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ST. LOUIS — The city’s comptroller and mayor both addressed the Board of Aldermen in person on Friday — something not seen in years — one urging the city to correct mistakes in its beleaguered north side grant program, and the other pushing the board to see the program’s potential.

Comptroller Darlene Green spoke first, calling the matter one of “great urgency to the taxpayers of the city� and citing “the appearance of improprieties� about the grants, awarded by the city’s economic development agency, the St. Louis Development Corp.

“I urge SLDC to get it right while they still have time,� she said. “This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to uplift a long-distressed area of our city.�

Mayor Tishaura O. Jones, in response, painted the problems as temporary and the program as transformative.

The money will get to the businesses as intended, she said, the businesses will grow, and “north St. Louis will look totally different in the next five to seven years.�

“We will see that these bumps along the way,� she continued, “were just bumps along the way.�

She said SLDC has acknowledged mistakes in checking out businesses and is working to correct them.

“We have every intention of making sure these dollars are spent with integrity,� she said.

The appearance by two of the city’s top elected officials at the board meeting marked the latest show of concern, on one hand, and defense, on the other, of the high-profile, $37 million grant program.

Businesses at first complained that the SLDC, tasked with administering the program, was taking too long. Then some who didn’t win or received less than expected complained about the scoring process and questioned how the agency decided to divvy up the money. And media reports this month have raised questions about some grant winners — with ties to an alderman or addresses in empty buildings.

The program, paid for with federal pandemic relief money, is supposed to be a big win for the city. Jones and other officials have talked about the cash as a way to restore vibrancy to forgotten corridors and offer opportunities to people left out for decades.

But SLDC chief Neal Richardson and a top lieutenant acknowledged concerns about the process at an aldermanic committee meeting Tuesday. They suggested SLDC may have put too much faith in a third-party contractor, Grow America, to review an initial batch of applications for the grants.

“We felt pretty confident in those,� said Lorna Alexander, SLDC’s program compliance chief. “Now with all the investigative reporting, we should have spent a little more time looking at them.�

Officials said another firm, Morgan Graves Consultants, is reviewing applications now, and SLDC staff is double-checking the work.

Green and Jones have generally been allied on most issues since the mayor first took office more than three years ago, but the comptroller in recent weeks has been criticizing the handling of the grant program.

Green recently got some competition in her bid for re-election next year when state Rep. Donna Baringer, a former city alderman, announced she was running.

St. Louis mayors and comptrollers over the years have rarely attended or spoken at Board of Aldermen meetings. It’s even more unusual for the holders of both offices to do so at the same meeting.

The Green-Jones faceoff was late-breaking. Aldermanic Clerk Terry Kennedy said Green contacted the board about 8:30 a.m. Friday asking to speak; that was only about 90 minutes before the scheduled start.

Jones told reporters that when she found out about 9 a.m. that Green was going to address aldermen on the issue, she decided to do so as well.

“If anything was raised that required a response, I wanted to do it myself,� Jones said.

Green and Jones read separate statements and didn’t engage in a give-and-take.

But one of Jones’ opponents in next year’s mayoral election, Alderman Cara Spencer of the Marine Villa neighborhood, did pepper the mayor with questions about the grant program during the board meeting.

Spencer said she agreed with Jones that the city needs to invest in north St. Louis to “rectify the massive amount of disinvestment� that’s happened over the years. But she added that “we have to be rebuilding with trust.�

Spencer, an SLDC board member, also pressed Jones on who is responsible for vetting the businesses getting grants. The mayor said it’s up to the SLDC staff.

Jones, at Friday’s board meeting, said federal guidelines give SLDC until the end of 2026 to spend the grant money.

Austin Huguelet of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.