that unless anyone objects. All right. See no objection then we will um move on to an update on business changes and other business news here in the city. And for that I will turn things over to do I turn this over to you city administrator or to Miss Vassan? I will kick it off, but then I'll pass it off to our new economic communications manager. Perfect. Thank you, chair. Uh just a couple quick updates on the business front. Uh wanted to and many individuals here tonight were actually at the ribbon cutting, but um Good News Brewing officially opened. They had a soft opening about two weeks ago on May 4th, but they had their official opening and a ribbon cutting with the city on uh this last past Friday here on May 16th. They are now fully open for business. Uh the ribbon cutting had quite a few individuals in attendance and it was uh marked with a pretty nice day. So you're there. I know some of us were here. So great time over there. Um wanted to give a quick update as well on the chapter 100 request where that is and where it's going to full city council as discussed at this committee. Um the initial request came in about a month and a half ago and then it went to council. the council then authorized the uh funding agreement that would allow them to pretty much pay for the legal services associated with it. Uh at this time that costbenefit analysis is being conducted by Gilmore Bell. Um that'll be actually finished in here about a week and it'll be submitted to the council. Um and then it shouldn't actually come back for formal review uh with a and after well here's the important part. So after we get this cost benefit analysis that then needs to go to each one of the taxing districts and we have to get receipt that they received it. Uh once they have receipt that they received it we have 20 days

that need to take place before you can have any type of public hearing. U so just looking at the schedule if they were to turn it in within a week that would be the July city council meeting where any formal action would actually be on the table. Um we could have and we would most likely have the costbenefit analysis either discussed at a subsequent meeting uh if referred back but we could have it on the work session just forformational purposes but for the council to take a look at it it probably would not be until July July for a public hearing and if there was bill that would be all right question what are the taxing districts the taxing districts are St. Louis County uh the library district St. Community College. Um, but the biggest one's Rockwood School District because the Metro West in this case would actually get a pilot payment because they can opt out of the program. About the special school district, the special school district would also get zoo. Yep. Those are Yep. Everyone that gets a piece of that pie would get. So, we have probably about 13. There's quite a few. Okay. Mr. farmer. I mean, I I understand the point of waiting to get the numbers back, but are we preliminarily reaching out to any of these people or is the cone or whatever to try to Yes. So they the the individual developer is waiting for that costbenefit analysis to set up official meetings but before any council action would take place they would would be uh and the department has said once we will make the connection if they need it but we are not going to support one we'll just make sure that they are aware just going to suggest that it doesn't seem like a great in terms of like like I mean they got to get the numbers but what what inevitably winds up happening is this thing is

going to have a public hearing in July. We're going to have to then figure out in July what's going to happen. More than likely it last for two readings and so we're going to be like I doubt Rockwood is going to be super enthusiastic about this. I'm just guessing. So I know it's not it's not really our place to do any of these things. I'm just saying we might want to encourage the developer to like Joe do this thing or uh Rockwood did not do anything when Eureka they gave chapter 11 to an Aldi and um the school district's losing $40,000 a year for the next 20 years. I called the chief uh financial officer about it and it was like, "Well, I don't know if we wanted to contest this or not. Uh you're going to have the the store there. It's going to generate sales tax." Well, they don't get any money from it, right? They lose they lose $40,000 a year. They're not getting any money now. I I guess my point is like this in my opinion whatever iteration of this we've done and I think I might be wrong Scott you've been on a few of these runs with this thing. I appreciate that this is a good this seems like a really good project that we're looking at over here and I would genuinely like to be able to support it, but every single time we do this, it is like the last minute. I I don't I don't get why we keep doing it this way. Like we did it with the Prime Place, we did it with whatever the next thing was going to be called. Like it doesn't it just doesn't seem from a public perspective or people that are like maybe on the fence on the council that like waiting until the very last minute to then throw a bunch of numbers at people is the world's best plan. Um um you and I had spoken about this last

week a little bit. What did the city attorney say were the requirements in terms of how we report? So the requirements are for minimum standards, but typically the the advice was to wait till you have the formal numbers because the person the developer could withdraw at any time. That doesn't mean that they could not reach out at any given time here as well. Uh the department could reach out to them preliminary, but we do have the it's not our job. Yeah, that's that's I'm not telling you guys to do it. Okay. I'm saying like whoever is having a conversation with Mr. cone should perhaps illuminate him to the possibility that waiting for the last minute on this is not a great plan. No. And that that is agreed by the department too and that's something that in each discussion we we've definitely pushed. They need to be making contact with these with all the taxing. The number of these people he should probably know already from past activities. Yeah. Right. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. That's right. But I want to know how many times chapter 100 has been used for an apartment in the county. Not very many times. Can you get that information or not? We can get that information. Yeah. Um I appreciate it. Certainly. with well is just a general question with him being on the U B&Z is is there a conflict of interest with that being being the developer and if not a conflict of interest is it kind of just a bad look it's appearance as well Tom why don't you address that and and tell me what you or tell the rest of the committee what you told me yeah so in this case uh it is completely in the city's eyes, at least from the legal legal side of things, it there is no issue with them requesting it. That said, um if they if the individual developer would not have abstained from the vote, that would have when they voted to approve their resoning request, that would look a little bit more not

great and then we'd start getting into more of an ethics area. Um that said from our legal counsel as as of right now it's there's legally no issue with them requesting this especially with the fact that uh Tom Kimman and the other developing entity in this case Mia Rose is the one that's actually carrying out the construction. But it does it it could end up just being a a bad look or or or a cause for concern by people when they look at it, you know. Yeah, Tom. I I agree. Yeah. Officially it's not, but superficially it could look that way. Well, I'm wondering if I'm wondering if there isn't a problem with them asking that. That's fine. Is there a problem with us granting it? No, there would be nothing wrong with us granting it either. No, but there's nothing wrong with us. The PR side of things and also the the discussion amongst the council that is the discussion that needs to take place. Legal is one thing PR is another exact legally there's no issue but PR-wise. Yes. Is my hand raised? Yes. Yes. Deb, go ahead. I'm sorry if we kept you waiting. Yeah. Um Mr. comb being on PNZ and having projects before city council and as long as he's been on there, I mean, he's been on there longer than um what is typical um you know, I've I've had concerns all along about any of his developments or projects moving forward. You can say, well, he he abstains, but just because he's sitting there, you know, makes a huge difference. If he wasn't sitting there, people may vote differently. So, um, yeah, I think it's a PR issue and I've been concerned about it for a very long time. Thank you. I think we have Cliff. No. All right, Chris. Um, I mean, just to

readress this because I mean, if we're going to talk about optics on it, um, I mean, this, uh, sales tax sales tax exclusion would be, um, viable and available to all developers. correct within Town Center and we established that almost none of the building supplies would actually even be purchased locally if even somewhat I mean maybe called regionally but certainly not within Wildwood. So, I mean, you know, I I I agree the optics of it look a little suspect at first, but um you know, I I I mean, the long-term benefit of this, I mean, what does it happen a few times in every few years when someone else is redeveloping a space and that's the end of it? It's not ongoing like an Aldi's or something like that that would be producing, you know, sales tax would be missing out on on a perpetual and daily basis. It's like one of those uh very slightly incremental things every now and again. So, I I guess I don't I mean, I can certainly see the optics, but I don't know if there will really be any measurable long-term impact of it. Okay, Jim, we're talking $3.5 million. Now, this uh sales tax uh is going to buy outside of the county. I I think is use youth sales tax, you're talking $1.175 million that other cities and towns are not going to get if we approve of this. So if some other city did that to Wildwood, I'd be pretty upset. So you're actually screwing other cities and towns out of $1.175 million. That's a lot of money. And um this looks bad. The appearance is bad. Uh, I don't know why Mr. Con is doing this. I know him personally. He's a good guy, but he's putting us in a bad situation, and I

don't like it, and I'll fight this all the way. All right. Any other comments on this particular issue, Mr. Farmer? I just think, Tom, if you can, like the whole idea if we if we do this like the city own like we own something, on the land technically on paper for the duration of the bond. I just think because I'm am in agreement that this is optically just it's not a good look. But like we need to be super specifically clear with a message as to what exactly that means and how that impacts us because those are the things you know that's the thing where like even if it's just it is legally required to do it but you know we've had other situations in the city where we put we pass something that is seemingly only applicable in one place and that is in my estimation a pretty unwise choice. Also, we don't necessarily get a lot of buildings built around here, but I'm not 100% sure that like how do how do you say no after this? After say this was a if we approve it and then somebody else shows up and wants to build something else, how do we say no? Well, they have there's that's when it comes down to and the figures all have to be on the up and up. Obviously, that's where the cost analysis comes in. But once the actual transaction takes place, the city in theory can hold some benchmarks. It gives us as a city a little bit more power to say, "Hey, we expect to have this done by this date this." No, I get there's not I'm not saying there aren't some benefits to it. But I'm just saying like let's say, you know, somebody comes in and the thing wherever it is back here, back here the big land that's open and they propose apartment buildings. So if some other developer comes in after

we've granted this and goes we would like chapter 102 and we say no. So that and that okay I get then we go then they go do I just have to sit on P&Z to get this? No. But that that said there is we do have an economic de economic development incentive policy that was followed in this case. They submitted the formal application. You pretty much have to I'm not saying it's like I'm not saying what we're doing isn't above board. I'm this is I am asking if we approve this as a council member. There is no way I can conceive of that I would then deny it to somebody else. That would be insane. Yeah. I mean that that well that could be a perspective but at the end of the day it they have to go through a for this formal process. I mean that's again this is bad law. It's a bad law. And that said the council can act as as they can deny it. They're just as well. Tom, you're going to issue bonds too, right? You're going to be doing bonds for 20 years. What What do you sell the bonds to? Con is is that how that works? I would not issue any bonds, but the city in this case, it's not what what municipal bonds, that's it's in the law. Chapter 100. I was reading about it. It it the bonds are a kind of a term that covers up that land lease. So transferring the ownership. It's more so on paper. It's not any debt obligation. So at the end of the day, if all this project So we're going to own it for 20, we're going to own this apartment for 20 years, right? Is that true? It would be 10 years. So the city's going to own the apartment, right? In on paper. Yes. Yeah, that would be the case. That's weird. And that's it. The council can deny it. I'm not speaking for or against. I'm just throwing out my opinion. And as you can tell, I threw too too many of opinions out. But but that's that's how I feel. I don't think the public will see this in a good light. That's all. I've already got one comment from a neighbor. Uh and uh so anyway,

I get it. Is Mr. Con approved for the new PNZ? Is he still on it going forward? Yeah, we just we voted him last year. He's on till I think he's got a two-year term or something. Would it help if he would resign? Um, I mean, I don't think it would hurt, but at this point decision that he would have to make. Well, I know our it's just when you're listening to it, it's just a bad look. But it's a bad law what it does to schools and to other towns. All right, Debbie, you've got your hand up. I'm sorry. Right. Oh, what? I was just going to say um what Mr. Farmer said. So, I'm sorry. I forgot to take it down. Oh, not a problem. All right. So, I think we've had a good discussion on this issue. Um, we've still got a lot more information to receive in terms of um, you know, the financial analysis on this topic. I'm sure there's going to be a lot of additional discussion as we move forward. So, um, we're a long way towards um, approving or disapproving anything. Yes. All right. So, Mr. Lee, why don't you continue with your update? Thank you, Chair. All right. A couple other updates and then we'll turn it over to our economic development manager. Uh Singer's Ice Cream's officially open as well. Uh the department's been in contact with the owners and we'll be working to do a ribbon cutting for them. So just a heads up that'll be coming out. Um we'll be publicizing that as well. Um American Mattress is moving in right next to where Singer Ice Cream actually is. Um over at 2440 uh Taylor Road, another mattress store. Uh it is right next to Deerberg's in that plaza and uh the department has reached out to them. They have not gotten back to us with a specific you know what they're selling mattresses but they and they haven't they have a location in Bowwin. They just have not got back to us with the details of when they're opening what signage they're going to be putting up. But this is our second mattress store in the last six months. So we might have a

trend. How many more can we accommodate? Any any retail plaza? Actually this is a bedroom community. Not what a better fit in his bedrooms. Should the city have a president's day sale for everything? That's coming up, man. This that in theory. I mean, we could have a president. I don't think we could sell mattresses. I mean, city could get that business. But, uh, some other news though here in the town center right where Fountain Place is. Uh, originally there was an inquiry that Sip and Saber Wine Spirits and More was going to be purchasing them moving into 174 Plaza Drive. Um then that kind of went quiet for a while and requesting additional information about needing a liquor license but also needing u a business license. It was found that Advanced Carpet uh had bought in the place and now we have a new carpet store that will be moving in there which uh they are currently working on some interior renovations but they'll be opening within the next couple months. Where at now? Right here at the plaza where you have the there's a CBRE still um for sale sign in there but it it has been purchased. They took down the actual for sales sign, but it still says CBR. It's a standalone building. Yeah, standalone building. It used to have Heels boutique. I was going to say and then it went over to the time share place, but it it's gone through a couple transitions. Uh but now it seems like that whole two it's technically two different pl uh two different parcels, if you will, not parcels, uh storefronts. And in this case, uh both will be accommodated by the carpet store offering a different kind of selection of carpets and rugs. So they they also do the install. So, it's kind of a show show. All right, couple more here. Sorry. Uh, just want to give a quick update that the farmers market will be taking place starting on May 4 24th, Saturday. That'll go all the way through October 4th. Um, so that's coming right up actually this weekend. So, make sure to come on out. It's over at uh at the plaza across the street, 221 Plaza Drive. Um, other than that, just wanted

to make a quick note that this Thursday, May 29th, um, we do have a ribbon cutting over at the community college. It's a more so for just city officials and other officials that have been instrumental in building the secondary building, but that'll take place at 10:30 a.m. Thursday, May 29th this week. So, next week. Yes. Yes. Next week. Uh, Thursday next week. And, uh, we hope everyone can make it. That building is going to bring in a lot of, uh, a lot of different students. They're expecting to go for 500 to 2,000 students over the next couple years. So, good news on that front. And then quick update on Bros, Fish, Shrimp, and More. I know some individuals have uh reached out, some residents reached out to see what's going on there. They do still plan on opening. Uh what happened was they had some uh in those final rounds of inspections that they were going through. They found a couple things that they did not identify, but very expensive and costly repairs they had they had to do to be able to get open. And in this case, they are hoping to be open this summer, but they had did not firm down a specific date. That's we're at now, but they said they should be open. All right. But then top of that, Paul, you had some updates. Paul, you mind if I ask a quick question? Benadettos, lots of schedule for something moving in there. So, it's Chula Indian hearth that is moving in there, but they have not confirmed a schedule when they would be open. All right. So, they are still doing some interior renovations. I think they're moving. They are changing it from kind of the Italian restaurante that they the vibe that they had in that building. They're doing res uh they're changing the interior of that building to add in a different type of aesthetic. And they are also uh we did make contact with the property owners. They are looking into the possibility of replacing the projection sign that was there before with a different they have not submitted any of the permitting yet though. So wait and see. Thank you. All right. Um to give a quick update, Paula has been visiting with a lot of businesses over her first couple weeks

here, first month. Um I thought it would be pertinent to share some of the feedback that the business community has been bringing in and thought we'd show that here today. So in the in um the packet that um Colleen has so kindly printed out, you'll see a five-page memo. Um it's titled economic development current findings and next steps. So, this is a summary of the dozens of conversations I've had over the last month with the residents, businesses, groups, um, about how they feel about the pulse of Wildwood, what challenges they're facing, and what they think needs to change, and what they're hoping for the future. So, um you'll see an overview, feedback from stakeholders, um including business environment concerns, um digital signage concerns. Uh I also looked at what's happening, uh and how other similar similarly sized cities approach digital signs um from John's Creek in Georgia and Parker, Colorado to Charleston County, South Carolina. Um and these models do show that cities can support business visibility while preserving community character. Um I also looked at um so we also have a new a new um series uh about businesses and profiling different businesses of different industries and sizes. Um we've had the Wildwood Fitness Collective, three French hens and mattress dogs so far. And we have the Wildwood YMCA coming up. We have the Wildwood Hotel coming up. And so all these prof profiles are um definitely doing really well on social media. Uh and uh these are these conversations, these profiles are woven into this feedback. Um, so you'll see a um a

section on next steps and kind of what I'm proposing and uh and how the economic development committees can support. So I mean I just I'm open to questions if you have any questions on different conversations and anything you'd like to know more of. One question I will ask specifically as it relates to digital signs. I know that um you were doing as part of your listening campaign sort of a subtle survey of various businesses regarding their feelings on digital signs and you know were they a high priority for them or were they a low priority or a medium priority? What did you find in in the research you've done so far? So good question. Um, the way that I summarized it was that digital signage, it's not a top concern for many businesses, as in they don't rank digital signs as their number one thing. They're not like, "We need a digital digital sign to survive." But it's it's a very polarizing topic and um, you know, some residents and civic groups very strongly oppose it, as you all know. Um, and they're worried about everything that we know that it could erode Wildwood's unique charm. But others say that visibility is really essential for small businesses trying to compete. So the way that I approached this was I did I had it more of a conversational I I didn't roll out a very a survey for example because I really I'm really thoughtful about um results that are skewed and uh I wanted to approach it first as like a very randomized conversation. So I spoke with had random conversations with uh with businesses in a really casual way. I'll give you some examples of some of the feedback that I'm hearing. Um so I uh three French hens for example says that businesses around the Wildwood pub are hard to see from the road and Wildwood

the city is not allowing um them to put signs out by the road. So that's been an issue and that it would be nice to have signage on the road as well since new fencing blocks their building. Um she says anyone not in town center feels that way and it's the biggest gripe that she hears. Um Piglia for example, they said that with a location on the outskirts of town, it would be advantageous for them from the standpoint of more visibility uh to communicate their hours, sales, and not deter from the aesthetics or safety in their immediate area. U and so you know it's it's definitely it's a polarizing topic. people feel strongly about it. Mattress dogs, for example, you know, I have a conversation with them. It's like if it's allowed, businesses would probably embrace it. If it's not allowed, it it's they're going to do what their neighbors do, you know. So, but in collectively businesses do say that they need more visibility and get that signage is a concern and you know it it's a challenge for their business. Thank you. Anybody have any questions for Paula? Yeah. So, French Hands wants a sign up near Old Manchester then? Yes. Um I mean you pretty much see it when you you drive by. Yeah. They I think you said Wildwood Pub. Wildwood Pub. Yeah, French Hens said the Wildwood Pides. Wildwood Pub. Well, I thought you said something about French Hens. So, the businesses So, these are like three French hens has told me that the businesses around Wildwood Pub are hard to see from the road. Um, and so like the conversations that I've had are with businesses directly and then their awareness about their conversations with other businesses in the area too. Yeah. But don't we have a sign up there kind of a marquee? It says, "Wow, what's Yeah. Yeah, they're wanting something that's

more I I this discussion's taken place before it was brought up at the economic development forum. They're wanting a monument sign that in theory could be accommodated. We have our director of planning that could discuss that aspect. But they're wanting something that's more specific to saying, "Hey, Wildwood Square, what's in Wildwood Square?" And then having their logos on it, but it would be closer to the route of way versus what it is. And are they what's the status on that? We we had a discussion with them. uh are they pursuing it? Back in January at the Wildwood Business Forum, Miss Jones brought up that particular issue. There are several that agreed with her. I explained to them, submit something or if you're not sure what you can or can't do, let's meet. I've not heard from anybody. Okay. Because we told them they could we'd work on them getting a larger monument there. Uh I mean, I want to do what we can for the businesses, you know. Uh, so I'm give you another example. Um, at P I thought this one was interesting. Poppingham Palace said that they don't care what the signage looks like. Any exposure on Manchester is what they're wanting since they're tucked away off of a main road. Yeah. They've also got they've got signage on Manchester, though. Oh, they want you to follow up with um what's the lady's name? Uh Laura Jones. to follow up with her and just say, "Hey, wanted to follow up on your concern." Um, when might we expect something that you are proposing for that location? After we left the business forum, I fully expected to hear something from them pretty quickly. I'll be glad to call her. Thank you, Mr. Farmer. Um, so up at Village Plaza, which is at the top of Westland Farms, they cleared out a whole bunch of vegetation to help them more. Is that on that hill? Okay.

in business artist. My assumption is that that didn't do anything because while I appreciate what the business owners are saying, Puckingham Palace has been there for like six years. So there's nobody driving down 100 that is going to see that a sign and go, "Oh, there's a a Puffingham Palace over here. Let me go check that out." the these kind I think that it's really super important. My suggestion would be it's super important in the types of questions that we're asking because like monument signs are super expensive to put in whether we approve them or not. So a and they get fall apart quickly like the one out in front of town center here where it's all crackly and looks like pardon my French and there's nothing we can do about it. So like I would suggest that a lot of times if you ask people do you want a bigger sign their answer is going to be yes without understanding the cost or any of the other pieces for it. I would also say any of those people up at Wildwood Pub or anywhere else like I am not a person that's going to open up a store necessarily but like if I've done the research I'm going to figure out about can I put a sign here? Is this a problem? These are all things that happen like before you open the doors, not afterwards. And and I I would just say like, you know, I'm I'm all for getting the feedback from our business community and I and I want to help them as much as we can, but I think we have to be careful and realistic because the career Jones are great local owners. They're doing great things. That is not the case with a lot of these plazas. So, the second we start putting stuff up, it does not stop. it will go everywhere. That's true. Yeah. And we I agree with

you about the way that we phrase the question. So I think that you know to move forward it could be this could be a more formal process and as a survey if we want that information or we just take this with a grain of salt but you know like you had mentioned a scale a fivepoint scale. How strongly do you feel about this? Like we could get into much more detail with these questions but this was the you know initial starting point. I I mean I I just know like driving, you know, I've sent this to stuff to Scott, like if you drive down, you know, Clayton Road between Clarkson and 141 at night, all the digital, all the churches, all the stuff. I mean, it looks like it's not great. If you drive down Manchester going through Ellis and all those things, everything is lit up like a pinball machine. It's it's just not it's not what draws people in. People come because people go to Three French Hens because they want to go to Three French Hens. You could put the biggest Three French Hen sign up in the world. If somebody doesn't know what Three French Hens is, it's not like they're going to stop by to figure it out. It's an advertising issue how they advertise their business instead of signs. You got to let them know. Yeah. But but advertising like we don't have the people that are driving around our city live here. They're not just random people. So pe people know I mean we had a conversation about Larry's. Larry's has been there for like 70 years. You didn't even know what it was about. They don't have a sign. It's packed every time we go in there. Same 25 guys. Yeah. And that's what makes a business run. You don't need new customers if you got good ones that keep coming back. And a lot of these businesses, you know, Three French Hens did mention that even people in Wildwood don't know about the three French hens. They She does a good job advertising though. She she does a lot of TV advertising, right? Meta meta ads, targeted meta ads. And that's what that's like the future of advertising anyway, which um and that more and more

businesses are saying they're spending more of their money on digital ads. It's a good way to do it. That's the future. Great. So, how do we bring businesses into I don't that's why you're here. Well, so I I have a I don't know if this is the right time, but I do have a general question. So, um this is just speaking for me. I I've been on the council for a while. Katie has always been on this committee. I have a general concept of what we're supposed to be doing here, but I I actually don't have any idea in real terms what what we are supposed to be doing. That make sense? Yeah. So, I think the name the the name economic development says it all. Well, right. Supposed to bring new businesses in here. So, we don't recruiting pardon. We don't recruit new businesses. I mean I think it's to facilitate their you know I mean either function here or improve the you know paradigm in which we operate here by which it becomes more attractive for them to be here but like do we like I'm just thinking about town center for example that's our primary business place what kind of businesses are we supposed to have in town center mostly it's you're wanting to attract retail and office but that there's developers aren't building that these days yeah I'm not even talking about building new buildings I'm talking about occup like what like we've got a couple big restaurant chunks, right? And I think Indian food is great. We're going to have two Indian Indian food places. We now are going to have two mattress stores. I would suggest we go get like a Blimpies or a Fire Subs and now we get a competitor for Subway. Like I don't I'm I'm not I'm not kidding. I don't I am asking what we're supposed to have in town because I have been on the city council for six years and I don't know. Well, I think we can have that. I I think we can have this in the master plan discussion, but I would say that when our when we ask our residents what they're wanting, they're wanting retail.

They're wanting they're let's say we have enough office space that's being used. I mean, more than enough office space. They're saying they want retail, they want dining options, they want fast food, right? Fast food. Fast food. And they also well like retail what do they what does that actually mean? I mean retail is well it can mean a plethora of different things but as of you can see I mean I know what it means asking what are the citizens ask shoe stores you gota shoes right so I think one of the conclusions we've come to here is based on the population density of the city which everybody's familiar with it's about 534 people per square mile versus which is about 3,444 people per square mile. So, it's very very difficult to attract the location of a chain of businesses into the city. Well, and it's incredible. I mean, I I know because I looked at where Mattress Dogs was. It's insanely expensive. Yes. But where we do seem to be successful is what I will call with what the oneoffs, unique and different businesses. Magnolia Soap and Bath. I mean, that that's a unique business. Uh, Good News Brewing Company. That's a unique style of business. Everybody that we tend to attract here seems to be a unique and different business. And many of them tend to be small and medium-sized businesses. Uh first year they're in business, very difficult. Many times they struggle with cash flow issues. We have something coming up a little bit later tonight that we can help them address that issue with. And uh so those are the types of businesses we're trying to draw in here right now. Unfortunately, we don't have the population density to be real selective with the types of businesses we can pull in here. So, I'm not saying we should turn any of them down. I'm just saying like I guess what I'm trying to figure out is, you know, whether it's like I know when the uh Benadetto's guys were still there and I've talked to I talked to the guys when it was slice or whatever it was before Mitten Martini

Panica. Yeah. Their big issue was they couldn't get their staff home, right? Because the bus stopped running. So, and that was the same issue with Benadettos. That's what I'm saying. So, like to me that's an issue that makes sense that we can as as a city or whatever we can try to attack if that's what we're going to do. I'm just trying to figure out like I'm appreciate the reports and all these things, but like we're not actively out recruiting businesses, right? Well, we do reach out, but I think a lot of it's business retention. It's making sure that you touch base with these businesses and highlight these activities that are taking place, the events that they're holding, but also the Scott. Oh, I'm sorry, Deb. Go ahead. Um, you know what I hear from from residents is they want something in Town Center, family oriented. Um, if you, you know, if you look at these oneoff little boutiques, I mean, how much traffic do you think they're really going to get? We need some more familyoriented um, retail and restaurants to eat. I mean, some of the ones we have are very expensive and if you're a young family starting out, you know, you you can't afford to go there. Um I you know like I was saying during one of the um master plan update committees, if we had something in there like a recreation center, then we're going to pull people in because they're going to want to go to the recreation center, especially the teens and the twins, they have nowhere to go. And but then if you would add some some other retail like I don't know uh some whatever kids are eating these days whether it's a hamburger joint or whatever that's not so expensive. I think you would get more people in. And then my other com comment is we're in a unique situation. I mean, is do we think

this is really viable? Because we're right next to Eureka, Ellisville, Ballwin, Chesterfield, and I know a lot of residents who live in in areas that are close to those other municipalities. They go to those other municipalities to to shop. They don't come to Wildwood. Stop and think about it. How many times a day or a week are you in town center? How many times do you go? Stop and think about that. So, and why don't you go or why do you go? Um, you know, I we don't really have anything that that draws families. I mean, the Well, we do. Um, El Muway, they draw families, but, you know, we need something like something that'll draw people to town center. you know, the Village Green might do that somewhat, but I think if we had something like, you know, like like a rec center where you could do all different kinds of things in there. You could have meeting locations because I know people are struggling like they can't use the schools anymore, you know, so HOAs don't really have anywhere to go or if some other organization wants to do a meeting, they they have nowhere else to go. Um, you know, there could be activities there for the kids or early childhood activities could be there. I mean, you have a a wealth of potential clients to come to um Town Center if you had the right things would attract families with preschoolers and kindergarteners and first graders. We had that at one time. Uh what was the name of that soccer place that wanted to build next to the fire station? It was a fantastic uh facility, a sports facility, and it got chased out of Wildwood when I was on console. Uh the lighting was bad or something. Was that like vet or something? Yeah, it would have been a super thing bring in a Wildwood. Are we having a soccer are we

having a soccer field going in in the um Mr. Phil Valley area? Yeah. There's a huge sports thing going in chased a lot of this stuff away years ago when I was on council. Target left. you know, I I spoke out and didn't get anywhere. Okay. So, we we have lost and will continue to lose a lot of opportunities because of our drive-thru policy. I've heard so many things we've lost over the years and it I hope that's going to change in the master plan because you you think about I don't know what the problem is with it. I don't know but the average family a lot of times doesn't want to pile their kids in and out of the car. They want to go somewhere and get through it. But I, you know, we have a few of them that are in here in the town center ready and they seem to work fine. I just think we if we're serious about this, we really got to change our minds about that. I've heard that over and over again about the drive-through policy that the Yeah, people have families and they have pets and they want convenience and they want a deli and they want a drive-thru. We got Culver's was coming and uh right years ago the the roof was blue and we said you can't build air. So, I'll give you a specific example of why we need to have some drive-through options. Several years ago, I pulled into a Chick-fil-A into the parking stall. A woman with three small kids pulled into the parking stall next to me. I got out of the car. She got out of the car. I'm walking into the restaurant. She's getting her kids out of the car. I walked into the restaurant, went into the restroom, washed my hands, ordered my food, sat down, ate my food, walked back out to my car just as she was beginning to come in across the parking lot to the restaurant. So, young families with small kids need that drive-thru. That's one way we can bring

them into the city. Mr. Voyage, Mr. Rottenberg. Approximately three years ago, the Department of Planning initiated a proposal to add drive-throughs in the workplace district. It went to planning and zoning commission. And at that time, Mayor Bolan did not support it and convinced enough the planning and zoning commission members not to. When it arrived at city council, it didn't even get a discussion because it came as a denial. So, please understand the Department of Planning hears the same things that you all hear and it's tried. It's tried very hard to basically make Town Center a viable component of our community. But when things come to you and three people stand up and say they don't like it, recognize that a lot of that's been through a whole lot of discussions before it got to you and a lot of the things that those three people might say have been addressed. I urge you, I urge you to count on your professional staff, people like Tom, Paula, public works, planning and your planning and zoning commission and they'll get you a good answer and the answer oftentimes will help town center. So what I will do on that particular topic is I'll have a conversation with you tomorrow and we'll see since we have new regime I shouldn't say regime since we have new people at the top of city government um it's time to resurrect this issue again and take another look at in this case could we uh um with that that being said since we're going to kind of jump into master plan I think that could be something we definitely does it have to be in the master plan no no no it can get started sooner than that but I think it could be something that under the economic development goal could be a goal and then then it will be pushed then it's something that everyone will kind of agree. Can't we just do this like next month? Yes, it's nothing against it. Yeah. We don't do this master plan. We can I would like to add it there too so it's solidified for the

next. That's the main thing because it can be reversed. That's and I just hope our plan our current planning and zoning doesn't have their head in the clouds for a lot of these things. You know I'll tell you one thing that that worked several years ago. Um, we were told we could never do anything to change the sign code and we heard at an economic forum concerns about our temporary sign code. So Tom did a lot of research on surrounding municipalities what they were doing with their temporary sign code. We came up with some suggested changes and before that legislation made it to city council, I went and testified in front of the planning and zoning committee and explained to them what we were doing, why we wanted to do it, how it would benefit our local businesses, and they got behind it and approved it. Good. Okay. So, well, we can make things like this. I I think we're in a new regime. I think the the the mayor would support things that previous mayors don't wouldn't support. You know, you got limited opportunity now because very few commercial properties exist now. We're so small now. There's room. There's plenty of room to build three years ago. We were on the council three years ago. I don't remember a drive-through thing. I'm not doubting you, Joe. I'm just saying receipt file. Mr. Farmer, if if a report comes out of planning and zoning commission as a denial, it's a receive and file. Does not go to public hearing. Wow. And you know, receiving and files are always done at the end of I get that. So I I would suggest I don't think it would take much work or effort at all. Take whatever you put out there the last time and run it through this time. And now if we know that if it comes back as a denial, we've dealt with that too. We get to the right to look at it. We can then do that. Mhm. But it still should be new P&Z people for the most part, right? The drive-in really came into focus during CO. Yeah. I mean, you

couldn't go into restaurants. Those that had drive-through survived. Those that didn't I mean, I think to this day, fast food places don't even I mean, that's a key point of any design and location they look at. If it doesn't have Yeah. I mean, if they can't do that, see you. I mean, we can establish what I know one of the big concerns is that when you say fast food, everybody thinks of I'll just pick McDonald's and they think of trash cans and garbage overflowing into the parking lot, that sort of thing. So, that's the one issue we have with the general public. Co took down Llewellins, I guess, right? Pretty much they sold their everything. That family sold everything they had. I think they were just retired. Oh, well, they're still I think they sold the name. They still I mean I thought CO shut that down pretty bad. They still have they still have a restaurant in Webster grows but all the other there's one in Sulart maybe maybe Popey said they come into well I I will say I I new management that's called the guy that owns the Ellisville Chick-fil-A lives right over there. He lives on center. There's a long line out at Chick-fil-A. I will say about the trash thing. You know, just so happened when we had our concert on Friday, I was at El McGay or whatever it is. And you know, it's busy. There's a lot of people. There was a lot of trash outside. And and there was a guy that walked in and was like, "What is this? I thought we were in Wildwood. Why is all there Why isn't all this garbage here?" And he made a point of saying it three or four time. I mean, he didn't know who he didn't know why I was or he was just saying it. But I do think, you know, I do think we need to communicate that like, you know, should drive-throughs be in limited degree allowed. I mean, it's not like we're going to just open the floodgates or something. It also takes people to come. Like, we just need to put some some stuff in there that's like this is the expectation. We we're having that with our friends up at the Bros thing. I mean, I know those guys are

struggling on a lot of fronts, but like you got to keep up with the build. You know, it's not helping you if your building looks like that. Yeah. We could set the design standards for what the drive-through facility looks like. Sure. Yeah. But where would they go? 109 there probably. There's a couple. Yeah. Well, that over here. Put one in across the street. Where? There's two parcels across the street, right? That's fun. from here. There's actually four parcels on Route 109 that are in my opinion almost perfect for and one more thing I'd like to I would like to mention also about um emerging industry opportunities. So looking at St. Louis and the industries that are growing in St. Louis. Um I so advanced manufacturing, bioscience and health, digital transformation, financial and business services, mobility and transportation and agricultural technology. We have so much open space. We have so many like so much space. One of one thing that I was even thinking of was Richmond, Virginia. They have they're of um they've really harnessed being a data center. They have huge data centers. you know, really aligning, talking more and aligning on vision and how what industries we see as growing that would that we could um that we see Wildwood supporting which would bring in people. We talk all the time about how Wildwood, like so many other suburbs, decreases in population during the day because all of workers are going elsewhere um and then increases again at night. But bringing more industry here would support economic development by bringing just people here. And so I think it's just um I think spending time aligning on vision and talking more about what industries we see those being and how wild we could support that helpful in the valley. I have I have somewhat related question. Um Mr.

Vunich, I we keep hearing all the time that it's really difficult to get a business started in Wildwood. You know, the permits are too slow. The um you know, guidelines are too too difficult and too too high expectation. So, Paul, I don't know if you if you ran across anything like that. I mean, compared to other cities, is that true or is that just and how is that true? What's the difference? Oh, so you're asking reality versus perception, right? Is that your question? Yes. Yeah. I think you're totally right. There is a perception. And you know, like quote, the quote really is, and I have that here. Um, okay. So, many business owners, they describe Wildwood as a difficult environment to open or sustain a business due to high costs, lengthy reviews, and rigid regulations. And I think it is a mix. uh I don't know about the reality of that quite frankly but so that's what businesses are telling me but there's definitely is the perception and I think a from a communications perspective we're really trying to combat that for example good news brewery posted publicly on Facebook that they really enjoyed working with the city of of Wildwood and that it was a really great process and they enjoyed it and so we shared that message and amplified that message because I think there is the challenge of changing perception and that's 50% of the problem. And how does that relate to other municipalities like Bowwin, Ellisville? Yeah. Um, so what I've heard is that uh yeah, there's less the the process is faster in some other and I haven't dug into the reality of that, but that the the businesses are that are telling me, yeah, the process may be faster in some of those places. And then the signage requirement isn't as strict, but like I

said, the signage thing isn't a number one thing. It's just something that is on their minds. Um but yeah, I think just speed and efficiency and the big thing is also foot traffic. That's that's the other draw. Some of the other places, Mr. Vod, will you chime in on that? Pardon ma'am. I said, will you chime in on that topic? Well, all I can tell you is is that there's two staff people that handle 90% of the permits. So some days it takes a little longer than others and we enforce the code as approved by city council. So if you want to make it a less regulated environment, all you need to do is tell us how you'd like to do that and we'll do our best to make that happen. Uh personally, I don't want to make a less regulated environment. I'm just curious based on comments and how it compares to other cities if they get the same comment or you know how different is their process versus our process. the chair just real briefly. Obviously, there's some key characteristics we look at. Most municipalities around us don't have architectural review. You can see it because on a single stretch of Manchester Road, you can have five different looking buildings next to each other. There's no consistency. They're up, they're down, they're white, they're black, they're this, they're that. Secondly, we manage signage because it's a component of the architecture and the streetscape. Our signage generally provides visibility. Most of our businesses don't have direct frontage onto a major arterial and that's where your visibility comes from. And then lastly, just from the perspective of the

department, we have regulations that were based on new urbanism. So, it was all about kind of getting people off the main arterials onto the streets and out of their cars and create a walking environment. In 2018, I should say when 18 when we updated the town center plan, that was the first question the department asked everybody at the at at the volunteers. Do we really want to do new eras anymore? Because, you know, it gets a little old for the department. I guess I'll say it. All we hear is we're the problem. Our signs are too regulated. This is too much. We're too slow. We're too this. We're too that. We have town center. We have new urbanism, architectural guidelines, design standards, this, that, and the other. And then throw in all the utilities and MSD. Nothing moves fast. And I can tell you it's not much different anywhere else because they all have to go through these levels of review with outside agencies, utilities, sewer districts, fire districts. I can tell you a story about three French ends in the fire district if you really want to hear a whopper. I think everybody recognizes, you know, your team does a great job and you can only do what we ask you to do. So, um, and if you want us to do something different, let's look at the regulations, change the regulations, and we'll be glad to implement them. There are some things we need to change. I think, and we're talking about signs a little later. There's some things there. We I'll be the first to admit we listen to an expert. I don't think the expert understood what we were dealing with here at times. And so, I think we can make it better. And I think one more difference. Well, do you make recommendations, Joe? put it in writing for everybody. I mean, just for our

purpose to to get started. I mean, that might be something drive-through issue, Mr. Farmer. It was 2018. Time flies when you're having Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, it was about six years ago. Um, drive-throughs. We want to move forward. Wow. I I don't know how we do it. Cliff, did you have No. No. Joe. Yeah. Joe, I was just gonna ask because I mean I I was thinking about this. I had a conversation with um priest at Clark about the environmental stuff for the master plan. You know, I I appreciate and understand and respect what the master plan is and and I think it's great, but my sort of general concern because we've dealt with this on admin and PW is when you have citizen volunteers that are trying to do their best, but they don't understand the minations of how all this actually works. And then we're sort of stuck in a way with what seems like it should be a generally good idea, but in the application it actually isn't. I'm just wondering if we need to since it's going on right now like I am concerned that people don't understand on the master plan thing and I've talked to the couple of the council members on there that like you know the the the drive-thru thing a handful of people on there that are just opposed to drive-throughs in general or don't get how it works that now that comes out and then we as council members are often told like well it's in this thing we can't do anything about it. So I what I'm what I'm hoping from a city we can do and I think you know I've had enough conversations with Mayor Gitano I I think that this is a thing that is a real thing. You know he wants to look at like where are the where are the problems coming from in general. So if it's the the signage or whatever it is and let's have like an actual conversation about how to fix it because

you guys are constantly stuck in a place where your hands are tied. There's not a whole lot you can do. And then I'm with you. Like I look at Ellisville. They build a new They put a new what? They got seven coffee shops in the city. I I don't know how much people are drinking in Ellisville. Apparently it's a lot. Um but you know, any one of those could make their way out here. I suppose if we wanted them to. So I I just think that we're in we're kind of constantly stuck in this place of like and I mean I feel that I felt this for a couple years. We're we pingpong back and forth between E andZ and then it goes to this committee and then it comes over here and then by the and you have enough council members going like put this on the agenda next month and we will vote on it and we can't it seems I get I guess I don't know and so we're stuck and then you guys are stuck in this cycle of like we're stuck too. So now all of us are spinning our wheels in the mud. Well, and again, we'll be glad to expedite whatever you would like. Anything that amends the zoning ordinance has to do first go to the planning and zoning commission, but we can make that we can make that process work. It was just like years ago, if there was a denial out of the planning and zoning commission, the prevailing thought was it still goes to public hearing. Give that person a day in front of city council. basically make their pitch. Why should a denial out of the commission, a recommending body not even get an opportunity to be discussed at city council as a receive and file? But that's what we do. So why why that's I guess that's my question. Why do we do Mayor Bolan? Okay. So he's I Jim's great. He's not around anymore. Y So my question would be is there something I don't know if it comes out of here or somewhere else where we can just say this is the process. It is not based on someone's political philosophy. It just

is. And if the mayor at the time doesn't like it, great. Great. Yeah. But what I would say is I think everybody deserves their day in front of city council regardless of the proposal supported or not supported by planning and zoning commission because you are the legislative body. You've been elected by the residents to make those decisions, not the commission. So h how do we how what is the proper and I don't know Tom if this is you or sorry I'm monopoly that's right how do we ensure that that happens you have been in this a part of this city since its beginning everyone on that I know here defaults in one way or the other to your expertise on this so if you are the guy saying just let people in front of city council to have a conversation I not a guy that loves meetings but I'm happy to listen to the conversation so how do codify that to make sure it occurs. As as it is practiced, the mayor sets the agenda and that's why when the mayor asked that denials from the commission go to receive and file, that's where they went. Mayor Garrett Tano can basically reverse that and say, I want everything to have a public hearing that comes out of the commission that is zoning or reszoning related. I mean, it's really about who sets the agenda period. And that's not the council. It's not the department of planning. It's not the city administrator. It's not the economic development manager. It's not the city clerk. It's the mayor. Well, so okay. And this I'm sorry. Go ahead. We've started figuring this out in admin and PW. I I haven't spoken to the mayor about this. I don't know if he would be receptive or not, but in admin PW, we're putting together a thing because as chairman, we get to figure out what we're going to talk about in our meetings. But in admin PW, if there is somebody that wants to talk about something and for whatever reason, I'm the chair of that at the moment. I don't

want to, right? But if if that person gets two other council members from different wards to say, "We would like to have this conversation," then it goes on to the next agenda. The conversation can go one way or the other, but we're going to have it. So, I'm just wondering and I'm you don't want to I'm not trying to strip away what the mayor is supposed to do and all of that kind of stuff, but there to me there's a difference between the the process of how something should flow through and I am not talking about this because I don't want to. That is up to the mayor just like it would be up to, you know, Scott as the chair or me or I guess Mike if he's the whatever. We can sit on something for a little bit, but for some for something like this that seems like really patently unfair just on a whim. And the only re I wouldn't advocate for anything other than zonings coming out of the planning and zoning commission. And the reason I advocate for it is they probably spent $10,000, $20,000, $30,000 to get to that point because we require an application fee and we require a preliminary development plan. Preliminary development plans developed by a survey and an engineer and nothing's inexpensive. So that's why I say just in terms of investing in the community, there are certain people that spend a lot of money and then ultimately they their their proposal ends with a recommendation by a administrative body, not a legislative body and and because of this process word's out there that you can't even get past planning and zoning now, right? So, it's the perception again that wildwood is hard to deal with and that's something I never knew about and boy that's that's enlightening. Yeah.

So, so I think sorry I think sounds like that'd be an easy change too expense. Yeah. Can we change? I mean, Joe, can we flip that around? That it has to come to council first and then if council passes it, it goes to planning and zoning. State statute reverses it. So, we'll follow state statute, but if you're inclined, you could talk to Mayor Garrett. Sounds like a job for the prompt mayor. Yeah, Mr. farmer. Let's get busy on that. I'll see what I can do. Delegated. Yeah. Sounds like you're already having some of those conversations already. Yes. Yeah. I mean I I think I mean I think you know and we talked about this with our bar thing like there is a level there is a level when you're selecting a chair to a committee there is a level of um power I guess that like I'm not sure that everybody understands what that actually means. same thing like I'm not sure that a lot of the citizens in our city understand that you know the mayor's primary function is setting the agenda and managing the agenda for the city council meeting. I mean he does a lot of other stuff too but that is that's the real part of the job. And so I just think, you know, blocking something like that or even making it maybe it's as simple as making it a more clear statement in the agenda that says if you know this is one of I don't know how we would say that but this is one of those items perhaps somebody on the city council would like to take a look at. But that's an exception. Bolan was the exception, wasn't he? Maybe a wild was different, but uh um yeah, we shouldn't he shouldn't be blocking anything without us knowing. It's not blocking, but I we can definitely have I'm I'm I look I can't I'm not promising anything. I will I will have a conversation with We should

know the opportunity that exists. But I also know now I mean I know now and you know this is one of these things that we're going to run into a lot whether it's in our committees or on our council. you know, the the time the the term limit thing is a is a real thing. So, you know, I've been doing this for six years and I technically have three left cuz I got appointed or whatever, but it's taken me a long time to actually figure out how to do this and so all a lot of these people, you know, Dev's been around for a, you know, a very long time. Katie's been around for a long time. Those people that have done this are go to go away. So we we have to find a way to help people to understand that you how this should work. I mean that's maybe an education thing on our on our side. But I'll talk to the mayor. We'll see what we can do. He seems like a pretty receptive. Maybe we should maybe we should look at term limits too. Yeah. But I don't think we can do that because that's a that was a vote. Although I guess the the current legism to care what people vote on. So maybe we shouldn't have to care about it either. We could overturn that. I got a question. But it is a big problem. Every two years. Every two years the council almost completely turns over. Not almost. Every year. Like was there four new people this year? Every year. Yeah. There's an opportunity for half of it every year. That's the other thing. Jim, you wanted to say something? Well, I'm just Does a city try to advertise businesses to come to Wildwood? Do we do anything as a city to get our name out there? Well, we have we have a page on our website, but as we're talking, I'm thinking of some ideas about how how we can change perception. Um because um we you know, we have a a page of how to attract what businesses should know. But it's definitely something we can share more widely and frequently on social media, on newsletters. you know, we

could have a kind of communications campaign to change that perception. Come to businessfriendly wild. Yeah, something like that. Well, a couple of years ago, we actually explored that. Remember, Tom, we were talk taking a look at a and we had that's a page he's referring to is that that's open on there. We hope that individuals like go on there and read it and it's really I think as and this is a discussion we can have today is what kind of businesses do we want to set our focus on and really do the efforts to reach out to because I will say when you look at retail or these quick dining restaurants you could probably get them on 109 but if you start thinking like let's put them over here I mean they're the the traffic isn't there they need 45,000 cars cars per day and we're there I mean they're going to look at you know they're going to go down the street and say, "Oh, if I go east of Clarkson, I've got that traffic." And they do. So, that's that is a big I I do think Mr. Bruner said the spaces we have on 109 are most likely our best bet to get the drive-throughs that people are people are wanting. Um, but I think when it comes to what kind of businesses we truly want, you ask a good question. What can we really get is the question. Well, it's that and I mean, I just know as I went through it. I'm sorry, Scott. Go ahead. I I went through it when we looked at where Mattress Dogs was when it was the previous owner at my old company and the previous owner it was a REIT and they were based in Oregon and all they had was a spreadsheet in front of them and they looked at the you know minimum median income in the area which is very high and they went well your rent based on this is very high and I had to go I don't think you understand what what this is there's not like We're not, this is not a major intersection. There's not a lot of traffic. This is a different kind of a thing. And so I'm I am I've wondered for a while like, you know, whether it's here or up by Shnooks, like we we as a city are

somewhat dependent on whatever the real estate people are telling us is supposed to go somewhere. And having been in real estate for a really long time, I can offer this suggestion. They don't care. They want whatever is going to go in there. So depending on them for an accurate assessment of what we actually need or what is not even what we need, what is realistic? You know, I we brought this up when we talked about N38 and the fact that like this is maybe 200 people. Is that a real impact? Is it is it become an additional one if it's 400 more people at the apartment building? Like I have no idea how many people are supposed to come here to make a legitimate impact on any business. Certainly it makes sense to go well some people is better than none people but that's not a particularly scientific way of thinking about this. So, I don't know if there is a group or I'm not, you know, I've got my own reservations on some of our consultant stuff we're doing, but like this to me seems like something from a committee that it should be like let's figure like have somebody that knows what they're doing tell us what we can do here. Not what we want to do, but like legitimately what is possible because I mean we have turned down a lot of businesses. We have some weird rules. So, we are not starting from a great spot. However, we do have very high netw worth individuals. You know, if you drive down parts of, you know, that little section in what is it in town and country that's on Clayton Road by Principia, I went in there. I looked at opening an office in there. That place was super expensive. It is jam-packed with people now. So, it c it can be done if we're doing it right and if we're going after the right people. I mean, I I just think we don't know. I mean, I'm even looking at the stuff on our website. Like, we don't know. We we we count on

NDESCO or whatever it is, and you know, we have a great partner now in RL Jones because they live here. They understand what it is. The rest of these people don't. So, they're they are dependent on math. So, the communication you might need to be doing is saying, "Let me explain why this shouldn't cost $8,000 a month because that's a lot of whatever anybody is selling mattresses." It's a lot of mattresses. What is like a like is it is a normal space around here of 4 to 5,000 square foot? No, I mean these are I so where Mattress Dogs is, I think that's like 2500 square feet. Okay. And with the previous owners, I have no idea what they're paying now. I'm not saying any of that, but I know that that was going to cost me $8,000 a month, which is insane. That's almost as much as my 20,000 foot office in downtown Clayton. Yeah. I have a 15,000 foot manufacturing facility in Minneapolis and I pay 10,000 a month. Yeah. So, I mean, it is outrageously expensive. Yeah. That's crazy. Wow. And there is nothing there is no amount of signs that we can fix to fix that. That's extremely expensive. So, it's it's just what supply and demand. And I mean the cost is whatever someone's willing to pay for it paid for it. So someone is willing to pay for that. Well, but they weren't. And so because it is in a REIT or was they it it's a writeoff. They don't care if nobody's in it. Or in some of these cases like Botanica had like that guy signed like a 12-year lease. Oh. So when it went when it went under, they're still getting paid. They don't care. They don't care if something is in there. They get paid. I think but I think uh Benadettos is the same kind of a deal, right? Yeah. That one that actually that one was not that they they had a clean and that January. So I just think process standpoint maybe that's the stuff we can fix. I don't know. But I mean that to me is the stuff

I feel like we can impact versus like well I think has always shown a strong interest in promoting the fact that we've become sort of a health and wellness sure with all the various health and wellness related businesses that we've got and that should be attractive to a lot of the people especially the demographic that's in the city since it tends to be a somewhat older population than the county in in general. Yeah. I mean I think I mean we can do an inventory but I mean I'm just going off top of my head there's a lot of dentists there's a lot of vets there's a lot of optometrist optometrists mattress stores Indian food restaurants like I mean I it's common for a business a competitive business to go well it works for them it'll work for me too um you know we traded one ice cream store for a different ice cream store so that's I think where we might want to look karaoke in that it's fun time coming out and sing and have some ice cream. Sing and eat ice cream. Yeah, that's a unique experience. So, that was that's an experience. Yeah. Like that's the thing that I think we really need to start looking at is you're you're not going to be able to see even retailing. Retail just doesn't exist. The only retail that exists and thrives and opens today is usually selling some type of unique experience along with whatever they're unless they're a big chain. You know, you've got the Chick-fil-As of the world, but you know, you need something like Singers where you're singing or like, you know, I even think about that. You know, my kid is up here every day and she is bored out of her mind and they wind up in Walgreens or in Deerbergs. It's like those people hate the kids. I get it. Um, but you know, like I don't know, you could there's space in here. Put an put an escape room. Put something Yeah. for people to do that. I mean, that's what they need. Sports facility if there's something we need. Yeah, but that's gone and now it's down in Chesterfield. Yeah, that'll be huge. You know, the targets assuming we move forward with that all-inclusive

playground. That will be a big thing and different people and with the parking garage right there. I mean, it that will help drive people here that it's it's an attraction and then they you need that that initial attraction to allow individ people aren't coming to movies used to be the thing that you'd think. I also think we could do a better job selling the school district. We are it's a top school district, low cost of living, you know, it's and so right now we're now we're now putting new information about parents as teachers program into new resident packets. But that's one step to to really sell the fact that we have a top school district here and attract young families. But when they get to when they get to the village green, there has to be something up here for them to do and access other than the village green. Yeah. Yeah. The playground. then oh having supplementary things and I think that's where you tie in though is okay what businesses ecoourism um bike stores but I know those are tough to carry the overhead especially if you're in the other thing is something we're not discussing is the SID I mean the the property tax assessments they are going to be going away in 2026 but that this whole area to the left of us here going east that kind of expl it's rough that is an extremely high amount to pay each year and that's what they they trickle that down. Uh and you you actually see that Wildwood Crossing and the Deerbergs area, they their rents are significantly lower per square foot because of it. Um but specifically this area here to the to the Walgreens back to Starbucks all the way to the retirement home to the left. It's very small area, but they are um within our SID and they pay large tax assessments each year. That'll stop in 206. It might I'm sorry. Go ahead. I I was just thinking about this, you know, Paul, you might want to look at um like we talked

about Larry's, that's a little bit of a unique thing, but like the Thai Vistro across the way there, that's been there for a very long time. And it might be worth having a conversation with some of those businesses to figure out what has allowed them to maintain their level of success because that place is great, but like it's never jam-packed with people, right? They there was a meeting with them. It was probably 2023, so it's been a minute. But they had mentioned that takeout was one of their big sellers. So they they literally they almost organized the way they um conduct their transactions. They're not really focused on having the 50. They they accommodated if you want to sit down at that restaurant, you can, but they made it so if you go to their website, they have a decent website. Panda the Panda place is the same kind of a deal. They focused in on trying to make it easy and almost like you would be picking up from place where you have to go in like a typical Chinese place like that. But the them and they actually integrated with Uber Eats and got them to come out here too. But you know what was it? Yen Ching was over by Shnooks forever and it wasn't and it isn't anything anymore currently and isn't probably going to be for a while I would assume. Um so I don't know that might just be something to look at. I just think those are some things we I think we can fix that stuff quick. Yeah. Um so we were talking about bringing new businesses into the city about um trying to build the population in the city, but we still need to pull people from outside. I just did some quick seat of the pants calculations. Taking a look at that report from the realtors association. They're projecting Wildwood's population to be flat down the road. So that means we have to bring people in from outside the city. So that's going to be one of our challenges going forward. That's where the all-inclusive playground help destinations. Yeah. Bring people in. Um and um

they got buses coming to Larry's. I've seen they come at night. They do like that. They do pub crawls at Larry's now. That Can we get Larry to come in here and Mr. lunch and learn for real like the three French hen store brings people in from all over the place more places like that you know and and I and I've always you know been here 27 years and when we moved out here we always thought that uh old Manchester had the ability to be like oldtown St. trucks and uh and there's still a lot of opportunities to do that kind of stuff there. But uh you know um and and that's and that's you know how you talk about destinations you know house people love to go to Oldtown St. Charles to walk, shop, eat, you know, and uh I just we always thought that Old Manchester, you know, and a Route 66 factor had that possibility. And about St. Charles, um I've heard a lot of people mention the um buses. So during the during Christmas Yeah. So shuttle buses taking people around and so businesses were t putting forth the idea about having a shuttle during the holidays to take people from one business to another but bringing people and making a destination. Well and we talked about we did we talked about the holiday thing you know trying to do like a hayride thing or something. Yeah. That's a little different though from like the overhead for having a bus that consistently is going in a in a circle around town center. That's I think what you're saying is like on the day of the event or maybe threw out a little like a two week build out the event. I mean we could do it same thing like I know at one point we talked about doing a a film festival in some capacity. You know I know that Cinema St. Louis, you know,

they had a lot of their funding dropped which is unfortunate but you know we're I would just suggest we're going to have two Indian restaurants. We've got some new temples that are built like a Bollywood festival would draw people here and we could have a fun thing. You don't have to necessarily do that. We can just maybe help make it easier so it can be done. Build a trolley into the street. Yeah, let's let's dig up the road for the loop. Right. All right. Great discussion here. Um we do have some additional business covered tonight. So why don't we move along here? I do have a couple of takeaways here. One is a transportation thing. Uh Tom, I'm going to call you tomorrow and talk to you about that as well as the drive-through policy. Uh Joe, if you've got additional thoughts on that, you know, feel free to give me a call. I think that's something we can address like you suggested. Uh PNZ, I'm very interested in um how we can um move some things forward without getting stalled out along the line. As well as um industry recruitment, I think that's pretty important, too. What types of industries do we want to recruit into the city? How can we do a better job of recruiting these industries? Do we need to go to an industry show somewhere or do we need to have some type of a popup on our website so that something pops up and says if you are interested in Wildwood, you know, here's what you need to know. I don't know what it is. Hey, question that front too, Scott. Um, yeah. And does anyone have any maybe insider information? Um the eaten facility over off old state that seems to be really big. I mean that would be I mean obviously maybe not a host but whatever the industry really doesn't matter but to Paul's point earlier I mean it would be interesting to have kind of some information on a place like that because I envision that place having hundreds of employees. I'm glad you brought that up because I'll be there place right next to Clancy's Bold

State. It's been called I worked there for 22 years. officer, vice president of sales, and I'm going back there on Wednesday of this week to go on a tour of their highowered test lab that they've got in the back. So, okay. I'll be seeing a lot of people. I just curious because I mean that like they were called Busman. They were manufactured fuses of all shapes and sizes. So, if you remember when you were a kid going down to your grandparents basement, the round fuses were screwed into the fuse panel. They said B USS on them. So, company has been around since about 1914, right? But that's like the kind of place like, you know, no environmental real impact. I don't think you'd have people here with pitchforks. Um, you know, you know, having a ride again without having some place like that, but where it's a nice quiet campus. It's set back. There's hundreds of people that are there. Um, it's just interesting. I don't know much about the place other than that every time I go to Clancy's, I see 25 people from there from eating there, having it at happy hour, and it just seems like a very vibrant place. I'm having lunch there on Wednesday before I go over to the facility. No, there you go. All right. Um, moving along to the occupancy report. So, the occupancy report was distributed by Mr. Lee. I asked him to distribute that and it was primarily intended for the new committee members and the occupancy report originated from an idea that Tom and I had several years ago. We were hearing doom and gloom predictions and observations from various people that town center was dead, town center was dying, town center was becoming a ghost town. And we said, what is really the occupancy rate of the available commercial space in Town Center and that's what prompted us to come up with that survey. And once we completed that survey, you can read through it at your leisure, take a look at it at your leisure, but basically what we came up with was that our occupancy level was somewhat comparable to surrounding communities. Now granted, when you start to dig down into the numbers, you find that two of the

reasons the occupancy rate is what it is is because of Shnooks and Deerbergs. They make up a big portion of that occupancy rate. And uh but it's not quite the doom and gloom picture that we were hearing so often. And the reason I think people had that observation is that um as you drive through town center with our businesses being concentrated here, if there were vacancies, they were pretty easy to spot. And I think that's how people were developing that observation. So that's a for information type of uh report and the mayor came up with suggestion that it's probably time for us to update that since we did that back 2020. will be join it's gonna we had a tech we had a software that was a lot easier to pull the data from and then we go confirm it in real time the reason why it's not updated we would typically do that um the cost that software went up sign so we did post our specifically um so we did cut that to save some monies but um we can we'll get out there and update u that said I can I call one thing out too chair yeah absolutely u one thing too I mean it's a good comparison but just looking at the total square footage that retail and office space in general makes up in Wildwood. You're sitting at 642,000 square feet. Uh when you compare that to somewhere like Bowwin and Ellisville, I remember Manchester was uh comparable to they're at 5,149 thou. Well, that's Ballins. Um but they're over they're in the millions like multiple millions of square foot of retail. And there's plethors. I mean, you could actually look at Chesterfield. Um, now that they've t you actually see a major increase in their occupancy since they tore down the the mall mall. So, I mean, it sometimes can the data can be skewed in that sense. Um, but it goes to show and I I point that out because when a when a business goes out of business or leaves in Wildwood, the the percentage of the pie is larger than it would in a traditional city because you don't have as many

businesses around. You also have that square footage is a larger percentage of our whole pie, especially when all of our commercial is concentrated in one single area and not necessarily spread out. got multiple retail plazas kind of uh spread throughout one small area. So, just wanted to point that out as well. Perfect. Thank you. We move on to the next item, local economic area report that was um attached to the agenda. Some of you may have had a chance to take a look at it. Basically, bottom one of the bottom line um ideas that comes out of there or observations is that the population is expected to stay basically flat for the next few years. Excuse me. Also, it emphasizes the fact that this is a um what we call it a city in which a large percentage of the population leaves during the day. I think the population drops to somewhere around 24,000. Most of that's probably kids. Kids, people driving to work. Yeah, it actually has information about the commute time, too. It's just interesting to look at that data because the majority of the commute is about 30 to 35 minutes. So, you know, typically it's going, you know, blon areas are going it's taking a minute to get out, but it's showing, you know, the majority of the population is above that 10 20 minute line. So, shows that they're leaving while that just a little bit of data that's not necessarily showed, but you can infer it. Thank you. Um, let's move along to the update on the sign code review and everybody received a document there. Uh, city administrator Lee, did you have any comments that you wanted to make? Yeah. Um, review. I appreciate that. I just wanted to give a quick update. I know Mr. Vonage is with us tonight, so I do not want to u he's here to provide a little bit of an update as well. Uh, that said, we are currently in the process of the review at planning

and zoning at the planning and zoning commission. Uh there's two components, well two and then plus a bunch of smaller components that I think we're we're looking at here. One is does the city allow electronic message board signs? That's what's prompted this review um along with feedback from the business community. But that's question one I think we have to answer and if so we'll have more of a comprehensive report from our consultant to show how do you regulate it. U and that's if this is something the city wants to do. That said the other component is making some minor alterations. I think the two major ones are looking at our current sign regulations and doing two things. There's some other administrative processes that are included, but um changing our current equation that is used to calculate the a wall sign. Most of the time you get a wall sign um with businesses. They're the usually the easiest and cheapest to make uh but still have an impact. So you see them make those most often. Um, right now you have one square foot per linear foot of uh frontage that you have and then you can have that doubled up to uh 50 square feet with a height total of 24 in if you're on an arterial which the majority of town center is but not all. Uh so the question would be hey instead of that we would change it to a percentage of the facade. So it would help accommodate. We've had some businesses reach out and say, "Hey, you know, my my sign, I have maybe three letters or I have two letters in my my logo." And that has created issues for them because you can't stretch that out far enough to make it look natural and fit the facade correctly. um while also uh making sure that the height isn't the 24 inch height limit really does kind of limit um why don't you go ahead and and give them the real world example on the percentage of the facade NPT that's yeah NTP uh so they they're called network technology partners but they go by NTP that's what their logo is they didn't want to go off

brand uh when they did NTP and they followed the the official code it made They have a pretty large facade right next to Bank of Houston. They're right there. Um that did not fit the facade very well. Let's just say that. And then they did go to u get it to the board of adjustment, but uh it was denied. Um so in that case, I mean that kind of issue can take place. Some other ones it fits in perfectly. I mean Starbucks is obliged by our code and their sign actually looks more tasteful, I would say, in Wildwood than it does elsewhere. So I think there's a a fine balance. Um, but it would move what we currently are doing based off the one square foot of linear foot uh, frontage to more of a percentage based model that most communities surrounding us utilize for calculating this. Um, then also the $500 sign escrow that is deposited when you create when you put up a sign. The city would also be that's what the department's recommending that we take a look at that as well. Uh I know uh council member Farmer here also had some notes that was provided with the uh memo tonight but also wanted to let Mr. Phone agency came down tonight for this specific clause to provide some input. Tom did a very good job of explaining it. I think the only other item I would mention is the temporary banners. Um, we have modified the temporary banners at least three times, if not more. It's still not the right fit for what we're seeing when businesses submit. So, actually, I think we're going to change it kind of radically. At least that's going to be the department's presentation to the planning and zoning commission. And so, from that perspective, I think we can improve that. And then finally, just one last thing on the sign escrow. Over the

years, and we implemented this in 2007, we've collected 82 of them. Um, for the most part, I should have returned all of those 82 because many of them were collected in the span of about five years from its implementation. And so from the department's perspective, it was an idea that came to us from our consultant, Albert Gibbs. But almost as soon as we started to try to implement it and use the $500 to address a sign, a business that had left the city, there was problems with liability going on somebody else's property and taken a sign down off their building. And so it just doesn't work. We're going to recommend it be eliminated. So, u couple questions regarding the sign escrow and quite frankly I I'm in favor of eliminating it. Normally what I do when I chair these committee meetings is I'll keep my ideas somewhat to myself and let the rest of the committee members chime in. But to me a eliminating the $500 sign escrow is a slam dunk. That's an easy one. We eliminate an unnecessary rule. We eliminate something that that code enforcement has to get involved in. And we immediately improve the cash flow of our new businesses. I mean, everybody knows when you start a new business, cash flow is your number one concern for at least the few first few months, if not the first year or so. So, to me, that's a slam dunk. But the funds that have been previously collected, what is their status? Where are they now? They are holding a pardon me, they are holding in a special escrow account. Okay? And so, if the $500 escro fee is eliminated, we'll just return those All right, perfect. So, um, we have about five items here. What I would like to suggest, and city administrator, chime in here if you don't think this is the right procedure, is I would

entertain a motion that we uh eliminate the sign escrow program immediately. Would somebody like to make that motion? Council member Farmer, seconded by Council Member Preston. So Joe's recommending that? Yes. Okay. So we have a motion. We have a second. Any discussion? All those in favor say I. I. I. Opposed. Abstensions. Motion carried. Approved. Thank you. we can move on to um how flat wall sign is calculated to better address larger facads in a more proportional manner. Um Mr. Bonich what formula would we move to or how would we do this? So, as Tom so explained, right now we use just a linear the width of the tenant space, that linear number of feet. It works pretty well for small one-story buildings, but when you get to larger buildings, it just still takes into account the one dimension. What we are proposing is to go to height and width and a proportion of it. And the sweet spot has always seemed to be about 5%. And it'll correspond to what we allow in terms of a largest wall signs and for the most part it's a tried and true method. A lot of municipalities use it along with St. Louis County and I think the signs more proportion to larger facades. Okay. So does everybody understand what Joe's suggesting? Is everybody comfortable with that? In that case, I would entertain a motion that I just I have one quick question. Go ahead. So,

my only thought on that, Joe, is like there's some places like up at Village Plaza where like there's these weird like bends and stuff and you know, as we've talked about there, there there isn't a lot of frontage anywhere. So, like there's just a lot of weird angles. So, I'm wondering if rather than a calculation, which I I mean we have to have a certain level of it. I'm wondering if there's some way to like look at these buildings and then I don't know plug it into AI have somebody look at this and go this is the this is what the sign should like this is the appropriate size for this building because like if you have not I'm not picking on anybody like Pingham Palace I think has like four bays or whatever you want to call like so their their sign just kind of like keeps going but it doesn't actually do anything for them because it's just spread out over all of space. I I'm just my only worry would be I don't want us to get in the same spot that we're in currently just now with another metric to measure it by if I and certainly we we'll look at that for you. U the best example I can give is the new sign that Mattress Dogs has on the front of their store. The current interpretation of the dimension loomed it to about let's say around 30 square feet. And when the rendering was provided of a 30 square foot sign on that twotory facade, it looked minuscule. We did the calculation and if you did 5% it was like 52 or 53 square feet. And so that's what the board of adjustment eventually gave them. And I think it fits pretty well up there. Yeah. you know, is it aesthetically what you like? I don't know. But proportionally, it works well on the facade. So, we'll look into that and certainly we'll do some additional research, but I think we need to realize

buildings are one dimension. So, would you feel more comfortable? No, I'm fine move I'm fine moving forward. I mean, I want to get some stuff going. So, like I'm I'm cool with that. I'm just saying, you know, in the long term, let's just what I don't want to do is lock us into just a different version of what you got going now. And as I say, this has been used for years and years. In fact, prior to 2006, that's what we used out here. And it worked pretty well, I thought. So, Joe, you feel that this provides a little this type of calculation provides more flexibility to address larger facades, etc. Okay. Very much so. All right. So then I guess I would entertain a motion that we move forward with this made by Council Member Farmer, seconded by Council Member Alers. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor say I. Abstensions. Motion carries. Reise process for architectural review by the city's board to better reflect current trends. So Mr. runage. Many of our signs, particularly some like projection signs that been a det on main had have to go to architectural review. Depending on the sequencing, it can be up to two months. Department would like to eliminate that. Signs are signs. Generally speaking, the delay, I think, doesn't benefit the character of the sign because the signs are on a recipe, so to speak. there's a prescribed height, there's a prescribed sign size, and that we address lighting. So, just don't I just don't see it as an intricral part to ensure a sign is appropriate. And I would say the department of planning would be just as sensitive to how appropriate a sign is

for this city as anyone else. I'd like to think so. There are people in in the department of fining that actually have good taste bes and it's not me. So what I can tell you is there's all kinds of pattern books that we can look at to make sure that if we're seeing a sign that looks a little unusual, we can figure it out. All right, Mr. Farmer, I'll make the motion. I just had a quick question. And so if somebody wanted to do like the Benadetto sign the way it's kind of supposed to be that horiz or or that vertical kind of well not just even vertical like I mean we've talked about it before like especially in town center there's ideally they're supposed to be like pool signs not like whatever. I get you. So if somebody comes with something that is different in that way, you guys obviously it's a taste thing, but like is there a there some kind of a trigger that does something else or is it like if if somebody comes with a weird sign and you guys don't like it, it's just that's it. There is always a kind of a failafe process. I'll do a better job of telling you where it is. I know it's in there. So, but yes, if it's not there, I think that's a fair request that if we deny a sign, the appeal would always be to city council. Okay, cool then. Yeah. All right. So, Mr. Farmer makes the motion. Mr. Preston it. Any discussion? Yes. Um, Miss McCutchen. Um, so Joe, how do you how would that work as far as you you enforcing what we do allow versus what we don't? Because when you think about the shopping area of nearby West Glenn Farms with all those uh 3D like signs, I mean, how do we is there a way to prevent that light? Are are we still going to have the same standards, but the department of planning is going to be the one who handles it, brushes the architectural review board. Is that

correct? Could you try to mute yourself and then turn the mute back off? I We're getting some some audio feedback here. I I understood what she said. Is that better? That's much better. Mr. Farmer did hear what you said, though. Do you want me to repeat it, Deb? Or you want to say it again? You can repeat it. That's fine. I was asking Mr. Funage basically, how are we going to enforce um the fact that somebody's following our I mean, it's still going to be a cold versus like the signs at West Glenn Farms. Look what happened there. They're 3D signs and they're lit and you can see them from, you know, a good distance away. So, how would we prevent something like that from happening if um the architectural review board doesn't take a look at it? Or will it just be the department of planning's decision and just bypass the architectural review board? Well, the architectural review board, Miss Pikacha, doesn't see all signs. Generally speaking, they're called out in the code and any sign requiring a variance goes to the architectural review board and that'll probably stay just because. But in the instance of Village Plaza, a couple of those were temporary signs that were never removed. That's an enforcement action that's underway. And a couple of the signs, they took some liberties and we're trying to address those as well. So what I'll always tell people is compliance is a partnership between the city and its authorization and the entity in this case the signed manufacturer and installer following the rules. So from the perspective of the department it only works if everybody agrees that you have to basically do what you say

and how do you accomplish that? Um most of the time it's not an issue. Most sign manufacturers are reputable. They understand that they generally will be back in town and if they do something wrong, it just makes it harder for them the next time around. Um, so again, it's not all their fault. One of the signs for the tavern, um, the copy wasn't very good and the old man that looked at it didn't see it. So, we're going to address it as best we can. But what I will tell you is is that architectural review board had a limited role and what limited role they did have only slowed the process down and the intent is again to expedite signs where we can and get from the perspective of the department signs are contentneutral. So we're really not looking at what they say. Well that's really kind of two different things right because I mean the enforcement side is an important part but that's not this. So again, it's just how many steps in a process are you going to have and if we can minimize it and still achieve the end the end result. I think that's the goal. I agree. Very good. And moving on to uh but you got to vote. That was the discussion. All right. Sorry about that. Uh all right. So all those in favor say I. I. opposed extensions. Motion carries. All right. Very good. All right. So now, next item was clarify again the process for temporary banners and other restrictions on these items. So the way I read this, uh, Director Buunich, you don't necessarily expect us to take action on this item tonight. This is something you're still working on. Well, key amongst anything we do is we have these crazy time frames

that you can have it for 60 days, then you've got to wait 30 days and it just needs to be simplified and that's what we're going to look at doing. The intent would be is to have attractive temporary signs, but at least give some more flexibility in terms of how they stay out. Everybody has sales and I think what we're doing is limiting the temporary signs to a couple of sales a year which may not be reasonable. Okay. So would you expect to have some suggestions then for us at the next meeting? Yes sir. All right. Everybody good with that? Perfect. Okay. Next. Reinforce processes for illegal placement of commercial signage and public rights away. We already alluded to that a little bit but director if you'd like to continue on that. This came more from Mayor Garitano to Tom and I. Just the frustration what happens on Friday night and the number of bandit signs that appear on our ride ofways and then pull them on Monday morning then they're back on Friday night. So, it's going to talk more about just engaging the police department more and having them assist us because we contact the sign the the the business and they're like, "Yeah, I know." And then they just come back because to them it's it's just the cost of doing business. So I think if the police were able to enforce it a little bit better for us when we're not here, I think we'll see a reduction, substantial reduction. So do we need to have some formal process by which the uh in place by which the police are contacted and and how we engage with them? It's already against the law. So in this case, it would just be directing police department to pick up a little bit, but they're just picking up signs, right? Yeah. So we just need to make sure that we enforce the current code as it is. Yes, having the Well, it's typically something code enforcement has done, but this is more so giving direction to the police department that we would like

that to be part of their typical services. Do we have fines that can be a standard standard fine if you can get to the person? I mean, that's the thing that usually a company will pay a sign company or a contractor to then put these signs out and then there's an argument in court that says, "Okay, well, prove to me that I put the sign out there even though it's my number, my address or not address, my company's name." Typically, they're they don't do the dirty work themselves and you don't get pictures of them doing it. So, the question would be if the police go to your place of business though and say, "Hey, I don't want to see these signs out there anymore." Then it's a little bit more persuasive than us giving them a call and saying, "Hey, that's Do we confiscate the signs?" Yes. Yes. What do we do with them? They go to the dumpster for political signage. They can get it back. We hold it. If it's in the right way, we hold it and they can come pick it up at any time at their leisure. What happens with commercial signage? Dumpster. Dumpster. Yep. Oh, I'm sorry, Deb. Go ahead. You've got your hand. Would would this apply to um like garage sale signs or you know we're have a mattress event going on at the high school? Those kinds of things. Miss Patchen, if it's in the right of way, we have to pull them because if we treat one different than another, then we're liable for being called out to court as not being consistent, content neutral. So what I will tell you is for garage sales and lost dogs, we generally turn a blind eye for a bit. Okay. Thank you, Joe. So I'm just wondering if we can do I mean we we've talked about this in a couple other places if we need to do more of like a a data thinking here. So if the police are going to go out or you guys are going to go out and get them, you know, keeping track of who it's usually the same like five places. So, keeping track of who it is, if we got to take them to court and

we need to, you know, prove that they put it out, we can issue discovery for their invoices to any company that is assigning signs. And if they've paid for someone, then they get to be responsible for it. And if they aren't, then it's that sign company that we can approach and do that with. I mean, it's sort of a pain in the ass, I think, to do it that way. But I also think, you know, it is it's the same it's the same mosquito Joe's and, you know, power washing, whatever. Power washing, Christmas lights. Yeah. Hang your Christmas lights. So, I I just think if we company actually, yeah, I'm sure, you know, there's a certain level of this of, you know, I I think it is if you're going to misbehave in such a way, there's nothing wrong with calling that out publicly at a certain point. you know, you ask nice the first time. We've got a whole bunch of these signs. You know, they aren't expensive to make, so it doesn't matter to them. And if but if you get these repeated finds and we have the data that says, hey, look, you know, Bloom Lighting or whoever the it's the one I always see, you know, this this is not going to work for us and here's what happens. That's all I want to do is just emphasize in the regulation that it's just not the individual that places the sign, the owner of the sign or the individual or party involved. It may not hold up in let's say an appeals court, but it certainly doesn't mean that we can't inconvenience them because a lot of the signs are also in the sight distance triangle. So, it's just just detraction. Should we institute a holding fee? Are you sure? Sure, but I could check. I mean, if you got to store something, we're not going to throw it out, right? We're going to store it. We're going to charge them to store their signs for them to come pick them up. Do you have any comment? I I would have to check the city attorney, but I I think we can we dispose of the signs. I know. I know we do currently, but I'm

just saying like if you got to come up here a couple times and get all your muddy signs and pay a fine, Yeah. maybe you're going to be less inclined to do it. That's the goal is to not base it. Again, these aren't business these aren't local businesses. These are businesses that generally find in St. Charles County, the east side, whatever the case may be. But, and I I know it's hard to say it to the economic development committee, but we're trying to inconvenience them so they stop using our rightways and clutter it up with signs. When it comes down to I think what the way eventually you have to do it is you have to take them to big boy court. Great. Let's do it. I mean this is just me. We have rules for a reason. So if we're going to if we're going to have them and enforce them, we should enforce them fully. I don't just when I mean the main thing is the cost associated with it but if there I think that's fair at the end of the day there are repeat offenders and and I mean I don't know how this works maybe you get a report maybe we get a report that says hey this company has done this 200 times the city council authorize the next level of action I think that's what it would work what would happen if we were to do as Mr. farmer suggesting and then have a legal cease and desist order sent to the property. They the sheriff's department would be taking care of it from there. So, it'd be out of our hands. But it would be that that they wouldn't really want to if they got an injunction against placing the signs in the right way. That would I highly doubt that they would keep it. I But then again, they could. I mean, then it would just go up to the next. I mean that's sometimes that's where usually when law enforcement people show up that tends to carry a little bit more weight than a that's where no offense intended and none taken. That's where the department's kind of heading too is that

you know the idea is to kind of intertwine the police department in this a little bit more because we're able to sometimes find where we think these came from the business owner having a police officer return the signs to them. necessarily giving him a ticket too, but having that ticket delivered by a police officer, especially for repeat offenders. I mean, I think that that adds weight to it versus just getting a call. I think it's great. I just think we just want to make sure we're keeping track of how many times and that's happening and who it's happening with. Thank you. All right. Very good. Um, next item on the agenda, electronic message board background. Um, Dr. bridge Monday night um our lighting consultant will be at planning not this coming month I'm sorry the first Monday in June lighting consultant be at the planning and zoning commission going over the steps that we should consider if we want electronic message boards for whether it's institutional uses our town center or whatever the circumstance may be there are ways to accommodate those types of signs and dark environments through those ways and some of the positives and negatives. Um, we intend to have a report to the planning and zoning commission in July and then to city council as soon as July if not or no later than August. For the most part, there are some risk but there are some benefits as well. Mr. Farmer. So, I I sent you guys this thing. I did some research on it, and I think I think talking to people is always a great plan. Um, my my big suggestion in this is to try to keep it

as limited as possible basically to just, you know, those taxable entities that should need to communicate publicly because, as we know, you guys aren't here 24 hours a day. And so any level of evening or nighttime enforcement, like as soon as this thing gets out of the box, it's I don't care what we put on the books, it's not going to make any difference. So basically that boils down to schools groups. Well, uh you have first responders and then you have schools and the city and the city. So you could limit it only to first responders. You wouldn't have to necessarily allow for the schools. Yeah. I I just think I mean I'm not saying we should do one or the other. I'm just saying, you know, those are a couple of options. The big thing I s I mean, and again, this was with this wasn't just this was an AI thing, but the idea would be if you're going to make our rule say that the only places that are available to do this are are other are taxable entities than any kind of argument outside of that. So, not that they necessarily would, but you know, if we say the fire department can, but the schools can't, then Rockwood can come and say, "Well, we're attack. why can they and we can't? Um just like a you know a church or somebody else might be able to do that same thing. So if we said it's a you if you are a taxable entity you can do it. These are the rules that you have to abide by. Um you know that I think I was adding it up. I mean there's like maybe six locations that that qualifies for and that's much easier to right manage. And then even in there, there's some other rules or suggestions I put in there like if it's within 150 ft of a house, then that sign has to turn off at 10 o'clock at night or whatever it is, which is basically all of those other locations, right? So, this allows the public need to be serviced and eliminates the problem from this department's to go, well, it's it's

11:35 and the sign is still lit up and I have my light meter out. I took a picture and all those other kinds of things. But well, can I chime in? Yeah, absolutely. Well, if you're if you're talking about schools, so the Clayton at Clayton and 109, there is one, two, three, four, four schools right there on that corner. And if you light each one of those signs up even till, you know, 10 o'clock, I think 10 o'clock is is way too late. You might as well have one of those big spotlights going through the sky, going through the night sky. So So the only then there's another one right here at Green Pines. So, in ward five, there's at least six or seven signs and and a group of them right there together that would all be lit up. And then what does that do to our night sky? People west of 109 and east of 109 should have the same guidelines for signs. You know, it's we're Wildwood and we all have night sky and we all want to be able to see the night sky, but if we have all these lit up signs, we're not going to be able to. I mean, just because you don't have three acres doesn't mean, you know, they that we can have more signs than they do because of the size of the lots, which I think is really backwards. But, um, you know, I'm I I don't think it should be that generic. I'm sorry. So, appreciate those comments. So, here's a point of clarification I would have at Clayton and 109. There are actually three schools because you have Lafayette, you have Babler, and then you have St. Albvin School. St. And there's a and there's a um a preschool right there also. So it's only Babler and Lafayette. It's only Green Pines, Babler, Lafayette, the fire department, city and the middle schools and the middle schools. Yeah. And and you talk

and well there's there's preschools. There's no they don't count because they're not taxable entities. Only only out only other taxable entities. So only Rockwood School District schools only fire only the fire department or the police which is here. even the city, all the other churches, schools, all that stuff doesn't it doesn't apply because they're not taxable entities or tax collecting entities. So, you're saying that because the schools are taxable entities, they should be allowed to have lighted message boards. No, there's a there's a there is a specific uh I guess it's a rule, I don't know, law that says that entities that have a a immediate need to communicate to the public, so first responders, taxable school districts and municipalities, that's that puts a kind of very neat wrapper around why a church wouldn't apply or or whatever it might be. it is only like a very small handful of spaces and then the conversation would be you know when is the right time to turn something off if it's you know in the middle of summertime 10:00 it's barely dark if it's the middle of winter time it's been on for a long time but at a certain point especially if they're close to homes those signs have to automatically dim below a certain threshold which means they're ostensibly very difficult to see and more than likely it's more expensive for them to have it that way. So they would just have it turn off one change. Schools have other other ways of communicating. I mean they have their own internal communication. Yeah. So I don't know. I think part of Lafayette wanting a lighted sign is because the other high schools who are in different municipalities have lighted signs. And I think that was one of the motivations for Lafayette asking for a

lighted sign. Yeah. I'm pretty sure all other Rockwood schools outside of the ones in Wildwood have lighted signs. 100% of them. But that doesn't mean that Wildwood should have them just because other municipalities have them even though it's the same school district. That's true. But in this case, so our new fire department has a sign. What happens when they turn it on? I'm going to write them a warning notice. But then what happens? Turn it off. And we're talking about going to the other you go through the process multiple times. Then you prove for you usually you need to go through a six-month process and then you can finally take that issue to a higher level court that would potentially put an injunction out on that. They wouldn't they'll build default if they have a need of public communication. So there I mean that that that's true fixes that would is what I would say. I mean I look I don't love I don't love digital science. I don't I don't think they're worth a whole lot. I mean, at all. But, you know, I think that if we don't, this is kind of one of those things I would just suggest if we don't get in front of it, we're going to be real behind it and we have no way to put the genie back in the bottle. Well, I think if we start using them, we have no way of putting the genie back in the bottle. So, Mr. Farmer, is there a motion you would like to make? I am happy to make the motion that uh I mean you tell me Joe you guys tell me this is what I had in here and I'm looking at it and it looks like the same thing but I might be missing something. So this would be digital signage is limited only to public schools, fire districts, police departments and the community college and the city. Right? These are outside taxable entities. Um they have a taxing authority and a public service obligation. So, it's a static message only. No animation or flashing. Minimum

10-second display time per message. Maximum 60% of the sign face may be digital. Dimming required after dusk. Fully shut off by 10 p.m. or in adj uh in or adjacent to in residential areas. Signs must be monument style with architectural base. No polemounted screens permitted. religious institutions, regardless of zoning, are not eligible for digital signage under this framework. So, it just it's out it's outside taxing entities with real specific ways to do this. So, you're making that motion. I'm happy to make that motion. Make it clear for you, Colin, if you want. But you don't you don't include it anything about clusters. you like on 100 and um or 109 and Clayton Road, we have a cluster right there that every one of those could have a lighted sign. Only two of them. Only two of them can. Only Lafayette and Babler. What about St. Albins? It's not an outside taxing entity. It's It's only It's only Rockwood Fire Department. You would know Green Pines's probably Green Pines. But I'm saying they have to be associated with Rockwood School District directly is what Mr. Farmer saying, Mr. Hudson. Yeah, I I understand that. It's just um like Joe said, I've been on council for quite a while and this issue has come up many times. Um, and I realized there there are some people who want lighted signs for the schools, but once they go up, then all the residents around those, especially if there's more than one right in the same area, people are going to complain. So, we have a motion on the floor. If somebody want to second that motion, there's a second by Council Member Alers. Now, we can continue the

discussion. So, Deb. Yeah. No, I didn't mean to cut you off, Deb, but you please continue. No, I didn't follow process. I'm sorry. That's all right. That's all right. Not not an issue. Um I I I think I pretty much said what I said. I mean to have, you know, two or three or how many, you know, that are allowed to have lighted signs in a group, you know, I think that's an invasion of quality of life. I think it's invasion of night, you know, night sky. I think residents are going to complain. Um, you know, the schools have other ways of communicating information than lighted signs. Um, and I, you know, I'd be willing to bet if if the other two high schools weren't permitted to have lighted signs, there would not be a question about Lafayette and their lighted sign. Um, my kids graduated from Lafayette, and this discussion has been going on for quite some time, and my kids aren't young, okay? So, um, I don't know. It's it's from what I hear from residents and I I truly see their point. So, uh I have a question for Director Brunage. Assuming that this um motion, which has been seconded, passes to allow digital signage for these um entities that we've discussed, what type of an increase in workload does that create for your department to enforce the uh codes pertaining to these digital signs? One of the things the lighting consultant is has been asked to do by the department is provide us mechanisms so that enforcement requirements are minimized. He claims that there's all kinds of mechanics now that can be required. So, as those specific things that we talked about, a 10-second duration, a 60% coverage, those can be hooked into the

sign and we can and limit and limit how they can be manipulated. At least that's what he's told us. So, that would be the goal is to minimize the amount we have to be out there because we make sure the sign contains all the components to achieve our goal. several that's one of the critical roles the lighting consultants play is playing many of the things that Mr. farmer just mentioned, we've already talked about with the lighting consultant and he's a strong advocate at at a point in at night they just go off because there's nobody there to see them. So, um and then just to I guess clarify a little bit, it is possible that the planning and zoning commission could come up with some completely different recommendations than this committee may vote out tonight. Then we'll still have a discussion in front of the entire city council on this particular topic. So discussion either way. Yeah. But I will assure you that your motion if approved tonight will be a component of the discussion we have when the report I'll include it in my report. I think there's a I I didn't see anything there that caused that was inconsistent what we've what what we've been talking about. The only thing that we did collectively as the department, we were recommending that it be a conditional use permit process. That way it gets the scrutiny of the neighborhood, the commission, and you. Okay. Very good. Um, further discussion. Jim, you've been quiet for a while. Can you enforce this? I think so. Again, because we're asking the lighting consultant to give us the tools that make it easy to enforce instead of like everything else relative to lighting. It's just hard. How about 10:00 is late to me. I go to bed early now. Well, I'll leave that up to you all. But like I say,

there isn't a shut off. There should be a shut off. I can re Do you want me to reread this thing so everybody knows what it is or? Absolutely. So, um, I move that we adopt a policy allowing limited digital signage only for public institutions with external taxing authority, including public school districts, fire protection districts, police departments, and St. Louis Community College, and the city of Wildwood, subject to the following restrictions. Message must be static with a minimum display time of 10 seconds per message. No flashing or animation. No more than 60% of the total sign face may be digital. The sign must include automatic dimming after dusk and full shut off no later than 10 p.m. when located in or adjacent to residential areas. This is where we can come up with something else. Um, all signs must be monument style and architecturally compatible with adjacent development. Polemounted screens are not permitted. This policy shall not authorize digital signage for any other commercial, nonprofit, or other private use business. staff shall incorporate these provisions into the forthcoming ordinance for council review. All right, thank you. Um, so discussion is still underway. Any final thoughts, Cliff? Anything? Um, this kind of a big deal, so that's why I'm going around the table. I'm sort of thinking going around school by school and I don't see it being 10 o'clock being an issue really with most of these. Okay, Chris, myself, I mean, I thought about it pretty well. I I would agree. I mean, it's I mean, 9 10 o'clock. I mean, at that point, who cares when you're not All right. Yep. Final thoughts before we vote. No, I think I've made myself clear. Okay. All right. Very good. So, motion and it's been seconded. Uh, regarding the digital

signage, all those in favor say I. I. Opposed? Opposed? Abstensions. Hey, motion carries. Thank you. You should get an email. Second. Are there any you have there none you have to get rid of? Is there? Yeah. Okay. So, that takes us to um ready for action master plan update 2026 economic development element. here on as we've been sitting here there is one as we before we jump into the economic development element uh with the pretty large turnover I know that the current economic development committee members didn't get a chance to review this survey I just wanted to is it would be appropriate that we would give them some time since we do have it seems like we have some differing approaches and there feedback that was gained from this discussion earlier tonight uh that we may want to drive I know the drive-through wasn't included in this feedback back and some other components we've discussed. So as a suggestion to post June meeting and extend also extend the survey timeline we've got and send it to the new people and send it to the new individuals. Does that still uh keep us on schedule for completion of the master plan? Yes, sir. So does anybody on the um committee object to that? Do we need to take a formal vote on postponing this? Yeah, if we could take a formal vote to postpone and bring back at the June meeting. I'll make the motion to do so. All right. So, council member Preston makes the motion to postpone this discussion to the June meeting. Council member Farmer seconds. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor say I. I. Extensions. Motion carries. Not ready for action. Nothing.

Perfect. All right. Miscellaneous. Um the only friendly little reminder going out to everyone is uh things come up from time to time as we move forward. If anybody cannot attend a particular economic development committee meeting, uh it would be greatly appreciated if you would let us know ahead of time. What I will try to do is besides the agenda going out from Mr. Lee several days ahead of time, um I will try to send out a reminder email that the meeting is coming up. So ju just to jog your memory. Like I said, things come up. You know, everybody's going to miss a meeting from time to time, but there were several instances last year where several of us showed up for a meeting. We did not have a quorum, so we had to go home. And if we know ahead of time that we're not going to have a quorum, then we can let people like Mr. Boon and Paula uh go home at the end of the day rather than sticking around here for a meeting that's not going to take place. So, assistance there would be appreciated. All right. Next meeting, Monday, June 16th. Oh, Colleen. Um, just a reminder, we're trying to get away from making copies. So, if you need something, let us know. But we're not making copies. I don't get copies anymore. Well, you get copies for the council agenda. But that was this is for this for this meeting because we end up throwing most of it away. And it's just like general copies. She's talking about we had a policy before we we would print out like 15 copies of every single document. Yeah. And then we realized $100 of my pay. You just made me copy. That's okay. You can as a council member, that's part of your No, no, no, no. Not needed. As a council member, you can get your No, no, we can get you make you copy. We're not going to do Mr. CR anything. Jim Cray's rule. Next meeting day, Monday,

June 16th, 5:30 p.m. With that, I'll take a motion to adjourn. Made by Mr. Farmer, seconded by Mr. Preston. Non-debatable. All those in favor say I. I. One last comment. Uh Deb, I think I kept you waiting a couple times longer than I should have. I apologize for that. No problem. It's a little hard to follow somebody when they're