The completion of the Crown Square historic rehabilitation project was celebrated on Thursday, July 29 with a ribbon-cutting ceremony and a street festival featuring live music and activities for the community in Old North.
Enterprise Community Loan Fund and the Regional Housing and Community Development Alliance, along with several other private predevelopment lenders, worked with the Old North St. Louis Restoration Group for four years to plan and restore the neighborhood that had been deteriorating for the past few decades, held together by the historical attraction, Crown Candy Kitchen, and the urban pioneer rehabber community.
In a 2008 American article, during the early construction phase of this large rehabilitation project, Regional Housing and Community Development Alliance (RHCDA) President Stephen Acree said they surpassed the set inclusion goals for minority- and women-owned businesses. RHCDA is a non-profit organization that works with community-based development organizations for neighborhood revitalization and was responsible for meeting the set diversity goals.
The goals were 25 percent minority-owned business enterprise (MBE) participation and 5 percent women-owned business enterprise (WBE) participation for the construction of this 27-building project. While law does not mandate these goals, set forth in an Executive Order by a previous mayor of St. Louis, they show that inclusion of diverse businesses is a priority. RHCDA reported that they exceeded these goals with 26.2 percent of business going toward MBE and 9.75 percent to WBE in 2008.
At the completion of the project, the MBE and WBE inclusion numbers were even higher, according to Regional Housing and Community Development Alliance and E.M. Harris Construction Company, the primary contracting agency for this project.
Both report that overall there was 41 percent MBE/WBE participation with 30 percent from MBE and 11 percent form WBE.
“We are very proud of our efforts on this, and even more proud that – although it does not show up in these numbers – if you went out to the job site the work crews were overwhelmingly minority trades people,” Stephen Acree said.
“We think it’s really important to show how these investments provide jobs for people who may be just like the people who live there, and sometimes do live there.”
E.M. Harris has several MBE/WBE partnerships in the St. Louis area and has been recognized by the City of St. Louis and the Senate of the State of Missouri for its diversity initiatives.
The $35 million project has mixed-income housing that includes apartments, townhouses, lofts and workspace with just over half of the housing being low-income housing. The project is in the preliminary stages of leasing for commercial space.
“It solidifies an important goal of neighborhood residents – to maintain the economic diversity of the community in a sustainable way,” Acree said.
Along with private funding, the restoration project received federal, state and city funding. The project received the New Market Tax Credit and the Low Income Housing Tax Credit, both federal funds given for the development of commercial and residential mixed funds and low-income housing. The Community Development Block Grant and Affordable Housing Trust funding was provided by the City of St. Louis.
