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I have heard many sides of the TIF issue many times before and while I believe that TIF’s can be used effectively examples like this are troubling. This is one neighboring community “stealing” income from another community, albeit they are sharing the revenue currently. This is the main issue with TIF financing in my eyes.
That issue is developers finding the sweetest deal from any willing community and having stores migrate there while leaving empty buildings behind and possibly a community with a significant loss in revenue. This cannot be blamed entirely on the developer as the retailers themselves are often as guilty hopping from community to community following the money and wealthiest population.
St. Ann will lose the revenue from the current facility while Walmart moves a few miles down the road for greener pastures and more space. In this situation the issue is not space though as I would have to believe there are plenty of suitable locations for development in St. Ann. Greener pastures is what I think this is about. More traffic a few miles down the road between two interstates and a developer ready to help with the financing.
The communities in the metro area need to talk to one another and treat each other with respect. That is hardly what seems to be happening in this case.
“But Bridgeton Mayor Conrad Bowers said the entire area would benefit from the new store and he wanted no fight with St. Ann. He said he had invited St. Ann's mayor to the TIF commission meeting.”
I would have to think St. Ann is not going to share the same viewpoint here. I would have to doubt that St. Ann feels much of a benefit from all of the other stores in Bridgeton; obviously Northwest Plaza is not feeling the benefit, so how does losing its second most valuable revenue stream benefit them in any way? That would be my question for Bowers if I were mayor of St. Ann attending the meeting tonight.
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St. Ann's loss of Walmart was not just the fault of Walmart itself. It originally wanted to tear down the houses behind it but when St. Ann said no, they wanted to move in where the closed mall, Northwest Plaza stands. Walmart wanted to tear down that empty, sad place and build a new Walmart. The St. Ann townsfolk refused and fought back going with the delusion that NWP could be saved or salvaged in some way. They all said, including the mayor, that they don't want to turn such a great place into another Walmart.
So Wally actually did something that no one has ever seen before, Wally left where they knew they weren't wanted and to a city that accepted them with open arms.
St. Ann's last major economic contributor has left. You can't just blame Wally for it either.
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