The St Louis Contrarian

Providing Independent and Intelligent Insight on St. Louis Public Policy Issues

Housing Subsidies in St. Louis

Development subsidies have been a controversial topic in St. Louis. Progressives and conservatives alike tend to think development is over subsidized. My experience is that due to market constraints, not much of anything would be build in St. Louis without subsidies. Mayor Tamra Jones has extricated a commitment from a developer of market rate housing in Grand Center to also build some workforce units on the north side. This is all fine, but what activists don’t realize is that you don’t create a market by building housing. People will not live in certain neighborhoods due to crime. That is a fact. Written by Paul Dribin

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St. Louis Could Benefit from Housing Boom and Exodus from High Priced City

www.stltoday.com/business/columns/david-nicklaus/nicklaus-expect-housing-prices-to-keep-rising-post-pandemic-gains-are-no-bubble-expert-says/article_0dbccdc6-b39d-5273-ba6b-3ec645f388db.html

Interested column by David Nicklaus in Post Dispatch. St. Louis as usual is not doing enough to attract high paid workers who are fleeing places like San Francisco. St. Louis has a lot to offer but needs to get crime under control.

Biden and affordable housing

www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/06/27/housing-eviction-rent-biden-white-house/

Good srticke in washington post

City actually Razing Some Houses

www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/push-begins-anew-to-raze-condemned-structures-in-north-st-louis/article_67ad84fa-8d28-5d85-9f44-0f173e7300c2.html

Not enough but a good start

Increase the Supply if Housing

www.city-journal.org/maxine-waters-down-payment-proposal-wont-solve-housing-crisis

A good article from City Journal

Vacancies and Crime

There is a major overlooked cause of crime in St. Louis, vacant foreclosed properties.

Much research shows that vacant properties not only cause deterioration of a neighborhood, but cause an increase in crime. These properties become attractions for criminals and vandals.

St. Louis has thousands of vacant foreclosed properties owned by a city agency, the LRA. These properties were usually foreclosed upon for non payment of taxes. This foreclosure process may take years, all the while keeping abandoned buildings on line. In addition, and equally important, it takes the city years to dispose of these properties, many of which should be razed. They lack the data systems to oversee this inventory and even know what they have in stock.

I worked for HUD selling foreclosed properties in Milwaukee. From that experience I learned certain lessons. Holding a property on the market in the hope of getting a better price is foolish, properties must be priced to sell quickly, investors must be activated to purchase properties,the private sector can be good partners, Urban Homesteading is a great tool to sell properties and bring homebuyers into the city, bulk sales are necessary, and good data and information is critical. Demolition must also be part of the mix. The City of St. Louis has done very little of these things. Written by Paul Dribin

Do We Need A Great Downtown

Much ado has been made of the crime and mayhem in downtown St. Louis. Billions of dollars have been invested in various projects in the area with little to show for it. I rarely go downtown except to a Cardinals or Blues game and am not alone.

A common bromide is that we need a great downtown to have a great city. That may have been true in the days when most office workers worked downtown, and shopping at department stores was common and indeed a treat.

Today most people do not work downtown and often work at home. The cultural institutions in St. Louis are not located downtown, so why try to develop it. More resources need to be put into neighborhoods with growth incurring more organically. Written by Paul Dribin

Why St. Louis is a Mess

Just some random examples of the mess we are in.

1. New mayor Tashaura Jones is elected, crime is at an all time high, and she wants to cut police budget.

2. The same mayor is trying to end support to the Foundary Project which is one of the few new projects in St. Louis and had already received city support. This decision makes no sense and puts ideology over practicality.

3. Metro Link, our light rail system is a haven of crime. Bi state which runs Metro Link won’t let cops carry guns while patrolling the trains. Furthermore, the three police departments who do this patrolling cannot communicate with each other over their respective radios.

4. There are concrete barriers blocking lanes on many of the streets in the downtown. Why? Because bad guys had been racing cars.

5. The covid vaccination program at the Dome was a big bust because we can’t get people from the black community to come down and get shots.

Written by Paul Dribin

Horrible Game Being Played with Medicaid in Missouri

www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/it-s-just-shocking-how-missouri-republican-politics-drove-twin-crises-in-medicaid/article_249f4a52-2a15-5f42-bf2f-52f0948047e4.html

Read this article. Republicans in legislature are tying up even routine funding of Medicaid over narrow interests concerning contraception and abortion. Missouri is just really fucked up. Sorry to use such crude language but that is the only description that is appropriate. Written by Paul Dribin

Illinois targets money to landlords to help tenants

www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/illinois-preps-to-give-away-1-5-billion-in-federal-rent-aid/article_c9dbc2fe-9d27-563a-a90c-863a35dadda6.html

A good idea. Much better than pure eviction moratorium which hurts landlords.

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