Thousands of boarded-up, broken-down buildings dot the St. Louis landscape. The city lacks enough money to tackle such a massive problem decades in the making. The region’s philanthropic community, despite its stake in seeing St. Louis recover and succeed, has historically stayed away from the blight issue.
The same individuals and corporations that have been willing to invest in ambitious urban projects — $250 million toward the Gateway Arch ground renovations and the $130 million for Forest Park Forever — still aren’t convinced that their dollars would be well spent in anti-blight programs.
It’s not for lack of interest or desire. It’s for lack of a viable plan.
Corporate donors say they are reluctant to attach their brand to efforts that, until now, have largely consisted of tearing down dilapidated buildings without clear plans to make something useful of cleared properties. Land clearance, without a program for construction and renewal, doesn’t tend to inspire philanthropy. Unless the return on investment is demonstrable, major philanthropic dollars will continue going elsewhere.
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This is a critical moment for city officials to articulate their progress not just in tearing down vacant structures but also proposing new partnerships that outline a vision of the possibilities. The city needs to sell philanthropists on plans for a renewed, rebuilt, livable St. Louis. Rest assured, the planners behind the Gateway Arch and Forest Park Forever projects didn’t simply say, hey, trust us, we’ll do something good with your money.
Mayor Lyda Krewson says she’s working on it. Her office has created new partnerships with nonprofits to better analyze vacancy data and streamline communication between the disparate agencies dealing with blight issues. Construction company executives have stepped up to donate time, services and materials for demolitions and cleanup. The Post-Dispatch’s yearlong Tipping Point series has underscored the consequences when blight is allowed for decades to eat away at the urban core. Crime, vandalism and declining property values can only worsen unless the problem is addressed in a meaningful way.
Demolition of the city’s 4,000 condemned, vacant buildings would cost about $40 million. The city, along with substantial contributions from the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District, can cover less than half of that cost over the next five years. A $22 million philanthropic investment — not a large sum compared with other donor campaigns — could tackle the remainder.
That said, the prospect of creating thousands of empty lots doesn’t exactly inspire. The hard part is articulating plans to do something grander with cleared property or, better still, finding ways to preserve historic facades and restore the grandeur of old St. Louis neighborhoods.
Certainly, if the dollars are there to sustain parks and private schools or to build a soccer stadium, someone can find the inspiration for philanthropists to help save one of the world’s great cities.
