NorthSide property list spreadsheet available, at least 20 churches affected

By Audrey Spalding
Show-Me Institute

More than 4,600 properties are included in a proposed $8.1 billion development of Saint Louis’ north side. On Sept. 9, the city of Saint Louis made available to the public development plan and application for $398 million in tax increment financing (TIF) filed by the development company, NorthSide Regeneration, LLC. Within the application was an 80-page list of properties the company had either already acquired or was eying as part of its project.

Unfortunately, the city did not make the list available in spreadsheet form, which meant that it would take residents, such as Ann Dorn, some time to find out whether their property was on the list. A spokesperson for NorthSide Regeneration said that the company would not release the database, although it had been requested a number of times by the media.

Policy Pulse commissioned data entry by eight individuals to turn data from the supplied photostatic PDFs of the 80-page property list into searchable and sortable data. Today, that data entry was finally completed and a spreadsheet of their work is available for download here.

According to a preliminary analysis of the data, at least 20 different churches have property on the development company’s list: Rhema Baptist Assembly, True Light, Bethesda Mennonite, Star Bethlehem, Bethesda Mennonite, Zion Lutheran, Greater Mount Vernon, Faith Temple Church of God, True Grace Baptist, Greater Shiloh, Mount Tabor, Thessalonian, Faith Hope Charity Church, Church of the Living God, Revival Center Church, Bible Way Church of Christ, Evergreen Full Gospel Church, New Life of Praise, New Union Vine, Zion Temple, Samaritan Methodist, St. James, and St. Louis Park Baptist Church.

Properties are classified by 11 different “blighting factors,” which can refer to severe conditions, such as vacancy or unsafe conditions, or to less straightforward designations, such as the small size of a property or whether its assessed value hasn’t increased at the same rate as the city average from 2003 to 2008.

Of the properties, more than 80 are classified as blighted simply for having assessments that haven’t increased at the city’s average rate. None of those properties are classified as vacant, unsafe, or unsanitary, or as being in poor or dilapidated condition. Another 153 are classified as blighted for having no increase or decline in assessed valuation from 2003 to 2005. As explained before, this can be the case if a home was built during a tax abatement.

For a more complete analysis of this property data, stay tuned.

This entry was posted on Monday, September 21st, 2009 at 5:20 pm. Both comments and pings are currently closed.