One Lucky Duck
Developer Paul McKee is winning, but is Saint Louis? McKee’s NorthSide Regeneration received $10.5 million in state tax credits at the end of December.
The state now has given more than $40 million in credits to the NorthSide project to redevelop a 2-square-mile area in north Saint Louis. And for all this money, there has not been much progress to show for it. So far, the state has not seen any real benefits from awarding several million dollars for this project.
If I was reimbursed for (almost) everything I bought, I would not be in much of a hurry either. McKee says he will make progress after he receives the $390 million Tax Increment Financing (TIF) package he is waiting on. As our regular readers know, we have been covering this issue for a long time. NorthSide applied for the TIF more than three years ago but it has been held up in court.
There is a chance that the Missouri Supreme Court will rule against the TIF in the next few months.
“If that doesn’t go our way,” McKee said about the potential ruling, “we’re dead.”
That would not be such a bad thing. Taxpayers would be off the hook for hundreds of millions of dollars, which are likely to be of more benefit to McKee than to North Saint Louis.
